Want to Take the Fast Track in English Learning? Pay Attention to These Points in Foreign Magazine Study

On the long journey of language learning, both beginners and students cannot avoid studying foreign magazines. In the process of preparing for MTI or learning English, I believe everyone has accumulated a considerable amount of reading from foreign magazines. If you want to effectively improve your English level and make full use of foreign magazine resources, what are some good study methods? Let's take a look together!

No.1 Emphasize "Reading" Aloud

Many foreign magazine resources come with original audio, but many students do not pay attention to this and often only read silently. Reading foreign magazines aloud is very important.

Read the article out loud the first time to discover unfamiliar words, unfamiliar pronunciations, and get a general impression of the content. Follow the original audio for shadowing practice the second time, trying to imitate the original voice and intonation. Moreover, while reading, understand the connotation of the article and clarify the author's meaning.

The third time, read to understand the structure of the article, treating it as a composition and thinking about how you would organize the logic if you were the author.

When you get a foreign magazine and don't know where to start, reading it out loud is definitely the right method. A fear of difficulty is not advisable; facing challenges and accumulating knowledge over time is the truth.

No.2 Vocabulary Usage Accumulation

Fans of foreign magazines like The Economist and The New York Times must be experts at accumulating new words. Foreign magazines often use some very interesting words, including not only rare words but also metaphors, references, and changes in part of speech of common words, which are very thought-provoking.

When you encounter such words, you must look them up in a dictionary in time, understand their usage, and accumulate them in your notebook for future use.

There are also steps to look up new words that require everyone to do detailed work, such as:

- Pronunciation of the word

- British/American dictionary annotations

- British/American dictionary example sentences

- Corresponding Chinese meaning of the new word

- Usage of different parts of speech

- Synonyms/same meaning replacements, etc.

No.3 Long Sentence Analysis

After learning new words, the next step is to understand complex sentences! In fact, many colleges like to test complex sentences in the postgraduate entrance examination to see the candidate's ability to analyze sentences. Complex sentences are definitely one of the steps that must be tackled in intensive reading of foreign magazines.

Of course, you also need to develop your own set of methods for dealing with complex sentences. A sentence that occupies 3 or 4 lines may seem daunting at first glance, but as long as you analyze the vocabulary and clarify the sentence structure, the problem will be solved.

First, set aside the branches of the sentence and go to the main structure, which is the subject, verb, and object, and then analyze other components of the sentence, such as clauses and parenthetical phrases.

During the reading process, it is important to focus on practicing complex sentences. The more you practice, the more naturally you can improve your understanding of complex logic. When encountering long sentences, we can observe the sentence structure, and if necessary, copy and recite, organize examples with similar structural logic, learn by analogy, and apply them to compositions in the future.

No.4 Background Knowledge

Some foreign magazine articles are highly specialized, some are highly timely, and some involve historical and cultural backgrounds. Reading foreign magazines is also a good way for us to understand foreign cultures. While reading foreign magazines, it is very important to supplement the background of related articles. For MTI learners, you can also learn encyclopedias, and for English learners, you can accumulate more directional knowledge.

Some foreign magazines, such as The Economist, have already categorized the articles. We can read foreign magazines from a specific section. In this way, it is easier to summarize and conclude the background knowledge of this module.

No.5 Reviewing to Learn New

Don't think that foreign magazines are just ordinary readings that can be discarded after a few reads. Foreign magazines are a good way to improve reading and composition levels, and if you read them and throw them away, the long-term effects will be greatly reduced.

After reading a foreign magazine, you can try to retell it in English or Chinese. A few days later, you can review your notes or practice writing compositions based on the theme of the foreign magazine.

The above five methods are suitable for every English learner. There are thousands of ways to learn from foreign magazines. While drawing on other people's learning methods, everyone should also summarize their own learning model.

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