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Background radio - Helpful or Fantasy? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies |  | |
| Romanist Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5078 days ago 261 posts - 366 votes  Studies: Italian | Message 17 of 36 24 July 2010 at 1:01am | IP Logged | ||||||||
Hmmm.. It's not quite as clear cut as this, is it? There are many manual activities (such as driving a car, doing artwork, etc) which can be done at the same time as focusing very clearly on background speech from a radio.
So by hearing a language more, you may actually get worse at understanding it!? C'mon Benny! That seems a bit like saying you shouldn't spend too much time in a Jacuzzi in case you stop yourself from being able to swim!
I don't quite follow this. Are you implying that immigrants tend to be lazy people? Or are you saying that it's only the lazy ones who have been "trained" not to listen? (Either way, it seems like a fairly strong generalization to make...) Edited by Romanist on 24 July 2010 at 2:15am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| irishpolyglot Nonaglot Senior Member Ireland fluentin3months Joined 5429 days ago 285 posts - 892 votes Speaks: Irish, English*, French, Esperanto, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Sign Language Studies: Mandarin | Message 18 of 36 24 July 2010 at 1:11am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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The purpose of a Jacuzzi isn't to swim. If you use a Jacuzzi to learn to ultimately swim, you're wasting your time. Your metaphor proves my point ;)
You can use a Jacuzzi to "get used" to water, which will help somewhat, but it won't make you a sniff better at your breast stroke. I'm constantly an immigrant myself. I was talking about the lazy ones, lots of whom I get to meet regularly, I'm not making any sweeping generalisations. Luckily most immigrants are ACTIVE in their language acquisition and can speak a language because of that. If you do activities such as washing dishes or vacuuming the floor (and I would hope not as often for driving a car, considering the two tonne death machine you control) then you can put your hands on autopilot and give the task very little mental focus and actually give the audio your attention. I'd argue that the side activity is passive while you are genuinely focused on the language. Edited by irishpolyglot on 24 July 2010 at 1:16am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| liddytime Pentaglot Senior Member United States mainlymagyar.wordpre Joined 6025 days ago 693 posts - 1328 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Galician Studies: Hungarian, Vietnamese, Modern Hebrew, Norwegian, Persian, Arabic (Written) | Message 19 of 36 24 July 2010 at 1:17am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I thought of one instance where passive listening could be helpful (at least it was for me!).
When I was learning Portuguese I listened to a TON of Brazilian music CD's. Some had liner notes, most didn't. Eventually I was singing along (very poorly...my poor dog..) with the CD's. I had no idea what I was singing initially but over time, as my vocabulary increased (from other methods) , I had several "A-HA!!" moments. "A-HA!! So THAT'S what he is saying!" I gradually came to understand most of the songs nearly perfectly. It helped my speaking considerably. Who knows?! Music might be an exception to the rule! Edited by liddytime on 24 July 2010 at 1:22am 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Romanist Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5078 days ago 261 posts - 366 votes Studies: Italian | Message 20 of 36 24 July 2010 at 1:31am | IP Logged | ||||||||
No, the metaphor is as follows: language=water; Jacuzzi=passive exposure; swimming=active listening/speaking, etc. Therefore the notion that passive background exposure to a language may harm your ability to understand is exactly like saying that too much Jacuzzi may stop you learning to swim. ;-)
So anyone who listens to a car radio is a dangerous driver? Any artist who listens to the radio while painting is not concentrating on his art? LOL :-D Edited by Romanist on 24 July 2010 at 1:49am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| irishpolyglot Nonaglot Senior Member Ireland fluentin3months Joined 5429 days ago 285 posts - 892 votes Speaks: Irish, English*, French, Esperanto, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Sign Language Studies: Mandarin | Message 21 of 36 24 July 2010 at 1:43am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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If Jacuzzi time counts as swimming practise then the lazy logic is "more jacuzzi time will make me a better swimmer!" It's a slippery slope and people will be confused at why they aren't fluent in a language despite ten thousand hours of "exposure". Lazy people spend their days in jacuzzis rather than swimming and quite frankly, lazy people aren't willing to focus on their language.
Sorry but there's no such thing as a free lunch. You have to put work into your language to improve in it. Lovely as it might be if there were a learn-in-your-sleep fix. Can I learn advanced differential equations in my sleep too? And can I become a kung-fu master while I drive to work? Sign me up! Edited by irishpolyglot on 24 July 2010 at 1:44am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Romanist Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5078 days ago 261 posts - 366 votes Studies: Italian | Message 22 of 36 24 July 2010 at 2:08am | IP Logged | ||||||||
Sorry, but who has said anything about learn-in-your-sleep? (I certainly didn't...)
No, but you can learn quite a lot of a foreign language. I know that for a fact because I have done it myself. (And hey, I didn't even crash!) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| TerryW Senior Member United States Joined 6153 days ago 370 posts - 783 votes Speaks: English* | Message 23 of 36 24 July 2010 at 2:20am | IP Logged | ||||||||
If you were singing along, you were (mostly) actively listening to the songs, no? I doubt you'd be able to sing "Kaja goo goo, Oh blah di, Oh blah da..." without actually listening to the song, vs. having it on as background "elevator music." 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| irishpolyglot Nonaglot Senior Member Ireland fluentin3months Joined 5429 days ago 285 posts - 892 votes Speaks: Irish, English*, French, Esperanto, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Sign Language Studies: Mandarin | Message 24 of 36 24 July 2010 at 2:22am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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@Romanist
Can you speak the language fluently and confidently with natives thanks to your passive learning? Everyone I've talked to who has tried it "felt" that they learned a lot. I felt that I learned a lot of German in 5 years of schooling until I couldn't even order a train ticket when I arrived in Munich a few years ago. I "knew for a fact" that I'd do well in my German aural exam a few weeks ago thanks to more than one thousand hours of passive listening I put in. Pity the examiner didn't agree with my delusion! If you did master your target language, I'd argue that it's due to the work you put in outside of your car. Edited by irishpolyglot on 24 July 2010 at 2:22am 1 person has voted this message useful |
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