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Losing basic Englis yet doing immersion?!

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17 messages over 3 pages: 1 2 3  Next >>
fairyfountain
Senior Member
Zimbabwe
Joined 5968 days ago

254 posts - 248 votes 
5 sounds

 
 Message 1 of 17
12 May 2009 at 1:24am | IP Logged 
Edit: I know there's an h missing in the title, but I ran out of characters!

Greetings!

Some of you may know me from my learning log. I've been doing "total" immersion for more than a month now (I'm only using quality material: podcasts and news radios.I'm especially focusing on American English, and avoiding rap and most forms of music like the plague.)
My listening comprehension really has improved thanks to the experiment. So has my pronunciation ... but apparently, the effect was temporary.
I've basically fallen back a good couple of years - I struggle with basic grammar, have problems finding the right word, and massacre the odd word, French-style or gibberish-style.
Yesterday, I recorded myself - I didn't understand half of what I was saying when I played it back!
It's sort of funny, because at least 5% of it sounded freaking close to native, half of it sounded understandable and the rest just ... yeah, crap.
I'm quite stressed because of oral presentations I have to do soon, but this doesn't justify all that struggling. I feel like I'm forgetting English.


What am I doing wrong?
I'm listening to good English most of the time, and I'm close to understanding it all without having to put in too much effort.

Oh, whatever, I'm giving up and waiting for your opinion guys.

Edited by fairyfountain on 12 May 2009 at 2:02am

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dmg
Diglot
Senior Member
Canada
dgryski.blogspot.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 6851 days ago

555 posts - 605 votes 
1 sounds
Speaks: English*, French
Studies: Dutch, Esperanto

 
 Message 2 of 17
12 May 2009 at 1:35am | IP Logged 
Yeah, I _hate_ forgetting stuff I know I've learned. I go back over the Assimil "New French with Ease" lessons every so often and find that I've forgotten stuff. Or rather, I still understand the dialogs, but I _know_ that some of the vocab has moved back to my passive because when confronted with the word in context I think to myself "Man, I wouldn't have remembered that if I needed it..."

The only piece of advice I can give is to relax. For most people, stress hurts their ability to remember stuff. There certainly are those who thrive on adrenaline and for whom it gives a performance boost, but they're certainly in the minority.
I struggle with this myself too -- being very driven and not wanting to make mistakes. I set very high standards for myself and I only ever see my mistakes, not my progress. We are our own harshest critics. It sounds also like you're just mentally exhausted. Try turning your studies back to a more reasonable level. Spend a little less time doing straight immersion, and maybe go back to shadowing some dialogs. Give your brain a bit of a rest.

I hope everything works out for you. I know you're doing great!
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fairyfountain
Senior Member
Zimbabwe
Joined 5968 days ago

254 posts - 248 votes 
5 sounds

 
 Message 3 of 17
12 May 2009 at 2:00am | IP Logged 
Hey - it's quite odd, but I felt like you'd answer to that question. I may be developping psychic powers, who knows!
First of all, thank you for your insight on the problem. By the way, your French sounds awesome (I even listened to your audio file again to make sure) just so that you know - you're by far the most gifted Anglophone I've talked to. I'm well aware of the fact that compliments don't help (duh, if they did, we wouldn't be in that situation) but I still wanted to say that :p
I don't have the right material to shadow dialogs, let alone anything else, and shadowing is *the* thing I dread the most - especially because I've used it in a desperate attempt to try and sound temporarily English, and it backfired big time.
However, I totally agree with you on the stress issue - the tricky thing is that what calms me down on some level - like podcasts or music - may effectively flip me out on another level.
It's like eating some of the potentially poisonous fish they get in Japan or whatever.
Most of the time, it's safe and the food's good (I guess) but sometimes, people get really sick. (I suppose, I've never actually checked).
It's not like they can predict whether they're eating "killer fish" or not. Well, it's the same for me.
English is the most soothing thing ever most of the time, and I even took lots of naps today while listening to podcasts - I couldn't have slept at all if I hadn't had my mp3 player.
That said, I tend to freeze when I have to produce something myself, because all that immersion has developed my listening capacities and thus... has enabled me to hear my mistakes even better.
I just can't put up any more with playing back audio files I recorded, because I'm like "this sounded soooo wrong and you know it, how can you". I can sort of make all the sounds, but not make them all at once, if that makes sense. I'll consider Tarzan-ish for my exams, LOL.
Anyway, I'll try to get some sleep, and potentially give my brain a bit of a rest. That said, I really don't work as much as I did before. I'm probably sacrificing 3 hours of listening everyday, just so that I don't do "too much".
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Bao
Diglot
Senior Member
Germany
tinyurl.com/pe4kqe5
Joined 5606 days ago

2256 posts - 4046 votes 
Speaks: German*, English
Studies: French, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin

 
 Message 4 of 17
12 May 2009 at 3:21am | IP Logged 
That happens to me a lot. With German. (=

What about a simple but maybe aesthetically pleasing answer - didn't you cut down on active speaking while you were doing your American English immersion? (I only read sporadically, so I may be mistaken)
If that's the case, it's not surprising that your spoken language is a bit rusty and, as you noted yourself, your ability to perceive your own mistakes has improved at the same time.
Relax. If you don't want to shadow, don't. But maybe while listening to your podcasts try to repeat some phrase or sentence every now and then. Maybe learn to sing some songs. Read aloud to yourself.
1 person has voted this message useful



Cainntear
Pentaglot
Senior Member
Scotland
linguafrankly.blogsp
Joined 5851 days ago

4399 posts - 7687 votes 
Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic
Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh

 
 Message 5 of 17
12 May 2009 at 12:25pm | IP Logged 
There's one really important difference between true immersion and simulated immersion at home: in true immersion you're always talking to people in person, and they talk back to you. Reading, watching and listening can't replace that genuine spontaneous speech.

That's where Skype comes in. Get a language exchange partner in the US. Talk. Or hang about in the bars nearest the local backpackers' hostel and meet native speakers there.

But talk. Talk as much as you can. That's what real immersion is.
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fairyfountain
Senior Member
Zimbabwe
Joined 5968 days ago

254 posts - 248 votes 
5 sounds

 
 Message 6 of 17
15 May 2009 at 5:10pm | IP Logged 
Quote:
But talk. Talk as much as you can. That's what real immersion is.

I used to advocate that method big time. Well, I don't know, really. I've been phoning people for years and I never felt like it helped me much. However, I made a lot of progress since I started what you call "fake" immersion. Quite a few "immersion" gurus that need not be quoted here didn't talk much during their immersion phase. Some of them did shadow stuff, but what I do is merely silent shadowing. I'm trying to pay attention to all the sounds of English while I'm listening. I couldn't recognize Southern accents or Canadian (or even New Yorkers, yeah, sue me) before and now I can. It also means that I kind of internalized most of the sounds of English. That doesn't mean I can produce them - I still need lots of listening. That said, I got rid of lots of bad habits because I didn't talk. I'm probably not going to call Americans before my vowels and consonants system has stabilized.
1 person has voted this message useful



LittleKey
Diglot
Senior Member
United States
Joined 5792 days ago

146 posts - 153 votes 
Speaks: English*, Spanish
Studies: French, Japanese

 
 Message 7 of 17
16 May 2009 at 8:15pm | IP Logged 
Yeah, talking should help. And you said you have some struggles with grammar too, in which case I would suggest go over the grammar concepts you know, and refresh your memory. In my case, with Spanish, I'll think I know a conjugation or something but then later when I encounter it in writing, I don't remember what it is. So maybe if you just make sure your grammar concepts are in place and review a little bit, it'll help a lot.

Also, off topic, is your name related to the "The Legend of Zelda" games?
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Recht
Diglot
Senior Member
United States
Joined 5641 days ago

241 posts - 270 votes 
Speaks: English*, GermanB1

 
 Message 8 of 17
16 May 2009 at 10:07pm | IP Logged 
Well, just as encouragement, your written English is fine. I can't access your "5
sounds" for some reason, though.


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