Tag: English

  • Techniques for Memorizing Extensive Vocabulary Phrases Idioms

    Techniques for Memorizing Extensive Vocabulary Phrases Idioms

    Mastering a new language requires memorizing extensive vocabulary. Learn effective techniques to expand your word bank.

    Simple Techniques for Memorizing Extensive Vocabulary Phrases Idioms

    The hardest part is memorizing extensive vocabulary all those new words! It has to be done though. You cannot hope to master the language successfully without learning the words and phrases that make it up. The best way to expand your vocabulary and knowledge of idioms is through reading. Hence, making that list of new words is important! However, watching English movies will give you a bigger knowledge of idioms and phrases. Now, when you build your English memorizing extensive vocabulary as well as stock of phrases and idioms, you can disintegrate your learning into two levels:

    Fundamental level:

    There are 2000 to 2500 words which called the foundation blocks of English language. These words are not particularly listed but comprise of each first word for every meaning that you learn to the count. These include certain words like how, why, where which are not replaceable by another word. For phrases and idioms, the cardinal ones will fall in the fundamental category.

    Extensive level:

    Every word, phrase or idiom with similar or opposite meaning and intent as of the fundamental ones will form the memorizing extensive your vocabulary list for a more in-depth learning.

    Tips for memorizing extensive vocabulary

    • One word at a time: Do not try to learn the entire dictionary in a weekend. That will not do you any good! Start small. Once you find a new word, incorporate it in your daily use.
    • Spend every spare minute reading: Read, read, and read! Books will expand your vocabulary to a large extent. Pay close attention to what you are reading. If you do not understand a word, use a dictionary to find its meaning.
    • Context skills: Usually, while reading it is easy to decipher the meaning of a word from the sentence it is used in i.e. the context. In this sentence, you can figure out that the word ‘decipher’ means to understand or convert into normal language. If you come across a word that you cannot completely understand, before turning to the dictionary, trying figuring out what the word could mean. Then, you can cross check with the dictionary to see if you were right. This will build your context skills and it is important in English because a lot of words are similar and pronounced in the same way. Some words even have the same spelling but mean something completely different.
    • Practice: Of course, practice makes perfect. Use the new vocabulary you have, or you might forget it before you even get a chance to use it. After learning a word and understanding the context it is used in, make it a point to put that word in your sentences.
    • Use the dictionary: I know I said do not learn the dictionary in a day, but skimming through it and picking out words that fascinate you is a good exercise. Learn these words and use them so you get used to the context they are used in.
    • Play with words: Play games like scrabble or words with friends or razzle. These games can increase your vocabulary in a fun way. Ask friends to help you along the way. Since these games have a competitive twist, you intend to learn new words faster. Even Pictionary is a good game to learn new words. Since you are drawing the words out, the meaning of the word stays with you.
    • Crosswords: Make it a point to do the crossword every day. They can be a little overwhelming but with a little help, one can usually manage to complete the whole thing. They not only give you knew words as you go through the thesaurus, but your general knowledge also expands. I think this is a brilliant exercise for learning a language.
    • Write a journal: Start a written journal where you pen down your thoughts in English. This way you can practice writing as well. Remember to use the words you learned that day.
    • Listen: When others speak, listen! Observe how native English speaker use their words. Do not hesitate in asking what they mean if you don’t understand something. When you learn listen, you will also learn the usage of idioms, phrases, slang and colloquialisms. This will make you more fluent as well as understandable.
    • Associations: When you learn a new word, associate it with something so that you have an easier time recalling it later. It could be a color, a feeling, another word, or anything else. For example, ‘quintessential’ – one of my favorite words – means ‘the perfect example of something’. You can associate it with your favorite dish, your favorite actress or actor, your parents. Use these associations to remember the word.
    • Make a list of words: In a diary you keep with you, make a list of all the words you come across in a day. When you get home or in your free time, open a dictionary and find the meanings of each word you collected.
    • Learn the roots: Make it a point to learn the roots of the words. This is an interesting way to remember the words. Mostly every word in English has roots in either Latin or Greek. It is fun to learn how the word came about. Languages keep evolving, so a word that meant something in the 17th century would not mean the same today.
    • Use the word: Again, this point is so important that I am repeating is over and over again. If you do not use the words you learn; you will forget them. Learn to use the words. Make is a habit.
    • Prefixes and suffixes: English has a lot of words that use prefixes and suffixes. A prefix is a word that is added before another word. A suffix on the other hand is a morpheme that is added to the end of a word.

    Note: Steps to Start Improving instantly

    • Pick a subject or a noun,
    • Look for words and descriptive phrases in the dictionary which can describe or narrate about the subject,
    • Note down the relevant words with its meaning/s, synonyms and antonyms,
    • Now, using those words, construct descriptive sentences about the subject and place phrases in the right sequence,
    • Also, Repeat the process with other topics, objects and nouns.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    1. Why is reading important for expanding vocabulary?
    Reading extensively exposes you to new words, idioms, and phrases in context, which makes it easier to understand and remember them.

    2. How can I use context skills to learn new words effectively?
    While reading, try to guess the meaning of unfamiliar words based on the surrounding context before checking the dictionary. This practice strengthens your ability to decipher meanings independently.

    3. What are some fun ways to learn new words?
    Playing word games like Scrabble, Words with Friends, and crossword puzzles can make learning new words engaging and enjoyable.

    4. How can keeping a journal help improve my vocabulary?
    Writing in a journal allows you to practice using new words and phrases in context, reinforcing their meanings and improving your recall.

    5. What makes associations an effective technique for memorizing words?
    Associating new words with familiar concepts, feelings, or images helps create mental connections, making the words easier to remember.

    6. Why should I focus on learning word roots, prefixes, and suffixes?
    Understanding the roots, prefixes, and suffixes of words helps you break down and comprehend complex words, making it easier to learn and remember them.

    7. How can listening to native speakers improve my use of idioms and phrases?
    Listening to native speakers helps you understand the natural usage of idioms, phrases, and colloquialisms, enhancing your fluency and comprehension.

    8. What should I do if I come across a word I cannot figure out through context?
    After attempting to deduce its meaning, consult a dictionary to verify or correct your guess. This double-checking process solidifies your understanding.

    9. Why is it important to use new words regularly?
    Regular use of new vocabulary reinforces memory, ensuring that you retain and can accurately employ the words in different contexts.

    10. What are the benefits of learning a new word each day?
    Learning a new word daily builds your vocabulary gradually without overwhelming you, making it an efficient and manageable way to expand your word bank.

  • Easy Methods for Improving English Reading Skills

    Easy Methods for Improving English Reading Skills

    Boost your English reading skills with these helpful techniques. Increase your vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension abilities.

    Easy Methods for Improving English Reading Skills

    Learning how to read is an important part of learning English. It expands your
    vocabulary and gives you fluency. If you are in a country where English is the main language, you will not get by without learning how to read. Also, reading is substantially easier than speaking and writing, or even listening.

    • Remember to always read a book that is of your level. Do not get ambitious and read a book above your level because that would involve words that you will not understand. Reading English can get downright weird! Why? ‘Read’ and ‘read’ have the same spelling but different meanings as well as pronunciations. ‘Read’ is pronounced as ‘reed’, which is in present tense while ‘read’ is pronounced as ‘red’, which is in the past tense. A few steps for you to start improving your reading skills are explained below.

    Decide what you want to read

    Preferably, you should stick to reading a book that is your level. Do not decide to read Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte. You can do that when you have successfully mastered the language. That novel will not disappoint! You can read children’s books, newspapers, comics, or anything else. Once you have decided, go pick up the books from the library or bookshop.

    Take it slow:

    Reading takes patience. Do not try rushing through the book or newspaper. Concentrate on every word that you read. If you do not understand a particular word or phrase, look it up in a dictionary or on Google. Do not proceed without understanding it completely.

    Reread:

    Rereading is a good exercise. You know how when you watch a movie for the second time, you pick out all that bits of information that you missed out on the first time you watched it? Rereading does the exact same thing. At times, while reading, a person fazes out. That means they is reading but not really concentrating or understanding. A second read makes everything clearer.

    A list of unfamiliar words:

    Make a list of all the new words you come across with their meaning. After you finish reading the text, go through this list and try using the words in your daily life.

    Read aloud:

    Read every few sentences or paragraphs out loud. Concentrate on your pronunciation. This will help in developing fluency while reading. Fluency in speech is not the only thing that is important!

    Once you are done reading, summarize everything you read by either writing it down, or by speaking out in front of friends and family. You could also do this by yourself in front of the mirror. Remember to do this in English.

    Note: Steps to start improving instantly;

    • Pick an English book or topic over the INTERNET of your interest,
    • Keep a dictionary, pen and a paper alongside,
    • Scan, skim and start reading the text out loud in a subtle speech,
    • Break the words that are difficult to pronounce at one go into sounds and speak in a connecting flow. In you don’t know how that particular word sounds, refer to an audio dictionary and follow. E.g.: Anticipation = An – tee — see — pay — shun,
    • Note down new phrases, words and expressions you come across while reading and simultaneously take meaning from the dictionary,
    • On completion, review the topic in your head, Note the estimated time you took to read the text, number of words read and as a trend, try and speed up with every third time you read.
  • Ways to Leverage Your English Listening Habits

    Ways to Leverage Your English Listening Habits

    Discover the importance of English listening habits. Enhance your language skills by incorporating listening into your daily life.

    Ways to Leverage Your English Listening Habits

    The English Language has a lot of slang, colloquialisms and idioms. The only way to master these is by listening. Listening will improve your speaking capabilities hugely. You will learn the correct pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar, accent, and intonation. One can apply what you hear in your daily life.

    • Make it a point to listen to the radio, or T.V. while doing random chores. All human beings learn a language by listening. Make sure you watch a movie without subtitles.
    • Singing is a great fun way to improve your pronunciation. It can also develop fluency. Remember, developing your English listening skill is not only important to learn to language. It is also important because a person is not going to repeat himself over and over waiting for you to understand. Watching a movie without subtitles will teach you how to keep up with what a person is saying.
    • Role-playing also helps in improving speech. Watch an English movie that you are fond of over and over again till you understand it complete, and then enact the movie yourself. Repeat this exercise with another movie. This will not only improve your speech; it will also improve your ability to listen. Listening and repeating is the best way to learn a language. I know people who have learned a complete language perfectly just by watching the movies and listening to the songs. Of course, this works better if the language you are trying to learn is closer to your own native language. However, remember that English is a mix of a number of different languages.

    How to Strengthen English Listening Habits?

    Now, in order to strengthen your English listening habits for an extra leverage, let us take a look at the three types of listening one must indulge into and further ways to improving your skills in each.

    Type 1: Passive or Inactive Listening

    Passive listening plays a dormant role in the communication process. The listener simply listens and absorbs the meaning of the language and is not expected to react or put his views across. As a foreign learner, passive listening allows you to acquaint the verbal form of speech and take time to assimilate what you listen. It is the most comfortable way of taking massive input. Here are some important aspects you can instill to maximize learning from passive listening. Focus on understanding each word in individual sense and in correlation with the constructed sentences. Do not deviate your concentration in putting emphasis on preconception of the context while listening.

    • Rehearse and summaries in your mind what you comprehended from the speech as an aftermath.
    • Take note on how vocabulary is used interchangeably to get a hand on varied ways of expressive ability.
    • If possible, pen down the main frame of sentences in short hand for further reference.
    • Keep observation on the pauses used while conveying the emotion of the context. There is clause, sentence and paragraph pauses in conversational speech in a rhythmic pattern which you must focus on while listening English.
    • As a foreign listener, at times the speech might sound out of your pace to absorb the meaning of it. Do not get intimidated with the volume of words and sentences while listening as it might keep you from taking whatever input you can anyway.
    • In case of listening live to a speaker, note the lip movement made while pronouncing the syllables, vowels and consonants differently.

    Type 2: Extensive Listening

    Furthermore, and beyond specific information, Extensive listening includes listening to long textual narratives which in return builds the listener’s stamina to take in more and more bulk of conversational language and understand the contextual reference in larger lengths. After listening to a particular audio book on repetitive mode, you will observe that you are consciously picking up the pronunciation and can fairly summaries the meaning in portions. Extensive listening is a great self-tutoring method for learning second languages. While making extensive listening a habit, keep the following points in mind for exceptional learning.

    • Use different mediums like English audio books, recordings, videos, entertainment pieces, musicals, debates and dialogues for extracting a variety of accents, speech alterations and genres of vocal English.
    • To avoid hurtling up while listening extensively, pick a topic of interest and listen through till the end.
    • Since mostly you can repeat and take a pause while listening to prerecorded mediums, list down new words and phrases you come across and look up for the meaning of complex vocabulary to keep up with the flow of speech.
    • One of the best way to keep a log of different pronunciations while listening to voluminous text is to pen down the words as they sound. This will give you an edge on the phonic tone to understand what you listen better. 

    Type 3: Responsive Listening

    In interpersonal communication, responsive listening is the half kernel of the two-way process. Now as a non-native learner, getting into habit of responsive listening is a place where you are active as a listener as well as a speaker. Engaging yourself with this type of listening will build your grasping speed and make you spontaneous with the language. Once you start practicing it as a habit, you can further optimize listening through these elements: Responsive listening is a behavioral act. Keep the focal point on listening calmly rather than getting anxious about how you would frame your response. Ask the speaker to reiterate if you do not get the context clearly. It is always better and elucidating to seek clarification rather than responding in irrelevance. Take time to apprehend what you listen before jumping to a response

    It is observed that very often people practice prejudiced listening and neglect the minutes. As a settler to the foreign language you must keep a flexible and open mind while listening so as to ingest the actual meaning of what is being spoken. 

    Note: Steps to Start Improving instantly;

    • Watch an English movie,
    • Make an honest list of all the words that you thought were pronounced in a different way,
    • By the end of the movie, if your list is small, your pronunciation is not so bad. However, if your list is long, you need to work on pronouncing those words.
    • If you are not sure about the pronunciation, use the help of Internet tools or download a dictionary app on your phone to help with correct yourself.
  • How to Speak English Fluently?

    How to Speak English Fluently?

    Improve your speak English fluently with practice and gain the skills to speaking the language without stopping or stuttering.

    How to Speak English Fluently?

    Fluency is the ability to speak a language with ease, without any hiccups! Now, you must be wondering what I mean by ‘without any hiccups’. Do not take that literally! It is an idiom. An idiom is a group of words whose actual meaning is different from the literal meaning. ‘Without any hiccups’ does not mean speaking a language without suffering from a bout of hiccups, what it means is speaking a language without stopping and stuttering, and being unsure of how to use your words.

    Fluency means knowing how to use your words with ease and comfort. Fluency comes with practice. You cannot study every “How to speak English” book and expect to be fluent in the language. Practice is a must! Also, if you think you read well and so you must be fluent as well, you are mistaken! Reading and speaking are very different. The thing with leaning English is that you need not concentrate on the grammar while speaking. Concentrate on conversing. English is a weird language with a lot of loopholes. 

    Practice:

    Practicing speaking in English is a must. You cannot learn how to speak fluently otherwise. The reason for this is the slang that has infiltrated the language and also the utter lack of regard for grammatical rules while speaking. However, if one starts using correct grammar, by the book, English would sound extremely weird.

    Small talk:

    Learn how to begin a conversation. This will also grow your confidence. While standing in line, ask the person in front or behind you a simple question such as ‘What time is it?’ Try continuing with the conversation. If you have trouble understanding the person, politely ask them to repeat what they said. Normally, people say “I’m sorry?” but you could also say “Pardon”. 

    Confidence:

    Practicing English speech will require confidence. During a social gathering, start small conversations. Do not hesitate to ask the person to repeat him or herself. If you do not understand the meaning of a particular word or phrase, ask them to clarify. Chances are they know you are in the learning process and would gladly help. Do not think that you can go home and open Google translations and type in the word or phrase they used. This does not work! Also, do not feel embarrassed when somebody corrects you. You could also go to a karaoke bar!

    Listen:

    Reading and speaking is not enough. Listen to how people speak, the pronunciations, and the way words are use. Watch T.V., listen to songs etc. This way you are listening to other people speak and observe how they pronounce the words.

    Read books:

    Read novels. Concentrate on the formation of the sentences. Novels have dialogues, a conversation between two people that you can use to your advantage. Notice how people speak. They do not pay attention to the grammar as much as they do to talking. Also, when you are reading, mark every unusual phrase or word and find out what it means. Incorporate new words into your vocabulary.

    Do not translate:

    Avoid translating what you hear, or what you say. Translating a phrase from your mother tongue to English or vice versa will completely ruin the actual meaning of the phrase. It will also most likely be incorrect. Instead, use a dictionary.

    Study words and phrases:

    I’ve been using the term ‘phrases’ a lot. You may know a thousand words in the language, but putting them together and making an intelligible sentence could be difficult. This is because you are not concentrating on using the words you are learning. To speak fluently, you need to learn how to put words together into phrases and sentences.

    Idioms:

    Idioms are an essential part of the English language. You will find yourself dumbstruck if you do not understand idioms. You might hear somebody saying ‘break a leg’ to you before your English exam, and you would be baffled at why somebody would want you to break a leg. ‘Break a leg’ is actually an idiom meaning ‘best of luck’ or ‘I hope you do well’. Fluency in English requires the knowledge of idioms.

    Do not think of yourself as a student:

    To become fluent, think of yourself as a person who can speak English. You will make mistakes, but these are the building blocks. As a student, you would probably find yourself studying Grammar books. This is not important. To speak English properly, you do not need to study Grammar books. You would also be wasting a lot of your time by reading these books.

    Recruit a friend as a mentor:

    An English-speaking friend is the perfect person to be with when learning the language. Surrounding yourself with people who can speak English fluently is important. You can ask a friend to help you along the way. Make it a point to talk in English, no matter how scattered it sounds. Ask friends and colleagues to correct you if you are wrong.

    Movies and songs:

    Build a library of English songs and movies. This works better than just reading or listening to others speak. Songs and movies stick to your mind. ‘My Fair Lady’ is a good movie to watch since you are learning English.

    Think in English:

    Make it a point to think in English and not your mother tongue. Whenever you are talking to yourself or thinking, do it in English. This way you will become more comfortable with the idea of speaking and learning the language.

    Record yourself:

    Every night before going to bed, record your day’s events in an audio journal in English. You will find that you speak much better when you do not have to worry about embarrassing yourself in front of others. When you realize that you can speak reasonably well without stumbling around, your confidence will grow and you will find yourself initiating conversations. Incorporate these points in your day-to-day life.

    Note: Steps to Start Improving instantly;

    • Watch an English movie twice and concentrate on how a person speaks,
    • On a piece of paper, note down all idioms and colloquialisms you come across,
    • Look up their meanings,
    • Make your own sentences and try incorporating them in your everyday life.