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We, who manage to focus on ONE language | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Tsopivo Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4473 days ago 258 posts - 411 votes  Speaks: French*, English Studies: Esperanto | Message 97 of 142 23 August 2013 at 7:17am | IP Logged | ||||||||
On the other hand, I have the impression that the camp of people who believe that it is better to focus on one language at a time do so on the premise that somehow, the second foreign language is taking something from the first foreign language, as if those languages were necessarily competing for the learner's time and attention. This is simply not always the case. I'll give 2 examples from my own experience : - The first is from when I was in junior high school. In my school, kids started learning their 1st foreign language in grade 6 as a mandatory requirement. They were also offered an optional Latin class starting in grade 6 or 7 (can't remember). As an option, the Latin class was taken during a student's free time and was taken in addition to the mandatory classes. In that case, I do not see how the addition of a second foreign language slows down the acquisition of the first foreign language and I can assure you that the pupils who choose that option did not study English less and did not learn it any slower. The next year, however, an optional "European Section" class which consisted in 2 additional hours of English was added. Due to conflicting schedule, pupils could not choose both the Latin and the English options and the pupils who chose to stick with Latin did get behind those who focused on English (but they were still on par with those students who chose neither options). - The second example applies to my current learning style for Esperanto. Note that I am a beginner in Esperanto and while I speak English, I learnt it in school at first so I still consider myself a newbie in language learning so I think I fit the description of people who should stick to one language. Everyday, I try to meet my objectives in Esperanto and do more study if I can or want to. During my day, I also spent time on various house-chores, sport or physiotherapy exercises that do not really require my attention so I will sometimes watch a movie or a TV show while performing those tasks. Every now and then, I decide to dabble in Spanish so I spend that time in front of Spanish TV shows rather than French or English ones. Except for the risk of interference, I am fully convinced that this has absolutely no impact whatsoever on the speed of my progress in Esperanto. So basically, what I am getting at is that yes, it is better for some people to focus on one language and the quality over quantity is a great approach but you can not apply this to everyone and the breadth over depth approach is no less respectable.
Except it does not really work like that. Saying that you know 80% of English words does not mean that for any given text, you will only know the 80% easiest words. I probably know less than 80% of English vocabulary and I can assure you that my level of understanding is neither poor nor useless and that I knew the words sauna, sirens, casualties, footage and I kind of see what thrombophlebitis is, to the same extent that I do in my native French.
1) We are discussing what is for most people here a hobby. If you want to go in translation or other language related career, it is probably better to focus on one language until you get a very good at it. 2) In a lot of professions, you can absolutely make a living with only 80% of the knowledge in that field. Edited by Tsopivo on 23 August 2013 at 7:21am 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| JC_Identity Triglot Groupie Sweden thelawofidentity.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4123 days ago 53 posts - 108 votes Speaks: Swedish, Serbo-Croatian*, English | Message 98 of 142 23 August 2013 at 7:44am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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@kujichagulia
I would suggest that you look up the originator behind LR and see how she does it. She has a webpage out there. It takes time to prepare material. But it is possible. If don't like fiction there are articles and non-fiction as you mentioned. Now they might be on an advanced level. This is really the point with the whole approach, i.e starting out with native content. You just have to spend some time in the beginning, finding and setting up the material to ensure comprehensive input. I rather spend a whole week if needed of not studying just to get the right material that I like no matter how hard it is. I just need a translation then I am good to go at my own pace. The whole point of your study is to be able to consume these types of content, so why not try to do it from the beginning since today with Internet and everything it is possible. As an example of non-fiction material I have managed to get hold of the Steve Jobs biography in French and English. I don't want to impose anything on you, just saying that it is possible. Edited by JC_Identity on 23 August 2013 at 8:35am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| patrickwilken Senior Member Germany radiant-flux.net Joined 4535 days ago 1546 posts - 3200 votes Studies: German | Message 99 of 142 23 August 2013 at 8:46am | IP Logged | ||||||||
It sucks to be learning a language where you can't find any materials that you want to read. If you can't find anything interesting written originally in Japanese, what about something translated into Japanese? The character set in Japanese scares the hell out of me, but in German at least it was relatively easy to start reading real books at about A2+ on a Kindle with a pop-up dictionary. Depending on your tolerance for speed of reading perhaps you'll need to suck it up and read some books that are a little less interesting for you at first, so you can get to the more interesting materials. I have recently finished reading through the Hunger Games trilogy, and the Harry Potter books; they weren't bad, and they were able to maintain my interest sufficiently when reading them, but they are not books I would have read in English either. The first HP book at 300 pages or so took me just over a month with a dictionary to read in April; the last two books - about 1400 pages - I read without a dictionary in the first two weeks of August. Finally I have started to read authors I like, like Murakami, and my reading speed has gone down, and my use of the dictionary has gone up, but I am learning tons of new words and using a more complex syntax than before. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| kujichagulia Senior Member Japan Joined 4849 days ago 1031 posts - 1571 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Portuguese | Message 100 of 142 23 August 2013 at 8:48am | IP Logged | ||||||||
@JC Identity - I've read several times the legendary threads by the originator of LR. Volte, Serpent and others have harped the virtues of Listening-Reading, and I was intrigued and did some research. The thing that puts me off of LR is that the originator said that you have to be willing to put hours upon hours a day working with the material - I believe she said eight - in order to get the benefits of LR. NO WAY do I want to spend eight hours a day with a book or article - even if I do like it a lot. I could spend eight hours doing various activities if I like them enough, but not eight hours doing one activity, unless it's sleeping. I love my wife, but I don't want to spend eight hours a day with her. You said that you would rather forego study in order to spend that time searching for the right materials to study with. Okay, but I get tired of things very quickly, so is the tradeoff worth it? I hardly read books more than once, or watch movies more than once or twice. I know what happens; why do I need to see it again? So if I spend a month looking for the right material and preparing it, then I use it for a few days before getting tired of it, that doesn't sound very efficient. And if you say, "Well, then that wasn't the right material to begin with," then that suggests I need to spend even longer looking for that one, perfect, fun material that I might spend two weeks with. I could easily see myself taking more time looking for that perfect piece of material than doing actual study. Hell, I spend way too much time here at HTLAL looking for and discussing the perfect way to study my languages. Imagine if I actually used that time for, you know, actual study. Edited by kujichagulia on 23 August 2013 at 8:51am 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| kujichagulia Senior Member Japan Joined 4849 days ago 1031 posts - 1571 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Portuguese | Message 101 of 142 23 August 2013 at 8:59am | IP Logged | ||||||||
No, no, don't misunderstand me here. This is what I already do. I do suck it up and read things that are not that interesting to me, but what I can tolerate. The Japanese novel I'm reading right now falls into that category. I don't really care for that story, but the Japanese is comprehensible and I am learning a lot of useful, colloquial Japanese. Same with the Japanese fairy tale website that I frequent. I use a lot of materials. I'm reading, watching TV, listening to music, etc., with material I don't particularly care for, because I want to progress in Japanese so that I can do the things that are interesting to me. That is what I'm doing. But I'm being told here that, because I can only do that for a few hours a day, and I use the rest of my free time for a second language, I'm doing it wrong, and that I should just focus on one language, and use the time I was using for the other language to do more fun stuff, when I'm not yet at the level where I can do the stuff I consider fun. I never thought that what I was doing was wrong, because I was progressing. So to be told that I am wrong is shocking. 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| patrickwilken Senior Member Germany radiant-flux.net Joined 4535 days ago 1546 posts - 3200 votes Studies: German | Message 102 of 142 23 August 2013 at 9:02am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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There has been a lot of discussion about how learning to an intermediate level will get give you 80% of the language at hand. I think that really depends on how you measure it.
What you really miss-out on when you are below C2 is nuance. For any word in a language there is a penumbra of meanings and associated words surrounding it. As I got better at writing in my native language I realized was that it wasn't the ability to use low frequency words that mattered so much, what was interesting was knowing the subtle connotations and associations that high frequency words would impart if used in a certain context. I completely get the point that the cost of getting to C2 in a language is perhaps too high for most people - and there are lots of benefits associated with learning languages to B1-C1 level - but it's also wrong to think that going for B2/C1 to C2 is just about learning the approximate meanings of some low frequency words. It's as much, if not more, about learning the subtle meanings of high frequency words. There is a special pleasure when you get to that level both in consuming and in communicating in that language. Edited by patrickwilken on 23 August 2013 at 9:05am 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| casamata Senior Member Joined 4264 days ago 237 posts - 377 votes Studies: Portuguese | Message 103 of 142 23 August 2013 at 10:28am | IP Logged | ||||||||
IMHO, the process goes from: Learning high-frequency words→learn many connotations of high-frequency words→learn rarer words→learn connotations of rarer words→learn very rare words/specialized vocab→etc In word form, I think what you are saying is already done by the time one starts to learn relatively unused vocabulary. Did you mean to say "plethora" in your sentence? But yes, being able to speak and write (and understand!) with more skill is definitely an advantage in specialization. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| JC_Identity Triglot Groupie Sweden thelawofidentity.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4123 days ago 53 posts - 108 votes Speaks: Swedish, Serbo-Croatian*, English | Message 104 of 142 23 August 2013 at 10:28am | IP Logged | ||||||||
Have you even tried this approach, is my first question? I do not want to be rude but you are shooting down all advice that people are giving you here. Maybe you are not clear about your interests in the first place. I get the impression that everything is boring to you. I do not like to reread books either so I make sure I use material that I haven't read before and want to read, like the Steve Jobs biography or the "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo". These are not even materials originally written in French so I you don't have to love the culture. I would forego a week of study because I know that I make that week in one day at most. When you enjoy what you are doing and learn from context with a drive to find out the meaning of what you are reading, everything sticks much better. Had I studied verb conjugations or hanzi in isolation, I would have had a hard time getting it to stick. It is also harder to apply when you learn it out of context. Also I would like to say that I do not spend 8 hours of study each day, some days I do but others I don't. I benefit anyway. You need repetition to make things stick but this doesn't mean that you have to spend 8 hours every day or that you have to reread the same passages. I don't. Anyway I think you should keep doing what you are doing. I am not trying to convert you here. I think that it is always wrong to impose one's approach on others. If this does not make sense to you, use what does. I am just sharing what I know works for me. And I do not think I am unique so it might work on others. The principles are the same for all, there is after all only one reality. 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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