AVERINA, E.D. READING A NOVEL WITH LITERARY TRANSLATION SUPPORT
(A technique developed and tested in a 25-year pedagogical experiment by the Head of the Foreign Languages Department, Candidate of Pedagogical Sciences, Associate Professor E.D. Averina)
This technique can be used by learners who have already mastered the basic vocabulary and grammatical models but cannot yet understand a text without word-for-word translation. This is exactly what they will learn by reading one or two novels with translation support.
I recommend this exercise starting from the second semester instead of traditional home reading, which turns into a tedious search for words in the dictionary and copying them into personal vocabulary notebooks. Instead, you can prepare to retell what you’ve read using this text work technique.
The methods used in a standard language course are based on the mechanism of conscious memorization, which, as my research has shown, is less effective for foreign language learning than the mechanism of unconscious memorization that underlies the proposed technique.
When your attention is focused on understanding meaning rather than analyzing grammatical models and word formation, your brain has the opportunity to form a language system at the subconscious level and practice using it to extract meaning. This is the natural process of reading, both in one’s native language and in a foreign language. This is precisely what should be practiced when learning a foreign language.
For this, only one thing is necessary: an avalanche-like flow of language information through your brain. But how can this be achieved if you don’t yet master the foreign language to that extent? Use the technique I’m offering! It allows the brain to process the maximum amount of information in minimal time, repeating already learned words, expanding vocabulary, and applying mastered grammatical models in practice.
Guidelines for Reading a Novel with Literary Translation Support
Abandon reading short stories, articles, and poems!
The work should be long, at least 200 pages, because only in this case can you expect that by the end of reading, thanks to sufficient repetition of vocabulary and syntactic models, understanding will become significantly easier. You should not choose adapted texts. Select a novel that you want and are interested in reading, with plenty of direct dialogue, preferably by a contemporary author.
So, you need to find one novel in two languages: foreign and native. This is perhaps the most difficult part of implementing this technique. Use the services of stores that sell books in foreign languages, including second-hand bookstores, and libraries—state or those of your acquaintances.
After selecting a pair, under no circumstances read the work only in Russian. The effectiveness of this technique is based on the interest that arises when you read, on the desire to know how events develop. If you first read the work in Russian, the technique will only work partially, and you will have to find a new pair of books, which is quite difficult.
Work Procedure:
- Read a complete passage (about 5-7 lines) in the foreign language.
Goal: Based on the impressions formed when reading familiar words, try to imagine the described picture, even in the most general terms—that is, to formulate a hypothesis and understand what is being discussed. - Read the same passage in your native language.
Goal: To “film” a movie in your imagination for this text—that is, to evoke in your consciousness a chain of images corresponding to the text in your native language, and to clarify your hypothesis. - Read the same passage again in the foreign language, clearly imagining the sequence of pictures and the pictures themselves.
Goal: To recognize in the foreign text the “titles” for the images that arose after the previous reading. In scientific terms, to superimpose the semantic series onto the visual.
Read paragraph by paragraph in this way, enjoying the content of the literary work.
What NOT to do during reading:
- Look up words in the dictionary or ponder grammatical problems: this would significantly reduce reading speed and lead to lexical and grammatical analysis at the conscious level, which this technique aims to wean you from.
- Compare the translation with individual words and sentences in the original, bypassing the chain of images, because you are working with a literary translation, and the translator is free to change sentence structure and length to make it sound beautiful. However, every translator strives for the most accurate transmission of meaning.
What is RECOMMENDED:
- At the end of a session, reread all the pages covered during that session in the foreign language, imagining what you are reading.
- After finishing the novel, reread it quickly again, without relying on the text in your native language.
My twenty-five years of experience using this technique in teaching adults and children has shown that it is an excellent bridge for an easy and fascinating transition from educational activities in learning a foreign language to creative speech activity in that language.
Recently, I received a letter from India from a former compatriot dedicated precisely to using this technique. Allow me to quote a few lines:
“I graduated from an English special school and had an ‘A’ in this subject, but I practically didn’t know English: I couldn’t read or speak, even though I had studied the language since the second grade for 5 hours a week. I was in graduate school and had to pass my qualifying exams. I decided I wouldn’t translate. I would first learn the language, and then read everything I needed.
And then your book fell from the sky (specifically ‘Foreign Language in 200 Hours’). I tried reading a novel with literary translation support using your method. I managed 250 pages of Moby Dick (what a book I chose!). It was as if a wall had collapsed! After that, when I opened a specialized text (I was studying English philosophy), I realized that mysterious constructions like ‘THAT WHICH’, ‘THEREFORE’, ‘THOUGH’ suddenly became understandable by themselves, logical and clear without any explanations or translations.
Finally, I could enjoy using textbooks, dictionaries, and reference books, and I had the feeling that I was moving forward, not banging my head against a wall.
Gradually, I began to read specialized literature in French as well (with the same ease as in Russian and English). But I can also read Molière with a dictionary, and with pleasure.
For the last 6 years, I have lived in Auroville and teach physics, chemistry, biology, and philosophy in English at a school. Every Aurovillean should ideally know 4 languages. Many try, but few succeed. It seems to me that if people are not familiar with your method, they are missing something. I would like to introduce local teachers to it…”
I think this letter will dispel your doubts, and you will use the language learning system I propose.
I wish you success!
Elena Dmitrievna Averina
The learning system I developed for translation-free mastery of a foreign language is detailed in the book “Foreign Language in 200 Hours,” St. Petersburg, 1994, which is now available from me in electronic format.
For all questions of interest, you can write to me by email: eaverina@yandex.ru.
Also visit my website: https://eaverina.ru/