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How many words you learn per year (avg) | ||
Tags: Poll | Vocabulary learning | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies |  | |
| chaotic_thought Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 3354 days ago 129 posts - 274 votes  Speaks: English*, German Studies: Dutch, French | Message 65 of 229 06 May 2015 at 6:34pm | IP Logged | ||
If you write a blog in your target language, you could see how many unique words you are using actively after each period (1 year, 2 years, etc.) This would be a lot of more interesting than making thousands of flashcards. After I reach 1000 flashcards, I start quickly losing interest. I have to really strain myself to get a pack approaching 10000 words, even though I know more words than just what's on my flashcards. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7017 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French | Message 66 of 229 06 May 2015 at 11:41pm | IP Logged | ||
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Flashcards aren't the only way to learn words.
2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5242 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 67 of 229 07 May 2015 at 12:24am | IP Logged | ||
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Using an indirect method, @patrickwilken estimates that he has been learning passively around 3000 words a year.
The figure sounds quite realistic to me. At this point in the poll, there are 2 people who claim to learn 5001 - 8000 words a year and 3 people who learn more than 8001 words a year. All over the past five years. I don't doubt these figures as such but I'm curious as to how these figures were calculated. Was there some way of tracking these words, or is there some method of realistically extrapolating these figures from smaller samples? 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 68 of 229 07 May 2015 at 3:01am | IP Logged | ||
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Two of these people are me and robarb. We both learn related languages, where robarb has focused on the Germanic family, and me on the Romance and Slavic as well (but also Germanic to some extent). Of course robarb already speaks several Romance languages.
I mostly just remembered where I was 5 years ago. Intermediate Portuguese and German, elementary Spanish and Italian, no Polish, minimal Danish and no plans to learn Swedish. Also some Indonesian. Perpetually curious about Croatian but not really learning it yet. Curious about Dutch and Catalan as well. I'm not sure I had already given up on Esperanto, though I think I probably had. My Finnish was already fluent, but I hadn't passed C1 yet. And I've learned some English vocab as well. Comparing that to where I am now, 5000-8000 words per year don't seem unrealistic (where the active ones would be closer to 5000). I also do the Dialang tests every now and then, and sometimes other tests that go viral on HTLAL. As I've already said, if I tried to focus on one language, I think 3000 words would be my limit, and I would have to be extremely motivated. I'm not saying I remember all these words btw. I've definitely forgotten many Indonesian ones, some English and German vocab I learned specifically for university and some other words that I didn't come across often enough. But that's a natural part of learning. Edited by Serpent on 07 May 2015 at 3:14am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5242 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 69 of 229 07 May 2015 at 3:40am | IP Logged | ||
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There seems to be an interesting distinction between learning new words in one language and learning new words
over multiple languages. So, for example, if one is learning five languages simultaneously, then four new words a day in each language seems easier and more realistic than 20 words a day in one language. Part of this ease of learning can be explained by the learning of related languages. Someone who is learning French, Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese simultaneously will in many cases get four words out of the same cognate. This I understand, and although I have my reservations about this cognate discount when it comes to actually using the words, I think that this reasoning is essentially correct. What I still have a problem understanding is how do people keep track of all these words in order to arrive at a figure like 8000 words a year. Even if they are spread over many languages, the 22 words a day still have to be written down somewhere to be counted. So, maybe it's not 8000 flashcards a year. Then, what is it? Or is it just guestimating out of thin air? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4519 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 70 of 229 07 May 2015 at 4:15am | IP Logged | ||
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I don't count them, but I can tell from my interactions how many I am reasonably using
in my target languages. Just to give you an example: - I have certainly learned hundreds of Italian words this year, and a decent amount of Greek, Esperanto and Mandarin, as well as a lot of Norwegian. I've also learned new words in my better languages. I can tell because my interactions in all of these languages have noticeably improved. I don't track the words, but I can tell I am using more words in my language use. That's good enough. What that comes down to exactly I don't know, but given my learning curves over the last years that definitely is 8000+. Edited by tarvos on 07 May 2015 at 4:16am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| smallwhite Pentaglot Senior Member Australia Joined 5120 days ago 537 posts - 1045 votes Speaks: Cantonese*, English, Mandarin, French, Spanish | Message 71 of 229 07 May 2015 at 4:22am | IP Logged | ||
While what I have problem understanding is how you still don't understand after several members' explanations of how they arrive at their figures. I get the impression that you have difficulty understanding opinions different from your own, maybe due to difficulty understanding the words used, which is probably why you're less interested in words that come out of other people's mouths (passive vocabulary) than those that come out of your's (active vocabulary). All these things that you don't understand are probably just due to one thing: that some people understand words and messages better than you do. This may seem unbelievable and impossible to you, but that's the only conclusion I could come up with so far that answers every question. Now, how to beat those better people, I don't know. There's a forum tag "Comprehension/understanding" you can try. Edited by smallwhite on 07 May 2015 at 4:28am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| iguanamon Pentaglot Senior Member Virgin Islands Speaks: Ladino Joined 5074 days ago 2237 posts - 6731 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese, Haitian Creole, Creole (French) | Message 72 of 229 07 May 2015 at 5:02am | IP Logged | ||
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I didn't answer the poll because there's no category listed that fits me- "no idea". I don't count words or do srs. I'm with tarvos on this one. I know I'm learning because my look-ups in reading keep getting fewer and fewer. My circumlocutions and word searching in speaking are similarly diminishing.
I just wanted to add this comment in case someone new to language learning sees this thread and thinks, "wow, I need to learn x amount of words to be successful". One can learn a language with counting words. There is plenty of evidence for this. Also, one can learn a language without counting words, as I and others have done. Ultimately, it's what works for you. One size does not fit all in learning a language. Edited by iguanamon on 07 May 2015 at 5:03am 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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