Saturday, October 4, 2008
How to learn English ? ?
This morning I watched a TV program. It talked about learning English. It shows that many students of university in Taiwan don't have courage to speak English, or they can't speak it very well. There are two reasons. One is that the vacabulary is not enough. Another is that they don't understand what the foreigners say. This information makes me recall that if we ask the foreigners how to learn English, they usually say listening to the radio such as ICRT or English songs, reading Englsh books and above all practicing. One day my friends whose English is not good tell me now they want to learn English, and what they should do? I tell them these methods and want them follow these, but they say "we don't understand what the lyrics or words mean at all, so it causes they feel frustrated instead of helping them learn English easily. From now on, I think if you want to learn languages, the best way is to move to the native country. Is it a good way for everybody? I'm not sure....
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You're right about television and radion, and so on. If they are too difficult you can't learn much because you don't know what they say. On the otherhand, if you listen to something and you know everything it is good practice but you aren't learning anything new because you already knew everything you heard.
The trick is that you have use things that are just a little bit more difficult than you are used to. In linguistics this is called "level +1" or "L+1" which just means a little more than the level you have now.
In my experience, many students in Taiwan make three mistakes when they study on their own:
1. They don't use English at all
2. They only use simple English that they already know, so they don't learn anything.
3. They think their English ability is lower than it really is, but they lack the confidence to try new things.
When teachers tell you to put more English in your environment they are right, but it's up to you to find the right level of English since that changes for every student. Don't be afraid to chellenge yourself!
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