ielts-yasi.englishlab.net         

Updated June 25, 2009

How to Learn to Speak English

Introduction

Several people have recently emailed me with a simple question, "How can I learn to speak English?" They mean, "How can I really learn to speak English, not just prepare for the IELTS Speaking test?"

This thinking is an intelligent way to approach the IELTS Speaking test because the test really does assess your true speaking ability– it's not a test that you should approach by "preparing for the test" as if it were a high school physics or history test. Yes, some of that kind of preparation is a good idea but, on average, only about 15% to 25% of your Speaking test score is influenced by your specific "preparation for the test" – most of your score will reflect your "real" or overall speaking ability. It's a very accurate test and IELTS examiners are not fools.

This page is just a quick summary of my suggestions for improving your overall speaking ability. You might notice that some of the ideas I write here are the same as on this page: http://ielts-yasi.englishlab.net/Three_months_to_go.htm. Actually, there are some things on that page that I want to rewrite but the basic ideas are similar to what I have written below.

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Attitudes

First, you should find some genuine reasons to be interested in English, besides just doing the IELTS test. With little or no genuine interest in the language, you will find it much harder to improve your English.

Second, you should move beyond the idea that studying English, especially learning how to speak, is similar to studying academic subjects in school. A language is a tool for communication. You have to recognize that you must practice using this tool in situations of genuine communication if you expect to make progress.

Third, you need to recognize that making big progress in English takes time. Most recent high school graduates in China are at the Band 5.0 or 5.5 level, and recent university graduates are, on average, only a little better. They need at least 6 months and even up to 1 year of (more or less) full-time English study and practice before they can reach Band 6.0 or 6.5 standard. (This is the total time spent on all the four basic skills; reading, listening, speaking and writing.) If you try to do it in a big hurry, you won't improve very much.

Many people in China have an attitude similar to this: "I don't have much time to study English because I have to go to England three months from now to start my Master's degree in Business Management. As well as that, I'm not really interested in English; I'm more focused on my career." With these attitudes, you will probably (= 很可能) neither do very well in the IELTS test nor succeed in getting to England to study for your Master's degree!

The last point is this: Not only do you need to give yourself time, you also should try to progress one step at a time, not two steps at a time. If you are Band 5.0 or 5.5 now, you should not begin by trying to study materials that are at the Band 6.5 or 7.0 (or 9.0!) level.

What to Do

1) Make Grammatically Correct Written Sentences

The first thing you need to do is learn to make sentences using correct grammar. Find a good quality book that teaches you this. (See Booklist.) The best quality books are those books that were originally written overseas by native English-speaking experts. On the other hand, books written by Chinese authors have easy-to-understand explanations for you and translations, especially translations of new vocabulary. So, use both but understand that books written in China tend to approach English as an academic subject, not as a communication tool. As well as that, the English is sometimes overly formal because the books are for writing, not speaking. A good grammar book should also include some new vocabulary but, at the same time, a grammar book should not overwhelm you with a large amount of new vocabulary in every 'lesson'.

I know studying grammar is a bit boring but it is necessary, just like learning the correct way to do mathematics.

2) Make Grammatically Correct Sentences in Spoken Dialogues

For speaking, using a book to learn to make sentences is just the beginning. You also need to make and speak grammatically correct sentences in dialogue situations. For this, you should use 'Side by Side', starting with Book 1. (Only those students who know they are at Band 6.5 level now but are aiming for a 7.0 for speaking should skip Book 1.) Of course, you must use the recordings with the Side by Side books – it's impossible to correctly use the books for self-study without the recordings.

The 'Side by Side' student workbooks also have excellent practice exercises for making grammatically correct sentences in writing, but those workbooks do not have detailed explanations of the grammar. For explanations, I recommend you use the Chinese Edition of Collins Cobuild English Grammar (英语语法大全). In fact, to some extent, you could just use 'Side by Side' and 'Collins Cobuild English Grammar' instead of the books I mentioned in Step 1, above.

Using 'Side by Side' will start you on the road to "thinking in English", that is, speaking straight from your store of English knowledge rather than translating from Chinese. This is an important part of improving your fluency.

3) Mimic Naturally Spoken English Recordings

In addition to Steps 1 and 2, you should find relatively easy and interesting English listening materials that you can mimic (模仿) in order to improve your pronunciation. Some people need to do more of this activity than others, depending on how good their pronunciation is now, but everyone should do some of this activity.

Mimicking does not just mean copying the pronunciation of each word. It means copying everything about the way the native English speaker speaks, such as how they link their words, how they put stress on one (or more) particular word in each sentence and how they might rise or fall in the tone of their speech. Obviously, you need to get the best materials you can for this activity because you want to mimic people who are speaking as naturally as possible, including at a natural speaking speed.

As much as possible, try to find recordings of people speaking in dialogue or conversational situations or speaking similarly to the way you need to speak in the IELTS Speaking test.

The best materials to mimic are probably the listening practice materials in Books such as #3, #4, #23 and #24 that I mention in the Booklist. I think mimicking some parts of the Cambridge Practice Test listening tests is also quite suitable for this activity, if you first spend some time studying the new language in the parts you want to mimic so that they then become, 'relatively easy'. Use the transcripts (抄本) as you mimic the recordings.

4) Communicate with Speaking Partners

After you have made a little progress doing Steps 1 to 3 (above), you should find one (but preferably more than one) person to be your speaking practice partner. This is a very important part of learning to speak English! If you omit this item from your study, you will definitely make much slower progress than those who do follow this suggestion. It's the same as saying, "I want to make big improvements in my basketball-playing ability" but only spending your time learning and practicing the skills alone. If you really want to improve, you need to also do the actual thing you want to improve. For the guy trying to improve his basketball ability, this means playing some real basketball games as a member of a team.

A speaking partner should be at about your level of spoken English. You should chat with your speaking partner, one-to-one, in a natural way. Imagine you are chatting with another student from Asia in a coffee shop at a university in Australia, a student who looks Chinese but who doesn't speak your language.

The aim is to practice communicating. For this activity, you should emphasize exchanging information (and don't forget, talking about your feelings and opinions is one example of exchanging information!) Don't worry too much about grammatical errors – Steps 1 and 2 are activities for concentrating on grammatical accuracy but this activity is mostly for improving your fluency and for using the tools (i.e., the language) that you have learned in your private study. Not only is this by far the best way to make big improvements to your fluency, you will also remember your grammar and especially your vocabulary much better if you actually practice using them this way. I repeat: Steps 1 to 3 give you the basic tools for speaking English but if you really want to make the fastest possible progress, you need to use these tools in real communicative situations.

This activity is the main way to progress beyond the step of, "thinking in Chinese" and then translating into English. By minimizing and then eventually almost eliminating the translation step, your fluency will increase dramatically.

One way to help you overcome the habit of translating from Chinese is this: Don't always try to speak English at the same level as you speak Chinese. Instead, be satisfied with communicating at a simpler level. People who are very well educated or very thoughtful often try to speak the same in English as they do in Chinese, with the result that they struggle to translate their rather complex thoughts and end up speaking with a low level of fluency. When you speak in a natural and communicative way with a partner, just go into your "memory bank" of English and choose to use vocabulary and expressions that you know as your tools of communication– be satisfied with that. It is possible for a person who has just a Band 5 level of vocabulary and grammar to reach a Band 7 or 8 level of fluency by constantly using his or her limited vocabulary and relatively weak grammar in situations of true communication. In other words, you need to repeatedly use the English you know in true communication with another person, no matter how limited your English is at the moment. Don't worry about repeatedly speaking the same grammatical mistakes. Yes, you should try to do something about your grammar mistakes when speaking and the best thing to do is to use 'Side by Side' to fix these errors. If you worry about turning your grammar mistakes into habits of speaking and use that as a reason not to try to communicate in English, you will never improve your fluency.

Let's return to the imaginary foreign student you are speaking to in a coffee shop at a university in Australia. Imagine the student is from say, Thailand or Korea. (And imagine your language partner in China is this person when you speak to your language partner.) Now, imagine that when you are chatting to this other Asian student in Australia, you really do want to chat, you really do want to communicate– your aim is not to "impress" this other person with your English. In this kind of situation, you will be satisfied with just using the English you know. You will, in fact, speak more fluently than you might speak in the IELTS Speaking test when you are trying to "impress" the examiner.

Speaking in situations of real communication by using simple English at first is a necessary step to go through when learning the language. If you include a speaking partner as part of your plan to improve your spoken English, the quality of your grammar and vocabulary will improve over time, while you will be quite fluent whatever stage of grammar and vocabulary you are at any particular time. It is much better to practice with a speaking partner right from the early stages of learning English than to learn a lot of English over a year or two in private study and then trying to improve your fluency by speaking in situations of genuine communication.

Of course, in the Speaking test you do need to impress the examiner to some extent, but you should not make that more important than communicating clearly. For example, you do need to show the examiner that you know how to begin some sentences with words that introduce your main answer (or link to what you have said previously, or both introduce and link) and you do need to use complex sentences rather than habitually speaking in short, simple sentences. After you have studied and practiced these things at home, you should try to include them in your natural communication with a speaking partner. Eventually, this higher-level English will become automatic for you.

5) Read and Listen to a Lot of Relatively Easy Material

While you are continuing with Steps 1 to 4, you should do a lot of listening and reading. However, I think many students make a big mistake in the way they do this – they always try to read or listen to materials that are quite hard, materials that have a large number of new words or expressions and other language that is too difficult. This is not learning in a step-by-step manner! Not only that, it will damage your enthusiasm for learning English. You need to read and listen to a large amount of quite easy material, material that has only a very small number of new words and expressions, for example, only one, two or three new words or expressions in every 200 words. Why should you read and listen to materials that are so easy? Well, guess what this activity is called ... it's called, "practice"!

There are several reasons why you need to practice reading and listening this way. Firstly, whenever a person learns to use a complex tool, such as learning to play a musical instrument, or learning something like playing basketball or doing wushu, this person doesn't always try to learn a large amount of new things every time they do the activity. Instead, they repeatedly do a lot of the basic things that they had learned earlier. In the case of language learning, you repeatedly read and listen to words and sentence structures that you have learned earlier, but in new materials that you haven't read or listened to before. Students who learn new vocabulary by studying vocabulary books and especially by learning new words from lists of vocabulary always complain that they forget many of the words. But by repeatedly exposing yourself in this way to words you have learned earlier, you will remember them better and have a much better understanding of how to use these words. Reading and listening are powerful ways to practice and revise the language you already have learned (and as a means of gradually learning new vocabulary) because reading and listening are natural uses of the language in communication; the writer or speaker is communicating one-way to you (it's not mutual communication but it is still communication).

The second reason why you should do this activity is rather common sense: It's much easier to know how to speak if you have listened to a lot of English and, similarly, it's much easier to know how to write if you have read a lot of English.

I realize it is a problem for many students to find suitable materials, at their level, for easy reading and listening practice. If you find English learning sites on the internet, you should be able to find some materials on those websites for doing this. Similarly, internet sites with materials in English for primary school and junior high school students (in the U.S., Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, South Africa etc.) would be suitable for learners of English, like you.

But probably the best idea is to buy more than one general English language textbook (preferably originally written overseas) and practice reading and listening to the materials in the book that is one level below your current level.

Of course, as much as possible, you should try to use materials that have contents similar to the contents of the IELTS test, whether you are practicing with easy materials or learning new language from more challenging materials. For example, listening materials in which a person speaks naturally about his own life, sometimes speaks at length to describe something, and engages in discussion with another person. Easy reading materials should be similar to easier examples of the IELTS reading test.

It is also a well-known fact in language learning that students who read and listen to materials on subjects that interest them make the best overall progress. In other words, if you are particularly interested in basketball, pop music, films, art, world geography or history then you should give more time to reading and listening to materials on your favourite topic(s). By doing this, your reading and listening will feel less like 'study'. At the same time, you should also read and listen to typical IELTS topics because examiners will use a variety of topics to assess your overall vocabulary. For example, if you are a young man who likes computer games but is not very interested in clothes, you should not completely ignore the topic of clothes in your reading and listening. Similarly, girls should spend a little time reading and listening about the topic of sport.

At the same time, you should spend some time reading and listening to materials that are new and more challenging for you. That is, spend some time learning new materials such as in the textbook that is at your current level and by doing and studying the IELTS Reading and Listening practice tests.

I believe the best progress will be made if you spend about 3 hours on quite easy materials for every 1 hour you spend on more challenging materials. In other words, I believe this plan will, in the long run, lead to greater progress than if you spend 3 hours on challenging materials and only 1 hour on easy materials. 慢慢来!

6) Watching Hollywood Movies Won't Help You Learn to Speak English

And don't waste your time watching Hollywood movies. Ok, watch an occasional movie for entertainment but don't expect that to improve your speaking ability – it won't because it's not progressing in a step-by-step manner. Besides, you don't speak when you watch a movie! Yes, you are listening when you watch a movie (or maybe you're just reading the subtitles in Chinese, the 中文字幕) but Hollywood movies (i.e. films that were not made for language learners) will also only help your listening ability to a very small extent because, once again, it's not step-by-step learning.

7) Learn Vocabulary in Conjunction with Other Activities

You might notice that I haven't yet written much about learning vocabulary. It certainly is a very important part of language learning. And for people who are at the Band 4.0, 4.5 and 5.0 level now, a small vocabulary can be a great handicap.

The main reason why I have not specifically put learning vocabulary into an activity for you to do is this: I think learning new vocabulary is best done in combination with other activities, not as a separate activity. I know many Chinese students try to increase their vocabulary by studying those "IELTS Vocabulary" books, as a separate and isolated activity. However, I suspect that most students become frustrated and disappointed with their progress when using those books because, since the vocabulary is really meant for reading comprehension and writing, a lot of the vocabulary is too high-level or too formal. Not only that, it is a rather unnatural, academic way to approach building up one's communication skills or tools. I think you should spend less time with those vocabulary books and find other methods for building your vocabulary.

As I said, I think the best method is to combine your vocabulary building with other activities. For example, in Step 1, learning to produce grammatically correct sentences, you should choose a good book that adds to your vocabulary as you progress through the different sections of the book. Most good grammar books do that. If you get a good grammar book that was originally written overseas by native English speaking experts and has been republished in China, you will often find the vocabulary is already translated for you in the back of the book or in lists. Book #17 (by Martin Hewings), in my booklist does that for you. Then, as you see the examples and use the vocabulary in the exercises, you will learn the real usage of these words and they will be better imprinted in your memory because you will have actually used these words.

Then, when you move on to using Side by Side, your will find another opportunity to increase your vocabulary. The Side by Side books not only use pictures to teach you vocabulary, they also have Chinese translations of words in the back of the books. By doing the speaking exercises you repeatedly use the new words and, in this way, will learn the new words in a natural way.

I know it's time-consuming to be frequently using your dictionary so the best idea is to try to find study materials that have lists of words already translated. So, as much as possible, try to find good-quality IELTS study books or oral English books written by native English speakers that include translated vocabulary lists. Book #19 (by Juliet Adams) is a good book for increasing your knowledge of some basic, everyday words that are useful for the Speaking test but that book is quite small.

One of the best books (with an audio recording) that I have seen for Chinese students to build their vocabulary for spoken English is 生活英语情景口语100主题. If you use the book and the recording as mimicking material, you will be learning new vocabulary at the same time as doing another activity. I don't think it is necessary to try to memorize a large number of the dialogues – there are hundreds of sentences in the book, although it is a good idea to test your ability to make the English sentences after first looking at the sentences written in Chinese. Just mimic a large number of the dialogues and, by doing so, many sentence patterns and new words will imprint themselves on your memory.

8) What about attending conversation classes at a language school? Is that necessary? Is is useful?

Yes, I think it's a good idea to attend classes at a language school for a few months, if you can afford the tuition fees. Everything that I have written above is for self-study but not everyone is mature enough or skillful enough as a student to learn to speak English by self-study, and self-study can be unattractive for people who don't like spending a lot of time alone. In addition to that, many people are too shy to find a language partner or there are other reasons why they can't find a language partner. A good conversation class should substitute for not having someone to practice with.

Overall, I don't think it's absolutely necessary to attend a conversation class if you have the maturity and ability to follow the self-study guidelines that I suggest and you can find one or more suitable language partners. But it is a good, additional way to learn to speak English.

See this page for my comments on choosing a language school conversation class.

9) Conclusion: Overall, those are my ideas for learning to speak English. If you do that for many months and then spend one or two months concentrating on preparing for the Speaking test itself, (i.e., preparing for some of the known, or frequently used topics and questions in the test), then you should be quite successful in the test.    

ielts-yasi.englishlab.net          

2009 年 6 月 25 日更新

如何学习开口说英语

简介

最近，有不少人都给我发来电子邮件并咨询一个简单的问题：“我应该如何学习说英语？”他们的真正意思是，“我到底应该如何真正学习开口说英语，而不仅仅是为雅思口语考试而作准备？”

在对雅思口语考试进行准备时，这种想法确实比较明智，因为考试的确会评估你真正的口语能力——这种考试和你在高中时候准备物理或历史考试的情况有所不同，不应该采用“应试型”的备考方法。没错，进行适当的应试准备的确是个好主意，但是平均而言，“应试突击”在你口语考试的分数当中大约只占 15% 至 25% 的比重——你的得分更多地体现了你的“真实”或整体口语能力。这是一项十分准确的测试，而且雅思考官们并不是傻子。

本页面中仅仅提供了概述性内容来帮助你提高整体的口语能力。你可能已经留意到，我在本页所写的有些观点和此页面： http://ielts-yasi.englishlab.net/Three_months_to_go.htm中的看法相同。事实上，我对于那个网页上的某些内容的确想进行重写，但是里面所阐述的基本观点和我在下方所表达的看法却是相似的。

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态度

首先，你应该找到对英语感兴趣的真正原因，而绝不仅仅是为了备考雅思。如果你对于学习语言兴趣匮乏，那么想提高英语水平会困难得多。

其次，你应该摒弃这样的观点：学习英语，尤其是学习如何说英语，与学习学校里面的其他学科是很相似的。语言是沟通的工具。你需要意识到，如果自己真的想取得进步，那么必须要在实际的沟通场景中练习使用这项工具。

第三，你需要认识到，在英语方面取得较大进步是需要一定时间的。大多数近期的中国高中毕业生处于雅思 5.0 或5.5 的水平，而近期的大学毕业生平均而言也仅仅稍强一点。他们需要至少 6 个月甚至长达（或多或少） 1 年的时间来专职学习英语并进行练习，然后才能达到总分 6.0 或 6.5 的标准。（这包括了花在四项基本技能——听说读写——方面的总时间。）如果你试图在短时间内拔苗助长，那么在语言方面的进展反而不会很显著。

许多中国人都有相似的态度：“我没多少时间学英语了，因为我三个月后就需要去英国开始工商管理的硕士课程。 另外，我实际上对英语也没什么兴趣；我更专注于自己的事业。”如果你抱持着这样的态度，那么很可能既无法在雅思考试中取得好成绩，也不能在英国的硕士课程学习中获得成功！

最后一点，你不仅要给自己留出时间来取得进步，也要尽量耐心地走好每一步，不要贪多嚼不烂。如果你现在处于总分 5.0 或 5.5 的水平，那么不应该苛求自己开始学习想达到 6.5 或 7.0 分（甚至 9.0 分！）水平的学习资料。

学习方法

1) 写出语法正确的句子

你需要做的第一件事情就是学习写出语法正确的句子。找到一本可以教会你这项技能的高品质书籍（参见书目。）品质最好的学习书籍是那些由英语母语的专家所撰写的学习类书籍。从另一方面而言，由中国作者所著书中的解释性文字和对英文的翻译（尤其是对于生词的翻译）都使读者比较易于理解。因此，你应该对于这两种书籍都加以使用，但是同时也要明白，中文的英语学习类书籍都倾向于把英语当做一个学科来看待，而不会把它视为沟通工具。不仅如此，里面的英语有时候会出现过于正式的情况，因为这些书籍主要是针对写作而不是口语。一本好的语法书的确应该包含一些生词，但是与此同时，它的“每一课”当中不能充斥着大量生词，使读者被生词压垮。

我知道学习语法有点枯燥，但这却是必须的。语法有点类似于解数学题的正确方法。

2) 在口语对话中说出语法正确的句子

对于口语而言，借由书籍来学习如何造句仅仅是万里长征的第一步。你还需要在对话场景中说出语法正确的句子。在这一步中，你应该使用“《朗文国际英语教程》（Side by Side）”，并从第 1 册开始学起。（只有对于那些了解自己已经处于 6.5 分水平并且把目标设定在 7.0 分的学生而言可以跳过第 1 册，其他人都应该从头学起。）当然，你必须要使用《朗文国籍英语教程》（Side by Side）书中的配套录音材料——不采用录音材料，就无法正确地利用这套书籍进行自学。

“Side by Side”学生手册中还有很不错的习题，可以练习写出语法正确的句子，但是这些习题集中没有语法方面的详细解释。如果想了解对各种语法的详细解释，我推荐你们使用中文版《英语语法大全》（Collins Cobuild English Grammar）。 在某种程度上讲，事实上你可以采用《朗文国际英语教程》（Side by Side）和《英语语法大全》（Collins Cobuild English Grammar）而忽略我在第 1 步中所提到的书籍。

使用《朗文国际英语教程》（Side by Side）丛书将令你踏上“用英语思维”的光明大道。这即是说，你将会利用自己头脑中所储备的英语知识来直接讲话，而不是把中文思路翻译成英语。这是提升流利性的非常重要的一环。

3) 模仿语调自然的英语口语录音材料

除了进行第 1、2 步之外，你还应该寻找相对简单而且有趣的英文听力材料进行模仿练习，从而改善自己的发音。有些人在这部分当中可能需要投入比别人多一些的时间，需根据其当前的发音状况而定，但是总体而言，每个人都应该进行这项练习。

模仿并不意味着复制每个词的发音。它是指复制英语本土人士讲话的方方面面，比如词与词之间的连接方式、在每句话中对一个（或多个）特定词汇加上重音的方法、以及讲话时语调的抑扬顿挫。很明显，你需要在这项练习中找到最适合自己的良好资料，因为你应该去模仿越自然越好的说话方式，这也包括自然的说话语速。

你需要尽可能多地搜集在对话或谈话场景下的录音材料，或是与雅思口试的方式类似的谈话材料。

最佳的模仿材料往往是书中的听力练习材料，例如我所提及的书目中的第 3、4、23 和 24 号学习用书。我个人认为，如果你能够花点时间对《Cambridge Practice Test》的听力测试材料中相关部分的陌生表达方式加以学习，使它们变得“相对简单”一点，那么这些资料也很适合作为这项练习的模仿对象。在你对听力资料进行模仿时，要同时使用听力的文本。

4) 与口语搭档进行沟通

当你在进行第 1 至 3 步练习取得一点进步之后，应该找一个人（最好不只一个人）做你的口语练习搭档。这是学习说英语的一个非常重要的部分！如果你在学习中忽略了这一项，与接受这项建议的人相比，你的进步肯定会慢得多。这就好比说，“我想大幅提高自己的篮球技术”，但是却只花时间来学习和练习单人技巧。如果你真的想提高自己的水平，就还需要从事你想提高的实际项目。对于想努力提高篮球技术的人而言，这就意味着他需要作为球队的一员来参加一些真正的篮球比赛。

你想寻找的口语搭档的口语水平应该跟你差不多。你应该和口语搭档一对一地以自然的方式进行聊天。你需要想象自己在澳大利亚一所大学的咖啡店里面和另外一位来自亚洲的学生聊天，他/她外表看起来很像中国人，但是却不会说中文。

其目的是练习沟通。在这项活动中，你应该着重于和对方交换信息（而且别忘了，讨论你的感觉和观点也是交换信息的一种方式！不要太担心语法错误——第 1 和 2 步的练习专注于语法的准确性，但是这项练习主要是为了提升流利度和使用你在个人学习中所学到的工具（即语言）。这不仅仅是迄今为止大幅提升流利程度的最佳方式，如果你能使用这种方式来练习使用语法及词汇的话，那么你对它们的印象会深刻得多。我再重复一遍：第 1 至 3 步为你提供了英语口语的基本工具，但是如果你真的很想取得最快的进步，那么你需要在实际的沟通情境中使用这些工具。

这项练习是摆脱“中文思维”并将其翻译成英语这种习惯的主要方法。通过减少并最终消除翻译的步骤，你的流利度将会得到明显的提升。

下面列出了帮助你克服从中文翻译成英文的思维习惯的一种方式：不要总是试图把英语说得如同中文一样好。与之相反，你应该对自己采用较简单的方式实现信息沟通而感到满意。接受过良好教育或者思路十分深邃的人往往会力求在说英语时表达出和说中文时相同的水准，结果他们只能磕磕巴巴地翻译自己十分复杂的思路，而流利程度大打折扣。当你和口语搭档以沟通性的自然方式进行交流时，只需要进入自己的英语“记忆库”并选出你所知道的词汇和表达方式来作为自己的沟通工具即可——你需要对这种程度感到满意。一个在语法和词汇方面只有 5 分水平的人通过在实际的沟通情境中不断使用自己有限的词汇和相对较弱的语法，有可能在流利度方面达到 7 或 8 分的水平。换句话说，你需要与别人在实际的沟通当中重复地使用你所知道的英语资源，无论你当时对英语的了解多么有限。不要担心自己在说话时重复地犯相同的语法错误。是的，你确实应该对自己说话时的语法错误想点办法，而所能采取的最好方式就是利用《朗文国籍英语教程》（Side by Side）来纠正这些错误。但是，如果你担心这样会把自己的语法错误变成说话习惯并且把这一点当作不去使用英语尽力进行沟通的借口，那么你永远也无法提高自己的流利度。

让我们来关注一下你在澳大利亚一所大学的咖啡店里面和一位想象中的外国学生对话的情形。请想象，这位学生来自泰国或韩国。（此外，当你和你的中国籍语言搭档对话时，请想象他/她就是这个外国学生。）现在，请想象你在和这名位于澳大利亚的亚洲其他国家学生进行闲谈时，你真的很想和他聊天，也的确很想进行交流——你的目的不是用自己出色的英语令他“肃然起敬”。在这种情况下，你如果能使用自己已知的英语知识，就会感到满意了。事实上，在这种情况下你的口语流利度会更好，而当你在雅思考试的情境中却做不到这一点，因为你会力图“给考官留下深刻印象”。

起初，在实际的谈话场景中使用简单的英语表达，这是语言学习中的必经阶段。如果你在提高英语口语的计划中还包含一个口语搭档，那么你的语法和词汇的质量会随着时间推移而不断提升，而且流利度会相当不错，无论你的语法和词汇处于何等水平。从学英语的最初阶段起就找个口语搭档开始练习会是个好得多的方法，而尽量不要在一两年中依靠个人自学进行大量的英语知识学习，然后再去实际的沟通场景中尝试提升自己的流利度。

当然，你的确需要在口语考试中或多或少地使考官对你印象深刻一点，但是这一点的重要性不应该超过清晰的沟通。例如，你确实需要向考官展示，自己知道如何采用某些词汇来引出一些句子，从而提出你的主要答案（或是与你之前所说内容的语义相连，或是既引出又进行语意连接），而且你确实也需要采用复杂的句子结构而不是习惯性所采用的简单短句。当你在家练习了这些内容之后，就应该尝试在与口语搭档的自然沟通中加入这些成分。最终，你会对这种较高水平的英语表达驾轻就熟。

5) 广泛地阅读和收听大量相对简单的英语资料

当你在进行第 1 至 4 步时，应该要进行大量的听力和阅读练习。但是，我认为许多学生在进行这项练习时都犯了一个很大的错误——他们往往力图去阅读或聆听相当难的资料，其中有大量的生词、表达方式或其它过于艰深的语言内容。这并不是循序渐进的学习方式！不仅如此，这样还会挫伤你学习英语的热情。你所需要的是去聆听和阅读大量相当简单的材料，其中只有很少量的生词和陌生的表达方式，例如每 200 个词中只有一至三个生词的材料。为什么应该去阅读和聆听这么简单的材料呢？呃，我想这项活动应该被称为……“练习”！

你需要这样去练习阅读和听力，共有如下几个原因。首先，如果一个人想学习使用一项复杂的工具，像是学习一件乐器、篮球或武术，他不会在每次练习时都经常尝试很多新东西。与之相反，他们会反复地从事之前所学过的大量基本练习。在语言学习中，你需要重复地阅读和聆听已经学过的单词和句子结构，但是必须要在以前没接触过的新材料中进行学习。那些通过学习词汇书、特别是背诵生词表来学习英语的学生们总是抱怨自己会忘记很多单词。然而，通过这种对于之前所学单词的重复性接触方式，你会把它们记得更牢固，并更好地明白如何使用这些词汇。阅读和听力都是练习和复习你之前所学语言的强大有效的方式（也是逐步学习新词汇的方法），因为阅读和听力都是语言中沟通当中的自然使用方式；作者或讲话者在与你进行单向沟通（尽管不是双向沟通，但它仍然是沟通）。

你应该进行这项练习的第二个原因其实是一个基本常识：如果你听过大量的英语之后，想知道如何说话会容易得多，与之相似，如果你读过大量英语，想知道如何写作也会容易得多。

我发现，许多学生想找到适合自己水平的阅读和听力材料时遇到了问题。如果你在互联网上搜寻英文学习网站，那么应该能找到一些材料来进行这些练习。与之相仿，互联网上面（美国、英国、加拿大、澳大利亚、新西兰、爱尔兰、南非等国）针对小学生和初中生的站点里提供的英语材料比较适合像你这样的英语学习者。

但是最好的主意大概是购买多本一般性的英语教材书籍（最好是由国外人士撰写的），并且选择书中比你当前水平低一个级别的材料进行阅读和听写练习。

当然，你应该尽可能地尝试使用与雅思考试相似的材料，无论你是采用简单材料进行练习或从更具挑战性的材料中学习新的语言资源。举例来说，在一个人很自然地谈论他自己生活的听力材料中，有时候也会较大段地描述某些东西，并与另外一个人进行讨论。而简单的阅读材料应该类似于雅思阅读测试中比较简单的范例。

众所周知，在语言学习中，采用自己感兴趣的阅读和听力材料的学生能够取得最快速的整体进步。换句话说，如果你对于篮球、流行音乐、电影、艺术、世界地理或历史特别感兴趣，那么你应该花更多的时间在你喜爱的话题上进行阅读和听力练习。这样，你的阅读和听力练习就不那么像是“学习”了。与此同时，你还应该对典型的雅思话题进行阅读和听力练习，因为考官会采用话题来评估你的整体词汇量。举例而言，如果你是个喜欢电脑游戏但是对服饰不感兴趣的男孩，也不应该在阅读和听力练习中完全忽略关于服饰话题的内容。相似的是，女孩子们也应该花点时间来进行关于体育运动的阅读和听力练习。

与此同时，你应该花一些时间对更具挑战性的新材料进行阅读和听力练习。这即是说，你要花一些时间来学习诸如课本中适合你当前水平的新材料，或者学习雅思的阅读和听力练习测试。

我认为如果你能够每花 3 小时进行相对简单的材料学习并且对应地花 1 小时学习更具挑战性的材料，那么能取得最快的进步。换句话说，与花费 3 个小时在比较难的材料上并对应地只花 1 个小时在简单材料上相比，我相信这个计划会在长远上取得更大的成功。慢慢来！

6) 观看好莱坞大片不能帮助你学习开口说英语

不要浪费时间观看好莱坞电影。好吧，偶尔看看电影娱乐一下也未尝不可，但是不要期望这样做能够提高你的口语能力——办不到的，因为看电影没有遵守循序渐进的规则。除此之外，你在看电影的时候不会开口说英语！是的，看电影的时候的确在练习听力（或者也许你只是在看屏幕下方的中文字幕），但是好莱坞电影（即不是为英语学习者而制作的影片）只能在很小程度上帮你提高听力，我再一次重申，因为它不遵守循序渐进的学习方法。

7) 结合其它活动来进行词汇学习

你可能已经注意到了，我一直没怎么写关于词汇学习方面的内容。这当然是语言学习中很重要的一部分。对于现在处于 4.0、4.5 和 5.0 分水平的人而言，较小的词汇量确实是一个很大的障碍。

我没有把词汇学习设定为一个特定练习供你们进行的主要原因如下：我认为生词学习最好和其它活动结合在一起，而不要单独进行。我知道，许多中国学生都通过背诵那些“雅思词汇书”来试图提升词汇量，并把它当成一项单独的学习活动。然而我很怀疑，大部分学生在使用了这类词汇书之后是不是都感到沮丧和失望，因为这些词汇实际上是针对阅读理解和写作之中，而且其中大量词汇都要求过高或过于正式。不仅如此，通过这种办法来提升一个人的沟通技能也是不自然而且过于学术化的。我认为，你应该在那些词汇书上面少花点时间，并找到其它方法来扩充自己的词汇量。

正如我所说，我认为最佳的方式是把扩充词汇量的工作与其它活动结合在一起。举例来说，在第 1 步中，你要学习如何写出语法正确的句子，这时候应该要选择一本不错的英语书，随着你在语法书不同内容的推进学习中不断地增加你的词汇量。大部分不错的语法书都能做到这一点。如果你拿到的是一本由英语母语的专家在海外编撰并于中国发行的语法书，通常可以在书的最后找到已经翻译好的词汇或词汇表。我所推荐书目中的第 17 本书（作者 Martin Hewings）可以在这方面帮助你。然后，随着你阅读例子并进行词汇使用的练习，将会学习这些词汇的真正使用方法，而它们也会在你头脑中留下更深的印象，因为你自己会真正去使用它们。

此后，当你开始使用《朗文国籍英语教程》（Side by Side）之后，会找到提升自己词汇量的另一种方法。这套书不仅仅会使用图片来教你词汇，还在书的最后附上了这些词汇的中文翻译。你会通过口语练习反复地使用生词，这种方式可以帮助你以自然的方式来学习生词。

我知道频繁地使用词典很耗时间，所以最好的办法是找到已经提供生词及其中文翻译列表的学习资料。所以，你要尽可能地找到并使用由英语母语人士所写的高品质雅思学习或英语口语书籍，其中附有词汇及其中文翻译列表。第 19 本书（作者 Juliet Adams）是一本不错的书，可以提升你在日常基本词汇上的知识，对于口语考试很有帮助，但是这本书比较薄，内容不是很多。

我所见过的最适合中国学生提高口语词汇量的书籍（配有音频材料）是《生活英语情景口语100主题》。如果你把这本书和录音资料作为模仿材料进行练习，还能在进行其它的学习活动时学到生词。我认为，试图背诵长篇对话并不是必须的——这本书里面有成百上千个句子，但是如果你能首先看一下中文的句意，然后用英文造句来表达相同的意思，从而检测自己的英文造句能力，这也不失为一个好办法。其实你只需要对大量的对话进行模仿练习即可，这样做可以使许多句式和生词都深深印在你的记忆中。

8) 去语言学校报名参加谈话课程怎么样？有必要这么做吗？这样到底有没有用？

是的，我觉得去语言学校参加为期几个月的课程是个不错的想法，如果你能支付得起学费的话。我在上面所写的一切建议都是采用自学的方式，但是并不是所有人都有足够的成熟程度和学习技巧来自学英语，而且对于不喜欢花大量时间独处一室的人而言，自学可能很无趣。此外，很多人都羞于寻找口语搭档，或是由于种种原因而无法找到口语搭档。一项出色的对话课程应该可以替代没有练习搭档的空缺。

整体上说，如果你足够成熟、能够依照我所建议的自学指导进行学习、而且你能够找到至少一个合适的口语搭档的话，我觉得参加口语课对你而言不是必须的。但它确实是一种良好的英语口语学习方式，可以作为补充。

请参阅此页面，查看我对于前往语言学校选择对话课的意见。

9) 总结：总之，这就是我对于如何学习口语的看法。如果你先花几个月时间进行这些练习，然后再花一两个月专门准备雅思考试，（即对考试中的已知或常用话题和问题进行准备），那么你在考试中应该能够取得成功。