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Learning a language entirely on the spot | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Advice Center |  | |
| albysky Triglot Senior Member Italy lang-8.com/1108796Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4387 days ago 287 posts - 393 votes  Speaks: Italian*, English, German | Message 1 of 11 03 October 2014 at 6:44pm | IP Logged | ||
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It is well known that you should be at an intermidiate stage to take fully advantage of an immersion stay ,
even more so , if your stay is short . I guess at times one simply cannot be at such a stage . So my question is : how much can you learn in a time frame of 9/10 months starting from scratch living in the country , if you can work indipendently for at least 30 minutes a day using something like Assimil and a grammar , an other half an hour with a tutor plus all the social interactions you can benefit from living in the country . How much time would you need to be functional at around A2 ? Here I am thinking of someone who needs to move abroad abruptly who is motivated to learn the local language and need to learn a language like polish or russian . Has any of you gone through a similar experience ? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| patrickwilken Senior Member Germany radiant-flux.net Joined 4532 days ago 1546 posts - 3200 votes Studies: German | Message 2 of 11 03 October 2014 at 6:59pm | IP Logged | ||
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It obviously depends on how easy the language is for you to learn.
My wife did her Master's research in Naples. She did a month-long crash course in Italian before she came, but knew very little. She had been led to believe that she could get by with English, but found out after arriving that only her professor spoke English. And as she mostly had to work independently of him this wasn't of any great help. She ended up in shared apartment with seven other Italian students and by the end of her nine-month stay could speak Italian in the B2 range. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| rdearman Senior Member United Kingdom rdearman.orgRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5235 days ago 881 posts - 1812 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Italian, French, Mandarin | Message 3 of 11 03 October 2014 at 8:13pm | IP Logged | ||
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I have tried unsuccessfully to find a link to a blog I read. An Australian (possibly New Zealander) who travelled to Taiwan for 6 months. In that time he only spoke Mandarin, he had 2-3 tutoring sessions each day with a different tutor. He used them to help with grammar and speaking but had his own agenda (didn't use their lessons) and he did independent study for another 2 hours per day.
That was the gist of the post if I remember correctly and he passed the HSK exams (I think). The point of this being, I think it is possible to become very fluent in 9 months. But I would have thought 5-6 hours every day like the fellow who studied in Taiwan would be the model to follow. Especially for a "difficult" language like Russian, Chinese, etc where there is a different script as well. Just my humble opinion though since I haven't actually done it. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| eyðimörk Triglot Senior Member France goo.gl/aT4FY7 Joined 4098 days ago 490 posts - 1158 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, French Studies: Breton, Italian | Message 4 of 11 03 October 2014 at 9:04pm | IP Logged | ||
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"all the social interactions you can benefit from living in the country" is an extremely varying factor. I live in France but I could easily go weeks without
any social interaction in French with a native speaker. I'm not saying that I do, but I want to drive home the point that living in a country does next to nothing for creating social learning situations. It's everything else that you do that matters (which includes successfully searching for social situations, deciding to do things "the hard way" by finding things like housing, loans and work the native way, etc.). 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| robarb Nonaglot Senior Member United States languagenpluson Joined 5058 days ago 361 posts - 921 votes Speaks: Portuguese, English*, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, French Studies: Mandarin, Danish, Russian, Norwegian, Cantonese, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Greek, Latin, Nepali, Modern Hebrew | Message 5 of 11 04 October 2014 at 6:08am | IP Logged | ||
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If you're thrown into survival situations where you need to communicate in the target language, you will learn to
get by extremely quickly. You'll most likely speak quite poorly for the first few months, but you can get some functional communication in a very short time that will heavily depend on the learner and the language. I have family members who've immigrated and learned to communicate in a hurry. It doesn't mean they get mastery faster, only that they're forced to learn core communicative skills first, rather than, say, a silent period/input method where speaking only comes in after a year, which might work as well or better in the long run but isn't viable for that situation. If you're not thrown into survival situations, but have a support network that allows you to settle into your new home while dealing with practical situations using a language you already speak, then you probably won't learn any faster than you would if you were at home. If you learn faster at all, it'll be because being in the place helps to motivate you, or makes it easier to find a tutor/speaking practice partner. Once your level is high enough that it makes sense to use the local language to study, work, socialize, etc. then being in the place will help a lot without having to be thrown in the deep end, which isn't everyone's cup of tea. The course suggested by the OP will probably be not much different from a highly motivated learner who stays at home, unless the plan is to spend hours a day using A0-A1 level language with the locals doing what, I'm not sure. Edited by robarb on 04 October 2014 at 6:14am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5429 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 6 of 11 04 October 2014 at 6:50am | IP Logged | ||
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Although the question of actual interaction with native speakers is a very important variable, I think that being in-
country is very valuable, even for the rank beginner. In addition to all the things already pointed out, there is the opportunity to observe the language in its real environment. This is so much more interesting and exciting than learning in a situation where the language exists only in a book or on the internet. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| tristano Tetraglot Senior Member Netherlands Joined 4046 days ago 905 posts - 1262 votes Speaks: Italian*, Spanish, French, English Studies: Dutch | Message 7 of 11 04 October 2014 at 6:58am | IP Logged | ||
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EDIT: I misread the question.
Polish or Russian for scratch without any previous experience with slavic languages? To me 3-6 months for A2 if the person is efficient studying alone. 1-2 years if studying in classes (not intensive ones). The help given by the environment depends by the personality of the learner. I personally prefer to read a newspaper in the tram than talking about the weather with some native speaker that I don't previously know (and after 2 years I know a couple of natives in total). Edited by tristano on 04 October 2014 at 7:05am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| albysky Triglot Senior Member Italy lang-8.com/1108796Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4387 days ago 287 posts - 393 votes Speaks: Italian*, English, German | Message 8 of 11 04 October 2014 at 9:23am | IP Logged | ||
Agree , even though at the very beginning a newsspaper seems to me a bit intimidating , it would be more about deciphering than reading . As for the tram , you must have bought your ticket somewhere , it can already be a start :-) 1 person has voted this message useful |
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