Hey hey hey, what's up? It's your favorite American English teacher here
My name is Gabby if you didn't already know and this is go natural English today
I want to share with you some tips for using a
monolingual dictionary
in English that means English to English
not English to Spanish English to Portuguese English to Arabic English to Turkish or whatever your native language may be this is the
universal English dictionary monolingual means one language English to English
So it's very important that you start using a monolingual dictionary
and you throw out your bilingual dictionary because we need to develop your
thinking skills in English
Why?
because when you're always
Translating from English to your native language from your native language back into English it takes a long time
So if you're participating in a conversation in English or trying to participate you can't just be like hey guys wait wait wait
Can you just stop?
while
I check my dictionary because I'm not sure what you said so everybody just stop talking because I need to translate this real quick
Okay, got it now. Let me translate my thoughts from my native language back into English, okay guys
I'm ready to actually respond now. It doesn't work like that especially
in fast conversations
maybe in a meeting or like a
high-powered business situation you need to be ready to respond and in order to respond you first have to
Understand so we need to get your thinking skills going in
English fast the best way to do that or one of the best ways is to use a monolingual dictionary
Now some people say
But Gabby, it doesn't work when I look up a word in a monolingual dictionary
It just gives me more
Words that I don't know so I still don't understand the word that I looked up and now I feel even more
Confused because all the other words are new and I'm confused and now I feel really dumb and bad
And why did I even try guys?
Relax, it's gonna happen. Do you remember the last time in your language in your native language that you didn't know?
What a word meant I'll give you an example in English okay. I learned a new word the other day
amortization
What does it mean? Well I?
Kinda sorta thought I knew what it meant
But I looked it up and even after I looked it up in an English English dictionary
I did something else I looked for examples of how it is used on
Websites, and I did something else I looked for images
Through Google Images so I googled this word
And then I looked at pictures to see how it was visually
Described and this is an awesome way for you to clarify any doubts about a new word is
Use Google images and also look at how the word is used in
Context on other websites so that you have a variety of diverse
and
numerous sources of information not only your one monolingual dictionary
But now you have the whole internet. Oh my gosh. The Internet's pretty awesome
I don't know if you've heard of it
but it's a great place to find out more information about words and
meanings of things you can learn anything on the internet even English, okay, so
Use all of the tools out there and don't give up if you don't succeed
Right away you have to try and try again
If you don't get the meaning right away just
Breathe and keep looking for information, or you know just let it go because it actually takes several
recurrences of the word several times
to learn a word
By heart to really understand the meaning and to remember that word so it's okay
It's okay, if at first you don't
Quite understand the meaning of the word, and you can't remember it at all
So just relax and keep going with English keep reading keep listening
And maybe make a note of those words
That you'd like to look up that you'd like to learn more about and trust me with this
Positive attitude and not giving up of just keeping going day after day you're going to improve quickly
You're already improving. You're watching go natural English you're doing the right thing
So thank you so much for watching if you liked this
Tip on how to learn English how to think in English?
then you would love my video on how to stop translating in your head and
Think in English right up there. You can watch it and make sure if you have not subscribed to go natural English
subscribe by clicking the big red subscribe button
And that will give you a little notification when I make new videos or tips like this so thanks again for watching
And I'll see you again in another video soon mwah bye for now