- Learning the pronunciations of English words

In many languages, when you read a word, you know how it sounds. Not in English. Reading an English word does not tell you how it is pronounced. For example, the words no and do both end in the letter o. However, no is pronounced like this, and do is pronounced like that. This means that, generally, you have to learn the pronunciation of every word that you're going to use.

How can you learn the pronunciation of an English word? You can look it up in a dictionary and read about how it is pronounced. Dictionaries tell you about pronunciation through a special system called phonetic transcription.

Phonetic transcriptions are written in a phonetic alphabet. The most popular phonetic alphabet is the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). Antimoon has also created the ASCII Phonetic Alphabet, which is suitable for typing on a computer.

Antimoon's software, PerfectPronunciation, helps you learn the pronunciations of the most important English words. It lets you record your voice and compare it with the correct pronunciation. Because it contains phonetic transcriptions and audio recordings, it can also teach you how to read phonetic transcriptions.

- Learning to pronounce the sounds of English

English uses different sounds than other languages. For example, the first sound in the word thin and the first sound in the word away are never heard in many languages.

Therefore, you have to:

   1. know all the English sounds

   2. listen to how they sound in real words and sentences

   3. practice your pronunciation — listen to English words and sentences, and try to repeat them as well as you can

Learning tips

          * It's not so important to spend a lot of time practicing; it's more important to do it regularly. In my experience, instead of practicing for three hours, it is better to practice for one hour and then start again the next day after a good night's sleep. You cannot rush things. Your brain needs time (and sleep) to get used to the new sounds.

          

          * Not all English sounds require hours of practice. You can improve in many areas just by being more careful. If you just focus on the way you pronounce the r sound or the z in words like is and runs, your English will sound much better.

          * When listening to native speakers (watching TV, watching a movie, listening to an audiobook, etc.), always pay attention to the sounds they pronounce. Try to imitate them.

          * You should try to pronounce English words whenever you're alone with a little time to spare, e.g. while waiting for the bus, taking a shower, or surfing the Web.

          * You will need at least some talent for imitating sounds (for instance, if you can imitate people in your own language, it should be easy for you to imitate English pronunciation as well). However, if you don't have these skills, you can achieve a lot with persistence and a little technology. One helpful technique is to record your voice and compare it with the correct pronunciation. This way, you can see where your pronunciation is different from the original and you can gradually make it more native-like.

          * Find someone who speaks your native language with a British or American accent. Try to imitate the way he/she speaks your native language. It will help you see the differences between the sounds of English and your native language. You may also be able to imitate the pronunciation and other qualities of speech more easily. (See this article and this forum topic.)

          * Check out online resources for practicing English sounds: Rachel's English (American), Merriam-Webster's Learner's Dictionary (American) and BBC Learning English (British). These sites allow you to listen to each sound pronounced clearly in many words. Rachel's English and the Merriam-Webster site also have videos which show you the proper position of the mouth and tongue. (I have never found these anatomical details helpful, but your mileage may vary.)

          * Oh, and one more thing: Don't let other people tell you that "since you are a foreigner, you will always have a foreign accent".

- Choosing between American and British pronunciation

Different kinds of English have different pronunciation. For example, the pronunciation (the accent) of British English is different from the pronunciation of American English.

The most frequently learned kinds of English in the world are American English and British English.

American pronunciation

In the context of language learning, American pronunciation means General American (GenAm) pronunciation. This is the pronunciation used by educated Americans, on television and on radio. It is described in dictionaries of American English, such as the Merriam-Webster and Random House dictionaries.

Most Americans and Canadians speak something similar to General American. Whether you're in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Seattle or Toronto, you will generally hear the same accent. There are some regional differences, but they are usually very small. The only major exception is the South of the US (especially outside of big cities), which has its own distinct accent.

General American pronunciation is rhotic, which means that the letter r is always pronounced.

British pronunciation

When people talk about learning British pronunciation, they usually think of Received Pronunciation (RP). This is the pronunciation that you will learn at a British language school; it is also the model taught in coursebooks and dictionaries from publishers like Oxford and Longman.

In the UK, only a small percentage of people speak something similar to RP. "Normal people" only speak it in the southeast of England — in the area near Oxford, Cambridge, Brighton and London (excluding working-class Londoners, who speak Cockney or Estuary). Elsewhere RP is spoken only by upper-class people, academics, actors, TV personalities, politicians and English teachers.

"Normal" Britons usually speak with their local accents, which are often quite different from RP, and can be very hard to understand to untrained ears. Sometimes cities that are only 20 km apart have very different accents. (The British Library has an interactive map of the UK which lets you listen to some examples of British accents from various areas.)

RP is non-rhotic, which means that the letter r is usually "silent", unless it is followed by a vowel. Here's how it works:

     * In words like car, tower, inform and first, r is silent (r is not followed by a vowel).

     * In words like red, foreign, print, r is pronounced (r is followed by a vowel).

     * R is also pronounced at the end of a word, if the next word starts with a vowel, for example: number eight, far away.

     * Most RP speakers also insert an r in phrases like: the idea(r) of, Africa(r) and Asia, law(r) and order. This r is not in the spelling; they just use it to separate two vowels.

The following pairs sound exactly the same in RP: or/awe, court/caught, sore/saw, farther/father, formerly/formally. In General American, they all sound different.

Which one should you choose?

To choose between American and British pronunciation, you need to answer two questions:

which one will be more useful to you?

which one will be easier to learn for you?

On the first question, you should remember that whether you choose General American or RP, you will be understood by all English speakers, because everyone familiar with both of these accents from TV and movies. So the objective usefulness of GenAm and RP is about the same. Still, if you know you're going to be talking mainly to people who have a particular accent, you may want to learn a similar accent (or you may decide that it is better to stand out).

For example, if you are planning to move to England, or if you have many English friends, you may want to learn RP. Of course, the accent of most Britons is quite different from RP, so you will probably stand out anyway. (Speakers of GenAm will have a much better chance of blending in with Americans, as there are fewer regional differences in the US.)

The second question is more tricky. Here, the most important thing are your individual circumstances, such as:

* Whether you simply prefer one of the accents (for example, because it sounds more pleasant, more sexy, more intelligent, more powerful, etc. to you). If you want to get results, you have to be excited about learning

* English pronunciation. The more attractive your goal seems to you, the more motivation you will have.

* Which accent you find easier to imitate. Sometimes people find they have a knack for one, but not the other.

* Which accent your friends are learning. It is easier to learn if you can talk things through with your friends.

* Which accent your teacher speaks. (Same reason as above.)

* Whether you are interested in science or computing. GenAm is more frequently used in those fields and if you are interested in them, you will hear it more often and will find it easier to learn.

My choice of General American pronunciation

My reasons for choosing American pronunciation were personal. I wanted to learn the same kind of English as my two best friends in high school, who were also the best English learners. I also wanted to be different from "average" students (most people in Poland try to learn RP), and I wanted to annoy my teachers, many of whom viewed RP as some kind of "gold standard". If I had been studying RP, I simply would not have had so much fun on a social level.

Even though my reasons were personal, American English turned out to be a good choice. RP may be the king of schools, coursebooks and dictionaries, but most popular, real-world content (movies, TV series, podcasts, Web videos, etc.) features American speakers. Because I was learning American English, I could practice my pronunciation while watching my favorite TV shows and playing my favorite video games. If I had chosen RP, I would have still had some fun content to learn from, but my options would have been more limited.

The importance of learning about the other accent

Whichever accent you choose, you should have some knowledge about both accents. Let's suppose you want to speak pure RP. You don't want to have an American accent at all. Should you pay attention to the American pronunciations in your dictionary?

Yes, you should. First of all, you need to understand both British and American English, since both are widely used. Even if you want to speak RP, it is good to know how words are pronounced in General American. It helps you understand American speech.

Secondly, you ought to be aware of the systematic differences between RP and GenAm because you will be learning words from Americans as well as Britons. Consider what happens if you (a student of RP) hear a new English word on an American TV channel. Let's suppose this word is nuke, pronounced /nu:k/. If you know nothing about American pronunciation, you may assume that the word is pronounced the same way in RP, and you may learn to say it like that.

However, if you had some basic knowledge of American phonetics, you would know that many words which have the sound /ju:/ in RP, have /u:/ in GenAm (for example: new, due). Because nuke is one of such words, the pronunciation /nu:k/ is not correct in RP. The correct pronunciation is /nju:k/.

If you pay attention to both British and American pronunciations in your dictionary, you will eventually develop a type of intuition about these things. For most words, you'll be able to tell how to pronounce them in your accent, even if you have only heard them from speakers of the other accent. For other words, you'll know that you just have to look them up to be sure.

- The role of mistakes in language learning

Of all the advice on Antimoon, "Do not make mistakes" is by far the most controversial. Hardly a month goes by without an e-mail or forum post from an angered English teacher, letting me know how stupid I am for telling learners to avoid mistakes. Don't I realize that mistakes are a necessary element of all learning? Haven't I heard the phrase "learn from your mistakes"? And why am I scaring learners into silence?

With this article, I hope to clear up the confusion once and for all.

Are mistakes good or bad?

Let me say something obvious first: mistakes are bad. If one had a choice between saying a sentence correctly and saying it with a mistake, nobody in their right mind would choose saying it with a mistake — and no teacher would recommend that. Similarly, no teacher would give a higher grade to a student who made more mistakes than another one.

The reason teachers sometimes say that mistakes shouldn't be avoided is that they believe one of two things (or both):

1. That mistakes are an inseparable part of the learning process; therefore, the only way to avoid language mistakes would be to avoid speaking and writing in a foreign language, and that would be bad. (the "Mistakes are inevitable" group)

2. That making mistakes, and having them corrected, is a good way to learn a language. (the "Mistakes are good" group)

Let's take a look at each of these beliefs:

1. “Mistakes are an inseparable part of the language learning process”

One of the most frequently repeated pieces of business advice is that to succeed in business, you have to try many different things, until one of them finally works. Even huge corporations often release unprofitable products despite spending enormous amounts of money on market research. That's because it is impossible to tell with 100% certainty whether customers will buy a product until it hits the shelves.

These examples teach us that in "unknown" areas like scientific research and marketing, mistakes are truly inevitable. Where no one can predict what will work, people who try and fail have a higher probability of success than those who are doing nothing for fear of failure. Think of Thomas Edison, who had to test over 6,000 unsuitable materials for light bulb filaments until he found one that worked.

Are there any other situations where mistakes are necessary? Let's take learning to swim. Swimming is not an "unknown" area. There is no mystery in it. Everybody can watch slow-motion videos of Michael Phelps and see how it should be done.

Photo by gabyuThe problem here is that there is a long way between knowing how to swim and doing it yourself. It takes hours of training to develop the right reflexes: putting your head under water at just the right moment, synchronizing your legs and your arms, breathing in and breathing out, etc. The process involves many mistakes; in fact, as a beginner, almost everything you do is wrong.

Are mistakes costly? You bet. Every swimming coach knows that mistakes can easily turn into bad habits, which are difficult to unlearn. When you fail in business, you lose money. These are the costs of mistakes. But you have to accept them, because there is no other way to succeed in business and in swimming.

What about language learning?

Now let's take a look at language learning. It's obvious that learning a language is not an "unknown" area like research or marketing. No one is asking learners to invent anything (indeed, they should not invent their own grammar and vocabulary) — they just need to do things exactly the way the native speakers do it.

Language learning is not like learning to swim, either. In swimming, you can remember very well how your coach moves his arms, but still be unable to re-create that motion. Knowing the right way is not enough. You need to train your muscles to react in a certain way, which is a long, error-prone process. First you make a lot of mistakes, then fewer and fewer, until you are error-free.

Copying and transforming sentences is an easy job for the brain. By contrast, in languages, knowing the right way is enough. If you can remember and understand a sentence in a foreign language, you can repeat it without any mistakes. If you remember two correct sentences, you can transform and combine them into another correct sentence. There is little room for mistakes.

Now of course things are a bit more complicated than that:

- If you are just beginning to write or speak in a foreign language, it will perhaps take you 30 seconds to produce each sentence (you will make a lot of edits or, if you're speaking, you will stutter and start over). That's because it can take a long time to recall things, especially if they are not in your "active memory". But even if you're slow, your sentence can be error-free or almost error-free if you are careful.

- As noted before, the key to producing correct sentences is remembering correct examples. To build your own sentences in a foreign language, you need thousands of words, hundreds of grammatical structures and dozens of idioms. Furthermore, you must know which words are used in what contexts. For example, end can mean stop (e.g. We must end the project), but you cannot say I have decided to end seeing her (you must say: I have decided to stop seeing her).

There are thousands of "exceptions" like that in any language. So, although there is only a short way between theory and practice, the theory is huge. However — and this is crucial — the theory can be acquired without producing mistakes (by reading and listening).

- Although following correct examples is not hard, there can be some problems. One is that certain information is difficult to notice. For example, if you don't read English texts carefully, you may ignore the use of articles (a/the), as they are not necessary to understand the meaning. As a result, information on article usage will be missing from your memory and your correctness will suffer.

A smaller problem is related to "unexpected exceptions". Some usage patterns are so rare that it is very difficult to learn them, even with massive input. For instance, "I'd like to see The Simpsons" is correct if you mean the movie, but wrong if you mean the TV show (in that case, you're supposed to say "I'd like to watch The Simpsons"). Differences like that are really hard to learn, even if you read a lot.

- There is one area of language learning where "knowing the right way" does not immediately translate into "doing it the right way": pronunciation. You can spend hours listening to a native speaker saying a word, and still be unable to repeat it properly. In fact, learning to pronounce the sounds of a new language is very much like learning to swim — your brain and your muscles have to get used to new movements. The process takes time and involves many mistakes.

What have we learned so far? First of all, that not all learning is trial-and-error learning. In particular, language learning is possible with few mistakes because:

1. It does not require innovation or creativity. All you need to do is copy other people (native speakers).

2. The gap between "knowing how it should be done" and "doing the right thing" is small. Once you have enough correct examples in your memory, it is relatively easy to transform and combine them into your own sentences.

3. You need a lot of correct examples to speak a foreign language, but they can be acquired without mistakes.

2. “Making mistakes is a good way to learn a language”

We have seen that language learning can happen with few mistakes. But why should it? Isn't speaking and writing with mistakes an effective way to learn a foreign language? After all, "practice makes perfect", doesn't it?

Those who believe mistakes are a good way to learn probably picture the following model:

The learner says a sentence, makes some mistakes, the teacher corrects them, and the learner memorizes the proper way to say the sentence. Next time around, the learner will hopefully make fewer mistakes. The process is repeated until the learner is error-free.

Now, why doesn't this model work so well?

It's too slow

Language learning is a very memory-intensive task. There is a staggering number of words, phrases, structures, and subtle differences in usage to memorize. Some verbs take the infinitive (e.g. cease to do something), some take the gerund (e.g. stop doing something). We get in the car, but on the bus. My copy of Michael Swan's Practical English Usage has 654 pages of examples like these and it does not cover everything I know about English. (In contrast, all the information you need to swim perfectly can probably be written on a few pages; the rest is a matter of practice.)

It stands to reason that an efficient language learning method must somehow supply all this information to the learner. In other words, the learner needs a huge number of correct examples of the target language. In the feedback-based method, he gets correct examples when the teacher corrects him (and tells him how to say something) and when he listens to his own speech (and his sentences are correct).

The problem is that the flow of information is too slow. When you speak in a language you don't know well, you speak slowly, with many pauses. Before you open your mouth, you have to think what to say. Often, in the middle of the sentence, you start over when you realize you've made a mistake. There are also delays due to teacher-student interaction. All this means that the amount of correct language that reaches the learner's ears is quite small.

I did an informal experiment to measure this. First, I read a simplified German book for 15 minutes, using the "pause and think" method (paying attention to grammar and usage). I managed to read 55 sentences (476 words) before the time ran out. Then, I recorded myself talking about the story for 15 minutes. I constructed 21 German sentences (196 words).

In terms of the amount of input you get, 4 language classes per week (45 minutes each) would be equivalent to reading a book for 74 minutes. That's about 10 minutes a day, 7 days a week. A whole school year (9 months) of classes (4 classes per week) provides about the same amount of input as a single 250-page book (84,000 words). Of course, these rough estimates assume classes where students speak all the time — in real classes, a great deal of time is simply wasted; a little time is also spent on pure input (reading a short article in the coursebook, listening to a short recording).

It requires a competent teacher

As the method is based on errors and feedback, it requires a competent feedback-giver. It is not clear where the learner is supposed to find such a person outside of the classroom. If he tries to interact with native speakers in real life or on the Internet, he will find that native speakers generally won't correct his mistakes, as long as they can understand him. So grammar like this (example by Johnny) is likely to go unchallenged outside of the classroom:

that not truthful really, i now am answer and express my thinking, and you understand myself on this replying, i am no doubt about it, but if you don't correct my false words in this post then i keep practice false english and means i am learn this crap english.

The learner can of course "stick to the classroom", but making any real progress will require more than 8 classes a week. Such intensive courses are quite expensive and impractical for someone who has to go to work, school or college. It seems that a method based on "free" reading and listening will be both cheaper and more flexible.

Finally, there is also the problem of finding good teachers. While I have so far assumed that teacher feedback is perfect, the reality is that teachers will ignore many mistakes due to insufficient attention, knowledge or time. Non-native teachers will sometimes object to correct sentences, or their "corrections" may be wrong themselves. My experience in the Polish educational system shows that very few non-native teachers are a reliable source of correct input (not to mention pronunciation, which is a typical Achilles' heel).

It can reinforce mistakes

Every time you say an incorrect sentence, your brain gets used to it, and it becomes more likely that you will make the same mistake again. We are all familiar with the "fossilized" English learner who always says things like He make, She work, and no amount of corrections seems to help. This is what happens when you've been listening to your own version of English grammar for a long time.

Therefore, the output-based learning method actually contains two feedback loops:

1. When the teacher corrects you and you try to remember that a given phrase is wrong (this correction will not always occur).

2. Whenever you say an incorrect sentence.

The second effect (reinforcement) is probably weaker than the first one (correction), but it further slows down learning methods that are based on speaking. If a learner spends most of his time listening to bad grammar (produced by himself and other students), and he gets little other input, one cannot expect good results.

Final word

Language learning does not have to be based on speaking, mistakes, and repeated correction. Indeed, if your goal is good English — that is, if you want to be able to speak and write in English with few mistakes and understand English-language television — the feedback-based method is the wrong way to do it. It builds your knowledge very slowly and depends on a good instructor. As a result, only intensive, long-term courses with competent teachers can give satisfactory results, but these are very expensive and very impractical.

The alternative — input-based learning (more specifically, the Antimoon Method) — does not rely on mistakes and corrections. It gives you more information in less time and enables you to build your English whenever you want to, for as long as you want. On the other hand, it requires that you enjoy reading books in English or watching English-language programs, and that you apply the principles of careful reading and writing.

- How to avoid making mistakes in English

Learners make mistakes and reinforce them because they produce sentences 1) too carelessly or 2) too early. You will avoid mistakes if you follow a couple of rules:

Rules of error-free speaking and writing

1. Use simple language. Some beginners try to build very complicated sentences with things like the present perfect tense or conditionals. They make horrible mistakes. Don't do this! If you've just started to speak or write in English, you should say what you can say (simple sentences that you have seen many times) — not what you want to say (complicated sentences). You may feel you're talking like a child or that you are not expressing your thoughts, but don't worry about it. Right now, your task is not to express your thoughts freely; your task is to learn the language.

2. Be slow and careful. In the beginning, you should write very slowly. If you need 2 hours to write an e-mail message with 10 correct sentences, that's okay. That's how long it should take if you're just starting to write.

Why should it take so long? Because you should read your sentences many times, looking for mistakes. You should correct your own sentences frequently. You should check if your sentences are correct by using a dictionary and the Web. And you should look for example sentences to imitate.

When you're speaking, it's okay to build a sentence for some time in your head before you open your mouth.

3. If you're not sure how to say something, don't say it. If you can't say something correctly, it's almost always better not to say it. You don't want to teach yourself the wrong way to say it. You can try to look for the correct sentence in a dictionary or on the Web (see next point), but when speaking, usually you don't have time for that. So it's a good idea to say something else — something that you know is correct. It can even be something on a different subject.

4. When writing, always look things up. Whenever you're not sure how to use a word, look it up in a good dictionary to find example sentences with it. When you've written something, and you are not sure if it's correct, search for it on the Web with Google. If many pages contain your phrase, then it is probably correct. Dictionaries and Google should be your everyday tools, and you should use them even many times in one sentence (especially if you've just begun writing in English). See this forum topic for more information on using Google when writing.

5. Know where you can screw up. Sometimes learners don't even realize how different English is from their native language. When speaking, they translate word for word from their native language, and they think their sentences are okay.

When reading or listening in English, pay close attention to things like word order, articles, prepositions, and tenses. Compare sentences in English with equivalent sentences in your native language. Notice the differences in words and in word order. This will make you more careful when speaking in the foreign language, because you will realize which parts of your sentences can be wrong and should be double-checked.

"Will I ever be fluent if I speak so slowly and carefully?"

Don't worry about fluency. Fluency is easy to achieve by simply talking. If you practice speaking, you will be able to speak faster and faster. In high school, Tom achieved pretty good fluency in a month by talking to his English teacher (a native speaker) about two hours a week. That's only 8 hours of talking.

In our opinion, it is much better to be slow and correct than be fluent and make a lot of mistakes. Why? Because if you are slow and correct, you can easily improve your speed and become fluent and correct. But if you are fluent and make a lot of mistakes, it is not so easy to remove your mistakes and become fluent and correct.

Tom's experience with error-free writing

I recently started learning German. I wanted to start writing e-mails in German as soon as possible, but I didn't want to make mistakes and teach myself bad habits. I wrote my first e-mails in German after reading just one short (40-page) book for learners written in simple German, a few e-mail messages from a German friend, and after using my very small SuperMemo collection for a few months. And my e-mails in German had almost no mistakes.

How was that possible — writing correct sentences after getting so little input? First, my e-mails contained very simple sentences. But the most important thing was my research: I looked for example sentences on the Web and in dictionaries.

For example, I knew that the German word for use was benutzen, but I didn't know how to use it in a sentence like "Which program do you use to copy CDs?". Often, I had an idea how something might be done in German, but I wasn't sure if my idea was correct. In such situations, I looked for the answer on the Web or in my dictionaries.

I spent a lot of time on each sentence. It took me more than an hour to write my first message, which contained only a few German sentences.

The writing process was long and it took much effort, but it was fun. The experience was very motivating and it made me even more interested in German. Perhaps one of the reasons why it was so enjoyable was that I knew I was building correct sentences.

Don't speak or write too early

If you follow the above rules and still make a lot of mistakes when speaking (= more than 1 mistake every 3 sentences), you should probably switch to writing for a while. Consider the following guidelines:

1. First write, then speak. Writing is easier than speaking because: 1) you don't need to have good pronunciation (but you need good spelling), 2) you can write very slowly and nobody will mind, 3) you can use dictionaries, the Web, etc. So, it's a good idea to practice writing first until you can build correct sentences quickly enough for speaking.

2. Don't speak until you've learned to pronounce English sounds. You need to be able to pronounce all the English vowels and consonants in a clear way before you speak. If you don't, you will get used to bad pronunciation.

3. Don't say a word if you don't know how to pronounce it. In other words, you need to know the pronunciation of all the words that you use. If you don't, you will be making pronunciation mistakes and teaching yourself bad habits.

If you make more than 1 mistake every 3 sentences when writing in the slow and careful way described above, you should probably stop writing for some time and concentrate on reading and listening.

Remember that you should first get lots of English sentences into your head, then build your own sentences. Your main activity should be reading and listening to English — and the reason is that you need good examples to follow before you can build your own sentences. The more sentences your brain absorbs, the more you can express in English. If you don't see/hear enough correct, natural English sentences, you will not know how to say things in English. So you will be inventing your own language. And you will be making mistakes.

What happens in English classes

The recommended order in the Antimoon learning method is: Pronunciation - Input (reading and listening) - Writing - Speaking. Unfortunately, something completely different happens in English classes. Almost no courses teach you pronunciation at the beginning. Few teachers give you enough "input". Instead, they force you to speak and write — asking you questions, telling you to do grammar exercises or writing assignments. In a way, they force you to make mistakes and create bad habits.

-You can damage your English by writing and speaking

How practice can damage your English

If you ask "How can I learn to speak English better?", many people will tell you "Practice, practice, practice". "Speak and write in English whenever you can" — they will say. All English classes are full of activities which involve speaking and writing. You produce sentences when you do an exercise in your textbook, when your teacher makes you speak in class, or when you have to write a composition. All these activities are supposed to help you with your English.

We agree that practice can be very useful. It's even necessary to learn English well. So what's the problem? The problem is that for many learners, "speaking" or "writing" means "making a lot of mistakes". Some people make a mistake in every sentence!

If you don't make many mistakes, then you can speak or write in English and it can only help. But if you do, then every time you write or speak, you reinforce your mistakes. As you write or speak, you repeat your mistakes constantly and your incorrect habits become stronger.

Imagine this situation: You are writing an e-mail message in English. Your English is not perfect and you want to write the message quickly. You write (incorrectly): I want speak English.

When you write a sentence, you also read it. So the incorrect sentence goes into your head. The next time you write a message, you will be more likely to write I want finish or I want be happy. Why? Because I want speak English is fresh in your head — you've just used it! And when you write I want a few more times, you get a "bad habit".

Reinforced mistakes become your way of writing in English. So the more you write, the worse your English becomes. Some learners' bad habits are so strong that no amount of correction seems to help.

Wait a minute—doesn't practice make perfect?

You have to realize that speaking or writing does not improve your grammar or your vocabulary. It's really very simple. Can you learn a new word from yourself? If you don't know how to say "Good bye" in English, can you invent it by yourself? No, you can't. You can only learn it by reading or listening to English.

If you make mistakes in your English sentences, that means you don't know how to say things in English. You need to learn how to say them. You won't learn that by speaking or writing. You must read and listen to correct English sentences. There is no way around that. You can speak and write later — when you can already build correct English sentences and want to improve your fluency.

What about “learning from mistakes”?

The only way you can learn something while speaking or writing in English is when somebody corrects your mistakes. If you say an incorrect sentence, and if your teacher points out the mistake and tells you the proper way to express your meaning, then your knowledge of English increases.

You may therefore think that speaking with mistakes is not so bad because it is a chance to fix your errors and learn something new. Unfortunately, this method of learning requires a competent person who will correct your mistakes.

English teachers:

           The first problem is that your English teacher is usually available only for a few hours a week. During those few hours, he/she can correct a limited number of sentences — probably less than 100. But if you are serious about making progress in English, you will need to get knowledge much faster than that. So it is obvious that your learning process cannot be based on speaking in the classroom. (There are intensive, long-term courses which give better results, but they are expensive and impractical for people who have to work or go to school.)

           The second problem is that teachers will not correct all your mistakes. They do not notice everything, and they do not have the time to correct every error. In addition, many teachers (especially non-native speakers) are simply incompetent. Sometimes they will even criticize correct sentences or suggest bad alternatives.

Native speakers (not teachers): This category includes your American friends, Australian penpals, native speakers on Internet forums, or just regular people around you, if you are in an English-speaking country. In general, native speakers will not correct your mistakes! As long as they can understand what you mean, they will completely ignore all your mistakes in grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation. For example, the message below is perfectly understandable and could easily pass uncorrected:

I am want make question for knowing how to able speak English proper way. I need of a internet learn book for American word of slang. I will thank your help for life.

Why is that?

           First, many native speakers consider it impolite to point out the mistakes of people who speak English as a foreign language. Telling someone that they made a mistake creates an awkward social situation, and most natives will avoid that.

           Second, people are lazy. Correcting mistakes and suggesting alternatives is hard work, especially if a learner makes a lot of mistakes. It's much easier to ignore them and keep the conversation going. Sometimes native speakers will correct you if you ask them nicely (e.g. on the Antimoon Forum), but that is an exception, not the rule.

"Learning from your mistakes" sounds good, but it is not easy, because making mistakes is not enough — you still need someone to give you feedback. And it is difficult to find a competent person to help you. Besides, even if you had a teacher available for 24 hours a day, speaking with mistakes might not be very effective, since every error you make (corrected or not) teaches you bad English.

Solution: Stop making mistakes!

We have said that when you practice, you reinforce your mistakes, and that you cannot rely on feedback from other people. We have also said that you need practice to learn English.

There is a simple solution to this paradox: Never make mistakes! Before you conclude that we have completely lost it, please read what one of us (Michal Ryszard Wojcik) has written about his experiences:

     It is close to the truth that I have never written an incorrect English sentence.

     I knew many grammatical structures and I used only those that I knew. My sentences were similar to sentences which I knew to be correct. I followed good examples, so all my sentences were good.

     In the beginning, I could write only very simple sentences, but all the simple sentences were correct. Then as I advanced, I added more and more complicated structures, and again all my sentences were correct.

     Because of this approach, I was never reinforcing bad habits. I never had any bad habits! From the beginning, I copied only correct sentences. With every sentence that I wrote, I reinforced my good habits.

You can speak and write with almost no mistakes, too.

FAQ

“But if I'm afraid to make a mistake, I will never open my mouth!”

First, try to be more careful by using the rules of error-free speaking. If you still make a lot of mistakes (= more than 1 mistake every 3 sentences), or if you find that the rules are killing your motivation, you probably shouldn't open your mouth just now. Instead, try to get more input by reading and listening in English.

The sooner you realize you cannot "speak your way" to good English, the sooner you will make some real progress.

“But you cannot learn anything without mistakes!”

Of course nobody is perfect and some mistakes will occur. But believe us — you can learn English with almost no mistakes. How? You can fill your brain with correct sentences and imitate them. You can simply follow good examples.

If you write or say sentences that are similar to correct English sentences (from a book, a dictionary, or heard from a native speaker), then it is very hard to make a mistake!

People sometimes say that the process of learning a language has to involve many mistakes, because they think learning a language is like learning to swim, drive a car, or run a business. But it is very different because imitating correct sentences is easy if you have them in your head (much easier than imitating swimming strokes). The only hard-to-imitate element in languages is pronunciation. (A more detailed analysis can be found in this article.)

“Can I ever make a mistake on purpose?”

Yes. Sometimes you can say or write something which you think is wrong. You can do it if you want to learn how to say something in English. For example, if you are talking to a native speaker, you can do this:

     1. Say "I'm not sure how to say this in English, but ..." and then say your sentence (which is probably wrong).

     2. The other person can tell you how to say it in English correctly.

     3. Learn the correct way to say the sentence.

Notice that this technique is only safe if:

      . you are sure that the other person will correct you if you make a mistake

      . you use it only occasionally

Mistakes and pronunciation

We've explained how speaking and writing with mistakes can damage your grammar and vocabulary. But the same can happen to your pronunciation.

Suppose you are talking to someone in English. You don't know how to pronounce a word, so you say it in your own way. Then, you become used to this incorrect pronunciation. You pronounce the word incorrectly again and again. You've gotten yourself a bad pronunciation habit.

In our opinion, pronunciation should be the first thing that you learn about English. If you do anything else, it will usually involve speaking. (Notice that even if you're reading a book, you're often pronouncing the sentences aloud or in your head.) That means you will be speaking with bad pronunciation and you will be teaching yourself bad habits.

So if you really want to avoid mistakes, you must study English pronunciation before you do anything else, and especially before you start speaking. When you first open your mouth, you should know how to pronounce everything (more or less) that you are saying.

Unlike learning grammar or vocabulary, the process of learning English pronunciation involves many mistakes. Your brain and your muscles must get used to new sounds. This requires practice and usually involves many errors. But it is best to take care of pronunciation first, before you develop any serious bad habits.

-Improving your motivation for learning English

In this article, we share our techniques for improving your motivation for learning English as a foreign language. We used them all the time when we were learning English and we still use them when we need to boost our motivation in areas other than English.

Imagine yourself in the future

Imagine you can talk to native speakers just like you talk in your first language. Imagine other people wanting to speak English as well as you do. Imagine the possibility of writing e-mail to people from all over the world.

It is helpful to read an article about the advantages of knowing English well. There are two such articles on Antimoon: Why learn English and English makes you feel good.

You should know that it is possible to learn English really well. Just look at other people who have done it.

Remember that you are already good

You already know some English (you're reading an article in English right now). That's a big success! Now it's time for more successes. Time to start using powerful methods of effective learning. Time to gain an impressive knowledge of English.

Remember there is a lot that you don't know

You are good, but your English probably isn't perfect. You probably can't understand English-language TV, read books in English, talk to native speakers easily, write letters without mistakes, etc.

You should never think your English is perfect. Even if you are the best student in your class, always try to find your weak areas and work on them. When you've learned to speak English well, your problems will be quite small: punctuation, rarely used grammar structures, rare words, understanding "street language". Right now, your problems are probably more basic: mistakes in pronunciation, small vocabulary, grammar problems with the present perfect tense and conditional structures.

Use your English whenever you can

This is very, very important. The more you use English, the more you will want to learn it.

Because English is so popular, you can use it everywhere. You can use Google to find English-language websites with interesting information, you can watch American cartoons, you can play adventure games on your computer, you can read interesting books in English, or you can do other things that we write about.

If you do these things, you will not only have fun and learn English. If you see that a new English word lets you understand your favorite TV show (or communicate with people, or beat a computer game), you will want to learn more words. So you will learn English more, use it more, learn it more, use it more... If you also use effective learning methods, your English will grow faster than you can imagine.

Talk to people about English

This is a very simple method, but it is very effective. Here's how it works:

You usually talk about things which interest you. But the opposite is true, too. If you start talking about a boring subject, you will begin to get interested in it.

Imagine you are studying a subject that you hate. You are bored and tired, but you have to pass the test tomorrow. If there are people near you, you have two options: you can tell everybody how much you are suffering or you can tell those people about the things you've learned. If you choose the first option, you will only feel worse.

If you choose the second option, and start a conversation on the "boring" subject, you will begin to look at it in a totally different way. Suddenly it will become a subject worth talking about — therefore, an interesting subject.

How can you begin such a conversation? If you're studying English, you can surprise another person by talking to him/her in English. Say (in English): Hi, I'm studying English and I hate it. Or you can say (in your first language): Hey, I've learned 50 English words today. Do you know what's the English word for ...? If there are no people near you, you can telephone or send an e-mail message to your friend.

What will your friends say? Probably they won't be very interested, but it doesn't matter! The important thing is this: After talking about English, you will study it with much more passion. Try it.

Find a friend who is learning English

If you can find a friend who is learning English and is on a similar level of skill, you will be in an excellent situation:

  1. you will have someone to talk about English with. These conversations will increase your interest in English, as explained in the previous section.

   2. learning English will be easier, because you will be able to discuss your problems with your friend.

   3. you will study English more, because you will want to be better than your friend. :-)

You should meet your friend regularly. Ideally, he/she should live near you, or go to the same school as you. If you absolutely can't find anybody willing to learn English with you, you can try to find somebody by e-mail. This is a worse solution: your conversations will probably be less frequent, and it is difficult to compete with someone who you don't know well.

Spend some money on learning English

If you spend your money on something, you will want to use it. For example, if you buy an expensive tennis racket, you will probably go out and play tennis every day.

This rule is also true for learning English. If you want to increase your desire to learn English, buy a new dictionary, an interesting English-language book, English-language cable TV, etc. The idea is simple: You paid for it, so you will want to use it, and you will improve your English.

There is a problem with this method. It only works for a short time. You usually lose your desire to learn English after a few days. To keep learning, you would have to buy something every week!

However, this method is helpful, because it gives you an impulse to start learning. For example, if you buy a dictionary of phrasal verbs, you will probably learn some words from it. Then you should try to use them. For example, write an e-mail message with these words. This will increase your motivation (as explained before), and you will learn more.

Read Unlimited Power by Anthony Robbins

Anthony Robbins' book Unlimited Power: The New Science of Personal Achievement gives excellent advice on how to achieve any kind of goal. This book has changed the lives of many people, so you might want to take a look at it.

Remember that learning English requires action

We have said this many times. One small action is more powerful than reading hundreds of articles. Yes, we know it is very hard to do things, even if they are good for us. We humans are lazy creatures. That is why not many people speak English well.

Still, we hope you can do the things we talk about in our English learning method — not only read about them. You will be successful only if you change something about your life.