I've read books in 12 languages. Here's how I do it

Today, I want to talk about reading, why reading is important as a part

of our language learning strategy and how we can enjoy reading at different

stages in our language learning journey.

So I was sitting at the doctor's office this morning.

Actually, it wasn't a doctor's office.

It was a lab.

I had to have a blood test done.

I'm waiting for 25 minutes so I can read on my iPhone.

I'm reading Arabic.

I can look up words, all kinds of functionality.

I can hear the words all great.

And yet, for me, my goal and my sort of greatest milestone in working towards

acquiring a language is getting to the point where I can read a paper book,

a full paper book, away from computer, away from all of the types of help that

are available to us on digital formats.

So, how do we get there?

I'm going to be talking about history to some extent, I'm going to be talking

about some scientific studies about how the brain reads, and I will leave the

links in the description box rather than going into a lot of detail about these

links and the names of the people who did the studies and so forth and so on.

Human beings have not been reading for very long in terms of their history as,

as human beings, the earliest writing systems from what I gathered from my

reading were the systems developed in Sumer, in what is today Iraq, the either

cuneiform or cuneiform writing systems.

They in turn influenced the Egyptians who developed their hieroglyphic

writing system and that's going back three, four thousand years ago.

And then there was even a writing system in Crete which has yet to be deciphered.

Called the Minoan, uh, writing system.

And, uh, then the Chinese and the Phoenicians, I think roughly around

the same time, developed, uh, writing systems quite independently of each other.

The assumption is that the Phoenician system was influenced by the

Sumerian system and it in turn influenced, uh, the writing systems

that most of the world use today.

The Latin alphabet, the Greek alphabet, the Cyrillic alphabet,

and of course the Arabic script.

So writing hasn't been with us for a long time.

So the brain didn't evolve some kind of very efficient way of getting right

into reading and converting sort of written lines on a page into meaning.

And therefore the way we process reading is very much connected

to the way we process sound.

So if you look at this diagram, you'll see that there's sort of like

a portion of our brain, which is apparently where we recognize faces.

And that's where the word comes in as an image.

And then it connects up to the area where we process sound.

And then through sound, it goes into meaning and all of the other

things that we need in order to decipher what is written on the page.

So reading and listening are very closely related.

People who read well also understand the spoken word better.

They have a larger vocabulary.

They hear the words more clearly, apparently, and I also find that

if I'm acquiring vocabulary, if I can't see the word, it's very

difficult for me to remember it.

Once I've seen the word a few times, I have that image of the word, and

then when I hear the word, I seem to remember the meaning more clearly.

So, close connection between listening and reading, and that's important as I

continue to explain how we as language learners Can use both listening and

even more important, reading as part of our, uh, language learning strategy.

It's interesting in that regard that the form of the writing system

influences how the brain processes it.

So the Chinese characters, for example, which are like clumps of meaning and even

Hangul, which is clumps of sound, they are processed in the brain in a similar way.

Whereas the purely sort of letter by letter phonetic script

are processed differently.

So there is a relationship between the type of writing system and how the brain

deals with it, although the general path is what I described earlier.

Now, the important thing about reading is, for most of history,

most human beings, Obviously, we have the development of paper and of

printing and technology that makes it easier to sort of distribute written

material and therefore makes reading accessible to more and more people.

Still, probably no more than 10 percent of people in the world could read, even

up to a couple of hundred years ago.

And it's only now that Or recently, relatively recently, that we've

got this world where, you know, over 90 percent of people can read.

That's relatively new.

And reading changes our brains for the better.

It helps to create stronger connections between different parts of the brain.

It increases the white matter in the brain, which is that

sheathing, which facilitates communication within the brain.

Now, some people who have dyslexia, those developments in the brain are.

It's not always there in, to the same degree.

However, forcing ourselves to read can create improvements

in that regard in the brain.

So using different technologies and different therapies, if we can

somehow help people read, that's going to help them strengthen

these connections in their brains.

Studies have shown that beyond that, reading is relaxing.

Reading increases empathy.

It obviously increases the number of words we know.

Typically, the written word has more low frequency words than

we're likely to hear in speech.

It's even suggested that it can prolong our lives because

of all of these beneficial things that derive from reading.

And of course, we acquire lots of knowledge through reading, and we

even acquire language through reading.

Now, some of you are going to say, well, how do I get to reading a language where

I don't know the words, and I will get to that, but first I want to touch on

another subject, and that is reading on paper versus reading on a digital device,

and part of getting to where you can read And a book on paper, which I said at the

outset was my goal in language learning.

Part of that is to be able to quickly access the meaning of words.

And in some cases where the writing system is not familiar to us or not,

that's called transparent one to one, then also the ability to hear the word.

So, we can use digital reading to access the Text, that would

otherwise be too difficult for us.

We can look up words, we can hear the word, we can isolate a sentence

as we do at LingQ, we can listen to the sentence, we can look up

words and then review those words.

So there's many different ways that we can use digital devices as a

sort of a gateway towards eventually being able to read on paper, which

to me is kind of the holy grail.

However, then the subject comes up, should we continue reading on our iPhones,

iPads, computer screens, or should we read a book on paper, uh, also Kindle,

for example, which is digital reading.

And apparently there's a lot of research that shows that it is more beneficial

for us, we retain the information better.

There are greater benefits to our brain from reading on paper

than from reading on a screen.

And there are a number of reasons for this.

One, there is that sort of tactile experience of holding a book, of being

able to move your finger along the paper, of turning the page, even the thickness of

the page, all of these things apparently are relaxing, are beneficial and help

us remember, and they have done studies.

For example, there was a study out of Norway.

You'll find the link in the description box, which demonstrated

that the retention of information was better with paper books, as opposed

to reading on a digital device.

In fact, there have been other studies, one done in the year 2000 and one done

in the year 2017, that indicates that reading on a digital device tends to

create a more superficial or shallow approach to reading, we're not as focused.

We're attracted or distracted by other things, and we start reading in a

more shallow manner, and this tends to influence how we read on paper.

So there are some negatives to the sort of digital reading, even though

it is a very good way to get to the point where you can read a paper book.

And certainly in my own experience, I always invest a lot of time

with my digital reading before I then pick up A paper book.

So technology is changing how we access books or information

that is contained in books.

One of the major changes over the last perhaps 10, 20 years is the

emergence of podcasting, mp3 files, audio books, and things of that nature.

The average person in the United States older than the age of 13

spends an hour and 40 minutes a day listening to some form of audio.

75 percent of people over 18 in the U.

S.

Listen to some form of audio every month there.

And it's become a dominant way for us to consume information.

And the reasons given are that it's possible to do it while doing other

things, primarily in the home.

And I'm an example of this.

I listen while cleaning up around the house or doing other things or exercising.

I listen in my car and all of that has become so important.

Easy to do now.

I'm in my car with Apple CarPlay.

I can listen to my favorite podcasts.

If I'm, my interest is tweaked, then I can go back in there and get the transcript.

And that's another thing that's happening with the advent of AI, the

sort of lines between audio and text are starting to be blurred because my Apple

podcast now is available on Apple TV.

As a transcript, immediately in certain languages, not in all languages.

For my Arabic, of course, I can use Whisper AI, which we

have connected with LingQ.

And any podcast that I'm listening to, I can just, if I can get ahold

of the MP3 file, I pull it in.

I have a transcript of that lesson, which I can use then to

try to, you know, learn the words.

That I wasn't able to understand while listening to the podcast.

So there's a tremendous availability of, of audio.

It's very popular with people.

It now connects to text so we can read it whenever we want and use

that as an opportunity to learn the words that we need to learn.

Now let's get back to this idea of enjoying our reading.

So we can use.

Audio, uh, we can use the connection between audio and text.

We can use the ability to look words up online in digital text, uh, different

apps that help us review what we're listening to and the words in there that

we need to learn, we can use all of that.

To improve our ability to read independently.

And the goal, as I've said before, is to read away from the computer in a

more relaxed way on paper where we can actually heft that book and turn the page.

Now, in order to enjoy that experience, What I have found

in, in my own experience, it's easier to read nonfiction.

So in the different languages that I have learned, I start

reading a nonfiction book first.

The likelihood is that I'm familiar with, or at least interested in, the

subject matter of that nonfiction book.

Once I'm into a story, once I'm into literature, I'm no longer

familiar with the context.

It's culturally different.

There are a lot of words there that are more literary that I don't know.

So that is at a later stage.

I might also add that a lot of the literature that I have read in

different languages, these have tended to consist in rather thick books.

And to me, it's perfectly all right to read, uh, and also listen to, but

then read, uh, Anna Karenina or War and Peace in Russian, or I Promessi

Sposi, You'll excuse me for being a fan of 19th century literature,

but not to read the whole thing.

In other words, it can be an enjoyable experience to read a few

chapters from those books and have that sense of sort of, look at

me, the training wheels are off.

I'm reading on paper.

I'm reading literature.

I'm in that world of Italy of the 17th century, uh, but I

don't understand everything.

And this brings me to another point.

Very often in, in language class and even in, in reading class, the

teachers seem to want the learner to understand everything and to prove

that the learner understood everything.

And the teacher wants to impose reading strategies and

ask comprehension questions.

And all of this destroys the enjoyment.

Uh, even if there are large parts that you don't understand, the fact

that it is washing over your brain is going through those pathways, uh,

the visual, uh, entry point through the phonological or sound processing

area of the brain, it's bringing all of that into our brains and improving

our ability to process that language.

Any sort of reading strategies that teachers love to foist on kids

basically relate to the level of our knowledge about the subject at hand.

And the teachers recognize this, the prior knowledge, as they call

it, is fundamental to comprehension.

Not inferring, the ability to infer, the ability to analyze, the ability

to rehash, none of that matters.

What matters is.

Our familiarity with the subject, and if our familiarity is less than perfect,

but we still enjoy processing it, we are acquiring some background knowledge.

The background knowledge as we acquire it doesn't have to be 100%.

Uh, it can still be enjoyable.

And I think it's important to have that as a goal.

To be able to process some of the language, maybe go back over the

same material again later, but enjoy the fact that we're able to read.

And in that regard, one of the things that you often hear people say is that we need

to know 90 percent or 95 percent or more of the vocabulary in a text in order to

enjoy it or in order to understand it.

And I would say to that, I don't have to understand it all.

Uh, I can build myself up using digital means in a text that has 20 percent

unknown words, if I'm interested enough.

So there are no hard and fast rules in my mind as to how many known words you

need to have in order to understand or appreciate that text, because I can

appreciate texts where there are gaps.

Ultimately, I would like to go back in and fill in the gaps using, you know,

digital means where I can look up words.

But once I've sat myself down with a book on paper and I'm holding on to

it and I'm in the 17th century Italy, I just want to enjoy that experience.

And I don't care about stuff that tends to fly by me as long

as there's not too much of it.

Of course, it's all a function of degree.

So to summarize, you know, reading, reading on paper.

As an ultimate goal, reading using digital devices as an ability to increase

our capability, our vocabulary, our familiarity, using audio to enhance

our reading because audio and reading are, you know, intimately connected.

These are all parts of using reading as an Fundamental

strategy and language acquisition.

And everyone has to find their own way, but the goal should be to enjoy

it at every stage, to enjoy it.

I once referred to this sort of upside down hockey stick, how in an initial

period, it's tough sledding, you know, it's hard going up that steep hill.

We don't know the language at all hard to get traction, but finally

we get to sort of a level of some familiarity with the language.

But then we have that very, very long path, very, very long path where we have

to acquire so many low frequency words.

It's difficult at first.

And as we acquire more and more words, we're chasing lesser

and lesser frequency words.

However, the amount that we understand, the amount that is clear

to us is increasing all the time.

It seems like we're not getting anywhere, but in fact we are, and we're better

and better able to enjoy the language.

And ultimately, even with some missing words, we can grab that book, sit

down in our, you know, favorite sofa or, or a chair and read that book

on paper, enjoy it and get all of the benefits of reading on paper.

There you have it.

Thank you for listening.

And I have talked about this subject in the past, and I'll leave you

with a couple of related videos.

Thank you.