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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| ibraheem Groupie United States Joined 5163 days ago 84 posts - 106 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: German, Russian, Mandarin | Message 1 of 8 10 April 2011 at 3:20am | IP Logged | |||||
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The question is, has anyone ever used this language learning method that I am proposing here?
I have often heard about research into how babies learn languages as a way of finding the best adult language learning methods. But I have another idea, learning a language from the very basic (caveman) level (noun+verb?) and only then adding more sophisticated words (adjectives+pronouns?) then (prepositions?) then (adverbs?) etc... Learning maybe a few hundred of the most common nouns, only then introducing verbs, then adjectives etc... The point is that it may be easier to focus on one group of words starting with the easiest, so this is really a way of grouping words together which is frowned upon by some. At the same time I think this might be an efficient way of learning a language, instead of learning random words (boy, little, with, effective) you will only learn nouns first (which seem to be the words we can most easily remember, especially when they are things we can visualise). An important part of this strategy would be to put these words together at some point. So after learning nouns and then some verbs, you can start making the most simple phrases and progressively work on more complex sentences. This would be more efficient than starting with sentences like "I come from America" where you are actually using very different word types and complex verb conjugations etc... Any opinions? 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 5809 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 2 of 8 10 April 2011 at 12:59pm | IP Logged | |||||
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The problem: this leads to overrehearsing the "dictionary" form of words. Once you try to start learning the various inflected forms, you already have the instinct to spit out the uninflected forms, so it actually makes it harder to learn grammar.
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| Splog Diglot Senior Member Czech Republic anthonylauder.c Joined 5467 days ago 1062 posts - 3263 votes Speaks: English*, Czech Studies: Mandarin | Message 3 of 8 10 April 2011 at 1:45pm | IP Logged | |||||
There is plenty of research showing that irrespective of the materials you use and the approach you try to follow, what is actually going on in your head is a predictable multi-staged process of language acquisition. The following is taken from a wikipedia article on second language: "Acquiring a second language occurs in systematic stages. Much evidence has been gathered to show that basic sounds, vocabulary, negating phrases, forming questions, using relative clauses, and so on are developed. This development is independent of input (we do not hear nor read language in this order) and learning situation (in the classroom or on the street). It is also generally applicable across a spectrum of learners (from different language backgrounds). This is similar to the learning stages that babies go through when acquiring the first language: babbling (bababa), vocabulary (milk then later milk drink), negation (no play), question forming (where she go), and so on." There is a whole load of work in this area. Just do a Google search on something like "stages of language acquisition". Edited by Splog on 10 April 2011 at 1:46pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| TerryW Senior Member United States Joined 6155 days ago 370 posts - 783 votes Speaks: English* | Message 4 of 8 10 April 2011 at 2:46pm | IP Logged | |||||
That how me/I/myself learn/absorb/acquire English! Be/was/had been you impressed/astounded/surprised that I so good/accomplished/skillful? ;-) 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| ibraheem Groupie United States Joined 5163 days ago 84 posts - 106 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Russian, Mandarin | Message 5 of 8 10 April 2011 at 3:50pm | IP Logged | |||||
In the first stages you will only be able to form incomplete sentences, "Black house. Red cellphone.". This flies in the face of the phrase-book strategy where you start learning using complex sentences like "Might you have seen the assailant who has stolen my purse?". Edited by ibraheem on 10 April 2011 at 3:51pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| ibraheem Groupie United States Joined 5163 days ago 84 posts - 106 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Russian, Mandarin | Message 6 of 8 10 April 2011 at 3:53pm | IP Logged | |||||
I was not familiar with these studies, thanks. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 5809 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 7 of 8 10 April 2011 at 10:58pm | IP Logged | |||||
As I understood it, the idea of a "universal order of acquisition" is based on a very small body of work. In fact, I have seen the main evidence for it criticised on grounds of methodology. The notion of a universal order was derived from a latitudinal study (different students ata single time) within a single school, whereas what's really needed is a longitudinal study (the same students throughout their study) covering students from different schools. After all, it's pretty trivial to show that students following the same course learn the language in the same order. Certain elements of language do follow on from each other -- you can't learn the progressive in English until you understand "to be", for example, and you can't handle complex embedded clauses until you've mastered simple sentences, but I don't think you can extend that to much of the language. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6501 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 8 of 8 10 April 2011 at 11:53pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I agree with Caintearr, but would like to add that you also have to study the order across different languages. For instance the past tense forms of Russian are not only very few, but also built upon the forms of the adjectives, not those of the present/future tense. This should make them very different to learn from the past tenses of for instance Spanish or Italian. On the other hand the distinction between perfective and nonperfective verbs is important even for the present in Russian, while the nearest parallel in Spanish only regards the past tenses.
So from a purely linguistic point of view you should be able to learn the Russian past tense very fast and right after the present, while the Spanish past tenses should take longer time, follow later and maybe have their own internal sequence. I don't know whether anybody actually have studied the sequences across languages, so I'm not even going to guess whether my theoretically based prediction is correct. But if it is wrong, then I would take that as a sign that the order of learning different elements in a language can't be dictated by purely intralinguistical factors. If it is true then I wouldn't expect the same learning order (except in very broad terms) across languages. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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