How to Master Successfully Any Language of the World 23
You better start to learn reading and writing only AFTER you’ve mastered proper
pronunciation. The letters will then not confuse you. Letters reflect pronunciation
approximately, they rather imply it. Moreover, pronunciation of a word may be affected
by other words around, or by the whole meaning of the sentence. The same word may be
uttered SLIGHTLY OR SIGNIFICANTLY different in various cases. Letters rarely
represent sounds to THAT extent.
Reading may be done aloud as well as silently. When you are drilling READING, you
are not drilling PRONUNCIATION. You have drilled oral communication before, now
it’s just about reading. Read a text again and again until you recognize and understand
immediately each one of the encountered words.
Writing may be drilled as follows: look into the textbook you have used to drill reading,
memorize a simple sentence, put the book aside and write the sentence in your copy-book
or type it (with all your fingers!) on a PC. You better drill typing up to the point when
you are typing without hesitation, stumbling or any other difficulty. You may drill all the
sentences you come across in your textbook, but you might first drill those you need to
fulfill the requirements described in “The Main Targets for This Level”.
Non-Verbal Communication and Culture – Let’s Play
It is a good time to learn gestures and mimics accepted in the target society. Properly
using gestures makes life much easier, even without knowing a language and helps to
evade confusing situations. It would be a good relaxation pause during the lesson, too.
Actually, all important non-verbal communication should be learnt at this level.
At this level, your teacher or your course book should introduce, in your native language,
the cultural similarities and differences between your native and target cultures, on the
issues related to day-to-day life activities.
Most common filler words and exclamations should be introduced, too. Play them. Act
them. Live them through. Feel their emotions and give them back.
Word games for toddlers may be an excellent (but insufficient) tool for easier language
learning.
Intermediate level
CEFR B1-B2
This is the level, where you may (although, not advised to) start learning without a
teacher or a textbook. The guidelines provided below will make your learning easier.
Copyright © 2012 Dmitry Slomov. All rights reserved.
Dmitry Slomov is a language learning consultant, a tutor and the author of the Russian Language Course – Lessons with Dmitry
Contact Dmitry at: http://www.courseofrussian.com/en/contact.html
