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Six months in-country immersion | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| seand_ Diglot Newbie Australia Joined 5623 days ago 6 posts - 6 votes Speaks: English*, French | Message 1 of 3 03 July 2009 at 4:40am | IP Logged |
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Hi everyone,
I'm a native English speaker who also speaks French. I'm looking to delve into other languages over the next few years with the ones I'm focussing on being: Arabic (MSA & Levantine dialect), Persian and Spanish. I've got 5-6 months this year (Aug/Sep09-Jan-09) to travel overseas and focus on one of these languages and was looking for suggestions as to which one it would be best to spent time on. Currently I have no previous experience in any of those three languages mentioned. As well this upcoming five/six month period to study overseas, I also know that I have a two month break (Dec10/Jan11) as well as the whole year of 2012 to travel and study languages. It's also worth mentioned that for Spanish I was set on studying in Colombia and Persian in Iran (which is why it's probably not worth pursuing Persian in Iran for the coming months as to obtain a student visa takes 2-3months apparently). I know its a tough question to answer but I've decided that over the next few years reaching a decent level in those three languages in going to be my priority so any advice that you suggest is much appreciated. Thanks, Sean. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| fanatic Octoglot Senior Member Australia speedmathematics.com Joined 7146 days ago 1152 posts - 1818 votes  Speaks: English*, German, French, Afrikaans, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Dutch Studies: Swedish, Norwegian, Polish, Modern Hebrew, Malay, Mandarin, Esperanto | Message 2 of 3 03 July 2009 at 6:54am | IP Logged |
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In your place I would begin with Spanish. It is the easiest (especially since you know French) and I would try and get started before you leave so you have some kind of foundation to build on.
Just being in the country won't make you fluent. You still need to make an effort. Buy a good course before you leave and take it with you. My own recommendation is Assimil Spanish and Teach Yourself Spanish, both of which are very cheap from Amazon. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6011 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 3 of 3 03 July 2009 at 9:44am | IP Logged |
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Immersion may be vital to learning, but if you've got a grounding in the language, you'll get a lot more out of it.
I agree with Fanatic: Spanish is your best bet this year, because you can actually learn a fair amount before you go, taking advantage of its similarities to English and French. Get a home-study course (I recommend Michel Thomas, I'm sure other people will recommend others shortly) and work through it before you go. Also get a pocket grammar book before you leave, but you can wait till you get there to pick up a dictionary if you prefer (bilingual dictionaries Spanish<->English are fairly common as plenty of people in South America want to learn English). However, Spanish grammars for English speakers are rarer, because there's less English speakers learning Spanish! 1 person has voted this message useful |
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