It’s no secret that self study is essential
if you want to improve your English quickly. But what’s the
best way to go about it and how much time do you need to spend?
Let’s look at the last question first.
The short answer is “as much time as possible” obviously, but
it’s not just a question of doing a bit here and there,
whenever the urge takes you. You’ll soon find that other urges
are more urgent and your English will take a
back seat to whatever’s on Television, or whatever isn’t English.
The key to a successful study program is
setting aside a regular time each day (or every Tuesday or every
weekend) and
sticking to it.
Whether you can
afford half an hour a week or half an hour a day, make sure you
schedule it in and around your other activities and be realistic.
Remember too that short regular study
bursts are better than long intermittent ones.
If you
have five hours a week to spend on English, it’s better to do
an hour a day five times than one big long session on Sunday.
But if one long
stint is all you can afford, make sure you do it on a regular
basis.
So now that you’ve
timetabled in your study hours and put the kids up for adoption,
what’s the best way to spend the time? There is one
golden rule here that must never be forgotten. It takes precedence
over all others and is absolutely crucial if your self study
program is
to be successful.
DO THINGS YOU ENJOY.
Many of us have grown up with a deeply
entrenched belief that learning can’t occur without blood, sweat
and tears: we must suffer before we progress.
No pain no gain. Many students of English seem to think that
they must
assume an attitude of stoic resistance when confronted with
the
task ahead. That doing grammar exercises, learning vocabulary
lists, writing essays, are all essential steps that one must
go through and endure if progress is to be made.
This is a fallacy. In fact it’s worse than that. It’s the kind
thinking that actually impedes real progress because it
undermines an essential element in language learning – motivation.
Let’s have a look at an example to prove the point. One of
the classics of English language teaching is a book called “English
Grammar in Use” by Raymond Murphy. It’s certainly a
handy resource book for teachers but imagine the
prospect of doing all 130 units one after the other. It’d be
about as interesting as watching paint dry and pretty soon you’d
end up hating English and everybody called Murphy. All your
good intentions would be
buried at the prospect of another encounter with the present
perfect. Before long you would most likely stop altogether and
perhaps
put your failure down to a
lack of self discipline or resolve rather than the real reason
- you’re human and need to do interesting tasks in order to
stay motivated.
I should point out that there are people who enjoy doing grammar
exercises and reading the dictionary and if that’s the case
for you then
by all means keep doing it.
The whole point is to find activities which are fun for you
whatever they may be.
So what alternatives are there? The following list is far from
exhaustive but might give you a few ideas to
kick things off.
1. Watch video and TV.
Watching films regularly is an excellent way to improve your
English, not just because they’re entertaining, but because
they provide an
incredibly rich source of language.
Scriptwriters mostly imitate real speech patterns in their dialogues
which means they’re full of idioms, phrasal verbs, colloquialisms,
and
slang or in other words language as it’s really used. All you
need do is choose a film you like, put both audio and subtitles
on in English and then sit back and relax. Doesn’t sound too
difficult, does it?
This is a passive learning technique and is extremely effective
when done regularly over time. It may not have a great impact
on your speaking ability but will dramatically improve your
listening comprehension and ability to recognise vocabulary
and expressions.
Don’t worry about not being able to understand everything. If
you can follow the
plot and get the
gist of what’s being said, then that’s enough.
A more active
approach is to watch films a second time round and note down
anything that
grabs your eye. You could have a
stab at the meaning from the context and then just switch the
subtitles over to Spanish and see if you were right.
Aside from films, there are also many TV series available on
DVD
(Friends, House, The Simpsons etc.), which can be used in the
same way.
2. Listen to the radio
The
beauty of radio is that the language is authentic. Even for
lower level students who don’t really understand that much,
it doesn’t hurt to have it on in the background while going
about other things. You’ll start to
get used to the way English sounds and
pick out words you already know. For more advanced students,
radio
offers tremendous possibilities. The BBC (http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/d/)
has about eight channels to choose from with programs including
current affairs, sports, music, arts, drama, history, science,
religion, comedy,
you name it. Many programs can be downloaded and some come with
transcripts which
allow you to listen and read along at the same time.
3. Write creatively
Why not
drag out some of those idioms you noted down during the last
film or radio program and try to use them yourself. Put them
in a story. It doesn’t matter how
off the wall it is. Reusing new vocabulary, putting it in a
written context, and associating it with visual images is a
powerful tool for
enhancing memory. You don’t have to show the
story to anyone or worry about the grammar. Just do it for fun.
4. Read.
For those who love reading in Spanish, reading in English
will be no less enjoyable. It might require a little more effort
at first but once you’re
into the story, it’s content, not language that matters.
First of all, you’ll need to make friends with one of
the retail outlets in Madrid selling English books namely Pasajes
in calle Genova, www.pasajes libros.com, Casa del Libro in Gran
Via, and Booksellers in Calle Fernandez de la Hoz.
Graded readers, which are simplified books specially written
for students of English, are a great way to start off, and as
your English improves, you will be able to work your way up
the levels and eventually be able to read books in their original
version.
The text in italics above was changed
after it was translated.
For upper intermediate and advanced students, plays (in original
version) are a great option. They often come with audio as well
which means you test out your aural skills by listening first
and then listening and reading together second time round.
As for films, the language used is usually an attempt to imitate
real speech with all the richness
that implies. Classics include:
“The Importance of Being Earnest” and “An ideal Husband”
by Oscar Wilde.
“A Streetcar named Desire” and Cat on a Hot tin Roof” by Tennessee
Williams.
“The Crucible” and “Death of a Salesman” by Arthur Miller
“Who’s afraid of Virginia Wolf” by Edward Albee
(All of the above have been made into films as well).
Modern
playwrights such as Sam Shepard, David Mammet and Tom Stoppard
are also
worth having a look at.
Reading offers an
immense array of possibilities. There are magazines in English
on practically every subject imaginable. If you’re interested
in Scuba diving, model aeroplanes,
knitting, the lives of the rich and famous, rock climbing, car
mechanics or computer programming,
hop off down to VIPS or a newsagents and see if it’s there.
If not, it’ll surely be available somewhere on the internet.
Newspapers and magazines such as The Guardian, The International
Herald Tribune, the Financial Times, The Economist can all be
purchased VIPS or at Newsagents around Sol and Gran Via. They
make good reading for the more
business-minded.
It might be motivating to
keep in mind that as your English improves so does the range
of choice for improving even further.
5. Do courses related to a hobby
Let’s look at an example:
Imagine one of your hobbies is photography and you’ve been
chewing over the idea of how to learn more about it. Obviously
you could do a course in Spanish of which
there is no shortage to choose from. But
you could just as easily do it in English and
kill two birds with one stone. There are as more
on-line courses these days than you can
poke a stick at and a good many of them are in English.
Likewise, there are plenty of face-to-face courses in Britain
and Ireland
on everything from gardening to Thai Chii to Astronomy that
run over a day, two days, three days, three months, you name
it: the duration times are
as varied as the courses themselves. So next long weekend, why
not
grab a cheap flight to England and do a two-day cooking course
in Cornwall or a day-long seminar on “the ethics of cloning”
in London.
The great thing about this approach is that you’ll have
more chance of meeting people whose native tongue is English
than you would on say an English language course for example.
The text in italics above was changed
after it was translated.
There are other less obvious benefits too. Many linguists argue
that by focusing on a task rather than the words themselves,
students
acquire language naturally. They learn without realising it.
Taking up this option requires self confidence and a minimum
level of intermediate (preferably a little more) as there is
unlikely to be an understanding teacher prepared to repeat everything
five times just for your benefit. (Then again you might be lucky).
An
even more ambitious plan is to do a
degree in English. Not as
far-fetched as it sounds. The Open University in the UK (www.open.ac.uk)
offers a
huge variety of courses at both undergraduate and post-graduate
level, all of which can be studied by distance. You would be
required
to sit an English exam before being allowed in, but the level
demanded for most courses rarely
goes beyond CAE level (Cambridge Advanced Certificate in English).
What better way than to perfect your English and improve your
professional qualifications at the same time?
6.
Measure your progress
Seeing evidence of progress can be highly motivating, and one way of measuring that is by doing a test like IELTS
or TOEFL before you begin your study program and then the same
one again a year later to see how much you’ve improved?
IELTS (International English Language Testing System) is marked out of 10 (www.ielts .org), while TOEFL
(Test Of English as a Foreign Language) is out of 250. (www.ets
.org)
Or alternatively you could
enrol in one of the Cambridge exams (First Certificate, Proficiency
etc) as an added incentive. (www.cambridgeesol .org)
7. Use your imagination
There really are
all kinds of ways you can practise English.
If you’ve got a webcam and a
theatrical bent, record yourself doing
whatever comes to mind. Recite a poem, do an imitation of someone
famous, tell the story of your life. Remember no-one has to
know. You don’t have to publish it on You-tube.
For music lovers, learning
song lyrics is a brilliant thing to do and singing them even
better. It helps students link words together and is a great
for building vocabulary and improving comprehension.
The text in italics above was changed
after it was translated.
If you normally write up a ”to do” list, or keep a diary, try
writing it in English. Beginners could consider labelling everything
in their house with
stick on signs: e.g fridge, bed, cup, drawer, etc, Spend five
minutes before you go to work thinking in English about all
the things you have to do during the day. Talk to yourself,
talk to the cat.
In short,
surround yourself with English:
immerse yourself in the language. With a little imagination
you can surely
come up with many more ideas of your own.
Finally, whatever study plan you decide on, I highly recommend
you buy both a monolingual and bilingual dictionary, Digital
format is probably better than book format as
nowadays most dictionaries have pronunciation models which can
be
invaluable. It’s also quicker and you’ll feel less lazy about
looking up “strange words”.
A last word
Although self study can and should be fun, there may be moments
when enthusiasm
wanes and your objectives seem impossibly
far away.
To this I would like to throw in a couple of
sayings which I think best
sum up what one should remember at such times.
First, a five-thousand kilometre march begins with one step.
And second, "sin prisa pero sin pausa."
Just keep
chipping away.
You’ll get there in the end. And
at the risk of sounding like a
broken record player, never
lose sight of the golden rule, the one that takes precedence over
all others – enjoy the journey.
the best way to go about it - la
mejor manera de enfocarlo whenever the urge takes you - cuando a uno le apetece take a back seat to whatever - muy por detrás de cualquier setting aside a regular time each day - fijar un momento específico
del día sticking to it – respetarlo regular study bursts - pequeñas
sesiones de estudio regulares one long stint - una sola sesión larga timetabled in your study hours - programado el horario de
estudio golden rule - regla de oro is to be successful - lograr el éxito a deeply entrenched belief - la creencia firmemente arraigada no pain no gain - hay que clavar los codos assume an attitude of stoic resistance
- adoptar una actitud de resistencia estoica task ahead - tarea que se les presenta one must go through and endure - uno debe seguir hasta el
final undermines an essential element - ataca al que quizá
sea el elemento clave handy - muy útil prospect of doing - la perspectiva de hacer all your good intentions - todas tus buenas intenciones would be buried at the prospect - se van al traste ante la
idea put your failure down to - atribuyes tu fracaso a lack of self discipline or resolve - no tienes madera I should point out that - conviene matizar que by all means - sin dudarlo the whole point - la idea kick things off - para empezar an incredibly rich source of language - fuente increíblemente
rica de sustrato idiomático scriptwriters - guionistas slang - vulgarismos a more active approach - una técnica más activa grabs your eye - llame la atención you can have a stab at - puedes intentar the beauty of - la ventaja de pick out words - reconocer las palabras offers tremendous possibilities
- abre un enorme abanico de posibilidades you name it - etc. transcripts - transcripciones Why not drag out some of those idioms
...? - ¿Y qué tal si escogieras algunas de esas
expresiones ...? off the wall - descabellado story - relato once you’re into the story - cuando
estás metido de lleno en la trama as for films - como sucede con las películas with all the richness that implies
- con toda la riqueza que ello conlleva also worth having a look at - También
merece la pena echar un vistazo playwrights - dramaturgos offers an immense array of possibilities
- ofrece numerosísimas posibilidades knitting - el punto hop off down to - pásate por the more business-minded - para
personas más orientadas al mundo empresarial keep in mind - una buena motivación es pensar there is no shortage to choose from
- no tendrás ningún problema para encontrar could just as easily do it in English
- resultará casi igual de fácil encontrar uno
en inglés kill two birds with one stone -
matar dos pájaros de un tiro cursos por Internet - on-line courses than you can poke a stick at - de los que uno se pueda imaginar a good many of them - gran parte de ellos likewise - por otro lado on everything from - que van desde as varied as - la variedad está servida why not grab a cheap flight . .
.? - ¿por qué no cogerte un vuelo barato ...? students acquire language naturally
- los estudiantes adquieren el idioma de manera natural even more - aún más far-fetched - descabellado a huge variety - una enorme variedad you would be required to sit an
English exam - se requiere presentarse a un examen de inglés the level demanded for most courses rarely goes beyond - el
nivel exigido para la mayoría de los cursos no suele
superar What better way than to ...? - ¿Qué mejor que
...? measure your progress - medir el progreso is marked out of 10 - se califica en una escala de 0 a 10 enrol - inscribirse all kinds of ways - un montón de maneras if you have a theatrical bent - si tienes debilidad por el
teatro whatever comes to mind - lo primero que se te ocurra song lyrics - letras de canciones stick on signs - pegatinas in short - en pocas palabras surround yourself - rodéate immerse yourself - sumérgete come up with many more ideas of your own - que se te ocurren
muchas ideas más finally - por último nowadays - últimamente invaluable - muy útiles enthusiasm wanes - el entusiasmo decaiga your objectives seem impossibly
far away - el objetivo parezca demasiado lejano e inalcanzable sayings - dichos best sum up - resumen a la perfección keep chipping away - sigue adelante, pasito a paso you’ll get there in the end - al final llegarás a buen
puerto at the risk of sounding like - aun a riesgo de sonar como broken record player - disco rayado never lose sight of - nunca pierdas de vista
DO THINGS YOU ENJOY.
the best way to go about it - la
mejor manera de enfocarlo
How To Learn A Language by 