Hello and welcome to 6 Minute English – the show that brings you an interesting topic, authentic listening practice and vocabulary to help you improve your language skills. I'm Rob…
Watashi no namae wa Neil desu. And that means 'my name's Neil'.
Watashi no namae wa Neil desu.这意味着'我叫 Neil'。
Rob(罗伯)
So Neil, here's a question for you – can you speak any languages other than English of course? I think you can!
所以 Neil,这里有一个问题要问你 —— 你当然会说英语以外的其他语言吗?我想你可以!
Neil(尼尔)
Un poco de español that means a little bit of Spanish. Some Japanese, which I tried at the beginning and also a bit of Czech language - Dobrý den, jak se máš?
Un poco de español 的意思是一点点西班牙语。一些日语,我一开始尝试了一下,还有一点捷克语 - Dobrý den, jak se máš?
Rob(罗伯)
Very impressive. So what tips can you give for learning to speak another language?
非常令人印象深刻。那么,您可以提供哪些学习说另一种语言的提示呢?
Neil(尼尔)
Well, practise, practise, practise – and don't be afraid of making mistakes as I no doubt have.
好吧,练习,练习,练习 —— 不要害怕犯错误,因为我无疑已经犯了错误。
Rob(罗伯)
Of course. Well my aim this year is to master the Spanish language. Master means to learn thoroughly.
答案是肯定的。嗯,我今年的目标是掌握西班牙语。师父的意思是学得透彻。
Neil(尼尔)
Muy bien! Well you're not alone. A survey by the British Council found learning a language is a new year's resolution for about one in five Britons in 2018. So learning Spanish is a good start Rob but do you know approximately how many languages there are in the world altogether? Are there… a) 70; b) 700 c) 7,000.
Muy bien!好吧,你并不孤单。英国文化协会 7,000。
Rob(罗伯)
Well I know there are many but surely not 7,000 so I'm going to say b) 700 – but don't expect me to learn all of them.
That's right – but many scientists also believe that knowledge of another language can boost your brainpower. A study of monolingual and bilingual speakers suggests speaking two languages can help slow down the brain's decline with age.
All good reasons. But Neil, learning another language is hard. It would take me years and years to become fluent in say, Mandarin – by fluent I mean speak very well, without difficulty.
Well this depends on your mother tongue. In general, the closer the second language is to the learner's native tongue and culture in terms of vocabulary, sounds or sentence structure - the easier it will be to learn.
But whatever the language, there is so much vocabulary to learn – you know, thousands and thousands of words.
但无论使用哪种语言,都需要学习很多词汇 - 你知道,成千上万的单词。
Neil(尼尔)
Maybe not Rob. Professor Stuart Webb, a linguist from the University of Western Ontario, may be able to help you. He spoke to BBC Radio 4's More or Less programme and explained that you don't need to do that…
也许不是 罗伯。来自西安大略大学的语言学家 Stuart Webb 教授或许能为您提供帮助。他在 BBC Radio 4 的 More or Less 节目中解释说,你不需要这样做......
Professor Stuart Webb, linguist, University of Western Ontario(Stuart Webb 教授,西安大略大学语言学家)
For language learners in a foreign language setting – so for example if you were learning French in Britain or English in Japan, students may often really struggle to learn more than 2,000, 3,000 words after many years of study. So for example, there was study in Taiwan recently that showed that after nine years of study about half of the students had still failed to learn the most frequent 1,000 words. Now they knew lower frequency words but they hadn't mastered those most important words.
So Rob, don't waste your time trying to learn every single word. Professor Webb spoke there about research that showed students knew lower frequency words but weren't learning enough high frequency words.
Right, and frequency here means the number of times something happens – so the important words to learn are the high frequency ones – and how many are there exactly?
是的,这里的频率是指某件事发生的次数 —— 所以要学习的重要词是高频词 —— 到底有多少个?
Neil(尼尔)
Here's Professor Stuart Webb again…
又来了 Stuart Webb 教授......
Professor Stuart Webb, linguist, University of Western Ontario(Stuart Webb 教授,西安大略大学语言学家)
For example, with English, I would suggest if you learn the 800 most frequent lemmas – which is a word and its inflections – that will account for about 75 per cent of all of the English language. So that learning those 800 words first will provide the foundation for which you may be able to learn the lower frequency words.
Fascinating stuff. And good to know I just need to learn about 800 words – or what he calls lemmas.
迷人的东西。很高兴知道我只需要学习大约 800 个单词 —— 或者他所说的词元。
Neil(尼尔)
Yes a lemma is the simplest form or base form of a word. And the inflection here refers to how the base word is changed according to its use in a sentence. Knowing these things give you a foundation – the basics from which you language learning will develop. Simple!
Thank goodness I am learning just one new language!
谢天谢地,我只学了一门新语言!
Neil(尼尔)
But how many languages could you potentially be learning Rob? Earlier I asked you, approximately how many languages there are in the world altogether? Are there… a) 70; b) 700 c) 7,000.
No Rob, you were wrong. There are around 7,000 recognised languages in the world but UNESCO has identified 2,500 languages which it claims are at risk of extinction.
That's news to me Neil! But it would be good to be fluent in Spanish – or any language – or to speak it fluently – that's speaking it well and without difficulty.
Now our next word was frequency. Here we are referring to high and low frequency words – so it means how often they occur. Examples of a high frequency word are 'it', 'the' and 'and'.
And our next word is inflections. These are the changes to the basic form of words according to their function in a sentence. Such as adding an 's' to the end of a word to make it plural.
And don't forget lemma which is the simplest form or base form of a word before an inflection is added.
别忘了 lemma,这是在添加屈折变化之前单词的最简单形式或基本形式。
Rob(罗伯)
And finally foundation which means the basics your learning grows from.
最后是基础,这意味着您的学习基础。
Neil(尼尔)
That just leaves me to remind you that you can learn English with us at bbclearningenglish.com. That's it for today's 6 Minute English. We hope you enjoyed it. Bye for now. Na shledanou. Hasta luego. Ja-ne.