Ask HN: How to excel in English?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1183477

by csomar • 16 years ago

6 12 16 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

I'm not a native English speaker. I'm good at English. I can write, easily understandable text. However, I didn't reach the point of excellence. The hard point is "How to reach it?"

Reading can be a way to that, but I'm actually reading a lot (around 20 articles per day and also active in few good forums and discussion sites). I started massive reading (20-25 articles per day and also printing PG, Joel and other interesting authors articles and read them offline) around 40 days ago.

I don't see a big difference from where I started. So is it just a time process, or are there other ways how I can become fluent in English?

Thanks for the advice.

jcrocholl• 16 years ago

Writing may help you more than reading, especially if you can find somebody to give feedback. Maybe start a blog or contribute to a magazine?

I'm not a native English speaker, but here's some feedback for you: I would say "advice" (always singular) rather than "advices".

shrikant• 16 years ago

Start subscribing to the Language Log (http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll), and click on links to previous posts, ad infinitum.

But what do you mean by "I don't see a big difference from where I started."? What are you doing to measure this?

slater• 16 years ago

If you define "point of excellence" as "talk like a native English speaker", then I'm sorry, but that will take a LOT of time. Reading lots and lots will not make you a better speaker.

My advice would be, if you want to become a better speaker, to seek out English-language programming available internationally (sadly, that may limit you to CNN International, but better than nothing), and focus on things like intonation, and the flow of discussion. Two things you won't learn from reading articles.

Of course, the alternative is to spend 20+ years in an English-speaking country, then you'll probably have better pronunciation and diction ;)

soyelmango• 16 years ago

Practise, practise, practise! In Real Life.

Couchsurfing.org is good for this - you're not obliged to offer your couch. You can just meet up with people, hang out, speak English.

Don't pitch it as "I want to practise my English with you" - that's off-putting. Be interested in the person - and as a side-effect of the fun, you'll be practising your English!

Now, if only I'd practise what I preach...

vishaldpatel• 16 years ago

Hmm. Upon reading your post I'd say that you need to further tweak your grammar and choice of words.

- The placement of your commas is often incorrect.

- "I didn't reach" should be "I haven't reached".

- "The hard point is.." should probably be "The hard part is" etc...

So three things to work on:

- Grammer, especially the placement of commas - when to pause in a statement.

- Use of correct choice of words - this will come from more practice.

And finally: - Try listening to more rock / alternative music. For the first few years, it will mostly sound like gibberish. This is partially an exercise to train your ear =)

chaosprophet• 16 years ago

The best thing to do when you are learning a new language, would be to start thinking in that language. Trust me, it makes a world of a difference.

DanielStraight• 16 years ago

Surround yourself with English text, English audio or English video 24 hours a day. That's how native speakers learned it.

drtse42• 16 years ago

Yep, second that.

drtse42• 16 years ago

The first thing to do is define clearly what it means to be "fluent" or at least what it means for you (i.e. determine what level of proficiency you want to achieve and how you will measure that) It may seems obvious but usually this is the hardest thing to do for someone learning a language. How i'm doing? What i need to improve? What i can do to improve? All stuff that comes as a consequence of defining a goal clearly.

So, even if you can't immerse yourself in a "native speaking environment", i suggest first and foremost to understand you current state for area of usage of the language:

- Can you understand spoken english/american english/fereigner english? Just watch some movie/tv show and you'll know the answer. With this you can also check your pronunciation.

- Does reading english text slow you down too much? Do you sometimes forget if you read something in eng or your native language? If yes this is a good sign imho.

- How is your vocabulary? Try reading different material, reading only IT oriented stuff is not enough and not indicative of how good your comprehension is, try reading books with completely different argument and see how it goes.

- Writing. Are you able to produce a good non technical short/long text? Do you notice errors in the paper/etc written by others?

- Speaking skill? Just register yourself to one of those language exchange sites and see hot it goes.

Once you identify where you are,what need to be improved and where you want to go (language-wise, e.g. speaking- being able to converse on the news of the day with a good english), just go on and check how it goes once in a while. (40 days are not enough to evaluate anything, i'll suggest at least 3 months... seems more reasonable)

pmiller2• 16 years ago

I think you underestimate yourself. IMO, had you not come right out and stated you were not a native speaker, I might have overlooked the couple of very minor mistakes you made. Seriously, go read some comments on digg, youtube, reddit, or slashdot to get an idea how far above the "average" English speaker you are already. You communicated your point effectively, which is a lot better than most writing on the internet does.

As for what you should do to continue to improve, you're on the right track with the reading program. But, you must supplement it with conversation (preferably with native speakers) and writing (which you should also preferably share with a native for critique). If you continue to do this, I can practically guarantee your English will improve.

balding_n_tired• 16 years ago

Feedback, as somebody says, is important. Nagging from parents and teachers smoothed out the rough spots in the native speakers' English. If there's somebody you can trust to review your writing, ask him or her to do so. Conversation will get you a long way on the rest.

alanthonyc• 16 years ago

Don't just read articles (I'm assuming from the internet). Pick up some literature, maybe Dickens or something. That will help expand your vocabulary as well as get you used to different styles and syntactic constructs.

They'd be fun to read too.

Ask HN: How to excel in English?

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