The Psychology Tips for Mastering Spoken English:

English language can be learned easily if you have interest and focus. I can provide you with some tips for learning and imbibing the language. It is meant for those who want to learn the English language.

1) You should think in English and not in mother tongue. It is assumed that you want to learn one language called English at a particular time. You can learn the basics of the language in a spoken English class. Try translating a daily work process or the way somebody cooks or somebody drives or the way a work is done. In a nutshell, you should be able to describe a process. As you learn the language, you learn different words; you should also try to describe different things.

It is not as if somebody is tutoring you. You are the tutor or teacher for yousrself. It assumed that you have learned the basics of English like grammar and rules of punctuation.

So, when you describe a process that happens in your every day life, do not worry about grammar. Try to describe the process. Do not write. It is learned by talking to yourself and if you develop the clarity in your description, you will start using the language.

For example, can you describe when you walk in the street, what are the shops in the street? Say, there is a supermarket, juice shop, a coffee café, internet browsing centre, dry cleaners, a shopping mall, etc? Can you say to yourself in English what you see? Are you able to describe what you see? If you are not able to find an English word for “supermarket” in your mind and you get only a native language word in English, then that word “supermarket” is not there in your mind.

It is important to find the word in the mind at the time of describing something. You know that you can find it in dictionary or in your language books. But you should be able to use it in every day conversation and in your thought process.

2) Fill up your mind with English words:

You should know different words for different situation. You should build strong vocabulary. One should learn 10 new words a day.

Can you write or say immediately the conversation that you had with the supermarket clerk? Can you translate the problems in billing, the problems in queue, and the inferior or superior quality of the grocery items? Would you say whether the mango is good, very good or excellent, fabulous or tasty? Do you have different words for different situations?

3) Read popular Psychology books:

One should read popular psychology books like “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus”, “Seven Habits of High Effective People”, “The Eighth Habit”, “You are ok, I am ok”, etc. There is many a book like this.

By readying these books, you would be able to describe what you feel. Are you angry? Or are you somber? Or are you depressed? Or are you optimistic? Do you know the difference?

Can you describe in English the fight you had with your spouse yesterday? How she felt?

Assuming that you have basic knowledge of English and there is an intention of learning the spoken language, I suggest you read these books even if you don’t understand these books fully. You will develop vocabulary for practical everyday life situations.

If you don’t know a particular word, create the habit of checking the dictionary immediately.

(to be continued)

Replying to [David Frencken]: Mr.David Frencken, you have given a more relevant example to this forum. What I have given is a different kind of approach.

I think, for a Chinese or any native language speaker, if he spends time on studying the process of selling a particular product and learning everything about that product and when they get confidence while speaking to the client, it will improve their spoken English skills. Because they will get to learn different kinds of addressing and communicating with a person.

Because every person, whether he is India or USA, has got unique accent and has a unique way of talking to his client. From business to personal issues to complicated philosophical issues, all these issues can be learned in English. Interest and Focus are only required. And I am sure, if the steps are followed, within a year, one can be master in English.

Replying to [Ganapathie]:

Moolan,
Actually I meant to say “millions of English speaking males around the world who are willing to flirt with you” but I typed it as I, it seems like I’m saying that I willing to flirt around, quite an effect tough….I must also admit that I’ve been flirting around with a few English learning girls from Thailand.

Ganapathie,
Talking about accent, I find it strange in me, as you said one should think in the language that he is speaking, I think that is obviously a right thing to do and that’s what I’m doing because I speak six languages. Howvever there is one thing that I can’t over come that is when I speak with some one who speak broken English with a lot of mixture Chinese expression tone like what the Singaporean speak, it really effect me, with those kind of people I couldn’t speak fluent English anymore and started to follow the way they speak. But if I’m speaking to an European or an American then automatically I’ll speak in an American accent that no one on the other end of the telephone line know that I am an Asian. I find it strange maybe it is a psylogical thing.

I also find it very difficult to understand a British accent, as when they speak the accent was so thick and fast that I think it is quite difficult to understand what they are talking about. We have a few people here in our purchasing department who dare not to call up the British suppliers as they said they don’t understand a word the Briton said. So normally I have to do that on their behalf.

So for the Chinese ladies who wanted to practice your English with the flirting speaking males, choose those from the US so that the accent don’t scare you away.

Replying to [David Frencken]: American speakers talk as if they open their mouth much wider and have a deeper voice compared to British speakers. That is what I feel.

Replying to [David Frencken]:Pretty girls only care the handsome boys but not their accent

Replying to [Ganapathie]: The difficulty for me is rolling the r's, as for the accent, if listen more, will follow with some one, I think.

Replying to [Ganapathie]:
Your articl is easy to understand,use english words in every day conversation and in our thought process,I think this is most important.

Replying to [Grace Tung]:

Grace,
I know there are a lot of Chinese that cannot roll the R, I can't too when I was a little kid, now my 3 years old daugther is practicing on that, her teacher in nursery teach them to blow a little bit of air and make the tongue to vibrate a little, I do not know how the teacher manage to teach the kids but some result has been seen.

Buy a tape on Phonics, it teach you how to pronounce the alphabets, very kindergarten here teach that, my son is able to pronounce difficult words correctly when he was just five, of course he doesn't know the meaning. I was quite surprise that he can read the whole passage on a English newspaper without pronoucing any words wrongly at six. I'm impressed with the modern way of teaching nowadays, when I was six I'm just learning how to read ABC

Replying to [Ganapathie]:Good idea.
What bother me is I really can not remember so much words,so each time I have to speak sth in a long sentence.

Mental Tips (continues)

4. Thought Fillers

One should have ‘thought fillers’ and should use it more often. As you speak, your mind goes through the work of translating your thoughts into English words or whatever English words it is having in its list. Sometime it takes fraction of a second more. So, at time you can use words like “you know’, ‘the’, ‘like’, ‘in a way,’ ‘by the way’. There is no grammar involved in these words. How do you repeat it, depends upon your individual style. If you observe people when they speak, you pick up your preferred style. For example, “we are looking for different colours. You know…it is like……what you have in rainbow or a kind of mix of those colours.” In this statement, the words, ‘you know’ and ‘it is like’ are not necessary when you speak. But they are useful thought fillers. Because your mind is still searching for the way to describe the colours in a rainbow or a mix of those colours.

5. Speaking generally or speaking about similar things.

For example, take the case of saffron colour. You are in a apparel shop and you want to say that you want to buy saffron color clothes. But you don’t have the word ‘saffron' in your mind. But you have an idea of the colour. You have seen people wearing it. And you don’t know what colour it is. You would say, “I am looking for colours of clothes in the way the colours of Buddhist monks’ dress look.”

6. Spontaneity

You should speak the English or language spontaneously. When you are angry, are you scolding a person in English? Are you feeling strong and does that strong feeling occurs to you in English? If so, you are there and you would start speaking English even though your mouth fails you or fear overcomes

you. It is like water in a dam. It is about to come out.

7. Develop the habit of learning different words.

Do you know the nine gems? We in India call it a navaratna. To remember a word or group of words, develop a small story for it and the story can be stupid. The more stupid it is, the more easily it will come to your mind. The story is for you and it is for remembering the words. Write it in a small piece of paper. As you wait for a train or wait for a bus or sitting and doing nothing in the house, you can always read that piece of paper. Once you become familiar with those words, you can trash it away. Of course, you can develop your own memory techniques. School children can probably paste different and difficult words in the wall. So whenever they go around, they see those words.

(To be continued)

Replying to [Ganapathie]: I am looking forward to members' comments