Hi Davide,
“Progressive” can refer to different things in this context. For example:
-
Intensive listening of short texts / paragraphs (including re-listening several times).
-
Extensive listening (with / without re-listening).
-
Listening to one narrator or various native speakers.
-
Trying to master a subject you’re interested in by approaching it from various SLA angles (only listening, reading-while-listening, etc.).
Tip 1:
Maybe it’s best to vary your oral “diet” during the week so that your study sessions remain interesting. For example: intensive listening (Monday - Wednesday - Friday) / extensive listening (Tuesday - Thursday - Saturday), etc.
Tip 2:
Your English skills are already quite good, so it’s probably best to listen without subs at first (exception: if there are hard-to-understand accents/dialects involved, so you’ll need more time to get accustomed to them).
Tip 3:
Another good strategy is to play around with the speed of the audio (1.25-2x).
After a few weeks you will find many fast conversations “easy” because your brain will have become accustomed to the faster pace (btw, this strategy also improves our focused attention and helps to avoid translations into our L1s!).
Tip 4:
“Learn the entire text on a deeper level in order to be sure that I really get the nuances.”
I think to get the “nuances” of a text (non-fiction, fiction or poetry - it doesn’t matter), it’s best to summarize the important points / nuances in our own words (this is, at least, one of the core lessons I’ve learned in various scientific disciplines).
And, nowadays, I want to have discussions with generative AIs (ChatGPT, etc.) about the text, too.
I do this every day in English / German (and sometimes other L2s) in my day job when I have to analyze hundreds of pages of public tenders or write blog posts about business process management and complexity research (note: you can’t trust the AI bc. of its “hallucinations”, etc., but to have such discussions is extremely helpful!).
You could use a similar strategy. For example as follows:
-
Select an appropriate topic where there is both a text and an audio version available.
-
Listen to a chapter - without reading - at a regular or higher speed.
-
Summarize what you have read in your own words:
Writing is probably better if you really want to polish your sentences, but oral summaries are also helpful.
-
Make sure ChatGPT (or another GAI) can access your text.
-
Discuss the important points and nuances with the AI.
-
if necessary, re-listen to the chapter (the next day) or practice reading-while-listening at a fast pace (1.5-2x).
If you only have 45 min, then you could use two Pomodoro blocks.
For example like this:
ChatGPT is now able to talk. Therefore you could:
- Only talk with it (oral mode).
- Only chat with it (written mode).
- Do both (that is, switch between both modes).
Rinse and repeat.
Or you could do something similar with a Netflix series (e.g. “House of Cards”) using LingQ or Language Reactor.
-
Watch an episode without subs (for 25 min).
-
Rewatch the episode with subs the next day (again: 25 min) or import the text into LingQ and learn the collocations / sentences you want to acquire / use Language Reactor).
-
Watch / re-watch the rest of the episodes the following days.
-
Listen to the episode again a few days later at a fast pace (while doing other things).
Note: If you want you could also have a discussion with ChatGPT about such an episode.
To be honest, I can come up with countless such “routines” for myself or when I’m face-to-face with another learner. However, it’s difficult to develop them without knowing your specific needs, strengths/weaknesses and interests.
Anyway, I hope you find a few nuggets here and there - and that reading my post wasn’t a complete waste of your time!
Have a nice weekend,
Peter
PS -
I recommend taking courses on Coursera, for example, because there you can really “test” your comprehension of a topic that interests you.
Most courses are usually free to attend, but you can also get a certificate for a small fee.
