Rose English Fantasy

The Forty Most Important Minutes Each Day: Are You Using Them Well?

人一天最重要的40分鐘，你用好了嗎？

Recently I had a conversation in Beijing with an adult Chinese friend who was complaining how difficult it is to study English. No surprises there. It is a difficult language to master, just like Chinese.

最近我在北京聽一位中國朋友吐槽英語難學。這並不奇怪，英語跟中文一樣，都不好學。

I made a few suggestions based on my own experience. One involved a very valuable fact which I learned from my high school Latin and Greek teacher. He was a Jesuit priest, a gifted linguist, and had an amazing ability to memorize things, like poetry, essays, speeches, etc.

根據親身經歷，我有幾點建議，其中也包括我高中拉丁語和希臘語老師的真傳。這位老師是名耶穌會的牧師，很有語言天分，對詩歌、論文、演講等記憶力超群。

His advice to us students was that for memorization purposes, there are forty minutes each day in which our memory is vastly more receptive than it is during the other 23 hours and 20 minutes. This 40-minute “super memory” period is divided into two parts: the 20 minutes before we sleep, and the 20 minutes after we first awake.

他告訴我們這些學生，人在一天之中有40分鐘記憶力最強，接收能力超過其餘23小時20分。而這“記憶超強”的40分鐘又可以分為兩段：臨睡前的20分鐘和醒來後的20分鐘。

The theory supporting this is pretty simple. First, the last information you input into your brain before a good night’s sleep has a better chance of taking root than information acquired during the hustle bustle of normal daily routine; and, second, your mind is free of distraction when you first awake in the morning — so more receptive to inputs, like a blank slate.

要證明這一理論十分簡單。首先，在進入夢鄉前把資訊植入腦海比在白天亂哄哄的情景下更容易紮根；其次，早晨醒來精力不容易分散，就像空白的葉岩，吸收能力更強。

I took the advice to heart and it served me well in my school years. In my university days, our Chinese teacher would assign us 200 new vocabulary words each day, on which we would be quizzed the following day. Without the “magic” forty minute technique, there’s no way I would have passed those daily quizzes.

我牢記他的教誨，上學期間身體力行，受益良多。大學期間，我的中文老師每天都會教200個新單詞，次日還要搞小測驗。幸虧有這“魔力40分鐘”秘笈，否則我早就“掛科了”。

The technique really works, but like many things, it takes practice and discipline to hone and perfect it.

這個辦法真的很管用，但和其他很多事一樣，也需要練習和自律才能日臻完美。

As far as language study goes, it’s not only useful for memorizing vocabulary. It’s also a very useful window of time in which to listen to the language you’re studying, even as background noise, and even if it’s at a level you find difficult to comprehend. It might be audio language study aids, or just radio, TV or whatever.

隨著語言學習的深入，這個方法不僅對背單詞有幫助，也可以成為鍛煉聽力的最佳時段，而且不論收聽的是背景音、晦澀的內容、外語聽力材料、廣播、電視、還是其他什麼。

Beyond our years of formal education, memory skills are hugely important in any career.

記憶力除了上學必需外，在各行各業中也很重要。

How many times have you heard a speaker read their speech from a prepared text, or read the word-by-word content of a powerpoint presentation as they present each slide?

你聽過幾個演講人會照本宣科，又見過幾個人在做演示時會逐字逐句地朗讀每張幻燈片的文字？

These are annoying, distracting, boring, and ineffective ways of communicating. They are almost guaranteed to lose the audience’s close attention and interest, let alone persuade or inspire anyone to do anything. And yet lots of people still make this mistake.

這樣的溝通方式令人厭煩、精力渙散、枯燥乏味、效率低下，保證會讓聽眾興趣索然，味同嚼蠟，根本就無法說服或激勵聽眾採取行動。但仍有很多人會犯這樣的錯誤。

If you use the “forty minute” technique, you may not succeed in memorizing your presentation contents on a 100% word-by-word basis, but you’ll be familiar enough that you can spend much more time making eye contact with your audience. You will engage them in the process, while glancing at your text instead of staring at it. This will also free up your hands and arms to add some emphasis through gesture.

運用“40分鐘”技巧，也許你並不能一字不落地背誦演示稿，卻可以充分掌握內容，從而留出更多時間與聽眾進行眼神交流。你可以讓觀眾參與其中，抽空兒再掃一眼螢幕，不用緊盯不放。你還可以解放胳膊和雙手，增加一些動作，以示強調。

Memory is of course a big challenge for any language learner, especially as we grow older. Possibly an even bigger challenge, which starts around the pre-teen years for most people and gets progressively worse, is the fear of looking or sounding stupid.

不管學習哪國外語，記憶都是個難題，特別是隨著年齡的增長。另外一個更大的難題可能是大多數人從年少時起就害怕出醜，而且越老越怕。

Younger children are generally uninhibited by this kind of self-consciousness when among their peers, and that’s one reason they learn language so quickly. They are not afraid to mimic, even if they get it wrong. Mimicry and imitation are core elements of the natural process of language learning.

小孩子因為還沒有形成在群體中的自我意識，所以學習語言會更快。他們不怕有樣學樣，就算犯錯也無所謂。重複和模仿是語言學習過程中的核心要素。

So, for young adults learning English or any second language, my advice would be threefold: 1) seize the forty-minute learning window; 2) slay the dragon of self-consciousness associated with mis-pronunciation or sounding funny; and 3) find ways to use the language outside of the classroom, as regularly and frequently as possible.

所以，我對學英語的年輕人有三點建議：一要抓住四十分鐘的時間窗，二要克服擔心念錯或發音搞笑的心魔，三要在課餘時間儘量找機會多用。

One fundamental rule of language learning is: “Use it, or lose it.”

語言學習的根本法則就是“用進廢退”。

The paybacks of success are enormous and life-long.

成功的回饋十分巨大，終生受用。

Likewise, the cost of failure is high. It includes all the money spent on tuition and associated expenses, plus a huge amount of time poorly spent. Not necessarily wasted, but poorly spent because the results could have been so much better.

同樣，失敗的代價也很慘重。不僅是學費和相關支出打了水漂，付出的時間成本也不可估量。雖然說不上是浪費，但與取得的成果相比就得不償失了。