Ask HN: How did you become fluent in English? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: How did you become fluent in English?

#171

Post by Baeocystin » Mon, Apr 09, 2018, 6:56 AM UTC

fenomas wrote: post #162

Baeocystin wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't have to agree with me, and that is OK. But my opinion is based off of experience. You might be interested in http://www.govtilr.org/Skills/ILRscale5.htm as an example of the scales used when defining levels of competency.

I'm sure you meant this reply to be constructive, but without describing the experience in question or saying which category from your link you think applies here, it doesn't convey anything. For me, my experience is two years as an English teacher and my opinion based on that experience is that someone who can convey complex ideas clearly and without effort is fluent. If you define that to be intermediate, what's le…

Thank you for the friendly reply. Here is the ILR page regarding spoken language, which may be more what you had in mind:

http://www.govtilr.org/Skills/ILRscale2.htm

Based on the criteria given, I would estimate that his English writing ability is ~2+. Without hearing him speak, I can't properly assess. Perhaps a 3.

None of this is a criticism or a put down. Achieving this degree of competency in a second or third language takes a great deal of work over a long time, and is something to be proud of. But true fluency happens at level 4 and above.

(My father was a professional linguist and diplomat, and I spent much of my pre-adult life living in different non-English-speaking countries. I say this just so you know where I am coming from. I also want to spread awareness of what the various professional standards of fluency are.)

Re: Ask HN: How did you become fluent in English?

#172

Post by bayindirh » Mon, Apr 09, 2018, 7:08 AM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #167

bayindirh wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for your comments. I'll take note of these, and will revisit from time to time. Most of the commas I use (before the "and" & "or"s) are Oxford Commas which dictates to use a comma before the conjunction if the sentences are separable. If the sentences are separable you don't use the comma. A more general rule is explained in [0]. My juries of my Master's and Ph.D. were very strict in this manner so I learned i…

> Most of the commas I use (before the "and" & "or"s) are Oxford Commas which dictates to use a comma before the conjunction if the sentences are separable You seem to be confusing the Oxford (or serial) comma [0] used after the penultimate item of a list with the rule on comma + conjunction (or semicolon with no conjunction) separating independent clauses as opposed to a bare conjunction separating dependent clauses…

Generally the corrections were between independent clauses, and I made some research on the matter at that time. It's possible that I just mix the name of the rules since I got them from the back of my memory.

Thanks for clarifying these up. Will keep these in mind too.

Re: Ask HN: How did you become fluent in English?

#173

Post by apexalpha » Mon, Apr 09, 2018, 8:11 AM UTC

Besides the other posts about simply comsuming as much English I'd like to offer my tip that helped me a lot:

In England there is (/ was?) a tradition of making middle and high school students read increasingly more difficult books throughout ages 11 - 18. There are entire book series written with this concept in mind. These are excellent to pick up.

Harry Potter is a good example of this: the first Harry Potter book was written for 11/12 year olds and the books become longer and more mature with every next book.

Harry Potter and the prisoner of Azkaban was the first book I've ever read in English when I was 14 or so and since then I always try to read books in English if the original is.

Re: Ask HN: How did you become fluent in English?

#174

Post by fenomas » Mon, Apr 09, 2018, 9:17 AM UTC

Baeocystin wrote: post #171

fenomas wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure you meant this reply to be constructive, but without describing the experience in question or saying which category from your link you think applies here, it doesn't convey anything. For me, my experience is two years as an English teacher and my opinion based on that experience is that someone who can convey complex ideas clearly and without effort is fluent. If you define that to be intermediate, what's le…

Thank you for the friendly reply. Here is the ILR page regarding spoken language, which may be more what you had in mind: http://www.govtilr.org/Skills/ILRscale2.htm Based on the criteria given, I would estimate that his English writing ability is ~2+. Without hearing him speak, I can't properly assess. Perhaps a 3. None of this is a criticism or a put down. Achieving this degree of competency in a second or third la…

Thank you in kind, and I understand where you're coming from, but I still think the standard you're applying is pretty far removed from normal. Separate from any subjective rankings, the person describes having been educated solely in English for 6+ years, and from context appears to have been actively speaking it for at least 15-20 years overall. If one ranks that as intermediate, one winds up calling someone with 10 years experience a beginner, and such absurdities.

As for subjective rankings, I'm more familiar with CEFR, under which I see no obvious reason not to rank this person C1 or C2, which is what one would expect for someone with more than 800-1000 hours of study.

CEFR: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_R...

Re: Ask HN: How did you become fluent in English?

#175

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Re: Ask HN: How did you become fluent in English?

#176

Post by petraeus » Mon, Apr 09, 2018, 1:58 PM UTC

aerovistae wrote: post #129

FearNotDaniel wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry to say it, but your written English reads very stilted to me, a native (British) English speaker. Assuming your spoken English is a similar level, your European colleagues are right - it is clear in the sense that it is easy to understand what you are trying to say. But your word choice and grammar are a very long way away from a native speaker. If you do have a desire to sound more natural in the way you use E…

> a very long way from a native speaker uh....this guy's English is really excellent. it may be distinguishable from a native speaker by occasional poor phrasing or misuse of words, but it's really, really good. i think your criticism is overblown.

Let me see, if nine out of 10 people asses this poster as having non-fluent english and 1/10 seem to think he is fluent, the most resonable explanation is that there are now 2 people who are not fluent in english. Stop trying to grasp at straws, it quite clear the poster is not a native english speaker nor does he fool fluent speakers.

Re: Ask HN: How did you become fluent in English?

#177

Post by AnnoyingSwede » Mon, Apr 09, 2018, 2:31 PM UTC

Mtv, series, movies and programming literature, but i guess that depends on how you define "fluent", i still mess up a lot in English.

Re: Ask HN: How did you become fluent in English?

#178

Post by Natsu » Mon, Apr 09, 2018, 5:40 PM UTC

jogjayr wrote: post #170

Natsu wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For someone not from a Western culture, it will also help them understand a lot of cultural references that won't make much sense otherwise, like "seeing the handwriting on the wall."

> "seeing the handwriting on the wall." I've known that phrase for...I don't even know how long. But I only learned yesterday that its origin was Biblical. I love how Dan Carlin says "mene mene tekel upharsin" and wanted to read more about it, and made that happy discovery.

Ahh, but actually the 'u' at the start of the 4th word is how they wrote 'and' so it's not clear it would've been written on the wall :)

Yeah, there are a lot of things like that which people have forgotten the origins of...

Re: Ask HN: How did you become fluent in English?

#179

Post by ecesena » Mon, Apr 09, 2018, 6:17 PM UTC

simonebrunozzi wrote: post #45

I grew up in Italy. Among EU countries, Italians have one of the worst English accent and vocabulary, because Italian TV "dubs" every single movie and TV show ever invented. In fact, you often hear that "Italian dubbers (e.g. voice over actors) are the best in the world". In my teenage years, my father gave me an amazing present: for two summers, he paid to send me to study English in Scotland once, and in Sussex onc…

Adding my experience to the "Italian thread". I want to share just to say that it's easier than you think, and you don't necessarily need special experiences if you can't (or you didn't) have them.

During school I always studied French, and very little/basic English. I did a 3 months full immersion in Dublin, but it didn't help that much. When I started my PhD I literally had issues with the "s" at the 3rd person.

Because I was required to write primarily in English, I started doing that: write a lot, and do exercises to be better at writing. In parallel I started to read more in English, mostly research papers. I still had issues with reading, let alone speaking. Specifically, I never read an entire book in English, and I still used to read news in Italian even though a lot of them, especially technology news, are much better in English.

The major change for me has been starting to watch series in English (the first one was The Big Bang Theory), initially with subtitles in Italian and soon after subtitled in English -- I highly recommend the latter. With that, I transformed. I watched TBBT also dubbed in Italian, I realized how worse it was (jokes not got by translators, weird voices once you heard the real ones, etc.). I remember soon after I was excited and watched the black swan in English, I certainly had improved but couldn't get most of it still.

Fast forward a few years, improvements were clear. I published peer reviewed papers, and spoke to conferences. I moved to San Francisco and survived well. Five years in, I live here, my wife is American, and I work & live primarily in English. I can't work in sales :), but my English is certainly fluent for my work, to talk to people, and to speak in public.

In summary, from 0 to fluent writing a lot, watching TV series, and later talking to others.

Re: Ask HN: How did you become fluent in English?

#180

Post by Baeocystin » Mon, Apr 09, 2018, 8:56 PM UTC

fenomas wrote: post #174

Baeocystin wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for the friendly reply. Here is the ILR page regarding spoken language, which may be more what you had in mind: http://www.govtilr.org/Skills/ILRscale2.htm Based on the criteria given, I would estimate that his English writing ability is ~2+. Without hearing him speak, I can't properly assess. Perhaps a 3. None of this is a criticism or a put down. Achieving this degree of competency in a second or third la…

Thank you in kind, and I understand where you're coming from, but I still think the standard you're applying is pretty far removed from normal. Separate from any subjective rankings, the person describes having been educated solely in English for 6+ years, and from context appears to have been actively speaking it for at least 15-20 years overall. If one ranks that as intermediate, one winds up calling someone with 1…

> If one ranks that as intermediate, one winds up calling someone with 10 years experience a beginner, and such absurdities.

I'm sure you are aware of people that have spent decades+ in an English-speaking environment, yet still speak in a stilted manner. Time alone isn't enough- you need active correction. A few folks are able to self-correct via listening, but almost everyone does best with regular instruction by qualified teachers.

Thank you for the CEFR link.

Part of the problem with English in particular (I am sure you are aware of this, I am just stating it for other readers) is that the number of ESL speakers exceeds the native population. This rather unusual case means that many learners are receiving instruction from English speakers who themselves are not fluent, compounding the error. From a strictly academic standpoint, it is fascinating tracing the growth of all the different flavors of English (some mutually unintelligible) but it does present certain practical difficulties in communication!