Alan Palmer's Language Chat podcasts Alan Palmer

Hello everybody,
This is the last article I will put on this website as it is full!

My new site is:

www.language-explorer.co.uk

See you there!!
Bye
Alan

Hello again
Today I want to make a suggestion about how we can make a decision on our language skills.

People say “I am a learner of English,” “ I am learning French”, “I learn Italian” etc

This means that we think of ourselves as “learners” , “students” “pupil”

Then people may say:

“I am a beginner of Chinese”
“I speak some German”
“I can get by in Russian”

All the time we make these sorts of statements to other people, particularly native speakers, we make a judgement of our ability and class ourselves as a “learner”.

I want to suggest that we think of ourselves as both learner AND speaker. This way we can make a judgement in a different way which I believe will help us improve and enjoy language.

For example

I would say that I am 80% speaker of French and 20% learner
I would say that I am 60% speaker of German and 40% learner
I would say that I am 10% speaker of Chinese and 90% learner
I would say that I am 5% speaker of Spanish and 95% learner

This rating changes as we feel we know more and are confident in speaking.
Even as a native speaker of English I would also say that I am a learner

I think I am maybe 98% speaker of English and 2% learner. This is because I learn new phrases and words in English as I learn new things about my language or as new words come into the language. For example I did not know the word “Podcast” two years ago, but now I use the word a lot.

These figures need not be very accurate – they are just a way of judging our language skills. My idea is that we rate our speaking to learning depending on our own feelings and attitude to the language

I believe the more we tell ourselves we can call ourselves a “speaker” – even if the percentage is quite low, the more we will feel proud, enjoy speaking as well as learning and make great progress.

Bye for now
Be good be happy

Hello everybody
Today I want to talk about an idea for learning I call "Relaxing Challenges"

Remember when you were a child and you liked to play? Sometimes you dared yourself to try things: climb a tree, make a snowman, build a sandcastle, catch a ball. Each of these sort of things were a physical challenge. Some other things were mental challenges: playing chess, making a jigsaw, drawing and painting.

Learning a language is a big challenge. It is a huge undertaking; building up vocabulary, pronunciation, writing a text, reading a book, listening to speech and also speaking ourselves are all different challenges with language learning.

When I refer to a "relaxing challenge" I don't mean having a rest. I mean setting ourselves a small challenge with a relaxed mind, but with an energetic and enthusiastic intention.

For a language learning "relaxing challenge", we can think of something to do with the language we are learning that challenges us for a short while, but doesn't tire us out completely.

Some examples:

Reading a passage quickly to see how many words we know
Speaking a text to see how well we can pronounce it
Seeing if we can learn 5 new words a day
Try singing a song in the language
Try phoning or e-mailing someone and speak about a subject you are not very familiar with
Listen to a foreign radio station to see how many words you can understand
Ask a friend for their opinion on how they think you speak
All these ideas and many more are a way of us using the language or practicing and pushing our knowledge and skill further....but without worrying. Like we did when we were a child.

We didn't climb a tree to worry about falling
We didn't build a sandcastle to worry about the sea washing it away
We didn't worry about dropping a ball sometimes

We can put this sort of attitude also to language study. I do not mean act like a child, I mean be "childlike" in our way of challenging ourselves to do something which excites us about language and relax after, safe in the knowledge that even if we did not do things so well, at least we had a try and enjoyed the challenge

Be good be happy

Bye for now

Hrllo everyone
I am back after quite a long absence. I had problems with my home internet connection.

Here is something new, a German/English videocast
See what you think
Bye for now
Alan

I hope you like this podcast about Punch and Judy. A famous traditional puppet show in England.

Bye for now

Alan

China, the homeland of tea
It is universally acknowledged that China is the original tea-growing area, as well as the first country to grow, produce and drink tea.
In the Song (960-1279) and Yuan (1271-1368) Dynasties a popular custom was tea appraising. Over the long history of drinking tea, a special and simple Chinese tea culture came into being. Drinking tea was not only for quenching thirst or for enjoyment, but also for the promotion of friendship and mutual understanding. Folk customs of drinking tea reflected the ancient Chinese people's great interest in tea culture.
(to appraise – to value, to judge) to quench- to satisfy (mutual – common)
People often used tea as a betrothal gift; for it could not be "transplanted." After accepting tea as a betrothal gift, a girl could not capriciously change her decision to marry her fiancé.
Betrothal – promise of marriage capricious – impulsive - reckless
Entertainment of guests to tea is the most fundamental social behavior in the Chinese people's contacts with each other. When a guest comes, the Chinese will offer him or her a cup of tea to express friendship.
Fundamental –basic, original
China is the home country of tea. Before the Tang Dynasty (618-907), Chinese tea was exported by land and sea, first to Japan and Korea, then to India and Central Asia and, in the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911) Dynasties, to the Arabian Peninsula. In the early period of the 17th century, Chinese tea was exported to Europe, where the upper class adopted the fashion of drinking tea. Chinese tea, like Chinese silk and China, is an outstanding contribution to the world's material and spiritual civilization.
Adopted – take on
China is the homeland of tea. It is believed that China had tea-shrubs as early as five to six thousand years ago, and human cultivation of tea plants dates back two thousand years. Tea from China, along with her silk and porcelain, began to be known over the world more than a thousand years ago and has since always been an important Chinese export. At present more than forty countries in the world grow tea, with Asian countries producing 90% of the world's total output. All tea trees in other countries have their origin directly or indirectly in China. The word for tea leaves or tea as a drink in many countries is a derivative from the Chinese character "cha." The Russians call it "cha'i", which sounds like "chaye" (tea leaves) as it is pronounced in northern China, and the English word "tea" sounds similar to the pronunciation of its counterpart in Xiamen (Amoy). The Japanese character for tea is written exactly the same as it is in Chinese, though pronounced with a slight difference. The habit of tea drinking spread to Japan in the 6th century, but it was not introduced to Europe and America till the 17th and 18th centuries. Now the number of tea drinkers in the world is legion and is still on the increase.
Derivative – taken from, original legion – great many