Hi all,
I recently joined in a convo here where the original poster was discussing ways to improve speaking. I offered some tips about how I have improved my speaking. However, I feel like a bit of an imposter when I realize that I still translate in my head–like, all the time. Reading - check! Listening - check! Speaking - check! Writing - major check! I consider myself at the “lower advanced” level at this point, but this is only because I have grown very fast and fluid at translating in my head-to the level where I can use the language faster and more efficiently when I do it than when I don’t.
I did this experiment this morning, and what I learned was that if I don’t translate in my head, I have to pause after a paragraph or two to review the content and be sure I understood it. Whereas, if I’m translating in my head it is happening quickly enough that I’m understanding the content in real time.
So… my question for those who have soundly defeated this hurdle: Did you actively make an effort to stop yourself from translating in your head? Or did you just keep reading and listening and not worry about it, and the translation just automagically stopped happening? If you took active steps to break this habit, what were they?
Thanks!!
5 Likes
I don’t think I’d bother actively trying not to translate in your head. My personal viewpoint is that the folks who say they start from the beginning not trying to translate are a) b.s.'ing b) trying to get rid of something that will actually help them learn faster
I’m not sure how well your LingQ stats equate to what you’ve actually done, but for the amount of words that you “know” your reading and listening stats are pretty low. You may be doing a lot outside of Lingq though. Essentially though, as you get more input you’ll translate less in your head. More common words will be translated less. Less common words, or words that give you trouble you’ll still translate in your head for awhile.
3 Likes
Thanks Eric! My known words increased super rapidly because I only joined LingQ a couple months ago and already had been studying Portuguese for some time. I also do use content outside of LingQ; specifically, I listen to the news most mornings without importing it as a lesson (although I do manually log the time spent) and I have language exchange meetings outside of LingQ which are also manually logged. So, yeah, I do expose myself to the language all the time, and I can definitely see improvement from it, but I feel like it’s really just that I keep getting more adept at translating in my head, haha. It’s comforting that this should stop happening - - I am certain there must be a point where continuing to improve fluency must require that the translation decreases/stops; I just don’t fully understand which comes first because I haven’t gotten there yet :).
3 Likes
When you listen outside of LingQ, do you listen like a child, so to speak? In other words, just listen without dissecting the meaning, and without translating? If not, then perhaps you could spend a little time doing so. It is a good exercise. If I translate, I end up getting lost as I can’t keep up, unless the speaker is talking more slowly.
2 Likes
Thanks Leif, this is interesting. The answer to your question is a resounding “no”, I don’t think I have ever just listened without trying to understand and/or dissect meaning. I think to be honest I would completely zone out if I wasn’t actively listening and trying to understand. I don’t think I would absorb anything.
I also really favor content that is a little or a lot difficult for me, so some of it requires a lot of concentration and repeated listening to understand.
Having said all that, now that I read this I might experiment with it and see what happens 
Cheers
2 Likes
This is more of an opinion.
When attempting to speak without assistance from translating is a bit challenging is because the words you are still translating are not converted to a stage that can be used at will. Your brain mostly have some doubts for the meaning and needs more reassurance. I believe that you need to translate a lot in the beginning stage to give your brain more reassurance for the exact meaning that you want it to be since it’s similar to learning vocabulary in which are you creating links between the word and meaning. The more you Translate, the better. It’s simply that you have not translated enough and the brain is unsure of the meaning and usage in the context that you trying to use the word in. The words that you can already use at will are words that you have made enough translations or links to the point that it’s automatic.
The more you translate the better. Give it time simply, but you can speed the process to convert from translating each word to an automatic process on your own time by simply thinking about it and have a phone on standby to translate the word you’re missing and not understanding clearly and repeat. Each words require a certain amount of times to translate but the words you need are mostly words that takes more work. Keep it up!
3 Likes
It is pretty normal to translate when starting to learn a new language I’d say. The more familiar you become with the language, the less you will have to rely on translating.
For me personally I am mainly translating sentences that I can’t understand, because they contain many unknown words or grammatical structures I am unfamiliar with. Also if a sentence is very long it can be helpful.
I wouldn’t say that I made an explicit effort to avoid translating, but when reading I try not to translate it form the beginning on and see if I can understand the meaning anyways. This depends on my condition or mood, too, though. If I am tired or unconcentrated I probably tend to translate more.
The positive aspect of reducing the amount of translations performed is that you can read a text much faster and that it takes you longer to become tired, as it would take more brain power to handle two languages and constantly switch back and forth between them. Of course, especially when not very advanced, not translating makes it more likely that you miss a nuance or misunderstand something.
2 Likes
Listening to slightly hard input is probably very good, I did it, and still do it, in French and I’m sure it helps me a lot.
Incidentally, when you translate it can be harder to speak because words don’t translate one by one, of course. I don’t speak French well, but I find thinking in French makes it easier
1 Like