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If FSI is Audio-Lingual...... | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| Random review Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5811 days ago 781 posts - 1310 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German | Message 17 of 29 21 August 2010 at 2:26pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
I'm sorry if I came across as argumentative, I didn't mean to, as you say we have a huge amount that we agree on, especially that you agree they are extremely useful and I agree that they have weaknesses that need to be covered using other methods. It's just that I believe that the DRILL portion of FSI is largely misunderstood. I say this having once had a similar opinion to you guys, my mind having been changed by trying it for myself.
I didn't intend to compare it to Martial Arts training, but rather to use that story as a useful analogy to point at something important. I have very little interest in the Martial Arts. That said (and at risk of misunderstanding your point completely due to my lack of M.A. knowledge) I note that the human Motor Cortex is heavily involved in many (most?) kinds of learning, especially where some kind of sequencing and nesting is involved (the case with grammar), and that of course, as you yourself say, language also involves motor movements (especially of the tongue) allowing this same kind of synergy. I have this idea that many people have believe that you are being trained to associate a response (e.g. "para") with certain SYNTACTIC stimuli (e.g. "no tengo suficiente tiempo") and this would indeed be incredibly inefficient. The reality is that in FSI you are being trained to associate a response with certain MEANINGS (in this case the notion of motion TOWARDS versus motion THROUGH which is covered by "por"). This is first pointed at from a variety of angles through drills, then explained explicitly, then practiced through drills. At first (unavoidably) you get hooked on the superficial cues (you are looking at the finger doing the pointing rather than the thing pointed at) but eventually the penny drops and you are learning the real connection. There is a "Conversation Stimulus" section to facilitate the transition from understanding to creative use, but it needs a teacher to implement it and therefore is not suitable for self-learning.
I think we are largely agreed on this point. You are (probably correctly) critical of the methodology and its scientific basis, yet note that somehow it can be very useful. I note that they did an amazing job writing the course but allow that drills are probably not the best way to go about it. I largely agree with you that drills are not the most efficient way to do things, and that they made such great courses in spite of their use rather than because of it. I would love to have seen what these talented people would have produced had they been allowed to use a different methodology such as that of Michel Thomas. The only place where I disagree is that I think they did such a good job that these courses are by far the best out there (and the lack of an FSI course is the main reason I'm not learning Russian!) for you CORE method, and that through ingenuity and understanding of the learning process (for example they knew the kind of self-defeating short cuts your brain was likely to take when doing drills) they even managed to turn drills into effective tools.
True, but I think the U.S. FSI must have employed many. Again, I hope this hasn't seemed like I was picking an argument, I think this is a very interesting thread and find your points stimulating and thought-provoking. I have no doubt that many people will find this thread useful when making up their own minds on whether to try FSI. Edited by Random review on 21 August 2010 at 2:39pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| JWC Groupie United States Joined 7126 days ago 69 posts - 107 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 18 of 29 21 August 2010 at 10:25pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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People studying on their own have the luxury to "misuse" study materials by exploiting the best features of more than one course.
I would like to second Elexi's comments, therefore, about FSI. It is an excellent course if used improperly and against the recommended approach that is described by the authors in each course’s introduction. One way to exploit FSI’s better features is to view it as a cleverly designed set of exhaustive drills to practice with understanding, but without any attempt to memorize. The drills and exercises are not mindless, but rather present set of permutations to grammatical structures that force one to understand and apply a broad range of nuanced changes, with all (or virtually all) sections recorded at native speed on audio. How to use such material presents the same dilemma any musician would face in learning “boring” scales. A musician who plays only scales will get bored out of his mind. But a musician who does a certain amount of scales each day (while also spending time playing and improving with other material) will advance more rapidly than a musician who only plays songs. This same principle also applies to other disciplines such as painting, or various types of sports. Drills by themselves are tedious, but a smaller of drills mixed with other activity make one stronger in the end. Anyone studying French can see the value of FSI material by studying units 9 and 16 for the FSI French Basic course. These are two of the most mind-numbingly dull units. Unit 9 stresses pronoun and preposition substitution (and their order) in simple and compound tenses. (“je le lui ai dit...”, etc.) Unit 16 stresses conditional clauses, shifting between tenses and stressing certain subtle changes in pronunciation in moving from the future tense to a conditional tense for the same verb. The material is simply outstanding, however—after working on these units, it is much easier to use and understand French phrases. I have found no other course with comparable audio drills on these subjects. Here is how I approach FSI by misusing the material rather than formally “overlearning” the way the course introduction would recommend. I listen to a phrase on the audio, repeat it back several times with understanding, and translate it each time into English out loud if I do not understand it in the original (i.e., if I cannot simply hold all the words in my head at once and know the entire clause or phrase in French). I do not try to memorize the phrase. I do not try to anticipate the answer in a set of drills (i.e., I don’t worry about repeating back an answer before it is provided on the audio recording). Instead, I simply listen, understand or pause and make myself understand, and repeat back several times. If I understand what I am saying, this goes quickly. If I have to pause, and repeat back phrases while forcing myself to translate out loud, this is also ok because it means I am actively engaging the material. By focusing on repetition with understanding rather than robotic perfection, I can move more quickly through the material. I also don’t do too much FSI material in one day. Perhaps only 30 minutes a day, often broken down into 5 to 10 minute segments. Meanwhile, I am using other material to learn grammar and French vocabulary. Nonetheless, much of the FSI material is memorized in spite of myself. FSI is repetitive, building on structures and vocabulary presented earlier in the course. Because of this, I actually find that I have memorized much of the past material by the time I work through subsequent units. Now here is the payoff (and what keeps me doing a little bit of FSI each day if possible): although my passive vocabulary recognition and audio listening skills are broader than if I had used FSI by itself (I have gone through French in Action videos several times and have looked up most of the words in that course, for instance), the phrases and structures that seem to pop out of my mouth with less effort are the same material I have done over and over again with FSI units. There is something about rhythmic and repetitive FSI exercises (with intelligent permutations in grammatical structure) that seems to do more than many other courses to develop the basic motor skills and mental connections needed to speak without effort—even if those skills are developed without trying to “overlearn” and perfectly memorize material. This reminds me of the Karate Kid (the original, with Ralph Macchio) and the scene in which he repetively waxes the cars—“wax on . . . wax off”. The basic exercises have a payoff in the end even if they seem boring at the time. I began and quit several FSI Basic courses during a point in time when I was determined to overlearn the material. Today, I am not finished with FSI Frech Basic (I am in unit 17 of 24 units, at this point), but I am still going and that is farther than I have gotten with any FSI course in the past. Sometimes I do a bit of FSI every day, and sometimes a week or two will go by before I pick up where I left off and keep working through the course. It is not a quick process but I am surprised to have gotten this far without quitting. The very fact that I have not quit, in a course that stresses linguistic concepts and speaking skills without leavening the course with humor or culture, tells me that there is some value to relaxing and letting go of perfection. I can make myself listen and repeat a certain amount of tedious drilling before spending time on material (French in Action, past issues of Champs-Elysées audio magazine, French dvd’s) that I find more enjoyable. Summary: rely on other material but misuse FSI in manageable doses—whenever you feel like it—and see if that helps. --JWC 7 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| frenkeld Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6971 days ago 2042 posts - 2719 votes Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: German | Message 19 of 29 22 August 2010 at 8:07am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Wow, that's six audiocourses, actually, audiocourse series. Is this really the way to go in terms of efficiency? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Elexi Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5593 days ago 938 posts - 1840 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 20 of 29 22 August 2010 at 12:22pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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For me, yes.
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| Random review Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5811 days ago 781 posts - 1310 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German | Message 21 of 29 22 August 2010 at 12:34pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
That's only two courses for beginners (one excellent for grammar and the other with a reputation for being a nice gentle introduction to other aspects), followed by 3 intermediate courses (with FSI as a supplement). I would have thought it difficult to use less (unless you have classes and/or a native speaker you can talk to), and personally I use more. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Elexi Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5593 days ago 938 posts - 1840 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 22 of 29 22 August 2010 at 1:08pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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If I have to justify my approach I should say that I once spent £450 (in the early 1990s) for a 40 hour course to learn introductory Spanish at a local university. The teacher was ok, but the class consisted of 10 people (too many in my view), one of whom already had a degree in Italian as well as A levels in French and Latin. The Italian speaker also had a fierce competitive streak and insisted on dominating the limited time available with the tutor and answering every question before anyone else (which given the proximity of Italian to Spanish, was not a difficult task for her). The rest of us (who only wanted to learn enough Spanish to go on holiday and not appear like average Brits (tm)) struggled on but in the end I dropped out as it was a waste of my time. It was also £450 wasted. The whole debacle made me turn my back on language learning for over a decade.
Even if I had bought all the courses I used (as opposed to borrowing them from the library) they would have come to about £250 in todays money. As it happens, the reason for learning French was because my work started to take me to Francophone Switzerland for three weeks about 4 times a year, so I got the practice paid for as a business expense. I consider my time spent using the above courses pretty efficient (1 hour a day over two years, with more if I was travelling by train or plane and a weekend bonanza if I had the free time) and cheaper than going to a college. The fact that I had native speakers to talk to, of course, accelerated my learning, but I wouldn't consider 6 audiocourses to be an inefficient use of time. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| frenkeld Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6971 days ago 2042 posts - 2719 votes Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: German | Message 23 of 29 23 August 2010 at 1:43am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
This wasn't the reason for my question. I have always assumed that a traditional grammar-based course is the fastest way to grasp the fundamentals of a language, which, however, falls short in developing speaking skills, so presumably an audiocourse coupled with a traditional course would be the quickest way to get into a language and start working with authentic materials. Your approach seems different, but I didn't really ask you what other things you had done besides the audiocourses, so I may not have a complete picture of your overall approach. One thing that is clear from your post is that you did have conversational practice with the natives. Edited by frenkeld on 23 August 2010 at 4:05pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Elexi Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5593 days ago 938 posts - 1840 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 24 of 29 23 August 2010 at 9:27am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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Dear Frenkfeld, I think you are right - With French I was flying blind - but I think a big dose of grammar from a structured grammar based course coupled with an largish audiocourse is the best way to go before getting into native materials. This is the way I am learning German - but as my wife and son speak it, I have access to native speakers and my son's pre-school DVDs, so its a different story to French. Edited by Elexi on 23 August 2010 at 4:44pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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