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How do "normal" people learn languages? | ||
Tags: Learning Strategy | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| HenryMW Tetraglot Senior Member United States Joined 4986 days ago 125 posts - 179 votes  Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, French Studies: Modern Hebrew | Message 1 of 16 05 January 2012 at 12:43am | IP Logged |
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I was talking to a friend of mine today and he pointed out that "people like me" aren't
exactly like everyone else when it comes to learning a language, and it got me thinking. I'm a big fan of FSI, but I have a hard time seeing someone who needs to learn just one language for their job using it. Does anyone know someone who was in this position? A friend or relative who doesn't spend hours a day learning multiple languages but still had to learn a language for work, say Spanish for a retail job or if your company sends you abroad? How did they learn it? Assimil? Pimsleur? Classes? Something else? Edited by HenryMW on 05 January 2012 at 12:45am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6409 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 2 of 16 05 January 2012 at 1:31am | IP Logged |
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Classes or private tutors, I think. If nothing else then for motivation and socializing.
Practically everyone will tell you that it's impossible to learn a language on your own. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5187 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 3 of 16 05 January 2012 at 3:14am | IP Logged |
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I am someone who has been learning Spanish for a little over two years on about 30-60 minutes a day. I think the best way is to do Michel Thomas and Pimsleur followed by Assimil followed by FSI. That is more or less what I have done. I think Assimil would have been too difficult for me at the start and FSI would have been way too difficult to start with.
I do, however, know a number of other people like me learning Spanish and most of them are learning by taking night classes or using private tutors. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6515 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 4 of 16 05 January 2012 at 3:23am | IP Logged |
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Normal people in Denmark learn English in school, and then they keep it alive because they can't avoid getting it stuffed down their throats - though some supplement this with evening courses. Normal people may have learnt other languages in school, but the sad truth is that it is becoming less and less normal to learn other languages than Danish and English - even though you might think that cheap travel opportunities and the internet would point in the other direction. FOr those who try to learn languages as adults the normal way would be evening courses, but I'm not too optimistic about the effect of those courses - maybe 20x2 hours during a semester with co-students who are as bad as themselves and who speak more in Danish than in the language they are supposed to learn.
1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Bao Diglot Senior Member Germany tinyurl.com/pe4kqe5 Joined 5578 days ago 2256 posts - 4046 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin | Message 5 of 16 05 January 2012 at 7:33am | IP Logged |
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How do you define being normal? Any person I know needs following to learn a language: A lot of motivation, a lot of effort and having to re-learn some parts of it in different situations or with different apporaches.
The only difference between me and many of my peers is that I find it easier to gather and sustain (positive) motivation simply because I think a language sounds cool or has intriguing features, which means I find it comparatively more easy to stay self-motivated. (Can anybody explain to me why I used 'easier' and 'more easy' in one sentence and can't decide which I should change, if any?) 1 person has voted this message useful | |
 newyorkeric Diglot Moderator Singapore Joined 6191 days ago 1598 posts - 2174 votes Speaks: English*, Italian Studies: Mandarin, Malay Personal Language Map | Message 6 of 16 05 January 2012 at 7:53am | IP Logged |
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It should be 'easier' in both cases but I can't tell you why.
1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Elexi Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5377 days ago 938 posts - 1839 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 7 of 16 05 January 2012 at 9:48am | IP Logged |
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You will find 'more easy' being used in some writing (but not 'more easier') but it is considered a redundant usage as the comparison of adjectives should go easy, easier, easiest. However, stylistically most English children are taught to not use the same word twice in a sentence where possible, so the construction 'comparitively more easy' may be forgiven on stylistic grounds :)
3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 5823 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 8 of 16 05 January 2012 at 10:44am | IP Logged |
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English comparatives are slowly changing.
The old rule used to be -er and -est everywhere. The rule taught in books now is that monosyllabic words take -er and -est. Disyllabic words ending in a Y, where Y is the only vowel in the second syllable, also take -(i)er/-(i)est. (easiest, prettiest) (You'll sometimes see a few exceptions (eg "commonest").) As a lot of learners forget to use -iest and say "most -" instead, there's outside pressure changing habits in English. I'd encourage you to say "easiest" for now -- you're probably saying "more easy" because of other learners. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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