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Plateau at B2/C1, immersion doesn’t work | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Advice Center |  | |
| pab Diglot Newbie Poland Joined 4197 days ago 8 posts - 11 votes Speaks: Polish*, English Studies: French | Message 1 of 18 16 May 2015 at 11:48pm | IP Logged |
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TL;DR: Been stuck on a quasi-advanced level for years. Immersion seems to have little to no real influence.
Ok, so I will try to be concise. I'm frustrated as hell with my English. Even though I read a lot [forums, articles, books] I still don't feel I'm fluent or can express whatever I want in a way I would like to. Also, listening is far behind other skills. Biggest issues are: 1) speaking in a rather simple way, despite knowing [passively] lots of more sophisticated words and phrases. [Writing this I'm not resorting myself to any dictionary or don't stop for more than a few seconds to find a better/more advanced word in order to mimic the way I speak]. Spent a lot of time in the past with religious regularity with anki, trying to work out what seemed to work the best but all-in-all the results are, in my opinion, discouraging. There is a poor ratio of words that end up in passive part of my memory to those that I manage to use in a regular chat. I can easily make my point understandable but it's the quality of the sentences that bothers me the most. It's still closer to a non-native high-school graduate that to an educated native. It's easily highlighted when I chat with various people in my job. I work in a multinational corporation and contact a lot of folks from the network each day. I feel I sound closer to those non-natives who don't really care about being extremely correct rather than those who came from the US or natives from the UK. I struggle to have an effortless chat with the latter :( Small talk and the real talking sound rather…uptight. 2) not being able to watch native materials with decent comprehension. This pains me very much and makes me feel terrible but after all these years (I'm 26 y.o, have started over 10 years ago my journey with English) I struggle to fully understand shows, interviews, podcasts, even football match commentary (which I watch at least once a week). Every single day I immerse myself as much as time allows in spoken English. Podcasts on my commute, TV series in the evening, in-between reading almost exclusively in English. My job is almost 100% done in English as well. Yet still can't watch an episode of Modern Family with even 90% comprehension. Funnily, a few weeks ago I translated subtitles to my native Polish of an episode of Modern Family. It was a piece of cake to translate from English subs. Would never do that just from listening though. And MF is not very demanding English-wise, I’d say. When I try to tackle my favourite British series (The Thick of It, Peep Show, Miranda and lots more) I struggle so much it makes me cringe and discourages to the point I gave up other languages… Now, that I feel so lost, I reached the point when I’m ready to pay for a dedicated plan to be back on a route to fluency. Every advice is welcome and will be appreciated. I have big faith and admire the HTLAL community, it’s unspeakable how amazing people post here. P.S If someone feels like having a language learning guinea pig – I volunteer! [just PM me] 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7206 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French | Message 2 of 18 17 May 2015 at 1:06am | IP Logged |
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Modern Family is very sophisticated in its dialogue and language. There are a ton of subtle jokes. Keep
watching if you are enjoying it. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Speakeasy Senior Member Canada Joined 4053 days ago 507 posts - 1098 votes Studies: German | Message 3 of 18 17 May 2015 at 1:34am | IP Logged |
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Hello Pab,
While I cannot offer a solution to your problem, I can at least empathize with it. Many years ago, at my request, my employer transferred me to a plant in the Québec hinterland, a region where absolutely no one spoke English. I made this move simply because I wanted to live in French. Although my French was abysmal on arrival, after about six months, I was “functional” in the workplace; that is, I could participate in routine office discussions. Nonetheless, when taking a coffee break with my fellow employees, I was at a total loss as to what was being said. Over the next two years, my French improved dramatically and I attained a level of B2-C1 in routine office discussions. Nonetheless, to a large extent, my problem of comprehension during the coffee breaks persisted. Quite frankly, it took me about three-and-a-half years before I could fully participate in the coffee breaks conversations. So, what seems to have been happening to me? Slowly, it dawned on me that my colleagues had grown up together in a small town. They had shared life experiences that they could recall with a few incomplete phrases that sent the other participants into peals of laughter. Lacking both the local history and the dialectal vocabulary, I simply couldn’t understand what they were talking about. Furthermore, as they were talking amongst themselves, in a relaxed setting, they were quite understandably making no particular effort to help me understand, nor were they interested in drawing me into the conversation (how could I contribute anything to a discussion of an incident from their childhood?). Now then, coming back to Modern Family or any other televised comedic or dramatic series produced for an American audience, you should be aware that these programmes are directed at a “local” audience, where “local” means “a broad spectrum of younger, hipster, Americans who possess the colloquial language in virtually all its variants and sub-cultures and who have similar real or vicarious life experiences to understand the ‘inside jokes’ and other ‘local knowledge’ that permeates the greater American society and upon which the script-writers draw for theatrical effect” … uh … meiner Meinung nach. As an example from 1980’s television, the American comedian/actor Bill Cosby once had a small skit wherein he relied upon a question that elementary teachers in the 1950’s might ask a small child as: “are you one-ing it, or two-ing it?” Bill’s use of this commonly-understood question, and what it implied, allowed him to turn the situation to which he was alluding into a joke that his audience greatly appreciated. I would be surprised if, in your office communications, you have come across the "one-ing it, two-ing it" question. If it’s any consolation to you, whereas English is my mother tongue (or at least Canadian English is my mother tongue), I do not understand 100% of what the actors say on American television today: the texts are scored for either dramatic or comedic effect, the speech is rapid, clipped and colloquial, and it is often filled with references that have no meaning for me. I am not a hipster and I never was. I’m in my late 60’s and, as I prefer to watch documentaries produced by the BBC, the PBS, and the CBC, I do not expose myself to rapidly evolving English language as it is apparently spoken on the street. As an aside, although I have spoken only French for the past 28 years, I do not understand 100% of television programmes produced in France, whereas I have absolutely no problem with similar programmes produced in Québec or, surprisingly, in Belgium. Don’t be so hard on yourself! Edited by Speakeasy on 17 May 2015 at 1:47am 10 persons have voted this message useful | |
| holly heels Groupie United States Joined 3887 days ago 47 posts - 107 votes Studies: Mandarin | Message 4 of 18 17 May 2015 at 4:50pm | IP Logged |
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Sometimes it's liberating to share your struggles. You are not alone. I have no brilliant advice, but it's possible your present study methods will one day reach critical mass and you will understand everything with ease.
Studying Mandarin alone, I am at war with my own mind. I want to stand under a waterfall and let the knowledge come cascading down, but it doesn't work that way. For me, painstaking effort is the only way to break down the mental resistance. It may be that you are going a little heavy on the reading. Some learners may reach a level where they can read Dante's Inferno in the original but they can't understand an Italian TV comic imitating a drunk. Only the learner can decide what is more useful. I commend any learner who emphasizes TV watching. Comprehension of TV is definitely the neglected stepchild of mainstream language learning, and should be extensively discussed throughout this forum. Have you tried daily self-talk about news events? For me it is a reasonably effective method of reaching C-level speaking ability, but a somewhat less effective method of acquiring consistent C-level comprehensive ability. I can blather away about the theory of evolution or native American basketry, but there are still days when passive skills go into sensory overload, especially watching Mandarin news from Taiwan. I can understand Mainland China news with very little effort. Standard talkradio format in the target language is helpful for me. 18 months ago I didn't know how native speakers talked, and now practically every sentence I speak has at least one colloquialism, just from daily listening. And even in these 18 months the Mandarin language has evolved, with one colloquialism after another being thrown out and replaced by another. After awhile a learner can gradually work in fast-paced TV news shows and then compare their comprehension level with news in their native language. As for the 90% figure for comprehension, that's a high threshold to have consistently, even for natives. 90% or better is only necessary for brain surgery or assembling atomic weapons. 6 persons have voted this message useful | |
| patrickwilken Senior Member Germany radiant-flux.net Joined 4534 days ago 1546 posts - 3200 votes Studies: German | Message 5 of 18 17 May 2015 at 5:05pm | IP Logged |
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While I am sure you have done lots of immersion over the years, you probably just need to do lots more.
What worked for me was trying to watch at least one movie or tv show per day (say 30-40/month). In addition try to read +500 pages of an English novel a month. If after six months you don't see a really significant increase in your English comprehension I would be surprised. 5 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Speakeasy Senior Member Canada Joined 4053 days ago 507 posts - 1098 votes Studies: German | Message 6 of 18 17 May 2015 at 6:46pm | IP Logged |
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Hello Pab,
I concur with the recommendations concerning television, news programmes, etcetera. While I imagine that there are numerous sources, here are a few links for video material with sub-titles: Youtube_Learn_English I presume that the service is free-of-charge. Yabla English The is a pay-for-view service. The materials seem to be, for the most part, commercial advertisements and training/motivational videos, all with transcripts. The only caveat that I would mention is that this company practices "automatic invoicing" through your credit card account. You can cease the automatic billing, but, to do so, you must check the appropriate box in your user account. FluentU The materials seem to be similar to those of Yabla. Owing to the "automatic billing" experience that I experienced with Yabla, were I to subscribe to the FluentU service, I would first determine whether or not they, too, use this kind of billing. Good luck with your studies! Edited by Speakeasy on 17 May 2015 at 6:50pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6598 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 7 of 18 18 May 2015 at 2:45am | IP Logged |
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Consider doing a MOOC (online course) at Coursera or similar. Doesn't have to be one intended for improving your English, simply on any topic you like.
3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Elenia Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom lilyonlife.blog Joined 3857 days ago 239 posts - 327 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: German, Swedish, Esperanto | Message 8 of 18 18 May 2015 at 10:02am | IP Logged |
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Hi Pab,
You mentioned subtitles in your post, but how do you usually use them? Do you simply watch with subtitles, or do you study the subtitles before/after watching? Studying the transcripts of a show can make a great difference. I can't tell you what's best for you, but I personally like to watch things through a few times with and without subtitles, and whenever possible I study the transcripts. While I have never used it, I know a few forum members have used subs2srs with success. Here's a link to eyðimörk's Italian log, which in itself contains a link to emk's subs2srs log, which contains a link to another log... Also, as Serpent appears not to have gotten here at the time of my writing this message, have you tried using lyricstraining? This is a pretty fun way of testing and improving comprehension using music. Learning and singing along with your favourite songs will also help you both in production and comprehension. Finally, have you looked at getting a conversation partner or tutor? If not, perhaps try italki. You can find a language partner to do an exchange with, or a dedicated tutor who will help you improve your English (which may be the better option for you). Good luck, I hope at least one of these suggestions help. 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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