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"I want to learn X in Y months" - useful? | ||
Tags: Measuring Progress | Goals | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| tristano Tetraglot Senior Member Netherlands Joined 4046 days ago 905 posts - 1262 votes  Speaks: Italian*, Spanish, French, English Studies: Dutch | Message 1 of 23 09 October 2014 at 12:06am | IP Logged |
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Hi everyone.
I have a question for you, based on your experiences. I noticed, on myself, a pattern. I constantly fail when I put a tight deadline tu reach a certain level. Personally my productivity drops in such situations. So if I have to talk about this, I'm biased. Probably is different for other people. But if I put on myself a goal as a number of study hours, I can stick with it and the results are tangible. So, I noticed that a lot of people set a tight deadline like "B1 in 5 months". Now I have a doubt: is it really useful to set a goal like this? It is for sure to someone that wants to challenge himself to how fast can learn a language up to a certain level. But is it relevant in the long run if you just want to learn the language? Or you just hit a wall where you cannot anymore learn that fast and in the long run you learn the exact amount of things even if you go much slower? I would have pleasure reading your opinions. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4706 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 2 of 23 09 October 2014 at 12:59am | IP Logged |
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I give myself smaller deadlines than that. 5 months is a long time for a project and I
don't have the discipline to reach or check whether I am a certain level or not. Instead I set myself small tasks like "do x activity in language y successfully". It helps to have a real threat waiting, like an actual exam you're taking, or an actual trip you're planning. Don't just set a goal, set a goal that makes sense in the context of your work, life and future. Edited by tarvos on 09 October 2014 at 1:00am 5 persons have voted this message useful | |
| daegga Tetraglot Senior Member Austria lang-8.com/553301 Joined 4520 days ago 1076 posts - 1792 votes Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Swedish, Norwegian Studies: Danish, French, Finnish, Icelandic | Message 3 of 23 09 October 2014 at 1:17am | IP Logged |
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My results are best when I don't care about the goal and just enjoy the road. Works only
once I've reached a certain level though. Before that progress is fast enough so I don't need goals anyway, I just try to enforce progress. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Stelle Bilingual Triglot Senior Member Canada tobefluent.com Joined 4143 days ago 949 posts - 1686 votes Speaks: French*, English*, Spanish Studies: Tagalog | Message 4 of 23 09 October 2014 at 1:26am | IP Logged |
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I find that quantitative goals are much more useful to me than qualitative goals.
Some examples of quantitative goals: - I'll run through my anki decks every day this month - I'll do 3 Skype sessions per week for the next four weeks - I'll read for 30 minutes at least five times a week this month - I'll finish up to the end of lesson 9 by the end of the month - I'll write five short paragraphs by next Friday I like SMART goals: Specific Measurable Achievable Relevant (I can NEVER remember how to spell that word...) Time-bound The qualitative stuff - being fluent, being able to carry on a conversation comfortably, reaching the equivalent of a B1 level, being able to read a novel for fun - is much more subjective. It shifts based on my mood, the number of hours I've slept, and whether or not I've had my morning coffee. On Monday I might announce that I've had a fluent conversation, only to find myself stumbling over words on Tuesday. So "a fluent conversation" just doesn't make sense to me as a goal. The quantitative stuff is much more objectively achievable. So long as you put the time in, there's no failing at the quantitative stuff. And if you work on the quantitative goals, you'll eventually reach the qualitative "big goals" that you have in the back of your mind. The qualitative stuff is a result of the day-to-day quantitative stuff. edited to ask: Do I win a prize for the most frequent use of the words "stuff", "quantitive" and "qualitative" in a forum post? That's a thing, right? Edited by Stelle on 09 October 2014 at 1:32am 12 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6596 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 5 of 23 09 October 2014 at 2:14am | IP Logged |
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I think that it's best to find a specific problem to solve (in one or even several languages) and aim to deal with it in 20 hours.
I also like material-related goals, like the Super Challenge and most other challenges. The ones that allow you to switch to other content as soon as you get bored or tired. Edited by Serpent on 09 October 2014 at 2:19am 6 persons have voted this message useful | |
| robarb Nonaglot Senior Member United States languagenpluson Joined 5058 days ago 361 posts - 921 votes Speaks: Portuguese, English*, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, French Studies: Mandarin, Danish, Russian, Norwegian, Cantonese, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Greek, Latin, Nepali, Modern Hebrew | Message 6 of 23 09 October 2014 at 3:54am | IP Logged |
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I agree with several above that the useful goals are the ones that describe what you will do, rather than what
level you will achieve. The latter can be fun for bloggers and maybe useful if there's an externally imposed deadline for something you're going to need to do, but otherwise not as good. Why's that? If you're not meeting your goal of how much you're going to study, this motivates you to solve the "problem" by studying more. Good. If you're not meeting your goal of reaching B2 level, this motivates you to question your abilities, despair, and can't be directly solved by simple actions. Bad. It is kind of nice when you set reasonable goals for achievement and then easily surpass them by a long shot, though. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7204 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French | Message 7 of 23 09 October 2014 at 4:08am | IP Logged |
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I like small guidepost goals. Sometimes these are mixed in with a large goal.
Examples: Add 10 words per day to Anki from Frequency Dictionary. (1.5 year goal - 5000 words). FSI - Get through the current tape today. Mid-term goal - One unit a month. Long term goal = Get through the course (24 units) in two years. Listen/Read a short interesting book enough times that I can understand it well when just listening to the audio or reading the target language. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Ari Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 6581 days ago 2314 posts - 5695 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese Studies: Czech, Latin, German | Message 8 of 23 09 October 2014 at 8:04am | IP Logged |
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I hate goals, but like routines. I guess they're sometimes the same thing? The basic
thing is to do stuff I enjoy, and as long as I'm putting in the hours, I will progress. Routines are good because they give me a sense of accomplishment, which is how they're like goals in a way, I guess. When I finish my Anki reps for the day, I feel good about myself. I usually look at my stats and say "Ooh, 86% on mature cards, that's pretty good!". And maybe look at all the decks and go "Just a few more days and I'll hit 12,000 mature cards!" and such. I don't like setting these up ahead of time, though. I've realized that I'm afraid of failure. When there's a goal and a way of failing, I don't make an effort, because if I try and fail, that'd be bad for my fragile ego, but if I don't try, I can always tell myself that I'd have made it if I had put in the effort. Needless to say, this hampered my grades in school, but I somehow still managed to become an engineer, and I've learned to work around my lazy personality. And the way to do this is to think in terms of activities and processes, and not measureable goals. So my advice is: know thyself. Try to find out your personality and how you work best. Then find a way to study that plays to your strengths. I suspect goals are great for some people, but it's not that great for me, so I don't set any. 7 persons have voted this message useful |
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