Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

Conversational Hindi: Reasons To Study It

Uncategorized | Posted by languageinfo
Feb 06 2011

Together with the appearance of India like a international outsourcing area, more and more persons within North America are attempting to find out how to learn Hindi. This is a dialect which is used by many millions all over the world. Coupled with the English language, it is one of the two executive dialects of India, a realm of 347 strange languages. Only Mandarin, Spanish and English have greater speakers all over the world than Hindi. Though first to India, the Hindi language is definitely spoken not simply there but in addition in Fiji, Mauritius, Guyana and elsewhere. Furthermore, Hindi bears a really close resemblance to Urdu, the resident tongue in Pakistan. Despite the fact Hindi and Urdu might be written and published in different alphabets, their own everyday used tongue is practically identical with words, phrases as well as grammar rules. So that an individual having a working skill of oral Hindi may speak as well as understand oral Urdu. Small wonder the reasons so many people will be looking to find out how to understand Hindi. Online Hindi Learning!

Many absolutely want to know how to learn Hindi with the intention to develop their industry possibilities. Learn How To Talk In Hindi. Maybe they are going to India for business, thinking about delivering their produce or companies to India’s extremely affluent middle class. Other persons consider India using a desire of sacred experience or perhaps individual progress. And you can find other reasons, also. Some people turn out to be interested in India as a result of private connections with users of Hindi. While others simply like Bollywood.

Evidently, there exists a number of motivations for why folks wish to understand Hindi. Then looms your issue of approaches to study Hindi. Even given India’s developing value globally, resources for discovering the language are hard to find. Even though selection in college Hindi programs has improved inside this decade, not many United States universities have a Hindi major let alone a complete course of study in the Hindi language. Mainstream language schools sometimes offer Hindi programs, but those programs are usually not accessible everywhere. Exclusive Hindi tutors aren’t easy to search for in certain places. If one might find one, it is not always the best coaching because of the fact talking a foreign language would not always qualify any individual to give lessons. Probably the most trustworthy solutions to learn a lingo is by way of personal study, making use of DVDs or perhaps an on-line application. Of course, there are disadvantages to learning a new language through home study. It’s tough to keep bettering your dialect abilties when we don’t use a instructor to correct us. Also, the top training for learning a language is conversation, and there aren’t many possibilities for that using a self-study course.

Yet, for someone who desires to know methods to learn Hindi, the finest system may be a home plan. It can give you the fundamentals of grammar and at the very least the fundamental vocabulary. It is available anywhere you may have the gear necessary for the DVD or on the web classes, at any given time along with a spot handy to you personally. The most beneficial methods offer each of written and published and spoken language teaching and mix the instruction up with video games, exercises, chats and lecture. So that a diligent language learner could very well be triumphant and learn a lot through such solutions. Self-study language plans are there for you if you are in the largest town or little place. Hence a DVD or on the internet self-study course can be exactly what you are looking for in case you are looking to discover the ways on how to study Hindi.

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Tricks For Mastering French Efficiently

Uncategorized | Posted by languageinfo
Feb 05 2011

Conversational French is contemplated as your lingo of romance. Best way to learn French! It’s a Latin dependent dialect adopted in over 25 geographical regions world wide such as France, Canada, as well as Switzerland. When you are attempting to fully comprehend this wonderful dialect here are a few pointers about the great approaches in order to gain knowledge of French.

When discovering an extra lingo, it is essential to be trained via anyone who has previously conquered it. Hopefully, you need to be educated using a native talker since they should train you the proper means to talk the phrases. They shall moreover teach you concerning the official edition of your new language that’s necessary should you will be talking within a formal or legal locale. Learn how to speak French. Having a non-native or even easygoing speaker, you might be given plenty of unfitting phrases.

Learning the language involves that you immerse yourself into it. A great approach to get yourself a grip about the way to communicate French would be to listen to it being used. This can assist to enhance your own capacity. When you are learning inside of a college setting, the audio library should have speech tapes you could check out and also play at your own leisure. In case you are applying another process, it is possible to download conversing and video footage records from the web.

Studying text books printed with The French language is a very good way to be taught the structure of the tongue. Part of the problem of gaining knowledge of another language is grasping ways to place sentences and phrases properly. Studying texts where official language is used, just like newspapers and also magazines, is going to show you how you can build sentences in an intelligible way.

Conversing with a fluent speaker will get you with somebody who will alert you if you mess up words and phrases or perhaps state anything out of order. This will in addition provide you with great opportunity absorbing and replying to spoken suggestions. One example is, an issue as solicited in French might not possess the identical voice inflection as it can inside your language. Knowing how to grasp and know diverse voice patterns implies it will prevent plenty of challenges.

A lot of the technique of talking a language rather than your first dialect is converting your ordinary lingo to the words and phrases of your new language you are discovering. Speaking with yourself in French will help improve and speed up this job to ensure that your conversations will be quicker and more natural. It is advisable to alert any individual you might be living with that you’ll be commencing this exercise to prevent confusion.

Getting to know French is more than just learning vocabulary and regulations. You’re truly embracing an additional custom and the way they communicate themselves by way of words. It’s a good idea to read with regards to France and other French speaking civilizations to reinforce your comprehending of the language.

The advisable way to learn French should be to learn and chat it conscientiously. This will likely educate the head to remember the words and phrases and enable you to recall them progressively more easily as you progress. Getting to know a new language is often a big job. Having said that, so long as you take your precious time and immerse yourself as well, you may come to be a proficient talker really quickly.

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Marketing Your Book – Making Your Book’s Message Easy To Understand

Uncategorized | Posted by languageinfo
Feb 05 2011

Everything utilized to market a book, no matter if it’s the cover, the website, or the words out of the author’s mouth, need to send a clear idea about what the book is about. A lot of authors do not pay attention that their purpose is to expand their message and sell books when it goes about presenting their book to the mass. Here are a few samples of mixed messages authors send in various areas of their marketing and which way an author can instead make his or her book’s message clear.

The Front Cover
The front cover of your book is your most effective marketing instrument. No one will read the back cover, or anything else you create about your book like treachery in death, unless the front cover takes his or her attention. The front cover should, in one picture, not only convey what the book is about, but show that the book’s idea is interesting. Mixed messages from book covers may badly hurt book sales.

The Back Cover
When the front cover grabs the reader’s attention, the back cover needs to convince the person to buy the book. The back cover must also convince the book’s message. An efficient back cover will have at least one paragraph creating it clear what is the book’s message, or in fiction, what is the book’s plot.

Author Photo
The author photo is rather important in conveying an idea about your book. Unfortunately, too many authors do not have an appropriate photographs placed. The authors should tell a professional photographer what his book is about and that he wants that idea conveyed in his picture. That doesn’t imply you should have a gimmick in your photo. It may just be an ordinary headshot, but the pose must have dignity if you desire your book accepted seriously, or you should be smiling if your book is humorous.

Business Cards
Anything you are going to provide future readers with needs to have a clear message about your book. All other marketing pieces- postcards, posters, etc.-also need to convey a straightforward idea about your book.

Promoting The Book in Public
When promoting your book in public, make sure you don’t convey combined ideas. Find something “fantasy-like” to wear for example. A suit probably won’t sell a cookbooks, but a chef’s outfit will help.

Be sure when giving interviews that you are conveying a clear message. You can’t control what the interviewer can ask, but you may steer the interviewer in the necessary direction. Most interviewers won’t read your book before the interview, so you need to be prepared to do certain steering.

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Talking Points In Connection With Mastering Spoken German

Uncategorized | Posted by languageinfo
Feb 03 2011

Studying another language can be complex. Plus the older you might be the harder it appears to become. We live within a globe in which we all want instantaneous progress and desire to communicate in a different dialect rapidly. Nonetheless, getting to know a whole new lingo takes a lot of months and keen work. Learning German Online!

You have to gain knowledge of the particular alphabet system of the particular language, which may be separate from yours. If getting to know dialects such as Chinese, Japanese or perhaps Korean would require very much added learning before one might speak and read any of them. Learn German Language Online. We have to understand the sound system regarding the dialect. Then, you must learn the terms that will take a long time when you require perhaps 1000 words and phrases of vocabulary to get started to be effective within the dialect. Next, you need to be taught the specific properties of the terms for the reason that the characteristics will tell you how you can add those together inside a sentence. We do this by hearing all of them applied well in sentences, hopefully, by way of a natural speaker of the language. It is preferable to stay away from too much conjugation in the beginning because you will become bogged down in many of these complex guidelines and never have fun with gaining knowledge of as well as making use of the real language.

At the time when you were actually a young child and began to speak you probably did not understand the rules of your first language first. You learnt simple words. You did not learn to read up until you could speak fluently. And you also could not gain knowledge of complex rules until you could read and write the fundamentals of the lingo.

Have you noticed how the majority of international language courses start off with teaching the grammatical regulations of the dialect. This can be the extremely complex and unnatural way to understand a language. It is also dull for learning and off-putting. One of the vital components in studying a language is motivation and getting driven up until you get competent enough to interact along with native language talkers. Gaining knowledge of a language will have to be fun and fascinating or newcomers in simple terms shed the drive and neglect to learn.

The German language software method should be to mimic the way we discovered to speak our native language when getting to know German. The absolute best technique to be taught German is by hearing and repeating what you listen to. In the end, that is the way how you mastered the dialect you speak presently. The software uses interactive studying activities and highly amusing word approaches that result in larger memory retention of what has been covered. Most of these fun strategies enormously help students remain highly motivated while gaining knowledge of the language leading to a more rapid, easier and even more productive learning approach.

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Problems, Discovery And Situations – 3 More Learning Theories

Uncategorized | Posted by languageinfo
Jan 30 2011

Here are some more learning theories that our teachers use in presenting materials to our students. You don’t have to read them all in depth but it’s sure useful to know they exist!

Discovery Learning

Discovery learning is an inquiry-based, constructivist learning theory that takes place in problem solving situations where the learner draws on his or her own past experience and existing knowledge to discover facts and relationships and new truths to be learned. Students interact with the world by exploring and manipulating objects, wrestling with questions and controversies, or performing experiments. As a result, students in who learn English in Dublin may be more likely to remember concepts and knowledge discovered on their own (in contrast to a transmissionist model). Models that are based upon discovery learning model include: guided discovery, problem-based learning, simulation-based learning, case-based learning, incidental learning, among others.

Proponents of this theory believe that discovery learning has many advantages, including:

encourages active engagement
promotes motivation
promotes autonomy, responsibility, independence
The development of creativity and problem solving skills.
a tailored learning experience
Situated Learning Theory

In contrast with most classroom learning activities that involve abstract knowledge which is out of context, Lave argues that learning is situated; that is, as it normally occurs, learning is embedded within activity, context and culture. It is also usually unintentional rather than deliberate. Lave and Wenger (1991) call this a process of “legitimate peripheral participation.”

Knowledge needs to be presented in authentic contexts — settings and situations that would normally involve that knowledge. Social interaction and collaboration are essential components of situated learning — learners become involved in a “community of practice” which embodies certain beliefs and behaviors to be acquired. As the beginner or novice moves from the periphery of a community to its center, he or she becomes more active and engaged within the culture and eventually assumes the role of an expert.

Problem-Based Learning (PBL)

Problem-Based Learning (PBL) is a pedagogical approach and curriculum design methodology often used in higher education and K-12 settings. The following are some of the defining characteristics of PBL:

Learning is driven by challenging, open-ended problems with no one “right” answer
Problems/cases are context specific
Students work as self-directed, active investigators and problem-solvers in small collaborative groups (typically of about five students)
A key problem is identified and a solution is agreed upon and implemented
Teachers adopt the role as facilitators of learning, guiding the learning process and promoting an environment of inquiry
Rather than having a teacher provide facts and then testing student’s ability to recall these facts via memorization, PBL attempts to get students to apply knowledge to new situations. Students are faced with contextualized, ill-structured problems and are asked to investigate and discover meaningful solutions.

As a strategy PBL:

develops critical thinking and creative skills
improves problem-solving skills
increases motivation
helps students learn to transfer knowledge to new situations
Summary

The use of the above theories in the classroom allows for the students to acquire language in an organised and structured environment. As soon as students become, or are made aware of this organised approach to learning they feel more at ease, and more confident in themselves, in the knowledge that they are following a tried and tested path to language acquisition. The teacher, whose primary role mediates somewhere between facilitator, instructor, context setter, and student-needs analyst, is also responsible for making the students feel relaxed in the classroom, thus optimising their learning potential. At ULearn English school Dublin we employ all of these theories dynamically so as to best suit the individual class and learner in that class.

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Theories Of Learning English

Uncategorized | Posted by languageinfo
Jan 28 2011

Theories Of Learning For English Students

In this article ULearn English school Dublin begins a discussion on learning theories. Many of these theories draw on psychology models and their relevance to the classroom and different students cannot be overlooked. From communicative theories to attention / relevance processes we can see a range of structures that attempt to better understand how students approach learning and how teachers may be better able to facilitate those styles of learning. At ULearn English School Ireland we believe an overview of these different concepts is important. We also aim to provide personalized teaching methods rather than adopting any one system rigidly.

Methods

Around the turn of the century much of Europe entered into a fervor about new political theories. They turned to Socialism and Communism and Democracy and Fascism as models of how to run human society. As experiments, they failed. Human interaction is too complex and changes too often to be pinned down by one approach. Nowadays much of the West adopts a floating kind of Democracy. We don’t vote on everything, nor do we give absolute power to our governments.

Language learning too is a complex activity and many educators have searched for the Holy Grail – a method that works for all tasks and all
learners. And there are hundreds of established theories about language learning. And each of them will direct you in some positive way. The academic consensus at ULearn English school Dublin is that the use of a number of methodologies and approaches to second language acquisition is often necessary and preferable. What we aim to do now is introduce you to some popular theories, the benefits they have, and their shortcomings. If nothing else they will give you cause to think about the methods you use yourself. If you are in some form of instruction now right now this section may also help you to critique your instructor’s performance!

Communicative Language Teaching (CLT)

CLT spans a broad set of principles such as:

1. Learners are provided the necessary motivation – this can be either internal or external (see Motivation)

2. Learners learn a language through using it to communicate.

3. Authentic and meaningful communication (see Situated Learning Theory) should be the goal of classroom activities.

4. Fluency is an important dimension of communication.

5. Communication involves the integration of different language skills.

6. Learning is a process of creative construction and involves trial and error (see Discovery Learning).

Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) involves the use of different approaches and methods to be utilized in the classroom:

· Motivation

· Discovery Learning

· Situated Learning Theory

· Problem-Based Learning, Discovery Learning

For many students of English, the type of teaching model they receive goes unnoticed. Personally I believe that it is a sign of a good teacher who can implement a pedagogical style without being overt about it. Should you come ULearn to learn English in Ireland you will find that throughout our English course Dublin there is an emphasis on no one particular theory. Each task is taken on its own merits and each student is approached individually based on their goals throughout their learning path.

In the next article we will go through more learning theories designed to help both teachers and students better understand how to learn English.

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How To Keep Learning English – A Guide To Student Motivation

Uncategorized | Posted by languageinfo
Jan 26 2011

In sickness and in health – human motivation

In my spare time I like to cycle up the Dublin Mountains. It clears my head and I love that feeling nearing the end of a hill (we don’t have real mountains in Ireland!) coming around the bend towards the peak. I remember when I was a teenager I would be so motivated to go climbing that I would go to bed at 9 o’clock and wake up at 5am when nobody else was around so I could take off on an early ride. I still cycle today but sometimes now I need someone or something else to get me going. I’m more motivated by the idea of keeping fit, going along with a friend or maybe just to listen to a new album I’ve bought than the activity itself.

So sometimes my motivation is for the cycle ride itself and sometimes it is for reasons outside of the activity (in this case, my desire to hang out with somebody on the weekend or listen to some good tunes along the way). We can divide students into these categories too. We see students who are

· Intrinsically motivated – a student who enjoys learning for its own enjoyment

· Extrinsically motivated – a student who performs to obtain some reward or avoid some punishment.

There is evidence to suggest that intrinsically motivated students are more likely to sustain their efforts at learning and are more likely to become interested in and take pleasure from resolving difficult tasks.

However, as adults there is no real dividing line. Some days you will be keen to go to language classes and other days if it weren’t for meeting your friends you might not go at all. All of us are motivated by both factors at different times. What we all need to be aware of is that motivation is a complex thing and requires new perspectives for us to continue and to persevere. This is where your teacher can come in really handy. Many students Learn English Dublin without English courses and can find it really difficult to keep their motivation and direction.

There is a third term here which we are more interested in developing as a concept. It is called Motivation to Learn. It is defined by one author as “the meaningfulness, value, and benefits of academic tasks to the learner–regardless of whether or not they are intrinsically interesting” (Hermine Marshall 1987). We can also note that Motivation to Learn is characterized by long-term, quality involvement in learning and a commitment to the process of learning (Carole Ames 1990).

Motivation to Learn is a competence acquired “through general experience but stimulated most directly through

· Modeling

· Communication of expectations

· Direct instruction or socialization by significant others (especially by peer learners, friends, and teachers)

Pool our resources

Once you enter a school you have all the books, videos & audio and teaching knowledge at your disposal. In U-Learn there is also a strong focus on social and sports events when you get a chance to learn with your peers, teachers, and other staff members in a relaxed environment outside the classroom. This is a key element in your growth and ‘real world’ practice.

And even if you aren’t in the school, you are more than welcome to come along to one of our weekly screenings of English movies, (we have a nice projector and sound system for a quality cinema experience) five-a-side football, tag rugby (when the weather in Ireland permits!) and of course it wouldn’t be Irish if there wasn’t a weekly pub night and monthly in-house parties.

Visit the extracurricular page of our Learn English Dublin website or go directly to the Socials Page for details of how to sign up for this weeks event at no cost to you. We would love to see you there even if you aren’t in the school. It’s a great way to learn, practice, and meet new people too.

Summary

Language learning is not a one-day project, but requires endless efforts and growth. The power to keep their learning efforts moving for longer depends on the stimulation of motivation in language learning. So, one of the primary tasks of our teachers is to get familiar with motivational strategies and then apply them in class. No matter what kinds of field of study, learner’s motivation in studying should always come before the application of learning theory.

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Learn English Vocabulary Fast

Uncategorized | Posted by languageinfo
Jan 22 2011

STAGE 5: AN OFFER YOU CAN’T REFUSE
 
The importance of instruction
 
So now you’ve got all the information you need, right?  So why do so many people part with their cash for help with their learning?  That’s a simple question with an answer that is a complex as the history of education.  And we know that learners are complex too.  The following paragraphs might shed some light on this subject. They have helped real life students in our English school Dublin.
 
Only the Golden Tickets – why error correction is so important
 
When I was younger I used to love watching a game show called The Crystal Maze.  The final challenge for the contestants was to enter an enormous glass room with huge fans blowing from under a gridiron floor.  The fans blew gold and silver tickets high into the air.  The idea was for teammates to collect as many golden tickets as possible and leave the silver ones behind.  Quite a difficult task given the confusion and the wind gusting around the room!  The golden tickets counted as +1 point while any silver tickets accidentally collected were -1 point.  The total score equaled all the golden tickets minus any silver ones. 
Think of your language learning success as the golden tickets and the repeated errors as the silver tickets.  The more errors you repeat the less successful you become.  That’s why instruction and error correction are so important.
At the end of Stage 2: Recognize Yourself, I gave you the example of learning the guitar and it’s similarities to language learning.  But unlike learning a musical instrument, you can literally use your language at all time.  Improving it is a numbers game.
Here’s an example:  Imagine both STUDENT A and STUDENT B are absolute beginners who want to learn English.
STUDENT A (Christopher) goes to English classes approximately six hours a day over a period of six months and at the end has completed a little over 1000 hours practice time. 
STUDENT B (Simon) attends 1000 hours of English instruction but in his case it is done over the course of four years.
What is the likely outcome for both learners?  Will they both gain the same level of proficiency?  No.  Despite what you might think, the most likely outcome is that Christopher will advance faster, and will also gain a higher final level than Simon! 
 
Why?  It is because of error counts, error correction, and the how long the gaps are between them.  Have a look at the graph below.

 
Above you can see the plotted graph of repeated errors (made three times or more) per thousand words spoken.  These are mapped over the course of one sample week.  In the example Simon has more time to lapse into making the same errors as he goes unseen and uncorrected by his instructor.  His repeated error count remains roughly constant while Simon’s decreases.

Now take a look at this next graph which plots communication errors for every 1,000 words spoken.  (Communication errors signify mistakes which actually get in the way of the speakers message and make it difficult to decipher what he wants to say.)
 
You can see from the above graph that Chris’ and Simon’s overall error count throughout the period remains, but the key difference here is Simon is making different errors while Chris is making the same ones.

While you may make the same mistake in class once, twice, even three or four times, once the error has been corrected you become less likely to commit that error again.  This will mean that your error count remains pretty constant for your level but you are expanding your knowledge faster by making (and being corrected on) new errors and not just repeating the old ones. 
Think of errors like old friends.  Correction is the reminder not to forget our old friends.  Remember that errors show us the right path.

This brings us back to your goals from the beginning in a more concrete way.  Now as well as what, you also need to decide when you want to achieve.  In my experience I have seen some students get very frustrated while coming to class part time in the evenings or ‘whenever their schedule allows’.  Ironically in many English courses Dublin it is often the students who do fewer hours per week whose attendance begins to drop off or even stop.  Often this is because their advancement is not as fast as they would like.
 
YOUR DECISION:
DO YOU WANT TO ACHIEVE YOUR LANGUAGE LEARNING GOALS IN A SHORT PERIOD OR A LONG PERIOD OF TIME?
 
And while you think about it remember this:
 
The longer the gaps are between your instructions the more likely it is that you will develop the wrong habits.
 
And here is another great quote about habits from Samuel Johnson who said, “The chains of habit are generally too small to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.”
 

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Learn English Free – English Courses Dublin Strategy On Learning New Vocabulary

Uncategorized | Posted by languageinfo
Jan 19 2011

STAGE 4: VERBAL GYMNASTICS
 
Foreign Language Vocabulary Acquisition
 
There are 540,000 words in the English language.  Five times as many as in Shakespeare’s time!  Luckily however the average native speaker of any language uses around a tenth of his vocabulary in everyday speech. In other words, around 1200 to 2000 words.  By the end of this page you will have read over 500.  And by the end of the article you will have read far more than 3000 different words.  So you see that vocabulary isn’t really the enormous task it first appears to be.
 
Now, please don’t laugh, but the first thing I recommend to my students in our English school Dublin is
 
Buy a separate notebook or use a divider to separate vocabulary from other language learning categories. 
 
Paper is relatively cheap and good organization will lead to cleaner thinking.  Enter all the information you learn each day into the notebook or folder on a new page and date the page.  You will later have to re-organize it and I want to show you how.
 
Memorizing things isn’t something most people are fond of.  I for one have a terrible memory.  We dislike memory tasks because we aren’t so good at remembering abstract concepts and it also reminds most of us of boring schoolwork and perhaps even failure. (Not a great combination to give you confidence.)  So, abstract concepts are hard to commit to memory.  They are floating ideas and if they have no anchor in our reality they will simply float away.  But humans are adapted to learning and memorizing meaningful patterns without any real effort at all.  So my next piece of advice would be
 
Write down and learn only the words you encounter personally or are significant to you during your week of classes.  (You will have plenty there without searching out random words, which you will find more difficult to remember.)
 
 
Birds of a feather flock together
The title is an English expression meaning that similar types of people usually come together socially.  In my experience I always found it much easier to learn vocabulary (and access it for use later) by category.  EFL Developments in ‘lexical semantics’ (words grouped by meaning) have prompted the development of the ’semantic field theory’, ’semantic networks’, or ’semantic grid’ strategies, which organize words in terms of interrelated lexical meanings.
 
Vocabulary is central to language and of critical importance to the typical language learner (Zimmerman, 1997). The prominent role of vocabulary knowledge in foreign language learning has been increasingly recognized.  The last decade witnessed a growing interest in the ‘lexical approach’ to EFL teaching. Besides, developments in ‘lexical semantics’ and the ‘mental lexicon’ have prompted the development of the ’semantic field theory’, ’semantic networks’ or ’semantic grid’ strategies, which present and organize words in terms of interrelated lexical meanings (Gu & Johnson, 1996, p. 645).
The ’semantic field’ theory suggests that the lexical content of a language is best treated not as a mere aggregation of independent words or an unstructured list of words but as a collection of interrelating networks of relations between words (Stubbs, 2001). The meaning of most words is governed, in part, by the presence in the language of other words whose semantic functions are related in one or more ways to the same area of situational environment or culture (Robins, 1980). A very simple example of a semantic field is the set of kinship terms: father, mother, brother, sister, son, daughter, uncle, aunt, etc. Clearly, all these words share some aspect of meaning that is not present in the word chair, for instance.
It is noteworthy that words may be grouped together (related to each other) according to different criteria. Animals, for example, may be grouped in terms of physical or perceptual features; they may be grouped in terms of nonphysical features, such as pet, wild, food, etc.
Try to think of meaningful categories for your vocabulary notebooks.  Don’t think in terms of putting “all the verbs together” or learning “prepositions.”  To your brain these are not meaningful categories and will be difficult and very abstract things to try to absorb.  If you want to learn verbs put them together by meaning.  Using a computer is very useful for organizing words.  If you rely only on handwritten notes then it is more difficult to manipulate them later when you may wish to change their location to group them with other similar words.
 
So, after you have your notebook and you are writing down the important and meaningful words from your own experience, how should you go about the task of learning vocabulary?  How do we approach something so large?
 
Well, firstly if we write down “Learn English vocabulary” as a daily objective this will only reinforce our fear of a huge memory task.  It is also ineffective because
 
·         It is non-specific
·         It is not an achievable goal because the parameters aren’t clear. 
·         It is not measurable – how would you test your success? 
 
Let’s think of an example.  If you want a relationship to go better, setting a target such as “be a better boyfriend” or “be a better wife” would not be very effective.  That’s because it is vague, non-specific, and not measurable.  A better method would be to write down
 
“Spend one hour every day talking to my partner.”
 
That’s an achievable goal.  And you can do the very same thing with this task. 
 
I recommend my students to begin by breaking it up like this
 
·         Using the lists from “Core Communication Techniques” (visit www.u-learn.ie for downloads and more) devise your word schemas which you (and only you) can draw up.  We are not going to use words as abstract concepts.  That’s a difficult route to go down.  We want to firstly focus on the vocabulary you have encountered or you find important and meaningful to you.  Then follow the five steps below…
 
1.      Work through 10 words a day for the first week.  (70 words)
2.      Work through 8 words a day the second week. (56 words)
3.      Work through 6 words a day in the third week (42 words)
4.      Do the same amount in the fourth week (42 words)
5.      Repeat the process each month
 
We must now draw a distinction here between
 
·         Active vocabulary and
·         Receptive vocabulary. 
 
You may already be aware that your active vocabulary is the words you that you produce to communicate and your receptive vocabulary is made up of words you will recognize and understand but may not be producing independently. 
 
So, to review the plan above, the total amount of words in your active vocabulary after one month will be 210.  We can estimate that your receptive vocabulary will be roughly three times that.  So you will be able to independently produce these 210 words plus roughly 420 more.  Your total vocabulary will now exceed 840 words. 
 
Within two months your active vocabulary will top 420 and your receptive vocabulary will be roughly three times that at 1260, giving you a total vocabulary of 1680 words.  That’s a lot of words in two months!  Not all learners will move at this pace and you will need to gauge how much time you have to learn and assess yourself each day.  Some of my own students found this very difficult and were in constant need of assistance either through suggestions of what the word was or encouragement through readjusting their goals.  Goals are there to be attained but also to give you confidence.  If this structure is too intensive for your goals, then create a similar one and lower the number of words. 
 
At the end of your first month of learning in ULearns English Courses Dublin your own words from “Core Communication Techniques” your teacher and peers can assess you, later you can employ the self-assessment techniques as a guide to your progress (and believe me, there will be plenty of progress!)
 

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How NOT To Learn Grammar – ULearn Dublin English School

Uncategorized | Posted by languageinfo
Jan 16 2011

A Rose By Any Other Name

If you want me to point to one specific action that I think wastes more time in language learning than any other it would have to be the following:

Students asking the names of all the grammar structures.

It’s fruitless.  What sense is there in focusing on the names if you don’t know how to use them and express yourself?  These names, or labels, have no meaning outside of the context in which they are used. Strangely there are many English courses Dublin use textbooks and course manuals that focus on exactly this type of work. So, when you get nervous, or feel anxious when confronted with tough sounding terms like

“FUTURE PERFECT CONTINUOUS”

looming large over your next lesson, just relax.  It’s just a label.  The name is not important – the function is what matters.  And there are many more students out there who know the name than know how to use it.
Consider the following example:
                                
A. (John moved to Ireland in 2007)
B. John has been living in Dublin since 2007.
C. (He still lives in Dublin)

Here we have a short sentence relating the length of time John has been living in Ireland. We might encounter this sentence in class where the grammar focus is the PRESENT PERFECT CONTINUOUS. However, rather than stressing over the idea of the Present Perfect Continuous, consider how, from the context (given in the bracketed clauses A & C) we can determine the use of the following combination of words:
 
SUBJECT + HAVE/HAS + BEEN + -ING FORM

This form, we now know, is called the Present Perfect Continuous. That is its label, and that’s all.  The context in B is made explicit in sentence A and sentence C.
 
The form can be learned easily enough, but it is the application of the grammar point that is most important. Try changing sentence A and C. Write one sentence about something that you did (and are still doing today). Write a second sentence about it nowadays. Then combine the information into one sentence. For example, can you complete sentence B?

A. (The earth began to warm significantly in 1977)
B. The earth’s _______________________since 1977.
C. (The earths temperature is rising today)

Did you get it? (If you didn’t and you really want the answer then visit ULearn’s English schools Dublin website or drop me an email me – I’ll forward you the answer straight away!) If you did then congratulations! It’s a difficult structure, and even for advanced learners will struggle to get it right all of the time.

Now try your own example. Use the newly-learned grammar form; practice it in different situations (don’t worry about mistakes just yet – your instructor can help you here – after all that’s his/her job), and try to be comfortable with the structure in real life contexts (see Stage 6 Situated Learning).

So, whether it’s an adverbial phrase, a compound noun, or a tense with a triple-barrel name, like PRESENT PERFECT CONTINUOUS, remember: these words, without context, are nothing but meaningless labels. And who’s afraid of a label!

The Jigsaw Theory – How NOT To Learn Grammar

A lot of students get frustrated with new grammar structures and as ‘Why can’t I see the bigger-picture here?’
Well, the grammatical elements of any language comprise an immense amount of information.  Trying to approach grammar head on in an attempt to understand and visualize the whole frame-work is a fool-hardy task, and one we do not advise you undertake.  Consider point one below. It highlights the fact that grammar is context bound.
These three points address the key issues of grammar learning.

1. Students do not need to master every aspect of each grammar point, only those that are relevant to the immediate communication task.

2. Students need instruction that connects grammar points with larger communication contexts, and not larger grammar-related frameworks.

3. Error correction is not always the instructor’s first responsibility. Students need to practise fluency in an nonthreatening environment.  

Think of grammar learning as you would a jigsaw puzzle; rather than manipulating the puzzle with one simple step, you solve the puzzle, in a logical progression, piece by piece, until you begin to see a clear development and the process becomes less of an obstacle and more of a step-ladder. The puzzle has lots of pieces, but your progress with grammar will mean that your language needs will develop as the grammar points become more challenging.  Enjoy making the puzzle and don’t worry that you can’t yet see the whole picture – eventually it will take shape.

Summary

Language is there to be used.  Its purpose is communication.  You should try to remember that the next time you feel you are feeling frustrated with grammar rules and tags.  They are not your goal.  Your goal is to communicate successfully in English.  Stick to the goals you made in the beginning and you’ll learn a lot faster than you ever thought possible.

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