Study skills tips

Study skills tips

Read the study skills tips to practise and improve your reading skills. You'll learn some great study tips at the same time!

Do the preparation task first. Then read the text and do the exercises.

Preparation

Reading text

Many studies about language learning ask the question: What makes a good language learner? There are some things that good language learners do and some things they don't do. Here are some of the most useful suggestions from studies.

  • Don't be afraid of making mistakes. People often get things wrong. Good language learners notice their mistakes and learn from them.
  • Do group activities. People use language to communicate with other people. A good language learner always looks for opportunities to talk with other students.
  • Make notes during every class. Notes help you to remember new language. Look at your notes when you do your homework.
  • Use a dictionary. Good language learners often use dictionaries to check the meaning of words they don't know. They also make their own vocabulary lists.
  • Think in the language you're learning outside the classroom. When you're shopping or walking down the street, remember useful words and phrases. Sometimes, when you're at home, say new words to practise your pronunciation.
  • Do extra practice. Test and improve your language, reading and listening skills with self-study material. You can find a lot of this online.
  • Imagine yourself speaking in the language. Many good language learners can see and hear themselves speaking in the language. This helps their motivation.
  • Enjoy the process. Good language learners have fun with the language. Watch a TV series or film, listen to songs, play video games or read a book. It's never too late to become a good language learner.

Task 1

Task 2

Discussion

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Average: 4.2 (79 votes)

Submitted by Shoma Tateishi on Sat, 18/07/2020 - 14:38

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I think the tips for learning a new language are watching foreign movies and listening to foreign music. I think these are good ways to have fun learning a language. There are two improvements in doing these things. The first is to improve ability to hear the language. Words are often used in songs and videos. Therefore, I think I will get used to listening to words naturally. The second is to improve vocabulary. Words that I don't understand often appear in foreign works. I can increase my vocabulary by looking up words in a dictionary. It feels difficult at first, but I think it's good.

Submitted by Akemi Matsumoto on Fri, 17/07/2020 - 13:10

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I think listen a lot is a good way to study a foreign language. In detail, it is like watching movies or listen to music in the language we want to learn. Also, this method helped me a lot when I had difficulty to solve listening tests. But this way of learning could be tricky sometimes because if we do not enjoy that method it would not make sense. So, what I want to say is that if you want to learn a foreign language you also have to enjoy the process.

Submitted by Kaho Dokko on Fri, 17/07/2020 - 08:34

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I have two tips for learning new language. First, watching foreign movies and dramas or listening foreign music. You can enjoy learning a new language through them. In the beginning, you may be not able to catch them, but your ears will be used to a new language. Second, increasing your vocabulary every day. It's important to keep it until the meaning come to you as soon as you see the word. I could pass EIKEN Grade Pre-1 thanks to the practice.
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Submitted by Hennadii on Thu, 16/07/2020 - 16:06

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I've been learning English for many years so I get enough experience to have some tips. First of all, you need a goal. You can't learn English in general, you have to do it on purpose: study, work or something. I suggest setting an ambitious goal - be ready for IELTS or TOEFL exam. Maybe you want to take this exam or maybe you don't but it's a quite challenging goal which claims huge effort to achieve. If you prepare yourself for the exam, I mean being confident in all four skills - speaking, reading, listening, and writing - you will be ready to face any task at work or at study.

Submitted by Naru Yasuda on Thu, 16/07/2020 - 07:21

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I think other tips for learning a new language is to use that language in everyday life. But it is very difficult. I think we don't use other language because all people speak Japanese. Therefor we think difficult. So, if you have a time to other country, it is big chance to learn language. But many people don't have a chance to go this country. So, I recommend listening to CD and read around. If you have a movie spoken other language, it is good. Movie have a seen to everyday life. If you see movie many times, you can learn language.

Submitted by Machida on Tue, 14/07/2020 - 09:06

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I think watching foreign movies and listening to music is good. I think most of people don't like study. But if your favorite singer is a foreigner, you naturally want to understand the meaning of lyrics, don't you? So we can study happily while listening to songs. The reason I decided to study foreign languages is because my favorite artist is foreigner. I think I want to understand them, so I can study hard.

Submitted by Noyama Juri on Mon, 13/07/2020 - 10:53

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Hello. what I need to learn a new language is listening to foreign songs and watching movies. those are very English lessons. I also think speaking with people from overseas will help improve your English ability. I think the tips for learning a new language from these are listening to foreign songs, watching movies and talking to foreigners.

Submitted by Saria Muraoka on Mon, 13/07/2020 - 08:28

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When I became a college student, I started learning a new language. At first it was very difficult and I couldn't do anything. When I checked it on the internet, I found a application. It's free and anyone can use it. In addition, it's like a game. I don't feel like studying, it's very fun. The application can study words and grammar. We can review the wrong problem. I was surprised that we could practice pronunciation. I thought I couldn't practice pronunciation by myself, so I was very happy. I'll continue to use it from now on. I want everyone to try it.

Submitted by Suellen Esteves on Fri, 10/07/2020 - 00:39

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My tip is to PRACTICE. Every day, practice a lot, practice reading, writing, speaking or listening, everything is valid.

Submitted by CAU Franzoia on Thu, 09/07/2020 - 05:29

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Hello, I am from Argentina and I would like to give you my recommendations. First of all I think this advide could be helpful for anyone who want to be fluent in english. A good advice is do anything with the language that you want to learn such as: read a book, listen to music and understand the context. My thought are concern about the process to transform our brain in order to get a good level of english/spanish or whatever language you want to learn. Also it is important to be aware about the consequence to translate every single word in your mother language. If you do that, you wIll be struggling to make progress. Sorry about my mistakes I only started learing english recently.