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Intensive reading | ||
Tags: Reading | Learning Technique/Method | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies |  | |
| cpnlsn88 Triglot Groupie United Kingdom Joined 5040 days ago 63 posts - 112 votes  Speaks: English*, German, French Studies: Spanish, Esperanto, Latin | Message 1 of 6 07 December 2014 at 6:22pm | IP Logged |
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Practices differ regarding intensive and extensive reading. I read quite a lot and
tend to look up words as I wish depending on what I want to get out of what I'm reading, so, as I say, I don't make a difference between extensive and intensive reading and if anything have given attention to the more extensive side of reading. Now I'm interested in trying out intensive reading activities and strategies and am on the look out for how to make reading intensive, how to choose material and so on. Ideas I have had so far include looking up words in a monolingual dictionary, identifying grammatical constructions that surprise me or I haven't yet mastered and rereading after the intensive work. Anyone else use intensive reading to good effect with tips or ideas as to how to make this more effective? 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| patrickwilken Senior Member Germany radiant-flux.net Joined 4536 days ago 1546 posts - 3200 votes Studies: German | Message 2 of 6 07 December 2014 at 8:31pm | IP Logged |
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I've been reading for a couple of years with ebooks, using a pop-up dictionary to look up the meaning of any words I don't know as I read. This is probably the simplest way to intensively read, and I found it quite effective for learning vocabulary.
More recently I have been using Readlang and Firelang to look-up any words in books and on the web that I don't know, which has the advantage I can easily generate Anki cards of unknown words for further study. I recently made a post in my log about what I'm doing here: http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=36720&PN=1&TPN=28#520542. Edited by patrickwilken on 07 December 2014 at 8:32pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| shk00design Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4447 days ago 747 posts - 1123 votes Speaks: Cantonese*, English, Mandarin Studies: French | Message 3 of 6 08 December 2014 at 4:36am | IP Logged |
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Last month I was in Hong Kong for a 2 weeks visit. Got caught up with the local news about the "Umbrella
Movement" for democracy. The apartment I was staying has an area downstairs there they would keep several newspapers for the residents. I would start with the English edition of the "S. China Morning Post" and then the Chinese editions including Apple Daily, Ming Pao & Singdao. I can recognize up to 90-95% of the Chinese characters. The ones I don't know I can scribble it into an iPad and use an online dictionary. After returning to Canada I'm still keeping up with news in Hong Kong by reading free articles online. Every time I come across an unfamiliar character, I would Copy & Paste it into an online dictionary. In the old days people had to look up a character by radical and count the # strokes. There are words in a newspaper article I would skip since going to a paper edition of a dictionary was too much of a hassle. Now I can just look them up with a few keystrokes on a computer. Reading is a good way to keep up with a language. The newspapers always have a few articles of interest even if you get turned off by conflicts in Africa or the Middle-East. A month ago I came across an article about Marco Polo and his travels and made a rough translation from Chinese to English and forwarded it to somebody interested in that period of history. The only part I had to look up are foreign place names in Chinese and the English equivalent. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6706 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 4 of 6 08 December 2014 at 1:53pm | IP Logged |
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When I do intensive reading I primarily want to learn linguistical facts - which doesn't prevent me from being fuzzy about the topic and style of my source. And one thing more: I write things down if it is humanly possible (in the bus back home from my job it isn't).
In many cases I combine intensive reading with verbatim copying because I feel tempted to read too fast and carelessly if I only read - though strictly speaking it isn't pure intensive reading anymore then. And as I mentioned: in the bus back home from my job it isn't possible to take notes, but I still try to understand every word and every grammatical feature in the text. Definitions are nice, but sometimes they hit reality and get bent. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4912 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German | Message 5 of 6 08 December 2014 at 2:34pm | IP Logged |
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The only time I have practiced intensive reading recently was on the Amelie script. I put every unknown and hazily known word on a spreadsheet, and got a translation from online dictionaries (usually the Collins French dictionary). In the next column I put the IPA pronunciation, and then the original sentence in the next column. I used internet searches to help with any phrases I didn't understand (e.g. word reference forums, etc). After going through the whole text, I read it intensively again, improving the spreadsheet. Then I read the text a third time without needing to look up most words.
You don't need a monolingual dictionary to read intensively, if your goal is to understand a particular text. If your goal is to meander around in the language, then a monadic might be fun. But if you're using a monadic, why not also use a monolingual grammar? Actually, forums with discussion in French about French phrases are the most helpful monolingual resources for me. I think the re-reading part is important to cement what you learned on the first pass. Without re-reading, you've potentially wasted a lot of time with reduced benefit. 5 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Ogrim Heptaglot Senior Member France Joined 4642 days ago 991 posts - 1896 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, Spanish, French, Romansh, German, Italian Studies: Russian, Catalan, Latin, Greek, Romanian | Message 6 of 6 08 December 2014 at 4:16pm | IP Logged |
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I can strongly support Jeffers when it comes to the benefit of re-reading. I worked quite intensively last summer with some short fun stories in Russian, doing word lists and making sure I understood the grammar in each and every case I was unsure. However, when I returned to the texts a couple of weeks ago, I had forgotten more than half of the vocabulary I learnt five months ago.
I've found it useful e.g. to print out a news story and read it intensively making a word list. I then leave it aside and pick up the article again two days later. When there is a word or a sentence I don't understand, I start making a new word list. I repeat this once more after another two or three days. If I then pick up the article for a fourth time, let's say after a week, I normally experience that I don't need to look up words any more, I will remember them. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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