Stop Translating in Your Head.
Learn to Think in English.
To be honest, it is an easy but time taking process. Although I’m not a native speaker but still I know it is pretty difficult in the beginning when we try to think in English.
Think in single words
When
When your mind is clear and you’re not busy, one to two times a day.
How
If you’re just starting to learn English, don’t worry—it’s never too early to start thinking in English. You can begin as soon as you know even a small number of vocabulary words.
Look around you. What do you see? In your head, try to name each object in your surroundings.
Charles Thomas tells his students to name the things that they see around them, wherever they are.
“As you continue with this, it becomes more of a habit, so things are going to pop up into your head – computer, telephone, chair, desk. Whatever it is…wherever you are.”
Start with nouns and then add in verbs, he suggests.
He says you can also do this at home when you wake up and before you go to sleep.
“I’ve had students tell me that they label everything in their room or their apartments so that these English words, kind of, stick in their heads.”
Narrate your day, Describe your day
When
When your mind is clear and you’re not busy, one to two times a day.
How
A narrator is someone who tells or reads the story. In books, the narrator is the part without dialogue, which describes what’s happening. Many movies—especially documentaries—use narrators to explain certain parts. Now you get to pretend to be the narrator in your life, as if your life were a movie!
Your daily life narration might sound something like this: “It’s morning. She wakes up and rubs her eyes, preparing to face the day. She yawns as she makes herself a cup of coffee, and wonders what she should wear today.”
Thomas asks his beginning-level students to describe their day using the simple present verb form. So, they would think to themselves things like, “I put on my shirt” and “He drives the bus.”
For example, you might tell yourself, “When I leave the house, I’m going to get an iced coffee. Then, I’ll take the train to class. I’m studying with Paola today. She said she booked a study room at the library for 2 p.m.”
Make up conversations, Talk to yourself in English
This is a great way to practice what you might say in a real conversation.
When
When you’re alone and not busy, once a day.
How
Of course, when you speak to other people you don’t just tell them about your day. Conversations come in many different topics, so you’ll want to practice conversations as well.
For example, if you’re planning to go to a restaurant soon you can practice a conversation with the waiter. Think of both the waiter’s parts and yours. Your conversation might look something like this:
Waiter: “Hello, and welcome to our restaurant. Do you know what you’ll be ordering?”
You: “I’m not sure yet. What do you recommend?”
Waiter: “If you like seafood, our fish of the day is fantastic.”
You: “Great, I’ll have that, then.”
You can try the conversation in different ways, and seeing how differently it turns out each time.
Get creative
When
Every time you don’t know how to say something in English.
How
So you’re sitting in your car and practicing your English. That’s great! But what do you do when you can’t think of how to say a word? Instead of interrupting a conversation to pull out a dictionary app, it’s time to get creative.
For example, if you’re trying to explain to someone that you lost your key, but can’t remember the word “key,” you can tell them instead that “I can’t open my door because it’s locked,” or “I can’t get into my house, I lost the thing you use to unlock the door.”
Both sentences don’t use the word “key,” but they’re both clear enough to be understood.
Build your vocabulary
When
Every time you think in English.
How
You know that word you couldn’t remember earlier? (The words you don’t know, which cause you to get creative in #4.) As soon as you can, write down the “definition” in English or the word in your native language. Carry around a little book or use a note app on your phone. Every time you can’t think of a word (or don’t know a word) in English, write it down. At the end of the day, look up these words in English and write them down. This will help you fill in the gaps in your vocabulary.
Now that you have a long list of new words, what can you do with them? The first step is to use them in conversations (and your thoughts). A good way to do this is by grouping the words into chunks. Choose a group of around five words every morning, and use them throughout the day. This will help you remember them in the long run.
Something else you can do with your growing vocabulary list is move them to the digital world. Wordnik is a website where you can look up a word and see real examples of it being used. You can also make a list of words here. Add your new words and learn how to use them. As you internalize these new words you can move from your “vocabulary” list to a “learned words” list.
The Dictionary website (and apps) also lets you add words to a list of favorites, as does the Vocabulary website. Use these websites and lists!
Use an English to English dictionary, Don’t use a bilingual dictionary
When
Every time you look up a word.
How
When you feel more comfortable thinking in English, make sure to do this in your daily life whenever possible. This includes looking up words in an English to English dictionary (with definitions in English). The less you translate, the easier it will become to just think and speak in English.
Think in sentences, Learn vocabulary in phrases, not single words
Our brains are pattern-matching machines that remember things put into context. If I can’t come up with any context examples, I check out Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary or google it.
For example, if you are sitting in a park, you can tell yourself things like, “It’s such a beautiful day” and “People are playing sports with their friends.”
Once this becomes easy, you can move on to more difficult sentences.
Hinshaw sometimes uses this exercise to think about what he wants to say to people in Spanish.
“I definitely try to say these sentences in my head or try to put the words together without thinking too much about if it’s absolutely correct.”
Describe unknown words
Another exercise that both Thomas and Hinshaw suggest is describing in your mind objects you don’t know the words for.
An example would be if you couldn’t think of the word “garage,” Thomas says.
“If you’re looking at your house and you see your garage, but you can’t think of the name in English, you can say, ‘The place inside where I put my car.’ Or you can say, ‘It’s next to my house. I keep things there.’”
He says you can also use shorter phrases, such as “It’s similar to…” or “It’s the opposite of…”
Hinshaw says doing this can help learners of any language. As a Spanish learner, he does it himself.
Take notes
Hinshaw suggests writing down just five to 10 new words and phrases each day.
Keeping a notebook, he says, helps you remember the situation that you needed that word or phrase for. This makes it easy to recall when you are in such a situation again.
Practice it daily
Thomas says do a little every day.
“So when you’re doing it every day, over and over again, little by little, that’s the key. Because, when you make things a habit, then it just pops up into your mind without thinking and then, before you know it, really, you’re thinking in English.”