An Information and Study-Help Website
提供各种帮助及学习资料的信息网站
Thoughts On Learning Language:
学语言的看法:
Table of Contents 目录
I. English Article 英文版文章
II. Chinese Article 中文版文章
I. English Article 英文版文章
The English lessons in this website were created as a result of the English tutoring I did at the
Johns Hopkins Medical Institute and the Greater Homewood Community
Corporation in Baltimore, Maryland, USA. While tutoring there, I began to have an understanding of the challenges a person faces when living in a foreign country. Perhaps the
greatest challenge a person faces while in a foreign country is that of communication. While living in China and studying Chinese, I decided to use the same approach that I used in the United States, listen to and study real-life conversations. The Chinese lessons contained in this
website are the results of those efforts.
For most people, we are born, grow up, and experience life in our 'home' country. Throughout this period, we naturally associate feelings and thoughts with words.
When communicating with people, we are communicating feelings and thoughts and the tool that we use to convey these things is called words. Regardless of our native language, in
our brain and in our soul there is a feeling associated with every word. We naturally feel and think, so therefore our words, without any effort naturally emanate.
For a person living in a foreign country, 'learning' to develop a 'feeling' for that country's language is a tremendous challenge. How does a person go about
acquiring a feeling for a word in a foreign language? We learn language from our environment and our brains do so naturally because at any moment in time, our ears are listening to the
conversations of the people around us. Our eyes are also a natural tool and through reading text, we add to our already known body of knowledge.
These English and Chinese lessons are my attempt
at helping non-native English and non-native Chinese speakers solve this predicament. This site contains a collection of interviews and dialogues with a variety of speakers. My
objective is to use these natural conversations as a tool to expose the learner to a variety of speaking styles and subjects, develop the learner's listening ability, as well as introduce and
explain various words and phrases.
I believe that through repeated listening to and reading real conversations, in particular paying attention to the emotion expressed by the speaker, the student is able
to develop an acquisition ability as well as develop a natural 'feeling' for the language. I view these lessons as a primer for students. After developing an "ear", the student can
then individually select and transcribe conversations from any number of sources ie. radio, TV, Internet, etc. Every transcription a student completes is a stepping stone to the next
level of understanding the language. The ultimate goal is for the student to be able to listen to and repeat the conversations, not blindly repeating, but rather using their acquired
feeling to express the words in a meaningful way, then using his/her own words, explain what the speakers are saying. By doing this, the student will have the skills necessary to
communicate with people in everyday situations and most important, have an understanding of the feelings inside those people.
My best wishes to you in your studies!
II. Chinese Article 中文版文章
这个网站的英语教程制成于我在美国马里兰洲巴尔的摩市Johns Hopkins大学医学院和Greater
Homewood
Community公司（为社区服务的组织名）辅导英语的时侯。在那个时侯，我开始了解住在国外的时候要面对的种种困难。也许最大的困难是会遇到语言交流障碍。我住在中国学习汉语的时候，决定使用和在美国时一样的学习方法，就是听和学真实生活中的谈话。这个网站的汉语课正是我这些尝试和实践的结果。
一般来说，人们都出生、成长和生活在他们自己的故乡。在这个时期，我们自然地将各种情感，思维与词汇联系在一起。和别人交流的时候，我们用来表达感觉和想法时使用的工具就叫作词汇。不管我们出生地的语言是什么，在我们的脑子里和心灵深处，每一种感觉都至少连结着一个词。人的感觉和思想是一种本能行为，所以词汇很自然地被运用于表达中。
对住在外国的人来说，“学”会如何去体会那个国家的语言是非常困难的，我们应该怎样去感受外语词汇的内涵？我们无时无刻都从周围的环境中，用我们的耳朵听周围的人谈话、用我们的眼睛读取身边的文字，加上我们已有的知识，大脑很自然地对语言进行学习。
这些英语课和汉语课是我为了帮助非英语母语和非汉语母语的人解决语言上的困难而做的。这个网站中收集了许多人的各种不同内容的谈话和朗读。我的目的是通过这些日常的内容给学习者提供各种主题的材料和不同的口语风格的听力材料、来提高学习者的听说能力。这也可以看作是介绍和说明各种词汇和词组的学习工具。
我相信通过重复地听和读，进行自然的会话，特别是注意说话人表达的情感，学生能够提高自我语言能力，此外还可以培养一种对语言的自然感受能力（语感）。我认为这些课文是学生的“识字课本”。培养语言的听说能力之后，学生自己能有选择性地记录下各种视听材料，比如从收音机、电视、互联网等。学生听写练习是了解语言并提高语言程度的垫脚石。学生的最终目标是会听并且会重复这些对话，要求的不是机械化地重复，相反的是要用自己已具有的语感来阐明谈话内容的深层含义，然后用自己的语言来加以说明。如果进行这种练习方法，学生就能具备日常生活中所必需的语言交流技能，更重要的是对对方的感觉有所了解。
我真诚祝愿大家学习进步！
*webpage loaded 网页完成*