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Hours of listening to fluency | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| shk00design Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4443 days ago 747 posts - 1123 votes  Speaks: Cantonese*, English, Mandarin Studies: French | Message 9 of 37 07 July 2014 at 7:46pm | IP Logged |
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Listening is part of the equation, the other part is communication. You can only carry on a dialog with
somebody in real time (face to face or Skype). Knowing what is said in a radio broadcast is part of your fluency test. The other part is to be able to speak like a native and the only way to do that is to get feedback from natives. I came across a language learning method call "shadowing". Basically you play an audio soundtrack and try to repeat what you hear simultaneously even if you don't know any word / phrase in the language. All you are doing is imitating sound patterns in a language. Learning a language is more than listening. You go about your daily activities (work, shopping, etc.) which requires verbal communication. Edited by shk00design on 07 July 2014 at 7:47pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| montmorency Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4827 days ago 2371 posts - 3676 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Danish, Welsh | Message 10 of 37 07 July 2014 at 8:27pm | IP Logged |
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@glidefloss:
I know you asked about TV watching, but don't discount the value of listening to radio and/or podcasted versions of radio programmes. I don't know the Spanish-speaking world of radio as well as I know that of say, German, but I'm sure it's pretty wide. Looking at Spanish National Radio for example: RTVE there are at least a couple, maybe more, channels that seem speech oriented, and quite a few podcasts to choose from: RTVE podcasts. There must be much more out there, especially from Latin America. TV/DVD has some pros, like getting visual clues to meaning, and subtitle options. On the other hand, those can also serve as a distraction to listening, which is vitally important. When you only have audio, you really have no option but to buckle down and listen. I like to close my eyes to further reduce distractions (obviously only when safe to do so). But as emk and others have said, you really need some sort of structured course like Assimil to begin with. There will be time for lots and lots of other native input a little later, but it's not really the place to start learning, except as background, to pick up the general sounds of the language. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| montmorency Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4827 days ago 2371 posts - 3676 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Danish, Welsh | Message 11 of 37 07 July 2014 at 8:47pm | IP Logged |
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p.s. The RTVE channel Radio Exterior seems to be like BBC World Service or Deutsche
Welle, and because it's for overseas consumption, it's possible that the language is slightly slower and clearer. RTVE Radio Exterior It also has its own series of podcasts: RTVE Radio Exterior podcasts 1 person has voted this message useful | |
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6908 days ago 4250 posts - 5711 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 12 of 37 07 July 2014 at 11:28pm | IP Logged |
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I know one TV method experiment which didn't lead to any impressive skills (some HTLAL members may know which one I'm thinking of), and that was after many more hours than "just" 300. Still, watching TV as a language learning method is probably better than nothing, but combining listening/watching with some dedicated study is preferable - even if it's just a transcript and possibly a translation.
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| holly heels Groupie United States Joined 3885 days ago 47 posts - 107 votes Studies: Mandarin | Message 13 of 37 08 July 2014 at 12:33am | IP Logged |
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Unfortunately, even if after understanding all 300 episodes or telenovelas perfectly, it doesn't automatically make the learner fluent.
Try watching a TV commercial. Or the news. You may be very disappointed. I am at a point where I can understand almost all of a Mandarin soap opera that I am sampling right now. But the TV news that comes on right before it is a different story. I am humbled every time I watch it, and am frustrated at at how much my understanding level in Mandarin fluctuates, not just from day to day, but from from minute to minute. The native speakers on TV news, witnesses to crimes, for example, are often mumbling or crying or both. Even if I listened to them 300 times I still could only guess as to what they are saying. Sometimes I catch Spanish TV news and my understanding level of Spanish is sometimes better than my understanding of Mandarin, even though I only studied Spanish for 2 months. Now of course native speakers of English when they listen to Spanish news would have less trouble understanding it, at least many of the nouns. So they could more easily transition to watching more difficult programs. Since the word "fluency" was used, I really believe that that the gold standard for fluency is something more difficult than a TV drama, even though watching TV dramas might be a good way to get out out of that no man's land between intermediate and fluent. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| kujichagulia Senior Member Japan Joined 4846 days ago 1031 posts - 1571 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Portuguese | Message 14 of 37 08 July 2014 at 2:40am | IP Logged |
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I've been regularly watching TV since moving to Japan 11 years ago. I'm sure I've logged much, much more than 300 hours, and I'm nowhere near fluent. For eight or nine of those years, I didn't do much consistent studying. TV by itself doesn't work.
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| glidefloss Senior Member United States Joined 5967 days ago 138 posts - 154 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, French | Message 15 of 37 08 July 2014 at 4:25am | IP Logged |
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Really great comments all around. I'm impressed.
I should have included a little more information. I was studying French when I started this profile, and haven't updated it since. A few years ago, I used various techniques for French that I learned from this site and others. I was happy that I was able to go from a failing grade in French 101, a beginner college course, to getting a good grade in an intermediate conversation course the next semester. That's probably not impressive to anyone here, but it was a big coup for me, to listen and talk in another language, after watching TV and reading, meanwhile not knowing any grammar rules or spelling. I'm sure I had many, many flaws, though, with my French, and I don't understand much of it now. I probably made many mistakes in my learning process, and I suspect one of them was that I used a limited amount of material. I mostly worked with dubbed Seinfeld episodes (only a few seasons), and two or three books. This time around, I have L-R'd some Harry Potter books (I soon got interested in the plot, and ended up speed reading them in English-only), and often listen to the audiobooks for many hours a day in the car. What was the TV experiment that did not work? 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| glidefloss Senior Member United States Joined 5967 days ago 138 posts - 154 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, French | Message 16 of 37 08 July 2014 at 4:33am | IP Logged |
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PS
I guess I do not mean true fluency, but just an ability to understand TV programs clearly, almost every word. From there, I might use other techniques to learn more, including speaking. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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