6 polyglot tips for self-learners of English
Polyglot Christina for AdMe.ru talked about secrets and life hacks that invariably help in learning a new language. Prepare yourself: it's not easy, but the results are worth the effort.
Where to begin
Before you start learning a foreign language, determine which channel of perception is most comfortable for you and in what form it is easier for you to assimilate new information. Do you like watching videos, TV shows or movies? Or listen to music? Perhaps your favorite thing is to communicate with people? There can be many answers.
But the most important thing is to choose a few channels that give you the most joy, and skillfully juggle them. It is important that information in the target language comes through at least 2 channels a day. For example, you listen to music and simultaneously watch the translation of songs, and watch the series in the evening.
And one more important point: when learning a language, you will not have days off. It is necessary to completely plunge into the language environment and draw up such a schedule, find such exercises and activities so that the process does not turn into boring and exhausting work. This means that what you read / listen / watch about should be really interesting to you.
6 basic forms of language learning, how to use each of them most effectively.
1. See
There are many services here to help you: YouTube, online TV and online media libraries. See how channels for language learning (for example, for learning English are good English with Lucy, engVid, ETJ English, EnglishLessons4U), and videos of bloggers who will tell you about some simple and everyday things, for example, how they clean their house or what they cook for the week. In this case, assimilation will take place "in the background" and you will begin to get used to the language.
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Christina's method of learning a language with the help of films and TV series is approximately the following: first, watch simple TV series with subtitles and with Google Translate at hand, then - without subtitles, and even later - more complicated series. Many streaming services have subtitles built in, which is handy. At the initial stage, you can choose the series that you have already watched and, possibly, more than once, for example, "Friends". And an important point: be sure to turn off subtitles when you reach a certain level of understanding! And of course, there is no point in including Russian subtitles.
Books with grammar in pictures are well suited for visuals, and especially such exercises are effective before bed.
2. Read
If you are learning English, you can download an English-Russian dictionary to your e-book and immediately spy on the translation. For advanced users, Christina recommends English-English: just click on an incomprehensible word - and a hint with a description of the word from the dictionary or an article from Wikipedia will appear. For paper lovers, simple magazines like cookery, comics, or fiction books for teenagers are advised.
You can also try the service Blinkist, which combines "read" and "listen". Here are collected non-fiction books in abbreviated format in English, which can also be listened to in audio format, while peeping into the text. Some books you want to buy right after listening, and for some you don't want to spend even minutes anymore - you get a kind of "trailers" of books of interest with the benefit of vocabulary.
3. Listen
You don't have to listen to boring educational exercises. Who will love endless repetitions of the same phrases? Find a radio station you like, or select a podcast about a topic of interest. It's important that you really like the topic. Are you interested in fashion? Or maybe psychology? Find a podcast about it, for example through your iTunes library, Spotify, or Apple Music. The convenience of podcasts is that you can listen to them without straining, anywhere and anytime: while jogging, on the subway, or even while preparing dinner.
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And music! Music, of course. Listen to the same song 20 times until you learn the words. Hum them in the car on the way to work.
4. Play
If the gaming component is important to you, many useful mobile applications will come to your aid. It is impossible not to mention Lingualeo - there you can read texts and learn new words. Everyone knows Duolingo и Busuu... There are a lot of applications, but the most important thing is regularity.
For a more advanced level, good Elevate и Peak: here you can train speed reading, expand the dictionary of synonyms, etc.
5. Write
Learning a language by writing is a pretty serious level, even if it seems to you that you know the language well, sometimes it happens that you cannot connect two words in writing. Non-binding correspondence will help overcome this barrier and improve the language.
Find a pen pal, read and leave comments on social media groups, communicate on forums - thanks to the world wide web, there are many opportunities for us to practice this important skill.
And of course, it would be great to go to language courses. It is very difficult to force yourself to study boring grammar tablets, and without this, alas, nothing.
6. Speak, speak and speak again
No matter how well you know grammar and no matter how well you understand speech, there is nothing more important than live communication. Best of all with native speakers, but language clubs and communication via video link will do. It is advisable to communicate as often as possible, not to take breaks, ideally 1 hour every day.
It's great if you get the opportunity to interact with the locals while traveling.
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