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Languages You Missed Out On | ||
Tags: Choosing a Language | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| snovymgodom Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5727 days ago 136 posts - 149 votes  Speaks: English*, Russian | Message 17 of 34 19 June 2009 at 2:56am | IP Logged |
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I was in the Middlebury Arabic Summer program two summers back, and their Arabic groups consisted of four levels - 1 being a complete beginner, and 4 being a fairly advanced learner who could understand novels and poetry without much trouble. I was somewhere in the middle, and I placed into group 3. Students in group 3 or higher were required to study a dialect as well as their morning fus7a lessons, and I signed up for Levantine Arabic. However, within a week I realized that I had placed into a group higher than my actual abilities in the language (there was a lot of grammar and vocabulary I didn't know and would not be able to quickly learn those and keep up with the pace at the same time), so I went back down to level 2.5, which is only fus7a. So my point is that if I had stayed in level 3, I may have gone insane and not done very well on the tests, but I may have learned some decent Levantine Arabic in the process.
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| cathrynm Senior Member United States junglevision.co Joined 6127 days ago 910 posts - 1232 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Finnish | Message 18 of 34 19 June 2009 at 7:24am | IP Logged |
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"I do want to learn Finnish, hopefully I can learn it, I just have no idea where to start... "
Hello, fellow 'lapsed Finn.' Sorry, this is a bit of a digression, but I've been looking over the FSI Finnish course. This is available free for download on the internet and it looks pretty complete -- though it is intense and very much of the 1980's. I also have "Teach yourself Finnish" and this looks much more conventional. I guess by page count the vocabulary in this book comes out around 700 words, so this is to beginner level only. Both have audio. I haven't decided which to start with myself. With Japanese, at the beginning I found it useful to cram about 500 words in the first month or so and then go back to text books and audio courses later. I plan to do the same for Finnish. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Ashiro Groupie United Kingdom learnxlanguage.com/ Joined 5804 days ago 89 posts - 101 votes Studies: Spanish | Message 19 of 34 20 June 2009 at 1:19am | IP Logged |
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So, so many missed chances. Let's start with primary school in Wales.
Welsh: I was taught Welsh at age 5 and 6 but moving away I stopped and lost it all. In secondary... Spanish: My first language at school that my horrible language teacher put me off for over 10 years. I'm now learning it with a much happier heart. German: I had a good teacher but rubbish class. I was easily distracted and so lost track with it. Never carried it on and regret it ever since. In college... Chinese: I had more CHinese than English friends in college and althoguh I'd ask about the language, phrases, etc a lot I never got into learning it properly. I could easily have immersed myself but never took the chance. I think like the original poster this has given me a big motivation to learn languages. Having tasted what its like to know I want more and I want it back. :) 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| graybox Newbie United States Joined 5666 days ago 12 posts - 12 votes Studies: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 20 of 34 22 June 2009 at 3:34am | IP Logged |
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Chinese (Mandarin), I went to Chinese school when I was in elementary school but I didn't like it and so my parents let me drop out..
Spanish, took it in high school, but I never really gave it much thought since it was a high school class and I didn't do any studying of it outside of the basics in class. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Ester Groupie Joined 5669 days ago 64 posts - 114 votes Speaks: Modern Hebrew | Message 21 of 34 22 June 2009 at 4:51am | IP Logged |
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I missed out mostly on German.
Throughout my childhood/youth I had repeated chances to study it and I never took it. I also could have easily immersed myself in the language and the culture given that I had access to vast material in German (books, TV, etc), I went on occasional trips to Austria where I could have used it and I also had relatives living in Germany, who would have more than welcomed me to spend some school break with them to practice the language and to experience the culture. Yet I never wanted to study it, and my parents never insisted enough - I regret that today, I could have been fluent in one of the "big" and important languages had they just pushed me a little for my own good. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| pielover24 Newbie United States Joined 5697 days ago 14 posts - 14 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Arabic (Written) | Message 22 of 34 22 June 2009 at 5:57am | IP Logged |
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I missed out on Spanish.
My parents are of Hispanic descent (both speak fluently), but they never taught me! They say they did but that I didn't like it. I do think life would have been easier if I learned, because I have absolutley no interest now. At least that pushed me to learn a language of my choice 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| RBenham Triglot Groupie IndonesiaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5645 days ago 60 posts - 62 votes Speaks: English*, German, French Studies: Indonesian | Message 23 of 34 22 June 2009 at 10:34am | IP Logged |
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I don't really think I missed out on anything, except perhaps Indonesian. I started trying to learn it, but the book was hopeless in many ways. I have spent a lot of time in Batam, an Indonesian island that is just off Singapore. That's a problem, because the place is a hive of economic activity, mostly involving Singaporeans and Westerners, and so English, my native language, is a lingua franca here. But all is not lost: my current girlfriend is not good at English, and I am learning Indonesian much faster than she is learning English; so we are communicating more and more in Indonesian.
My brother's ex-girlfriend's parents claimed that she spoke Romanian as a young child, but forgot it. These things happen. Now I have a query about all this. I have heard that raising a child bi-lingual is beneficial, but that children that grow up speaking 3 (or more) languages from birth often never get any of them right. I had a friend like this. Others described her as "tri-lingual", but I preferred the description "try-lingual": she'd try to speak English, try to speak German, try to speak French. (She was a wonderful person, by the way....) So, anecdotal evidence aside, is there any basis for this? I wonder what would happen, say, if I were to marry a Moroccan woman and live in France...would we have to give English a miss? 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| icing_death Senior Member United States Joined 5863 days ago 296 posts - 302 votes Speaks: English* | Message 24 of 34 22 June 2009 at 6:55pm | IP Logged |
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Nice thread. My grandma was French Canadian, but she never spoke French to us. But we lived near the Canadian border, so I heard lots of French growing up. After passing it over several times, and starting and stopping once, I'm finally studying it. It's really easy for me - I hightly recommend all of you go after those missed opportunities.
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