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3 things which work & 1 bitter admission | ||
Tags: Learning Experience | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| vermillon Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4678 days ago 602 posts - 1042 votes  Speaks: French*, EnglishC2, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, German | Message 9 of 17 29 August 2012 at 12:40pm | IP Logged | |||||
What language led you to this conclusion? Did you experience this several times or just for one language? And would you say it is related to the level you're trying to reach? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Zimena Tetraglot Groupie Norway Joined 4592 days ago 75 posts - 146 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, German, Spanish Studies: Czech, Mandarin | Message 10 of 17 29 August 2012 at 12:45pm | IP Logged | |||||
I agree about all of these, but especially about number two. I've realized that I resort to "doing things the easy way" if I can - as in: If people who are actually native speakers of a language I'm learning also understand me in Norwegian or English, I will automatically tell them things in those languages instead of trying to find out how to express it in the language I'm trying to learn. Or even worse: Our communication might actually end up being entirely in Norwegian/English! One interesting fact is that I used to have a German mail-friend some years ago. When we started exchanging emails, we would both write in English. However, once he realized that I was taking German lessons in school, he started writing me in German. I obviously appreciated that, but it took me forever to write him back, as it took much more effort to write in German than in English. Sometimes we would also chat online or even speak on the phone, and here comes the awesome part: Whenever I tried to resort to explaining things in English, he would pretend that he didn't understand me. I knew that he did, as we had communicated for a long while in English before he started using German with me, but he would still make me repeat in German. Only THEN he would understand, and along the way he also corrected my mistakes and gave me some suggestions to improve the language and express what I wanted correctly. Needless to say, I learned A LOT from this - and it also taught me to be a bit less insecure about my German. Nowadays I'm doing a similar thing learning Spanish - quite a few of my Spanish-speaking friends don't speak English, so that means I have to find a way to express things in Spanish if I want them to understand me. To me, this is extremely helpful - even though I'm not that comfortable with anyone to speak on the phone yet, I'm sure that part will come at some point. ... and then, time to start planning the trip to South America :D 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| numerodix Trilingual Hexaglot Senior Member Netherlands Joined 6783 days ago 856 posts - 1226 votes Speaks: EnglishC2*, Norwegian*, Polish*, Italian, Dutch, French Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin | Message 11 of 17 29 August 2012 at 6:09pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I don't agree about the choice point. The two languages that I've had the best results
with - English and Italian - don't fall into that category. With English I had plenty of choice to go at it half assed and indeed most people in a given population do just that. With Italian I literally had no outside pressure whatsoever, it's purely about liking it. I also think that by setting up that premise you're making it difficult for yourself. The one time in your life when you truly have no choice is when you're 2 and learning your native language. From there on few people ever get into a situation in which they have no choice but to learn another language. And as long as we do have choice we tend to be unwilling to give it up. Edited by numerodix on 29 August 2012 at 6:11pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 7156 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 12 of 17 29 August 2012 at 8:30pm | IP Logged | |||||
1) Relevance of the language to me in at least one of: romance, close friendship, travel, education or work. 2) Quality of material available (structured (e.g. textbooks with audio, dictionaries) and non-structured (e.g. texts, TV shows (with or without subtitles) alike). 3) Quantity of the aforementioned material 4) Effort and effectiveness of time devoted to studying or using the language. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| vermillon Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4678 days ago 602 posts - 1042 votes Speaks: French*, EnglishC2, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, German | Message 13 of 17 29 August 2012 at 8:49pm | IP Logged | |||||
If I may ask, how does same fit in all this? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 7156 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 14 of 17 29 August 2012 at 8:59pm | IP Logged | |||||
How do you mean? 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 15 of 17 30 August 2012 at 4:19pm | IP Logged | |||||
1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| vermillon Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4678 days ago 602 posts - 1042 votes Speaks: French*, EnglishC2, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, German | Message 16 of 17 01 September 2012 at 10:59pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Yes sorry, the spelling corrector.. I meant to ask how Saami was fulfilling the four conditions you've
mentioned. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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