vocabulary – amalfabian

I have been teaching English for fifteen years now. Over the years, I have noticed some positive traits and approaches of good language learners. What we will cover is based on my experience teaching English, but these points would be relevant when learning other languages as well.

4 points to keep in mind when learning a language

1. Have a positive attitude

Learning a new language is rewarding in itself. You learn new sounds. You learn new words and idioms. You learn new grammatical forms. In short, you learn a new way to express yourself. A new horizon opens up.

I remember a student telling me that she didn’t enjoy learning English, and that she was learning the language only because she had no choice. As you could guess, learning English is a chore for this person. This internal resistance will work against her learning the language well.

If you are learning a language, do not view it as a burden. Relish the sounds of the new words. Enjoy the process. It’s always a pleasure to be a student, whatever your age may be.

2. Be persistent and patient

If there is a word that you find difficult to remember, write it down. Keep practising it during the week. If there is a grammar point that is tricky, take your time. Slow down. Spend a minute or two to better understand it. Make a sentence with it. If you make a mistake, no worries. Try again. The more persistent you are are, the more your mind becomes familiar with what you are learning. Give your mind time to absorb the new information.

I have met students who are impatient when it comes to learning English. At times, they overestimate their level of English. They are in a hurry to become advanced-level speakers. Don’t be. Being impatient is not going to make you learn the language any faster. In fact, you may get demotivated when you find that you are not improving as much as you thought you would.

Persistence is the path that will get you there.

3. Celebrate small wins

After many attempts, you use the present perfect tense correctly when speaking. Celebrate the win! After repeated mistakes, you use a preposition correctly. You say, ‘I’m in the car’, instead of ‘I’m on the car’. Celebrate the win! I’m not saying you have to eat a slice of cake. But, just recognize that you have achieved something, however small it may be.

If you have been learning a language for some time, your errors may be fossilized. When you finally get a word or grammar point right, pat yourself on the back.

4. Immerse yourself

Immersion is the secret to learning any language. Imagine you are in a country where people only speak a foreign language. Your learning curve will be steep.

All of us may not have the opportunity to live in a foreign country. But, we do have access to the internet. Watch YouTube videos. This would include: the news, short clips, songs, documentaries, comedy series, and yes, even cartoons.

When listening, be an active listener. If you are a beginner in the language, see if you can identify any words. Listen to the sounds of the language.

If you are at the pre-intermediate, intermediate level, or upper-intermediate level, you could keep your ears tuned for new words. You can try to guess their meaning from the context. Don’t worry if you are not sure of the meaning of the new word or phrase. By using your mind to guess the meaning, you are already on your way to expanding your vocabulary. You can always check a dictionary. My go-to dictionary is Cambridge Dictionary.

Apart from words, pay attention to how words are pronounced. Pay attention to the key words that are stressed in a sentence. Pay attention to how intonation is used.

Notice how grammar is used. In the beginning, try to recognize the grammar that you have already covered. Doing this will help you consolidate your learning. Later, focus on unfamiliar grammar points.

Phew! As you can see, when it comes to language immersion there are a lot of things to do.

I recommend that you take a pro-active role when learning a language. Become an independent learner. Isn’t that the best way?

The takeaway

Enjoy learning a language. Don’t worry if it seems endless. Eventually, with persistence and patience, you will attain your language goals.

Learning a new language can be fun and rewarding or it can be boring and dreary. The choice, dear reader, is yours!

You can build your vocabulary by using more collocations. Collocations? I hear you ask. Now, what are they?

Collocations are words that naturally appear together. Like old friends from school days, they are comfortable in each other’s company. They enjoy spending time together.

By using collocations, your language becomes richer.

Let’s look at some collocations for make.

Collocations with ‘make’

You wake up at 6:00 o’clock in the morning and immediately make your bed. You turn on the radio and make breakfast. Careful! The milk is boiling. Don’t make a mess.

You receive a text from your best friend from college. Can you make it for the reunion next month? Oh no. You’ve just made a plan with the family.

How many collocations with make so far? Four. Or maybe five. Can you make a guess?

It’s your first day as vice-president and you want to make a good impression. There’s an important meeting happening downtown. You’ve made the arrangements to get there well in time.

At the meeting, you’re client makes some good points. You make some notes. You think to yourself: why isn’t our sales team making more of an effort?

You then make a suggestion. You say, ‘Why don’t we share the research data with you? We normally don’t share it with our clients. But, in your case, we could make an exception.’

Your manager looks at you with stars in his eyes. As you both walk down the stairs, he whispers, ‘We are going to make so much money!’

After lunch, there is a sharp pain in your mouth. Ouch! You can’t ignore the pain anymore. You need to make an appointment right now. Time to visit the dentist.

It’s 10:00 o’clock at night. You are at home. Your family is fast asleep. You look out the window and see the inky black sky. You make believe there is a shooting star streaking above the dark clouds. You make a wish.

Phew! All those collocations make my head spin.

Collocations with ‘risk’

Now, let’s look at business English. How many collocations are there with the word ‘risk’? There are more than you can imagine: Considerable risk. Low risk. Negligible risk. Increased risk. Reduced risk.

And then there is: take a risk; pose a risk; accept a risk; manage a risk; minimize a risk; assess risk; measure risk; and balance risk.

Wait… there’s more: credit risk; political risk; environmental risk; safety risk; and security risk.

How many of these collocations of risk have you used? What can you use in future?

At the risk of overloading you with collocations, let’s briefly look at a word I’m sure you use: budget.

Collocations with ‘budget’

Some collocations with budget are:

prepare a budget

plan a budget

approve a budget

propose a budget

balance the budget

exceed the budget

stick to the budget

Now, we need to budget our time. So, I’ll stop here.

Takeaway

Before you click away, remember this–collocations help us to express ourselves with precision and flexibility. And they widen our range of vocabulary.

Select a collocation that you haven’t used before from the lists above. Use it by the end of tomorrow. By doing so, you will have expanded your vocabulary without much effort.

Does that make sense?

Find out how a dictionary is a treasure trove of collocations.

Image credit: Freepik

Tag: vocabulary

How to be a good language learner