老布微信答疑：Suggestions to improve oral english

读者提问：

I feel sometimes it's hard to express what I’m thinking about, so could u give me some suggestions in order to improve oral english?

老布回复：

Depending on your level of English, many people have the same difficulty as you in trying to express what they are thinking. Very often this is because they think firstly in Chinese what they want to say and then attempt to do a running translation, which trips them up as they cannot translate fast enough for the thoughts that are going through their head!

Don’t worry – this is perfectly normal. It’s far better to try to express your thoughts directly into English without going through the translate-from-Chinese process first – which is far easier said than done.

I found, when trying to learn other languages, that a good way of getting to this stage is to listen to pop songs over and over so that certain phrases become embedded in your mind – and very soon you will start using these phrases without even thinking because they just pop up into your subconscious naturally. Then you start broadening this repertoire of phrases.

But remember, too, that the point of speaking is to make yourself understood. Don’t worry if your English is full of mistakes. It is more important to convey the meaning you are trying to put across rather than speaking in perfect English.

So relax and think about what you want to say rather than worry too much about getting your English perfect!

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