LANGUAGE EXPLORER

Hello everyone,

Today I would like to talk about how better to get conversations started.

When we learn languages, we always want so much to speak with native speakers – but at the same time, we also worry about it. Will they understand us? Will they find what we say interesting? Will they get frustrated with us, or bored, or both?

Lots of these sort of thoughts go through our mind. Even if we are lucky enough to have friends who speak the language we are learning as native speakers, it doesn’t mean that we don’t still think these things.

Another difficulty when speaking another language is that after we have said something, it is often difficult for us to remember what we just said! In our own language, we remember what words we say better than when we say something in a different language. I think this is because we are busy trying to think of correct words to use and make sure we are understood, so we only remember the ideas of what we were talking about, not the actual words we used to say it.

Often, we have little or no chance to speak with native speakers. We practice in class, at home, with friends etc, but unless we live in the country or can visit it, then the opportunities for speaking the languages we are learning with native speakers can be quite rare. Even when we visit the country, or find a native speaker to speak with in our country, maybe we don’t know who we will speak with or how long we will have to speak with them, or what we will need to say.

So, what can we do that gives us a little more confidence to speak with native speakers when we have the chance?

My opinion is, whenever we have the opportunity, we should take it, but also be very kind on ourselves and do not try to make it into a “language test” that we must “pass”.

I also think that we should not expect so much from the people we speak with. They might be very busy or have other things on their mind.

Negative experiences always make us question why we even want to learn the language. For example, someone ignores us, or says something we don’t understand, or doesn’t seem interested. We have to understand that not everyone is interested in languages and that people have their own lives to get on with. I’ve had some experiences like this over the years.

This is where a relaxed attitude can be very useful. Enjoying the opportunity to speak a different language however well we can, should always be a positive thing. So we must do our best to make sure that any conversations we have are as positive and pleasant as we can make them. We have a lot to do with making sure this happens.

So here are some ideas for helping any conversations we have with native speakers be as pleasant as possible:

1. Don’t expect to have a very interesting conversation, it might be a quite ordinary even a bit boring conversation. Many people just want to “pass the time of day” which means they just talk about very ordinary things such as the weather. So, be prepared to talk about the weather…a few useful phrases can really set off a conversation well:

“ Oh, isn’t it cold today?” “What a beautiful sunny day!” “Oh, it’s very windy today isn’t it?”

These sort of friendly openings are called “icebreakers” and nearly everybody does this. So why shouldn’t we do it also?

2. Remember that many, many people love to talk about themselves and what they are doing, subjects such as their family, their work and their hobbies. If we allow people to talk about themselves first, then we can have a perfect opportunity to listen and it gives us time to get used to the person’s accent, their preferred speed of speaking and we can get to know more about them quickly. So, maybe a conversation would go like this:

(you) “Hello, how is it going?”

(other person )“Oh, very well thanks. I’ve been busy and many things are happening at the moment, I have a new job, a new house. My kids are enjoying school and very soon we will be going on holiday…..”

(you)“oh, that’s nice, where will you be going to?”

(other person)“we will go to Spain this year, we’ve never been there and we are really looking forward to it”

Even though you have not said much yourself and you may wish that you were speaking more, accept that you may need to do this at the beginning of the conversation.

It shows that you are a good listener and people like knowing that they are being listened to, and also you will show that you are understanding normal conversation speed and vocabulary. This is important for you to know as much as the other person.

3. Always use polite words, even if the person you are speaking with doesn’t. This will mean everyone will always consider you as a polite, friendly person. From my experience, I know that this will make people want to speak with you more – and then you will have chances to say more about what you like, what you want to do and who knows, maybe you will make friends.

4. Always accept a compliment in a matter of fact way. “Oh, your English is great!” You should accept and acknowledge, but only a short “thanks, I keep trying my best to learn more” will be enough. You don’t need to say “oh yes! I have just passed all my English language exams and I had top marks!” Very few people would be interested in all this information. Of course, if they asked you “have you passed any exams in English?” then you could say this then.

5. Give yourself time by starting to speak in short sentences at first. “How’s it going?” “what’s new?” “I’m doing fine myself” These sort of well known conversational link phrases are fantastic at giving you chance to say something and then you should have an answer. When the other person is speaking, you just need another phrase ready in your mind “oh really?” “I see” “right, ok” – these are all useful to give yourself more time to form better sentences in your head when you need to do it – such as when they ask you a question.

So, see how you find it when you next have the chance to speak with a native speaker. See if my advice works for you as it has for me.

See you next time

Bye for now

 

 Standard Podcast [13:03m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Hello everybody

It’s nice to be here again to talk to you. I’ve been having some nice feedback about my podcasts recently and it’s always nice to receive it. Thanks to those of you who sent me messages of encouragement either here or on Livemocha.com.

I’m always glad to know that you find my podcasts useful and interesting.

Today I want to suggest an idea for those of you who want to know how your English is progressing and also a small English practice test.

My idea is this. I want to give you a topic here that you can read about and then you can write a small text in your own words to explain my text. Maybe between 50 and 100 words will be enough. Copy any words I have written – but don’t copy out my text word for word – or it will not be useful for the test. You must create a new text yourself in your own words.

If you have access to recording equipment, make a recording of your voice saying my words and also read out aloud your written text.

Keep this text and voice recording for a month and then do the same test again. Do not check your previous work and try to write the best text and speak as well as you can.

Record your voice again copying my voice recording and also your new writing.

Once you have done this – keep the text and recording safe for a few days.

Then get both recordings and texts together and listen to and read to the first one and then the second. You will be able to see if you have improved:

Your pronunciation, speed of speaking and confidence
Your reading skills – for how easily you can read and understand my text and your own
Your listening skills – how well you can understand this podcast
Your writing skills – how your written language has improved from the first piece of writing to the second – 1 month later

You can see how much progress you have made across all four language skills. I think this will be useful for you.

Now I will read out the text below at normal speed.

My country

Today I want to talk about my country. Did you know that I live in 4 different places? Well, I mean that my country has four different names.

My country is called England

Great Britain is the name of the largest island. Eire is the name of the next biggest island. There are many other smaller islands. Together these islands are called “The British Isles (Isles also means islands)

United Kingdom means England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. This is the political union of the country. The capital of the United Kingdom is London.

The United Kingdom does not have an official language – but of course, most people here speak English. Although English is the most common language, there are other languages in the British Isles. These are: Welsh, Scottish Gaelic, Irish Gaelic, Manx (Isle of Mann)

There was also a language that used to be called Cornish –this was spoken by people in the south-west part of England which is now called Cornwall.

There are many different people living in Great Britain. Those people who are born here are called “British” This is true even when their parents come from other countries

There are 50,000,000 British people living in the United Kingdom

The flag of the United Kingdom is very well know and is a red cross (for England) a blue cross for Scotland and “St Patrick’s cross” for Northern Ireland. There is no part of the flag to represent Wales – which is something that some people would like to see changed.

So, when I say “I am English” I mean that I live in one country of the United Kingdom of Great Britain which is called England

I hope you like this idea and I am very interested to know if it helps you judge your progress

Bye for now

 

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hello everybody

For my weekend words today, I want to talk about why sometimes it is difficult to understand native speakers, even when you may have been learning English a long time.

I discovered a long time ago that the language you hear in class with a teacher, or normally on sound recordings can be easily understood, and yet when you go to the country and listen to native speakers - you may not understand so much.

There are many reasons for this, and firstly I want to say - don’t worry about it. The more you worry, the more it will either frustrate or annoy you when this happens. Just accept that this will happen, the moment you set foot in the country.

Here are some reasons I believe can make listening to native speakers difficult:

1. There is usually some background noise - some examples:street noise, other people speaking nearby, television is on. This makes it difficult to concentrate on the person speaking to you.

2. The native speaker will hear you speak first and assume you know much more than you know - and they make speak quite fast - this makes it difficult to hear everything they say and make sure you understand it,

3. The native speaker may use dialect words, slang words or common expressions that you may not be familiar with - or only some. This makes it harder for you to understand, because you have first to understand the slang words or expressions and then translate that to normal speech and then understand it. Don’t be afraid to say “I am not familiar with this word/these words, what do they mean exactly?”

4. The native speaker can also make mistakes themselves— did you think of that one? There are few native speakers who speak perfectly!

5. The native speaker may have an accent that you are unfamilar with. In England for example, there are many different accents and some accents may clip the words short, use different sounding vowels or even miss out words. In the north of England where I come from, sometimes we clip words and drop “h”’s. This is especially done when we speak with family and friends. Here is an example:

Standard English: ” Are you going to come with me to the cinema?”

Northern accent: “Are yer goin’ t’come wi’ me to th’cinema?”

You can easily hear that the first is easier to understand than the second, but both are saying the same thing.

Don’t worry.In my experience, the native speaker will not mind changing his/her speech to make it a little more controlled and easier for you to understand - providing you ask!

So the key to understanding a native speaker better is to accept that you are not a native speaker - but a serious non-native learner and don’t be afraid to tell people you meet this fact. It will not mean they become frustrated with you, on the contrary - the native speaker will usually be very glad to make sure you understand everything - and even explain things more precisely to you. So you end up with good communication and a language lesson for free!

Bye for now

See you next time

 

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Hello everybody,

Today I have just decided to talk - no text prepared. So I will listen back to it later and write down for you what I said - so you can read along with me speaking.

In the meantime, for those of you who are learning English - see how you find it listening without text for the time being…

take care everybody…

Alan

 

 Standard Podcast [6:36m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

I hope you like my latest guitar tune

I hope you like this guitar tune I recorded today on my 12-string acoustic guitar…

Hello everybody
For my weekend words today I’d like to discuss ways to make language learning more interesting.
Often, people ask us why we learn one or more languages. We sometimes ask ourselves why. This question seems particularly interesting sometimes as we don’t always have easy answers.
Personally speaking, I often answer that I learn languages “as a hobby” like we do when we take photographs, collect things, read books, watch films.
Is it a good idea to compare learning a language to these activities that we would usually consider to be hobbies? I am not sure. I suppose learning a language is something that is interesting to do, keeps our minds occupied and there is something to be gained by learning - we eventually get to communicate with other people who speak the language - whether these are native speakers, or other people learning the language.
If we have no-one to speak the language with, then how do we keep interested in learning?
We need to find reasons than make us more interested in keeping going to achieve success.
Language learning is a long “journey” with many difficult aspects to encounter: remembering the words, understanding grammar, getting the pronunciation correct. It is easy to become demotivated.
One thing I think we should never do is say “sorry” when we don’t know a word, or make a mistake when we are speaking with someone who speaks the language better than us. I believe that if we do make a mistake and feel that we want to say something about the mistake, then we should say something like this: ” I enjoy learning the language (English, French, Chinese or whatever) and I make some mistakes - but I keep trying to learn to speak it better” This is positive and helps us and the people we are speaking with to understand that we know we make mistakes, but we don’t want it to stop us speaking the language.
Keeping going when we have no native speakers to talk to is difficult. I have a some suggestions to help:
1. A simple idea is to keep a diary and write something each day, or each week in the language we are learning. This will also tell us over time how much we are learning when later we read what we have written. This is the easiest way to keep the language in our heads each time we write something in the diary.
2. Another idea is to have a conversation with yourself. In the car, on the train, on a bus. Also, we can speak (silently) with ourselves when we are waiting for something: doctor’s waiting room, hotel room, train station etc. Although it’s not perhaps a good idea to talk to ourselves out loud in these sorts of situation, it can work if we quietly “speak” in our heads - we can try to remember the words for some things that we can see. For example, if we are waiting for a train, there is these words to think of” train”, “track”, “platform”, ticket etc.
3. A good idea I think is to try using a language learners website, such as this one: www.livemocha.com - here we can practice our languages with native speakers in different ways - writing, speaking , reading and listening.
4. Another interesting idea is to write a little about something that interests us. Then, when we later have the chance to speak with a native speaker - we can ask them to read it and see what they think about it. Not only will they be able to correct the text, but they will also learn something themselves from the text that we have prepared earlier - that is why I suggest making it about an interesting subject that we know enough about.
I’m always happy to hear your suggestions for subjects or comments on my podcasts.

See you next time

Bye for now

Hello everybody,

I hope you are all well. It has been a little while since I made a podcast. Thank you for all you nice messages.

Today I would like to talk about being positive and relaxed about learning languages and also being willing to take risks with language too.

Learning a language is a difficult thing to do, but as I have said before, we can always enjoy our language at any level. Young children do this. When we see a small child start to learn their mother tongue – they maybe don’t say so much at the beginning, They listen and maybe try some sounds that don’t sound like words. But later, when they start to say words, their mother or father will be happy to hear them say things and then they encourage them by speaking back to them – usually in a kindly way.

That way, a small child learns in a positive place with a friendly teacher (mother or father) and then the child enjoys using whatever language they have – they often don’t want to stop talking!

I think that as adults, we should try to copy this method a little. Of course we can’t act like a child, but we can use some of the attitude of a child: positive about learning, relaxed when we speak, read, write or listen. We can also not worry about mistakes – of course, try to correct these mistakes when we can or when someone helps us – for example if we are in a class.

My belief is that we can learn and at the same time make what we have already important.

We can also be willing to take some risks too. For example, when we speak with people we know who speak the language as a native speaker – try to see if we can push the language level a bit higher when we speak with them. If we make a mistake or use a wrong word, then maybe our friend will kindly advise us – without criticising us. It is the same with writing letters – try some things that are new to us. Of course, in exams this is different, because this is a test of what we know. But with letters, e-mails, text messages with friends – always try a little extra and see if you can get things right and learn more. When we listen – try to listen to language that is a higher level than we have ourselves – because we always understand more than we can speak.

The same thing with reading. Read short articles, magazines where there is conversation or interviews written down for reading like a conversation would be in reality.

So, we can be relaxed and happy to learn and still try hard to become better at the same time if we think about things carefully and we can keep getting better and better.

Take care and bye for now

Hello everybody.
For my weekend words this week I want to talk about conversation practice and speed of speaking.
Over the years, I’ve met a lot of people who are learning English as a foreign language. I’m always surprised how hard they try to learn English and their level of language, their high ability to handle difficult grammar points and how much vocabulary they have.
In some cases, maybe it is the first time they have had an opportunity to speak with a native speaker (me) and they want to be able to have an intelligent interesting conversation.
This means that very often, in order to develop the conversation, they speak much faster than they need to, and sometimes forget that a conversation is two-way - speaker and listener.
I often find myself doing a similar thing when I speak French or German. I speak faster than I should do. It is like I am in a race against time, to say what I want to say and hope that I have made myself understood.
As a native speaker of English, what I can tell anyone who speaks English as a foreign language is that you don’t need to rush when having a friendly conversation with a native speaker.
It is completely different from speaking exams or making a presentation - when accuracy and speed is very important. When you are having a conversation it is a two-way thing. You speak, the other person listens. Then the other person speaks and you listen.
To make this a more enjoyable experience, try speaking a little slower than you would normally like to and always allow a small gap for the listener to use certain phrases that let’s you know that they are listening. Words such as: “I see…” “really?” , “oh right..” ” do you think so?”, “ehm….well, you have a point…”
This makes the conversation truly two-way and you can learn much more. Speaking more slowly allows you time to think of more interesting words, more appropriate words, develop the conversation and allow the listener to correct you sometimes.
This way you will develop your language skills even more I believe.
Now you’ve heard my podcast, you might like to listen to it again as I am speaking at a normal conversational speed - as I would do if I were talking with my family, to my colleagues at work and people I meet in the street.
If I were to speak with a taxi driver, someone on the telephone when I am busy and situations like this, then I would of course, speak more quickly.
But this podcast is just to help you to understand that whilst maybe you think English people speak fast, only a few do in a relaxed conversation - and as I believe strongly -being relaxed is the best way to learn. Stressful situations don’t make good language learning situations I think. Such as:
* getting information for catching a bus or a train
* asking someone the time
* answering the telephone when you are busy
So, make use of each informal/friendly conversation you have to learn and enjoy the conversation!
* meeting someone on a train journey
* meeting someone on holiday
* meeting someone in an online chatroom
* discussing things in another language with friends who also speak the language
* meeting someone in a social setting, party, church etc
See you next time
Bye for now

Hello everybody. For my weekend words today I wanted to talk about using short newspaper, magazine or Internet articles to help develop language and also how, at the same time to understand more about a country’s culture as well as language. Also how to “think in pictures” to help make the text interesting and to retain vocabulary. If you find interesting articles like the one I have chosen, then language and culture start to merge together a bit more. These are not just words on paper or on a screen, but they make you think of situations and events in the past, at present or in the future.

I read somewhere that to learn a language well, we need to:

1. Understand the structure (grammar) of a language and have a good vocabulary.
2. Have the chance to communicate in a language with people who speak it well (Better still, those who speak it as a mother tongue)
3. Understand some of the culture of the country (or countries) where the language is spoken

No small task!

Having said that, all of us are learning new things all our lives and learning another language should add to the enjoyment of learning in a positive way. Always be pleased with what you know already - but keep learning as and when you can.

Today, let’s analyse a text that is about English culture. It’s about Pub signs. Many Public houses and hotels (where the word “pub” comes from) name the building and hang painted signs outside. It’s a long-standing tradition in my country.

I’ve copied a short piece of a bigger article to discuss. The full text is here:
http://www.britainexpress.com/History/culture/pub-names.htm#bio

So, I’ll read the text first

British Pub Signs - a short history
By Elaine Saunders

Everyone loves an “Olde Worlde” pub with its oak beams, horse brasses and roaring log fires. Nevertheless, no matter how old the pub itself, the name on the sign outside is probably the most historic thing about the place.

The idea of the pub sign came to Britain at the time of the Roman invasion. Wine bars in ancient Rome hung bunches of vine leaves outside as trading signs but when the Romans came here, they found precious few vines in the inhospitable climate. Instead, they hung up bushes to mark out the inns and the names Bush or Bull & Bush still survive………(text continues…)

This text is full of cultural references:

“Olde Worlde” is a way of describing old things as the pronunciation has a feel of times gone by when people spoke with more endings to the words

Pub sign
Oak beams
Horse brasses
Wine bar

And some good short phrases like:
“roaring log fires”
“precious few”
“vine leaves”
“at the time of the Roman Invasion”
“inhospitable climate”
“mark out”

Take some time to get a “feel” for what is being said in the text. The author wants to make it interesting and make you, as a reader think in pictures as well as words.

So, rather than reading through a full article that is difficult to read and becoming frustrated with it. Chose a small part of the text - say, the introduction and read it fully, taking it apart like a puzzle and then putting it back together again. This way you can practice all four skills:

Reading
Listening and Speaking (as you read out the text)
Writing (write about it in your own words and use the new vocabulary you learn)

Finally, use a dictionary to check the meaning of words or phrases you can’t guess well - more to confirm your thoughts after you have made a good attempt to guess it.

See you next time