diff --git a/386.md b/386.md index b93d3d3..925dc62 100644 --- a/386.md +++ b/386.md @@ -1,101 +1,64 @@ --- -title: Why Reading Matters for English Learners? +title: How to Aquire English? 如何习得英语？ --- -No grammer, No IPA, but how Americans learn English? In the eariler video, I talked about how America kids use Phonics to achieve literacy, when I said the American way is almost the oppisite of how we are teaching our kids in China. But the key difference will only be shown, in this episode in which we talk about leveled reading. The key takeaways here is American schools focus on developing the passion for reading, rather than rote memorization. Plz note, below is mostly how I borrow the idea of leveled reading in America edu system and tailored to my own needs, so a lot of things that I do can be largely different from mainstream reality. +On what it takes to be a fluent English speaker, what I am gonna share is maybe the opposite of what we've been teaching at school. I did not invent this, most of my idea actually follow the Natrual Approach, advocated by Stephen Krashen. However I will put it in a simples, just 4 principles we need to follow and 5 actions to take. -既不学语法，又不学音标，那美国人怎么学的英语呢？之前一集视频里，我聊了美国小孩是如何通过自然拼读法来实现认字和阅读的，当时我就说，美国人学英语的方法感觉跟咱们的学校里教的方法刚好是反着来的。但是其实最关键的差别还得是在这集里面才能体现出来。这集要聊的是分级阅读，特别强调的一点是美国学校关注的是学生对阅读的兴趣，而不是跟咱们一样就关注知识的量。请特别注意，我下面分享的这些方法，很多都是在美国学校的一些分级阅读教学实践的基础上，形成的更加适合我自己和我儿子 Elon 的一套思路，所以很多跟美国的教学也有很大差别了。 +最近觉得很有道理的一句话，英语是学不会的，需要习得。下面我要分享的观点可能跟学校里面的方法正好相反。大部分方法也不是我发明的，而是来自在第二语言学习界很有影响力的，自然法。主要代表人物是 Stephen Krashen 。我这里只分享4个原则和5个操作。如果你觉得我论证的不充分，可以去网上找自然法相关的视频去做进一步的学习。 -There are three Problems I want to address here? How to choose content, how to build up vocabulary, and how to build the passion for reading? +## Principles 原则 +Principle #1: Learn by Ears. Unlike school, most kids pick up their monther tongue by listening, not reading. So I beleieve videos are best learning material for Chinese students, not books. And kids does not have to learn words to be fluent at English, cause languange is about sound groups, not words. And, there is no need to learn grammer either, grammer is only useful when you are advanced and you want your languge to be formal. But at the stage of just picking up the language, it slow down the process, there is no doubt on this. -我主要想解决三个问题。第一是如何选择教材，第二是如何记单词，第三是究竟怎么才能培养起阅读兴趣。 +第一个原则是，用耳朵学。世界上绝大多数的孩子学习语言的方法，都是跟学校学习思路不一样的。因为孩子主要靠听，而不是读。所以对咱们来说，我觉得视频是比书更好的学习材料。英语母语的小孩子根本也不需要学单词，上学前，英语已经流利了，或者说，已经习得成功了。说英语，其实主要是要掌握声音块，而不是单词。并且，也不需要学语法，语法的作用是语言习得发生之后，或者说已经说的很流利之后，想要让自己的语言更上一层楼的时候去学的。在习得这个阶段，学语法会适得其反，这一点是板上钉钉的。 -## Choosing Content +Principle #2: start from real English. Unlike text-book attached audios, real English meaning connected language, which is hard for chinese students who learned from text books and memorized a ton of words. But again, if you learn sound groups, rather than words, this is not a issue at all. And the benefit is that, once you learn a bit real English, you can start to merge English into your life style by listening to English videos you can actually enjoy, and this transfer will make all the difference. In other words, our goal is different from the one of school, rather than chaseing after high score, our short term goal is to understand 3-5 yo kid's cartoon. Mid term one movies. And long term goal is to open your mouth and speak. -Firstly how to choose the right content to read? +第二个原则，第一天就学真实的英语。跟课本配的听力材料不同，真实的英语都是有连读的，对于我这种通过课本一点点背单词，做阅读过来的学生，会觉得好复杂。但是还是像刚才说的，学说英语就不该从单词出手，应该从语音块开始学，或者粗略的说就是从句子开始学。那么从这个角度其实真实口语一般要比对应的书面形式要更剪短，比如，what are you going to do? 变成口语就是 Wadaya gonna do? ，简单太多了。学真实英语的好处就是，可以在最短的时间内听懂纯英文的视频节目，把把学英语变成一种生活方式，这一点可能会成为英语学习成败的关键。换句话说，学真实英语到底是不是正确的做法，跟咱们要追求的目标有关，如果目标是试卷分数，不一定，但是如果目标是用最短的时间去看懂小孩子的动画片，然后看美剧，那么第一天学真实口语就是非常顺理成章的思路了。 -先来看如何选教材。 +Principle #3: set scope. So principle #2 means, we strive to create us a enviroment of English, which is great, but does not garentee the sucess of English Acquisition. You need to make sure to start where you are, and try not to learn too many things at one time. Firstly, we need to find relevant content that interets us most, which needs to be simple and comprehensable to use. As research showed, 3000 words will cover 98% of your daily usage of English, so let's focus on the core! Just focus on simple content that covers these 3000 words, and keep using the often within different context. This is the way, how language acquisition happens to kids in real life, and I beleive this is also the best way for older people who want to pick up English too. In real life Amarican school leveled reading practice, the rule is that don't move on to the next level before you finish around 1 million words of reading. Same logic apply here to leveled listening we are talking about here. Be patient control the scope of what you listen. -I should mention it's the level rather then the grade that matters. In china, if the kid failed the exam and has to stay in the same grade for another year, that is a big deal. While in US, teachers care more about your reading levels then the score. if a kids failed to go to next level of reading, teachers will provide special help. they have clear requirement which level a kid shoud be at, given certain age. A common scene in America classrooms is a lot of baskets each containes books of one certain level. there are many different ways to set levels of books, such as The Lexile Framework, say, if kid finish around 1 million words, she is likely ready to move to next levels. In reality I don't follow this method, but the general idea is right. Extensive reading is everything. Quantity matters. +第三个原则是设定学习范围。从简入难的学习规律还是要尊重的。所以一定还是要先找到适合自己难度的视频来学，完全听不懂的视频听多少遍也没用的。另外，自己不感兴趣的内容也不适合学。有统计说，其实3000词就够覆盖到日常口语使用的98%的情景了。我们的思路就是尽量找到简单有趣的视频，让这3000词反复在不同场景下出现。孩子学语言不是靠字典的，甚至主要也不是靠父母一个词一个词的解释，而是靠猜的，见得场景越多猜的越准，这就是习得英语和学英语的一个显著的区别。国外学校里面通过分级阅读的方式让学生去提升阅读能力，据说是大概读一百万字的内容就可以提升一个阅读级别，我们这里也算是分级听力了，不要急着去学很难的东西，从简单入手，控制好学习范围，量变之后才有质变。 -需要首先说明的是，在美国，孩子的阅读级别才是教学的核心，而不是她究竟是几年级。我小的时候，如果一个学生考分不够被留级了，这是最大的事了。但是美国小学不一样，他们的老师认为，你阅读级别没达到，才是教学事故。会单独补课的，考分反而没人关心。几年级的孩子大概得到那个阅读级别，都是有要求的，可见他们那边对阅读的重视是体现在制度层面的。教室里面常见的就是这些篮子，每个篮子里面都是一个级别的读物。书是浩如烟海的，怎么分级呢？人家是有很多分级框架的，例如 Lexile 。每个孩子能力不同，所以提升一级所需要的阅读量肯定也不一样，我自己没做过详细的调查，不过听说过“一百万词升一级”的这个说法，可见他们阅读量之大。我和 Elon 做分级阅读有我们自己的方法，所以不根据任何框架来定阅读级别，但是这里我赞同他们的点就在于，由简入繁，通过量变达成质变。 +Principle #4: Treat your second language as if it’s your mother tongue. The idea is to think in English, don't let Chinese goes between. For example, we want to set up direct connection from the word fire, to the image of fire in your head, not to the Chinese language counterpart Huo. Only in this way, can we really ship the word to our tongue tip when we need to blurt it out. -Make sure to start where you are. From my observation, most Chinese students failed their english because they are learning material's are too difficult. But how to define easy? seemingly simple question that is very controvertial in reality. Many believe real life English is too difficult to start, cause in real conversations, people try to be houmous and concise, words can be used in tricky ways, sentences are often not accord to grammer rules. But come on, this is just how native speaking kids learn how to speak. In my definition being easy simply means it is common in your life. Things you learn first are not the simple ones but the ones people around you are using most often, and in multiple ways, our brain love repitition as we all know. So, as long as the content is comprehensable to me or my kid Elon, it is good content. And only yourself knows hat is really comprehensable and easy for you, so don't let others in charge of the choosing of your learning contetn. +第四个也是最后一个原则，把英语当母语对待。要学会用英语思考，不要让中文夹在英语和实物之间。举个例子，我们大脑中有火这个图像，正确的学英语方式是，一听到 fire 这个词，直接就能调出脑子中火这个图像，而不是先调出中文的火这个词。只有这种样，当我们想说这个词的时候，这个词才会直接脱口而出。而用中英文对应的词汇书去背单词，恰恰就是违背这个规律的，这大概就是我自己学的是哑巴英语的最大原因了。 -选择教材，关键还是从自己当前的能力出发。按照我的观察，为啥咱们中国学生怎么都学不会英语，其中很大一个原因就是上课学的材料都大大高于我们的实际英语运动能力。但是什么样的内容才算简单呢？这个问题看似简单，但在国内是非常的有争议。很多人觉得，老外真正的日常用语不能用来当教材，因为真实生活中的老外讲话肯定是追求精练和幽默的，这就造成很多单词的用法其实都有些巧妙，很多句子也根本不符合任何语法。但要是日常英语不能用来教英语，那美国小孩子们难道都是看咱们的教科书学的口语吗？所以，我自己对简单的定义就是，越常见的内容就是认为是越简单最初级的。因为越常见的内容，不管它的句型单词多复杂，都因为可以反复遇到从而变得很容易记住。重复是学习之母，重复多了也就记住了。所以选择内容的时候就是根据我们自己的当前水平选那些能看懂的内容去看，同时要注意，只有你自己知道你的水平在哪里，所以选内容也要自己选。 +All right, these are the 4 principles I think is essential. -There is the thing called 5 finger rule. Open a page of a book, once you encounter a new word, you raise a finger, at the end, if you raise 5 or more fingers, that means the book is too challenging for you. 4 is still very chanllenging, 2-3 is just right, and 0-1 is too easy. +好，这就是今天要聊的四个学英语的原则了。 -有一个技巧叫做五根手指原则。打开一页书，每次遇到一个生词就竖起一根手指。最后如果五个手指都竖起还不够，那么这个书就太难了。4根意味着比较难，2-3根难度适当，1根或者更少书就有点太简单了。 +## Actions -It is also important to narrow your interests. Focus on a few areas you are mostly interested. I will suggest you think to problems, for myself, what bothers me is that I often struggle with family life communication, and I want Elon to pay more attention to science and technology. I believe having clear goals helps you advace faster, since you are more likely to repeat some content if you scope is smaller. +Now, let's move on to the 5 actions. What to do in every day, to be the English guru. -另外要注意兴趣不能太广泛。关注自己最感兴趣的几个领域就好了。我的建议是面对问题来选择阅读范围。比如我自己的情况，家庭日常用语肯定是需要的，另外全部的精力几乎都用在科技方面了。我觉得方向明确可以让孩子进步更快，领域越窄就越可能重复到已经学过的内容。 +接下来聊，5个具体行动。想要习得英语，每天都需要做些什么呢？ -What differs from my strategy with the one the schools' been using is that I use way more videos. Yeah, I know the benifits of books, being, less noisy, more room for imagination, less hormone stimulation. But I prefer more videos, well selected ones of course. Videos can be more entertaining that helps you to focus and sustain. Some highly logical and complex things are easier to learn in videos. And in my family's case, we need to do more shadow reading to practice pronouciations. And for my kid Elon, I believe it's better to build up the oral vocabulary before he can even read. He is now 4.5 years old, many of his classmates can read and even write lots of chinese charaters. But I am in no hurry, everyday we use 20 mins to draw something, letters are often a subject to draw, but I don't consider that's writing, I think I will keep it this way for next one or two years for him. reading ablities will only start to be paid serious attention after Elon speaks very well, taking the route of most native speaking kids. I've heard Finland shcools do not teach kids how to read until 7 years old. So videos are just right for Elon and me. +Action #1: find a coach. Find a person has the patience to listen to u, and you feel safe to communicate with. It’s a person that does not correct your mistakes too often. Instead, when he is replying you, he will use correct way in his answer. And he will only use the words that you already know. I've heard the three rules of natrual acquisition: 1. No mother tongue(it's not important and let's move on when stuck), 2. No grammer 3. No correction. And in my opinion, if you focus on the language, you can not really learn it the efficiently, using it as if it's the only language you know in everyday life instead. -Elon 的使用方法跟美国学校的方法有一个最大的不同点，那就是我们的泛读是以视频为主要教材的。印刷品肯定是有很多优势的，更少的噪声，更低的荷尔蒙，更大的想象空间。但是视频的好处我觉得被学校低估了，当然我指的是精心挑选过的视频。视频更具娱乐性，可以让孩子长期专注，视频更擅长传递逻辑复杂的概念，对于国人，视频更适合直接跟读练口语，不是所有的书都有配套语音的。我对 Elon 的规划是，阅读不着急学，起码六岁之前都不用故意学认字，主要的精力都应该用在听说上。目前 Elon 四岁半，每天我们会花20分钟的时间去画画，字母也属于画画的范围，我也不认为这是在学写字。读写的真正训练，一定是会在 Elon 能说的很流利之后才开始，这跟大部分母语孩子是同一个节奏。芬兰最为世界上小学生阅读能力最强的国家，其实他们的读写是从7岁才开始的。当然，不认字就读不了书，所以视频对 Elon 的作用就更重要了。 +行动一。找个教练。这个人会耐心的听你说英语，让你感觉说错了也不要紧。就像小孩子跟父母一样，说错了也没什么大不了。教练要像父母一样，不要纠正所有的问题，而是要在回答中把正确的表达方式融入进去，这样学习者既没有尴尬，还学到了东西。教练要注意尽量之去使用学习者会说的单词来跟学习者沟通。自然法主张英语课堂上有这么三个原则。第一是，不允许说母语，对咱们来说就是全英文授课，不要说中文。第二是，不要学语法。第三是，不要纠正学员的错误。另外，我自己想要补充的是，必须让学员不要去过多关注语言本身，而是要关注交流的有效性，这样才是学习语言最佳的状态。那么跟教练一起聊点什么呢？最好是学一些自己感兴趣的话题，例如音乐美术舞蹈哲学设计，然后互相沟通，这个有点难度。简单一点的，可以做一些角色扮演，故事复述，看图说话，看词造句等等这些我们小学语文课上的活动，以便开发用我们用英文思考的能力。 -So yes, that's how we choose right content for us. +Action #2: PA, cultivate sound awareness. Get yourself familiar with the 44 English sounds. This is especially efficient for grown-ups, who tend to pronounce many sounds in the wrong way already. Sth like the A A A Apple Video. -以上就是我们选教材的思路了，说白了就是去网上看视频，合理区分难度固然是必要的，但是我们关注的点是这个视频是不是我或者 Elon 最喜欢的，不喜欢的看个开头直接关了，如果是花钱买的书，一般就舍不得看一两页就扔了，所以这也是视频的优势。 +第二个行动就是，纠正发音。英语一共就44个音，可以专门的去强化一下。尤其对我这种原来很多音都发的不准的成年人还是特别有帮助的。可以去看一下自然拼读的相关视频，类似这种，AAA Apple 的视频。 -## Vocabulary +Action #3 Soaking your brain. I beleive, 1hr listening per day at least is necessary. Turn on the video, try to understand the videos from Bibili, Youtube, and channels like English Sing Sing, baby bus, Doraemon, Pipapig. No need to pause, if you r not interested in one video, just move to the next. -Let's move on to vocabulary builing. Yeah, I am convinced that the right way to learn new words is through extensive reading. not vocabulary book or dictionaries. The key here is bind a new word to the actual thing, not the decriptioin like in a vocabulary book or dictionaries. Even the decription is in English, I still consider that harmful, and If you use Chinese, I am convinced that your English learning is doomed. +第三个行动是要磨耳朵。一天至少保证一个小时的听英语的时间。打开视频，尝试去听懂 B 站或者油管上的视频，初学推荐 English Sing Sing, Baby Bus 这样的幼儿频道，进阶一些可以看机器猫英文版或者 Blippi 或者 Pipa Pig 。磨耳朵的内容不用太较真，只要大致听懂就行，不感兴趣的内容直接跳过。关键就是保证量。 -接下来聊聊单词的积累。现在我越来越确信，学新单词的最好的方法是通过泛读，要避免使用词汇书甚至是字典。如果你不想你的英语说的磕磕绊绊，最重要的一点是直接链接单词和实物，如果这中间用中文做了媒介，那几乎不管多努力，你也不可能英文流利了，因为说一个英语单词的时候，中文很容易就会先蹦出来骚扰你一下。即使是英英字典，我都不建议经常使用，这样会让单词跟实物之间间隔了一层解释，不是说这个隔阂不会消融，而是说大部分时候没有必要，直接在情景中学就可以，反正我们模模糊糊的感觉没有啥单词是非需要解释才能学会的。 +Action #4 shadowing. Shadowing means you try to imitate the sounds of the lines in the video, not only the pronoucaition, but also the tones. The natrual approach believe the ability to speak correctly comes naturally when you take enough Comprehensive input. So how much shadowing do you need to do may vary from one person to another. But one pitfall to watch here is not to pick up a book and do aloud reading, casuse then you make up your own sounds of the languange, as a beginner, you know you will just repeat and enhance your own mistakes this way. -Recently I've checked a few videos on The Natrual Approach, which is a method to learn your second language. In a classroom following this method, there are 3 very interesting rules. NO.1 No mother tongue. For me, it means I don't speak Chinese at home. NO.2 No grammer. Research has shown that trying too hard to learn grammer bring huge obstacle when you try to speak fluently. NO.3 No correction, anybody make lots of mistake when they are speaking, and there will be a lot of things they don't understand while listening, but the natual approach encourage you to just keep going. Correctioin works, but just for a while, you tent to forget it soon. Mostly does not worth the time. +第四个行动是影子跟读，英文叫 shadowing 。也就是打开视频，一句句的模仿老外的发音和语气。自然法的很多老师认为，只要听的够多，说是个逐渐的自然发生的过程，不需要太多的训练。我觉得这个说法很有道理，不过如果平时开口机会太少，影子跟读还是不错的一个帮我们形成肌肉记忆的方式。相关的一个我认为错误的方法，是朗读课本，作为初学者，咱们读出来东西肯定跟母语人士说的不一样的，反复朗读可以说就是反复强化自己的错误方式。 -我有这个自信说这些主要还是因为我最近学习了“自然法”，自然法是美国那边的语言学家们研究出的一套学外语的方法。采用这个方法的课堂有三个原则。第一，不说母语。对咱们来说就是不要用中文讲解任何内容，听不懂没关系，在纸画，用手比划都行，就是别说中文。第二，不讲语法。有实验数据支撑的一个现象，用自然法学习外语两年后，学生的语法水平比专门讲语法的班级成绩还要好。另外，语法学的太多学生，口语更容易卡克。第三，不要纠正。说错了就错了，不会说就过。自然法认为，不是说纠正不起作用，而是说作用很小，不值得那些花掉的时间。 - -Now I am convinced that learning with vocabulary books is fatal mistake. By connecting a english written word, to some Chinese charaters, you set yourself to the trap that you can never really speak English, no matter how smart you are and how hard you try. That's simply how our brain works. If you want to speak fluntly, it is best to connect the sound of a word directly to the thing you try to say. If reading speed is top of your priority, argubly it's best to connect the shape of a word, not whole spelling, just the shape to the thing yo try to understand. The way most american kids were tought is to put speaking on top, so most of the words are learnt by connecting sound to the thing. Then they use Phonics to translate sound to written word. This feels right to me, because it is when speaking that we need our brain to react fast, not so much when writing. Now pause and think of why speaking English is so hard for most Chinese people, everytime we try to say a word, we are burdened by a long chain from sound of English word to some chinese then to the actual thing. If you are trying to translte while you are speaking, you can not speak, if you think of the grammers before you speak, you can not speak. This is just simple and undeniable fact. BTW, some people suggest roting phrases is better than roting words, but to me, it does not work either, even this gives the word certain context, which is absolutely a better idea, but you are still connecting English to your mother tongue. So what is the right way? Forget your own language, just learn like a baby, all in English from day 1. Seemingly hard, but it is not. Watching cartoons, reading picture books, connecting the sound to the dame thing, this is just any baby can do, so does a adult. - -现在，我也确信拿本词汇书背单词是个致命错误。因为这种方式是在强化单词拼写和中文词义之间的绑定，大脑如果是这个回路的话，那恐怕不管你语言天赋多强多努力也最终说不了英语。这个道理很简单，如果我们想说的流利，那么最好直接绑定英文语音和实物。如果想读的速度快，那么最好绑定拼写和实物。实际中美国大部分孩子是实现语音和实物绑定，然后在用自然拼读做中介实现语音和文字的绑定。上世纪最后的二十年，西方也有很多语言学家批评了这种方式，认为这样会让孩子的阅读速度降低，他们认为不应该学自然拼读，因为这样拼写和实物之间隔了一层语音，而是直接就读书，建立字形和词义的绑定。但是，很多研究数据表明，自然拼读不会降低阅读速度，而不学自然拼读反而会大大降低孩子认字的进度，所以这种思潮在本世纪初已经不占主流了，目前可能只有新西兰一个英语国家还在坚持抵制自然拼读。不管怎么说，目前美国大部分孩子还都是语音第一，语言绑定实物。现在停下来想想咱们国人说英语为啥那么困难呢？每次我们想说一个单词，我们脑子中要背负起一个沉重的链条。中文是咱们的母语，也因为背单词的方式，你脑子肯定先蹦出实物，然后是中文意思，再然后中文对应英文拼写，因为没学过自然拼读，英文拼写也对应不出发音，还要借助音标为媒介，像我自己因为音标掌握不过关，即使拼写记得很牢的单词，也不一定能发音发对。看看整个这个拓扑，语音离着实物有多远。而老美为啥两岁小孩就会说英语，因为他们是语音直接对应实物，中文，音标，拼写，这些在他们脑子里面根本不存在，这种脑回路自然也会一直保留到成年。这跟我们自己说中文是完全一样的回路。可以这样说，咱们国人学英语最大的问题的就是采用了以中文为核心的英语学习，这就导致咱们的英语其实不是再说，而是在翻译，这样一个英语句子说出来之前还需要过语法这做大山，这个就造成流利的说英语变得更不可能了。另外一部分人聪明一些，不背单词，背句子。这个当然是好很多的方法，因为单词有了一定的情景，但是句子的解释有可能还是需要用到中文，另外句子也不是在情景中学的，所以最致命的问题没有得到解决，到时候照样说不出来。那么正确的方式是什么呢？答案就是忘掉母语，想象自己就是一个一岁的孩子，从第一天开始就在纯英语环境下学习。你可能会说，咱们国内没这环境啊？但是我跟我儿子的实践证明，没那么复杂，有动画片和美剧就足够了。每天看，就能实现语音直接绑定实物，注意我说的实物也包括任何很抽象的概念。过程中，听不懂的就过，不会的说的单词也不要查字典耽误时间，直接放弃。只关注一个指标，那每天的“可理解输入”的绝对数量。 - -Yeah, I think I will just follow the natural apporach, reading a lot, speaking and watching a lot. But one question arise here, are they suggesting extensive reading only? We've taught that it's better to combine extensive and intensive reading. The answer is clear. If intensive reading means you slow down, working on sth that is more difficult and thus you need to repeat many times to understand, I think the anwser is NO. You dont need intensive reading, to learn grammers, syntaxes, and vocabularies. I don't deny repetation in some cases are needed, but out of my own experience, too often, I wasted a tons of time repeating the content, simply because the textbook were too difficult for me. I could have learnt it with 10 persent of the time, if the course was designed properly. Now I don't think you have to slowing down in order to learn grammers or Phonics rules. In my current study, grammers and phonics rules will be highlighted by some dedicated Khan Kids lessons. you know what, I also take a extensive reading approach to learn these lessons, meaning I do not force myself to remember anything, just try to understand. For more, I also love the super elaborated tiny english lessons by some Youtube channels, say, Reachel's English, Bob the Canadian Guy, Learn English with Vernasa and so on. Again, I browse them, never repeat, never bookmark, never note taking. Pronoucation are practiced when I do shadowing and singing everyday with Elon. The natural approach beleive grammer, phonics, words, expressions these things can not be learnt. you can only acquire them subconciously, after enough proper leveled reading, enough comprehnsive input, everything will natually fall into its place. so the conculsion is good news, you can avoid the boring intensive reading completely. - -我和 Elon 最近几年的规划就是完全按照自然法来进行学习。多读书，多看美剧和动画。这时候，你肯定有一个疑问，这些不都是泛读吗？那还需不需要精读呢？学校里我们普遍接受的观念肯定是精度泛读结合的。我也并不反对精读，但是如果精读就是咱们国内这种概念上的精读，也就是选一些特别难的文章，耐着性子反复读，不会的查字典，我觉得有害无益。重复是学习之母，这句话没错，但是我觉着咱们的老师和同学们，都误解这句话了。我自己的经历告诉我，每次我发现一个知识要反复重复的时候，往往都是因为这个知识点对我来说太难了。水到渠成的知识点不需要怎么重复，能理解就能记住。我觉得只要课程安排的合理，很难想象有什么知识是需要反复重复的。我自己目前的方法是这样。语法和自然拼读的规则，我也不会通过精度去学，而是通过可汗学院的一些专门的视频去学。学的过程，也是泛读，也就是说，我只是浏览，试图去理解，但是从来不去死记。另外，视频平台上也很容易搜到一些美国老师讲语法或者语音的视频，比如 Reachil's English , Bob the Canadian Guy, Speak English With Vanessa 等等。同样，也只是浏览，从来不作笔记，从来也不反复看。我和 Elon 日常中每天跟精度比较像的事情就是影子朗读和唱歌了，会有一些重复，但是跟学校里说的精读也完全不一样。唱歌的时候 Elon 有很多单词其实发音根本不准，我也从来不去纠正。自然法认为，语法，自然拼读，单词，表达法，等等任何东西，学是学不会的，只能习得。只要有广泛的有效的输入，也就是“可理解输入”，大脑的神经元链接被不断强化，概率上月重要的知识被强化的词汇也会越多，所谓习得就是这样发生的。所以最终可以总结一句话，精读根本不需要。 - -Enlarging your vocabulary is a gradual process of getting a sense of what the scope of meaning of the word is as I see it in different contexts. getting familiar with the word, at some point it starts to click in. - -扩大词汇量，最终靠的是在多种的语境下去反复磨合，不断深入理解一个单词的意义，从而不断逼近这个单词精确的内涵和外延的过程。只要阅读量够，最终这个单词我们是会记住的，而且这样记住的单词，不但是能懂，而且会用。 - -## Passion - -The key to a successful education is cultivating motivatioin. If your kids are not interested in reading, anything else is just meaningless. - -最后要解决的也是最核心的一个问题了，那就是阅读兴趣是如何培养的？说大了，也就是孩子的内驱力从哪里来。如果孩子失去了学习的动力，那么其他努力也都是白费了。 - -I am just not too crazy about main stream leveled reading series, say RAZ or Oxford Reading Tree. They just give me a old-school feeling and most of the stories are not that exciting. I know, one of the design goals of these books are to teach you daily conversation, so being exciting is not necessarily the goal. But for me, if I want some fun, I rather let Elon follow a cartoon seriers, say dragon ball, Aoraemon or Transformers. This way, he will develop a deep love for the main characters, and I still remeber I cried for some cartoons many times in my life. I don't care some story about some random boys and animals. And on the other hand, if I am in the mood for sth serious, I'd rather Elon to learn real skills like designing, math, phtography, yeah, solid stuff, rather than, some random historical stories. In my eariler video, you may know that we are of a project-based learning approah, so pragmatic skills or even science related illustrations are well suited material even during the stage when Elon is learning English language. - -我对英美经典的那种分级阅读的读物不怎么感冒。国内流行的类似牛津树 RAZ 这些教材我都觉得太老土了。这些教材在设计的时候就要平衡很多点，不可能专门去迎合我这样的科技迷家庭。但是即使是用来学日常交流，我都不太想用。如果 Elon 想要放松的时候，可以去看 Peppa Pig 哆啦A梦这样的系列动画，我自己从小就是看聪明一休，七龙珠这些长大的，时常会因为动画中的人物而落泪，这种有核心人物的动画，要比 RAZ 里面那些随机人物吸引人太多太多了。日常对话，在哪都可以学到的。另一方面，当 Elon 需要学一些严肃内容的时候，这些书就更不太适合，之前视频里面，我提到 Elon 的教育是基于项目的，所以我们要学的肯定是一些技术性内容，例如，数学，逻辑，手绘，摄影，生物学，结构学等等这些知识，注意，这里并不是说要让四岁的孩子真的去严肃的去做项目，而是要在这些领域去学习语言，形成对动手的认知，这比 RAZ 系列里面那些杂七杂八的故事有用多了，讲的不深不浅的，很没意思。 - -American schools follow the I PICK rule. which means students has freedom to choose what he wants to read. I – I choose a book. P – Purpose- Why do I want to read it? I – Interest- Does the book interest me? C – Comprehension- Am I understanding what I am reading? K – Know- Do I know most of the words? Even for textbook, the teacher only require students understand 70% before move on, this is hugely different from our education during which whole article memerization is required for many of the articles. - -实际中，美国的分级阅读，并不单是我们国内能买到的 RAZ 的那套教材，它也是一套体系，囊括各个领域的书海。执行中会遵循一个 I PICK 原则。也就是孩子们可以选择自己喜欢的方向去阅读。类似的，Elon 日常也是在无数的符合他当前级别的动画中自己选择动画来看的。美国学校一般认为，一本书，即使是教材，学生理解了百分之七十也就可以了。自然法的老师们甚至说，理解60%甚至更低也没关系，关键是孩子是不是真感兴趣。回到国内，前几天我翻2022版的小学语文教材，还是很多动不动全文背诵。我自己是能够大段背诵古诗古文的人，我倒是不觉得背诵有什么不好，那也得看是值不得的文章啊。但是不管怎么说，我觉得人家西方人这个思路还是更好。 - -No kids want to be interrupted watching cartoons. Also from the natrual approach I've learned, as parents we tent to believe mistakes must be correct, otherwise they become constant. But in reaclity, wasting time on correcting and explaining does not worth the trouble. If your kid can not undertand a concept, it's highly likely he lacks a lot of the background knowledge, it is usually not something you can fix with a few minintes explaination. The best stretegy is probably don't pause, and just move on. The natural approach suggest that it is wise not try to hard to understand, 60% undertanding is good enough to move on. Repetetion makes reading boring, since our brain needs novelty to work best. - -回到孩子阅读兴趣的培养。没有孩子希望自己在看动画片的时候被打断。自然法也反对老师打断孩子，或者纠正孩子的错误。我自己观察 Elon 的学习，如果说它有一个单词第一遍听发音发不对，或者说一个句子它不理解意思，那么背后其实是整个一系列背景知识都不充分的问题，一般即使我去解释，或者让它反复听，它也听不懂。有时候重复很多次，他听懂了，发音发对了，但是回头这些知识也都是空中楼阁，撑不住的，很快就忘了。所以说，我坚持认为孩子投入阅读的时候，不要打断，不要纠正，就让他去重复接收正确的输入，早晚会自我纠正的。打断会让阅读变得无聊，新鲜的内容才能给大脑带来新奇感，才能让大脑更高效的工作。 - -So in my own home, Our rutine is that Elon will do 2hr shandow reading, 2hr watching cartoon, 1hr singing, everyday. We choose videos and books we are most interested in. There is some comunication to share the fun watching, but I try to avoid explainatioin and correction, unless I feel it is really sth ergent. - -所以 Elon 日常是这么安排的。每天半个小时学唱英文歌，一两个小时的影子朗读，三四个小时的纯粹看动画片，紧密依托互联网，不喜欢的内容随时放弃。除非急需的内容，不打断不纠正，目标不是语言本身，而是对内容的探索。 - -## Conclusion - -So to conculde, the way I described above is very different from what our schools are doing. There is almost no repetation, no expectation for full understanding, fast going, vast content quantity. content are chosen based on serving real life needs, rather than exam oriented. This is important, so that we learn the most common things first, not what is grammerly simple onces. perfection achieved by reapeatly seeing the words and grammers in real and different contexts, rather than remeber them with one lesson. All could be boiled down to one thing, learning like a baby. - -三个问题都聊完了。最后总结一下。上面我鼓吹的这套方法跟咱们国内的教学思路基本是反着的。不重复，不解释，不要求完全理解。快点看，以量取胜，基于真实需求选择任何自己最感兴趣的教材去学。以创作为导向，而不是考试。只有导向上改变了，才可能去改变学习路线，以现实场景中的使用频次作为评价知识难易的标准，而不是以语法结构的难易为标准。因为，后续知识的巩固过程也不是定期复习，而是在日常使用中服从概率的安排。说的逻辑挺复杂，总结出来就是一句话，像个婴儿一样学习。好，这集就是这些了，谢谢收看，欢迎讨论。 - -## Ref - -- Don't Try To Memorize Vocabulary https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQZYL39JEFo +Action #5 Memorizing. The idea of natural approach stress on enjoy more, and don't try too hard to memorize things. But learn to sing some songs, and recite some poems will certainly increase the understanding of the languange and build up a lot of confidence of using it. +第五个行动就是背诵。自然法习得英语，不是很赞成背诵。但是我觉得去学唱一些英文歌曲，背一下常用的句型，还是非常能提升学习兴趣和自信的。 +I am sure there are more useful actions you can take, but this is the 5 for now. +其他的方法肯定还有很多，但是我们这里就先列举上面这五个。 +## Conculsion 总结 +So again, we talked 4 principles, #1 learn by ears, #2 start from real English, #3 set scope, #4 Treat it as your mother tongue. and 5 actions: #1 find a coach, #2 sound awareness #3 soaking your brain #4 shadowing #5 Memorizing. To concude, don't be a students, be a baby, don't learn English, Live English. +至此，我们介绍了四个学习原则，分别是，第一，用耳朵去学。第二，第一天就学真实英语。第三，限定学习范围。第四，把英语当母语去学。对应有五个推荐的行动：找教练，纠发音，磨耳朵，影子跟读还有背诵。总之就是不要像学生那么学习，而是要像婴儿一样，不要去学习英语，而是要让英语融入生活。 \ No newline at end of file diff --git a/387.md b/387.md deleted file mode 100644 index 92c2bb6..0000000 --- a/387.md +++ /dev/null @@ -1,31 +0,0 @@ ---- -title: How to Aquire English? ---- - -- Principle #1: Learn by Ears - - listening, not reading - - do not learn, acquire the language like a baby - - no grammer, grammer is only useful when you are advanced and you want to be formal - - it slow down the process of aquiring the language, there is no doubt on this. -- Principle #2: start from real English - - why? - - the short term goal is to understand 3-5 yo kid's cartoon - - mid term goal is to understand movies - - long term goal is to speak - - if you learn text book English audio, you r learning a different language, and it's slowers to be able to understand real life English, then you don't have a learning Environment, that is cartoons -- Principle #3: set scope - - find relevant content that interets you most - - be simple and comprehensable - - 3000words will cover 98% of your daily usage of English, focus on the core! - -- Principle #4: Treat your second language as if it’s your mother tongue. - - Set up direct connection from the word fire, to the image of fire in your head, not to the Chinese language counterpart Huo. - -- Action #1: find a coach - - Find a person has the patience to listen to u, and you feel safe to communicate with. It’s a person that does not correct your mistakes too often. Instead, when he is replying you, he will use correct way in his answer. And he will only use the words that you already know. - - three rules of natrual acquisition: 1. No mother tongue(it's not important and let's move on when stuck), 2. No grammer 3. No correction -- Action #2: PA, sound awareness - - get yourself familiar with the 44 English sounds - - this is especially efficient for grown-ups, who tend to pronounce many sounds in the wrong way already - - the A A A Apple Video --