How to Become Fluent in English

[worthit]

I came across this British site the other day and thought they had some good points that could help many Korean people. Please visit the site at:  HOW TO LEARN ENGLISH

I think the British are far better at teaching English to ESL people than the Americans. I guess the reason is that the British used to have vast colonial territories around the world and needed to teach those colony people English. That is why ESL people have to turn to them for all kinds of resources for learning English. Some of you may already know that all good English grammars (grammar books) come from them. Anyway, I thought the first paragraph I copied from the site and pasted here is quite instructive.

If you are currently learning English as a second language, there are four skills that you will need to become proficient in: reading, speaking, writing and listening. All four of these skills are very important if you wish to become fluent in English.

The reading and listening skills are known as input skills, whereas the speaking and writing are output skills. To master the speaking and the writing, you must first perfect the reading and listening skills. We will break down the four skills and look at ways that you can improve your English.

I've been telling any people who would listen to me the same thing all along. Now I have some allies who can back me up. Learning a foreign language can be compared to babies' learning their mother tongue. Babies have to listen to their parents and other people around them before they begin to speak. Babies don't create their own language,  but they aquire their parents' language. That is why it is called the mother tongue.

When they grow older, they read kindergarten reading materials, comics, fairy tales or other reading materials before they begin to write on their own.

Since they talk about the INPUT skills and OUTPUT skills, it reminds me of a computer jargon, GIGO (garbage in, garbage out). If one expands this concept, one can also say NINO (nothing in, nothing out).  Many Korean people have had nothing in, but they try very hard to have something out. They will fail because it is against a basic physics law. No one can create something from nothing.

Here is another helpful suggestion from EnglishClub.com.

[「냐옹」]

When you observe infants acquring language, you can see that they acquire simple vocabulary first and they don't master syntax until much later. ie. They would say "Daddy here" instead of "Daddy is here." Second language acquisition is pretty much the same, in my opinion. One should enlarge his/her vocabulary first before getting caught up in learning grammar. Learning vocabulary makes reading much easier since you won't have to look up every other word in the dictionary, which can take the fun out of the reading itself.

[worthit]

Yes, I couldn't agree more with you. I believe those two web sites I cited also say the same thing as you do. I think too many Korean students refuse to read easy stuff because they are more interested in showing off rather than learning real English. They probably feel ashamed to admit to reading children's books which are a lot easier than Harry Potter series, but less popular or prestigious.

[Eunho Yang]

Thanks for your story..

[Eunho Yang]

buy, In my opinion, What your passage told needs us to be patient than ever. If we learn Enlish as well as others, i think we need to be patient to learn foreing Language. "Mother Tongue"(?) It might take us much time to learn Language, If we want to learn that. anyway, Not be hurry, Steady and slowly and wins the race.:]

[쌍칼]

I think all I need is time which I don't have enough unfortunately and nobody does either. So, key point is how to spare some time to practice from your daily routine. Isn't it? Maybe I need to learn time management skills first to practice English. ^^

[worthit]

Yes, of course, you need lots of time. You will be surprised to know that you still have your whole life ahead of you. If you want to be as fluent in English as native speakers, it may take your whole life time. You may not get there, but you will be able to say, "I have done it in the most effective way." That is the point. There are so many Korean people who have spent 10, 20, and more years of their life studying English but learned nothing useful. They have totally wasted their time for nothing. If we can help a few of them, we will have accomplished a great deal.

[worthit]

We come across quite a few people in the English Diary board even today who waste their precious time writing in their diary with Konglish. They don't know what they are doing is completely useless. Someone got to tell them. I've tried, but they don't understand what I tell them. I really feel sorry for them. They have no input skills, but they want to create output skills from nothing.