speaking fluidly

[L-F-J]

so we are all familar with steve kaufmann on the other thread by now. this is an off topic question. so i'm making a new thread.

i just listened to the audio of steve talking about his language system on a chinese radio show, all in mandarin. i understand it all but there are some words here and there that i need to look up. but what gets me is that i understand what they say, i know the words and how they are used, but i cant spit it out as fluidly.

i've been studying for some years now and i often practice speaking the language aloud to myself. but for some reason the words are slow to get lined up and roll off my tongue. its like i'm still arranging the words while trying to speak them. (though i know the order and all)

so what is it that helps speaking fluidly, getting it arranged? listening? speaking? when i listen its very fluid and easy. when i practice speaking, no matter how long, its just slow and jumbled. its hard to straighten out the sentence though i know the correct way it should be.

steve has talked about just listening and reading A LOT for 6 months and then he's ready to speak to people on the radio. he seems really good at letting the ideas flow from his mouth. what is that develops this?

i've repeated sentences over and over and that helps me be able to speak it fluidly, but it also makes me somewhat mechanical. like i'm just following the sound and not thinking about the meaning anymore.

and thus, i cannot think of the ideas and speak them out fluidly in conversation without arranging it in my mind first. (though i already know the arrangement)

whats wrong with me?

[wrbt]

I'm only an intermediate learner but have found things I've heard a lot, even if I haven't spoken them much before, come out much more quickly and naturally.

My biggest problem with words I use infrequently is a tendency to go dyslexic... I'll know what characters make up the word but since it doesn't sound off in my head from enough hearing/use something like "contract" will come out as 同合 instead of 合同, sometimes switching back and forth in the same conversation.

I listen a lot these days though, using audio from at least seven different text books when walking my dog, when driving to work, hell when suffering from the occasional bout of insomnia I'll listen to a good 4-5 hours of Chinese in my headphones while lying there quietly waiting for dawn.

[Pravit]

I think I count for a non-native speaker that speaks pretty fluidly. A few questions/points:

1. Do you have a problem reading sentences aloud fluidly(even w/ pinyin)? If not, maybe you're stuck on pronunciation/tones.

2. Steve Kaufmann has some commendable language learning abilities. However, I think a lot of what is written by language 'experts' only applies to themselves, i.e. they're so good they don't realize what is easy for them might be difficult for others. Language learning is an extremely finicky thing, and I've found that what works for one person may not necessarily work for someone else.

3. Do you, or have you talked to a lot of people in Chinese? Sorry, I have no clue about your China/Chinese language experiences. A lot of how I learn a language is based off of imitating other people's pronunciation, sentence patterns, and vocabulary. Drills have never been very useful for me - I find no matter how much I drill, I don't really learn something well unless I actually get the chance to use it in practice.

4. I find a lot of things like “那个..”， “就是...", "euhhh..." etc. cropping up in my speech when I need extra time to think up a word or the rest of the sentence.

5. I don't listen to a whole lot of spoken Chinese when I'm not in China, although my listening comprehension is admittedly not the best. I do read (silently and aloud) a lot or say things to myself in Chinese, trying to improve my accent.

[赫杰]

Hi L-F-J,

Some good questions posed by Pravit, and yes like Pravit said don't be so quick to judge yourself against those 'geniuses' at languages, I have met my fair share as well and they just piss me off so much, haha. What I think is so funny is how everything just seems to come so natural to them, bleh, o well.

Ok, my input for what its worth, I would first ask myself "how fluid can I speak in my own language about ____(whatever it is you are stuttering in)?" I remember one day a while back I was discussing a topic with myself in chinese, and I just could not think of anything to say and was even repeating myself sometimes, I mean it just sounded like shit, I was so fed up with myself so I was like FU** THIS, FOR ONCE I am going to try speaking in english, so I tried talking about the topic to myself in english and low and behold, there were problems, not only would I keep thinking of a feeling's chinese counter-part first, the english sentences that I did form just seemed to sound not right once spoken, it took some time before I could find that 'english flow' again, that's when I realized I just need to calm down, do my best to think first and find some kind of main expression or feeling, and then put as much thought as possible into my words and expand my sentences as much as possible (in english and chinese), this has helped me personally in discussing topics more naturally and fluently and has given me lots more confidence.

Now as far as arranging the sentences in your head and stuff before speaking, I can understand why its coming out stuttering, I remember this happening a lot when I first started studying actually, I think you are simply preparing too much for what you are going to say, meaning you are thinking about what you are going to say, the exact words, just everything, repeatedly in your head, language needs to be spoken as an expression or better yet as a reaction to situations, feelings and pictures in your head, so it's good to first find and think about that MAIN phrase or MAIN feeling that you are looking to convey, and then from there expanding around the idea/phrase/feeling making it as beautiful as you can, but if you pause and think about every little thing before you say it, it will indeed come out stuttering, because that process in itself is unnatural, I would even go so far to suggest as to not worry so much about arrangement, since your listening is good, you will know what sounds bad or not by just listening to yourself. Interestingly, sometimes I have found that by destracting myself to a point while speaking (be it listening to music, thinking/doing something else that is not of relation to this 'task' of expression), I have been able to express myself more fluidly and has allowed myself to be more pleased with the way I expressed myself, perhaps this could help you? I think you just need to let it flow and for the most part just speak your mind, which brings me to...

Do you think in chinese or your mother tongue? That is, when you look at things or think about problems are you using chinese to describe and/or ponder? I'm not asking if you are thinking LIKE a chinese, but are you using chinese thought, two totally different things. If you are not using chinese to think about things, I suggest you do it as soon as possible...might as well, right? If you find it hard to think in another language, perhaps doing some timed writings on various topics will help...

Finally, don't be afraid to slow down while speaking, slow does not necessarily equeal bad, trust me, and no matter what your speaking speed is, always pay attention to the correct tones, REALLY stress them if you must, you know like the news reporters and those government officials always being interviewed, lol, makes it sound really clear and will also help that stuttering problem.

just some thoughts,

and nothing is wrong with you. good luck

HJ

[wushijiao]

I think I could suggest three things:

1) Whenever you learn a new word, try to put it in a sentence, and practice saying it. My first tutor always forced me to create new sentences, which was great.

2) Try circumlocution drills. For example, they used to have that old game show (I forget the name) in which one person had a card with a word on it, say, “airplane”, and then three words that he can’t say, such as “airport, fly, wings”. Then the person has to get another person to correctly guess the word as quickly as possible without saying those three words. Such as, “If you want to travel from New York to London, the fastest way to travel is in a __________”

Anyway, you could take a pile of new words, and with another person learning Chinese, practice some form of this drill. I think drills like this help people break out of the frustrating habit of needing to find the 100% correct translation of an English word into Chinese.

3) The last thing I could say, is much more nebulous. Personally, I try to draw upon other experiences of things that I am good at, and use it in learning Chinese. For example, I’m a pretty good skier (or, was a good skier) (being from the mountains of Colorado), so I often think of speaking Chinese in the same way that I think of skiing moguls. There you stand at the top the mountain, look down at a line, and the mentally psyche yourself up. You visualize going down that line, the first hit, turn, next hit, turn….and on down the line. You might even visualize any hard parts and how you will overcome it. Then you get your legs, head, back, and hands into position, and take off.

When speaking Chinese, as lame as this sounds, I often picture myself skiing extremely fast down a steep, bumpy mountain, quickly darting and moving and adapting. The amazing feeling of that flow somehow gives me the psychological confidence and breeds a sense of nimbleness that helps me produce language quickly.

So, I think practicing listening (like Kaufman and wrbt suggested) will help a lot, fluency drills might help too, but also drawing on your past succesful mental experiences will help a lot too. I could imagine that if you were ever good at painting, sketching, freestyle rap, dancing, music, or some other sport (maybe mountain biking, football), you might be able to use those positive experiences to help you find the confidence and fluidity that you need to overcome feelings of self-doubt.

[Strawberries513]

wow I most definitly have this problem too. Nothing I say in Chinese comes out smooth or fluid, and my biggest issue is that I cant construct long or complicated without getting tongue-tied or running out of things to say. And I am too shy to speak so that doesnt help my situation any... lol

[DrZero]

Has anybody tried drinking a few beers? It seems to help my fluency a lot.

[Strawberries513]

^^ I'm not stupid enough to drink. I would need another method

[kudra]

And I am too shy to speak so that doesnt help my situation any... lol

Has anybody tried drinking a few beers? It seems to help my fluency a lot.

I have found this to help (when used in moderation of course). It makes sense because one is inhibited by the fear of making mistakes and looking stupid. To the extent alchohol reduces inhibitions, it can help one speak when otherwise one would have been afraid of making mistakes. Of course there is the danger of sounding like the guy who says, "yeah, I drive better after a few beers." In any case, alchohol is not a long term solution to this issue. (I can hear the chorus of "Oh, and why not?")

So the trick is to instill the required courage (or lack of inhibition) by force of will, instead of by force of the grape.

Which brings us to Strawberries513's comment on stupidity, which may have sounded a bit harsh. If Strawberries513 is under age (I think she said she was in high school in Ohio) then using alchohol is not legal as far as I know and she needs to find another way to loosen up and deal with the risky feeling of producing Chinese in conversation. All I can suggest is to take to heart the title of one of Richard Feynman's books, "What Do You Care What Other People Think?" yes, easier said than done. Try small steps I suppose.

[laowai1980]

Alchohol, used moderately, sure does help in fluency, from personal experience. Not that you always have to drink before using the language, of course not What it does, like kudra said, is gives confidence, you speak more fluently, maybe with a few mistakes here and there, but who cares, your interlocutor usually doesn't mind those You don't think about how you should exactly word it, you try to convey the idea, and if you add a few more drinks, you usually don't have to say much at all, the idea is then mentally conveyed so keep control!

[L-F-J]

some good advice here.. but i'm kinda with strawberry on the drinking suggestion, insofar as needing another method. because i never drink. but stupid is as stupid does.

i'm not really afraid of making mistakes. otherwise i wouldnt bother trying to learn something new. especially bloody chinese! i have noticed however, that when i slow down my speech its usually a little more fluid. also, it seems like i'm not thinking of the words i need and they just come up. which is good, but thats not the problem i have with speaking at a normal rate. the words come up, they just dont come out. or if they do there's about a second in between each word or phrase before the next comes out. and i'm usually certain of the grammar and tones.

actually the problem comes up mostly between phrases or sentence fragments. there's a slight pause between each part of the sentence. though i can usually say those parts fairly easily and fluidly. but its in linking them together that i stumble. and usually by the end of the sentence it degenerates into every single character be a stutter....

so it may be that i can speak certain ideas or phrases but have a problem mixing them to make new ideas and speak it as naturally. perhaps i need to practice speaking to myself by mixing and matching different phrases and ideas to get accustomed to new combinations coming out of my mouth?

[赫杰]

i have noticed however, that when i slow down my speech its usually a little more fluid. also, it seems like i'm not thinking of the words i need and they just come up. which is good, but thats not the problem i have with speaking at a normal rate. the words come up, they just dont come out. or if they do there's about a second in between each word or phrase before the next comes out. and i'm usually certain of the grammar and tones.

actually the problem comes up mostly between phrases or sentence fragments. there's a slight pause between each part of the sentence. though i can usually say those parts fairly easily and fluidly. but its in linking them together that i stumble. and usually by the end of the sentence it degenerates into every single character be a stutter....

I see, interesting, I still have the same problems sometimes, though not as bad as in the past. Allow me to clarify, perhaps you are indeed just being too hard on yourself (haha not such a bad thing IMO), but take this example: one day your 心情 is noticably 郁闷，so your friend (or you just doing 自言自语) asks you: 嘿！你怎么了？so you say something like (and I am going to expand a bit here because I think its a good overall practice habit in speaking and in writing,,, and will also help me clarify your problem) 哎，心情好郁闷呢，因为对于我自己来讲，在大多数情况下，我讲话总有些口吃、断断续续，就像一个结巴子似的，，，真不知道该怎么样才能解决这个问题。。。

So like in that sentence, would you pause after each character? or just after each word like 心情。。。好。。。郁闷呢。。。or do you pause at the comma marks (which i see nothing wrong with if you are...)? personally i often say things like this 因为(pause think - then speak the rest)，在(pause think - then speak the rest)，and so on, like I will pause at the beginning to think....but sometimes I will be like 靠，我的心情呢(pause think and then say something)....and other times when speaking is bad for some reason I will be like 我的那个。。。那个。。心情呢，，，and yet some other times I will just flat out 脱口而出, say all that and f*** the commas. All this used to drive me crazy and then I posted a message here about just how fast or slow should chinese be generally spoken, and got the best advice...just dont think about it. Truthfully, my english sucks like that too sometimes, so after realizing this I stopped being so freaking hard on myself, which I hope your not doing, but it is good to an extent I suppose...

So indeed perhaps you are just thinking too much, just let it flow, I think you should keep speaking slowly and fluidly, like you said, the fact that words come up without you having to think so much is not good...its GREAT, everything will speed up with time and repetition, but you also dont want to get into the habit of saying the same shite over and over again with absolutely no thought in your words and allowing them to become stale and boring to listen to, but that problem will come later, and another thing, dont get too hung up on grammar, yes you can run a mental check of something like (is that what they usually say? does this really sound right?) but just like when reading a book, mark it down and come back to it later, i think you should always try to do your best to first completely finish expressing your thoughts...

so it may be that i can speak certain ideas or phrases but have a problem mixing them to make new ideas and speak it as naturally. perhaps i need to practice speaking to myself by mixing and matching different phrases and ideas to get accustomed to new combinations coming out of my mouth?

yes, talking to yourself is a great practice in my opinion and has helped me a lot, it even has some perks over talking with people, in that when you talk to actual people you might fall into the nasty habit (I do this too freaking often as it is in my nature ><) of just listening to the person you are talking to and saying a few quick phrases and allow them to do all the talking,,, however, talking with real people is definately the best thing because among many reasons, with the obvious one being that it is the most natural and basic method of conversation, when talking to someone you are not only looking to express yourself, but to give the listener an impression of who you are (or who you want to be percieved as), so maybe you will joke more in your discussions, or say stupid random things (i do this a lot), or say something to piss the listener off just because you are mad, you know? this kinds of things, these are all factors that are practically non-existent when doing the 自言自语, because these feelings are simply not there, so you have to try to imagine you are talking to that person, and you have those feeling, but this is difficult for me...talking to a mirror seems to help somewhat, another pretty obvious but important aspect of talking to someone are the different points of view through commenting and questioning they provide, which will usually envoke feelings that by just doing the 自言自语 is unable to produce...

hope this helps,

J

[nubix]

HJ thanks for both your replies, I have found your insights to be very useful.

[chenpv]

Then the person has to get another person to correctly guess the word as quickly as possible without saying those three words. Such as, “If you want to travel from New York to London, the fastest way to travel is in a __________”

My knee-jerk answer to that was TRAIN.... OMG, I do have a problem...

As for the argument over the beer, I do encourage people to try this method if they are fond of drinking some. Not to do it on purpose, but whenever there is a party or celebration where beer or alcohol is served, take a few sips, let it in, I am quite sure you will sense the difference while talking in Chinese or whatever language. Also bear in mind that too much drink cause bathroom emergencies, which are a distracting factor while conversation.

[L-F-J]

赫杰 - when i'm reading something i can speak it as fast and as fluid as i want but when i'm set free and rely on my own mind for the ideas, that changes.

with the example sentence you gave i'd usually have a pause at each comma and as i go along speaking, at each comma i'll almost forget what i'm trying to say. and by the end if the section is long i'll start to pause at almost every word while i'm trying to spit it out.

this doesnt happen all the time. sometimes i can get it out rather smoothly. so i dont know why i cant do that all the time. if i could only speak freely the way i read chinese it'd be cool.

one problem i noticed is that when i write i can get out all of my ideas and have the correct grammar and all. but when i'm speaking, again, its like i forgot how to express my ideas like i dont know enough words or the grammar isnt there for me. but i know it is because i can sit and write it all out no problem. its just not there for me when i speak though...

[赫杰]

Hello again,

with the example sentence you gave i'd usually have a pause at each comma and as i go along speaking, at each comma i'll almost forget what i'm trying to say. and by the end if the section is long i'll start to pause at almost every word while i'm trying to spit it out.

I see, I think our problems are very similar, with only a little difference. I also feel my writing is much much better than my 口语, but during speaking I usually won't forget what I'm trying to say, I just have trouble coming up with feelings and opinions on matters in the first place as I am (a) very stupid and find it hard to find something intelligent to say about anything so usually just result to acting silly and making odd random comments about things and (B) am not an opinionated person by nature,,,I am like a computer with a very slow processor, I can get things done, I just need time to work it all out, I probably should upgrade but anyway....

Interesting, but l think I have some more suggestions that may help you as they helped me when this similar (but not exactly alike) problem happened to me in the beginning of last semester, where my writing abilities were way freaking better than my spoken, now it is much better, so besides what I wrote in the above posts also keep these things in mind:

You are forgetting what to say towards the end while trying to say longer sentences, i.e. perhaps trying to convey more abstract or complicated feelings, ideas, processes, telling of stories etc, this is because what you are trying to say is multi-layered and instead of focusing on one layer at a time you are trying to say everything...last year I had a roommate from Korea, his Chinese listening was so freaking good but his speaking was quite peculiar, that is he could communicate with anyone about pretty much anything with very very few words, his response was so quick but I don’t think I ever heard him speak one complete sentence...ever, but he could understand the news, lol. What I learned from this is everything we say has a main point, and like my Korean friend, if we are able to just find this main point, say it, then everything will be okay, we can be at least understood, the key is to first find them (my problem), and then of course while speaking around it using 复句 and various 句式 and 表达形式 to remember what your point exactly was (your problem).

So I think you should get used to exploring your feelings in Chinese (自言自语 or whatever), and structurizing your Chinese naturally without having to think about it, the main thing you need to keep in mind is that main idea you are trying to convey, so perhaps you are having problems for two reasons - you are trying to convey/think about too many main ideas at one time, and/or you are having problem structurizing around these main ideas, due to the structures being used not being familiar and natural. To allow these structures to feel natural you need to use them all the time, once they feel natural, you can simply focus on just thinking about remembering your main ideas, describing them with pretty figures of speech 起到一个修辞效果 and 加点感情色彩, so for instance:

someone asks you 你为什么要学习汉语？and if you are like me, then you will feel 百感交集, 不知所措, there is a lot to talk about indeed, where does one begin? Now if I don’t like the person or just don’t feeling talking for some reason I might say something short like 因为。。。我觉得汉语是一种乐趣, or even better 不为什么，没有理由。I imagine you saying something like this is not a problem at all, but now lets say you want to expand, or you are in a talkative mood:

begin,

(note to self: 乐趣)(begin thinking of a structure)

因为。。。(structure found 不仅仅，而且) (note: 除了一种乐趣外，我还觉得汉语是什么东西？)

就我来说。。。(found: 汉语也是一种挑战自己的方法)(think for next aspect, you know its there somewhere)

学习汉语不仅仅是一种挑战自己的方法，(next main idea found: the difficulty factor)(structure?)

而且还是一种乐趣(structure found 虽然 但是)

那么。。。。(how difficult? supposedly most difficult in world)

从学习汉语的难度方面来讲。。。(then how to express the level for you?)

虽然有的人认为中文是世界上最难学的语言， (found: 易如反掌)

但是我并不这样认为。(look for new idea...where are you??~~)

不过。。。(still looking - wtf should i say now??)

反过来说，(found: must complete this crazy language) (structure?)

我也不能说学习汉语是一件易如反掌的事情。(structure found 就算 也)

哎，不论怎么样。。。(express level) (what should i freaking say next? im hungry...)

就算汉语真的是世界上最难学的语言，(continue with expression of level 再 也)

我也得尽自己最大的努力去把它学好，(continue with expression of level)

再难也一定要继续学习下去，（found: 尽力而为...is that a puppy?）

尽力而为。。。(heh what a cute puppy...o shit, what do i say now? ummm)

那个。。。(成语？any more?)

全力以赴。。。(any more? no? shit,,,)

那个。。。(不妨换个话题算了吧)

嘿，你喜不喜欢猫？

I know this is a lot to think about while talking but this is basically my thought process while speaking, otherwise, I will just say as little as possible, as is my nature. Now, in the beginning, thinking like this might be slow, and weird but 熟能生巧， I remember last semester spending so many hours a day talking to myself (I have obviously gone insane since then, which is only a minor side effect) I actually got sick I did it so much, hurt to talk for about three days, but it structured my Chinese and gave me confidence to express myself more deeply about many topics. It's like you will hear a topic and you immediately get a blue print in your head of 对。。。来讲，从。。。方面来看，觉得。。。甚至，虽然。。。但，就算。。。也，何必呢, and then the relative main 主意's and 大意's and then the rest will just write itself...but then you may get into a problem of saying the same thing over and over again...which is not good either to a point, right? So you gotta do your best to mix it all up and always use what you learn.

Again, for you to remember what your point is, you got to feel natural about the expressions being used to surround your main ideas, this will allow you to talk about one thing and think about something else at the same time, which will prepare you to speak more continually, and this can be done simply through repetition, practice, and also 背ing things like 成语 习惯用语 and 常见的词组 as well as 模仿ing various programs I think helps a lot too. So what your pausing at words and speaking slowly? What? You want to sound like a Chinese when you speak Chinese or something after just a few years of study? haha, just keep at it (I am telling myself this at the same), improving one's 表达能力 is something that can always be improved, no matter what level you are at I think. Any kind of study of Chinese is a good kind, even if its 循序渐进式的那种

this doesnt happen all the time. sometimes i can get it out rather smoothly. so i don’t know why i cant do that all the time. if i could only speak freely the way i read Chinese it'd be cool.

yeah, i hear ya, hell, i wish i could speak English smoothly ALL the time, but that's not gonna happen, so I'm not placing that much hope on Chinese, but like you I'll keep doing my best whatever the case.

apologies, I wrote a lot again, hope some of this helps

J