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Moving from B2 to C2 | ||
Tags: Advanced Level | Learning Strategy | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5433 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes  Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 121 of 177 22 February 2015 at 4:22pm | IP Logged | ||
Very well put. I can't agree more. I hope this puts this whole tutoring business to rest and that we can talk about something else. One thing I want to touch on briefly is what it means to be a really good speaker of another language. Sure, we have in mind the idea of native-like proficiency, sort of the way we speak and write in our first languages. But we should also keep in mind that not all natives express themselves the same way. There may be regional differences, but more importantly, there are differences of quality that are usually the reflection of the amount of formal education. As victorhart said, you want to frequent high-quality and trustworthy sources or models. This is where good advice is very valuable. If I may use that dreaded word tutor again - or let's say resource person - I would say that it's important to get guidance as to what is proper or not. This is especially important in languages with major regional differences. Similarly, it is important to develop a sense of social register or level of formality. My tutor is always amused by my written Spanish because it is full of rare words and expressions that I love to use. I probably sound like a stuffy old fart in Spanish. But I do know how to lighten up when necessary. In my opinion, the key hallmark of high proficiency is the mastery of idioms. This encompasses things like puns, fixed expressions and proverbs. For people who are interested in passing exams, this is what really wows examiners. Great grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation are important, of course, but the ability to use the language to a second degree shows real mastery. Edited by s_allard on 22 February 2015 at 4:23pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Kc2012 Diglot Groupie South Africa Joined 4476 days ago 44 posts - 65 votes Speaks: English*, Afrikaans Studies: Dutch, Mandarin, Russian | Message 122 of 177 23 February 2015 at 6:13am | IP Logged | ||
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Wow I had no idea this thread would generate so much buzz and discussion. Thanks to
everyone who has contributed. It has been extremely helpful for me (and I'm sure many others) to hear the opinions of successful language learners on the topic. I have taken all of your ideas on board. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6706 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 123 of 177 23 February 2015 at 9:21am | IP Logged | ||
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It was also a surprise that it would generate so much animosity. It has been in severe risk of been closed before time, but it seems that the tone has been slightly less acrimoneous on the last couple of pages - let's keep it like that. Edited by Iversen on 23 February 2015 at 9:21am 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5210 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 124 of 177 23 February 2015 at 10:54am | IP Logged | ||
That's another important point that hadn't been mentioned until now, that needs to be mentioned if we're discussing reaching advanced levels: register. A lot of the corrections I've had for my Italian writing have been along the lines of "that's correct, but it sounds too formal" or "this sentence is strange because it has a mixture of formal and informal registers". Like everything else we've discussed, I think a lot of input from a variety of sources is crucial to getting a good sense for it but a helping hand to point out your own mistakes can also be very useful. The discussion about corrections raises an interesting point for me: I've come across lots of people who have been in immersion for years, who understand the language very well and express themselves fluently, yet keep making the same fairly basic mistakes. Some examples in English are "depends of" instead of "depends on", "is good" instead of "it's good", or in one case, always using the article "an" and never "a". They've surely heard and read the correct form thousands of times, yet they still get it wrong, so I don't think one could claim that the problem is simply lack of input. I also doubt that they've never been corrected. I think with both corrections and input, the important part isn't just getting them, it's what you do with them. A correction probably won't fix the mistake by itself; it's a sign to the learner that they need to then go and work on it, be it by studying or just increasing their awareness and paying more attention when they speak and write. Similarly with input, it's not enough to just understand it, you also need to pay attention so the words, expressions, grammatical forms etc. that you're hearing or reading, at least sometimes. Extensive and intensive input has already been discussed a lot on here; the people in the examples I gave probably get more than enough extensive input but not enough intensive. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| patrickwilken Senior Member Germany radiant-flux.net Joined 4536 days ago 1546 posts - 3200 votes Studies: German | Message 125 of 177 23 February 2015 at 11:07am | IP Logged | ||
Do you think these people have done much reading? I get the impression that those people I know in English who make these sorts of simple grammatical mistakes tend to be less well educated and/or be embedded in their own language communities. There are different levels of immersion after all. The old guy I buy beers from at the corner store speaks some German, but not a lot, even after decades here because he's only partially immersed. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| mrwarper Diglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member Spain forum_posts.asp?TID=Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5229 days ago 1493 posts - 2500 votes Speaks: Spanish*, EnglishC2 Studies: German, Russian, Japanese | Message 126 of 177 23 February 2015 at 12:17pm | IP Logged | ||
OK, since we're apparently back from the rantlands...
Exactly: the single most important part of an individual's learning is always what they do with what they're given. Many people seem to think of learning or studying exclusively in passive terms, like attending classes, getting a tutor or plowing through books and films will make them magically learn somehow -- sorry to break it to 'you', folks, but putting in the hours just doesn't cut it, you need to get involved to get something out of it, call it 'intensive input' or whatever you like. That's what I meant when I said I try to take after my prestige models in foreign languages, that I sometimes cringe at how people say things in my native one, etc.: I pay attention to others' production, and I take the effort to compute the differences with my own hypothetical production under the same circumstances (What Would I Say?), and to incorporate any results to my 'stuff pool'. The same goes for registers: unless you work on something heavily decontextualized, you can always have a good guess at register (and everything else) and, if interacting with live speakers, you can ask about it, or maybe even get corrections, spontaneous or not. But if you do nothing with that at the end of the day, register (and everything else) will simply fly past you. What exactly is more important is different depending on levels, and register awareness probably belongs high up, but it's the same principle at work all the time. I may have been special or unique as an independent learner, so any data about me would be anecdotal, but I was certainly one of many in my school years. Input was exactly the same for all of us, yet some people learned and some didn't. And there's no need to get all carried away on 'learning styles' or how less learners are likely to get to the higher percentiles -- the broadest and deepest cut was between those who sat and those who worked through classes -- Spanish, English, Physics or Biology. It wasn't any different at college and I doubt it is with fully independent or one-on-one learning. I still chuckle at how a Russian friend clapped and cheered when his wife spontaneously corrected herself from 'ruso idioma' to the correct Spanish 'idioma ruso' (Yeeees! There is progress at last!!)... after ten years of immersion, no kidding! No difference with a young couple I tutored for a short time to help them get a C1 certificate in English. If you get a correction, if it is pointed out how important it is, if you're still friends with the people who repeat the same correction over and over again, what is left to do? It must be important to you as a learner. Sometimes the light bulb goes off, sometimes it doesn't. As to why it may take ten years, I'll be damned if I know :) Edited by mrwarper on 23 February 2015 at 1:45pm 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5210 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 127 of 177 23 February 2015 at 1:30pm | IP Logged | ||
One of the people I had in mind is a keen reader and has read a lot in English and other languages, did a University degree on languages and literature, and has also read a fair few contemporary books. I think it comes back to the point I made and mrwarper expanded on: just doing all that reading isn't enough if you're not making an effort to actively learn from it. But in most cases, it's people in the situation I described in one of my previous posts, where they speak a lot of English but mostly with other non-native speakers. That's probably also a factor as they'll reinforce each other's mistakes. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5433 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 128 of 177 23 February 2015 at 2:36pm | IP Logged | ||
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I think error correction is probably one of the biggest challenges in moving from an intermediate to an
advanced level. In my opinion, there are two aspects to this problem: identifying the mistake and correcting it First, one has to be made aware of a mistake. The big problem here is how. Just to rewind a bit, one can ask why do we make mistakes in the first place if we have lots of good input. As has been pointed out by others, it's what you do with the input that counts. Unless you pay really close attention as you are developing your internal model of how the language works, it's easy to misinterpret or misconnect a detail in the language. And let's not forget the constant danger of interference from one's native language. The end results is that inevitably we make mistakes in the learning process. Will more input, such as more reading, solve the problem? Probably to some extent. But the assumption here is that exposure to the good forms will automatically eliminate the bad ones in the reader's output. This doesn't always work because mistakes have become so fossilized that the learner is totally unaware of the mistakes and keeps repeating them. For example, I hear French-speakers say things in English like "it depends of" or "make attention". This is where external help is so valuable. There is no way one can do this by oneself. Mistakes that you may have been making for years are quickly identified. And I hardly need to mention that so many tiny things can go wrong. The devil is in the details. I have found in Spanish that it's things like prepositions and use of the subjunctive that are still tripping me up. The second aspect of the problem is what to do after the mistake has been identified. Recent posts are full of good advice in this area. The only thing that I would want to add is what I call " going back to basics". The idea here is that since we know that in reality a small number of words and constructions make up the majority of output, it's extremely important to totally master these core or key components. I suggest reviewing this material from time to time to make sure that everything is under control. This usually involves some explicit study of grammar and vocabulary but I believe that this will help sweep away those elementary mistakes that one should never make at an advanced level. For example, the inflections of the 100 most common verbs must be totally mastered. Period. There should be no hesitation there. If this means reviewing verb tables and drilling them, that's what you have to do. There are of course thousands of other verbs that you may come across but since you are guaranteed to use the most common ones, you should at least get those out of the way. And most of the time those other verbs will follow common patterns. Then one has to explicitly monitor one's speech or output to make sure that the corrected forms have replaced the mistakes. This is not easy if those mistakes are deeply ingrained, but that's the challenge. The interesting thing here is that, in my observation, things basically fall into place as the correct forms start to sound right because of all that good input that one has already been exposed to. The correction is reinforced by the input. Edited by s_allard on 23 February 2015 at 2:37pm 6 persons have voted this message useful |
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