pizza
Member
- Joined
- Aug 30, 2011
- Member Type
- Interested in Language
- Native Language
- Latin
- Home Country
- Japan
- Current Location
- Japan
I have been seriously trying to improve my English for the last 6 months or so after realizing that my English isn't 'native perfect' as I mistakenly had assumed for the past ~5 years perhaps. (Please assume I had good reason to believe so and to certain extent I wasn't all together wrong.)
Reading and spoken English are my priorities at the moment. My reading level is good, most likely higher than your average college undergraduate, I can read Shakespeare (I couldn't before) and understand his sometimes arcane use of the language as well as other literary sources, like the Bible. However, even the most uneducated English-natives have 'something' that I still can't seem to grasp, idioms? phrasal verbs? slang?. Sure, they are more used to the language than I am since they've been using it for a longer time but arguably, if I put the time and work hard I should be able to equate with such uneducated natives at the spoken level.
One of the things I have been doing is reading children's books but I haven't read so many as to assert that was the solution. Sure, there is not an ultimate solution, but clearly there should be things I can do that are more useful than others.
What are your suggestions and ideas? Any comments will be appreciated.
Reading and spoken English are my priorities at the moment. My reading level is good, most likely higher than your average college undergraduate, I can read Shakespeare (I couldn't before) and understand his sometimes arcane use of the language as well as other literary sources, like the Bible. However, even the most uneducated English-natives have 'something' that I still can't seem to grasp, idioms? phrasal verbs? slang?. Sure, they are more used to the language than I am since they've been using it for a longer time but arguably, if I put the time and work hard I should be able to equate with such uneducated natives at the spoken level.
One of the things I have been doing is reading children's books but I haven't read so many as to assert that was the solution. Sure, there is not an ultimate solution, but clearly there should be things I can do that are more useful than others.
What are your suggestions and ideas? Any comments will be appreciated.
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