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20 hour technique | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies |  | |
| luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7205 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French | Message 1 of 15 11 May 2014 at 10:38am | IP Logged | ||
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This video on how to learn anything fast has an
interesting idea that I've found generally applicable in my language learning. It is the 20 hour technique. Basically, set a goal of something you can reach in 20 hours. Things that seem to fit this paradigm. 20 hours on a phonology course. 20 hours listening/reading a book. 20 hours getting a much shorter book under your belt. 20 hours familarization with an Assimil course. (That is about 4 trips through the audio). 20 hours on FSI drills. This may be limited to a particular portion of the course. 20 hours reading a book. 20 hours on lang8. What do you think you can accomplish in 20 hours? 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6597 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 2 of 15 11 May 2014 at 5:22pm | IP Logged | ||
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Is this information available in text form everywhere?
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Henkkles Triglot Senior Member Finland Joined 4253 days ago 544 posts - 1141 votes Speaks: Finnish*, English, Swedish Studies: Russian | Message 3 of 15 11 May 2014 at 5:36pm | IP Logged | ||
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I like it. When one divides large goals into smaller subgoals, they're easier and more satisfactory to tackle.
Let's say that in order to be very good at a language you need 2,000 hours of practice. And I mean very good. Let's play make-believe and say that the Pareto-principle applies perfectly and you need 400 hours to get 80% of the way to 'very good'. That's exactly 20 times 20! As for myself, I'll probably start applying the challenges to my learning once I am out of this exam-bind and get back to actually doing some language learning. I'll probably have something like "read a book in 20 hours", "listen to Russian radio for 20 twenty hours" but I'll have to see. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Mork the Fiddle Senior Member United States Joined 3969 days ago 86 posts - 159 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Norwegian, Latin, Ancient Greek | Message 4 of 15 11 May 2014 at 7:26pm | IP Logged | ||
There is a book of the same title, The First 20 Hours: How to Learn Anything . . . Fast! Amazon lists it in several formats: http://www.amazon.com/The-First-20-Hours-Anything/dp/1591845 556 Abebooks: http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?sts=t&tn=The+F irst+20+Hours%3A+How+to+Learn+Anything+.+.+.+Fast! (I don't know how to post clickable links, and there will be spaces in the url.) I have not seen the video nor read the book, by the way. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7205 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French | Message 5 of 15 11 May 2014 at 7:51pm | IP Logged | ||
That's exactly the direction I was thinking in. Sometimes someone will put up a chart for guided instruction hours to get to a particular CEFR or ILR (FSI) level, such as this one. One nice thing about that particular chart is that the hours of study are all divisible by 20. The hours of study of course varies with language and where you are coming from. What's the same though is that something worthwhile can be accomplished in 20 hours. If we ask ourselves a question like: What would be a challenging but manageable 20 hour goal right now? . Edited by luke on 11 May 2014 at 9:19pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Retinend Triglot Senior Member SpainRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4308 days ago 283 posts - 557 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish Studies: Arabic (Written), French | Message 6 of 15 11 May 2014 at 9:59pm | IP Logged | ||
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This approach might work best if you were going through a language in a grammar-heavy way,
since these types of books split up the language into simple formulas that can be individually mastered, whereas my current technique of shadowing and notebook-making is more holistic and head-on: my target is the large one of completing the book I'm studying with (also to write it out and annotate it) and I keep a daily target of 3 hours which means that this 20 hour target just translates to "a week". But I like this basic idea (the slick guy in the video, less so). I never systematically went through my German reference grammar book with all the exercises - I think I'll try out this method in the summer: spend 20 hours on one article of grammar, and see if it's a good way of cornering my weak points, grammar-wise. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6597 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 7 of 15 12 May 2014 at 3:48am | IP Logged | ||
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I'm finally watching the video and I like it a lot. I certainly agree that the 10k idea can do a lot of harm if it discourages people from even starting.
I'll now write some notes for myself and others. The five steps mentioned are: 1. Decide precisely what you want to learn. A specific goal, not just "learn Spanish". You define a target performance level for yourself. Obviously if you already speak Italian, you can be much further in Spanish in 20 hours. 2. Deconstructing the skill: dividing them into sub-skills and practising them. For us it's the specific layer of basic things like vocabulary, grammar, listening etc. If it feels too simple, it's probably right. Repeating simple things is important. 3. Research: just enough to identify the most important sub-skills. Also, be able to self-correct. The person in the video suggests finding 3-5 courses/DVD's/trainers/people or resources. Don't allow this research to become a form of procrastination. Skim your resources and see what ideas come up over and over. 4. Removing barriers to practice (ie distractions). The time that you set aside should be undivided and focused. (he suggests 30-45 min per day for a month) Also, make it actively easier for yourself. Keep things (books, guitar etc) within reach, also to remind yourself and hopefully get motivated. 5. Pre-commit to at least 20 hours of focused, deliberate practise. Reasons: -checking how important you consider it -the early hours are frustrating -20 hours is long enough to see improvement, but short enough that you can commit and follow through When you're done, commit to 20 hours again and start all over. If you want to continue, that is. Misc: -Motor skills: practise shortly before sleeping. (pronunciation/speaking especially) -Children spend a lot of unstructured time exploring -He's not used the technique to learn a language, but he thinks it works. He mentioned how a small amount of words constitutes 80% of a text etc. I even listened to the "extended" audio version. Actually, I've been doing similar things a lot recently. It also reminds me on what I consider one of the best posts by Benny. It's definitely similar to the Seinfeld calendar idea, but more flexible because it counts hours, not days. So if you miss a day, there's much less discouragement. I also think it can be more useful for female learners. Edited by Serpent on 12 May 2014 at 3:54am 7 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6597 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 8 of 15 12 May 2014 at 7:13pm | IP Logged | ||
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I just reread the multitrack approach thread and wow, so similar to the things described in the video/audio!
For example, he was specifically asked how uncomfortable the initial stage can be. emk's post about "no banging your head against the wall" is the perfect answer. Especially in the early stages, "painful" tasks are probably too difficult. Do something about it. This forum is full of suggestions :) BTW the language-related remarks to the five steps are my own additions. I mostly recommend the full materials to those who want to apply the strategy to other things, especially music (he played the ukulele at the conference/event!) 4 persons have voted this message useful |
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