English as an island

Here’s how I like to picture the situation of people around the world trying to learn English:

Imagine the world as a globe. People live all over it, right? And then imagine English as existing somewhere on that globe.

Suppose that learning English is a matter of traveling from where you are to where English is. For instance, English might exist on one of the Hawaiian Islands up on a mountain. Then for most of us, we have a journey in front of us.

Our journeys are of different distances. They are likely to include travel over land and across water. We may share parts of our journeys with others, but really we each have to make individual trips. No two trips are the same.

We also have choices. Across land we may walk, run, travel by train, drive our own vehicles or take public transport. And across the water we may swim, paddle, go by cruise ship, fly over by helicopter or plane. There are all sorts of ways.

Some things we can expect to be fairly common among the world’s population. Most of us will set out on land, eventually face a sea voyage, and end with a climb. You could form an analogy with learning vocabulary, getting a sense of the grammar, and finally producing output.

So what is the point of this little story?

To point out, I suppose, that everyone’s language learning journey is different, but that most of our journeys have similar elements. And finally, I suppose, it serves to suggest that some itineraries involve more effort and time than others. And that by carefully selecting your mode of travel you can make the journey much easier—maybe even a pleasant experience.

Hey, maybe someone knows of a matter transporter!

“Beam me up, Scotty!” and . . .

Bon voyage.

Japanese, Dutch and German

My first language is English. It's a handy one to know. I actually had to learn it twice during my early childhood. But for now I want to concentrate on the next three languages that I aim to acquire: Japanese, Dutch and German.

Japanese print shows a Dutch man and a German man drawing up a contract in a mercantile house in Yokohama, Japan. Done by Sadahide Utagawa (1807-1873) in 1861.

My 3 ‘Easy’ Languages

I want to acquire languages from varying start points, both to test whether my methods are universally applicable, but also because it would be a waste to ignore languages on which I’ve made a start.

Japanese
First started 20+ years ago but made very little progress. Have a history of resistance. In the past 2 years began to make some headway as a result of experimenting and refining my ideas. At the start of this 2-year period, I begin at an intermediate level as regards written Japanese, but at a beginner’s level with regard to speaking and listening.

Initial plan:

• Children’s book e.g. Enid Blyton, Magic Tree House to read and mine sentences
• Shadow HNT 1-10 in Japanese (Mami’s)
• Harry Potter for kanji
• Harry Potter for listening

Dutch

Technically my first language. I picked it up at home. I’ve spent the first year of elementary school in the Netherlands, but have never studied either grammar or tried to memorize any vocabulary. I start from a fairly advanced level.

Initial plan:

• Read Ghost Boy in Dutch done

German

Natural affinity to this language since I can guess at a good deal of it because of my Dutch and English. I completed a half-year beginner’s course in German at University 40 years ago. I’ve spent 2 weeks in Germany soon after that.

Initial plan:

• View My Name is Nobody in German and English done
  
• Thereafter, Harry book 3 text+audio

Other possible languages

French

I just love the work of Serge Gainsbourgh. But at high school, where I was obliged to do French for 2 years, I hated the language and thought it effeminate. Consequently I did poorly.

Hindi

I spent 18 months working at a school in the Punjab 35 years ago. I picked up the odd word, and tried to learn the alphabet. But since Punjabi and Urdu were spoken (at the English-medium school) I failed to make any further progress.

Update: see this blog.

A daunting prospect

Most people can’t contemplate learning a new language simply because the prospect of doing so is too daunting. And of those who try, only 1 in 20 succeed. Why should that be?

Is it the time that’s required?

Is it embarrassment at the thought of making mistakes?

A little, perhaps. But I feel that the biggest impediment is the tedium, frustration and hard work that they imagine such a project would involve.

And that’s fair enough. Who would willingly endure such stress? Who’d try, unless they had a damn good reason? And no means of escape?

But if there was a way to eliminate, or to bypass, all of that hardship, what then?

Why then, the sky would be the limit!

10 languages in 2 years!

Heinrich Schliemann, the German archeologist, is claimed to have learned 6 languages in only 2 years (and a total of 14 during his lifetime).

My method is better than his was.

So I ought to be able to learn more languages in the same time.

It's certainly a thought. 

So I've decided to spend a couple of years on an experiment. I'm going to see how well my ideas work. I'm going to put them, and myself, to the test. Let me see if I can't learn 10 languages in 2 years.

Starting now. Midway through the year, on the last day of June, 2016.

Update: See this blog.

Goldilocks sentences

The Japanese have a name for Little Red Riding Hood, but not for Goldilocks. Strange, that . . .

Anyway, mining for sentences is probably the simplest, easiest way to gain exposure supplemented with a dollop of attention.
 
You simply go through a book in the target language sentence by sentence. Consider each one. 

If you can read it easily, do so and move on to the next. If it is difficult, then skip it and go on to the next. 

Therefore, spend no more than 5 seconds on any sentence.
 
If there are no easy sentences, find an easier book.
If there are no difficult sentences, find a book that’s more advanced.
 
Very good. That’s the exposure part of it taken care of.
 
As for paying attention—‘study’ if you like that word better . . .
 
Whenever you come across a sentence that ‘catches’ a little, but only a little, then make some sort of mark. Underline the last word, or highlight the full stop. Don't waste time. Continue.
 
After your reading session, go back and write out in full all those Goldilocks sentences. That is enough to focus your attention for a few seconds at a time.

And that’s all that you do.
 
Nothing more.
 
Eventually you may accumulate 10,000 sentences, as someone online once advised people to do.
 
But don’t try to study or memorize those sentences or enter them into a spaced repetition system. I don’t think that you need to. You’ll get more out of doing more of what you’ve done.
 
Of course, you may want to, but that’s a different matter.

Seek input that you can understand

Comprehensible input. You've been there, done that.

When you needed to learn Dutch, you read ‘Ot en Sien’ and ‘Kruimeltje’. Later, when you needed to learn English, you read Superman comics, the Famous Five and Myths and Legends from Many Lands.

You got yourself comprehensible input in the language that you had to learn. 

You chose interesting material at your level.

It’s possible to expand the difficulty limit of the material if you have a way to making it understandable. (Cheating is allowed.)

If you already know the story, that’s good (unless you are disinclined to re-read books or watch movies again and again). But you could get around that by seeking more by the same author, or continue in that genre.

If your listening is at a level where it supplements your understanding, then listen to the audiobook at the same time as you follow along on paper or the screen.

And if you read on screen, you might use an application that gives you the meaning of words when you scroll over them.

  There are means and ways.

Consider keeping a journal

It may help to document your language learning journey in a journal. If you’re the type of person who has ever kept a diary this may be for you.

Apart from the obvious function of acting as a log, whereby you tally your hours, a journal may fulfill several other purposes.

It can act as a motivation. If it’s a public one, then the subtle pressure of living up to your intentions could help to spur you on.

But it’s also a place to record your experiments. What worked; what didn’t? It can help you to discover any patterns to do with mood, plateaus, or progress etc.

You can record the interesting tips and tricks of other people as well as your own.

It can be an organizational centre—a mini-desk as it were.

Keeping a journal may be a keystone habit for you, ensuring that you always sit down at your desk at the same time of day for a few minutes. It can act as a reminder and lead on to achieving other goals.

It could be in the form of a notebook or a blog (which may be private or public.) Some people prefer a vlog. Talk to YouTube. A vlog will capture your speaking ability quite easily and effectively.

Intact language if you please

There's this obsession to break knowledge into facts and rules. We're fascinated with getting down to its building blocks.

That has its place, I'll admit.

But to learn a language, certainly if you want to use it, deal with intact text.

Songs. Poems. Stories. Articles. Books. Movies. Comics.

And so a word is better than a bunch of letters. Words in groups as phrases or sentences include a sense of how they are put together. Paragraphs develop a sentence. And an entire chapter, story or book enable you to get into the language in the realest sense of all.

Steal others' ideas

Well, not exactly steal.

Borrow, maybe.

Or adapt.

Use.

It's worth checking out other approaches that people take to learning a language (especially those used by successful language learners, and even more especially the approaches of people who initially failed).  

Begin by getting hold of a copy of 'The Polyglot Project' (or here as a pdf) which is chocka-block packed with such accounts. Follow up the leads. Identify the common themes. 

Try ideas on for size.

What DON'T you need to learn another language?

What don’t you need to learn another language? And what do you? My two cents' worth.

I’ll start with what you don’t need. It may surprise you, since this runs counter to the conventional wisdom.

  
You don’t need:

• Willpower. You shouldn't. Your amount of this is limited, and you’ll run out of it if you rely on willpower on a regular basis. What you do should be so arranged that you enjoy doing it.
• Gift. There are far fewer people with a gift for languages than you think. Conversely, almost everyone has the aptitude.
• Time. You don’t need great big chunks of time. Five minutes here and there will mount up. And short bursts are actually better.
• Analytical mind. You need to be interested in order to learn. But to break things up into ever smaller portions won’t help you use a language. You lose speed and fluency.
• Memory. Not short term memory. Long term memory is what you need. And that relies on ‘forgetting’ nonessentials or things you’re not quite ready for.
• A knowledge of grammar. Certainly not the technical terms and whatnot. But an internal feel for what sounds right is another matter.
• Teacher. No you don’t. You need to take charge of your own learning. And the sooner the better.
• Intelligence. What’s the lowest IQ that you need to be able to use your own language? Exactly!
• Materials. Language learning materials are produced to make someone a profit. Just make use of the materials that people of the language you’re interested in are interested in.
• Outgoing personality. No difference has been shown between introverts and extroverts. Not as far as learning a language goes
• Energy. You may choose to spend a lot of energy. But if you need to, then you’re doing it wrong. Energy, like willpower, is limited.

You do need:

• Desire. It helps a lot if there’s something that you have a passion for which requires knowing the language. That’s too wordy . . . You’ve gotta love something about it.
• Reason. The stronger your reason or need to know a language, the more likely you’ll learn it.
• Tenacity. It takes a long time. It isn’t difficult, but progress is slow. So it helps if you are dogged. If you have a history of going long projects.
• Independence. You need to be able to work on your own. You are the best judge about how you learn best. At least you should be.
• Imagination. Imagination will create something interesting out of something boring.
• Open mind. You need to be able to hold of prematurely judging. Every new idea is born drowning.
• Self-belief. If you believe that you won’t be able to do something, then you won’t. Guaranteed. 
• Experience. If you can call on something in your history where you succeeded in learning another language, or with a long course of study, then that’s a big plus. Even if you failed, that will help you avoid future pitfalls.
• Self knowledge. The better you know yourself, your on-buttons and off-buttons the more likely you are to climb ladders and avoid snakes.
• Interest. You need to be alert to notice what’s going on in a language. 
• Patience. It’s going to take time. You don’t need negative self-talk slowing you down even further. Realistically, you need patience.
• Laziness. Finding the easiest and most pleasant way to do things will conserve your resources.
• Pleasure. Enjoy what you do. Otherwise, what’s the point?
• Resourcefulness. Use whatever you have at hand well. Work to your strengths.