A simple story of a simple fisherman in Africa has a lot to teach us about building English fluency. Read on to learn from this man’s wisdom.
In a little village, in the middle of nowhere in Africa, there was a man. He was quiet. He watched more than he showed and listened more than he talked. This village was near a river, and all the men in the village were fishermen. They would catch and dry the fish, and then take the fish to a larger village to trade them for other things.
To get to this other larger village, they had to walk. It was a long walk. They walked for five hours. The reason it took so long was because they had to walk around a thick forest. It wasn’t worth it to walk five hours there and five hours back if they didn’t have a lot of fish, so they only did it every once in a while. That’s why they had to dry them. They would get old and stinky if they weren’t dry.
Dry fish aren’t as good as fresh fish, so they often traded lots of dry fish for only a few things. That kept the village quite poor.
The man thought about this, and one day, he did something different. He was going to take his dried fish through the forest. The other men of the village didn’t understand what he was doing and told him not to do it.
It was very slow and difficult. It wasn’t just a five-hour trip. He had to push his way through bushes and plants, watching out for the ones with thorns. He got very tired and hungry, so he had to take some breaks and eat some of his dried fish. It took him the whole day.
By the time he got to the big village, it was dark out. The other men had already come, sold their fish, and gone home. The villagers were surprised to see him and asked why he was so late. They laughed when they heard he had gone through the forest. No one wanted to buy his fish, but one of the village families hosted him for a few fish because they felt bad for him.
In the morning, he got up, ate more dried fish, and went back through the forest. The villagers all gathered to watch him because they thought it was funny and unbelievable. Hadn’t he learned his lesson?
He pushed through the forest again, stopping for rests and food as before. He remembered a few of the places he went through and was able to avoid some of the problems, but he found himself still walking into thorn bushes and getting stuck in difficult places.
When he arrived back at his own village, everyone was surprised to see him because they thought he must have been dead or lost forever. They started to call him “Hard Man” because he chose to do something hard when there is an easier way.
A while later, it was time to go sell more dried fish. The men of the village were surprised again that he wanted to go through the forest. Some of them were angry because he didn’t listen to their advice. Still he went through the forest.
This time, he brought his fish, and a stick. He used the stick to hit and push things out of the way, like little plants and thorn bushes. He also used it to break low-hanging branches that were in the way. It was a lot of work, and he was very slow.
Again, he got to the big village when it was dark out. The family that hosted him last time welcomed him in again. They were curious about his trip and what it was like in the forest. He shared with them his trip, and they shared some food and a place to lie down.
In the morning, he went back again. They gave him some fruit for his way back. This time, it was much easier to go back because lots of the plants were knocked out of the way, and it was clear which way to go. He still used his stick to whack things out of the way. He got home while the sun was setting.
Three more times he did this, and now, each time he was faster. The third time, he actually arrived at the big village faster than the other men. He was able to sell all of his fish for the best price. He was gone before the others arrived.
That evening, back at the village, the other men were shocked. Many of them were angry because they didn’t get as much for their fish as they used to. They came to Hard Man and surrounded him. They didn’t know what to say, so they told him he cannot go through the forest anymore.
Hard Man laughed and called them fools. He said they should go with him through the forest, then they can be faster, too. Some of them were angry and still told him not too. Some didn’t know what to think.
The next time they were ready with more dried fish, they started off towards the big village. A few of the men decided to go with Hard Man through the forest, the others were angry and told them not, too, but they didn’t listen. The four of them grabbed sticks and joined him.
With five men whacking the plants, thorns, and branches, the path became a trail. They all arrived before the other men and sold their fish at the best price. They went left and got home earlier than they ever had before. They even had time to cook dinner over the fire when they got back.
Soon enough, all the men of the village decided to take the trail, and it became a very fast and easy way to travel. When the trail was well-trodden, it only took one hour to get to the big village.
The men realized that they could now catch fresh fish and take them to the big village on the same day. They were able to get more for their fish because fresh fish are better than dried fish. The little village became richer, and they thanked the quiet man for his idea and hard work. The started to call him “Fast Man”.
Next, Fast Man planned to go to a bigger village that was farther away through another forest. A few other men wanted to go with him.
Fluency is a combination of speed and smoothness. A snail is too slow to be fluent, though it moves smoothly. A duck is too wobbly to run fluently, though it can be quick. When we picture “fluent”, we see snakes gliding across the sand, sharks swimming through the water, and birds flying in the sky.
But none of these animals start out being so smooth and fast. It takes training. A horse, when it is born, can’t run beautifully, but as an adult it is fast and smooth enough to race on. People take the longest to develop these skills. From a clumsy baby to a sprinter, there is a many-year process.
Building English fluency is like the man who made a trail through the forest. If we want to be fast, we have to work hard, do things the slow way, and repeat.
At first, it takes more work and is slower, but in the end it will be faster and easier.
That’s because the brain works by connecting things with neurons. The things you sense (see, smell, taste, hear, and feel) are stored in your brain as memory, then, the language is connected to those things (the sounds of words, including the feelings you have in your throat and mouth while saying it, and how the written words look) in your brain with neurons.
Later, when you imagine a thing, the neuron connected to that thing brings you the sound of the word, and you tell your muscles to make that sound. As you do this more often, the process becomes automatic, and you are able to say a word instantly without thinking about it. That’s how building English fluency works.
What are some of the ways we prevent ourselves from building English fluency? Like going around the forest instead of through the forest?
1. The Translation Method
Using the translation method to learn is the easy way out with slow results. You immediately know the word you need because it is translated, but it isn’t easy to remember. Later on, because you always study this word through translation, when you want to use the word, you first think of the word in your own language, and then you think of the word in English. This is always slow, even if it seems like it is less work and faster at first.
Instead, we should learn the words in connection to the real thing, just like we learned our mother tongue. Learn the word “ball” through a picture of a ball and the audio the word ball. It is hard work to find a picture and an audio, much harder than just writing “ball” next to the word ball in your language, and it takes more time to review at first, but in the end, you will be able to see a ball, hear the word wall, or even imagine a ball, and immediately think of the English word because your brain has a connection there. (This is why making good Anki flashcards is key to language learning!)
2. Learning Only Written English
Spending lots of time reading English is a good thing, but if we only learn English through text, then we won’t be building English fluency. We have to surround ourselves with the sounds of English and immerse ourselves in a world of English. Movies and videos are great ways to do this if you can’t spend time in an English-speaking place, but remember you have to speak English, too, not just listen (more on that later).
This can also be a problem with the textbook approach. Textbooks can be great and helpful guides that give structure to your learning, but if you only learn through textbooks, you’ll struggle with building English fluency. You need to have more hands on experience with people communicating in English.
3. Receptive “Studying”
A common problem we talk about is the sit back and relax “studying” method. It’s just taking it without doing anything. This is easy at first, but it is slow to get results, and it will never result in high English fluency. What does it look like? Just doing what is fun and easy, like watching English learning videos, one right after the other, or listening to an English book for your study time every week, or looking up lists of vocabulary and reading them.
While this is easy now, we aren’t building connections from the real things in life to the muscle controlling part of our brain that helps us speak. We are just building connection between things and the sound or sight of a word. Without the practice of saying it and using it, it’s only half- way to true English fluency. Don’t get me wrong, you can and should use these things in your studies, but you can’t only watch and listen without any of the work involved in speaking it out and practicing it with a buddy.
The point is that you have to produce to build English fluency, not just receive.
4. Studying Things You Don’t Understand and/or Use
We don’t often end up studying things we don’t understand, but it can happen. Especially if your teacher is leading the learning process, and they think you should learn something. I’ve had teachers spend forever explaining to me the word for something in Chinese, to no use, because I didn’t know what that thing really was. Only much later, when I learned what it was (a food that I ate), I was able to learn the word, and it was easy to learn. If you don’t understand something (here you can translate to check for meaning if you need to or look it up online for pictures), why try learn how to say it in English?
Also, if it’s not a word you use, you will most likely waste a lot of time trying to remember it. Teaching kids “pedal” isn’t very useful if they don’t ride a bike. Similarly, we learn much faster when we learn things of interest, because we think of them more and talk about them more. Focusing on these things speeds up building English fluency a lot. In time, as you grow your English, you will find yourself talking about other topics more often, and you will develop in them then. But for now, stick with what you need and will use (like business English if you want to do business with English speaking people) and things you like (because you understand it and will use it often), and stay away from things you don’t understand and never talk about.
A lot of teachers are well-intentioned when they try to teach you difficult to understand stuff or fancy, rare words, but it isn’t helping you. Always stick with the more frequent and common ways of saying things until you have those mastered.
Let’s all learn from Hard Man who became Fast Man for taking the time and hard work to make a faster, shorter path to the big village, and let’s make faster and shorter paths in our brains from real life things to the muscle control system in our brains for building English fluency.