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49 sats \ 7 replies \ @0xbitcoiner 18 Apr \ on: I have been an English teacher since 2006. AMA AMA
As a non-native English speaker, why can I understand almost everything I read and hear in English but have so much difficulty speaking and writing it? What can I do to improve my spoken and written English?
That’s because speaking and writing are productive skills, as opposed to reading and listening which are receptive skills. There are many reasons why your speaking and writing levels lag behind your reading and listening skills (I empathise because I’m a non-native Japanese speaker haha and face the same situation as you):
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interference from your mother tongue. You may think primarily in Portuguese, so it’s difficult for you to do a mental switch even if you want to. Switching to English just doesn’t feel 💯 natural yet.
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fear of making mistakes. Maybe you have a perfectionist nature and don’t want to utter half-baked thoughts. Which is why you hold yourself back in speaking and writing - which then hinders your improvement
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or maybe you speak and write decently enough (which is my impression of you), but because you are holding yourself to the standards of your Portuguese proficiency, you may feel let down by these skills?
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lack of opportunities in your everyday life to speak and write English and thus, polish those skills. (As opposed to listening to podcasts or reading SN articles xP)
Does any of this resonate with you? Sensei will tailor his recommendations when he has a better idea of your learning needs xP
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As a non-native English speaker, I understand the struggle with speaking English because I don't practice enough. If you don't practice regularly, it's normal for your speaking and writing skills to fall behind your understanding of the language.
I had the opportunity to learn Japanese for six weeks straight in Tokyo, focusing mainly on speaking. As a result, my reading and writing skills lagged far behind. While I could grasp a bit of katakana and hiragana, kanji remained and still remains a challenge for me.
I'm curious about your experience learning Japanese and which phone app you find most effective for learning more Japanese. I'm from the Philippines. Thanks.
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I’m from Southeast Asia too! Hi from Singapore.
Can I know more about your current studying habits so that I can suggest something that would fit into your lifestyle?
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I recently started DuoLingo. I don't have the chance to interact with native Japanese speakers. I've been in New Jersey for the past 23 years and as a programmer with my face glued to the screen, I also don't have many opportunities to speak English. Also, I just realize your username is into @cryptosensei :-)
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Selamat!
Sorry that it took me a while to get back to you. I must commend your commitment to learning Japanese even though you don’t get to use it in your everyday life. But as Stoic practitioners say, “The obstacle is the way.”
I am not actually learning Japanese anymore since I’m a father of two. I have also never tried out Duolingo, but I would imagine that it’s not very motivational because you just listen to recordings and maybe play some games. No interactive element, no incentive to really make the words sink in.
I would suggest pairing the studying of radicals Tofugu has an informative article on this. with something you like. Anime? Drama? J-Pop? The going may be slow, and it seems like a more haphazard way of acquiring Japanese compared to using Duolingo. But I think you will find it a more rejuvenating process.
Just to use an example from my life, yesterday I asked about the difference between the -ful and the -ous- suffixes. I got an answer immediately n the dopamine rush I received will motivate to learn more deeply about English haha
Hope this helps
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You're absolutely right. Thank you for your insight.
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Morning! (Or at least, it’s a new day in my part of the world)
How to improve my speaking skills
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Determine a list of topics that I’m interested about and would like to engage others in discussions with.
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Be conscientious about collecting useful phrases for them.
For example, in order to prepare my students for their oral examinations, I curated this list of phrases in regard to hawker centres (some kind of eatery in Singapore)
You can see that I categorised the phrases in terms of levels. I will get the weakest progress students to be familiarised with the simplest conversational words and stretch the confident speakers with more sophisticated vocabulary.
I also tried to introduce phrases that can be applied in many situations
- Practise using these unfamiliar phrases until they become second nature.
Deliberate practice is important. If we don’t get down to using new words conscientiously in our lives, we would not able to level up our speaking skills.
Hope this helps!
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