Listening-Reading system (Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies) Language Learning Forum

Listening-Reading system
Tags: Guide to Learning Languages \| Shadowing \| Alexander Arguelles \| Bilingual texts \| Listening-Reading (L-R) \| Audiobook \| Learning Technique/Method
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Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies	( Topic Closed)

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Walshy
Triglot
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Australia
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Speaks: English*, Spanish, German

Message 25 of 489

27 June 2007 at 6:27am | IP Logged

Is the method outlined here any different from Ardashir's "shadowing" technique? It looks almost identical to me.

About half way down here:
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=269&KW=shadowing

More here:
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=22&KW=shadowing
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luke
Diglot
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United States
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Message 26 of 489

27 June 2007 at 6:18pm | IP Logged

Miss Hopper:

First off, thanks for this post. It is the most intriguing one I've read in several months. Like others, I have some questions and requests for clarification.

siomotteikiru wrote:

I’ve always been puzzled by the fact that even intelligent people learn languages in a clumsy way.

I ask myself that. Although I've made progress over the years, I can't help but thinking my learning methods are not a good fit for my learning style. I think your approach may be a better fit. I hope you can provide some additional guidance. Specifically, it would be enlightening if you could expand the goals of each step. I'll speculate, but you know better because it's your method and you've done it with considerable success.

siomotteikiru wrote:

The order ought to be EXACTLY as follows:
What you do:
1. you read the translation
because you only remember well what you understand and what you feel is "yours" psychologically

I picked up that you may read the same book in several different languages, which makes this a step you've often completed before you even start. I can see this as helpful. If you hadn't read the book before, and it is a very long book, do you still go ahead and read the whole thing before moving on to step 2? What level of story detail are you looking to have already in your mind before you move on to step 2?

siomotteikiru wrote:

2. you listen to the recording and look at the written text at the same time,
because the flow of speech has no boundaries between words and the written text does, you will be able to separate each word in the speech flow
and you will get used to the speed of talking of native speakers - at first it seems incredibly fast

This time through, you may not understand the book so well, because they are using language you haven't mastered yet. If you can mentally divide words in your mind, although you may not understand what the narrator is saying, have you finished with step 2?

siomotteikiru wrote:

3. you look at the translation and listen to the text at the same time, from the beginning to the end of a story, usually three times is enough to understand almost everything
This is the most important thing in the method, it is right AT THIS POINT that proper learning takes place.
If you’re in a position to do it right from the start, you can skip 1. and 2.

To know that you are at this point, if you can read the translation and keep pretty much in line with the narrator, you're ready for step 3, right? How do you know you have finished step 3? Is it when you can hear the audio and understand it without looking at the translation? How many words or phrases per page can you let slide by without complete comprehension and still consider this step complete?

siomotteikiru wrote:

4. now you can concentrate on SPEAKING: you repeat after the recording, you do it as many times as necessary to become fluent

When you can speak with the same pronunciation and inflection as the narrator, and you know what you are saying, have you completed this step 4?

siomotteikiru wrote:

5. you translate the text from your own language into the language you’re learning
you can do the translation both orally and in writing, that’s why the written texts should be placed in vertical columns side by side: you can cover one side and check using the other one.

How much time do you spend on this step? It could take years to write out the translation of a 10 or 20 or 50 hour book in it's entirety. What sort of expectations do you put on your translation? We know that different translators will translate the same work differently. What level of correctness are you looking for? Is this a continual process of trying to get your word selection more and more like the original work?

siomotteikiru wrote:

To put it in a nutshell:
Learning a language is all about EXPOSURE, that is how much NEW text you're able to understand in a unit of time (a minute multiplied by hours and days).
When you start at the beginner's level your exposure is almost none.

It does NOT matter whether you understand each single word, in the beginning concentrate on sentences. The more of them you will hear and see at the same time, the more exposure you will get. Let your brain do the rest.

One thing I am struggling with is how to know if a book is entirely too advanced for my current level. Is this a consideration? Imagine I had to read the translation twice and do step 3 8 times to fully understand the audio, does that mean I should start with a simpler book? Or should I just plow ahead if this is a book I really want to read? Books like Don Quijote use archaic language, but they are classics. How do you know when you're ready for a challenge like this?

siomotteikiru wrote:

The layout of the texts to learn is very important.
Sensory memories - visulal (iconic) and auditory (echoic)- are very short and disappear within a second, so you get lost when you have to look for words, they should CONSTANTLY be within your eyes’ and ears’ reach.

I see how the text layout is important in step 5. Can you say a bit more about how you use this text format during the earlier steps?

siomotteikiru wrote:

If you want to maximize your EXPOSURE:
Use meaningful texts (not words, short sentences).
Use LONG texts with AUDIO.
By texts I mean TEXTS (a story, a joke, a newspaper article, a poem, a novel), not individual words or sentences or boring textbooks dialogues about nothing.

This has me thinking about using more than one text at a time to vary the difficulty and change the pace.

siomotteikiru wrote:

Don't try to speak (or write) too soon, it is much better to listen to more texts instead, listening comprehention should be the most important goal.
I concentrate on the meaning, I do not try to learn a paticular language, what I am interested in is the story, not the language.
And don't do any tests, it is a complete waste of time and a source of appalling number of mistakes. Tests are good for teachers and publishers, not for learners.

So, no drills? Nothing but genuine books and unabridged translations, right? If I have to spend time driving and want to learn a language, what should I do?

siomotteikiru wrote:

Sooner or later you will feel you're ready to speak or write, it will come naturally, and it will be easy.
I’ve NEVER learned how to write English, and I am able to put across almost anything I want, (making hell of a lot of mistakes, but who cares as long as the meaning is clear). You may not believe it, but I haven’t written anything in English for three years, and still I can manage.

Fascinating.

siomotteikiru wrote:

ONE thing at a time.
Remember "The Last Samurai": "Too many minds: mind the sword, mind the people watch. No mind."

I'm guilty of too many minds. I haven't seen the movie and was puzzled by the comment, but found a link that helps a bit. So the last question, on the topic of "too many minds"; How many books are "too many" to be using this technique on at the same time? For example, I was thinking about my own collection where I may be ready for step 1, 2, 3, and 4 with various books I've been reading. If one is going to study 3 hours a day, is it okay to do that with 4-6 books? Or is that "too many minds"?

Edited by luke on 27 June 2007 at 6:22pm
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siomotteikiru
Senior Member
Zaire
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Message 27 of 489

27 June 2007 at 11:27pm | IP Logged

Sorry, but there are too many questions, it will take time to answer them.
At the beginning of the nineties I wrote a “book” where each step is explained in detail, and the reasons are given. BUT it is in Polish, it would be a daunting amout of work to translate it into English.

In fact there are two kinds of listening.
1. "listening-reading"
2. "natural listening" to which you get after you have "listened-read" to about 20 to 40 hours of NEW texts. (I’ve checked it with about five hundred Polish learners learning English, German, French, Russian, Italian – studying entirely on their own. And myself learning Japanese. I do not know if it would be the same for English learners. The Polish language is quite complex both phonetically and grammatically, so it is relatively easy for us to learn other languages.)

You shouldn't repeat anything after the recording until you have come to the stage of "natural-listening" (it basically means you are able to understand NEW recorded texts, usually simpler than the ones you have „listened-read”, relying only on your "ears", that is not using any written texts, neither the original nor the translation.

Edited by siomotteikiru on 27 June 2007 at 11:33pm
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Volte
Tetraglot
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Switzerland
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Studies: French, Finnish, Mandarin, Japanese

Message 28 of 489

27 June 2007 at 11:40pm | IP Logged

siomotteikiru wrote:

Is this book available anywhere? If so, it's yet another reason to learn Polish!

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siomotteikiru
Senior Member
Zaire
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Message 29 of 489

28 June 2007 at 12:45am | IP Logged

The "book" is available as an e-text, I can upload it somewhere.
I've written much more, here's the gist:

Here's an example of parallel texts.
www.stultorum.pochta.ru/aaaa/0038Sample.rar

Here's a more detailed explanation - OVERVIEW:

www.stultorum.pochta.ru/aaaa/0003_Staszek-Phi-Staszek_uswiad amia_ OVERVIEW.rar

Here's more about "listening-reading":
www.stultorum.pochta.ru/aaaa/0015SLUCHANIE _Miss_Polonia_sluc ha_na _oba_ucha.rar

uswiad amia should be uswiadamia
sluc ha should be slucha
(no spaces), otherwise you won't be able to download.

Edited by siomotteikiru on 28 June 2007 at 1:38am
2 persons have voted this message useful

Volte
Tetraglot
Senior Member
Switzerland
Joined 6437 days ago
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Speaks: English*, Esperanto, German, Italian
Studies: French, Finnish, Mandarin, Japanese

Message 30 of 489

28 June 2007 at 1:35am | IP Logged

siomotteikiru wrote:

The "book" is available as e-text, I can upload it somewhere.

Please!

I've made the links clickable.

siomotteikiru wrote:

I've written much more, here's the gist:
Here's an example of parallel texts.

Here's a more detailed explanation: OVERVIEW

Here's more about "listening-reading".

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luke
Diglot
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United States
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Speaks: English*, Spanish
Studies: Esperanto, French

Message 31 of 489

28 June 2007 at 4:40am | IP Logged

siomotteikiru wrote:

In fact there are two kinds of listening.
1. "listening-reading"
2. "natural listening" to which you get after you have "listened-read" to about 20 to 40 hours of NEW texts.

You shouldn't repeat anything after the recording until you have come to the stage of "natural-listening" (it basically means you are able to understand NEW recorded texts, usually simpler than the ones you have „listened-read”, relying only on your "ears", that is not using any written texts, neither the original nor the translation.

Okay, so don't move on to step 4 until steps 1-3 have taken your "natural-listening" comprehension to a good level. That's helpful, because it implies that one should spend some time simply listening to new material in order to evaluate your "natural-listening". I'm there's other benefits to "natural-listening" too. So for my long auto trip today I'll bring along an audiobook I had never finished.

Edited by luke on 28 June 2007 at 4:48am
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JasonChoi
Diglot
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Korea, South
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Message 32 of 489

04 July 2007 at 1:26am | IP Logged

Siomotteikiru,

Thank you for sharing this. I think I agree with 95% of everything you stated here. The last 5% is just my doubts that there could be something better.

However, I was wondering if you or anyone else knows if there is an audio book of Lord of the Rings in Chinese?

-Jason

Edited by JasonChoi on 04 July 2007 at 1:34am

1 person has voted this message useful

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