Question from a student

 A student asked me about factors for language-learning success. Here are ten things off the top of my head:

• Basic skills like listening and vocabulary are crucial. 
• Daily practice effort is very important, too. 
• Getting a lot of high-quality sleep is important to learn anything. If you drink 2+ alcoholic beverages, you will probably not get high-quality sleep.
• It's easier for bilingual people to learn a third language than it is for monolingual people to learn a second language.
• Some people are more observant than other people (they recognize patterns and nuance well). 
• Younger people tend to do better than older people.
• Women tend to speak more clearly than men (pronunciation).
• Smokers often do better than non-smokers (I think it's because they're used to meeting people in the smoking area at work and making small-talk with strangers).
• People who play a musical instrument or sing are often more sensitive to intonation than people who don't.
• Lots of lawyers struggle because they are used to legalese.

Advice: "and so on"

We recommend that you avoid certain words or expressions. One them is "and so on."

There are several reasons to avoid a word or expression:

1. It's difficult to pronounce and there's an easier substitute.
2. It has a difficult intonation pattern.
3. It doesn't have any meaning.

Last week, I recommended that you avoid "various"  because of reasons 1 and 3.

"And so on" checks all three boxes.

1. "On" is usually mispronounced as オン. That's not correct. It's spelled with an "o," but it's pronounced as アン.
2. The intonation pattern is the 1-3-2 pattern that Japanese people struggle with.
3. It doesn't mean anything.

Let's use English well (and avoid some unnecessary mistakes)!

Q: Should you speak loudly on TOEFL speaking?

A student recently asked me, "Should I speak loudly on the TOEFL speaking section [1]?"

I know from my own TOEFL test-taking adventures that some people believe their TOEFL speaking score is based on the volume of their voice.

This is a mistake. You should speak at your normal volume. Two reasons:

1. The microphone sensitivity automatically adjusts to the volume you use when you say, "I live in Tokyo, I live in Tokyo [2]." If you speak in a loud voice, the mic is less sensitive, and if you speak in a smaller voice, the mic becomes more sensitive. If both the microphone sensitivity is HIGH and your volume is HIGH, the recording will not be very clear. You can test this for yourself [3].
2. You can not control your intonation well if you are speaking too loudly [4]. Most Japanese people breathe shallowly, so a loud voice sounds like you are barking, not speaking.

So you are better off using your normal speaking advice.

Please use English well!

***   Notes   ***

[1] When  I get questions like this, the conversation is usually something like this:

Student: "I heard that I should speak loudly on TOEFL."
Dono:  "That's bad advice. Who told you that?"

And it's always one of two Japanese teachers in Tokyo. Use a Japanese instructor for reading and listening, but not for speaking, even if your TOEFL score is low.

[2] I don't recommend that you keep repeating "I live in Tokyo, I live in Tokyo ..." by the way.

[3] Test this yourself at home with an IC recorder. Set the mic 録音シーン to 口述モード (LOW sensitivity) and record yourself at a loud voice, then with a small voice. Then try it with 会議モード (HIGH sensitivity). Which of the four sounds better to you?

[4] Unless you are an opera singer, and even then it's hard to breathe deeply enough to use your diaphragm if you are sitting down.

Breathing and airflow

Shallow breathing is a big problem for a lot of people. It affects your pitch, and pronunciation of 摩擦音 and the American "r" sounds. I strongly recommend this video of Rebecca Linquist explaining how to breathe effectively.

Nice

This blog post should be spoken to demonstrate what I mean, but I think you'll understand it.

I sometimes hear people say, "It was a nice restaurant/hotel/whatever," and it sounds odd because they don't emphasize "nice." Of course, it's OK to say, "It was a really nice hotel," if you emphasize it.


But if you don't emphasize "nice," then it will generally mean "not very good." This is important for all you single men who are going to study abroad: If an American woman says you are a "nice guy," it means she's not interested in you.


Japanese women do this too, by the way, with expressions like, "彼はいい人だね." It means she's not romantically interested in you.


Please use English well!