Tag: fluency

Language Learning Tip #07

Problem

“I find myself hesitating when I speak because I am second-guessing myself and correcting myself.”

Idea

You are most likely someone who uses their “monitor” too much.

 

The Monitor Hypothesis is the idea that many people who try to learn a second language as an adult have constructed a sort of mental computer monitor between their thought in their mother tongue and their speech. This monitor is where they try out their grammar and construction before they actually say it. They sort of put their sentence or phrase up on the monitor screen to check it over before they talk or even while they are talking. The assumption behind the hypothesis is that this monitor is a hinderence to fluency and is of little to no benefit for accuracy in the long run.

So what is the problem really? Some would say that the problem is that your whole approach to learning the language so far is at fault. You have been trying to learn language as a system of rules and tranformations and translating methods instead of acquiring it. Acquisition is supposedly the natural way that a child learns the language without conscious analysis of the rules (i.e left brain). Therefore, we should be as childlike as possible when we try to learn/acquire a language.

Others would say that an adult has advantages over a child when learning a language because he or she can learn shortcuts and rules and can analyze the language and learn from mistakes. We can use both sides of our brain. (Have you ever tried to correct a child’s grammar? “Jimmy, we don’t say ‘goed’ we say ‘went.’ I know Mommy. I goed and went with Tommy to the store.”) We are great suckers for anything that is touted as “natural.”

I think both sides have a point. Most people who have an active monitor are producing just as many mistakes as those with no monitor. However, given time to think about it, the active monitor user can sometimes produce more grammatical sentences. However, if you find that your fluency is suffering because of this kind of hesitation and you are already an adult in a language program, you do not have a hopeless condition. There are still some exercises you can do to improve your fluency.

1)    Practice speaking quickly and incorrectly. You don’t need to be constantly wondering if this is the correct way to say something. For most situations it is perfectly fine to make mistakes as you speak and most of your mistakes should disappear as you are exposed to more and more native speech.

2)    Try recording yourself for short talks. When you know your speech is recorded, you know you can listen to it later to analyze and correct your mistakes. It brings a kind of freedom from the tyranny of the monitor.

3)    Time yourself talking. How long can you go without hesitating or correcting yourself? If you have in front of you a picture story or written notes about what you want to talk about, you can practice talking about that topic going faster and faster each time. If you get stuck on a vocabulary word or a structure, just say it in your language and go on. Don’t get sloppy with your pronunciation, but you can be sloppy with your grammar.

4)    Familiar dialogues (for example, dialogues from your book) are good for fluency practice as well. You don’t have to wonder about what to say, just how fluently you can say it.

Language Learning Tip #26

Problem

“There are so many vocabulary issues to think about. How can I have a balanced approach?”

Idea

Maybe this triangle image can help you to visualize and think about what vocabulary learning means.

Click on the image below to enlarge it.

       Triangle depicting balanced approach to language learning.
There really are a lot of vocabulary issues. For example, there are a ton of words that you need to understand. If you are not understanding 95% of the words you hear, comprehension is difficult. In addition, there is a large number of words that you want to be able to recall and use easily when you need them. Also, you need to be able to use the words in the same way Arabs use them, not in an awkward unnatural way. That is, there are issues of using the right form of the words and learning the expressions; and there is the whole area of collocations – which words usually go together and which do not.
Where are you? If you have exposed yourself to a lot of new vocabulary and gained a surface understanding of a large number of words, your profile is probably skewed towards the top of this triangle. If you have focused on learning and practicing only the most common and practical words that you often need to express yourself, your profile leans toward the bottom right corner. If you have deeply analyzed the words you know and focused on using the right forms of the word in the right places, you may have a profile that is rooted in the bottom left corner of the triangle. However, all these aspects of vocabulary learning are important and you should have strategies for making progress in each of these areas.

Targeted strategies are especially important for working on those areas that do not come easily to you. For example, if you need to add a large number of receptive vocabulary, you will need strategies like the vocabulary cards and 4 boxes as described in earlier tips. Or perhaps you need a lot of reading about a variety of things while writing down the new words you hear or read. If you need better vocabulary accuracy (bottom left) you need to ask for and write down lots of examples of different forms of a word, or maybe you need to experiment with words asking Arabs if that’s how people use the word. And lastly, if you have lots of words that you have learned but they don’t come out easily when you need them, you need strategies to build fluency and speed and easy recall of the most important and common words. These might include memorizing dialogues, or repeated listening of easy stories, and of course, lots of talking out loud to people about common topics. Everyone needs to form effective personal strategies that address their own vocabulary weaknesses.