Learning English did not always come easy to me. I struggled a lot to find ways to improve my English skills. After hard work and dedication over the last few years, it became much easier and an enjoyable hobby that has helped me succeed in life. These are the few tips that I’ve learned along the way and thought I would share with other students currently studying for the TOEFL® test and mastering the English language
First of all, dictation was most helpful for me to improve my listening skills. This is how I did it. I listened to the whole sentence first, and tried to write the sentences down when the recording was turned off. I repeated this process over and over until I wrote a perfect sentence. At first, I could only remember a few words from the sentence. It sometimes took dozens of times for me to come up with the whole sentence. However, as the practice went on, I could understand the structure of the sentence and was able to reconstruct it while trying to retrieve it from my memory. In the end, I could understand and dictate the sentence correctly, no matter how long and complicated it was.
Although dictation has been extremely effective for me, it would have been too tiring and dull to do it all day. Therefore, it was also important to increase the exposure of English in daily life. I didn't have to try hard to accomplish this. I was already a huge fan of Disney animations. My interest moved to the TV shows, Hollywood movies, musicals, and English literature as I grew up. Therefore, I watched a lot of movies and TV shows in English at home. I listened to pop songs and audio books when I was out. It not only helped me to get continually exposed to English but also gave me motivation to study hard. From my experience, it was more effective to watch one TV series (or movie) over and over than to watch many of them only once.
I started my reading experience with the Harry Potter series. The fourth Harry Potter book came out when I was thirteen, and I couldn't wait for the Korean translation. However, I could hardly understand anything when I opened the English copy. I had to search the dictionary literally hundreds of times. I tried to translate it by myself in order to understand what happened to Harry. It took enormous time and effort. I was only on the fourth chapter when the Korean copy was published several months later. Although most of my translation was wrong, I found the endeavor amusing. I promised myself that I would read the fifth book in English.
From the experience above, I realized that looking up every word that I didn’t understand takes the pleasure of reading away. When I found the word that I didn’t understand in the sentence, I first tried to assume the meaning through the context. I looked it up in the dictionary only when the word was used repeatedly and was crucial in understanding the text. In this way, I could never forget the meaning of the word.
Personally, I tried to avoid the dictionary as much as possible, but I had to admit that I needed to memorize some vocabulary in order to read and understand the English language. I started to buy textbooks to build my vocabulary. I made notecards or vocabulary lists from the textbook. I reviewed the vocabulary list once, and sorted out the ones that I'd memorized. I repeated this process until there were no words left on the list. I memorized vocabulary usually when I was waiting for the bus. It took no more than 30 minutes every day. (It is a simple process, but it was extremely profitable when I was preparing for the GRE® test as well.) When I returned home and read English books, I could often find the vocabulary that I had learned. It made me believe that it was worthwhile to memorize them. I kept the vocabulary list and reviewed it every few months to see if there were any words that I had forgotten.
When the fifth Harry Potter book came out a few years later, I was able to understand most of the text with a little help from the dictionary. I met my goal and did not have to buy the Korean copy to read the fifth book.
My opportunities to speak English with others were limited at times. I was worried that I may forget how to speak in English. I started to talk by myself when no one was around at home. I started from talking about the events of that day. I chose topics later. I practiced to construct my thoughts by phrases and translated it in English. I started with simple sentences first. Later, I tried used the grammar structure that I learned in school. I also incorporated my newly memorized vocabulary into my sentences. I sometimes memorized the lines of my favorite TV shows and used them when I spoke. However, this way of practicing English speaking had limitations. I was not sure if I was speaking correctly or not. I often found my flaws when I was reading English books or watching Hollywood movies. I started to write down the phrases that seemed useful from the TV shows or books. Using these phrases helped greatly to speak English fluently.
As a result, my English learning experience was not so different from the classical advice. I don’t think it is the best way to learn English for everybody either. However, the struggle to find better ways to learn English by myself was motivating and fun. And it did help me a lot to build a concrete English background; concrete enough to let me get through the college English courses, the TOEFL test, and even the U.S. university courses and the GRE exam. I read English novels and watched Hollywood movies when I took a rest. And I always kept up my old habits of improving my English skills.
It is odd to find out the English ability that I have long thought of as a hobby became one of the strongest tools to help me start my passage through academia. I am grateful to the little girl who struggled with Harry Potter books and Disney animations 10 years ago. I will make the best out of what she built on.
If you have high scores in TOEFL test or would like to prove your English proficiency skill, I recommend applying for ETS TOEFL scholarship program which evaluates your English skill objectively by recognized screening process. The deadline is April, 13th, 2012. Get more information about ETS Scholarship Program - http://korea.etsasiapac.org/
Kyuhyun Han, 2011 TOEFL Scholarship Winner
