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Can you read with the same fluency...? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| nescafe Senior Member Japan Joined 5409 days ago 137 posts - 227 votes  | Message 41 of 61 25 March 2010 at 6:12pm | IP Logged | ||
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We have a great difficulty. One does not know what is going on in his mind exactly, and the harder anyone does not know what is happening in others mind! With the word "quick seach" I meant that, just seeing a page filled with Kanji and Kana, not reading it and not knowing what are in it beforehand, My eyes are somehow attracted to spots which are inetersting to me naturaly, or automatically. I do not think I subcontiously read other places than those spots...This is kinds of "Where is Wally" game. Seeing, and finding something by its shape. Although not reading them I must get information from those lines of Kanjis and Kanas because I react to meanings of words: which is interesting and which is not.
I agree with Captain Haddock. In any language well educated people (especialy those who like online communication) will be able to read in more efficient way than subvocalizing reading, and Chinese character will allow more efficient shape-reading. It makes sentences shorter, and Its compliated shapes give more hints for scanning. Edited by nescafe on 25 March 2010 at 11:51pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| vb Octoglot Senior Member Afghanistan Joined 6422 days ago 112 posts - 135 votes Speaks: English, Romanian, French, Polish, Dutch, German, Italian, Spanish Studies: Russian, Swedish | Message 42 of 61 25 March 2010 at 6:58pm | IP Logged | ||
It doesn't follow that one isn't subvocalising - the eyes might skip along, but only because the brain can fill in what it doesn't perceive directly, which it then subvocalises! btw by subvocalisation, I also mean 'the voice in one's head' (both involving phonological processing). You might have reached 1800 wpm but did your comprehension suffer as a result? It may become impossible to articulate words at that speed but still possible to 'hear' in one's mind. Or, one might choose to flit over those parts of the text that seem unimportant (and, by not processing phonoligcally, consequently lose comprehension) and attend to ostensibly important parts more closely. However, this would not be testing reading speed as much as literary awareness. If reading for comprehension didn't involve some kind of phonological processing, then I would expect far higher reading rates to be possible - the 10,000 wpm+ that some speed reading programmes claim (eg. photo reading). No-one has proved that this kind of speed is possible. Edited by vb on 25 March 2010 at 7:39pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Bao Diglot Senior Member Germany tinyurl.com/pe4kqe5 Joined 5766 days ago 2256 posts - 4046 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin | Message 43 of 61 25 March 2010 at 8:13pm | IP Logged | ||
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I also can sing 'on autopilot' (it sounds even worse than normally) while reading an unrelated text. That doesn't mean that I don't process the text I read as language rather than as a flow of abstract bits of information.
I certainly can read at 900 wpm in English and German (depending on how complex a text is and how fresh I am), and I subvocalize for sure - when I actually read and don't browse the text for a certain bit of information (which I of course do faster). Funnily enough, I am experimenting with blind shadowing and one of my biggest problems is that I often end up shadowing automatically while daydreaming. I can't daydream while I actively process information I am reading or hearing ... 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6909 days ago 4250 posts - 5711 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 44 of 61 26 March 2010 at 12:30am | IP Logged | ||
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I read way faster than I speak. As long as I understand the content: two pages per minute (Swedish/English), up to three pages per minute if it's an "easy" text. At least one page per minute in German and Spanish, slightly slower for French and Russian. I have watched TV and movies with subtitles since I was four (1977).
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 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6703 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 45 of 61 26 March 2010 at 1:12am | IP Logged | ||
This may be a slight digression, so I'll be brief. When I speak about 'extreme speed reading' it something I do to find something specific. It could be a particular sentence or even a particular construction, such as a particular kind of relative subordinate. Another name for this activity is 'skimming'. To quantify the concept I have just done a practical test: I took a book in Danish (Grimbergs Verdenshistorie) and put myself the task to find the first mention of the Danish king Frederik the VI, who lost Norway to the Swedes. It took approximately one second per page to find such an information, with 4-5 eye fixations on each page. And afterwards I would be able to say that the text I read dealt with the last part of the Napoleonic Wars, but not much more. Then I tried some 'regular' speed reading, i.e. reading as if I wanted to do it fast, but also understand the text I was reading. In this case I got the optimum speed with an eye fixation for each 2-3 cm or so, corresponding to 4-6 fixations pr. page, which still took less than 5 secs pr page. With around 500 pages in the book I used it would mean that I could get through the book in 40 minutes plus the time it takes to turn the pages. Allowing for sundry distractions, let's say two hours for one volume of Grimberg, which actually sounds realistic. I then tried a Lonely Planet guidebook, but it has at least twice as much text on each page as Grimberg. So instead I grapped some of the dusty old novels on my shelves. Fives page of Frank Herbert's "Dune" took around 50 seconds (English), five pages of Jules Verne's "Vingt mille lieues sous les mers" took around 70 seconds (French). Then I became a bit adventurous and wanted to take a Portuguese novel, but accidentally got hold of "Narracions e outres prosas" by Alfonso R. Castelao, which is written in Gallego (which is not even on my list over active languages or dialects) - and then 5 pages of full text took more than two minutes. The thing that slowed down my speed was that I couldn't just glide vertically down through the page as I do with a Danish or English book, I had to let my gaze sweep across the page almost line for line, else I wouldn't understand the text. So a five hundred page book in Danish or English might take 2-3 hours including overhead, while a book in Gallego with a comparable typography would take twice as long. And what consequences does this have for language learning? ABSOLUTELY NONE! If you want to learn a language then speed reading is just about the most idiotic thing you can do, because it builds on the principle that you skip everything you don't understand or can't explain. And to learn a language you have to be attentive to the formulations even when you do extensive reading. So in this game the speedy hare would loose and the slow turtle would win the race. Edited by Iversen on 26 March 2010 at 1:22am 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| katilica Bilingual Diglot Groupie United States Joined 5471 days ago 70 posts - 109 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish* Studies: French, Catalan | Message 46 of 61 30 March 2010 at 10:09am | IP Logged | ||
Oh no, definitely try not to look up every word and just enjoy the story. Believe me, if you know enough of the language you will be able to make sense of it even if you don't know every single word. Unless a word is really bothering you or you are trying to acquire an SAT-like vocabulary, I would advise against it since you'll end up making it a study session and won't even be able to focus on the plot. Spanish is my first language but I never received a formal education in it so technically, I should only know conversational Spanish. However, my parents took me to church a lot so thanks to the bible I know a lot of (sometimes unnecessary) words. My guess would be that you probably have a greater Spanish vocabulary than I do, though perhaps not a greater understanding of those, 'because it just is that way' rules so my guess is you would probably do just fine. As for my reading skills, I can read at a very fast speed in Spanish without stumbling through words a lot though I occasionally get tongue-tied due to the speed I am reading at. People tend to make fun of me and tell me to slow down and respect the commas. I always tell them I do, just at my own speed. I can read French out loud at a normal speed although I find my self reading a paragraph over and over again since I get caught up in seeing how many times it takes me to be able to read it without stumbling. This however, is just an annoying habit I do in any language especially English (you would think I was training to be on the nightly news). Strange as it seems, I find that reading out loud helps a lot with my language skills since the words stay in my head and it helps me speak clearer and think quicker when speaking in the target language since through repetition I catch things I didn't quite catch the first time around. Sorry for the endless commas and run-on sentences but my thoughts were flustered. Edited by katilica on 30 March 2010 at 10:12am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| brian91 Senior Member Ireland Joined 5444 days ago 335 posts - 437 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 47 of 61 31 March 2010 at 6:19pm | IP Logged | ||
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At the moment I read German newspapers, and understand the text a little. However, I still use a dictionary quite
often. I'm not sure whether this is good or bad. If I do read an article without a dictionary I say to myself afterwards ''Well, that didn't go very well". So I think I should stick with using a dictionary for the moment. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6703 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 48 of 61 01 April 2010 at 12:13am | IP Logged | ||
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Try to look up some of the unknown key words before you actually try to read a paragraph, - that's better than looking up words in while you are in the middle of the text. And if you have had to interrupt your reading in the middle of somewhere to consult your dictionary then read the passage again without using it. Getting through a text in this way takes slightly longer, but you will experience the all-important 'flow' in your reading.
The purpose of extensive reading should not primarily be to learn new words, but to learn to understand the meaning on the fly, based on the words you already know, and to get a feeling for the proper way to use those words. Edited by Iversen on 01 April 2010 at 12:16am 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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