Tag: Fluency at your fingertips
August 29, 2020
My son, Hai Nam, is learning to speak three languages: English, Vietnamese and Spanish. He enjoys listening and repeating. He can copy pronunciation and intonation with good accuracy. There are a few phonemes that have taken more time to develop than others. In chronology of development, they are f, m, th, L, and in Spanish, rr. Vowel sounds did not pose much difficulty, but perhaps long vowels came after short vowels.
We have been reading books to him in all three languages. It was very interesting to see that at two years old he was recalling full sentences. And, now after two and a half years old, he produces original full sentences. Perhaps, because I speak to him in English most, I recognise his English speaking skill best. But, now that my father has been speaking with him more in Spanish, he is producing it independently, as well.
From the age of two he’s had complete and accurate recall of the alphabet song in English and in Spanish. Although as Spanish letters are not all single syllables, that one has been more difficult. For instance, the letter y is ee-gree-AY-ga, a four syllable word.
He recognizes and names sounds outside, like trucks backing up on the road. The sound of a chair moving in another room. He can ask and answer questions, which is great because he can express needs and desires.
The one persistent error is with personal pronouns. He mixes up subject and object pronouns, and possessive adjectives. He’ll use you for himself and I or me for the person he’s referring to.
He also slips up with word order in negative sentences. He’ll say ‘should not’ and ‘not should’ interchangeably.
I’ll be very interested to learn what his earliest memory is when he’s older. I’ve so often recalled places from childhood based on photographs I’ve seen of myself there. Even still, I believe my earliest memories are from around two years old. Particularly, I remember falling down the stairs when my parents went to look at the house they rented for us from the time I was two and half to the age of ten.
It’s great to hear Nam recall a full sentence from days ago. He just said something I had told him about our pet cat. He said, “It’s hard to control a cat.”
Speaking of time markers, he’ll use yesterday for any day before today. So, when the power went out a few weeks ago. He was saying a couple weeks afterward, “The power went out yesterday.”
All of this seems to validate the lexical approach, the audio-lingual method, and the value of a text-rich environment. I make this point as an observation of my son’s own effort to learn, not because we have pushed him to recall words or sentences. Repetition and recall of his own volition leads me to this conclusion.
He enjoys nursery rhyme animations called Little Baby Bum and Buster the Bus. These have certainly provided great input, in addition to our communication at home and on videocalls with my wife’s family in Vietnam.
For my part, I’ve been frustrated when my son is uncooperative, but from the time his speech was emerging, I’ve suggested, “Let’s talk.” His ears perked up, and he stopped whining. He was genuinely interested in my instruction or reason as to why he should not do what he had been doing.
It has become very difficult to get him to have a nap in the afternoon. I recently tried establishing rules, but Nam wasn’t keen. Without rewards or punishments related to sleep, the rules were ineffective. And, I couldn’t see any benefit to punishment in this case, because I had wanted him to relax enough to fall asleep on his own. So, I still rely on car rides or walks in the stroller to get him to sleep in the afternoon.
I’m not surprised, though. I remember that during preschool I had been very sad one day when I overslept during nap time and woke up alone, not knowing how long my friends had been up and playing already.
Since our moment to moment desires respond to fleeting impulses, I’ll conclude with the advice that I’ve needed myself, that I’d recommend any language learner, and that I’ll give my son when he needs a reminder: Life is not a sprint but rather a marathon.
1 CommentAugust 28, 2020
It may seem ironic to discuss overuse of technology on a blog. But, if you’ve landed here through a social media portal, there’s a chance that you’re using your smartphone or tablet compulsively. A recent reader comment on SebAnswers hinted at habits with technology that verge on addictions.
I dealt with this, too. At one time, I would reflexively take my smartphone out of my pocket every time I sat down. This wasn’t even the worst symptom of my overuse of the technology. The worst was when my last dreams upon waking in the morning were of scrolling the newsfeeds on my social media accounts. Frightening!
So, here’s my micro-habit tip. It was difficult at first, but it worked. I deleted the apps I was overusing. So, I no longer use Facebook or Whatsapp on my smartphone.
I went back to reading my favorite news websites and blogs for the information that I wanted to keep up on. And, I even found that doing so was keeping me in the loop better than waiting for the stories to pop-up in the Facebook newsfeed. Not only that, I don’t see the targeted advertising, nor do I get distracted. For instance, if I want to read an article on NakedCapitalism.com or Ecosophia.net, I’ve got the blogs bookmarked.
The second thing that I did to limit my technology use was to allow myself only to check Facebook by logging into the website. This does mean that I have to log out every time I log in. That extra step of having to put my password in helped to prevent me from going to that website almost altogether.
I later would only check Facebook once a week, and then eventually once a month. I had practically lost all interest in it after the three weeks that it took to really break the habit of habitually checking the website.
Finally, I made the effort to divert my attention to my surroundings. This was the real beauty of having come to the realization that it was technology that had captured so much of my attention.
When it came to making this change after about three years of using the Facebook app, I was able to remember that prior to having a smartphone I would wake up slowly in the morning, first hearing the sounds outside my bedroom, and then lie still until I really had to get up. And, I wanted to have that feeling again.
Nowadays, I don’t actually sleep in that much, but thankfully, I don’t have to wake up to an alarm.
The second thing I have tried is reading ebooks on my phone. Apart from having read two full ebooks, I just don’t think to open those apps even though there are books I’d like to finish on them. For that reason, I’ve recently ordered paperbacks through the mail.
Perhaps my one weakness now is podcasts, but at least I don’t stare at the device when I’m listening to them.
Life without technology came very abruptly earlier this month when storms blew over trees and took out the electricity. First, it was for five days just about three weeks ago, and again yesterday afternoon to midday today.
The experience was refreshing, and my family adapted quickly. However, to my wife’s particular disappointment, we couldn’t have showers. Even she had hot baths when she lived without indoor plumbing in Vietnam.
Of course, it’s easier to live without electricity in the summer. One evening that week without power, we had a nice campfire. But, in winter, even with a wood-burning stove in the house, when the power goes out, it feels cold five steps away from the fireplace.
Although the storms that brought the power outages were brief, lasting only a couple of hours, the fallen trees obstructing roads that were not cleared for weeks was an odd sight to become accustomed to. Furthermore, the frequency and ferocity of the storms are evidence of our planet’s warming.
To conclude, we don’t have to wait for extreme weather to force us to turn away from our screens, we can do so very simply by deleting one app at a time.
Leave a CommentAugust 26, 2020
Most often unconscious, habits that we actively develop can make a world of difference.
The reflective practice tool I’ve been using with students since 2018 is a habit scorecard based on ideas presented by James Clear in his book Atomic Habits and related talks.
(Recent podcast interview with James Clear on EntreLeadership: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/atomic-habits-with-james-clear/id435836905?i=1000428080039)
The basic idea is to reflect on our habits and make small changes, resulting in sustained improvement. In language learning, this could be the habit of using the target language to speak with classmates in casual conversation, perhaps a big challenge at first. After all, lots of students learning a foreign language only use their new language when they must. However, any classmate could be a practice partner, and the practice doesn’t have to stop when leaving the classroom. So, if you don’t do this already, making the change would certainly be an improvement that overtime will have a big impact!
Looking up new words in a dictionary could be a habit that needs increasing or decreasing depending on how frequently you do this. Overuse of an electronic dictionary or translator is a habit to decrease when it becomes a crutch and you can’t read without ever turning off your phone. On the other hand, using a dictionary and keeping a journal of new words in context can be a habit to develop if you’re trying to expand your high-level vocabulary. This is because the meanings of academic words can be very difficult to guess based on context.
A third and very simple reflection on the habit scorecard for language learning is having fun in study. Some will say learning can’t always be fun, but I strongly believe that it has to be a positive experience overall. Challenge certainly does push us to grow, but play is very important. So, the language learning habit scorecard also includes, “I had fun.” If students are active in class, they typically check this box at the end of the lesson when we do reflection using the habit scorecard. Believe it or not, this does target our goals. The reason we want to have fun learning is simple: If we have fun in class or with self-study, we are more likely to retain the lesson and feel motivated to continue with the subject. To that extent, we are more likely to pursue the subject in free time and thereby accelerate progress.
On the habit scorecard for discrete language, I include, “I pay attention to my pronunciation of final consonant clusters.” It can be very hard for Vietnamese students I’ve taught to pronounce final consonants. These sounds, however, are not just important to pronunciation as they also affect grammar. Take, for example, the third-person ‘s’ for verbs in the present tense and contractions for is. “She’s amiable. What’s amiable? It means friendly.” If the letter ‘s’ is not pronounced, or if it’s transposed, these sentences end up sounding like, “She amiable. What amiable? It mean friendly.” Or perhaps, “It’s mean friendly.” Or, “It mean friendlies.” In these sentences, the ‘s’ has been moved and the error seems even more awkward than omitting the ‘s’ in the first examples where the reduced verb ‘is’ and third-person ‘s’ on means are missing. Again, beyond pronunciation, these are grammatical errors, as well. Uncorrected, this type of error then fossilizes in learners’ speech. Thus, on the part of the learner, receptiveness to correction is of utmost importance.
As a teacher, I use immediate correction techniques with the aim of raising student awareness to their errors. As often as I can, I take the time to get students to self-correct with the hope that they develop the skill of monitoring their own speech. Hard as it can be to change, the purpose of focusing on the small habits (good and bad) is that overtime making small changes emerges as making great strides in progress toward fluency.
Now for an example of lifestyle habits that are relevant to all of us: diet and exercise. I have had to admit to myself that weight control as I age is a lifestyle based on habits in the way I have already discussed. I have seen a dramatic, visible change over years of good and bad habits. Most dramatically, the change has been with an aging body and changing musculature. I was fit as a teen and quite healthy-looking in my early twenties. However, bad habits led to weight gain in my late twenties, which over a period of years progressed very rapidly toward obesity.
In the years I was studying for my master’s degree, I was simultaneously working and studying full-time. I spent the days teaching and evenings at my desk reading and writing. At least the work and study matched, since I was teaching English and studying second language acquisition. Nevertheless, I saw my weight grow by twenty pounds over the preceding three years, and then by thirty pounds over the two years I was a student teacher. The physical change shocked my friends and family upon my return from overseas.
I took up fitness again at the age of 28 and went from obese to merely overweight. Then, I moved to Vietnam at 29. Because of the very hot climate and my participation in a staff weight-loss competition at the school where I taught, I lost more weight. At 30, my fiance and I took up yoga. I lost weight even faster. We attended hour-long yoga classes in the evenings. Then, we married, and the changes in habits became hard to sustain.
From the age of 31 to 33, I changed my workouts to strength training. Unfortunately, my range of motion became very rigid. Whereas I had been playing sports like tennis, soccer and swimming in my youth, the weight-training lacked both cardio and flexion. My back turned into a knot every night. At 33 years old, I had to address my back pain at the doctor’s through chiropractic adjustments and physiotherapy.
These days, I stretch every morning and evening, and I try to stay active throughout the day, rather than single hour-long workouts. Besides these basic fitness changes, my wife and I have had an ongoing weight-loss challenge. Over the past six months we have steadily lost weight. The change has been about three percent weight loss every two months. In six months, I have lost ten pounds, or five kilograms. My goal remains to reduce my weight again by this amount in the next six months.
The change to diet has been to reduce carbohydrates, and to restrict meals to an eight-hour window between 10 am and 6 pm. This technique of intermittent-fasting allows for 16 hours of fasting every day.
At the moment, I’m at the weight I was almost ten years years ago before I started my master’s degree. That’s twenty pounds, or nine kilos, below the highest, unhealthy weight I had reached. It is great considering I have built muscle in these years, as well. I have also overcome what, at one point, I thought would be chronic pain. And, I fit into clothes that had been too tight to wear, a result of slimming five inches, or about 12 centimeters, around my waist. Looking forward, my wife has challenged me to a waist measurement competition, as well. Theoretically, I could reduce my waistline by the same amount again, and if I did so, I would be at my teenage waist measurement… Update forthcoming!
So, if I had been a healthy young man, what got me to this point? Largely, anxiety from required participation in competitive sports in high school. This speaks to the point of having fun with our habits–to have fun with our goal in mind. And, it takes trying different strategies out. For instance, while it does work for rapid weight-loss, counting calories was not fun, and I could not sustain that as a habit. I subsequently realized intuitive food choices without constricting the amount would lead to sustainable weight loss without experiencing sleeplessness due to hunger. For better or worse, this has meant eating more meat and fresh fruit, and drinking still water or coffee with milk only.
To round off my point, I’ll reiterate that as hard as change can be, small changes are easier than big changes, they are longer-lasting and when fun, they are even easier.
2 CommentsThis 15-minute recording contains model answers to the IELTS Speaking Test questions below. The topic is particularly relevant to this coming academic year when so many students will be studying online for the first time as a result of the pandemic.
Useful vocabulary found in the audio recording above:
The playlist of videos below contains four segments with model answers to IELTS Speaking Parts 2 and 3 on the topic of art, photography and artists. The total time is approximately 14 minutes.
Related to the previous post with model answers to IELTS Parts 2 and 3 on the topic of Stars and Planets, here is a video with vocabulary and phrases that I used.
I suggest using a dictionary for new words. Practice repeating the words and phrases for pronunciation practice. And, listen again over the model to hear them in context.
Try recording your own original responses with an audio recorder. Listen to your recording, and take note of your speed and pronunciation.
Last week, I took the standardized test for United States public school teacher certification in English to Speakers of Other Languages. That’s the Praxis II designed by ETS. In the video below, I discuss my experience taking this and other exams, and the importance of simulating test conditions when preparing for these exams because time is such an important factor to success.