Wednesday, September 26, 2018

Language Learning Tips!

As the school year starts, most people are facing the prospect of a new year of language study--and contrary to popular opinion, just playing Duolingo or Rosetta Stone may not be enough to really learn a language fluently for everyone :-) Over the years I've seen many different ways of studying languages--one woman in my Modern Greek class had an email penpal that she wrote to all the time, but she refused to try to speak it until she could write perfectly; some friends have learned languages just by going to the country without any previous knowledge and learned there; I've even met a few people who took German in school and were fairly fluent simply from their college (or even high school) classes!

Of course, nothing compares to going to a foreign country and being immersed in it (like the time I got lost in the mountains outside of Korinthos, Greece, and had to find my way back into the city by asking people who only spoke Greek...), but it helps if you have a basis to get started. Everyone learns differently, some of us are tactile (need to write it down), some people need to hear it, some need to see things written down--it's important to figure out what combinations of studying work best for you. Here are some tips that we've put together over the years that might be useful!


--For beginners, try to find a balance of reading it on the page, hearing people pronouncing it, speaking it yourself, being able to spell in the foreign language and understanding the grammar of your own native language.

--Learn the orthography at the beginning. Understanding how a language is spelled will save a lot of time later in understanding how to pronounce it. The [ʧ] sound in Ciao in Italian is spelled differently than Tschüss in German or Chihuahua in Spanish, and it's important to figure those differences out early, so that when you learn new vocabulary you can make your best guess at pronouncing it. Especially in our jobs, which require using a vocabulary that can be archaic, this can be very important. By the way, when it comes to foreign language spelling, English is the absolute worst--yes, worse than French!--so you've already conquered the hardest part.


--Flashcards--I always recommend making your own, although there are pre-fabricated flashcards available, as well as flashcard apps like Duolingo. If you make your own you get the benefits of:
  • writing it down (for those of us tactile learners!)
  • being able to format them any way you want (I always leave room for the plural form of the word, any irregular verb forms or stems and phrases that the word is often used it)
  • being able to write in your own phonetics, including stressed syllables, open and closed vowels, voiced consonants or any exceptional pronunciation
When I first moved to Germany, I actually created flashcards on a Powerpoint presentation, and would watch it while I walked on the treadmill in the afternoons! Small flashcards can be handy to have along when you're standing in line at a checkout counter or in a rehearsal where you are waiting for your entrance, but it's also nice to be moving around, so find ways to incorporate them that work for you.


--Flashcards II--When studying flashcards, try not to just attach the foreign word with its equivalent in your native language. Instead, try to associate it with an image or idea. For example, if you have "das Fenster" in German, say the word a few times and look at your window. Create sentences for idea words so that you're always using the words to form phrases, this will create more connections in the foreign language.

--The best verb drills ever--in French III, every time we encountered a new verb, the teacher made us go through the entire conjugation in every possible form:
  • Statement--Je suis, tu es, il est, etc
  • Question (in 2 forms!)-Suis-je? Est-ce que je suis? etc
  • Negative Statement-Je ne suis pas, etc
  • Negative Question-Ne suis-je pas, Est-ce que je ne suis pas? etc
  • then include every different tense of the verb that you've learned so far! Don't forget to study the imperative forms and that some tenses will need "que" in front of them (and then you can add in "I hope that" forms to make this even more complicated!).
It gets very complicated very quickly with all the auxiliary verbs in some verb tenses and once you hit reflexive verbs even more so! But it creates neural pathways so that your brain will start to come up with these configurations automatically and it will start to sound right to you.


Listening exercises--the most important thing is to always listen ACTIVELY. Having it on in the background doesn't really help study, much as we all wish we could learn by osmosis! Try transcribing what you hear when you are doing listening exercises, it will help distinguish words and solidify the spelling rules, which in turn helps diction. Some free ways to get in some foreign language listening:
  • Switch the language on your favorite DVDs. Most DVDs come with several language tracks on them, try switching the language and see how much you understand. The also often have subtitles, which you can follow along (although they don't necessarily match the exact words of the dubbed speech, so don't get frustrated!). If your favorite DVD has subtitles but not a language track for the language you're studying, try turning off the sound and following the subtitles, to see how much you can understand.
  • Podcasts. I'm addicted to podcasts. I have podcasts on my iPhone in everything from Notes in Spanish to Learning Greek to Radio France (I'm addicted to On se dit tout sur France Bleu) to Binge Mode Harry Potter to How I Built This... and you don't need an iPhone or tablet. iTunes is a free download, and you can listen right on your computer. Most language podcasts include a website where you can download the transcriptions of the episodes or the answer keys to their exercises.
  • Pop music. I like to say that I turned off the radio in 1985, because I'm playing the piano so much that I don't listen to music outside of work. But I LOVE to listen to pop music in other languages! Generally the text repeats make it easier to understand, and they tend to use simple vocabulary that can be very useful. I've found playlists that other users have created already on Spotify of French, Italian, and Greek pop music that I listen to on my way to work sometimes, or you can set it to play specific genres in the Radio section. Pop songs also often use modern colloquial language that might not make it into a book, and we learn more quickly when something is set to music, so with very little time invested, you can get a big return!

Children's books are a great way to read in a foreign language, because they are generally closer to our level! I usually start with the 6-8-year-old age range and move up through the teens from there. Look up the words you don't know and try reading the book aloud every night before you go to sleep. If you have kids, make it a game you play with them--I used to read fairy tales in French to a friend's kids at bedtime, and after every sentence I would translate it into English for them. The next day, if they remembered any of the words in French, they got the first cookie out of the oven!


Get a library card! I'm always surprised that more people don't take advantage of the free resources available to us all--the city library is always the first place I go when I move somewhere new. I take out CDs and scores, as well as children's books in foreign languages, DVDs, language learning books, audiobooks in several languages, plus, of course, American/British crime fiction.

Once you're feeling comfortable enough, there are lots of different types of meet-up groups, language forums, tandem language partners--getting over the initial embarrassment of speaking a foreign language is critical, and finding someone who's in the same boat as you in your language can be really helpful in those initial steps. The shift from being able to read, to being able to understand, to being able to communicate yourself is a process. Make sure to enjoy the journey!


Do you have any tips that weren't mentioned here?
--Ellen

No comments:

Post a Comment