Doing things in a language is the best way to learn it!

Posted on May 9, 2012 by admin

I often hear ‘the best way to learn English is to go to England or Australia for 6 months.’ This is not always true. I had one student in Sydney (from Peru), in the first month he didn’t learn a lot of English. Why? He lived in a part of Sydney where everyone is Chinese, and he almost never heard English on the street, just Chinese. I had another student in Sydney from the Czech Republic, she said she found it very easy to learn…..Portuguese in Sydney. Why? Because she spent a lot of the time working, and all the other people at this work (a restaurant) where Brazilian. I know one Russian man who lived in Sydney for 5 years and still couldn’t speak English much. I met an American who lived in Moscow for 2 years and only knew ‘pivo’ and ‘schet pozhaluysta’. The Russian in Sydney lived and worked with Russians, and the American in Moscow lived and worked with Americans.

But for most people, it is true that spending 6 months in England helps for one simple reason. They spend more minutes ‘doing things’ in English. More minutes reading in English, more minutes listening in English, more minutes speaking in English, and, sometimes, more minutes writing in English.

It doesn’t matter where you are, the more minutes you spend doing something in English (or in Portuguese like the girl from the Czech Republic) the better you will get.

So, the question is…..”How can I spend more time doing things in English (Portuguese, Arabic…)? In my opinion, the main ‘rules’ are as follows….

1 – the more you enjoy something, the more likely you will do it
People often say ‘have motivation’ and ‘discipline’ and ‘lazy’, but from experience it seems that people do things regularly over a period of time because they like it, want to do it, or perhaps feel some benefit from it. Some examples
Anya – goes running 6 kilometres every morning. She loves it, so she does it.
Andrey – got good at speaking English by watching American TV series (that he loved) and speaking every day with the walls in his flat. He tried to speak like the different people from the series. For a colleague, Sergey, this is stupid, so Sergei doesn’t do it.
Mr Yi from the Shang Dong Province in China – has learnt 100,000 words in English because he likes finding new words in English more than anything else. (http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/7-11-11/61833.html)

Anya doesn’t speak with walls like Andrey, but it’s not because she doesn’t have ‘motivation’ /  ‘discipline’ or is ‘lazy’, she just doesn’t want to or feel that it would benefit her.
Mr Yi probably doesn’t run 6 kilometres every morning. Is he lazy?

How can you enjoy doing more minutes in English?

Have a variety of things to read / listen to, and different people to write / talk to.

Do start to do something, don’t say you will do it for a long time.

Do continue to do something if you feel positive, stop if you feel negative

(you can read more about ‘motivation) here – http://aitonenglish.com/?p=910)

2- the easier / more convenient something is, the more likely you will do it

You can do something that is difficult, but not regularly for a long period. Anya enjoys running 6 kilometres each morning. But if she changed it to 20 kilometres, she would probably not enjoy it. Often students pick up a big book of Charles Dickens in English and try to read it every day. This is like trying to run a long way (whether for you ‘a long way’ is 6 kilometres or 1 kilometre). Perhaps you will do it (if you really enjoy it), but most people don’t enjoy it so they stop. For this reason, it is generally a better idea to do easier things. You are more likely to enjoy it, and keep doing it. If something is difficult, do it for a short time, with dictionary support.

For example, a podcast with key vocabulary, or one newspaper article on ‘words in the news’ on BBC. To do things for a longer period of time, find ‘adapted’ texts, such as adapted books, or websites like www.lingq.com where they have different levels of texts / listenings.  Another idea is to do read texts which are in your language and in English (bilingual texts).
It also helps to be ‘real’ about your level and ‘relax’. If you have a lower level, then if you start reading a newspaper article, don’t think ‘I don’t understand 95% :( ‘, think ‘I can understand 5% :) ’, a little bit of the idea. If you are positive and relaxed, if you take it easy :) you will do it more often, that 5% will increase  to 10%, then 30% then 90%. If you are negative “AAAAAAAAHHHHHH :( ((((” you make things more difficult, which means you are more likely to stop!
If something is convenient, you are also more likely to do it. For example, in Sydney, my gym was 5 minutes walk from my house. I went a lot more often than in St Petersburg, where my gym was 30 minutes from my house. With language, let’s say you want to iron your clothes. If you have listenings on your phone (podcasts, audiobooks, news stories, music), you can pick up your phone, look through the playlist menu, put on the listening, and start ironing = 10 seconds before ironing. If you have listenings on CDs, you have to look through the CDs, turn on your computer, wait for it to start, put in the CD, wait for it to load, choose the listening = 1 – 2 minutes before ironing. And what’s more, when you finish ironing, and walk out the door to go to the station, you can do  moer listening on your phone, but not with your CD.

One last question, I ate home-made Russian dumplings (pelemeni) in Sydney more than in Russia. Why? ….. It’s too difficult to make myself (too much time) in Sydney or Russia, but in Sydney, I knew a woman who made them and just bought them from her. In Russia, I don’t know anybody :(

3 – the more you look at how words are used, the better you will use them
It’s very typical for some students to say ‘it depends of’. When they read, they see the correct ‘word combination’ / collocation ‘it depends on..’. They have seen it and heard it 1,000 times, perhaps even more. But they make a mistake when they speak. Why? Because they do not see ‘It depends on’ they only see ‘depends’. They don’t think ‘how do I use ‘depend”, they think ‘how do I say ‘depend’ in my language. зависит. So, when they start to speak in English, they think in Russian  зависит, по-английски ‘depend’ and then use ‘Russian – English’ ‘depend of’. If the learner looks at ‘depend’ and thinks ‘how do I use it’, they will see ‘it depends on’, and make a note of it. This learner is more likely to then use ‘depend’ correctly. One little ‘test’…. look at the following sentence.
“Barcelona is a nice place to stay in, but, as always, a lot depends on the hotel’

A lot of students say ‘it depends on hotel’ :)

4 – practice makes perfect (repetition is the mother of learning)
- a) the more you speak, the better your speaking will get
- b) the more you write, the better your writing will get
- c) the more you read, the better your reading will get
- d) the more you listen, the better your listening will get

So, think about what you want to do in English. This will
a – help you enjoy it
b – help you prioritise

For example, if you want to write business letters, you should spend more minutes reading business letters and writing business letters. If you want to have conversations in English, you should listen to and have conversations in English. If you want to do an academic reading exam, you should do academic readings.

But remember!!!!! The more you enjoy something, the more likely you are to do it, and reading, listening, speaking and writing all support each other, so reading a detective novel can be useful even if you’re preparing for an academic listening test. For example, you’ve spent minutes doing a part of a practice academic listening tests, and read some academic texts to pick up academic vocabulary and now you want to relax. You can watch something in Russian for some minutes, or, if you enjoy detective stories, you can spend these minutes reading one in English. This will increase the minutes you spend reading.

One last thing to point out, in my opinion listening is particularly useful for improving speaking. When I started with Chinese, I just read, and could not say anything. But when I did more listening I found I could start speaking. I think this is because listening and speaking are ‘sounds’ and not written words! I talked about Andrey before, who talked with walls. This speaking was supported with lots of listening (when watching TV series). Another example of listening a lot helping speaking is a student, Sergey. I taught him in a company, he had an intermediate / upper-intermediate level when he left. I saw him again a few years later and he had strong advanced English. I asked him if he had spent a lot of time speaking English at work or if he’d been having lots of lessons. He said that he only occasionally got to speak English on business trips, and that he had improved because he had watched over a 1,000 hours of TV series. How did he have the discipline and motivation to watch so many hours of TV in English? Because he enjoyed the programs!!
Do be careful to listen to English that you want to speak. Before I came to St Petersburg, I watched a lot of minutes of a series about Russian bandits. After a little while, I noticed I started talking like them!!!

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How to be polite when writing

Posted on April 9, 2012 by admin

Before I start, I should say that the following rules are general ones. How polite you should be depends on the situation. My Spanish teacher once told a story about how she only learnt polite English. When she came to Australia, a drunk man at the bar wouldn’t leave her alone. She tried to ask him to leave a few times, but because she was so polite, he thought she liked him. After that, she found out how to say ‘Vete a la mierda’ in English for such a situation. For other situations she used politer English.

There’s also a famous Soviet short satire story about how someone from the Communist Party decided that factory managers should not use swear words (very bad words) to motivate the workers. Production in the factory almost stopped!

Another danger is you may sound either sarcastic or silly if you are too formal. But in any case, it is a good rule to be ‘safe’ with politeness, especially when talking with people from a different culture.

There are some general rules on how to be polite when writing. They are

- do not be too direct

- give the other person control

- do not be too negative

- do not be too personal (especially if something negative is being said)

- use ‘please’, ‘possibly’ and ‘could’ rather than ‘can’ when asking , use ‘unfortunately’ and ‘I’m afraid’ when giving ‘bad news’.

Do not be too direct

Obviously, if you’re writing about black and white facts, then you can be ‘direct’, for example – The unit cost 500,000 dollars.

But, if you’re ‘interacting’ with the other person, asking the them to do something, or saying what you want to do, then it is best to be less direct. Below are some examples

Direct Indirect
Send me the document please. Would it be possible for you to send me the document please?

Could you possibly send me the document again, please?

I would be grateful if you could send the document again, please.

I would appreciate it if you could send the document again, please.
We want to change the time. We would like to change the time.
Let’s begin tomorrow. Perhaps we could begin tomorrow?
This is very important for us. This is quite important.

Two of the above examples use ‘II’ conditional (would forms). Often textbook say we use this to imagine about the present / future, but we can also use it to be a less direct version of I conditional. Note that it still refers to the future. It IS a real situation. We just use the II form (go – went) to be less direct. This is typical in Russian ‘не могли бы Вы..’ and other European languages. Here are some examples

Direct (I conditional) Indirect (II conditional)
It will be good if you can give us until next week. It would be good if you could give us until next week.
We will be able to start soon if you send the documents soon. We would be able to start soon if you sent the documents soon.
If you pay extra money, we will provide the service until next May. If you paid extra money, we would provide the service until next May.

Give the other person control

You can do this by making it clear that you will do something / continue only with their agreement. There lots of ways you can say ‘if it is OK with you’, here are some….

e.g.

We will start tomorrow – We will start tomorrow if that is alright by you.

We want to postpone the meeting – We would like to postpone the meeting as long as that is OK with you.

I changed the date of operations. – I changed the date of the operations, I hope it is not a problem.

Don’t be too negative

Any time you use a negative adjective, you can usually put something in front of it to make it less negative sounding

Your plan is not good. – Your plan is not very good.

Your idea is difficult to understand. – Your idea is a little difficult to understand.

Your explanation is unclear. – Your explanation is somewhat unclear.

Obviously, you can change the previous two examples, saying  ‘somewhat difficult’ and ‘a little unclear’.

Another, more ‘postive’ option, is to change the negative into a positive opposite superlative with ‘not’ (not the …..est / not the most ……)

Your plan is bad. = not good  =  Your plan is not the best.

You are a stupid person. = not intelligent = You are not the most intelligent person.

Your idea is unclear. = not clear = Your idea is not the clearest.

This computer is slow. = fast = This is not the fastest computer.

The last thing to mention is the use of contrasting clauses (parts of sentences) for ‘constructive criticism’. This is more or less just when you say something positive before saying something negative – ‘you did a good job, but it’s not good enough’. Once again, it is useful to use ‘positive’ language here – ‘You did a good job, but it could be better’

As you read the examples, please note…

- ‘could + verb’ for present ‘positive alternative’ and ‘could have + III’ for past positive alternative.

- no ‘you’ / use of II conditional and passive in the second sentences connected with ‘criticism’ = politer

Critical Constructively critical
Your product didn’t work well. Thank you for your punctual delivery, but the product could have worked better.
Your product doesn’t work well. We appreciate the fact that you sent us your product. However, it could work better.
Your workers always come late. We are satisfied with the quality of work,  but the workers could come more punctually.
You don’t give us enough information While / Although we are grateful for your help, we would appreciate it if we could be given more information.

Don’t be too personal

As mentioned in the previous part, it is politer not to use ‘you / your’  when saying something negative.

For this, the passive is often quite useful

Personal / negative Non -  personal negative
You made a mistake A mistake was made
You are doing the work badly. The work is being done badly.
You shouldn’t work so slowly. You’re doing a good job, but the work needs to be done more quickly.

Please note, this is also good when you say something negative about yourself :)

I made a mistake = A mistake has been made.

So, the rules

- do not be too direct - give the other person control- do not be too negative- do not be too personal if something negative is being said- use ‘please’, ‘possibly’ and ‘could’ rather than can when asking

and an example

You made a lot of mistakes. Don ‘t make so many next time…… = ……..

We appreciate the effort you made to help. Unfortunately, a lot of mistakes have been made. If it would be possible, it would be good if the work was more accurate next time
For more polite structures (both for speaking and writing), you can click on this link http://aitonenglish.com/?s=polite+english , and then on anything that says ‘polite English’

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Use ‘BBC – Words in the News’ to get better at understanding news stories

Posted on March 30, 2012 by admin

Why is it difficult to understand the news?

‘News’ English is a specific type of English, with specific expressions and structures which are often used. Students often find it difficult to understand because of this fact and the fact that there is a lot of information in a short amount of time.

How can I get better at understanding?

If you are interested in watching and understanding the news, there is a useful place to try and do a ‘daily’ news article on the BBC in the section called ‘Words in the News’. (http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/language/wordsinthenews/)

It’s useful because it’s ‘real’ news that you can listen to, but also read the text, and there is key vocabulary for the article. There are lots and lots of stories, so you can quite easily do one a day for the next year. Soon you’ll find understanding the news will get easier (though not necessarily ‘easy’ :) ). There are two types of listening, video articles, and audio articles. The video articles you can just watch, you can listen to the audio article in any way you like, but I recommend the following steps

1 – Find an article that looks interesting.

2 – Read the short summary (but not the main text), guess any words you don’t know.

3 – Think about what you think about the topic.

4 – Listen once or twice to the audio to try and pick up some details.

5 – Look at the key vocabulary under the text (but don’t read the text yet!).

6 – Listen again, seeing if you can hear the key vocabulary and form a better idea of the idea of the text.

7 – Listen and read the text.

8 – Copy and paste the key vocabulary into anki.

9 – Download the audio, put it on a ‘news’ playlist and listen to these news stories at a later time for audio revision of vocabulary.

Here is a news story about Australia

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/language/wordsinthenews/2012/03/120319_witn_australia_immigration.shtml

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Tip – listening to a text / podcast without exercises

Posted on March 26, 2012 by admin

It’s good to have exercises or questions when you listen to a text. It gives you a reason to listen, and a challenge. Often with podcasts there are no questions or exercises. This is not a problem, as it is easy to make you own exercises and questions. This is even better as

1 – you will develop a habit to improve your listening and reading ability

2 – you will develop a habit to improve your ability to learn language while you listen (or read)

The questions are that you can ask yourself before listening to the podcast are….

1 – What is the general topic? (look at the title)

2 – What is the main idea of the text? (read or listen to the first sentence, do the same with the last sentence if you like)

3 – What do you think about this topic? (why, where, when, who, which, ….)

4 - What word combinations do you think may be in the text?

After that, listen to the text (twice or more times), so that you can check to see if your guesses are what happens in the text. Then the last two things are

5 – What do you think about the ideas, reasons and examples presented in the text?

6 – Can you see any interesting collocations (word combinations) or prepositions or grammar strucutres?

EVERY ‘communicative’ textbook follows this process when doing a reading or listening. Look at your and you will see that before the listening there are some questions about the topic, then some questions to see if you think the same, then after the listening, often there is an activity to focus your attention on vocabulary and grammar.

An example -

This is taken from www.lingq.com  , a website with a lot of podcasts

The title of the text = “The English are Fat and want to Live in France.”

1 – What is the general topic? = the weight the English are, and the place they want to live

First line = This week our government published a report on how healthy we English are.

2 – What’s the main idea of the text? = A report on the health on English. There will be information and statistics about the health of the English.

3 – What do I think about this? I would say that the English are probably quite unhealthy as they are a Western country, so there are probably lots of problems with dieting, exercise, and some with alcohol and smoking.The probably want to live in France because it’s more beautiful and less crowded than England.

4 – What word combinations do you think may be in the text? Combinations connected with

diet – healthy / unhealthy food, sugary food, fatty food, excessive consumption, drink too much alcohol, inactive lifestyle etc……

So, listen to the text (twice or more if necessary) to see if what you guessed about ideas and vocab is the same as in the listening The English are Fat and want to live in France

Now read the text and check

This week our government published a report on how healthy we English are. There was some good news. The number of people who smoke has continued to fall. We live longer than any previous generation. Deaths of young children (infant mortality) are the lowest ever. The number of teenage girls who get pregnant has fallen, though it is still high compared to many other European countries.
But there was bad news too. We English are fat and are getting fatter. About two-thirds of men are overweight, and about 60% of women. We are fatter than any other nation in Europe.
Why? Many English people eat food with lots of fat and sugar. We love chips, burgers and doughnuts, potato crisps and chocolate. We drink too much alcohol. We don’t eat enough fresh fruit and vegetables. We watch football on TV, but we don’t take any exercise ourselves. But in the last year we have become more aware that our national diet is not good and that things need to change. Jamie Oliver is a well-known chef with his own TV programme. Last year he showed us how bad the food is that we serve to our children in schools. Many people were shocked and angry. So the government has banned vending machines selling crisps and sweets from schools. Many schools have tried to make their school dinners healthier. Of course, some people don’t like the government telling them what to eat. There have been stories in the papers about parents handing their children bags of chips through the school gates at lunch time
And how does France come into this? Well, a survey was also published this week which suggested that about a third of British people would like live in France, while only about a quarter think that Britain is the best place to live. You have to take this survey with a pinch of salt, because it was published by an organisation which promotes French wines. But France is undoubtedly very popular with many English people.
Why do we like France so much? Perhaps it is the food, or the wine, or springtime in Paris. And perhaps we like French footballers like Thierry Henry, and French film stars. And this is strange, because the French themselves often have a pessimistic view of their country and its problems. But we English don’t care about that. We are fat, perhaps the fattest people in Europe. And we want to move to France to eat more food, drink more wine, sit in the sunshine and get even fatter.

As for 5, I have started by showing some combinations in the text I ‘like’, and concerning 6…….. What do YOU think?

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IELTS Writing 2 – Sample answer ‘government aid’

Posted on March 22, 2012 by admin

“Governments from richer nations should not provide financial aid to poorer ones.”

To what extent do you agree or disagree?

ESSAY

For a long period of time developed countries have supported destitute ones by with money. However, it could be noticed that just only monetary aid has a very little effect and the necessity of further payments is somewhat questionable. It is more likely that non-financial assistance would have a greater impact. A number of reasons will would be provided in this assignmentessay.

First of all, the amount of money, transferred during the last several decades, can be is counted in trillions of dollars, while the results are far from those expected. Only a low portion of aid is spent as intended because of the high level of corruption in the third-world countries. Furthermore, in some countries the majority of most part of inpayments goes to the debt servicing, which leads to dependency on them. In contrast, there are countries that demonstrate greater growth of economy without any assistance, such as South Africa.

Nonetheless, financial aid is not always meaningless. When a country is able to use money perfectly, the results could be significant. Take, for instance, the Marshall Plan, which whose success was provided by the appropriate social infrastructure of Germany. Another example is the modern economy of Brazil. Despite this, most of the impoverished countries are not able to dispense money properly, consequently, further financial aid for them makes little sensce. Direct deliveries of food and energy are highly likely would to be more practical.

To conclude, the statement that first-world countries should provide financial support to the countries of the third world appears seriously flawed. It would be considerably more effective to render financial assistance only to the countries who which are able to spend it on poverty alleviation, simultaneously providing various kinds of non-financial aid to others.

Checklist Yes /no comment
Does my introduction introduce the specific topic? yes
Does my conclusion answer the specific question? yes
Is my stance / my position clear? yes Even though there was no use of ‘I agree’, it was clear that this was the stance
Do I justify my opinions with reasons and examples? yes
Do my opinions and reasons address the specific question? yes
Do my examples prove my point to the reader (i.e. are they relevant and clear)? Not always You could have used a better example than post war Germany, and the Brazil example did not really prove anything as it is unclear.
Have I got clear paragraphs? yes
Has each paragraph got a topic sentence? yes
Does each paragraph have a central theme based on the topic sentence? yes
Is information organized clearly and logically? yes
Have I used a range of linking words and referencing? yes
Have I used the range of linking words mechanically? no
Have I paraphrased the language of the question? yes Very good job here
Have I used words to convey precise meaning? yes Good range of vocabulary
Have I used collocations well? yes
Are there spelling mistakes? no
Have I used a mix of complex and simple sentences? yes
Have I used a variety of structures appropriately? yes
How often are there mistakes? Frequent = 6 for GRA Problems with articles, relative clauses and modals
Do they interfere with understanding? no
Tips –

-          Revise defining / non – defining clauses http://www.englishlanguageguide.com/english/grammar/definiting-relative-clause.asp

-          http://www.englishlanguageguide.com/english/grammar/non-defining-relative-clause.asp
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Doing things on your computer in English

Posted on March 21, 2012 by admin

Put things around you in English, and you will learn English without studying

You can learn a lot by having things on your computer (and internet) in the language you want to learn. If someone else uses the computer, just create more than one user. On this page I’ll give some information on how to create another ‘user’ for the computer, and some examples of what programs / internet pages I’ve put in Chinese. Do the same in English, and you’ll do more in English without ‘studying’ more.

Creating another user

If you’re the only person using your computer, this may not be important. If someone else does use the computer and they don’t speak the language you’re learning, then it’s a good idea to create another user. To do so,  go to the control panel and click on the ‘user’ part

1- Панель управления\

2 – Учетные записи пользователей и семейная безопасность

3 -Учетные записи пользователей

4- Управление учетными записями

then choose ‘add’ a user (добавить пользователя)

to switch between users, go to ‘finish work / завершение работы’ and click on ‘exit the system / выйти из системы’

For example, on our home computer I have created a second user, so I can put everything in Chinese, but Irina can still do everything she wants in Russian…

And now, different things I have in Chinese, and that you can set in English…..

Download mozilla / google  / any search engine

in English

Please note!!! Leave ‘Internet explorer’ in your language. That way, if you really need to use a search engine in your language, you will have that option.

The good thing about downloading these programs in English, is that when you search to download other programs, the search engine will automatically offer you the English language download. Here are ones I’ve downloaded in Chinese

Adobe reader

Youtube downloader

With some programs, you don’t have to download in the language you want, you can just change the language. Most of the time it is in ‘options / настройки’. For example

Anki

Change your e-mail into English

This has the added advantage that your online documents will also be in English!

And last but not least, social pages like facebook and vkontakte!

Summary

So, change things on your computer into English, and you’ll be surprised at how many little things you pick up / revise by doing this. And remember, depending on your phone, you might be able to change your phone to a different language.

One thing to remember…………………

Sometimes you may need to switch back to your language if doing something difficult! Just make sure you switch back to English afterwards!

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T2-ing in St Petersburg

Posted on February 26, 2012 by admin


T2 is listening to learn a language. You already know, more or less, the texts you are listening to, so you don’t need to listen to understand, you listen to pick up new things, and remind yourself of what you already know. The great thing about T2ing, is that you can do something else. This means LOTS of extra minutes every day where you’re doing something in the language you’re learning. On this page you can read about activities I do, the T2ing I do while doing the activity, and comments I have about how much I focus, grammar / vocabulary / pronunciation I notice (or not), and other things to think about like noise in the background (fon).

1 – doing this page at the moment :)

Action- on the computer writing something

Attention to activity – high

T2 - playlist on repeat. Very familiar story – “Low Wang’s office – Intermediate’.

Background noise - Soviet cartoon

Background interference - high, Gosha the crocodile is singing loudly

Vocabulary I noticed- ‘computer program, click, database, to ask someone to do something!

Grammar I noticed- Use of a grammar word in a question

Pronunciation I noticed- ‘Bill’ in Chinese is like ‘Biu’.

Tip - If you are doing an activity that requires a lot of mental attention, the easier the T2 the better.

2 – Waiting for the photo of the next activity to upload

action - uploading a photo of washing the dishes

attention to activity – very low

T2 - very familiar Lao Wang’s office

background - Soviet cartoon

background interference - low, Gosha the crocodile has stopped singing, there’s just a sound of a motorcycle

vocabulary – ‘to file a suit against someone’ ‘to give someone an opportunity’ ‘fool’

grammar noticed – use of Chinese present continuous

pronunciation - nothing

tip – you don’t need to focus on T2s. If you’re doing a ‘focused’ activity, you can’t do it much. But even in a focused activity, sometimes you have little pauses. If you have a T2 in the background, you can change your attention to the T2 in this time.

Situation 3 – Washing the dishes

action – washing the dishes

attention to activity – low

T2 - single podcast on repeat [about 3 mins]. Not familiar, had just read the text – “the 10 suns” a Chinese fairy tale – upper-intermediate

Background - noise of washing the dishes

Background interference – low

Vocabulary I noticed – ‘to long, long time ago’ ‘ shine sunlight on people’ ‘sick of playing’ ‘protest’ ‘selfish’ ‘let out a secret’ ‘archer’ ‘arrow’ ‘draw a bow’ ‘kick the bucket’

grammar noticed – how the linking word ‘otherwise’ is used

Pronunciation - the pronunciation of a Chinese sound not in English, between ‘shi’ and ‘si’

Tip – you can use T2ing to make things you dislike become things you like. For example, I now see washing the dishes as a chance to listen to a new or forgotten T2!

Action 4 – writing an e-mail

action - writing an e-mail

attention to activity - very high

T2 - playlist on repeat – Detective Li – upper – intermediate, difficult, about0 minutes

Background - nothing

Vocabulary I noticed – ‘drive a car’ ‘basement’ ‘bloody footprint’ ‘stomach’ ‘horrible scene’

Grammar noticed - nothing

Pronunciation noticed – nothing

Tip - It’s very easy to start a T2 to listen to while typing an e-mail, but it’s also easy not to start it! When the T2s were on my phone, I often did not listen to them when typing e-mails. But I put the T2s on Windows media player in playlists. It makes them easier to start, which means I listen to them often. Create the conditions to make it easy for you to do something, and you are more likely to do it.

Situation 5 – leaving the flat to go to the metro

action - walking somewhere

attention to activity – low, but can change to high

T2 – an old T2 playlist, one of the T2s on the list on repeat. Very difficult. “Dodging Hong Kong Taxes – upper-intermediate’

Background - just cars

Vocabulary I noticed – ‘levy a tax’ ‘shopping spree’ ‘end-of-year clearance’ ‘customs’ ‘corrupt’

Grammar noticed – word word with ‘no matter’. Didn’t fully understand, but I noticed it

Pronunciation noticed – how ‘zhi’ is pronounced a bit like the Russian ‘ы’

Tip - The same as I’ve mentioned before, but very important. Sometimes it’s easy to think ‘I’ll start listening later’ or you may think ‘I don’t want to listen now’ when you start walking. The result is you don’t listen. For one 10 minute walk, you’re not  missing much practice. But if you often think ‘I’ll do it later’ or ‘I don’t want to do it now’, that 10 minutes’ walk a few times each day, together with the 10 minutes e-mailing, the 10 minutes washing the dishes, the 10 minutes ironing the clothes..etc, will become  a few hundred hours over a year.   If you want to listen to something when walking, just take your phone / MP3 player with you and put in the earphones. Most of the time when I focus on ‘putting in the earphones’ I do it, and most of the time I put in the earphones, I listen to T2s. I don’t know why, but often when I think ‘I should do some T2s / listening practice’, I don’t do anything, usually thinking ‘I’ll listen later’, but if I say to myself ‘I’ll just put in the earphones, then I listen.

Situation 6 – playing with baby

Action- playing with baby

Attention to activity – high to low

T2 - playlist on repeat. Very familiar story – “Lili and Zhang -Intermediate’.

Background - nothing

Vocabulary I noticed- relationship language language

Grammar I noticed- use of linking words, word order

Pronunciation I noticed- different ways of pronouncing ‘u’

Tip- Don’t ever think ‘I have to put on a T2′. Just put it on. If you then don’t want to listen, stop it straight away. Put it on first. But stop straightaway if you don’t feel like it. Most of the time when doing things like playing with baby, if I start listening I enjoy it. Playing with baby and learning at the same time! However sometimes I think, ‘no I just want to play in silence’. I start the T2, if I still feel ‘no, I just want to play in silence’ then I turn it off. Develop the habit, but always leave it as a choice, not something you ‘have to do’. If you focus on developing the habit of putting on the language you’re learning, you’ll do it more and more. If you keep thinking ‘I have to listen, I have to listen’, there’s a good chance you’ll stop, if not sooner, then later. If it’s a habit, you won’t even think about it, you’ll just do it.

Situation 7 – going to work in the metro

Action- standing in the metro

Attention to activity – very low

T2 - The audio of the story I am reading in the book

Background noise – the metro train

Background interference - very high

Vocabulary I noticed- public and private transportation

Grammar I noticed- comparative structures (better than, as good as..)

Pronunciation I noticed- Nothing

Tip - the metro is very noisy, so it is difficult to hear something clearly. This means it is useful to read and listen to something at the same time, as when you can’t hear the words 100%, you can read them anyway. The shorter the text the better. If you stop hearing the words for a bit when the train is making a lot of noise, just focus on the reading. If the text is short, you can read and listen again no problem.

Situation 8 – going home from work in the metro

Action- standing in the metro, revising vocabulary

Attention to activity – high, but relaxed

T2 - Songs – I am very familiar with them

Background noise – the metro train

Background interference – very high

Vocabulary I noticed- nothing new, as vocabulary is familiar

Grammar I noticed- nothing

Pronunciation I noticed- nothing

Tip – music is a very relaxing T2. You may not notice anything new, but you’re revising the vocabulary. I like listening to music when doing ‘high mental focus’ activities such as revising flashcards or  vocabulary, as it provides a pleasant background.

Situation 9 – walking with baby

Action-walking with baby

Attention to activity – high to low

T2 - new text / audio, upper-intermediate ‘Chinese festivals’

Background noise – not much

Background interference - very low

Vocabulary I noticed- vocabulary connected with ghosts and holidays

Grammar I noticed- the comparative structure  ’the more ….. the more….’

Pronunciation I noticed- ‘yin’, the ‘i’ is pronounced very high and frontal in the mouth

Tip - I like doing a new T2 when going on a casual walk. I can listen on repeat  a few times, then stop and read the text, then listen a few more times, then stop and read again, the listen again many times, sometimes paying attention to the Chinese text, sometimes completely forgetting it and paying attention to something else.

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not much time to study, but lots of bits of time to learn

Posted on February 13, 2012 by admin

I recently wrote this to a student. It’s for a business context, but the same ideas are true for any type of English students are studying

Hello___

You mentioned that you would have more time to study English in a couple of months when the home renovations are finished, but in the meantime one thing you need to do is think about the difference between studying and learning. I get the impression from our lessons that you believe that to learn you ‘have to‘ sit down, listen carefully, translate everything, and make notes. This idea of  ’study, study, study‘ does of course help learn, and should be done, but in order to learn you can also use lots of bits of time where you can’t ‘study’, just by having podcasts on in the background.
Right now, I’m not listening to a Chinese podcast / music. If I had listened to a Chinese podcast every time I was writing an e-mail / surfing the net in the last year, I would have an excellent knowledge by now. Well, that’s fixed, I’ve just put on a Chinese podcast with two clicks. Back to getting you doing things in English as well as studying English, one site where you can get business podcasts is

http://www.businessenglishpod.com
The advantages are that there are..
- advanced or intermediate levels
- different categories
- different accents
- comments on the dialogue in each podcast
- less common idiomatic language with a more common equivalent e.g. “to get everyone on board” / “let’s talk Turkey” / “Nuts and bolts” are all explained
- functional language – how to show confidence, how to agree with others, how to make a suggestion – this is absolute magic for when you’re in real [business] communication
The disadvantages are that
- you have to pay to get the transcript
- the podcasts are quite long due to the explanations. This means that it might be difficult to find time to do one, and if you do, it would then mean you don’t do something else in English (be it ‘study’, or reading, listening for enjoyment).
I think the disadvantages aren’t that important if you can use these podcasts not to ‘study’, but just perhaps have in the background at work / home while you’re doing something else. In the one I listened to, there was quite a bit of language we’d covered recently in class, so you would be re-inforcing learnt vocab (you often say ‘we did this recently, but I can’t quite remember it’), and as the pronunciation is clear, and things that are difficult are explained, you could ‘pick up’ some other things without having to concentrate (i.e. while doing something else). The key is to have it on regularly, and approach it in a relaxed way, not worrying if something is not understood. It is an easy way of ‘learning’ while doing something else that would support you more active ‘study’. The key to doing this is having easy access, like I did with the Chinese podcast. Two clicks and it’s up and running.

John

So, think about what you can do in little bits of time to learn, as well as doing the serious ‘study’. One more time, the key is having easy access to a variety of things that are interesting for you.

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reading tip – looking for topic related vocabulary

Posted on January 22, 2012 by admin

How can I improve my English for my job? (for a specific purpose)

If you want to improve your English for specific purpose, then you want to do things connected with that purpose. If you want to have ‘good English for your job’, then you need to read, listen to, write, and speak about things connected with your job. In order to speak and write well about your job, you need to have the vocabulary. You can get this from reading and listening.

How can reading and listening help with my speaking and writing?

the basic process of ‘activating’ vocab from reading and listening when writing and speaking is

1 – read (listen to) things connected with your job

2 – make a note of expressions / collocations (словосочетания)

3 – use them when speaking and writing

The key point here is number 2. Most students look at and learn words in isolation. This means that they think of a sentence in Russian and then they translate all the words individually. This takes time, and also results in mistakes and strange sounding combinations, as Russian combinations or collocations are not the same as English ones.

So, when you read, don’t just look for new words, look for combinations that you can use. Because you are reading articles from one area (connected with your profession), you’ll see the same collocations / combinations again and again, and you’ll be able to use them more and more easily. This will help decrease the amount of ‘translating’ you do, as you will have the information in your head in ‘chunks’ (groups of words).

For example, if someone is working in the finance sector of the automobile industry, then they want to read finance articles connected with this industry, and use collocations from there. If they want to improve their communication in the finance sphere but in the media and advertising industry, then they read articles and listen to videos connected with finance in the media and advertising industry.

So, an example of ‘combinations / collocations’ that are interesting for someone working in finance in the automobile industry can be found in the text below. I did the first part, highlighting some possible expressions a learner may want to activate. Perhaps they may want to actiavte others, these are just examples. Please note how combinations are looked at, not single words! It may not be new or difficult, but perhaps it needs activating by the student. In some cases it may be very easy, for example expressions connected with time. This may seem unnecessary, by students make a LOT of mistakes with simple expressions connected with time.

Volkswagen Group reports record deliveries for the first half of 2011

• Over four million vehicles sold for first time in January — June period
• 11.7 percent increase in June
• Group Board member for Sales Christian Klingler: “Delivery figures show strength of model range — Success in second six months won’t be automatic”.

Wolfsburg, July 15, 2011 — The Volkswagen Group delivered more vehicles in the first six months of 2011 than ever. A total of 4.09 (January — June 2010: 3.58; +14.1 percent)* million vehicles were delivered to customers worldwide from January to June of this  year. Europe’s largest automaker therefore once again performed noticeably better (this sounds noticeably better than ‘a lot better’ ;) ) than the world market (+6.1 percent). June was also a very positive month, with 719,400 (June 2010: 644,300; +11.7 percent)* vehicles handed over to customers. (to not say ‘delivered to’ all the time) “Delivery figures for the first half of the year are very satisfactory. (satisfactory delivery figures – more exact / precise than ‘good / not good) )Our performance demonstrates the strength of our model range,” the Group Board member for Sales Christian Klingler said in Wolfsburg on Friday, and continued: “We are also confident we can perform better than the global automobile market during the second half of the year, thanks to our very convincing range of models.” He went on to say that developments during the first half of the year did not yet allow a projection for the full year. “Success in the second six months won’t be automatic. Plenty of hard work lies ahead to keep our deliveries during the second half of the year at a high level,” Klingler commented.

Deliveries on the American continent again developed very well. The number of vehicles sold in the North America region year to date grew 21.2 percent to 319,100 (263,200) units, of which 211,100 (175,300; +20.4 percent) vehicles were delivered in the U.S. market. The Volkswagen Group handed over 455,200 (410,600; +10.9 percent) vehicles to customers in the South America region during the same period.

The Group also reported strong delivery figures for the Asia / Pacific sales region. A total of 1.26 (1.05; +19.5 percent) million vehicles were handed over to customers there in the first six months of the year, of which 1.11 (0.95; +16.4 percent) million units were delivered in China, the region’s largest single market. The company reported further strong growth in India, where 55,100 (17,400; +217.2 percent) vehicles were delivered. No. 250/2011 Page 2 Group brands delivered a total of 1.90 (1.74; +9.3 percent) million vehicles to customers in Europe during the first half of the year. In Western Europe (excluding Germany), 1.07 (1.01; +5.5 percent) million customers took delivery of a new vehicle.

Group brands reported continued high growth in Central and Eastern Europe, handing over 253,700 (196,800; +28.9 percent) vehicles there. In its home market of Germany, the Volkswagen Group achieved 9.3 percent growth, delivering 580,600 (531,300) vehicles.

All volume brands grow deliveries

The Volkswagen Passenger Cars brand delivered over 2.5 million vehicles for the first time in the period January to June. In total, 2.53 (2.26; +11.8 percent) million units were handed over to customers. The brand developed particularly well in the Central and Eastern Europe (+42.2 percent), North America (+21.8 percent) and Asia / Pacific (+16.4 percent) regions.

Audi delivered 653,000 (554,900; +17.7 percent) vehicles worldwide in the first half of the year. The premium brand from Ingolstadt performed particularly well in the regions of North America (+17.2 percent), South America (+28.5 percent) and Asia / Pacific (+26.5 percent).

The Škoda brand delivered 454,700 (378,700; +20.1 percent) vehicles worldwide from January to June. The Czech automaker developed particularly well in Central and Eastern Europe (+20.2 percent) and the Asia / Pacific region (+36.0 percent).

SEAT delivered 186,400 (181,800) vehicles worldwide in the first six months, an increase of 2.5 percent. The Spanish brand reported growth in particular in Germany (+24.9 percent), France (+16.7 percent) and Italy (+13.7 percent).

Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles grew deliveries 29.0 percent to 260,300 (201,900) units from January to June. Growth was particularly strong in the regions of Central and Eastern Europe (+52.7 percent), Asia / Pacific (+42.6 percent) and South America (+38.1 percent).

*) excluding Scania

So, as you can see, the expressions are used a lot, and it is easy to improve in a short time because of this high level of repetition.

For more on ‘word grammar’ read here http://aitonenglish.com/?p=1169

and here collocations read here http://aitonenglish.com/?p=104

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Tips – 10 good ‘learning skills’ / habits one learner has

Posted on January 22, 2012 by admin

I recently had a lesson with a student, and told him he was a good learner. There is not one list of things that make a good learner, but I thought I would write the points that make this person a good learner. All of them are in some way another connected with

- taking an interest

- enjoying what you do

- trying new things

- thinking about the language and language learning process

Hello ____, your good habits are….

1 – you’re ready to try new things (skype lessons, anki, audiobooks, buying a phone to do anki flashcards and listen to podcasts on your phone)

This really is good, as I know you don’t like technology, but you didn’t say ‘I won’t do it because I don’t like technology’, you said ‘I don’t like technology, but I’ll try it and see how I can use it to learn’.  It’s important to try new things, as the more things you do in the language you learn, the better you will become.

2 – you think about the learning process. Some students just think ‘I must study hard”, you think carefully about the balance between doing English, studying English, work, relax, family. You also think about what things you want to do now in English, and what things you want to do in the future. Prioritizing! For example, you started preparing construction articles from newspapers to re-tell to me, but they were difficult because of a lot of vocabulary. You tried it a few times, then you realized that it was causing stress, taking time, and was not something to be prioritized now, so you decided to have a break until your general English vocabulary got better. When you came back to doing the articles, you did only a part of an article , now you’re a doing a bigger part, and soon in the future you will be able to do a whole article.

Thinking about what you are doing and why is VERY important, as it means that slowly but surely you can get into good habits, and not just ‘push yourself very hard’ for a short time before stopping. The most typical example is when a student gets a ‘normal’ book that’s VERY difficult. For example Charles Dickens, or Jane Austen. They spend one hour reading one page, do this for one week, then stop because ‘it’s impossible’ / ‘too boring’ . The funniest thing about this, the student’s actual goal may be something completely different from reading literature. They just don’t think about what they want to do (end goal) and how they can achieve it (step – by – step goals). One example from me, people often ask me why I don’t try and speak Chinese with anyone. The answer is simple. It’s not a goal at the moment. My first goal was to read the newspaper, so I prioritized that. Why a newspaper? I’m interested in learning more about business and finance, so I read the financial times in English. Now I read it in Chinese. My second goal was / is to improve my listening to conversational Chinese. I don’t watch the news in Chinese, as I’m not interested in watching the news in Chinese. But I am interested in watching TV series and movies in Chinese, so I spend most of my time listening to podcasts with conversations. This is because I can move up the levels from intermediate to advanced. Once I’ve done this, then I’ll start a Chinese conversation club with Russians who are learning Chinese. Or maybe not. That’s a decision for later.

3 – you have lessons constantly, but if you really don’t want to / can’t, then you don’t push yourself. For example, one Saturday morning, we started the lesson, but then we stopped because you were tired.

This is important, as if you push yourself too hard on Saturday morning, then all Saturday you won’t want to do anything in English. It’s important to have lessons / do things in English constantly. To do things constantly, don’t push yourself, just get into the habit of doing things. (more about this later)

4 – You try and use the new words from texts that you read. You don’t try and use every word, but you do ‘pick up expressions’ from the text.

This means that when you read / listen to English, it will also help with your speaking, as you’re looking to use words, or activate them. Most students think ‘what does this word mean’ = passive. But when you look to use expressions, you also think. ‘How do I use this word / expression’ = active. One of the best students I have ever taught (Elishka from the Czech Republic) was unbelievable at picking – up and using new words. When I asked her how she did it, she said that for many years she was bad at it, but then she had a teacher who said ‘who cares what the word means, just use the word. This was strange at first, but the more she asked herself ‘how do I use this word?’, the more she looked at the context, and the easier it became to use new words and expressions. This is how we all learnt our first language!

5 – if you don’t know / remember a word/ expression you use another word or way of saying it. This means that you speak more fluently. It is impossible to know all the words in English that you know in Russian. If you stop all the time, it makes it difficult / not pleasant!

There is also another good point here. Because you are reading and listening to things in English, you will come across the word you couldn’t remember / didn’t know soon enough. For example, today you tried to remember the word ‘conduct’  for ‘conduct research’, you couldn’t remember it, so you used a different way and said ‘do research’. But later today, or tomorrow, or Monday… sooner or later…. you will come across either ‘conduct research’ or in a different expression like  ’conduct an experiment / conduct a survey’. This will be sooner and not later, as you are reading and listening to English regulalry.

This is process of ‘asking your brain for a word / expression but not getting it’ is great, because when you ask your brain a question, it AUTOMATICALLY will look for the answer to this question when you’re reading / listening, and when you see / hear the answer to the question, your brain will notice it, and remember it better (maybe not 100%, but definitely better). This is why people learning English in Australia or America almost always make more progress than people learning in Russia / Brazil. In Australia, you are talking more, so you ask your brain more questions. You also see and hear more English, so your brain gets and remembers the answers more easily. When I was teaching in Sydney, VERY OFTEN a student would say ‘I saw that word I couldn’t remember in the newspaper’ or ‘I heard it whne I was watching TV’.

6 - When I correct a mistake, you don’t say ‘OK’ and keep talking. You listen to the correction, think about it, and then say the sentence again correctly. This is a good habit, as you are more likely to remember how to say it correctly the next time. I NEVER do this in Russian (me bad student in Russian :( ), and because of this, I make the same mistakes all the time. This good habit + anki flashcards with your mistakes means that when you become fluent in English, you will also be accurate. Once you are fluent, it’s difficult to ‘take out’ the mistakes you’ve been making a long time, this is why it’s important.

7 – if we’re practising a grammar or vocabulary structure, you make sure you use the structure. This means that you are constantly increasing / activating expressions. you do this most of the time

8 – you give reasons for your ideas, and examples. This is important, as it means you are practising developing your ideas. In any speaking exam I’ve seen, the most important thing is how well you develop your ideas. It’s also important when talking with ‘intelligent / well-educated people’.

9 – you take an interest in different topics. Because of this, you WANT to develop your ideas. Some students often say ‘this isn’t interesting’, ‘this is boring’, or ‘I don’t know’. When they say it, they block their ideas, and so they block their speaking. I’ve never heard you say these expressions. Even if something is not that interesting for you, or you’re not sure about it, you still try and give your ideas, and listen to mine, because you’re interested in finding out more.

This is great not only for speaking, but also for reading and listening, because you will read / listen and react more. Language is not words or grammar, it’s HOW we USE these words and grammar to REACT

10 – You think about how you can do more in English. This is similar to point number 1 I made “trying new things”, but now I’m more talking about developing the things that you are trying.

For example, you thought about trying podcasts. Now you think about listening to podcasts when walking the dog, or listening to English at work. Once more, you don’t push yourself to do it if you don’t feel comfortable, but you DO come back later and try again. You are already doing quite a bit in English (especially taking into account the fact that you have two children and a busy job). With time you will gradually do more and more, not by ‘studying hard’, but just by developing good habits. The better your English becomes, the easier it will be to enjoy doing things in English. For example, at the moment I’m listening to a Taiwanese Chinese drama I watched about two months ago. I can understand it better now as I’ve been listening to podcasts / audiobooks / films a lot, so it’s more enjoyable listening to it as I type this (still not ‘easy’, but it’s getting easier).

NOTE – One thing you might like to think about is gradually doing a bit of speaking with friends, colleagues and acquaintances in English. Use the same approach, try here, try there, don’t push it too much, if someone doesn’t (or you don’t) want to talk in English now, try again later. Gradually develop the habit!

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