It may sound a bit weird but I consider this topic a very serious problem when you’re listerning to the news or need to garther information from any source you’re working with.
I usually don’t have any problem when I am the person who’s telling the figures to someone or I’m just reading them from a text. A quite different story is when I’m the one that is listerning and have to catch them.
This is what I think it happens inside your brain. When you’re listerning to something what you’re really paying attention is to the whole message to get the gist of it. This is because most people can’t really, unless you’re a native speaker or bilingual, understand every single word that is said automatically. So your brain has a harder work to do.
Most people don’t have problems until specific data are given because in that moment you have to pay all of your attention to that data. In the case of figures the problem become worse due to the fact that figures mean nothing if you don’t put them into a context. So you have to deal with two problems; undertand the data (rather difficult when figures are large numbers) and guess what they are.
In addition, you must also pay attention for not losing the rest of the message or you won’t be able to put the data into their context. If several figures are said consecutively, the task can become a nightmare.
How am I trying to solve the problem? Bad news, there’s no short cut for that.
There’s only one way to solve this problem and it is mastering figures.
Most figures that I hear when listering to news, reports or any other source are relatively short. On the one hand, this is a setback because short figures are said quite fast but on the other hand, it’s much easier and faster to master dealing with short figures.
Look for short articles in websites that provide text and audio so that you can check afer the exercise. Take a papel and a pen, and try to listen to the article and garther all the figures (percentages, phone numbers or whatever) without paying attention at what they really are.
Your aim is gaining the ability to recognize the figures without thinking in them. Just like what they are; numbers.
You can also look for any text-to-speech tool (the Internet can help you here). There are some helping tools, even online, that you can use to train your ability to recognize numbers without thinking. You can prepare lists of figures and copy them into the text box they usually have, then press the start button and try to copy them all. Use several lists and select one of them randomly in order not to remember the figures.
Try to use quite short figures first and increase their lenth gradually.
This proccess is very slow and hard but quite useful because when you’re capable to assimilate figures without thinking, you’ll be able to get back your attention to the message itself and your brain will put automatically the figures into the context.
Remember that all the people deal with figures from their childhood and that's why you're not aware of the problem when you're talking in your own language. But when you're fighting against a foreign language, that's a quite different story!
Hope that helps.
I use English on a daily basis in my job for reading and writing.
Unfortunately, it doesn't happen the same with my spoken English. Furthermore, the kind of vocabulary that I usually use is quite technical. So, I face two problems when I try to speak in English: the lack of confidence and the need for common vocabulary in my non-job related conversations.
Really, I see both of them as one single problem. The need for common vocabulary that make me feel unconfident when trying to keep a conversation.
Keep in mind that I'm not talking about any kind of casual conversation about sports, the weather or something like that. I'm talking about the sort of vocabulary you'll need in your normal life: going to a restaurant, being at home, doing the shopping and so on.
But, what can I do to learn and keep (I've got an awful memory) the vocabulary I need if I don't do that sort of things in my home country?
I'll tell you what I'm trying to do and hope you'll tell me what do you think about it.
What I'm doing is saying outloud everything I do whenever I can. It doesn't matter what it is. No shame, just try it.
You're not alone? Don't worry, whisper it or simply think of it. Even if you don't say it, it's a good exercise. Although it's much better if you hear yourself talking.
Try doing it when you're having a shower, making dinner, at a restaurant thinking about your order or just walking down the street.
Hope that helps.
I saw this week on a TV show a teacher talking about the way we use our senses to perceive the information from around us, which sense we use mainly to do so and how the knowledge of that information could help us to get the most learning new vocabulary of a foreign language.
The three ways had a main point in common: never learn isolated words, try always to connect those new words to other known words.
This is something already known, the way we connect those words is where our senses and this matter takes place.
He was talking about three ways to learn depending on the main sense used:
Visual: Use images or schemas. Place the new word in the centre surrounded by other words connected with it with similar meanings or related to them in someway, use a photo of a place where the new word is represented.
Auditory: Place the word in the context of a text easy to remember. Sayings and idioms could be a good way, but also any message as long as you can remember.
Kinesthetic: This people need to perceive the information by touching it or by means of feelings. You must put yourself in real or virtual situations where you can deal with this word (ie. you can imaging that you're playing a football match, you're about to hit the ball when the referee signs you're offside).
I personally think that there isn't a so clear classification, so maybe you can use two of the three ways. In fact, I think I'd be a kinesthetic person but the use of the two other ways can help me too.
And you, What kind of person are you?
One English teacher, that was also learning Spanish (he lives in Spain so is quite logical), told me once that sometimes he was frustrated because he wasn't able to express how he felt sometimes but, at the same time, he thought that lack of knowledge of the language allowed him not to make mistakes due to the fact that he had first to think what he was going to say.
On the one hand, I agree with him because I've suffered situations in the past where my emotions literally blocked my capability to speak in English and forced me to express in my own language with the help of another person as an interpreter. It was really frustating but I must admit that if I'd kept my emotions under control that wouldn't have never happened.
On the other hand, I think that trying to keep your feelings under control all the time you're losing a very important part of the communication process. Furthermore, you won't be able to completely appreciate the richness of a language. You must keep in mind that the language of any country is part of its culture, and I think this is a point to make an extra effort trying to balance between the control of your emotions and the use of them to express yourself. The same way you do in your life.
So, what are your thoughts about that?
