如何使用常见词提升口语水平？

2022-10-26 07:10

复旦大学英文系教授、《英语惯用法词典》编者葛传椝先生在《向英语学习者讲话》中这样写道:

We are apt to neglect common words. Apart from the possibility of misuse and misunderstanding, we are apt to neglect their various senses, or rather idiomatic uses.

（我们总忽视很普通的单词。除了有可能用错或者不理解这些词，我们还经常忽略这些单词不同的意思和习惯用法。）

然后他以read 为例给出了下面几个例句：

Can you read dreams?

The baby cannot read the clock.

He is reading her thoughts.

Don't read too much into the text.

The thermometer reads 68°C.

相信很多同学通过上下文都能理解它们的意思，但平时要主动使用它们则比较困难。葛老师以前被复旦大学英文系的师生们称作“活字典”。不过他也谦虚地说，“说我能背整本字典就太夸张了，不过词典中最常用的 3000 个词我的确反复诵读。”

类似的例子还有很多。比如:我在大学念经济学。这句话你怎么用英文说?“念”这个意思如何体现?还是read 吗?

你可以说：I'm taking economics at university. 如果你能灵活使用常用 3000 个英文单词，那么它在口语、写作中的意义比你对着词汇书积累 3 万单词更为深远。

基于同学们往往过度重视词汇的广度，很少有机会提高词汇的深度。我们开了一门小词口语训练营，旨在这方面对同学们有所帮助。通过一个实例来介绍这门课程：

Who had the greatest influence on you growing up?

这个问题在各类英文面试和口语考试中都很常见。我们可以用再熟悉不过的小词来完整地回答这个问题：

I think this person must be my mom.

Unlike other people, she never said that she would give anything to have me shape up, because she thought such words would put a lot of pressure on me. However, for more than twenty years, her unspoken love and care help me grow physically, mentally and academically. When other children failed the exam, they often got the blame. But my mother helped me get over problems in my learning. Whenever I overcome difficulties, one thought that always comes to mind is that my mom is an angel sent by God to help me.

In short, if I have the chance to achieve something substantial in the future, much of the credit should be given to my loving but powerful mom.

这一段100多词的回答中，用了6个最常见的英语动词，但你仔细读下来，又会觉得自己基本不会在英文口语表达中去主动地使用他们。

类似以上例子中的词组表达，《小词口语训练营》一共有100个，每天训练1-2个上面这样的口语回答，在30天中，把这100个“逆中式思维”的小词表达在各类口语话题中反复使用，直至把它们变得像“want to to”这样熟悉，你就能够在英语口语表达中正确，准确地使用他们了。