10 tips on how to overcome the fear of communicating with a native English speaker
Did it happen to you that you speak perfect English with yourself, but do you get any random words with real people? And with a native speaker there is some kind of trash, after which I want to wrap myself in a blanket and never leave my apartment again! Well, if at hand, Google Translate or some kind of dictionary. And even better if you do not need to communicate live.
You tell me that already there are all sorts of phrasebooks and even magic headphones, like a fish from “Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy”, which translate everything on the fly. This is true, but the quality of such translations is still at the level of Google Translate or Prompt fifteen years ago. In the sense that machine translation is still not very good, and it needs to be filtered and checked, but it’s necessary to communicate now.
But you should not get upset, because we have prepared for you practical advice on how to overcome the language barrier.
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First you need to understand the causes of language barriers:
As you can see, there are not so many problems and, more often than not, everything lies in us, and not the lack of time or the complexity of the language. If a student has just started learning English, it is not surprising that he is not yet ready to communicate. Although in properly constructed classes, the practice of communication is laid at the initial stage. So think about changing the format of your lessons if you have a similar situation and do not have enough practice! But let's get to the tips.
Strange advice, yes? It is easy not to worry if it is not in this situation. Although, in fact, we share with you personal experience. Everything started from something and, in most cases, it was not easy. You just need to admit that the first time to speak as a carrier will not work. Yes, and the second and third. But from the fifth or seventh the first results will already be noticeable, which will give you more confidence in yourself. According to statistics in our school, students who have visited a month of spoken clubs (about 8 classes) feel much more confident.
Yes, the school said that mistakes were bad and lowered their grade for them. We just forgot to say that we learn very well from mistakes and extract a lot of useful things from them. Let's just think - who will speak English faster - a person who makes a lot of mistakes and speaks, or one who is silent and not mistaken? The answer is obvious, is not it?
In fact, this is a continuation of the previous advice. At the initial stage, the task of any student is to speak and overcome the fear of communication. Later, your speech can be corrected and improved (for example, at the pre-intermediate and higher levels). But it will be much easier to do when you have the courage, not when you just take the first steps.
Remember the first time you heard your voice on the tape? It was strange, right? The brain automatically turns on a defensive reaction, considering it to be some kind of mistake. Therefore, you need to say everything out loud to the brain accustomed to your speech. In addition, the words are well remembered!
This means that no one will suffer from measured or slow speech. In general, everyone does this to make it clearer, so feel free to speak at a pace that is convenient for you. And the interlocutor (especially the carrier) will be able to adapt to you and even say thanks.
All ingenious is simple. Ask to repeat the moments that are not clear to you, or specify what exactly was meant. The simpler the wording, the better for you. Better to be understood than an exquisite philologist! If this advice is not enough, here is a list of phrases for you with which you can ask again or clarify something:
Excuse me / I beg your pardon / sorry? - I apologize (with interrogative intonation it will immediately become clear that it is worth repeating something);
What was that? - I'm sorry, what;
What did you say? - What did you say;
Come again? - an informal way to say “repeat”;
Could you say that again / repeat that? - Could you repeat, please;
I didn't quite catch that - I didn't catch everything;
Could you give me an example? - is it possible to give an example.
The situation of the reverse. If the interviewee does not understand you - just say the phrase again. It may be worthwhile to speak more or less slowly or with clearer diction intonation. But nothing terrible will happen - even the carriers of each other ask and repeat the words several times! In this case, be prepared to correctly respond to the phrases given earlier.
You say that you can not prepare for unforeseen situations. And it is true. But, if you constantly expand your vocabulary and practice a new grammar, you will be much more confident and quickly decide when to improvise.
Here is a list of useful resources to help with this:
Listen to songs, podcasts, radio or watch short videos, TV shows and your favorite movies. In this case, do not rush to climb into the dictionary for each new word (after all, at least 25-30% of the vocabulary is specially selected complex and unfamiliar words). First try to mark the right word and understand the meaning by context. If it did not help, find the explanation in English. The translation should be addressed only after all these procedures. And do not forget to get used not only to the standard English from Britain, but also pay attention to American and other accents. You can do this on the following resources:
Your cap. In a sense, find the opportunity to communicate in English. If you are not yet ready for publicity, welcome to the language school! And if you are ready - share your gift with others. Heard, for example, foreign speech in Red Square - offer your help.
By the way, there are a lot of different conversational clubs and even social networks for the practice of English:
Gospeaky - social network with the ability to search for friends by interest, and you can also write and make video calls if you are registered;
Howdoyou.do - fill in the profile (interests, level of knowledge of the language), choose those who are online and write / call those who are interested in us;
Coeffee - go through the social network and fill out a profile about yourself. Next, we filter those who are interested in us (country, age, languages, gender) and chat with them;
Easylanguageexchange is a similar site, but you cannot log in via social network - registration is required. And the carriers here are smaller, so be careful!
Well, do not forget about motivation. It will become much easier to communicate if you encourage yourself somehow when learning English. For example, they studied one grammatical topic - they went to the cinema for a favorite movie or ate a chocolate bar. So English will turn not torment, but into pleasure!
Online Courses
We give you access for three months to the course of English for self-study "Online course". To access, simply follow the link until December 31, 2017.
Individually by Skype
We invite to English courses for IT-specialists.
Sign up for an introductory lesson and choose a teacher and a training program.
You tell me that already there are all sorts of phrasebooks and even magic headphones, like a fish from “Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy”, which translate everything on the fly. This is true, but the quality of such translations is still at the level of Google Translate or Prompt fifteen years ago. In the sense that machine translation is still not very good, and it needs to be filtered and checked, but it’s necessary to communicate now.
But you should not get upset, because we have prepared for you practical advice on how to overcome the language barrier.
')
The reasons
First you need to understand the causes of language barriers:
- lack of necessary knowledge for free communication (vocabulary or grammar ignorance);
- lack of practice (even with a sufficient level of English);
- fear of making a mistake and exposing myself in a bad light (what if I’ll pick up the words for 10 minutes just to say “yes”);
- fear of spontaneous communication (you never know what they want to talk with me, all of a sudden I don’t know how to communicate on these topics);
- fear of being misunderstood (I have a pronunciation that I myself do not understand what I am talking about).
As you can see, there are not so many problems and, more often than not, everything lies in us, and not the lack of time or the complexity of the language. If a student has just started learning English, it is not surprising that he is not yet ready to communicate. Although in properly constructed classes, the practice of communication is laid at the initial stage. So think about changing the format of your lessons if you have a similar situation and do not have enough practice! But let's get to the tips.
1. Do not worry
Strange advice, yes? It is easy not to worry if it is not in this situation. Although, in fact, we share with you personal experience. Everything started from something and, in most cases, it was not easy. You just need to admit that the first time to speak as a carrier will not work. Yes, and the second and third. But from the fifth or seventh the first results will already be noticeable, which will give you more confidence in yourself. According to statistics in our school, students who have visited a month of spoken clubs (about 8 classes) feel much more confident.
2. Start making mistakes
Yes, the school said that mistakes were bad and lowered their grade for them. We just forgot to say that we learn very well from mistakes and extract a lot of useful things from them. Let's just think - who will speak English faster - a person who makes a lot of mistakes and speaks, or one who is silent and not mistaken? The answer is obvious, is not it?
3. Do not pay attention to your pronunciation.
In fact, this is a continuation of the previous advice. At the initial stage, the task of any student is to speak and overcome the fear of communication. Later, your speech can be corrected and improved (for example, at the pre-intermediate and higher levels). But it will be much easier to do when you have the courage, not when you just take the first steps.
4. Talk to yourself out loud
Remember the first time you heard your voice on the tape? It was strange, right? The brain automatically turns on a defensive reaction, considering it to be some kind of mistake. Therefore, you need to say everything out loud to the brain accustomed to your speech. In addition, the words are well remembered!
5. Slow down
This means that no one will suffer from measured or slow speech. In general, everyone does this to make it clearer, so feel free to speak at a pace that is convenient for you. And the interlocutor (especially the carrier) will be able to adapt to you and even say thanks.
6. Ask again
All ingenious is simple. Ask to repeat the moments that are not clear to you, or specify what exactly was meant. The simpler the wording, the better for you. Better to be understood than an exquisite philologist! If this advice is not enough, here is a list of phrases for you with which you can ask again or clarify something:
Excuse me / I beg your pardon / sorry? - I apologize (with interrogative intonation it will immediately become clear that it is worth repeating something);
What was that? - I'm sorry, what;
What did you say? - What did you say;
Come again? - an informal way to say “repeat”;
Could you say that again / repeat that? - Could you repeat, please;
I didn't quite catch that - I didn't catch everything;
Could you give me an example? - is it possible to give an example.
7. Repeat if you do not understand.
The situation of the reverse. If the interviewee does not understand you - just say the phrase again. It may be worthwhile to speak more or less slowly or with clearer diction intonation. But nothing terrible will happen - even the carriers of each other ask and repeat the words several times! In this case, be prepared to correctly respond to the phrases given earlier.
8. Prepare in advance
You say that you can not prepare for unforeseen situations. And it is true. But, if you constantly expand your vocabulary and practice a new grammar, you will be much more confident and quickly decide when to improvise.
Here is a list of useful resources to help with this:
- EnglishDom Words , EasyTen , UpMind , Memrise - practicing vocabulary;
- LearnEnglish Grammar , Learn English with Babbel , EnglishDom. Grammar - grammar pumping.
9. Upgrade your listening skill
Listen to songs, podcasts, radio or watch short videos, TV shows and your favorite movies. In this case, do not rush to climb into the dictionary for each new word (after all, at least 25-30% of the vocabulary is specially selected complex and unfamiliar words). First try to mark the right word and understand the meaning by context. If it did not help, find the explanation in English. The translation should be addressed only after all these procedures. And do not forget to get used not only to the standard English from Britain, but also pay attention to American and other accents. You can do this on the following resources:
- ESL Cyber ​​Listening Lab - you can find different levels of difficulty and tasks for recordings (before and after listening), as well as different accents;
- Newsy - for all fans to listen to the news with an American accent (you can read the texts of the records);
- Voice of America - audio and video with a bias in American English, which can be downloaded with subtitles;
- Talk English - a selection of audio for different levels - from beginner to advanced, with tasks for them with different accents.
10. Practice
Your cap. In a sense, find the opportunity to communicate in English. If you are not yet ready for publicity, welcome to the language school! And if you are ready - share your gift with others. Heard, for example, foreign speech in Red Square - offer your help.
By the way, there are a lot of different conversational clubs and even social networks for the practice of English:
Gospeaky - social network with the ability to search for friends by interest, and you can also write and make video calls if you are registered;
Howdoyou.do - fill in the profile (interests, level of knowledge of the language), choose those who are online and write / call those who are interested in us;
Coeffee - go through the social network and fill out a profile about yourself. Next, we filter those who are interested in us (country, age, languages, gender) and chat with them;
Easylanguageexchange is a similar site, but you cannot log in via social network - registration is required. And the carriers here are smaller, so be careful!
Well, do not forget about motivation. It will become much easier to communicate if you encourage yourself somehow when learning English. For example, they studied one grammatical topic - they went to the cinema for a favorite movie or ate a chocolate bar. So English will turn not torment, but into pleasure!
Reader Bonuses
Online Courses
We give you access for three months to the course of English for self-study "Online course". To access, simply follow the link until December 31, 2017.
Individually by Skype
We invite to English courses for IT-specialists.
Sign up for an introductory lesson and choose a teacher and a training program.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/370839/
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