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How to Sound Good in a New Language

Jean-Paul Setlak — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 23:58:36 +0000

This post gives you ways to develop your ability to Speak a new language well. What level of knowledge am I assuming you need to start this process? An intermediate one. But you could really use it at any level.

So! You know basic vocabulary. You know how to form correct – or mostly correct – sentences. Your pronunciation is accurate enough for you to be understood. You are also able to understand simple conversations. What can you do to improve your ability to speak efficiently and systematically?

1. Accept your level! You cannot speak faster or better than your actual knowledge and capacity allow. Be nice to yourself. You have done the best you could given your life circumstances. Of course, you could have done more; but you didn’t. Leave it at that! Any recriminations or critical judgements will seriously hamper your progress. Failures and lacks simply give us information about our next step.

2. When you speak, speak at your correct speed! By correct, I mean appropriate to your level and capacity. Would you rather speak bad French really fast or good French very slowly? Obvious when asked in this manner, isn’t it? So you might want to run a 4 minute mile, but if it takes you 8 minutes to cover the distance, it is the speed at which you will truly develop. What a relief! You don’t have to perform the impossible. Try the following experiment: try to speak your native language twice as fast as you normally do, and see what happens. Stammering, stumbling, bad diction. etc. You know when your speed is correct: you feel good. Stay there! 8 minute miles lead to 7 and 6 minute miles etc.

3. Be relaxed as you speak: If your speed is appropriate to your level, you should be able to breathe comfortably, keep your body relaxed and have a nice feeling inside (fun, satisfaction, sense of achievement, etc.). Whatever emotion you connect to an activity will automatically surface anytime you engage in the activity. So make sure you are feeling mostly happy every time you practice German or Russian. Train your body and your psyche to associate joy with your new language. It is not a positive thinking platitude. It will fundamentally determine the quality of your experience of the new language.

4. Speak in short logical units: This is probably the greatest open secret. In your own language, ……….. you break up ……… everything you say …….. in short logical units. Do the same when you practice speaking a new language. If … you … try … to …. speak… one … word … at … a time… you will not feel or sound good. You will also probably drive the natives crazy. Ifyoutrytospeakawholelongsentenceatonce,youwilldefinitelyforgetthebeginningbythetimeyoufinish!A beginner or intermediate student cannot physically compose a complex sentence on the fly and speak it. So… take your time …. and speak slowly … and deliberately. It will make…. a world of difference. You can speak the words of each unit fast if you want. Just do not rush the flow of the sentence beyond your capacity.

The final three are adjunct activities to the speaking process, but they are essential.

5. Keep studying grammar: you cannot express your thoughts if you don’t know how to phrase them in the new language.

6. Keep learning vocabulary.

7. Listen to native speakers live or on recordings as much as you can.

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Vocabulary is the King and Grammar is the Queen

Jean-Paul Setlak — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 23:28:43 +0000

Vocabulary is absolutely vital. If you need to say “elevator” or “clown suit”, there is no substitute. This means that learning vocab is a huge priority when you are learning a language. So now you’ve learned 3000 words! But what do you do with them? This is the magical field of syntax and grammar. You have all the parts for an automobile. Grammar teaches you how to assemble the car and then how to drive. Here is a way of putting them together usefully.

Once you have learned some basic vocabulary and grammar, you can begin the task of beginning to express yourself. I find that using translation exercises really develops this capacity. I know! Many language acquisition theorists will probably try to have me drawn and quartered for saying this! ( And yet it turns!)

What I like to do, to develop my communication potential in a new language, is to first pick a topic of interest (to me) or an important life situation (cooking, buying, traveling). I then randomly speak sentence by sentence – in English – about this topic. After each English sentence, I do my best to say it in my target language. Sometimes vocabulary fails me; and sometimes it is grammar. It doesn’t matter! I just keep going. Later on, I can look up the words or the grammar I need. Doing something like this will really develop your capacity to speak.

There is another useful step. You can actually write out the English sentences and do your best to translate them correctly and accurately. Again if you hit the wall, you can look up the words and the grammar you need.

The next step after that is to find a native to validate and correct what you are doing. Inevitably, there will many mistakes to correct.

These days you can also use the Google Translate Tool – with care and a good sense of humor – and get a lot of work done. If you think the translation will be perfect, think again. With European languages – close cousins of English – you will get 75 to 90% accuracy. With Chinese or Hindi, hope for 60% accuracy. But still, if you keep your sentences short and non-ambiguous: ”The dog runs in the street” (one meaning) versus ” flying airplanes can be dangerous” (two possible meanings), it is a very useful exercise. If automatic translation can make a mess of things, realize that it probably will. So definitely check with a native to make sure that you are atually saying what you want to say. But it’s a fast way to learn vocab and sometimes even grammar.

So there you are. Translation can be an invaluable tool in your language learning development.

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Using Audacity with your Recordings

Jean-Paul Setlak — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 15:35:56 +0000

They speak too fast!I can’t understand anything! Does that sound familiar? When we begin to communicate with natives in a new language, it is often what we experience: they are speaking so fast that our heads spin! Even though we know the vocabulary and the grammar, it all goes by like a race car in the night. What can we do about this? Slow them down, of course.

When you are actually talking to a live person, ask them to slow down. It will definitely help if they are able to. What about with your recordings? There is a great free audio tool called Audacity that can slow down any recording on your computer in 1 minute . First, you will need to download the program: Audacity. (It’s open source.)

What it allows you to do is to slow down a recording (MP3 or any common format) 5, 10, 20, 50% without changing the pitch. So the speakers sound normal. They are just speaking a lot slower. Just what we needed!

So if you have installed Audacity – it takes 2 minutes – here is how to use it. ( I will assume you have an mp3 file or an iTune file on your computer that you want to play.)

1. Open Audacity.

2. Click file (upper left-hand corner.)

3. left-click Open

4. Find the file you want to play . To make it easy you could keep your files in My Documents or on your Desktop.

5. Left-click the file to highlight it.

6. Click Open.

Audacity now imports the file. If you push the play button (green triangle) it will play the file normally. Try it and then Push Stop (the square Yellow button).

Now! Let’s slow this recording down. It only takes a few easy steps.

1. In the top menu bar click on Edit.

2. In the dropdown menu click “Select/All” (or use the hotkey: type Ctrl+A)

3. In the top Menu bar click “Effect”.

4. Click “Change Tempo

5. In the “Change Tempo” Menu find ”percent change” and replace 00.000 by -20.000. (Remember the minus sign or you will speed up the recording.)

6. Click OK and wait a few seconds.

You are now ready!

Click “Play” and listen to the recording played 20% slower. You can slow it down as much as you want, but after 30% it seems to distort a bit.

There you are! You now have a recording that you can actually understand. Save it and play it whenever you want. If you like you can export it as an MP3 file and download it somwhere else: your iPod, for example.

Enjoy!

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Teaching on the internet

Jean-Paul Setlak — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 20:32:21 +0000

After teaching live for decades, I was a bit nervous about starting to teach online. Body language, minimal facial expressions, intimacy would all be changed radically. I feel pretty comfortable with technology and computers, but I was concerned about establishing rapport and maintaining a strong connection with students.

It has been a great adventure. I was surprised to realize that the voice is actually much more important than the picture. (This is even more so in a language class of course.) The video is just a pleasant addition, but it is the audio connection which is most important.

It is also great fun to have all your computer resources available instantly: the internet, photo files, etc. It actually makes teaching pretty effortless and more fun for teacher and students alike.

Instant messaging makes it so easy to teach vocabulary. Online dictionaries allow you to translate words instantly.

Humor is really important for me – in life and in my classes. Online teaching allows for new ways of having fun using the webcam.

No commuting of course! Snacks easily available! No shoes! A revolution in education.

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Learning a New language: Starting with the Sounds

Jean-Paul Setlak — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 02:11:25 +0000

So you have decided to learn a new language. The first step, in my experience, is to get a good grasp of the sound system. If there is a new script to learn (as in Hindi or in Russian), you can begin the script at the same time as you learn the pronunciation.

You can do this in a fun and spontaneous way, or systematically. The result we want is the same in both cases: good, comfortable pronunciation. How can you achieve this efficiently? By listening to the language of course, but there are several ways of doing this.

1. First listen to recordings or watch videos of the language. What do you actually hear? Can you duplicate it? What is the emotional impact of the new language on you: pleasant or not? Desirable or annoying? Learning a language whose sounds are unpleasant to you is, I think, unwise. Neutral is OK. You want to immerse yourself in the “music” of this new tongue.

2. If you like this new language, the next step will be to “break the code”. Just listening is good, but the process is speeded up and made more systematic if you learn more about the sounds of the language. For example, when learning Hindi, you immediately find out that there are four “T” sounds and four separate “T” letters. This is something you really need to know.

3. It is useful to compare the new sounds to the ones you already know. For example the “T” of Spanish is much closer to the French “”T” than the English”T”. This can save you a lot of time.

4. Sometimes you are learning a brand new sound. It does not exist in any language you know. In that case, listen to it, feel it in your body, imitate it as best you can. Also,understand how to make it even if you cannot do it very well yet.

5. If you can’t hear a distinction, let it go for now – until you can actually hear the difference.

So in this first step of learning a new sound system, you become acquainted with it as you would with a new friend. The process is actually an exploration. More than anything else you are exposing your ears and your whole body to the new sounds.

Advice for Language Practice: Speaking Confidently

Jean-Paul Setlak — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 19:44:40 +0000

Do you want to be more confident when you are speaking your new language with a native or a teacher? Here is some simple advice.

1. Relax. It’s impossible not to make mistakes. You might as well enjoy making them. The key is to begin tracking your mistakes so you can correct them over time. Listen to yourself or ask the native/teacher what you need to improve.

2. Take your time and speak simply. Make short sentences: get the basic point across. “Where is there a restaurant?” is good enough. You may not have time for: “Sorry to disturb you, but I was wondering if you had any recommendations for a place to eat nearby?” Five-year olds get their points across beautifully with no frills. Be that way!

3. Pronounce well and enjoy the sounds of the language. The better your accent is, the more pleasant your performance will be for your audience. Pronunciation creates rapport. Approach the sounds as beautiful music, not as a rare form of torture.

4. Prepare your encounters. If you can! Look up the vocabulary; rehearse what you will want to say. You are an actor playing a part. Rehearse your lines!

5. Record yourself. You will be amazed how much you will catch after the fact. You will understand much more, and you will see how you could improve your performance.

These five simple ideas can help you improve your ability to interact in the new language radically.

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A Quick History of a Linguistic Journey

Jean-Paul Setlak — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 03:25:59 +0000

My linguistic journeys always begin because I fall in love with the sounds and the culture of a new language.

I started studying foreign languages in France at the age of ten. My parents expected me to begin learning English and Latin at that time. I resisted but had no choice in the matter. “Sigh”. Two years later, German was added to the list. When I moved to the US at the age of thirteen, I immediately realized the importance of knowing English and quickly became fluent. (How else could I join a rock group?) I began to study Spanish in High School as well. In college I added Italian to the list.

Then came my true love of the era: medieval Punjabi! What could be fairer to the ear or to the eye? I picked up modern Punjabi and Hindi – a close relative, shortly thereafter. But Arabic caught my wandering eye and ear. Though I abandoned my study, I never lost my love of the sounds of Arabic language and music.

Years passed with no new linguistic journeys, when, in 1993, I foolishly decided to learn Mandarin and Japanese. Though both were amazingly beautiful, I quickly realized that I needed to choose one of the two. (“I wish I had but two brains to give to my country!”) Mandarin it was, since I was enamored of Chinese culture. It proved the greatest challenge for me because of its sound structure and its complex character system. But with Chinese came an enormous body of knowledge, culture and five thousand years of sophistication!

I am still working on mastering these various tongues. Next, I would love to learn a native American language: Lakota, Hopi or Apache. I know very little about their structures or phonetics, but their sounds are pleasing to my ear and I have immense respect for their cultures. This is how I have always begun: by discovering the amazing beauty of a new language and the fascinating culture of the people who speak it.

Jean-Paul at Focus Language

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Focus Language Online Classes

Jean-Paul Setlak — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 02:35:29 +0000

FOCUS LANGUAGE is proud to offer online language instruction. As the world changes, online classes are becoming a vital addition to education. We hope you will come study with us and learn a new language.

Fast: Online language classes are simple to set up and they save you time. They let you learn on your own schedule, at home or at work; but you retain all the advantages of studying with a quality private instructor.

Easy: With Focus Language, you can set the pace and the timing of your instruction. Tell us what you want: we will listen. All you need is a webcam and Skype. We will help you set up Skype in 5 minutes if you need assistance.

Economical: You will find our rates reasonable and our instruction cost-effective. All our programs are customized to meet your needs.

To Set up your Classes call us at (630) 338 1144 or (602) 569 7526 or email us. We will help you create the perfect program for your needs.

Jean-Paul at Focus Language

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Playing with Language

Jean-Paul Setlak — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 02:35:19 +0000

Although it is important to be serious about learning a foreign language, the ability to play and enjoy the process is equally vital. I have been a lover of languages for most of my life. I teach French, English, Spanish, Mandarin, Italian, Hindi and Punjabi, but I have also studied German, Latin, Arabic and Urdu. As you see, I have studied many languages through the years, but two common themes have emerged in my own success. The first is a deep and lasting desire and motivation to master each of the languages I have studied. The second is that I love to play as I learn. So when you begin, first play with the new sound system. Imitate, mimic, copy the pronunciation as best as you can. Even at this early stage, imagine yourself communicating fluently with natives. Imagine your persona – what you will look like and sound like – once you can communicate competently. As you progress in your learning, keep finding things that please you, and ways to enjoy yourself.

It is very useful to look for beautiful and fun materials. With the flourishing of the internet, there is an endless source of recordings, videos, podcasts e-books and general resources. Find the niche, the interests which please you, and connect them with your language learning journey. If you enjoy yoga and learning Spanish, find online or live Spanish yoga classes. If you love movies as you study French, find a French movie club or a movie forum. The more you enjoy yourself, the easier it will be for you to learn.

There are many emerging internet language communities in the ongoing social networking revolution. Find a community of people you enjoy and who have similar or complementary goals. This will place the new language in the realm of your real life. Making new friends is an amazing way to create a lasting relationship with a culture and language.

So, introduce whatever is fun and meaningful for you into your language learning. Enjoyment of life at all its stages is the secret of success – and happiness.

Jean-Paul at Focus Language

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