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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| mrwarper Diglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member Spain forum_posts.asp?TID=Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5218 days ago 1493 posts - 2500 votes  Speaks: Spanish*, EnglishC2 Studies: German, Russian, Japanese | Message 49 of 53 17 March 2013 at 5:46am | IP Logged |
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OK, thank you all. Because to the parallels, we can redirect otherwise perfectly valid reflections to the more in-focus (here) subject of language learning. :)
One can't improve unless [s]he admits to not knowing all that there is to know about a particular subject, and that work is necessary to learn what is not known to us yet, and even more work is necessary to master that subject to any degree. Such seemingly obvious realizations can be surprisingly 'not fun' at all, or even very painful, for an ever growing amount of individuals because in a pendulum movement of Western civilization we've been increasingly bombarded (a lot of feedback between cycles) with messages telling us how awesome we are, so we don't need to improve ourselves and we'll be loved for who we 'truly are', and how we all will be rock stars and all we should care about is being happy. Such childish messages —for 'happiness' can only be told from mere animal-like satisfaction by individuals who have some maturity, i.e. not children— are especially dangerous for immature individuals, who find critical thinking difficult because critical thought itself also requires some maturity in the first place. The problem is, the more children are bombarded with such nonsense the harder it is that they snap out of it later. And because many don't, this is the message they help to transmit to their own children when they become childish adults. We have seen this phenomenon expand and extend to more and more areas, and one of them is education. When was the last time you heard of schools encouraging students to work hard and better themselves through studying and (hopefully) learning? Now it's all about having 'fun' classes. The problem is, 'fun' should be a nice addition to learning, not the primary goal. And it is a problem because once you're out of school you won't be judged by how much fun you had but by what you can and cannot do because of what you learned. However, while this 'fun!' is a general message in modern education, it doesn't equally affect all areas — and language learning, because it looks so accessible to everyone, is completely devastated. I mean, after some reality settles in, I'm hardly ever questioned in my methods if I am to give a math class. After all, I am the guy who knows the subject, I know what it took to learn it, and, if I'm any good, I'll be able to make it accessible to the students so they can master it through hard work. Except for the hairy details I'm eliding that's what any good class is about. Now enter a language class, and everyone and their mom (yes, students and their parents, literally) is not only allowed but encouraged to give their own opinions and question my methods on absolutely no basis without ever looking at the results whatsoever. And poor me if my classes are not fun! Rings a bell? :) That's why most modern language classes are a complete waste, and why those who really want to learn something are better off on their own nowadays. As many here found out, the problem with that is, it is ever harder to snap out of that primal 'come on, let's have fun' mindset on your own and actually study when that is the only thing classes have been teaching you all along. I am ever so grateful to my parents for teaching me how much fun learning is in itself in the first place, so if I ever get to the point where I need to learn something for real, well, I just sit and work -- no wondering why it didn't happen magically ;) 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Woodsei Bilingual Diglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Woodsei Joined 4789 days ago 614 posts - 782 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Egyptian)* Studies: Russian, Japanese, Hungarian | Message 50 of 53 10 April 2013 at 12:14am | IP Logged |
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Very deep, your log, mrwarper, and I say that with the utmost respect. I enjoyed
immensely your take on languages and, generally learning, in the introduction, and did some soul searching after reading your battle with depression. Good luck to you on every front. I'm also passionate about learning and education, so I definitely get your more abstract points, although I may have differing ideas on a few topics, like the humanities vs. sciences debate :) I'm not here to stir up this topic again, though ;) So keep on fighting! Looking forward to more posts! 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Woodsei Bilingual Diglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Woodsei Joined 4789 days ago 614 posts - 782 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Egyptian)* Studies: Russian, Japanese, Hungarian | Message 51 of 53 10 April 2013 at 12:18am | IP Logged |
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How about implementing "fun" in a constructive way? Like curriculum redesign for
instance? Education can be both fun and serious. Hard work can be fun! Now I'm not a masochist, but it's in the way education is approached by both it's deliverers and receivers. I think psychology plays a major role on how education can be implemented. The stigma needs to go, I think :) 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| mrwarper Diglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member Spain forum_posts.asp?TID=Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5218 days ago 1493 posts - 2500 votes Speaks: Spanish*, EnglishC2 Studies: German, Russian, Japanese | Message 52 of 53 04 January 2014 at 7:01pm | IP Logged |
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Thank you everyone for bearing with me :)
Thank you so much, woodsei, for your words, I'm sorry to hear you had a really tough year, and I'm sorry not to have commented in our team log, but I owed you a reply here too and knowing it didn't help exactly -- then, as many people will imagine I didn't return to the forum until a bit before Xmas anyway. I had begun posting in lots of threads and right after Xmas my grandmother fell extremely sick and eventually died on New Year -- so I 'vanished' again after my short comeback to help handling this more important stuff in real life -- sorry about that everyone, I don't think I'll have the energy to further track 'pending' messages and threads. I prefer to start 2014 as a blank slate too, if just a few days late. Long due 2013 summary General (I) It was a year of little to no real language study, again. Unlike the previous one, though, a lot of important stuff happened off-languages so I didn't feel like I was being too lazy. I'll outline that a bit after individual languages. And anyway, I managed to study a bit, albeit it felt so inadequate that I didn't even update my progress post. German The plan was to consolidate my German and pass a B2 test, which I didn't. What's more, my B1 feels rustier than ever, so I'm not sure I can even claim that. Here's a short summary why. I generally agree with my teachers that being ready to try and pass a B2 level test means I've already have all the necessary German grammar explained to me, so in theory all I needed was to make some real use of German and keep my grammar manuals handy to consult when in doubt. For the first half of the year I just checked out digital TV channels, and tried to watch some German TV-movies. These still looked God-awful so I decided to leave at that and get German-dubbed versions of shows I did like. I let life get in the way so I never got round to it. June came, I sat the test and I was amazed both at how much I had forgotten and how much I still could do. The German B2 is a serious test here, so I didn't pass but no surprises. At the same time my best friend sat the English B2 (a less serious test here), and passed. The test was held again in September, so a month later I decided to try and cram to to take it again. While I would generally advice against cramming for a test I decided to do so as an 'experiment on cramming' of sorts. I thought the school materials I had would be good at least for cramming the vocabulary and a few samples for specific tasks I'd be expected to handle, but I was too rusty and the materials were a complete disaster anyway. Then my grandmother fell severely sick (a signal of what would come later) and kept us all hovering around her for a month, which further destroyed any attempts top or hopes of making any progress in time, i.e. if one doesn't get round to do something, then it's really hard to find the time if there's always got to be somebody at hospital, or driving them to and fro. So, no study, no September test, no nothing. In short, the only progress I made wrt German in 2013 was assessing for real how rusty I am and replacing my 'modern' (aka crappy) school materials with good old school, no-pictures books that may be difficult for 12-years-olds but not for adults. Russian Letting life get in the way of my German I did in several more ways. Another was taking on tutoring a Russian kid since April (off and on). This would normally be just a several hours per week disturbance, i.e. nothing, but the kid has two little siblings I instantly fell in love with, so I ended up spending hours on end with the family. This has of course led to my being exposed to lots of spoken Russian, albeit vastly different from the kind I had become used to, and more pleasant if you ask me. Hanging out and drinking with men iss over, having tea and pastries with mom and two little kids while we do other fun stuff is in -- or was until Xmas. I planned to build up on this by taking the opportunity to combine this outstanding opportunity with formal study -- but life got in the way of German, which had clear priority over Russian, so everyone can tell this plan wouldn't really work out. For good reasons, I let other activities eat into my studying time -- I would have felt immensely guilty of neglecting studying priorities too and doing Russian instead of German. Still, my Russian has seen advances, however little or hard to quantify. Yet another way life got to get in the way of my language learning was granting me access to my university library again, which led to more priority re-arraigning and a good amount of hours scanning books. This of course, included some really good Russian language manuals which I should have ready for the upcoming 2014... which should be a tiny victory in a field of failure. Japanese Never got round to calling any of my friends, and neglected my team too :( But I got to scan some very promising Japanese manuals too -- and got the audio this time ;) BTW scanning books takes a bit of time, then post-processing them takes considerable more hours and all of that has been done so please don't say I'm just lazy. General (II) Having spent a lot of time here at HTLAL made me start the year thinking I had more to digest than further learn about language acquisition, but boy was I wrong! Other important stuff that ate into my studying we is lots of time spent with kids of different ages (5, 7, and, to a less extent, my 13yo student), which gave me an incredible opportunity to re-learn first hand how differently their learning (language-oriented and otherwise) is, both from one another's and from that of adults. Too much to go into details here, but immensely valuable. I also engaged in many activities with them both short and more mid-term oriented, which, in turn, will help me with other stuff that had been deterring my language learning too: discipline and never letting things happen without a 'proper' setup. Now, this is taking ages to write and I'm also overdue with the new 2014 log. The 'discipline' story and such are also more like something I learned and will use in 2014 for languages rather than something I actually did in 2013, so for those interested, read it in my log for 2014 :) Edited by mrwarper on 04 January 2014 at 7:03pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5326 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 53 of 53 04 January 2014 at 7:11pm | IP Logged |
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The good thing about this forum is that it is always here for you when you get back after having been dealing
with real life issues. I am terribly sorry about your grandmother. My condolences. I trust that next year will be better for your studies :-) 1 person has voted this message useful |
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