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The Ultimate Accelerated Learning Exp. ! | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies |  | |
| aerozeplyn Senior Member United States Joined 4961 days ago 141 posts - 202 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin | Message 89 of 200 17 April 2011 at 12:42pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Based off this statement I would like to remind everyone that if you spend 72 study hours total, the real question is, "how many of those 72 hours made am impact on your body? how many of those 72 hours physically changed you?" For example, you can study 72 hours worth of material over 2 months, over 2 weeks, or over 3 days. The purpose of you studying this material is to change how your mind works, and changing how your mind works IS a physical change: your body needs to adjust to this change. If you want your body to adjust quickly, it needs the proper elements (obtained from food, the sun, the moon, water, air, whichever you bring in...)
Abazid, there is a lot of truth to what Cainntear is saying here. However, I strongly believe you achieved better learning results during your "exhausted" state with many naps. Unfortunately, a normal 16-hour session alone--with your current techniques--will not prepare you for the state of learning you want. But before I go any further, Abazid I want to thank you so much for the detailed post. We appreciate it :) A couple points from my own experience: 1) Personally, I think there were better choices than coffee. Of course the type of coffee and how the coffee was made play a big part, and really to an extent to where even your own environment can have a huge effect on how your body responds to this coffee; however, regardless...coffee does not relax you. it stimulates you. this is very obvious, but for rapid learning your mind MUST be relaxed. there's nothing wrong with the stimulation, but a relaxed state has always had very profound results in myself and my students. I am sure you GREATLY realized this during your venture :) My suggestion: definitely drink something you enjoy, but also go for something relaxing like peppermint tea or chamomile. If you want stimulation then you'll need the proper oxygen / blood flow associated with it: chew some spearmint gum (it is 'oxygenating') and drink oxygenated water. Oxygen = good for learning :) 2) The naps were completely necessary, so do not feel bad about them :) Even if you were truly "awake" 50 hours later, your brain would be pretty much in sleep mode. Especially when you awake for a moment and realize you were either hallucinating or being delusional :) The sleep gives your body important maintenance time. When you are awake, your body is obviously using energy to support your consciousness; however, when you sleep, your body can now utilize this energy to its maximum potential with performing maintenance tasks. Like I stated earlier: your mind needs time to adjust. While exhausting your mind will obviously put it in a more vegetative state, the long process of exhaustion i find rather inefficient because the method to get to that state takes much time. The fact that a relaxed / vegetative / "alpha-waved" mind is extremely effective for learning is only surprising at first to people who normally don't pay attention to their own process of learning. The more relaxed and mindful you are of your experience: the better your body will internalize that experience information AFTER your body has had the proper maintenance time. Perhaps this maintenance time ("sleeping") is the body's chance to adapt to the new environment. (Please note: what you learn in 1 day is also part of your sensory environment.) Abazid, if you or anyone else finds interest in an 8 hour learning technique that I have used with great success, I would be more than happy to write an article sharing this method. The 61-hour method you described reminds me of this; however, I think everyone here including yourself would agree that 8 hours with a lack of sleep is safer and healthier than 61 hours with a lack of sleep :) BUT...remember: the 8 hour method does have significant differences from the 61 hour method you described; however, the basic principals appear to have the same goals and purposes. Just like the 61-hour method, it is enlightening. The only pre-requisite is that you know how to exercise Pangu Shengong (a type of qigong that is technically a shengong). Surely you could utilize another practice that is similar and accomplishes the same result, but unfortunately I do not know of an official name for an alternative practice :( For you: find a qualified instructor on http://www.pangu.org/english/instructor/index.html , learn the method, and then you'll be able to initiate yourself to acquire all sorts of information in 8 hour sessions :) Is this something anyone would be interested in for rapid learning? Thank you again for sharing your information. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| carlonove Senior Member United States Joined 5799 days ago 145 posts - 253 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Italian | Message 90 of 200 17 April 2011 at 3:38pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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I'd like to see you write that article. I read up a bit on Mike Mangini after you mentioned him and have been thinking about whether it's possible to adapt his 90-minute practice regimens to language learning.
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| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5147 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 91 of 200 17 April 2011 at 7:10pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Congratulations on having the stamina to go through with this! I found your result interesting. Personally I would have preferred the model which included 8 hours of sleep at regular intervals, but I am a middle aged woman who need my sleep in order to function.
You have however inspired me to try and set up longer study periods. I just need to find a freezer big enough to hold two teenagers and a large husband while I do it :-). 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| slucido Bilingual Diglot Senior Member Spain https://goo.gl/126Yv Joined 6488 days ago 1296 posts - 1781 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Spanish*, Catalan* Studies: English | Message 92 of 200 17 April 2011 at 7:56pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
I understand you. I have a small wife and three large teenagers. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| HMS Senior Member England Joined 4920 days ago 143 posts - 256 votes Speaks: English* | Message 93 of 200 17 April 2011 at 11:36pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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This has been a very intriguing read. I would be interested to know how learning via this method affects retention. The number of times in my life I've "panic revised" for an exam the night before - got decent marks but - after only a few weeks have forgotton aspects in areas I was not daily utilising.
I can't help thinking it's rather like acquiring a decent suntan. You can rush into it and be a bronzed god after a week but it will wash away all the more quickly, as opposed to the slow methods. Congratulations & good luck in your further progress anyway. Edited by HMS on 17 April 2011 at 11:37pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| aerozeplyn Senior Member United States Joined 4961 days ago 141 posts - 202 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin | Message 94 of 200 18 April 2011 at 9:43am | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
HMS this is very true. Especially when you rapidly acquire information in a short time, you are also better off taking the time to exercise information that you will readily USE. Using this information readily can consist of actually speaking the language OR by continuing your studies. For example, the information on how your mouth/throat/etc needs to move in order to create new language sounds is very important information. Of course, if you do not use these muscles because you are not using the newly acquired information ("if you do not speak the new pronunciations because you are not speaking the language,") then your body will eventually change to accommodate what you do more often. Therefore, even the physical aspect of speaking the language will require more energy from your body--thus slowing you down. The same holds true with a suntan: if you want a suntan, then you have to be the person who has a suntan. You have to have the same habits as they do in order to have that suntan quality. If you want to speak a new language, you have to have the same habits as that language speaker in order to speak at their quality. Obviously, suntans and language learning have their differences...especially since they affect different organs. (I am including human skin as an organ. In fact, it is the body's largest organ anways soo....) So I believe a root question is: Since Abazid gained what he gained in less than 60 hours, will he also lose this knowledge if he does not use the knowledge for 3 days? I strongly doubt it. As Abazid posted earlier, he went in knowing very little--i believe absolutely nothing--about the Russian language. In 3 days of study abstinence, how likely can one expect that Abazid will remember nothing about the Russian language? I wouldn't be at all surprised if his language initialization has brought him to a point where he can continue to acquire more Russian language information in the future even easier than your exceptional beginner. Abazid, how do you feel? :) Or maybe you should tell us in a week. I will be following this thread. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5243 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 95 of 200 18 April 2011 at 1:37pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Brainwash or Hogwash? After following this very interesting thread, and with due respect to the OP, my conclusion is that this experiment is not really about learning a language but more about jump-starting the learning process. For many of us who have been working on our target languages over the years, to read that a marathon session of Michel Thomas can produce an intermediate level speaker of Russian in a few days is downright ludicrous. Just exactly what does intermediate mean? I'm not familiar with the MT Russian course, but the Spanish and French versions that I have listened to are at about a CEFR A1-A2 level. Frankly, I do not believe that spending a few days holed up with some MT cd's and lots of coffee will actually generate any permanent or long-term ability to interact with native speakers. That said, what I do believe is that the true value of this experiment lies in the fact that it did provide a quick introduction to the language. This is what I call jump-starting the learning process. It's a quick introduction to the sounds and the grammar. It provides a base on which to build. And this is something to be cultivated or it will disappear quickly, as happens so often with skills that are not used. Edited by s_allard on 18 April 2011 at 11:46pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Abazid Diglot Newbie Egypt Joined 4830 days ago 16 posts - 23 votes Speaks: Arabic (Egyptian)*, English Studies: Russian | Message 96 of 200 19 April 2011 at 4:46pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Thanks you all for your kind words =) .
There are three possibilities , One which is well-known and almost everyone has experimented with countless of times is Sleep-learning/Incubation , Or just the increase of my concentration which I believe may not be so , Or maybe due to the wealth of info sucked in during my state of deteriorated concentration , The obvious is the incubation/sleep learning , But which of the two is in the equation , I can't find out for sure .
You're welcome , I hope it helps , It's definitely a fun language =D , I love the fact that you can throw words all over the place and they'd still make sense , Such simplicity is very sophisticated .
My goal after all from this was understanding a documentary in Russian which is very complex in terms of scientific terms , So I need to step up to achieve fluency to be able to get to the point of understanding everything they say . Currently I'm revising the third MT course and working the exercises & extra vocab . Next up : I've researched many people experiences with Photoreading whole mind system & Foreign language/vocabulary acquistion on the PR forum and other places , And I've found that it's accelerates the process of understanding & memorization , The best among them was:
And I think I'm gonna use this next to acquire more vocabulary . But this time I'm gonna do "Syntopic Reading" which is going through many books , Say about 10-15 , And activating(Going through them consciously) the best of them , I'm talking many grammar books ,Translation/picture dictionaries...etc .
Actually it's about 54-60 hours without the 10-15 min breaks . I would totally agree with you if I've only did the Foundation course which is indeed basic , But the Advanced & Vocabulary course are comprehensive in terms of Grammar & vocabulary build-up and If I indeed needed to use the language to converse with people around Russia , I'd be able to manage pretty well . In regards of efficiency , I think I agree that small chunks distributed on a month with constant practice & revision would be indeed better as it gives time to the brain to process everything at ease and the time to practice as well , Which would be ideal , But it still takes a lot of time and there's also the factor of boredom with the slowness of the pace & the huge factor of procrastination (Making one get lazy ) An interesting thing I've noticed in this , Is that (Particularly with MT) as you continue with the building block approach , Even though I was progressing fast , Each extra building block/layer seemed to reinforce the one before it and solidifty it especially with the constant practice , That at the end . I felt they're all connected/associated together making them stick as a whole , And as I went to the more advanced course , That new structures reinforced the older ones solidifying them further , In my experience this form of constant extended reinforcement is probably why I feel very familiar with all that I've learned , Which is unique to this . But generally , I think that such format work hard till you're tired , Rest & continue , Saves time and would be great for developing a solid initial foundation and then developing it later on with time .
I totally agree , It also would be best if you tend to procrastinate a lot , Which I believe sth most people do anyway , But still it needs a very good purpose to keep on going on without giving up .
I'm totally new to the whole CEFR ranking , So I'm not sure if this is true , I'd say just at the beginning of B1 at both listening & speaking , And at the End of A1 in Reading & Writing , If it helps , I could show you the MT third level to see for yourself if you'e knowldegeable in Russian . Regarding Vocab , I can't possibly know how to even answer this even if it was toward my English Vocabulary , But I still got many gaps .
I don' think that most of people need the default 8 hrs of sleep , It's different for every person , But 5-6 hours is more than fine at least for me , I think it would be best described as work hard until you're tired, Rest & then continue . I think it's a good time saver to jump start anything but it also depends on the material used , But if mixed with other systems like Photoreading & memory techniques , It could work wonders .
I thought so before going with the experiment , This is why I've positioned MT in the beginning as my research pointed out that it completely depends on understanding , And I think this is still true .
I thought so as well , That I'd sleep like 24 hours or more , But the weird thing is that I found myself sleeping for about no more than 5 hrs , But in the following days , What I've noticed is that my eyes tend to be stressed easier when I'm spending time on my PC , I think that if one is going to do this , It should be done more like once a month or done with the "Natural" sleep period .
Yeah I think this what would sum it up as best , Because each one's body is different .
Thanks for the advice , It's just that I'm already used to drinking 3-4 cups a day , And I just increased it to about 4-6 but in the next 38 hours of the exp I cut down on it because it made me feel bad and it wasn't doing much in keeping me up anyway .
Not only it's exhausted , It's also very hard to continue through with as well , I was DYING to get some rest , So yes I agree that when one feels in need of rest , He should listen to his body's signals .
You're welcome =) .
Thankfully I've developed the skill of knowing how to relax myself in most of conditions however stressed , Which helped a lot , But indeed it had a bad effect on me in the beginning as I increased the dose , And later it lost its effect completely , I felt like I was "Drunk" .
Thanks for the advice , And yep , diluted h202 water/oxygenated water is great for helping with many things.
I agree , It definitely could be sleep learning as well .
I'm usually functioning from Alpha when I'm studying (Silva & Photoreading Training led to that after a long while) , Yet I think at the time I was losing my concentration completely I was probably functioning from Deep theta or even Delta coz when I closed my eyes for a second , I could see "Clear" vivid imagery like as if I was dreaming while awake , I bet this is probably why this had to do with brainwashing , One is wide open to suggestions , I also bet that this would be a TOTALLY different experience with talented instructors .
Please do , I'm always interested in new systems and after all , One doesn't have free time as much as he wants , I had to free all this time to do this and it wasn't easy as well .
You've mentioned sth about having information that would be learned in 3 months in one sessions , Could you elaborate further on your experience with this and what did you use it in , What happened..etc ?
Thank you Solfrid =) , I do think you should stick to sleeping "only" when your body begins to show you signs of stress , Pre-defined periods only lead to inflexibility , I thought I was going to do 81 hrs and ended up with 72 hrs and not even connected . One important thing I've also learned is that I was capable of arranging & managing my time to fit into this , Finding out that there's a lot of wasted time I've already had in between different periods and that I could definitely endure longer periods of learning if I'm willing to , Which surprised me , I bet you have time in between the main daily tasks as well .
Thanks HMS , I'm very familiar with Panic revising or more like Hardcore cramming , And I also lost many of what I was studying back then , Because mainly I didn't want to study it , I was "Forced" to ,And so It felt more like torture , Hence my brain dumped all the info coz I've had no extra purpose for it , Or more like it was dumped in the exam lol . In this case , I had a clear purpose which I still do , It was the understanding of material I need in my current research and my excitement for it , And when you sit down for 72 hours without being forced in anyway to do sth you don't want , Somehow this shows the importance of such information to your brain , Hence it's retained. Revising the user guides of the courses & testing myself, Almost all of the material comes up naturally , Yet I do believe that MT has a big part to do with this coz it seems like a mnemonic build up course with understanding .
I've already immersed myself through changing my Windows language into Russian (At least 3 months), So that I'd add up more vocab I'm already used to and show my brain that this information is still wanted & needed , And I'm having fun with it , I'm using it to think and make up words whenever I'm free , And I've downloaded many great russian movies to increase my recognition of what I already know and what I don't , So I think it's all about how you feed your brain back and how important sth is to you .
This is exactly why I wanted to do this experiment , Because I thought it was too good to be true , I've seen some genius memory man do sth similar (search Learn Icelandic in a week "Tammet") , And it made me think that it could be possible for us through such means . As to the complexity of the MT course , I believe that the vocab. course is pretty advanced not only with the grammar but also with the amount of vocabulary that could be developed from it , I'm new with the whole CEFR ranking thingie , I still do believe that I'm probably at the beginning of the B1 rank , If it's helpful to you , I could provide the 3rd course guide to someone who knows Russian and after analyzing it he could rank it based on its complexity . 1 person has voted this message useful |
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