Improve your reading skills

Day 4 of our New Year tips. Reading is really important when learning any language. It helps improve your vocabulary and from that you will see improvements in your writing, speaking and listening skills.

Reading can, however, seem quite difficult if you are reading levels much harder than you can manage. If you are reading a book and have to look up every other word, it is time consuming and can become quite disheartening. Furthermore, you won’t stick at it.

The first idea is to read texts on subjects that you are interested in, so you have background knowledge before you start. Then, jot down in your notebook some of the more common words and see how much you can do.

In a lot of languages there are “easy reader” books which are books either written simply for particular levels, or they are abridged and simplified versions of existing books. These allow you to increase your reading skills without stopping at every word to look it up. You will be able to read more fluently, similar to when you read in your native language. Finding these books may require some searching on the internet but this is time well spent.

How do you decide what to read in a foreign language?