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Become a Polyglot in Minutes not Years | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Polyglots |  | |
| dmaddock1 Senior Member United States Joined 5435 days ago 174 posts - 426 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Italian, Esperanto, Latin, Ancient Greek | Message 9 of 30 22 June 2010 at 9:11pm | IP Logged | |||||
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All the reference of 10k & 80/20 reminds me of this Dr. Arguelles post. "Running the numbers", as it were, can be very clarifying. Especially (as is expounded in the paper you link to), as it is not even simply a matter of clocking any hours, but deliberate ones working specifically to improve. I'm not the sort of guy interested in investing 10k hours in something to end up mediocre on the other side.
I can relate to the guitar example too as I began university studying music with guitar as my primary instrument. I realized that while it's an activity I am happy to do for 10k hours, it's not something I wanted to do deliberately for 10k hours. Of course, IMO most people aren't aiming to be real experts, but what I'd label "craftsmen"--someone with a solid core competency. Nevertheless, quantifying what the realistic investment for a given goal is has helped me make some hard decisions about what to pursue, what to let alone, and what I can reasonably expect of myself. But, how do you know if your goal is more than one 10k chunk? For instance: "I want to be an expert in French." Ok, do 10k hours. "I want to be an expert in Romance languages." Ok, do 10k hours. Or less? "I want to be an expert in Harper Lee novels." 10k hours?! For one book? d. 6 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Declan1991 Tetraglot Senior Member Ireland Joined 6441 days ago 233 posts - 359 votes Speaks: English*, German, Irish, French | Message 10 of 30 22 June 2010 at 9:23pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Fabulous video. At first, I thought it was going to be one of those painful, "how to become a polyglot" from people who obviously aren't interested in language learning, merely in being able to say, "I speak x languages". Instead, it was a lovely video with a vital message for anyone genuinely interested in anything.
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| josht Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6448 days ago 635 posts - 857 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Spanish, Russian, Dutch | Message 11 of 30 22 June 2010 at 9:28pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Agreed with all of the above; I quite liked that. I also watched your video about picking up children's encyclopedias in your target language, and like that idea.
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| Splog Diglot Senior Member Czech Republic anthonylauder.c Joined 5671 days ago 1062 posts - 3263 votes Speaks: English*, Czech Studies: Mandarin | Message 12 of 30 23 June 2010 at 5:24am | IP Logged | |||||
That is very interesting Fasulye. It really shows how even when you have several interests, your varying levels of passion can make the difference between something being "work" and something being pure enjoyment. I liked how you mentioned chess books. One of my friends, many years ago, was a professional chess player. Astonishingly, he didn't even have a chess board at home, but had hundreds of books detailing thousands of important chess games over the ages. He would sit for hours just reading these books, and he never seemed to be bored. He said to me the games were being replayed in his head as if he were there in real life with a board in front of him. In fact, his addiction to chess was so great that his wife complained he had no time for her! Then, one day, he just stopped playing chess altogether, saying he was sick of it now. It was really eye-opening for me. 6 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Splog Diglot Senior Member Czech Republic anthonylauder.c Joined 5671 days ago 1062 posts - 3263 votes Speaks: English*, Czech Studies: Mandarin | Message 13 of 30 23 June 2010 at 5:35am | IP Logged | |||||
Thank you for the link to that post by Prof Arguelles, which I had never seen before. It was an interesting read!
That is a good question, and I have thought about it myself. I think the answer is that 10k hours will take you to the "top of the game" in whatever area you have chosen. So that if you say you want to be an expert in, say, 50 languages then you will achieve as much as anybody who also wants to be an expert in 50 languages. Think of it as a bit like the decathlon at the olympics: they are world class athletes who have reached high levels in ten different sports. You cannot compare their performance in, say, 100m sprint with somebody who has focused on that one event but you can admire them just as much. In terms of your book example, think of a professor of religion who knows a great deal about many religions after putting in 10k hours of serious study. Now contrast him with a talmudic scholar who will have dedicated his whole life to, in essence, studying a single book (the torah). Both will be at the top of their game - one with great breadth and one with great depth. 6 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
 Fasulye Heptaglot Winner TAC 2012 Moderator Germany fasulyespolyglotblog Joined 5849 days ago 5460 posts - 6006 votes 1 sounds Speaks: German*, DutchC1, EnglishB2, French, Italian, Spanish, Esperanto Studies: Latin, Danish, Norwegian, Turkish Personal Language Map | Message 14 of 30 23 June 2010 at 9:00am | IP Logged | |||||
I noticed with chess players that they often have an excellent memory (which I don't have). Having played a game with people they could reconstruct the whole game in order to analyse it, even without having noted the sets on paper (what you have to do in chess tournaments). But your example of this chess player shows how important the factor "passion" is in the learning process. I would say it's VERY important because it makes the amount of study work done feel less hard. Of course this plays a role for language learning in general and especially when talking about polyglots. I have serveral hobbies and interests, but only for language learning I have this motivation to continue learning the whole year through without ever getting tired of that. In earlier years the difference was that I attended language courses which made an official summer pause of 3 months. But for me it's better, if I don't have such a pause in my learning process. Fasulye Edited by Fasulye on 23 June 2010 at 9:02am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| maaku Senior Member United States Joined 5576 days ago 359 posts - 562 votes Speaks: English* | Message 15 of 30 23 June 2010 at 1:28pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Excellent video! i don't know why I clicked on this thread.. I was expecting a scam with the provocative title. But you really delivered. I've read "the 80/20 principle", and heard the author of "outliers" interviewed. You explained the concepts very well--this is an introductory video every aspiring polyglot should view.
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| Splog Diglot Senior Member Czech Republic anthonylauder.c Joined 5671 days ago 1062 posts - 3263 votes Speaks: English*, Czech Studies: Mandarin | Message 16 of 30 24 June 2010 at 10:47am | IP Logged | |||||
Yet, I did worry that the video title was a little provocative. I am glad you were able to look past that and watched the video and liked it. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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