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Looking up words on digital dictionary slows me down, does it get better?

So my main language is Greek and I read english and greek books. Depending on the book/author I may have 2-5 words per page that I may not understand (or at least I want to understand them better). Thus, many times after I finish a page, I use aard2 and either search the word in the english-to-english dictionary or (rarer) in the greek wiktionary for a translation. (For context, I’m reading ~mainly fantasy, sci-fi or dystopian books of the 20th and 21th century and currently I’m on “Croocked kingdom”. I haven’t dared to try reading a classic book in english.)

The issue is that this effectively slows me down by an extra ~50% time per page and I’m not even very sure that those words are remembered. I could simply keep reading without searching the words up and just use the context to get a vague sense of their meaning (or simply ignore them as they ~usually aren’t necessary to the plot), but I think I’d miss on the whole experience by doing this and it doesn’t address the underlying issue (being that I don’t know english extremely well even if I have C2 and scored high on vocabulary), which will perpetuate the problem. I’d like to note that I have made searching words almost as efficient as it gets by using downloaded dictionaries, so I don’t think I can reduce the time I spend looking up words by anything more, at least on paper books.

I’d like to ask anyone who searches up words like me:

Did you eventually reach a point where you learnt enough words this way, that it wasn’t that much necessary to use dictionaries anymore? (I’d be kinda satisfied if I could reduce the frequnecy of unknown words to 1 per two pages or something.)

Corr ,

I’ve seen your comments about reading digital media but if you can get an eink screen (kobo, amazon paper white, etc) it Doesn’t feel like a screen at all. Then you can look up words right there. Ive started doing it every once in awhile as a native English speaker since its so convenient.

That said I’m gonna start picking up French again (hopefully) and that’s gonna be tough because my vocabulary was always lacking in French and I haven’t really read anything in French in years.

I hope you enjoy crooked kingdom. I really liked both books. All the characters are so cool :)

BlastboomStrice OP ,
@BlastboomStrice@mander.xyz avatar

Yeah, I might buy an eink reader one day, they seem useful (at least if I find one I can freely modify its software?). Especially because I don’t have much physical space to store books.

I’m in the beginning of the second book, so not much to comment about it, but I liked the first one, lots of action and nice characters/world :)

Good luck with the french books😄

Corr ,

I think I’ve heard of people putting custom images on kobos but I Don’t know too much about it. I’m just using stock kobo and not connecting it to the internet and it’s been great for me

Timecircleline ,

I’m a native English speaker with a fairly robust vocabulary and I still look up words now and then. E-readers make it super easy, and since I get most of my books as e-books from the library it’s easy to learn new words. My recent word is “solicitude”.

Empricorn , (edited )

Hmm, yes. I’m glad you’re enjoying reading. I’m showing care and concern for someone…

EDIT: It was a dumb joke about the definition of “solicitude”.

ascense ,

It gets better, but learning vocabulary at that level is going to feel very slow no matter what. I would recommend keeping a fairly low bar for just ignoring words and moving on, as keeping up the reading habit is by far the most useful. If reading feels tedious it’s easy to lose interest.

One to two new words per page sounds high enough where you are bound to get repetition, so you may want to only look up words that seem either important for context or familiar (i.e. feels like something you’ve seen before) to get the most value. I combine that with spaced repetition (Anki) for words that I seem to look up often, but Anki has a bit of a learning curve so it may or may not suite you.

BlastboomStrice OP ,
@BlastboomStrice@mander.xyz avatar

Oh thank you, I guess I should find some balance then between ignoring and searching up words.

Also tnx about the Anki/flashcards suggestion, might look into it in the future.

gueybana ,

Yeah, maybe highlight the words and come back to them

Carrolade ,

Add an additional step into your word-lookup routine: practice it a little bit. Repeat it several times, preferably out loud and with proper pronunciation, consider the definitions a little bit, and compose an original sentence or two that incorporates the word. Personally I sometimes look up the etymology as well, that stuff just interests me in general though.

This will take a few extra minutes, but will seat the new vocab word in your memory better. It can still sometimes take two or three individual encounters to finally have the word fully remembered, but eventually it does just permanently enter your vocabulary.

You’re basically trying to force it from your short-term memory into your long-term memory just like you would with basic schoolwork, using similar techniques.

frightful_hobgoblin ,

Haha been there.

You’re used to reading at 300wpm and then you switch languages and you’re reading at 70wpm, feels mad annoying

BlastboomStrice OP ,
@BlastboomStrice@mander.xyz avatar

Haha indeed, on Greek books it goes very smoothly, but on any other language I start and stop all the time

noobdoomguy8658 ,
@noobdoomguy8658@feddit.org avatar

I’m NOT a native English speaker by far, but I am a translator and a linguist (according to my BA degree, at least) and have spent 2.5 years teaching people English (with great results, too). Hopefully you’ll find my experience relevant to yours and comforting.

My native language is Russian (thanks for the alphabet) and I’ve never been outside the country. I learned English mostly playing Space Station 13, which is an online role-playing game (if you let it be) where you have to read a lot (some of it even outside the game, i.e. guides and forums to get a good grasp of some mechanics) and write a lot (to communicate with other players); I mostly opted for translating single words or, sometimes, short phrases that I couldn’t understand, and did it both ways, i.e. to English and to Russian. On top of that, I spent a lot of time talking to people on the Internet, both on forums of various kind and through private/direct messages.

So I read a lot, admittedly, even if it wasn’t fiction. I also watched a lot of YouTube and other media, but I can’t say it did much for my vocabulary.

As expected, I saw more progress when I was not that good with the language, because I had to face a lot of the frequent words, phrases, and constructions. At some point I just stopped encountering much new.

But that was until I picked up fiction in English. I can’t remember how often I had to look a word up, but I can definitely say that I had to do that more with Lovecraft than Rowling, for example, and never with some others. Hell, sometimes I have to look things up when reading Russian writers.

So, first of all, this is completely normal, especially if it happens with words that you recognize as non-essential for the plot or your understanding of the events. Second, it very much depends on the book and the author.

If I had to guess, you probably experience that with verbs or adjectives, as these usually serve as the means of introducing some variety or profoundness into one’s texts. I would say that, if you can help it, ignore them until they really prevent you from truly grasping the idea of what’s going on or what kind of emotions it’s supposed to invoke. You, however, mention that you are able to infer the meaning of many of the words you look up from context - and I, being a bit of a scientist, say that this is probably the best (if not the only) way to actually learn a word.

I’m saying this because language is a very abstract phenomenon, and so is everything that it is comprised of. In English, for example, we have two separate words for a desk and a table, while both are translated as “Стол” (Stol) to Russian, because the distinction between the two never necessitated a single-world solution to my ancestors, apparently. Whatever people put in dictionaries is an approximation of what multitudes of people that speak the given language think of when they hear or use the word, and that’s very different between languages.

So, I think that the best a person who understands the language as much as you do should just try and consciously resist the urge to look up meanings, for it seems to me that the context can already give you more than enough idea. As a result, I believe you should enjoy the act of reading more and develop a more natural, intuitive understanding of the words you may encounter.

But most importantly, don’t forget to praise yourself on the already-massive achievement you’ve made, and thank yourself for the gift of being able to comprehend the vast amount of literature and other thoughts and ideas that the speakers of the English language have produced across centuries. Good job, good luck!

BlastboomStrice OP ,
@BlastboomStrice@mander.xyz avatar

Ooo thank you for this huge text-wall! I had a similar experience with you too, using social media and doing casual usage of my devices (which almost all use english) was easy, but once I tried english books things got hard😅

After reading all those replies here and doing some thought of my own, I have decided to give some more focus on the flow and search words a bit less frequently (also trying to rehearse those words before I start reading again next time). I also think that I might have fewer unkown words on this book :)

My main issue now seems to be that I get disctracted easily and I want to do many things during summer, so I get a bit of choice paralysis, but I think I might figure these out myself.

Thank you for your time writing all this, it’s nice to see people writing big texts (with proper structure too).😊

noobdoomguy8658 ,
@noobdoomguy8658@feddit.org avatar

Thanks and you’re welcome!

I somehow forgot to mention this: don’t worry too much about rehearsing words. This is not the most effective way to learn them in most cases, because your brain just doesn’t consider something important and worth remembering until it has a very, very good reason to; forcing the repetition of certain words that way usually doesn’t happen to be that reason.

If you know it works for you, though, then go ahead, but otherwise, don’t beat yourself up and don’t give it more time than it deserves. After all, if you don’t happen to ever use the word or even see or hear it in five years or even more, then why really bother? ;)

huf ,

i basically read english books by ignoring/guessing the unknown words and only looking them up if they came up a lot. i did this until the deluge of unknown words dropped to something like one every few pages.

THAT’S when i became a dictionary fiend.

i also like re-read books multiple times, so that helps.

BlastboomStrice OP ,
@BlastboomStrice@mander.xyz avatar

Ohh, that’s kinda reassuring to hear

Strider ,

The only thing I can think of that would be easier would be swapping to an e-reader/app with a built in dictionary function. I use Moon+ Reader myself, but I don’t blame you if you want to stick to physical books.

BlastboomStrice OP ,
@BlastboomStrice@mander.xyz avatar

I actually started by reading pirated digital literature books on my phone and my tablet ~2 years ago, but I eventually switched to paper books about a year ago. I think I disliked the fact that I had to stare at a screen to read, because I’m already a lot of time on my phone and after a point it causes discomfort.

Fun fact, reading was what helped me reduce my reddit time. I swapped the shortcut of infinity (reddit) app with Librera FD (document reader) on my screen and it really worked somehow. Some times I even opened the reader by mistake due to muscle memory, lol. Soon enough though, the api changes came and got kinda hooked again, on Lemmy this time. At least it’s for a kinda good cause.🤷

Strider ,

Yeah I miss the feel of real paper in my hands but I have hundreds of books in this little black box and I like to reread most of them so it’s handy. Sometimes I’ll dust off my Kindle if I’m planning on reading for more than a few hours: the matte screen is a lot easier on the eyes.

That is a fun fact! I try to minimize the number of apps I have installed for that very reason, and the only things I have on my home screen are Moon+ Reader and my email, dialer, and texting apps.

skyte ,

It gets easier. My first language is hindi yet I am now able to read war and peace and bible kjv in a month. You get way faster after some time of doing this but your real way of speaking english doesn’t become as verbose which is my problem. Like you can understand difficult words easily after some time but you will still speak like americans not a victorian with elegance, which is something I wanted hence i started to read above mentioned books but sadly it seems the american anglo internet is what has shaped my english 😔

dandelion ,
@dandelion@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

this probably won’t help you, but just in case:

I went through a phase in my development where I had to look up a lot of words in the dictionary. There was a constant tension between wanting to stay with what I was reading and wanting to look up a word.

I got in the habit of keeping a pad of paper and a pencil nearby when reading, and I made it a habit to look up each word I wanted to know - I could either look it up later and keep reading, or I could look it up right then. After a while I got faster at navigating the alphabetic order of the dictionary and I could open the dictionary close to where the word would be. It was just a matter of practice.

Writing the word down was not just a deferral strategy, but also a way for me to memorize and appreciate the word I looked up - I put in effort to stop reading and look it up in a separate book, and when I first started I would keep forgetting the word and I had to look up words multiple times. Writing it down at first let me quickly refer back to recent words I was trying to learn or remember, but I noticed even just writing it at all made it more likely I wouldn’t forget in the first place (so my pad of paper wasn’t even all that necessary as a reference, though I could and sometimes did use it that way).

This is all much more effort than the digital approaches you are talking about, but it was a method that really helped me learn. I would say the learning phase was really intensive for a three to four month period, then it leveled out and I was looking up words less frequently and it was less necessary. It was especially helpful to study the etymology and learn Latin and Greek roots, which then helped me piece together the meaning of words without a dictionary (just from context and etymological guesses). For a while I even stopped carrying a dictionary, and instead carried a concise etymology dictionary, which let me learn the roots of the word and generally had much less about the definition (but gave me better access to the meaning and being able to memorize it).

BlastboomStrice OP ,
@BlastboomStrice@mander.xyz avatar

Writing down unkown words and searching them on a paper dictionary was how I studied vocabulary in the past, so I see what you mean. I think its gonna be very time consuming and distracting for me so I might not use that strategy.🫤 Thank for sharing your experience and your advice, if I start writing the words down I might let you know :)

dandelion ,
@dandelion@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Yeah, I agree that it is time consuming and distracting. When I was able to do it, I was studying full-time so I could afford the time and effort.

These days I hardly look up any words (digitally or otherwise) 😭

obbeel ,

It gets easier, but I think a mix of the two is more proper. For example, fantasy books may use the words hauberk or tabard a lot, but not necessarily you will know exactly what it is, as it would entail that you had encyclopedic knowledge about it. Besides dictionaries, you would have to refer to Wikipedia or other encyclopedias, which is fine and can be interesting if you are curious.

You have to balance your curiosity with the need to read along the text in a rhythm that you like. I also find those estimates used in many internet articles (indicated by x min read) to be much longer than what I usually take.

It gets better and you do not have to be perfect at it, as nobody is.

BlastboomStrice OP ,
@BlastboomStrice@mander.xyz avatar

Yeah, eventually thats what I decided to do, finding a balance :)

Thank you for your optimism and your suggestions😊

marron12 ,

Both ways can work. Looking up words, and trying to guess the meaning from context. I use both, depending on my mood and the situation.

I like trying to guess the meaning because you have to think things through. That helps you remember the answer. Doesn’t matter if you got it right or wrong. It’s not always easy, but it gets better with practice.

You can usually look at the situation and narrow it down to a few possibilities. If my guess seems decent enough to get the gist, I keep going. Usually, you’ll find something that helps you figure out if you were right.

If I see a word several times, I usually look it up. Otherwise, it’s probably not that important (unless I happen to be curious).

And if I look up a word and forget it, no big deal. Happens all the time. I’ll either come across it again, or it wasn’t that important.

It can be slow going, no matter what option you choose. But if you keep at it, you can get to a point where you rarely have to look things up.

OmegaMouse ,
@OmegaMouse@pawb.social avatar

Similar to some of the other commenters, I’m a native English speaker and (especially now that I have an ereader) I’m often looking up words. Previously when reading physical books, I’d just go off the context and assume I vaguely knew what the word meant, because looking it up on my phone would be quite time-consuming. However now that I have the built-in dictionary on my ereader, I’m constantly using it. Does it slow me down a bit? Yes, but I think it’s worth it. I see words popping up regularly that I was unsure about before but now I can define.

Ostentatious is a great word for example!

You said you were worried about not remembering them - Is there any way you can save the words you’ve looked up? Kobo has a cool thing where you can add these to ‘My Words’ and you then have a list of all the words you’ve saved, with the definitions to look back on. If you’d like you can then go through them to revise and hopefully they’ll stick in your memory.

By the way, I would have assumed that English was your first language! You write extremely well.

BlastboomStrice OP ,
@BlastboomStrice@mander.xyz avatar

Is there any way you can save the words you’ve looked up?

Yes, aard2 has both history and bookmarks (though both limited to 100 most recent words), so I might just start revising them when I stop reading for the day.

Also thanks for your kind words :)😊

papafoss ,

As a native English speaker I have to look up words all the time. One of the best and worst things about English as a language is that it’s actually constantly evolving. It also takes words from other languages and authors have a penchant from just making up words depending on what type of literature you read. I wouldn’t worry so much about reading fast. I understand it can be frustrating. But sometimes words being a mystery is part of the experience. I read a lot of sci-fi and there’s a lot of times that authors will just simply make up a word or concept. There can be an etymology for it based on some sort of like Sumerian text or random stuff like that. So don’t stress it

Rognaut ,

I am a native speaker of English and I do the same thing. Granted not as often but I will definitely look up words I don’t know or remember.

You’re on making your understanding of the English language better by looking them up and eventually you won’t need to look them up, you’ll just know them innately.

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