- Hi, I'm Mark from Coffee Break Languages.
Welcome back to another episode in our blueprint series.
This is the series which will give you a blueprint
to help you maximise your downtime and do something useful
in that downtime, like learning a language.
Now, in our last episode we were talking about
the whole idea of making your learning special
by treating yourself,
so that you've got something to look forward to
when you're going to be doing that learning.
So we talked about things like your environment,
making your learning environment special.
We also talked about your tool-kit, the notebook
or the app that you particularly enjoy using again
to make it more enjoyable,
to make it something to look forward to.
And of course,
when learning is something that you look forward to,
then of course learning becomes easier.
Now, in this episode
we're going to move on and look at a different topic.
And that is the topic of reading.
And we're going to be focusing on some tips and tricks
to help you maximise your downtime
and become a better reader in your language
and the language that you are learning.
So what do I mean by reading?
Or what do I mean about these tips for reading?
So let's take a look at some of these.
Now, first of all what I would suggest you do,
is read for pleasure.
Find the kind of content that you're interested in,
and read, read, read, read.
Of course, sometimes when you're reading
you might not understand everything,
but that doesn't really matter.
It doesn't matter if you don't understand it all,
because the whole idea is,
as you read you become more familiar with the language,
indeed how the words are fitting together,
what they look like
and how the whole sentence is structured.
So even if you're not understanding everything,
is important to try to read in the language
as much as possible.
I would also suggest that you think about what I see as,
following your passion.
Find material that you're interested in to read.
Now, I remember when I started my learning
of French back in, well, a long time ago
when I was at university, for example,
I was learning French at university
and in order to get access to up to date materials,
we had to go to our newsagent on Byres Road in Glasgow,
and in that newsagent
we were able to buy foreign language newspapers
but these were perhaps three or four days old.
And they were brought on train
from France or Spain or Italy.
So if I wanted my up to date copy of "Le Monde"
or "Vanguardia"
or something like that,
then all I would be able to do is find a newspaper
from three or four days ago.
Nowadays it's a little bit different.
We've got every kind of material at the tips of our fingers,
on our phones or on the devices
that we use every single day.
And we can find anything that want to read.
So if you're interested in horses
then find something about horses to read
in the foreign language that you're learning.
If you're interested in, I don't know, perhaps sports
then even starting with results,
you can look at a results page
and try to work out some of the vocabulary that's used there
and then move on to reviews of a match and things like that.
There's always something to read
and you can work up to more complex materials.
Another idea could be that you are finding a text
about something with which you're very familiar.
Let's say a text about a place that you visit often
or indeed your hometown,
and that you could find a tourist to guide to your hometown
in the language that you're learning.
So the benefits of this is that first of all,
the fact that you know your hometown
or this place particularly well.
So, you know the content,
you know the information that's being shared.
So that helps you understand more of the language
in which you can guess more of the words.
And if you're looking at things like cognates,
those words which are of the same origin,
from the language that you're learning
and your own language,
then you can sometimes understand things through those.
And if you multiply that
by the information that you already know,
about your hometown or the place that you visit often
then it will help you build those skills
in reading that a bit further.
So, follow your passion, find materials that interest you
and use those materials to inspire you
in your learning and read more about them.
A third tip is an interesting one.
And this is a about finding plays or graphic novels,
because sometimes they're really, really useful
as a learner.
Why, because a graphic novel or a play
represents spoken language.
And this is the language
that perhaps you're most used to hearing,
or the language that you're learning to speak,
whereas perhaps a novel, a traditional novel,
maybe more descriptive in nature.
It may have more complex language in it.
So if you can find plays or graphic novels,
then the words in the speech bubble
will actually be spoken words.
And therefore it is a good way to read spoken language,
if you find a play or a graphic novel
in the language that you're learning.
And the other point that I would suggest,
and this is perhaps a little bit controversial,
I very much believe that Easy Readers
are a hugely useful place to start when it comes to reading.
Some people think that no,
you shouldn't be doing Easy Readers.
You should just focus on
authentic content and so on rather than simplified text.
But I think the key thing about Easy Readers
is that they help you keep your motivation high,
when you feel you could have achieved something,
if you've read a short paragraph
or perhaps a few sentences
in the language that you're learning,
then it really is rewarding
because you get this immediate feedback on,
"Yes, I've understood this,"
and that feeling is quite rewarding.
Okay, I'm going to hand you over to my colleague Ava now,
who's going to share some of her ideas and tips
on how best to approach the whole idea
of reading in a foreign language.
Over to you, Ava.
(screen whooshing)
- Hi, everyone.
I'm really happy that we're talking about reading today,
because I love reading
and it really is such a useful way
to practise your language skills.
Now, what I like to do, if I'm reading a short text maybe
or perhaps a specific paragraph
from a longer text that I'm reading,
is first of all read through it all the way
one time to start with, without stopping too much
and trying not to worry too much about what I don't know
and instead focus on what I do know,
to try and figure out the overall meaning
of what's being said.
After that what I'll usually do
is go back to the start of the text
and read through it again,
and this time pause on the things that are unfamiliar
and maybe try to figure out what new words might mean.
The context can be really helpful here,
but also you can use your knowledge of the language
to try and figure out what the meaning could be.
Or maybe it'll look similar to a word in English
or to a word in another language that you're familiar with.
And at this point you can take your dictionary or your app
or whatever website you usually use to look up that word,
and note it down to help you remember it.
After this it's also a good opportunity
to take a look at the sentences themselves
and just try to spot any language points
that you might have been learning recently,
that you can spot in context as as good examples of them.
The last stage in this process is, for me,
just going back through the text one last time
and seeing how much you've learned,
the new words that you've learned,
and also maybe reading it out loud, if you can,
so, to practise your pronunciation as well.
And now of course, this is a great process to go through
and it's good if you can go through it in that much detail,
but we don't always have that much time
to dedicate to one specific language text.
And I think the most important thing to keep in mind,
is just that
it doesn't have to be an all or nothing process.
Even if you can just,
you have five minutes to just read through a text
and look up a couple of new words,
that's still really good practice,
however much detail you can go into or not.
I hope this has helped you think a bit about
how you read in the language that you're learning,
and just keep in mind
that the most important thing is just that you enjoy it
and that you can read just for the pure enjoyment of it.
I'll hand you back to Mark now. (screen whooshing)
- Thank you, Ava, some great tips there.
Now there's one other thing
I would like to add into the mix here.
And that is the whole idea of reading in general,
because reading, of course you could read a novel,
or you could read a book of short stories
or perhaps even articles in a newspaper
or something like that.
But there are so many other books and activities out there
which will help learners build their language skills.
For example, even taking a dictionary,
if you take a dictionary,
there's so much you can learn from a dictionary,
particularly a larger dictionary,
which has explanations of the words
and examples of the words in use.
I always remember
getting my first large dictionary of French
and suddenly realising that
it didn't just give a definition of the word.
It gave a definition of the word
and I saw this word in multiple sentences
and I really understood how that word is used.
Now, of course, dictionaries nowadays can also mean
looking at a site like WordReference,
or other dictionary sites that are available online.
But I do feel there's something quite special
about working your way through a dictionary,
using a dictionary in that traditional sense.
There are also lots of other activity books,
exercise books out there.
And funny, I should mention this,
we have our own series of Coffee Break books.
So these are the 50 Coffee Break series.
So you can learn and practise your language skills
in a coffee break.
And these are full of activities
set in five, 10 and 15 minutes,
to allow you to practise your reading skills,
your writing skills and lots more.
So the there's a huge amount of materials out there,
that will help you improve your language skills.
Let's take a quick run through on my tips for today.
First of all, I suggested,
that you read for pleasure to really get into the language
and remember that you don't need to understand everything.
Secondly, I suggested that you should follow your passion
and find materials are really interested in,
because then your motivation will be higher.
You will want to find out the information,
and also consider using the kind of materials which
perhaps you'll already be familiar with,
and therefore you will be able to understand things
immediately with the knowledge that you have,
and the addition of the foreign language.
I suggested that you could think about
graphic novels or plays,
and that way you're seeing spoken language written down.
And also consider those Easy Readers,
and of course the other types of activities
and books that are especially created for learners.
I hope that you found this useful.
And of course, if you have, please do give the video a like
and makes sure you subscribe to our channel,
to find out the next element in our blueprint
for language learners.
Thank you for watching as ever and happy coffee breaking.