 #3 (permalink) Wed Jul 30, 2008 15:04 pm how to improve my english skills? |
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A language is a systematic means of communication by the use of sounds or conventional symbols. It is the code we all use to express ourselves and communicate to others. We know that English is the most popular language in the world. In this computer age, English is the only language that any one can understand. So we can say that, it has become as an ideal language for expressing our feelings. English language attracts people because of the wealth of literature and knowledge enshrined in it. That’s why we must make the best use of it to develop ourselves culturally and materially so that we can compete with the best in the world of mind and matter. It is our window to the world. So we have to learn the language unless we have the fluency in English language.
There are many way’s to develop our English language but I prefer four step to develop it. Those are:
a) Reading b) Writing c) Listening d) Speaking
Reading:
To develop this step we have to follow certain ways. Such as:
1) Realistic about our reading level: Most researchers agree that people learn most when reading something they understand almost all of. If there are one or two words per page that we have never seen before, that is about the right level. If there are three or more on every page, we should switch to something easier and come back later.
2) Read the lyrics to a song: We can read the lyrics of English song with a dictionary. If the lyrics are not given in the CD booklet, we may be able to find them on the internet.
3) Read a book that already read in our own language: Reading a book that we already know the story of. This not only makes it easier to understand and guess vocabulary, but we are also more likely to remember the language in it.
4) Read English language comics: Even more than books with lots of dialogue, comics can be easy to understand and full of idiomatic language as it is actually spoken. Usually, serious or adventure comics are easier to read and understand.
5) Read English language entertainment guides: Nowadays most big cities in the world have an English language magazine and or online guide to the movies, plays, exhibitions that are on in the city that week. Reading this in English is not only good value, but it could also guide us to places that English speakers are interested in and where we might hear some English spoken around us.
6) Read English language magazines. Like books we can read English magazines to improve our English reading.
7) Read an English language newspaper: Newspapers like “NEW AGE” are usually the easiest to understand, followed by mid-brow titles like "The Daily Express" or "The Daily Mail" in English. Popular newspapers like "The Sun" are more difficult because of the idiomatic, slangy use of language and the number of jokes in the headlines and articles.
8) Learn a famous speech or poem in English by heart: Although we may never hear or get the chance to say exactly that line, having one memorable example of English grammatical form in our head can make it much easier to learn other examples of the same grammar as we hear them.
9) Reading novel: It is also a better way to improve reading capacity as well as English language.
10) Read Children's books: If we try to reading one of their books usually little kids know their favorite books by heart, so if we stumble a little, they'll be able to help us. If we enjoy this method of improving our English, and we find our self to be pretty good at it, then try reading a few Dr. Seuss books. The rhyming will challenge us, but once we master it, our pronunciation of English, and our delivery will have been considerably refined and improved.
11) Visit language sites: Visit one of the many websites that deal with English like e.g. Dave’s ESL Cafe (www.eslcafe.com) or Learn English (www.learnenglishclub.com/, www.englishclub.com/).
12) Read dictionary: To learn or improve English language skill it is mandatory because it is necessary to increase our vocabulary.
13) Reading grammar book: It is also important because without grammar we can’t make a appropriate sentence. So we have to learn grammar as far as possible.
Writing:
We have to develop this step by following those ways which are written below:
1) Write a diary: Another daily writing task that can work for people who would be bored by writing about their own routines in a diary is to write about the news that we read and listen to everyday. This can give us a good reason to read old entries another time, at which time we can also correct and mistakes we have made and generally improve what we have written.
2) Write a book review: Another motivating and easy way to make our self write in English is to write a review for a site such as Amazon or Internet Movie Database. Many non-native speakers write reviews on sites like this, and if we have some special understanding of the book due to your first language or knowing the artist personally, that would be very interesting for the English speakers who read and write reviews on the site.
3) Write fiction in English or short stories: For people who find writing a diary about things that happen to them everyday boring, the best thing is to let we imagination go and write about whatever comes into our head. The advantage of this is that if we can't think of how to say something in English, we can just change the story to something that is easier to explain.
4) Draw pictures that have to learn: This can be a better way of learning vocabulary than writing translations or example sentences.
5) Playing writing games: Like word games is a better way to develop English language.
6) Article: Writing article is also very good to improve writing skills.
7) Write e-mail or send: Write e-mail or send it to different English blogs where they will mark our wrong sentence and solve it.
8) Writing something that we want to say: There are many things that we want to say. Writing those things in English is a better way to practice writing. Such as I want to say history that I suffer tomorrow so write it in English is a good way to learn it.
9) Write journal in English: Write journal in English is also a good way to improve English skill and we can write it in our free time.
10) Join Newsgroups: Google Groups and other groups that discusses our hobbies or any other topic that we are interested in. We have keep it in our mind, however, that language in newsgroups is often very informal and sloppy and can contain a lot of mistakes because also a lot of non-native speakers contribute.
Listening:
There are many ways to develop this step. Such as:
1) Listen to English music: Even listening to music while doing something else can help us a little for things like getting used to the natural rhythm and tone of English speech, although the more time and attention we give
to a song the more we will learn from listening to it again in the future. We can listen and read the lyric at the same time and this can be a good way of understanding how sounds change in fast, natural, informal speech.
2) Watch English language films with English subtitles: It is a good way to listening with reading and it also helps us to know English well.
3)Listen to the radio news in English: We can make this easier by reading the news in English first, or even just by reading or listening to the news in our own language then listen to the radio news in English and it will be effective.
4) English language exercise videos: This is quite similar to how babies learn, by listening, watching and copying. It is also good for your health.
5) Listen English conversation: We can listen it in different channel, in different TV serials to develop our English pronunciation.
6) Listen English debate: It is also a good way to develop our English language.
7) Use computer pronunciation analysis: Although most programmed that claim to tell us when we are pronouncing correctly or not don't actually do that, listening many times and seeing how our voice changes as we try to match the sounds and waveform given by a pronunciation CD ROM can be good practice and more motivating than just recording our own voice.
8) Listen to native speakers as much as possible: There are some good English teachers that have had to learn English as a second language before they could teach it. However, there are several reasons why many of best schools prefer to hire native English speakers. One of the reasons is that native speakers have a natural flow to their speech that students of English should try to imitate. The closer students can get to this rhythm or flow, the more convincing and comfortable they will become.
9) Watch English Channel: This is not only a fun way to learn but it is also very effective. By watching this we can expand our vocabulary and hear the flow of speech from the actors. If we listen to that we can also hear different accents.
Speaking:
This step can be developed by following those ways which are given below:
1) Sing English song: The next stage after understanding and memorizing a song is to sing it. Although some words have their pronunciation changed completely to fit in with a song, most of the words have the same sounds and stressed syllables as in normal speech. Remembering which words rhyme at the end of each line can also be a good way of starting to learn English pronunciation.
2) Say what we are doing in English as we do your daily tasks: As we are doing our chores, try creating sentences describing what we are doing. This gets us used to thinking in English without translating, and can be a good way of seeing what simple vocabulary that is around our everyday.
3) Online chat: The closest thing to speaking for people who don't have the chance to speak English is online chat, as we have to think and respond quickly, and the language is short and informal just like speech.
4) Occasionally talk to our friends in English: Many people find this a bit false or embarrassing, but if we think of it as a study club and set a particular time and or place, it is no different from studying math together.
5) Speaking with native speaker: It is an effective way to develop our English fluency. We can find them in different organization.
6) Talking dictionary: Now a day we find different talking dictionary where we can compare our pronunciation and can get the right pronunciation.
7) Presentation: Different presentation is also effective to make our fluency more clear.
8) Debate in English: It is very helpful to develop our English speaking.
9) Visit an English speaking country: it is very expensive then other’s method but it can be very effective for speaking for us because there we can find a lot of native speaker. The top 5 countries to visit are:
1. USA 2. UK 3.Canada 4. Australia 5. New Zealand
10) Repeat the sentences after hearing them carefully: After hearing from media or native speaker we have to repeat the sentence as same as speaker and it helps us to improve our speaking in English.
To learn any thing either it would be a language or skill need self interest and hardworking without them nobody can do any thing. That’s why proverb says, “There is a will, there is a way” but to develop English language we also have to remember that “Practice makes a man perfect”. So we have to practice it again and again to get proper fluency. It is not our mother tongue that’s why we face different difficulty but we have to overcome them by regular practice. If we are conscious and determine to develop our English we can achieve our success and if we are success in this sector we can run with the world and by this we can enrich our mother tongue. On that time we will also be able to develop our country because “Education is backbone of a nation” and English is the store house of knowledge. So English is the door of overall development and we have to open the door. This is true that it is our need to develop our English language but to develop our country is a responsibility for all. So we the student, teacher’s, conscious citizen have to come forward to develop our English language because it is the key of success of our country and to achieve the key we have to follow the way to develop English language skill. |
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Ralf
