Steve - I can listen and read but I cannot speak
Recently I received a comment from LJF in Chinese in response to one of the recorded Chinese language radio programs that I have posted here at my blog. LJF asks two questions.
One is where to find the other recordings of my Chinese radio programs. The answer is that all the Chinese language podcasts I have posted here can be found in the "Chinese podcasts" category at my blog. I do not know where the other radio program episodes are and I will try to find out.
The second question is as follows. "I can understand 90% of what is said in English and know a lot of words. However, I cannot use many words. How do I get better at speaking? Is it just a matter of listening?" I believe that listening and reading are important. You can always improve your listening ability and familiarity with a language. You can certainly always increase your vocabulary. All of these things will help you to understand and eventually to speak and write.
If you are in a situation where you have very little or no opportunity to speak, then you are forced to concentrate on listening and reading and vocabulary study. When, eventually, you are put in a situation where you have to speak, you will be able to improve your output skills more quickly if you have a large vocabulary, even if that vocabulary is largely passive. In other words necessity will give you the speaking practice that you need to improve, but in the meantime concentrate on the kind of study that you are able to do easily.
We all have much larger passive vocabularies than active, especially in another language. This is not a problem and should not be a cause for concern. However, it is understandable that we also want to increase our active vocabulary and our ability to find the words we need when we speak or write.
What can we do?
Study your words, the ones you have saved from your listening and reading. That is what LingQ is for. Review the lists of words indifferent ways. Review them alphabetically, by importance, by category that you have selected when you "tagged" them, by date you saved them, by content item, etc.. From these lists you can create shorter lists of words that you especially want to start to use. You might want to focus on your "priority LingQs", the most important words you are trying to learn at LingQ. Print these lists. Review the phrases that come with them. Write something using these words. You can write a few paragraphs or even a few sentences.
Or maybe you can just talk to yourself using these words. Try making short speeches of nonsense to yourself, using using these words. This will not immediately add these words to your usable vocabulary, but it will contribute towards you eventually being able to use them.
If you are a member at LingQ, write using your words and send the writing in for correction. Then when you get the correction back, import the corrected writing into your LingQ WorkDesk for further study. Save any words that you did not use correctly in order to see more examples of those words in use.
Of course, if you have a chance to speak to people in the language you are studying, do so. If it is a friend or tutor, take a chance and use your newly learned words. If the conversation is with strangers or at work, you may prefer to stay with words and phrases that you truly master. When speaking to others, do not worry so much about how you sound or what you say. Listen to how the native speaker uses the words, and try to pick out words and expressions that you would like to use.
This explanation may not satisfy everyone. It is the lot of any of us who speak a foreign language that we are never satisfied. We are always conscious of the fact that we did not speak as well as we could have in our own language, and that we cannot speak as well as the native speaker.
So what! Get over it! Give yourself credit for what you have achieved and continue slowly improving your ability. Make sure that you enjoy your language studies, and be grateful for small victories. You will never achieve perfection.
