节目资讯
刊物:空中英语教室
日期:2013-06-18
难易度:Medium
关键字:coworker, syllable, sound out, fluency
Well, we found out so far today about how Jo learned a word in Korean.
The first word that she learned was bibimbap.
And of course, this is a kind of food, delicious Korean food that she had there.
How did she learn this?
Well, her Irish coworker taught her how to put words together... or put letters
together to form blocks, or syllables.
And then you put the syllables together to form a word.
Well, we're going to continue learning about how Jo is learning Korean in Korea.
Here we go.
(Music).
How I Learned to Read and Write Korean.
From then on I learned written Korean quickly.
Every day held dozens of opportunities to practice.
I sounded out words I read on subway ads.
I sounded out items on menus.
I even sounded out movie titles that appeared on TV.
It became a fun game!
My students loved it when I wrote Korean and helped me learn even more.
Learning to read and write Korean didn't equal fluency.
Most of what I read I didn't understand.
But mastering this small skill was a big step in adjusting to my new life in
Korea.
(Music).
Being able to read does really help when you're trying to adjust to a new
culture or a new life.
Well, right here at the beginning of this paragraph we see:
From then on I learned written Korean quickly.
So after her Irish coworker explained how to make words and she learned the
entire alphabet,
she was able to learn Korean... or at least written Korean very quickly.
That's right.
So she found out that it's a little bit similar to the English alphabet.
Therefore you could use these words, these letters in a similar way.
It can be easier to learn.
Every day held dozens of opportunities to practice.
Well, that's great.
If you go to another country and you're trying to learn the language, then you
want to have chances to practice that language.
At least I hope you do want to practice and improve in that language.
That's right.
And it sounds like she took every opportunity to practice.
She says: I sounded out words I read on subway ads.
So she's just going around traveling, doing her daily routine.
And she sees a subway ad with some words on it, and she sounded out those words.
And we want to talk about that phrase: to sound out some words, or to sound
something out.
What does that mean, Gabe?
Well, you're reading something, but you're not just silently reading it.
You're also using your voice to sound it out.
For instance, earlier in today's lesson, I mentioned a 12-syllable word:
antidisestablishmentarianism.
Now you don't know what that word means.
But if you looked at it on a piece of paper, you could sound it out.
So even though you could sound something out, it doesn't necessarily mean that
you understand what it means, right, Carolyn?
That is right.
And she was sounding out words that she read on subway ads.
So this was one way that she practiced reading Korean.
Well, I think right now it is time for us to learn something else with Ken and
Steve in the Information Cloud.
If you live in a large city, chances are your city has a mass rapid transit
system.
In Taipei, we call it the MRT for short.
But depending on the city, such a system may go by different names.
In today's lesson, we see the word subway.
That's a very common name for a rapid transit system.
The New York City Subway is one of the most famous subways in the world.
But the word "subway" literally means a path that's underground.
In fact, in British usage, subway refers to an underground crossing for
pedestrians.
So if you're referring to a rapid transit system that is built above ground,
then it wouldn't really qualify as a subway.
And that's probably why in Chicago, it's called the L, which is short for
elevated.
A big part of the L system is above ground, elevated over the roads.
Another common name is metro.
The rapid transit systems in Washington D.C., Paris and Moscow are all referred
to as the Metro.
And finally, there's the London Underground.
But most locals call it the Tube.
(Chinese).
All right.
Well, let's continue with Jo's story.
She says, "I sounded out items on menus." She's talking about sounding out words
everywhere she goes.
I even sounded out movie titles that appeared on TV.
So she's sounding out everything.
It sounds like wherever she goes, she is trying to have fun with the Korean
language.
That's right.
And she is taking every opportunity to practice.
Now that she knows the alphabet, she knows the sounds that each one makes,
and she knows how to put the sounds together to make blocks and then words,
she's able to read out loud.
And we see: My students loved it when I wrote Korean and helped me learn even
more.
So her students were even excited that she wanted to learn Korean, and they
helped her to learn.
That's right.
They helped her to learn even more, to grow even more, to enjoy it even more.
And I think that's kind of fun.
If you're a teacher, of course you're teaching your students something that you
know.
But it's really fun as a teacher to be able to learn from my students as well.
That's right.
And we said that she was sounding out movie titles that appeared on TV.
And it became a fun game!
This was a game for her, not just learning but playing while she learned.
And her students enjoyed it, too.
That's right.
Now we continue with Jo's lesson:
Learning to read and write Korean didn't equal fluency.
So it's not the same as being fluent.
Let's take a look at that Word Bank word: fluency.
If you have fluency in a certain language or in a certain subject, that means
you know it really, really well.
You can communicate pretty well with it.
And you know what other people are talking about when they use that language.
That's right.
So fluency is important.
When you are learning another language, you want to be able to communicate
easily and be understood as well as understand the other person.
So fluency is very important when learning another language.
But we see that it didn't equal fluency.
So being able to read is not the same as fluency.
That's right.
She wasn't fluent.
So you could see this word can also be an adjective - fluent, F-L-U-E-N-T.
Are you fluent in English?
Are you fluent in Chinese or in another language?
Well, we have more to learn right now with Liz in the Grammar Gym.
Hello, friends.
Welcome to the Grammar Gym.
My name is Liz.
We find this sentence in today's article:
Learning to read and write Korean didn't equal fluency.
That's our Grammar Tip sentence.
And today we're looking at the word "equal." Normally we use "equal" to talk
about math problems like:
One plus two equals three.
But in today's sentence, the writer is not talking about math.
Instead, she uses "equal" to mean to be as good as.
So today's sentence just means: Just because the writer learned to read and
write Korean didn't mean she was as good as being fluent.
We use "equal" like this when we want to talk about how something naturally
means or leads to something else.
For example: Having a higher job position equals greater responsibility.
Or: Poor time management at work equals less productivity.
And when we want to talk about how something does not lead to something else,
then we use "not equal." For example:
Having the latest technological gadget does not equal being cool.
Or: Being rich does not equal being happy.
If you have a copy of this month's magazine with you, do please check out
today's Grammar Tip section for more example sentences.
That's it for today.
This is Liz from the Grammar Gym.
See you next time.
Going back to how reading and writing is not the same as fluency, they do not
equal each other, Jo says that most of what I read I didn't understand.
So she could read it, but she didn't know what it meant.
But mastering this small skill was a big step in adjusting to my new life in
Korea.
Well, I would agree with her.
I don't necessarily understand everything that I read.
Even in English, there are some words that I have never seen before or I've
never used before.
I can try to sound them out, and then hopefully I will learn how to understand
and use these words.
Well, right now it's time for us to learn something new with Michelle in the
Language Lab.
(Chinese).
And now I'll give the time back to our teachers.
The past two days we've been learning from Jo and her experiences of being able
to read and write in Korean while she was studying in... while she was working
in South Korea.
And it sounds like a very difficult thing to do.
And we also learned that being able to read and write are not the same as being
fluent or having fluency.
And I just wonder, Gabe, how important do you think it is to be able to
understand or is it OK if you can just read it?
Um, actually if you can just read it, that helps with recognizing words, or in
my case, Chinese characters.
But of course, my goal is to be able to use those words and not just... not just
sound them out but also to be able to use them correctly in a sentence.
That's right.
And that takes a lot of time and a lot of practice, which I hope you are getting
plenty of with us here on Studio Classroom.
I also hope that you will join us again next time on our next episode of Studio
Classroom.
See you then.