不出國也能學好英語？

其實，我們學英文跟有沒有到國外深造是兩碼事。

Even here in China, you can speak very beautiful English. You can learn to write English without any grammatical errors.

（即便在中國，你可以寫出漂亮的英語。你可以學習寫出沒有語法錯誤的英語。）

換句話說，你在國內是完全可以營造一個說英語的環境的。

Quite a few people have been living abroad for quite a long time. Yet, sometimes they come back to China for a visit on vacation. The problem is that when they speak English, they still have a very heavy accent. That』s one thing. Another thing is that, when they speak English, they tend to stutter.

（許多人在國外居住了許久。然而，有時候當他們回來中國度假。他們的問題是他們講英語時還是帶著很重的口音。這是其一。其二是他們說英語時往往還會結巴。）

Occasionally, they will carry a lot of Chinese in their English. This goes to show that their English is not very fluent, even though they have been staying or living abroad for quite a long time. In other words, if you want to speak very fluent English, it has nothing to do with whether you have been staying abroad or living in a country where English is the native language for quite a long time. It has something to do with whether you have the ability to learn to speak English on your own. You have to build up an environment where you speak English. You yourself are the main role.

（有時，他們說英語時會夾雜許多中文。這表明儘管他們已經在國外待了很長時間，他們的英文還是不太流利。換句話說，如果你想說一口非常流利的英語，與你是否在英語為母語的國家待過或居住過沒有關係。那與你是否能自己學說英語有關。你必須營造一個環境，在這個環境里你要說英語，你在這個環境中就是主角。）

Take me for example. I was born in China a long time ago. I』m now 68 years old. Before I was 18, I was very playful. I wouldn』t bother to study English because at that time, this language was very tough to me as far as I was concerned. My family was very poor. My father was a soldier, and my mother was what they called an illiterate(文盲). We had to run a very small restaurant. Actually, it was not called a restaurant. It was just a greasy eatery. I had to do a lot of chores. For example, I had to do the dishes. Occasionally, I would carry some food to those rich families. And sometimes, they would ask me to stay there and they would just call their daughters or sons out and take a look at me, saying: 「see, if you don』t study hard, one day you will be just like the boy.」

（就拿我自己舉例好了。很久以前我出生在中國。現在我 68 歲了。我十八歲前，非常貪玩。我不會費心去學英語，因為那時候，英語對那時候的我來說很難。因為我家很窮，我爸爸是個軍人，我媽媽是所謂的文盲。我們必須經營一家餐館。其實那也稱不上是一家餐館。那隻不過是一家小吃攤。我得做很多家務事。舉例來說，我得洗碗。我偶爾還會外送食物去有錢人的家裡。有時候，他們會叫我待在那裡，接著就把他們的兒子或女兒叫出來看我，說：「如果你們不努力學習，就會像這小子一樣。」）

我姓賴，所以別人叫我小賴蟆，在方言中就是癩蛤蟆的意思，就是 toad，中文意思是沒出息的人。I was nobody at that time. 但是後來我開始發奮，因為我知道不努力就不會有出息。

When I was 18 years old, I failed to pass the entrance examination for colleges and universities, so I was pretty depressed. However, I managed to enter a military academy. It was during that time that I began to study very hard. I changed myself; I changed my philosophy of life. I learned to speak English on my own. And then I had a chance to talk to a lot of American soldiers occasionally, usually on weekends. I was very thick-skinned.

（我十八歲的時候，未能通過大學入學考試，所以那時候我非常沮喪。但是，我設法考進了一所軍校。正是在那段期間，我開始勤奮學習。我改變了自己，我改變了我的人生哲學。我靠自己學會說英語。接著我有時候會有機會去跟很多美國軍人聊天，通常是在周末的時候。我那時臉皮很厚。）

This doesn』t mean that I didn』t study other courses. Because other courses had to do with journalism, they were also considered very important of course. But other than that, any spare time I would try to save for the purpose of leaning English. I began by working on my pronunciation. I tried very hard to mimic those American teachers on the big record. And then, before I knew it, I was able to pronounce every single phonetic symbol very clearly. And then I began to be able to read one word, and then two words. And then, I sounded more and more like a native speaker. I felt quite happy at that time. Gradually, I had confidence in myself. I knew that when it comes to learning English, everyone can be a talent because it doesn』t take too much talent to learn English.

（這並不意味著我當時不學習其他課程。因為別的課程與新聞學有關，所以那些課程也被認為是很重要的。但是除此之外的任何零星時間我都會省下來學習英語。我從改善發音開始。我非常努力模仿那張大唱片上美籍老師的發音。接著，很快地，我能夠很清楚地發出每一個音標。然後我開始能讀出一個詞，接著是兩個詞。再接下來，我聽起來越來越像母語人士。我那時感到相當開心。逐漸地，我對自己產生了信心。我知道提到學英語，每個人都能是一個天才，因為學英語不需要太多天分。）有關於 talent 這個詞，我一會兒加了 a一會沒加，不加表示「 天賦」，加了表示「有天賦的人」。

從那之後我就開始不斷練習，然後從簡單的會話，進行角色扮演。之後給我帶來巨大影響，能使我極大地豐富辭彙量的就是I tried to read English newspapers. You know, a typical English newspaper usually contains different kinds of articles.（我試著讀英文報紙。你也知道，一份英文報紙通常包含了不同類型的文章。）In this case, you can pick up a large vocabulary. 你就能累積巨大的辭彙量。用 a large 修飾 vocabulary，因為 vocabulary 是不可數的。不可以說 He knows many vocabularies.我就是因為看英文報紙，勤查字典，At the same time I bothered to look up words I didn』t understand in those dictionaries. 我講的是 those dictionaries 不是 one dictionary。我用了很多詞典，不斷翻閱抄例句。And also, I bothered to jot down example sentences, as many example sentences as possible. By doing so, I was able to learn to understand and come to the conclusion that the more you expose yourself to example sentences, the more easily you』ll be able to use those words. I』m telling you the truth.（同時，我不厭其煩地抄寫儘可能多的例句。這樣做，我能學會理解這些句子，並得出了結論，你越多地接觸例句，你月能使用出這些字詞。我說的是實話。）

環境是要靠自己創造出來的。到國外念書有直接的好處，因為你直接可以接觸到英文環境，但這種好處僅限於用功的、對英語有興趣的同學。但是，後來我公費到美國留學，見到太多中國同學，上課的時候，可能因為本性害羞，都聚在一起。而我，是直接坐在外國同學的圈子裡，同時，抄筆記。所以，我並不是到了美國有了全英文的環境才開始學習英語，而是在台灣的時候，我就已經苦練好了英文。中國人是很聰明的，我們可以自創一個環境，你每天聽到英語，說英語、寫英語。你會說，我不知道自己說的寫的是否正確，You don』t have to worry about this. With the passage of time, you naturally pick up the right kind of English. （你不要擔心這個問題。隨著時間流逝，你會自然地學會正確的英文。）我們小時候學習中文的時候，也沒有特意學習語法，所以我在想，Grammar is important. But to begin with, when you』re just beginning to learn English, put aside the knowledge of grammar.（語法很重要。但是首先，你剛開始學習英語的時候，你要把語法知識放到一邊。）然後多看多背多念英文，你會被正確的英文所影響，慢慢你就會創造出說英語、寫英語的環境，而且隨著時間的流逝，你會說出一口正確漂亮的英語。最後，你會有學語法的需求，比如說等你需要做翻譯、同聲傳譯的時候，儘管已經積累了很多，你發覺自己功夫尚淺，再去看語法，馬上就會看得懂，正所謂是水到渠成。