I took a mock exam just now.
I'm depressed. I realized that my English doesn't improve AT ALL!!
My weaknesses are as the same as before. One is that I can't read English quickly. The other is listening. I wonder what I have been doing.
Should I rebuild my studying scheme more strictly?
Anyway, I will take another mock exam tomorrow in order to getting used to an exam, then I'm going to take the real exam the day after tomorrow.
9 comments:
Well good luck on the exam. I know how you feel when it comes to improving. Sometimes it feels like you really aren't improving at all, but in reality you are. When you are first studying a language, a small improvement may make a big difference in your overall ability, but as you get better and better the effect that the small improvements you are making do not seem as significant. But you are still improving . . .
I guess when you hit the intermediate stage, language learning can be kind of frustrating, because its kind of a slow grueling pace to fluency from there. . .
Anyway, maybe you have posted it on the site already, but it would be interesting to hear specifically what you do to study English. I have my own study methods, but I wonder if there are things that other people are doing, that would help me improve. So maybe its good to exchange ideas. . .
Peace!
Herm,
Thank you for your kind words.
When I can't see any improvement, it's sometimes damaging to motivation.
But, I don't give up!
My study methods are...
I used a short dialogue which is for about one and a half minutes.
1) Listen to a dialogue repeatedly without seeing its text.
2) Dictation
3) Repeating
4) Shadowing
5) Overlapping
Then, move on to next dialogue.
It's my main study.
Another study is,
I repeatedly say English sentences in my grammar book so that I can say them spontaneously.
Plus, I read English books and watch TV in English as much as possible. I heard "input" is very important to study languages.
How about you?
Hey Sand. Thanks for sharing.
I also do dictation and shadowing. What is "overlapping?"
Some other things I do are:
1) I make pretty heavy use of a flashcard program called Anki, which is here: http://ichi2.net/anki/
I enter sentences from my grammar books, vocabulary, kanji, etc. You can use it from your cellphone, which I really like when on the subway or somewhere . . .
2) I found some Japanese dramas that have exact subtitles in Japanese (as well as English). So I will watch it once with the English subtitles to understand the story generally. Then watch it a few more times slowly with the Japanese subtitles on (I rewind a lot to look up words I don't know). Then after I can watch it and understand it about 100% with the subtitles on, I will watch it a few more times with the subtitles off until I can understand it.
3) I found a way to download news clips from this website:
http://news.tbs.co.jp/
Which has almost an exact transcript of the video as well. So I will read the article and look up the words I don't know, and, after I understand that, listen to the video over and over again until I can understand it too. Or sometimes I'll have a friend record a newspaper article that I found interesting. Or read/listen to an audiobook.
In general, I think reading to something, and then listening to the same thing, is a good way of having it really sink in...
Right now, when I do shadowing, I use a special book just for shadowing, which has really simple sentences. But I would like to start shadowing real Japanese, like a character in a movie. I think that would be really good practice. . .
ああ、おまえはなにをして来たのだ ^___^
Hi sandさん
Haven't seen you on lang-8 for a while.
I hope your exam went well last week?
Herm,
Thank you for letting know me your ways to study.
I'm also using Anki! I think it's very good software. I use it on my PC. I didn't know it can be used from a cell phone.
Overlapping is...
Shadowing is saying the sentences following (chasing) what other says, isn't it? Overlapping is saying the sentences at the same time as other says. So you can find how your speaking is different from a native speaker's speaking, and adjust them.
If I find any other good ways to study, I'll post them on my blog!
Telini,
Thank you for visiting my blog and posting the comment!
My exam was so-so. haha. (^.^)
I haven't posted entries on Lang-8. I will start again soon!
Yes, I'm feeling that ああ、わたしはなにをして来たのだ ！
Bravo, brilliant idea
Your blog keeps getting better and better! Your older articles are not as good as newer ones you have a lot more creativity and originality now keep it up!
Thank you very much! I'm happy to hear that. (^^)
(I'm so sorry for my too late reply. I haven't access my blog for a while.)
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