17 posts tagged “english learning”
It's been a long time since last time I updated this blog. I've been doing okay. I just had a slight winter depression which is a kind of annual ritual to me past several years.
I almost made it through this gloomy feeling somehow. Not tried to dwell on (at least less than usual) things that I wanted to do or go but didn't or couldn't. Instead, I put myself into the situations to go out and meet people more often than usual years. I canceled one out of three events, usually, however, this year, one out of five or six events I let go. Not bad, huh.
Thanks to my wonderful friends, they keep me to go out.
I'm going to re-start to learn English more firmly and thoroughly from today. Go for it! I'll catch up with you all my fellow learners on LingQ!
It's been a while. I haven't written anything here for, how long? Anyway, it's Saturday today, and as always on the weekend mornings, I spent several hours siting in front of my PC, to visited some blogs I like, and post some comments here and there.
Then, after my hubby came back from tennis, we went out for lunch. This time it was a curry restraint called 'ラグパティ' (I don't know how to spell it, so sorry it's written in Japanese).
This is our first time, however, as you can see the Google link I put above, this place seems very popular among people around Koriyama I guess.
There's another curry restraint in the center of Koriyama near the station, called 'New Tajmahal'. We went there several times. You can enjoy quite tasty foods, especially their naan )nan bread) is so great.
After I came back home, I started to read aloud 'The Ultimate Gift' chapter five. Our Saturday group on LingQ is using this book as our reading material for past several weeks. Each chapter hasn't so much volume, but we can learn pretty lively expressions along with some teachings every time. I use this book as one of my vocabulary building guidbook. Every week, when I encounter words and expressions I have not known, I input them into PSS (P-Study System) software, and reviewing them when I have time. I haven't done any asiginements on LingQ these days, but instead I use PSS.
While I'm writing above, I've been feeling of guilt to LingQ where I always enjoy learning with, so, I've checked their store, and imported an interesting subject from there. It's one of ELLO's materials. Have a look.
ELLO
http://www.elllo.org/english/home.htm
I have never listened their contents, but it seems very interesting. They provide not only audio files but also transcripts. I've listened a couple of them, but I guess most of their contents are short, but it's pretty enough length if you'd like to listen over and over.
"NHKテレビ 新3ヶ月トピック英会話 英単語ネットワーク ～めざせ10,000語！～" 7月号と8月号 計700円
洋書 "The Ultimate Gift" 1249円
英語でしゃべり隊クラブの追加ポイント 5000円
計6949円
This is just a small note for myself.
I bought the July and the August issue of this magazine "NHKテレビ 新3ヶ月トピック英会話 英単語ネットワーク ～めざせ10,000語！～" today. One of each is only 350yen, which is about less than 3USD.
Since I saw a new word "mindmapping" at one of entries of a blog called "lifehack.org" which Kazu-chan told me a couple of weeks ago, this word has been hooked on my mind all the time. However, being procrastinate, I haven't google this keyword until today.
The magazines I bought today are using this mindmapping trick, I guess. I haven't read these through yet, but I've just seen the TV program this week and found it very interesting, so that's why I bought them.
Three books I ordered at Amazon.co.jp two days ago arrived today. What a quick delivery.
"Matilda (Puffin Novels)" by Roald Dahl
"Watchers" by Dean R. Koontz
"Remains of the Day (Penguin Joint Venture Readers)" by Kazuo Ishiguro
I should have noticed when I ordered it, but "Remains of the Day" wasn't a book I wanted to buy. Even though Amazon reports that this book was written by Kazuo Ishiguro, it is not exactly the complete version, but a revised version for Englsih learners.
The only slight difference between them is that the revised version does not have "The" in front of "Remains". It is quite tricky, isn't it? This may cause other customers who are not familiar with the 'Penguin Ladder Series' to place an order incorrectly, or was I the only scatterbrain in Japan? I guess Amazon.co.jp should tell us more precisely that it is not the original version, it is a revised version. Then it would be easy for anybody to understand.
Anyway, I decided to return this book to Amazon. Instead, I ordered a complete version of this novel at a lower price from Betterworld.com via Amazon market place. By using this method, the book may be delivered in a month or so. Until then, I hope I finish my other two books.
First, though, I have to finish reading "The Witches" by Roald Dahl, which I have been reading since last Friday.
Last several months, I have few chance to take discussions at The Linguist, except for taking part in discussions with the Tomies which is a private discussion group with Hitomi, Marianne, Kazuyo, our favorite tutor Julie and me.
Anyhow, even though it almost reached to the end of my monthly membership period, I still had three credits for participating discussions, because I missed two discussions with Tomies this month. Therefore, I decided to join 'pronunciation question" discussion last Thursday, starting at 11:00 p.m. The time was quite late at night for me.
A guy from Ireland who could speak quite decent English with a slight Portuguese accent, and me were only participants. Thus, we suppose to have a lot of opportunities to talk with the tutor.
Stupid me, I signed up the discussion just a couple of hours before its starting, with nothing prepared for it. I wouldn't be there, if I had payed more attention to the discussion's tile, "pronunciation QUESTION".
To be honest, I was expected that it must be something like there was a context to read out loud by each learners, then the tutor pointed out if any words we mispronounced. Or maybe, I was given advice about my pronunciation after having small chitchat with the tutor.
As the title showed the subject, our tutor asked each of us if we have any questions about pronunciation. Ouch! I didn't have anything in my mind. So, I told her about my R/L problem again. I have been nagging this trouble again and again to everyone I have talked, and she was one of them and I already had advices from her several times. I felt a bit embarrassed, because I'm always complaining about the same thing without any efforts to solve it.
Unfortunately, we couldn't keep continue to talk much. Thus, the discussions ended up 10 minutes earlier than the original duration. It's a really pity. If I could speak more fluently, I wouldn't let her go until the end of discussion.
I haven't listened to NPR for awhile (with no reason why), but I just happened to hear a very funny story on an NPR Health podcast today Here is the link.
Are Computer Keyboards Dishwasher Safe?
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=11029793
A reporter talked about her experience cleaning her computer keyboard by throwing it in her dishwasher!
Even though it's probably at a natural speed in English, these kinds of stories are quite easy to understand for me without any background information in advance.
I must admit that I like these kinds of light topics rather than, say, environmental issues, social issues, education and childcare, not to mention politics and the economy.
When I join online discussions, or a Skype chat with an English learning group (which I have just joined recently), often I'm disappointed in myself because I can't express what I want to say, to be honest. I feel I'm really stupid, and miserable. This causes me to lose motivation to some degree, which is such a pity.
How come it's possible for me to talk about those topics, even though I seldom talk in my mother tongue? I don't need to be upset nor tongue-tied, even though I can't handle unknown things. It's not a lack of vocabulary, it's just a matter of interest. I need to be more positive and to have more confidence!
This week with the Tomies (one of private discussion groups of The Linguist with Hitomi, Kazuyo, Marianne, our great tutor Julie, and me), we are going to read a biography of Marie Curie.
Quote from Wipipedia "Maria Sklodowska-Curie (born Maria Sllodowska; known in France as Marie Curie, aka Madame Curie; November 7, 1867 - July 4, 1934) was a Polish-French physicist and chemist. She was a pioneer in the field of radioactivity, the first twice-honored Nobel laureate (and still today the only laureate in two different sciences), and the first female professor at the Sorbonne."
[memolumdum]
http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/1911/marie-curie-bio.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie_Curie
http://curiousminds.co.uk/article_info.php/articles_id/42
As I wrote before, a podcast named "Evolution English" is my favorite show these days. This show is very good that you can not only enjoy listening on your potable MP3 player, but also you can see some pictures while you are listening on iTune. Those pictures often contain linkage to websites which are very useful. I strongly recommend this show!
In "Media Moment Episode 09", it introduces about an interesting TV program, "Planet Earth". According to Wikipedia, "Planet Earth is a BBC nature documentary series narrated by David Attenborough and produced by Alastair Fothergill. It was first transmitted in the UK from 5 March 2006. The American version is narrated by Sigourney Weaver."
Therefore, you can enjoy both British accent and American accent narration for the same program.
I haven't checked those webpages in detail yet. I might going to visit them this weekend again.
[memorundum]
http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/animals/planetearth/
http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/animals/mammals/tv/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planet_Earth_(TV_series)
http://www.cbc.ca/documentaries/planetearth.html
While I was searching Helen Keller's real voice audio file on the Internet, I happened to found another wonderful web page. This site seems very useful for English learners, especially someone who are liking to listen and read novels.
Here is the main page of this site. 'Internet Archive': http://www.archive.org/index.php
You can find lots of audio files here. http://www.archive.org/details/audio
If you are a fun of "Anne of Green Gables", this link is for you.
http://www.archive.org/details/anne_of_green_gables_2_librivox
All chapters of this famous Canadian novel are read by an English native speaker. Moreover, the narrator of Anne's story is a quite skilled one, I really love her sweet voice and the way she read.
Please forgive my confession, but I prefer her voice a 100 times more than the narrator of this story from The Linguist library. :-P
To get back to the original topic, I haven't found any Helen Keller's real voice audio file yet. Instead, here is the audiobook version of "The Story of My Life" written by Helen Keller.
http://www.archive.org/details/story_keller_librivox
The reason why I tried to find Helen Keller's real voice was because our convivial Saturday discussion group on The Linguist had used the biography of Helen Keller on VOA as our reading materials last two times. Those stories on VOA are read with a moderate speed and written in simple but useful words and phrases. These are good materials for reading aloud practice.
Part one: http://www.voanews.com/specialenglish/archive/2006-10/2006-10-08-voa1.cfm?CFID=152857970&CFTOKEN=53072667
Part two: http://www.voanews.com/specialenglish/archive/2006-10/2006-10-15-voa1.cfm
[memoruncum]
'Wikipedia' http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Keller
'American Funcation for the Blind' http://www.afb.org/Section.asp?Sectionid=1
'American Phetoric'. http://www.americanrhetoric.com/
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