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Beyond C2 and diminishing returns | ||
Tags: Advanced Level | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Advice Center |  | |
| betelgeuzah Diglot Groupie Finland Joined 4193 days ago 51 posts - 82 votes  Speaks: Finnish*, English Studies: Japanese, Italian | Message 1 of 18 05 February 2013 at 1:34pm | IP Logged | ||
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Even though I have moved past "serious" English studies long time ago, it doesn't mean I don't want to improve further. It's hard though.
I don't know how to do it properly. I consider myself fluent, but yet I'm not even close to acquiring a native-level comprehension and especially oral output. I've decided to buy a book/cd course for pronunciation practice for the next Summer but other than that I'm not sure how to go about this. I find it really hard to practice my writing, as I feel I have mastered the basics so it's harder and harder to define my flaws and correct them. I guess I could look at sayings and vocab unbeknownst to me (can I use the word like that?) and Anki them, since at this point there's a possibility that the new words I come across are so rare learning them in context would be difficult. Are other people here facing a similar problem and if so, what have you done / are doing to further improve? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| karpat Diglot Newbie Poland Joined 4107 days ago 24 posts - 28 votes Speaks: Polish*, English Studies: German, Czech, Latin | Message 2 of 18 05 February 2013 at 3:04pm | IP Logged | ||
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I have a problem very similar to yours. I'm graduating this year and, even though my English is quite decent by many standards, I still feel I could do more to improve it. The problem appears,however, when you hit a certain level and then you find yourself not advancing any further. This happened to me; I've been at C1 level for years now and I can't, for the life of me, make any progress. I could learn tons of vocabulary, but I do not think it would truly help. Perhaps lots of practice is what is needed; to gain fluency and a certain kind of effortlessness when producing the language. At least, this is what I think I still lack. It is hard though to find many opportunities to interact with other English speakers, aside from ocassional posts on the forum, when one dislikes chatting on Skype. Anoher problem with chatting is that, to advance, you need to find someone above your level of proficiency; otherwise, it won't work.
I can't really help you. You must decide in which areas you find yourself the weakest and try to work on them. Vocabulary is not everything; knowing words you will probably never have the need to use, just for the sake of knowing them because they are proficient level words... has no sense. You'll forget them soon enough and the effort will go to waste. It would be better to work on activating the vocabulary you already know. I find writing to be a fine method for activating your passive lexicon; you may try that if you like to write, however, I know that it's not everybody's favourite way of spending time - it sure isn't mine. And it doesn't really work on speaking so well, not for me at least - I still struggle to find the right words for my thoughts when I speak, which I have no trouble doing while writing. Well... it would be ideal if you could go for a couple of months to TL country, but it's rarely possible for various economic and/or personal reasons. I wish you good luck with trying to better your English. Working on your pronunciation is great fun and it's a good place to begin. Take care, karpat 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5173 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 3 of 18 05 February 2013 at 3:07pm | IP Logged | ||
In that case, it sounds like you need a good, well-educated conversation partner... Perhaps a professional foreigner living in Finnish wishing to push his level as well. You could challenge each other to make a presentation to each other on a chosen topic on a regular basis. Such a person may be hard to find, but there's bound to be someone somewhere... You could also begin by trying to determine just where your weaknesses lie, so you can better deal with them. For instance, you could prepare a video about a very specific topic you know well, post it on Youtube and ask some members here to suggest areas you should work on as a priority. You could also translate into English and post the text on Lang-8. You could start writing a blog about a subject you really care about and make a conscious effort to write with careful language to try to push yourself. Orally, you could also watch videos (like TED Talks) and try to interpret them into English (the opposite would be of little interest for improving English); might sound a bit extreme, but you'll get an instant view of what you are lacking to talk about these topics, without having to come up with the talks (or the knowledge they contain) on your own. Edited by Arekkusu on 05 February 2013 at 3:17pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| tastyonions Triglot Senior Member United States goo.gl/UIdChYRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4457 days ago 1044 posts - 1823 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish Studies: Italian | Message 4 of 18 05 February 2013 at 3:17pm | IP Logged | ||
Nope, that sounds off. "Unbeknownst" is used to refer to *events* that happen without the speaker knowing, e.g. "Unbeknownst to me, they were preparing a surprise party." Some dictionaries do give the simple "unknown" as a secondary definition, but I've never heard or read a native speaker using it that way. If you send me something longer you've written in English (say a page or two of text) I can try to pick out some more subtle things like that, just to give you a starting point. Edited by tastyonions on 05 February 2013 at 3:27pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Majka Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic kofoholici.wordpress Joined 4449 days ago 307 posts - 755 votes Speaks: Czech*, German, English Studies: French Studies: Russian | Message 5 of 18 05 February 2013 at 4:01pm | IP Logged | ||
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At your level, there are two possible ways:
1. in self-study, don't study the language on its own. Study math, gardening, literature, whatever... in English. Find a forum with native speakers, discussing your hobbies (one beside this one). Practice speaking about these subjects (self-talk). From time to time, go through a grammar book or dictionary (visual / picture dictionary is very useful). Grab online newspaper and read at least one story every day. 2. Find a native speaker. Ideally, they should be able to explain why they correct you instead simply saying "it sounds natural this way". Talk or write to them. If they cannot explain their corrections, you will need to make the work and look for explanations yourself. As you can surely see, it works best in tandem. Do the study on your own but look for the native speaker at the same time. If you cannot find language exchange partner, look for ex-pats and meet with them. You will get exposure to the natural language "in your backyard". Or, if necessary, find a teacher (native one is best at this level) and take a lesson every month or so. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| schoenewaelder Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5352 days ago 759 posts - 1197 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: German, Spanish, Dutch | Message 6 of 18 05 February 2013 at 4:06pm | IP Logged | ||
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I'll just throw in a recommendation for lang-8 (if you do like writing of course). Even if you write perfect English, you will probably still get corrections, suggestions and comments about what would sound more natural, and even if the corrections aren't themselves helpful, it might bring aspects of the language to your attention, that you were unaware of.
edit: you're -> your. Yikes! Edited by schoenewaelder on 05 February 2013 at 4:27pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 4801 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 7 of 18 05 February 2013 at 6:26pm | IP Logged | ||
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For native-like comprehension, there is only one way. A lot of input. Various kinds: literature, fiction, non-
fiction, wikipedia and other online sources on anything, radio, movies and tvshows, tv documentaries, text heavy pc games (MUDs are the best). That's how I got there. Anything and everything interesting for you will work, given the time. If you want to understand difficult dialects (that's what I haven't learnt and don't plan to), find sources including them. For native-like active skills, it's more complicated. For writing: write. Get corrections on italki or something like that, participate on forums, write fan stories or roleplay, play a MUD (my favourite way). And, from time to time, review grammar. I haven't been doing that and my writing is slowly getting worse. Don't make my mistake. But I still write quite well thanks to everyday practise. Reading a lot can help too, but practice is the key. For speaking: that is the hardest one. I haven't got there and probably never will. Listening comprehension is the prerequisite to be able to participate in conversation. The rest is practise, again :-) Speak a lot to get better. Speaking to yourself is a partial solution, when there is no other choice. With others, I would only recommend finding natives. I've been meeting nonnatives only for some time, and the influence is horrible. I am far from native-like but I am better than most people I meet and speak with and that is the trouble. So, you should speak with natives as much as possible and try to resist learning from worse speakers, I'd recommend. Of course, use anki or anything that youfind helpful for the active vocab. If there is no such a tool you like, don't worry. Input should work. A lot of input 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| karpat Diglot Newbie Poland Joined 4107 days ago 24 posts - 28 votes Speaks: Polish*, English Studies: German, Czech, Latin | Message 8 of 18 05 February 2013 at 7:35pm | IP Logged | ||
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Is Anki really helpful for active vocab? To me it's more about recalling and recognition rather than actively using the learned words. Writing, however, is a way to make your passive vocab active, as is speaking. Edited by karpat on 05 February 2013 at 7:35pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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