How to learn English well?

Recommended for you: Professor Dao Long and the Reverse Method of English Learning.

Learn English in a down-to-earth manner and be a translator for one year.

He taught himself spoken English at the age of 45 and became an interpreter a year later.

He taught himself computer at the age of 52 and became a computer writer. He has written and translated 38 books so far.

At the age of 57, he studied memory methods and was able to recite pi above 1800.

He is over 60 years old, with great enthusiasm, inspiring people's words and deeds, inspiring people's enthusiasm for learning English, and making many people embark on the road to success.

He is Professor Zhong Daolong and was once the vice-president of a university.

Why attack English repeatedly? How to get rid of "dumb English" and how to understand English broadcasting? Professor Zhong Daolong taught himself spoken English at the age of 45 and became a translator a year later. He found a way out for English learners through many examples of learning English by reverse method.

Professor Zhong, like many others, studied English hard and learned books and tapes such as 900 English Sentences and English Today. Reading a book seems to have nothing to understand, but because of poor foundation and improper methods, it took a lot of effort and little gain. In the end, I can't get rid of the embarrassing "dumb" state.

At the beginning of 1980, he learned by dictation and verbatim recording. He studied the basics for five months first, and then dictated English radio recordings every day. His dictation is primitive, with a tape recorder, a pen, more than a dozen pieces of paper, and no text teaching materials except a dictionary. If you don't understand it at first time, rewind it and do it again until you understand it completely. In this way, I accumulated 3000 hours of spare-time study in one and a half years, and finally became an oral translator. And summed up the five methods of "listening, writing, speaking, remembering and thinking" and achieved remarkable results.

Professor Zhong Daolong created the reverse method of English learning.

First of all, the embarrassment of dumb English

I didn't learn phonetic symbols in middle school. I basically followed the teacher, right or wrong. Sometimes it makes jokes. For example, the first I in Dining Hall is pronounced [i] instead of [i], but when the teacher reads it as [I], we will make mistakes and correct it later. After going to college, I changed to learn Russian. After graduating from college, I taught myself some English, so I can read relevant professional books. But I have never learned "listening" and "speaking", which is basically "dumb English".

1979 at the age of 45, I traveled to France and Germany for the first time. At that time, I was able to read professional books and periodicals that I was familiar with, and my English level was relatively high in the group. But in a foreign country, apart from the general greetings, I can hardly understand or speak, so I can't understand the technical explanation at all. For familiar professional written materials, if they are written in capital letters, they will not be able to respond at the moment, and they need to be translated into lowercase in their minds to understand them. The head of the delegation also encouraged me to be "more courageous" from time to time. In fact, where is the problem of courage? I can't understand, I can't say, and I can't understand. Where did I get the courage? When I was abroad, like all people who can't speak a foreign language, I had a note in my pocket that said, "I'm staying at XXX Hotel, please send me back." In case you get lost. At that time, I was the chief engineer and senior engineer of a design institute. When I saw this note, I really felt an indescribable feeling of being insulted. "I am a senior engineer and chief engineer in China, and I can hardly read. How can foreigners respect us? " Anger arises spontaneously. After returning home, I made up my mind to study hard and improve my spoken English.

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Second, teach yourself to translate for one year.

I asked foreigners, is it because I arrived in China that I deliberately slowed down my speech? They smiled and replied, "We have been talking at the same speed, but your hearing has improved. You think we speak slowly." I saw my progress from these experiences.

Because of the improvement of English, I can also judge whether the translation in the technical lecture is correct. Sometimes translation is inconsistent with my understanding, and the foreign Chinese present generally say that my understanding is correct (of course, the main function here is that I know my major, but the English level of professional translators is much higher than mine). This situation has been repeated many times. China Electronic Equipment Systems Engineering Company/General Manager of KLOC-0/982 1982 hired me as an interpreter when he visited Germany in early 1982. This is what I never expected. I replied that I couldn't do it. But he insisted that I could do it and gave me a lot of encouragement. So I made detailed preparations and drew up some situational dialogues. Such as: what you may ask when you arrive at the customs, how to answer, what problems you may have during the visit, how to translate, etc. And read the prepared manuscript to the tape recorder, and then let it out to see if it looks like it. Despite this preparation, the actual dialogue abroad is not the same thing at all. I either don't understand it or I can't speak it, which is extremely difficult. I always had a notebook in my hand at that time. If I don't understand anything, I'll write it down immediately. When I return to the hotel in the evening, I will look up the dictionary and read the conversation manual again. I must understand what I don't understand during the day before I have a rest. This event was a turning point for me, which greatly increased my self-confidence and convinced me that I could learn English well. After I can undertake the task of interpretation, I still don't relax my self-study, and I still insist on learning English every day, so as to "stick to my words" and "learn often and be new". Sometimes people will say to me, "You already speak and listen, so that's enough. Why do you spend so much time learning English? " I can only answer: "I like English". This is also a fact. For example, during the Spring Festival, other people in my family watch Spring Festival TV programs until one or two in the middle of the night, and I study English until one or two in the middle of the night.

Self-learning English, like learning other knowledge, must have the spirit of being meticulous and striving for perfection. When you encounter problems, you must go ahead and never stop until you reach your goal. As long as you don't understand, you should always worry and learn to ask whenever you have the chance. Never be satisfied with a little knowledge, but study deeply and make all the relevant knowledge about edges and corners clear. Only in this way can you learn new words every day, master more and more English knowledge and improve your level, just like primary school students learn Chinese. Here are some typical examples.

Once I heard the Khmer Rouge, I didn't understand the word red. Two years later, I once heard an article about American women's makeup, which mentioned rouge (lipstick). It suddenly dawned on me that it was the Khmer Rouge, and the question that had existed for about two years was finally answered.

Generally speaking, the medical explanation of the word "condition and state" is only "condition and state", but when describing patients with heart disease, it is not smooth to use heart condition. Later, I learned from a newly published Longman dictionary that this word can be directly interpreted as "disease".

When I heard the news of the assassination of Aquino, the leader of the Philippine opposition party, I kept hearing the word tar mac, but I couldn't find it according to the pronunciation. Later, I asked an American engineer to know that it was "asphalt macadam road", which was simplified from the word tar macadam. Another example is to record the sentence "the peace talks between LRAN and Iraq have returned to the starting point" once. Judging from the context, there is no progress in the Iran-Iraq peace talks. But the word "Fang Yi" is not in the dictionary at hand, so I can't know whether the dictation is correct or not, so I'll ask you. Later, I took the recording to a doctor who came back from Canada, and he was sure that my dictation was correct. I didn't stop there, looked for dictionaries everywhere, and finally found the following explanation about returning to the original point in the penguin English LDOMS dictionary:

Return to the beginning of a task or career because of setbacks. This allusion refers to the Ludo game. When a player lands in the wrong square, he will be sent to the first square. So we know the origin of this word. I know. It's very useful. 1On July 7th, 990, the headline of The China Journal was: Negotiations on Northern Ireland Back to the Starting Point. Another example is to hear and write the word derivatives from a program about economic news in Special English, and look it up in the dictionary, which means "derived, derived; Derivative ",I can't find an explanation related to the economy, and I don't know what it means. It was not until Ellison, an employee of Bahrain Bank in the UK, was killed that there were more reports on derivatives in various news media. I realized that the Chinese translation of the word was "derivative financial products", which refers to financial products derived from spot markets such as interest rates or bonds, foreign exchange or exchange rates, stocks or stock indexes, mainly including futures, options trading and swaps.

I pay more attention to summing up my learning experience, and I want to recall my lessons and experiences every once in a while. The learning method I adopt has no tangible teaching materials. At first, I only had sound. I have to "listen, write, speak, recite and think" at the same time to find out what the recording said. When all the recordings are written, I have a tangible teaching material, which is different from the normal "forward" method from the tangible teaching material, but is carried out "reversely", hence the name "reverse method". There are many advantages to self-learning English by using the reverse method. The written experience and experience are five books, such as Slow english introduction, Essentials of Listening Self-study in English for Science and Technology, Inverse Method of English Learning, Listening Skills and Selected Words in English News Broadcasting.

Since then, I have often told others how to learn English, especially since 1990. I have often helped people at all levels to learn English, and have a further understanding of the problems they encounter in their study and the advantages of the reverse method.

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Third, I learned it in China.

Some people think that I learn English because I often go abroad. Actually, I learned English before going abroad, not after going abroad. Of course, in foreign countries, there are good objective conditions for learning English and the possibility of learning English well. However, we still have to make our own efforts to turn the possibility into reality and make full use of the favorable conditions. Many people go abroad again and again, but they don't learn English. I became a translator when I went abroad for the second time. As a matter of fact, as far as I am concerned, I sometimes learn more English every day in China than abroad. Because there is a lot of routine work to be done abroad, especially as a translator, there is more routine work and there is no more time to sit down and learn English. In China, you can learn a lot of English by studying for five or six hours every day. A colleague once thought I was studying English abroad. Later, he went to Holland with me, and when he saw me listening to tapes every day abroad, he said, "So that's how you learn English."

Some people only see the result of my relatively high English level now, and don't understand how hard-won this achievement is. So it is easy to think that I am smart and have a good memory, so I learned English. In fact, memory is not innate, but acquired ability. I can cite three words to illustrate how I study English through hard work. One is my leader when I was working in Shenyang. Seeing me forget all about eating and sleeping, studying hard day after day, he said to me, "To study like you is to touch God." The other is a staff member of China Electronic Equipment System Engineering Company. She always sees me doing dictation when she passes by my office on her way to work every day. She was very moved and said, "I have never seen anyone who studies English as hard as you." The last one is my wife. When she saw that I was free to learn English, the tape recorder kept ringing and said, "Why are you so stupid? Haven't you learned it for so long? " In fact, isn't it a glorious thing for others to say that I am smart? Why don't I just say, "Yes! It is easy for me to learn English. Listen to tapes and write tapes when you have time, and learn unconsciously, so that others will think that I am really smart enough. Because that's not the case. A person who read the first book "People in Special English" said to me, "You should not write out the actual difficulties of learning English by yourself truthfully, but write it simply so that readers have the confidence to learn. "I didn't accept his suggestion, because the question of knowledge is a scientific question, and nothing is false. I want to make the difficulties of self-study real enough for readers to be fully prepared.

Moreover, practice has proved that it is more beneficial to estimate more difficulties than to estimate less. If you estimate more difficulties, you will be down-to-earth and will not be lazy to seek success. If you underestimate the difficulty, you will work hard quickly and give up halfway in a short time. I have studied English hard. Here are some concrete examples: insist on dictating 20 pages of A4 paper every day, never stop until you reach your goal, and make up for it if you are late for the meeting at night. From1980,65438+10, 3 1 to 1983 in February, I transferred to Beijing, and wrote a cabinet of dictation records for three years. I used a ballpoint pen (I put the used pen core in the pen container to learn English at that time) and listened to 9. So I often say to others: "Words are difficult". This is from the heart, no exaggeration.

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Fourth, the level was not high at first.

Some people think that when I started dictation, my English level was already very high and I learned it. Actually, it's not like this. The first news transcript I dictated in June1980 65438+1October 3 1 is as follows (the words in brackets are incomprehensible):

Iran's foreign minister accused Canada of helping six American diplomats escape from Iran. He said that this action violates international law and may lead to worse treatment of 50 American hostages stranded in Tehran. The foreign minister warned that Canada would have to pay for its actions. 1On February 4th, when Iranian militants occupied the American Embassy in Tehran, the six American diplomats fled. The six diplomats hid in the Canadian embassy for 12 weeks. They left Iran with Canadian passports a few days ago and returned to the United States on Wednesday. In Washington, the State Council once again called on Iran to release the remaining American hostages in Tehran. The statement said that they must be released before efforts are made to improve relations between the United States and Iran, and the host has been detained for eight days.

A * * * has only 10 records, and the new words are:

Such as condemnation, diplomat, violation, treatment, hostage, escape, embassy, belligerence and capture.

There are four places you can hear but can't hear: difference, call up, improvement, relationship and so on. This shows that my English level was not high at first. I'm afraid most people who graduated from middle schools and universities are much higher than my level at that time.

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Fifth, see the needle.

Learning English takes a lot of time. Where is there so much time? Mr. Lu Xun once said: "Time is like water in a sponge. As long as you are willing to squeeze it, there is always a way." In our usual spoken language, it means "seeing the needle". Here is a brief introduction to how I "missed" in different situations and squeezed time to learn English. When working in Shenyang, I am single and have no housework burden, which is more conducive to study. In the initial stage, it takes a lot of time to learn. So I usually get up more than an hour in advance, study for about two hours before breakfast, and study for three or four hours at night, so that I can study for at least five or six hours every day. Get up early as usual on Sunday, and study for three hours from 5: 30 to 8: 30 for the first meal. Take a bath after dinner, start at 9: 30, and study until 4: 30 in the afternoon to eat the second meal (northern units usually only eat two meals on holidays). After dinner, you can exercise for more than an hour to around 7 o'clock, and then learn to 1 1 point, so you can study for more than ten hours in total; Take a few days off and study on other holidays. For example, during the Spring Festival, we study continuously for four or five days. Everyone's specific situation is different from the English level they want to achieve, so there is no need to study for so long every day. However, the harvest of learning is directly proportional to the labor you pay. Especially in the primary stage, you have to study for at least three hours every day to get to a higher level as soon as possible. While working in Beijing, I didn't live in my work unit. It takes about 70 minutes by bus from home to the office every day, and it takes about three hours to go back and forth. My business work is much busier than when I was in Shenyang. What should I do? I quickly "adapted" and found time to learn English. First of all, after getting up at 5: 20 in the morning, whether you wash your face, make breakfast or eat breakfast, you should listen to tapes, or listen to tapes on your way to work. After arriving at the office one hour in advance, look up the words you don't understand immediately and enter the words you understand into the computer. In this way, I didn't leave English for two and a half hours from getting up to going to work, at least one hour! Listen to tapes on the way back from work and study for two and a half hours from eight to ten after dinner, so that you can study for more than three hours every day. On Sundays and holidays, I studied for more than ten hours, just like when I was single in Shenyang.

1990 single working in Nanjing, with good conditions to learn English. In the past four years, I spent most of my spare time on self-study and tutoring others to learn English, which not only improved my English level, but also accumulated some teaching experience. 1994 After I retired in early 1994, I spent more time learning English. I listen to (record) English radio for two hours every day. Pick up what you don't understand word by word, which not only improves your English, broadens your horizons, but also adds a lot of fun to your retirement.

"Seeing the needle" is to use the free time that most people look down upon. For example, waiting for a bus, having a meeting or waiting for a few minutes or more, queuing for shopping, etc. According to the principle of memory psychology, it is very effective to review foreign languages and other contents mainly based on mechanical memory in spare time.

We should also "adapt", that is, we have the ability to adapt ourselves to the objective environment. With the deepening of your study and the improvement of your level, English learning will gradually become an indispensable part of your life. You will feel that learning English is a pleasure and enjoyment, and you will always be worried about learning English. If you don't study for a day, it seems that something is missing. With this cowardice, we will never emphasize the objective conditions again. When we encounter any unfavorable objective conditions, we will not take it out on others, but will actively adapt to it and use it to make it a catalyst for finding new learning methods and reaching a new turning point. For example, 1985, I was unfortunately in a serious car accident. Fracture of right leg, plaster hit the root of thigh, can't move. I stayed in bed for about three months. Faced with this situation, is it impatient to complain? Or rest in peace and enrich yourself by learning English in bed? I chose the latter. At first, I just listened and didn't write. After a few days, I feel that I have not gained much. I can't sit up if I want to write. What shall we do? I try to tie a backpack strap at the end of the bed. I can sit up with it and write with a thick dictionary on it. In this way, I can dictate for more than ten hours every day, and I can understand and write all English broadcasts for more than two hours every day. Call an interpreter if you don't understand. Therefore, the English level has been greatly improved. When I talked to foreigners after my recovery, they were all surprised to ask me if I had gone to a foreign language college for further study in the past three months. The car accident was really a disaster for me, but it also became a good opportunity for me to learn English, so I named the dictation record of these three months "the end of the disaster". After I recovered, I never dared to listen to tape recordings to learn English on the bus again. A few days later, I felt it was a pity to spend three hours on the road every day. I must find a way to use it, and soon I found a new way to learn English. Other passengers on the bus listened to the Chinese news broadcast on the small radio, so I tried to translate Chinese news back into English. When I meet a word that can't be translated, I look it up in the Chinese-English dictionary immediately after I get home or office. Doing this for a period of time not only makes effective use of time, but also feels that it is a unique English learning method.

Business trip is often the reason why many people stop learning by themselves, but it is also a good opportunity for me to learn English by myself. The first is to make full use of a lot of ride time on the way back and forth. Before leaving, I prepared enough batteries and tapes to listen to on the road. If you don't understand something, it's not convenient to look it up in the dictionary in the car. Just write down the approximate location of the tape and listen to it again when you get to the destination. If you are going to a meeting, as long as you are not the organizer of the meeting, you will be more free than when you are at work. As long as you don't indulge in playing poker and other activities, you will have more time to learn English.

We should not underestimate the role of studying in our spare time and holidays. Every little makes a mickle. Two hours a day is equivalent to six or seven hundred hours a year, which is equivalent to the sum of English teaching time in all middle schools. Isn't it equivalent to going to college in a few years?

Another important way to "see the needle" is to infiltrate English learning into daily life, learn everywhere and learn everything. As long as there is a strong desire to learn English and a strong rise, all aspects of work and daily life can become the second classroom for English learning. Learning English in this way is related to some specific environments, so it is very effective to remember it quickly and firmly. The following are some examples of my second English learning class.

(1) When I need to read reference materials at work, I will force myself to read English instead of Chinese whenever possible, so as to improve my English constantly.

(2) Practice keeping a diary in English. In order to learn English, I began to practice keeping a diary in English from 198 1. Although the diaries written are all the same as the diaries of primary school students, they are still rewarding from the perspective of learning English. In the process of memorizing, you will encounter many English words and expressions that you can't. You can learn a lot of English knowledge by consulting a Chinese-English dictionary or consulting others.

(3) Reading China Daily is a good way to learn English, especially to understand new trends and learn some new English words. With the continuous development of the international situation and the rapid development of science and technology, English neologisms emerge one after another. You can't learn these new English knowledge by reading old dictionaries and books, but they are reported in China Daily in time.

(4) Learn from full-time translators. In addition to asking them questions, I also participated in technical exchanges: I carefully compared their translations with my own dictation to see how they were translated and immediately wrote them down in my notebook. Because I haven't systematically studied spoken English, what I said is either wrong or memorized from books, so I'm not colloquial. Translation is different. Their language is standardized and colloquial. By listening to their translations, you can learn a lot of oral expressions.

Similarly, in technical communication with foreigners, whether you are an interpreter or not, as long as you don't understand something, you should ask the other party to repeat or explain it in order to learn more English, and never pretend not to understand it.

Learn English by watching TV. For example, when watching the international news of news broadcast programs, you can often see some English words and slogans on the TV screen. You should pay attention to your study. If you don't understand, you should look it up in the dictionary at once. If you can't remember it once, watch it again when you replay it. If you are not sure, read and write down when you watch English service, so you can learn a lot of English words.

(6) When you see all kinds of English advertisements and slogans on the road, you should carefully read the English instructions brought by shopping. If you don't understand, look it up in the dictionary.

(7) Even if you help others learn English, you can learn a lot from it. For example, I helped my son learn junior high school English and learned a lot. Besides, I can get a lot of inspiration from the difficulties and problems that beginners encounter in their study, and a lot of contents in my book are accumulated in this way. For example, "Is the dictation correct?" A colleague asked me, "Without guidance, wouldn't you listen to dictation by yourself?" I think he's a good question, so I've always wanted to write a special section.

As long as you keep studying like this, your English level will certainly be greatly improved. Sometimes it may surprise others: why can I teach myself this degree! For example, after technical negotiations with foreigners, they drafted a meeting minutes for me to see. After reading it, I found some spelling and grammar mistakes. They feel puzzled: Why is Mr. Zhong's English level so high? I replied that my English level was not high, but I insisted on being meticulous in my study and tried to be perfect. Then I gave the following example: I accompanied a foreigner to visit the Great Wall in Beijing. He is very familiar with the situation of the Great Wall, the process of its construction and renovation, how long and how wide it is, and so on. As a China person, I can't tell him exactly. This kind of thing seems strange, but in fact it is normal. I didn't take it seriously because I knew about the Great Wall since I was a child. Before going to visit, foreigners read all kinds of brochures about the Great Wall in detail, so they know the Great Wall like the back of their hand. The same is true of learning English. Those who have no chance to study in a foreign language school can study. If you insist on being meticulous and strive for perfection in the learning process, you may even be proficient. This is the truth that "it's not difficult to get started, but it's ok to pursue advanced studies, as long as you are good at learning and being good at heart (Mao Zedong: the strategic issue of China's revolutionary war)".

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Sixth, enjoy English.

Sometimes after a hard day, I feel groggy and can't sleep in bed for a long time. But if you can listen to the English recording for a while before going to bed, you can fall asleep quickly. In addition, in life and work, you will inevitably encounter some unpleasant or distressed things, and you will be unhappy or angry, and you can't get rid of it. At this time, you can also concentrate on English by dictating English recordings, so as to get rid of your troubles. These are all good for health.

From real life, we can see some people who have no goals and do nothing all day. Day after day, they feel that life is slow and even tired of it. On the contrary, if a person has a clear goal and feels that there are endless things waiting for him all the time, he will feel that his life is full, he can see the fruits of his labor, enjoy the joy of victory and have confidence in himself and the future. A person's life is like a sports competition. It is only a moment to set a new record, but behind this moment is a long effort.

Some people think my life is boring because I study hard all day. Learning English, especially self-study, is really monotonous and boring at first. It is a "chore" or a "burden", and it is hard to say that it is a kind of fun and enjoyment. However, as long as you persist and work hard step by step, you will certainly gain something and improve your English. The more English you have, the more you will use it and be more happy. Starting from the basic understanding, we can make continuous progress-we can basically understand by dictation, just listen without writing, and understand while doing, gradually reducing the translation process from English to Chinese in our minds, directly understanding from English, understanding various special programs, understanding standard English, freely talking with foreigners, and undertaking interpretation tasks. Every step forward has a new layer of joy. If it is a burden and distress to serve English when you are struggling with dictation and recording in the primary stage, then it is a pleasure and enjoyment when you master English and apply it to your work and life. It opens a new window for you to understand the world, and you will have an unspeakable joy in your heart. All the efforts in the past were not in vain and paid off.

In today's reform and opening up, the use of English is directly proportional to proficiency. For example, when you can read English materials like reading chinese materials, you can keep abreast of foreign developments. When you can listen and speak, the information you get is by no means comparable to when you need a fake mouth and a fake ear to communicate with foreigners. Here, the author takes the improvement of telemetry scheme in the process of importing some equipment as an example to illustrate this point. This equipment is made by a company, and its telemetry system can only monitor about 1000 km, while we require that it can monitor about 2000 km. To this end, we asked the company to develop a new telemetry system at a cost of about $50,000, and formally signed a contract accordingly. All the people involved in the negotiation agreed to do so, as if there was no other way. However, I also translated at a technical meeting after the contract came into effect. When explaining the telemetry system, the staff of the company inadvertently mentioned that every machine has a signal that flashes once a second. I asked what was the use of this signal, and he replied that this signal was used for the alarm of this station and had nothing to do with the telemetry system. But I had the idea of using this signal in my mind, and clung to it, and proposed to control the telemetry signal with this one-second interrupt signal, so that the system that could only monitor 1000 km was expanded to monitor 2000 km. As soon as other technicians open the door.