Learning another language as an adult
- Thread starter cyrocksmypants
- Start date
Yeah and with Google Translate it's pretty easy to cheat, especially especially with European languages that use a common alphabet
Yeah I do well at the choice/typing exercises, but it feels like I always butcher the speaking ones
Some good will/has come out of this.
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Does anybody else miss the days of Emmitt Smith's helpful commentary?
"The way you perform make them feel about you different."
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This should be perfect for our boy Bri.
I'm thinking about that one too, I've heard a TED talk with the guy who started it, seems like an interesting approach.
Supplement it with watching novelas on Telemundo to help with recognition at regular speed. Just don't get distracted by the many many well distractions.
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Good for you! I'm a language guy and I have some comments, if you're interested.
I can say that Duolingo's approach isn't going to teach you why but rather focus on practicing with grammar instead of explaining it. The beef people have with grammatical explanations - which are very "old academic" - is that you spend your time discussing or being lectured to and that's impractical. This is more like learning how a kid learn's his/her 1st language, supposedly.
At some point, you have to break out and start to see and use language in different contexts through practicing with a real person, watching Youtube videos or TV shows etc. Ultimately, what you want to learn is to construct correct sentences with a pronunciation that can be understood. It's hard to go from passive learning to active use of a language.
If you get a base in the language but really struggle with turning that information to active speaking, I suggest getting a conversation partner (native speaker) and/or doing a couple weeks in an immersion environment (ideally at a language school geared to adults in a place where you have to use the language outside of class (and with a homestay family). You end up having a lot more in your head than you realize but it may take being "forced" to use it to bring it out.
Just a few thoughts. I wish you lots of luck.
So I’ve kind of started cruising through it once I got into the hang of it. Just started last night and I’m already completely through a bunch of sections.
I AM finding it start to stick easier and easier. I upgraded to the paid Duolingo. It gives you unlimited hearts. hearts are kind of like mullingans, where you can use one on a section. If you run out of hearts you have to earn them back by practicing. I turned off the unlimited option though because I felt I was learning better being forced to have to go back through the practice sections. Still don’t think it’s going to help me speak it very well, though. Each section has 5 levels and each level has roughly 4-5 sections in it. Progress since starting Saturday nights:
I AM finding it start to stick easier and easier. I upgraded to the paid Duolingo. It gives you unlimited hearts. hearts are kind of like mullingans, where you can use one on a section. If you run out of hearts you have to earn them back by practicing. I turned off the unlimited option though because I felt I was learning better being forced to have to go back through the practice sections. Still don’t think it’s going to help me speak it very well, though. Each section has 5 levels and each level has roughly 4-5 sections in it. Progress since starting Saturday nights:
