Guide To Learning Languages Discussion

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Guide to Learning Languages, part 1

Printed From: How-to-learn-any-language.com
Forum Name: Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies
Forum Discription: All about flash cards, LR, shadowing and other methods used to learn languages
on your own.
URL: http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=16932
Printed Date: 07 January 2014 at 6:08pm
Posted By: Iversen
Subject: Guide to Learning Languages, part 1
Date Posted: 14 September 2009 at 11:43pm
Introduction:
This is the first of a series of threads where I summarize my ideas about language learning. Of course
they won't be useful for everybody, and they may not even represent the ultimately best strategies for
me, given that I can't get the materials that would ultimately the best (such as scientific programs with
subtitles in the original language AND a printout with a suitable translation). Besides I basically hate to
be taught and only want to teach myself, but objectively seen some way of getting feedback is
necessary, and people with other personality types and other surroundings may have found better
solutions to those problems than those that I can accept. So the following proposals should be seen as
just that: proposals for ways to speed up your languages learning.
The present guide (no. 1) is mostly about the structure of a language learning process: i.e. when to
become active, working intensively or extensively etc. and the requirements of different learner types.
I will deal with the different ways you can use translations in the http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=16946&PN=1&TPN=1 - Guide no. 2 ! how to use them
and when to avoid them.
My stance on grammar is that it should be studied actively, using real grammars instead of relying on
the mostly insufficient and chaotic fragments in most text books or ! even worse ! your own
guesswork. I have described some methods to do this efficiently in http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=16956&PN=1&TPN=1 - Guide no. 3 , which deals with
grammar studies.
Following that, I have written in http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=16959 - Guide no. 4 about ways to extend your vocabulary. This of course includes wordlists (but
only in conjunction with as much exposure to genuine stuff as you can manage).
Finally I have written a http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=16963 -
Guide no. 5 about things like pronunciation and getting to understand the spoken language.
Replies:
Language learner types:
There are several systems on the market for describing differences between language learners (and
learners in general). The one described in the thread http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=1569&PN=1&TPN=1 - Learning styles follows principles
that are described in http://www4.ncsu.edu/unity/lockers/users/f/felder/public/Lea rning_Styles.html -
this article , and its main parameters are the following:
ACTIVE versus REFLECTIVE LEARNERS
SENSING versus INTUITIVE LEARNERS
VISUAL versus VERBAL LEARNERS
SEQUENTIAL versus GLOBAL LEARNERS
There is another system at http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/Visual_Spatial_Learner/vsl. htm -
http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/Visual_Spatial_Learner/vsl. htm that separates
AUDITORY-SEQUENTIAL from VISUAL-SPATIAL LEARNERS
http://www4.ncsu.edu/unity/lockers/users/f/felder/public/Pap ers/Understanding_Differences.pdf - This
article ("Understanding Student Differences") can be used as a quick overview over some of the
theories, with hints of some empirical work.
And Wikipedia has as usual a useful http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning_style - listing of different
systems, and there is a useful links list at http://fod.msu.edu/OIR/Learners/learning-teaching-
styles.asp - fod.msu.edu . If you want something substantial then try
http://www.ttrb.ac.uk/attachments/c455e462-95c4-4b0d-8308-bb c5ed1053a7.pdf - this report (but
don't say I didn't warn you!).
Finally I would like to mention a splendid book on the internet with examples of different learning styles
exemplified in real people: http://www.sil.org/lingualinks/languagelearning/booksbackinp
rint/successwithforeignlanguages/success.pdf - Success with Foreign Languages - it can be downloaded
for free!
As you can see there is no dearth of theories and writings about learning styles, - the problem is that it
is based more on empirical work and simple logic than on scientific studies. But we have to learn
languages now, so we cannot wait for science to catch up.
Personally I prefer learning languages globally rather than sequentally, i.e. I prefer amassing
squattered words, grammatical knowledge and useful expressions from all over a given language, and
with some training I expect one day to wake up and be able to read, understand, write and maybe even
speak it. But most teachers prefer a sequential method where you learn one expression, then the next
etc. while making sure that you can at every stage use those expressions correctly which you already
have learnt. For me it isn't important whether there are errors in your first utterances, - the important
thing is to 'get the machine rolling', and then you can weed out the errors later.
My methods are also to a high degree based on written materials, whereas actual communication with
others is relegated to a stage where I already know the language fairly well. Most language learners
would however prefer to speak to somebody from the start while they are learning a language, and
some would in fact loose every shred of motivation without a social context, - for them my wordlists and
hyperliteral translations will probably not be very tempting.
Furthermore I like to put up grammatical tables to get an overview over them, even though I don't learn
all forms from the start. Getting 'the big picture' from the start is very important for me, but most text
books are based on the opposite principle: giving informations in tiny little pieces in order not to scare
the pupils. That one good reason not to use them as intended, but at most as sources for ultra-easy
texts and things like that.
In general I think that pure self study along the lines I sketch out here will be difficult for newbees, -
they don't have the experience in sorting out a wealth of grammatical and phonetical material on their
own. So for your first foreign language pure selfstudy may be too tough. But even those that follow a
regular course with a teacher should supplement this with self-organized home work, - and if you don't
like a certain method used by your teacher then it may be your teacher that is a fool and not you. My
personal hate object no.1 is silly dialogues with people who speak the target language even worse than
yourself...
Iversen on 14 September 2009
How to attack a new language:
The following is borrowed from the thread http://www.how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.a sp?TID=6088& TPN=5 - How to study , 17 June 2007:
Let assume that you have just decided to learn a new language. You main problem is that you don't
understand anything. OK, there are two ways of tackling that problem. The 'natural' way and the 'tools'
way (or in practice a combination that can be closer to one or the other alternative). 'Tools' are
dictionaries, grammars and other books or homepages ABOUT language.
If you choose the natural method then you have to find something that is so simple that you can
almost understand it without any tools. You cannot totally avoid help, - if your teacher suggests the
meaning of a word by gesturing it is formally equivalent to a peek in a dictionary. It IS a tool. But
basically you progress through the study of written or spoken material, guesssing the meaning and
function of obscure passages along the way. However you can only do this with material that is almost
comprehensible to you, - so you or your teacher or your text book must feed you with carefully graded
texts, otherwise you can't understand them well enough to infer the meaning of those obscure
passages. Immersion is not substantially different: you just put yourself in a situation where you are
presented with so much genuine material that you can pick and choose something that hopefully is at
the right level for you. You still need to find comprehensible input though - that has not changed.
The 'tools' methods is different. Here you assume that if you just know enough words and grammar
then ordinary texts will suddenly become transparent to you. Of course it would be stupid to start out
with something far too difficult, so in practice you do search for more or less comprehensible input. The
main difference is that as a tool-seeker you don't need the fine-tuning of the texts, - you can use
dictionaries and grammars as preparation for material that really is a good deal too difficult for you at
the present stage, - suddenly you have collected enough words and stuff to understand those texts, and
kapoum! the meaning is crystal clear to you (aka epiphany moment). The important thing from that
point on is to incorporate some elements of natural studying. The reason is that even the best
dictionaries and grammars won't learn you to use the language in a congenial way, - they are tools, but
very efficient tools, and my belief is that you can 'crack' a language easier if you use them than if you
don't.
(end of quote)
The methods I describe in the thread about translations are basically attempts to making otherwise
incomprehensible texts comprehensible so that you can learn from them. On a more global basis this
also applies to wordlists et cetera, because acquiring a large vocabulary is also a way of making texts
comprehensible.
For another formulation of the same idea, see my contribution to the thread http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=11744&PN=0&TPN=1000 - Listening and understanding
nothing from 25 August 2008
By the way, the use a grammar and a dictionary as preparation for intensive work on a an easy text
reminds me of the method of the English explorer and polyglot Richard Burton, quoted from the
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=190&PN=0&TPN=1 - thread
bearing his name:
I got a simple grammar and vocabulary, marked out the forms and words which I knew were absolutely
necessary, and learnt them by heart. ... I never worked more than a quarter of an hour at a time, for
after that the brain lost its freshness. After learning some three hundred words, easily done in a week, I
stumbled through some easy book-work and underlined every word that I wished to recollect. ... Having
finished my volume, I then carefully worked up the grammar minutiae, and I then chose some other
book whose subject most interested me. The neck of the language was now broken, and progress was
rapid. If I came across a new sound, like the Arabic Ghayn, I trained my tongue to it by repeating it so
many thousand times a day. When I read, I invariably read out loud, so that the ear might aid memory.
I was delighted with the most difficult characters, Chinese and Cuneiform, because I felt that they
impressed themselves more strongly upon the eye than the eternal Roman letters
(end of quote)
Why focus on writing:
The following is quoted almost verbatim from http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=3435&PN=1&TPN=9 - my profile thread and dates back to
14 November 2008:
There are roughly two kinds of language learners: those that primarily learn through their ears and
those who learn through their eyes. I belong in the latter category, and what I write now may not be
relevant for those who belong to the first category.
My first objective isn't to learn to speak a certain language, but to be able to read it and think it, and
after that to be able to write it. We have a thread somewhere about silent periods, and I wrote there
that I don't want to speak a language before I can do so fairly fluently. However if I have to opportunity
to visit a place where one of my target languages is spoken I will of course drop my all my principles
and use every single opportunity to try to speak that language. For instance when I visited Minsk,
Moscow and Vladimir 2009 I tried my best to ask for sewing kits, prices, directions, tickets and
everything else in Russian, even though my spoken Russian is nothing to write home about. But I still
had to switch to English for more complicated matters.
To be able to read and even more to think in a language you must of course study the pronunciation
first. For some of my languages I have a solid foundation from my school years: English, German and
(somewhat later) French and Latin. When I however started to learn Italian and Spanish through
selfstudy as a schoolkid I didn't have any choice than to read about the pronunciation and then
frantically try adjust my pronunciation whenever I had the chance to hear the real thing. This is
essentially also what I do today, except that I now have the blessing of the internet where I can get
radiotransmissions and podcast in just about any language I might ever wish to learn.
In the beginning you normally can't understand anything, but you may be able to distinguish certain
words and use the pronunciation of these to catch the 'sound' of the language. After reading about the
listening-reading method of Siomotteikiru I have become convinced that the ideal way to initiate this
part of your study would be to listen to an audio source while trying to follow it first in a translation,
then while reading a transcript. The problem of course is to find suitable parallel materials for this, so
you may have to settle for less. The paradox of this phase is that you have to listen very carefully
without understanding the meaning, but this shouldn't be seen as a problem - it is the pronunciation
that is important at this stage, forget about the meaning.
To build my vocabulary and grammatical knowledge I copy original texts by hand and translate them, I
read about grammar, I make word lists, I try to get some modicum of fluency in my reading and last,
but not least: I start combining words in my head until they form nice, more or less correct, but at least
complete sentences. At this point it is important not to be too fuzzy about errors in vocabulary,
grammar or pronunciation, - I'm convinced that it is easier to correct those errors later when you have
enough reserves of skill and confidence than it is to deal with them while you are still struggling.
As a result of this toil and labour I expect some day to wake up and suddenly be able to understand the
target language in its spoken form (a so called epiphany moment - see below). This may may sound
like a joke, but it isn't. The main reason that you don't understand ordinary clear speech at this stage
normally isn't you can't follow the words (after all those listening sessions), but that you stumble over
unknown words or constructions all the time and then start thinking or - even worse - translating in
your head. And then you are stuck. Instead you should just try to follow the babble word for word,
syllable after syllable, letting the meanings that pop up pass by without caring too much about them,
otherwise you would miss the next sentences. Then some bright day you have in all silence passed the
treshold where you know enough to push on with your listening in spite of unknown words and other
petty hindrances, and then you suddenly understand just about everything without really making a
coinscious effort, just as you do with your native language - at least I have experienced this with most
of my languages, and it is pretty clear to you when it happens.
When you can understand genuine spoken stuff you finally have the ideal chance to focus on your
pronunciation. True, there are too many sad cases where people have learnt a language just well
enough to understand simple conversations and to say something that sometimes can be understood by
natives, and then they never progress from that point. Instead this should be seen as the time where
you finally can try to get rid of all the grammatical and lexical errors and bad pronunciation, and that
can't happen without making too much of an effort.
This also the best time for immersion. I know from experience that my pronunciation and fluency gets
much better after just a few days in a place where everybody speaks my target language and the
streets are full of written messages in that language. Immersion at an earlier point is valuable, but not
nearly as efficient.
My final remark in this post should be that I have stayed for weeks in suitable countries speaking only
the local languages, and I have rarely had any indications that people me didn't understand me - on the
contrary, they normally speak as fast to me as they speak to each other, which I have to take to be a
good sign. I can also feel how the local dialect creeps into my language when I'm in an immersion
situation, so after a week I normally feel quite at home and just babble away. On the contrary when I'm
at home in Denmark I am acutely aware that speaking is my weakest skill (after reading, writing,
listening and thinking), and I never quite trust my orals skills in any language after months of silence.
But if I then accidentally meet some natives representing one of my rarer languages I normally find that
I can discuss with them without big problems, so maybe I'm just too pessimistic. It is not something
that can cause me sleepless nights.
Silent period, but thinking actively:
The following is a quote from the thread http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=12248&PN=1&TPN=1 - Getting from passive to active from
05 October 2008:
When I went to school many years ago all language teachers (except those who taught Latin) wanted us
to say something, and for obvious reasons it had to be silly small sentences, and there were heavy
restrictions on what our teachers expected us to say. But even then I felt it as an irritating pressure that
I had to say something before I felt that I was ready. On the other hand our Latin teacher didn't expect
us to learn to speak Latin, and so we didn't. This illustrates the two errors you can make: you can force
people to speak too early /i.e. before they know what to say, and then they will use mechanisms like 1)
looking stupid and saying nothing, 2) learning sentences by heart to please the teacher. OR you can
wait for too long, and then you may never learn to use the language. My solutions to this problem has
been to start thinking at an early stage and then postpone writing and speaking. In other words: I try to
built a solid passive basis, which I then fairly easily can convert to active but 'silent' skills, which then
can be converted to active language in the sense that it can be used for travelling and other activites.
It is clear that this way of studying can't easily be combined with ordinary sequential learning where you
go through a number of lessons from nr. 1 to the last one under the supervision of a teacher, who
controls that you have learnt lesson 1 before you proceed to number two. However I do understand that
teachers like the sequential method, because with people like me who prefer learning the stuff before it
is made public there is no control whatsoever of your progress.
To illustrate what I mean by thinking I will quote myself from a recent pm:
"My use of thinking as opposed to speaking is not very scientific: I see a tree, and I think the foreign
word for tree: "Tree". Or "Green tree" if I also remember the word for 'green'. Or "This is a XYXYXYXYX
tree" if I don't remember the word for 'green', but I can construct the rest of the sentence. At some
point I'll look up the word for 'green', or I may just notice it while I read (and I notice it because I felt
the need to know it in a concrete situation).
Later on it is just a matter of coupling longer and longer constructions until you can deliberately choose
to think about things in your daily life or culture or science in another language. It may be helpful to
listen to a lot of talk in that language just to get the other language buzzing in your head before you try
to switch, but in my experience you have to be able to understand at least a word here and there before
you see an effect. Otherwise reading something may be better.
And you should of course avoid to think complete sentences in your own language and then translate
them. Translating is also a valuable skill, but you don't have time to translate when you think or speak.
These are all commonplace observations which I'm sure everybody would accept. It is probably more
controversial to say that it doesn't matter whether you think in correct sentences or not. I know that
some people are scared of uttering anything faulty because they believe that all errors they commit will
stick forever, but this is nonsense. On the contrary you should make the language productive as soon as
possible - simply because it is much easier to correct your errors if you don't have to fight like a
madman to construct even the most simple sentence.
And why not speak instead? If I had been speaking - especially in a classroom setting - I would have
second thoughts about uttering incomplete and malformed sentences, and I might even hesitate to say
them while I'm alone, but my thoughts are totally my own and I don't lose face thinking nonsense. But
of course you also have to train speaking - achieving the correct mouth positions can be a daunting task
in itself. People who spend their lives speaking 24x7 may not have a problem with speaking instead of
thinking silently - but we are all different. "
About intensive and extensive reading/listening:
If you take a piece of written text or a recording and spend the time and effort of understand just about
everything, looking up words, checking endings and maybe even syntax, in short doing anything to suck
every drop of information from it then it is in every meaning of the word an intensive process. If it is a
long text or recording then you don't have time for that so you will try to form an intuitive impression of
the meaning based on whatever words or expressions you recognize, combined with circumstancial
evidence. This is an extensive process.
The following passage from 15 November 2007 is copied from a thread simply called http://how-to-
learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=7991 - Reading :
There are two kinds of reading. One is the intensive (or active) reading where you try to understand
more or less everything (though pondering for hours over an especially contrived construction may not
be worth your precious time). This means that you have to look up as many words as you need, you
probably have to use a grammar and you may well advised to write a complete ultra-literal translation
(with comments) between the lines - at least in the beginning. A bilingual text is a blessing at this
stage, but ideally you should only use it for control purposes.
Besides intensive reading it is worthwhile also to get aquainted with the grammar, and it is a logical step
also to use the words you note down during the reading for wordlists or flashcards. You can do this kind
of reading almost from the beginning, preferably with very easy texts. It certainly is a very slow and
laborious process, especially in the beginning, but - depending on the languages - you will soon discover
that you can dispense with the complete translation and just jot down the unknown words and the more
interesting idioms and constructions.
The other kind of reading is the extensive reading. Here the goal is not to understand everything, but
to acquire a kind of momentum while reading, and to get through as much genuine stuff as possible. If
you are a total novice and the language is far from anything you know this kind of reading is only
possible when you have acquired enough vocabulary and grammar through intensive reading and other
activities. But it is bound to take up more and more of the time you spend reading, simply because it is
so much more pleasing
(end of quote)
This should be seen in the light of another important notion, that of comprehensible input. If you are
a total newbee then you have to find very easy texts AND to work hard to understand them, but soon
you find yourself in a situation where you can introduce extensive reading/listening to the same very
easy texts. Or alternatively you can choose more difficult texts, which you then have to take to pieces in
a very intensive process. Both strategies are relevant and useful (and should be pursued), but it seems
that it is even more profitable to combine the two extremes and choose relatively difficult texts, which
you make comprehensible through the use of translations.
The ultimate version of this strategy is the http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=6366&PN=0&TPN=1 - Listening-Reading method (LR
method), which was proposed by Siomotteikiru June 26, 2007. I won't repeat the details here, but to
execute all the steps you need a long recorded text, a transcript and a translation, and it is difficult to
get hold of all this ! especially if you aren't too fond of fictional literature. The method is extensive by
nature: you are supposed to listen for hours on end to the recording plus either the transcript or the
translation, and it is not planned that you should look words up or read grammars. The impressive thing
is that you can actually get something out of listening to a text in an unknown language while listening
to a translation, but it is actually working ! I have tried myself on a (short) Persian text. But as I said
it can be a trouble to find all the necessary elements, and you must be very interested in the content to
listening for the long periods foreseen with this method.
Instead I have chosen to use moderately difficult original texts with translations, and then listening for
content must wait until I can understand for instance a news broadcast with subtitles or without any
external help.
More about thinking:
This time a quote from the thread http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=14905 - Foreign language thinking pattern from 30 April 2009:
Can you explain what it is to think in your native language? It's just the same thing to think in a foreign
language, you are just not as good at it..
Now, I'm sure you can't use that answer to anything, so let me take it from another angle: how do you
achieve it?
First you have to get some building blocks: words, morphology, syntax - no thinking without those.
When you learnt your first language you couldn't use translations because you didn't know any other
language. Instead you learnt it by having parents and others point to things and actions and give them
names, or from explanations that used words you already knew.
However now the situation is different: if you are learning a second language it is logical to use
translations to teach you the meanings of words: "cheval" in French is normally the same as "horse"
in English. Sometimes it isn't, but it is good enough to give you the first approximation, and then you
can learn the details later. No reason to make small drawings of horses, unless of course you remember
pictures better than words (some people do).
So when you think "horse" in English do you then see an image of a horse? Or do you see someone
running around when you think "run"? Maybe, maybe not, but the point is that you don't need to use
visual imagery, you have the meaning stored somewhere in your brain in a form that isn't tied to the
way you learnt the word in the first place. It is exactly the same thing with language nr. 2: when you
are fluent you have a lot of words and phrases and constructions and whatever stored in some circuitry
in your brain, and that circuitry doesn't depend on how you first learned those things. In other words,
you may have learnt the foreign words by looking them up in a dictionary (in other words: from
translations), but when they have become engrained in your mind you don't need the translation any
more - you just use the foreign word as if it had been in your native language.
On a more practical level: to 'turn on' thinking in another language you may have to start with single
words. You see a tree, - OK, think "arbre" (the French word for tree, - it could of course have been any
other language). If you know the word for 'green' you see one more tree and think "arbre vert". From
there you proceed to still more complicated phrases, until you can form whole sentences in your mind.
Of course you have to use the words and constructions you already know so this process could in
principle come to a screeching halt very soon. But just be persistent and think along even if you make
errors: just think "arbre vert est" and be happy, - next time you read in your text book you may
stumble over the sentence "l'arbre est grand". Because you already have to tried to think or say
something similar you will immediately know that you have made several errors: you need the article le,
and the verb should be somewhere in the middle. So when you see the third tree you will think "l'arbre
est vert". From there the sky is the limit.
(end of quote)
Epiphany moments:
Wikipedia lists several meanings of the word Epiphany, but the most relevant here is
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epiphany_feeling - this one :
An epiphany (from the ancient Greek ""!#$"#", epiphaneia, !manifestation, striking
appearance! ) is the sudden realization or comprehension of the (larger) essence or meaning of
something. The term is used in either a philosophical or literal sense to signify that the claimant has
"found the last piece of the puzzle and now sees the whole picture," or has new information or
experience, often insignificant by itself, that illuminates a deeper or numinous foundational frame of
reference
(end of quote)
The following quote comes from my http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=3435&PN=1&TPN=9 - profile thread , 29 December 2008:
As I have written in the thread about ephiphany moments I think that they mostly occur for people who
mainly are global learners, as opposed to mainly sequential learners. A sequential learner starts in one
corner of the language and then adds new elements until more or less the whole thing is covered. This
is the way you work when you use a text book and goes from chapter one to the last chapter in the
prescribed order. A global learner takes little pieces from all over the language and tries to make them
fit. In the beginning this isn't possible, but when you accumulate enough of those isolated pieces you
pass a treshold somewhere where things suddenly seem to snap into place.
This reminds me of the two types of JPG-images: if you have a slow internet connection and a large
image file of the 'normal' type the picture emerges from the top and downwards. But there are also
'interlaced' JPG's around where the whole picture is shown from the beginning, but in a very coarse
version which however becomes clearer and clearer until a certain point. The language skills of a global
learner are organized like an interlaced JPG image file.
For me learning - or rather conquering - the written version of a language is a slow and gradual process,
and I typically don't care much about the spoken version of a language before I already can read most
written sources more or less fluently. This means that the process of learning to understand the spoken
language typically is a much more accelerated process, and therefore MY chance of experiencing an
epiphany moment is much larger with audio sources. In the case of Dutch it was really a case of not
understandign anything one day and then understanding more or less the whole thing the next. And the
speed with which it happened proves that it wasn't a question of learning something more, but more
about reorganizing the things I already had learn through my occupation with the written language.
(end of quote)
The following autobiographical rant comes from the thread http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=5326&PN=0&TPN=1 - Does fluency involve an "epiphany
moment"? , 12 March 2007:
I had my 'epiphany moment' with Portuguese when I went to Cape Verde at the end of November last
year. There I had some of the popular non-fiction channels on the TV in my hotel rooms (including the
Portuguese version of Discovery Channel). There I laid down on my bed and concentrated on the words
that came out of the speakers. And lo and behold, I understood almost instantly everything that they
said. One month earlier I didn't understand anything.
The key is simply that I had spent the month before my travel learning as many Portuguese words as
possible (which was quite easy because I already knew Spanish, Catalan and other related languages),
and I had worked my way through a couple of grammars and listened to TV Beira, TV Scincia and
other congenial internet sources. So when I was lying there on the bed in my hotel room in Mindelo on
So Vicente listening to a travel program in Portuguese, I just had to totally stop translating in my
mind, totally stop listening to the outside word and instead closely follow the stream of words, parsing it
into words and phrases almost as if it had been written on a sheet of paper. And because I now knew
the words and their meanings and most of the grammar, the meaning of what was being said just
automatically popped up in my head. This did not happen through magic, but through a regular method
that can be systematized and used by others: 1) learn the language (yes, - I mean it!)2) stop
translating when you listen, 3) follow the words like a bloodhound follows a trail. Then the meaning will
pop up automatically in your head.
With a weak and 'new' language you haven't got the robust listening skills that you have with your
mother tongue or with a wellrehearsed secondary language, so you have to concentrate more and avoid
outside noises, but listening in the way I described above is in all other respects the same thing as you
do when you listen to speech in your native language.
And it is truly a bliss (or epiphany or grok) when it happens for the first time in a new language. It is
just a pity that you can't experience it for the first time more than once per language.
(end of quote)
Activating languages
In the thread http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=15597& TPN=2 -
What do you mean by "Intermediate"...? I wrote the 21 June 2009:
I have a couple of personal guidelines:
I call a language intermediate when I can keep on thinking in the language. If I'm travelling with a
language on this level I can ask for things in shop or make short comments, but I couldn't manage a
extended discussion
I speak it about basic fluency when I can go to a country where the language is spoken and stay there
for several days without using other languages, not even when I'm having longer discussions with the
local people - but I can't avoid making errors
I speak about advanced fluency when I am confident (or I'm told by a competent source) that I speak
almost correctly, - but not necessarily without an accent
But these definitions only concern one skill, namely speaking the languages (because that's my poorest
discipline in each and every language). In fact you should indicate a level for both the active skills:
thinking, writing, speaking, and the passive ones: reading, understanding speech. You can in principle
be able to read read even the weirdest poems in a language and still be unable to ask for an ice cream.
(end of quote)
There are also some more official evaluation systems, such as the one used by the
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_ of_Reference_for_Languages - EU :
The Common European Framework divides learners into three broad divisions which can be divided into
six levels:
A Basic User:
. A1 Breakthrough
. A2 Waystage
B Independent User
. B1 Threshold
. B2 Vantage
C Proficient User
. C1 Effective Operational Proficiency
. C2 Mastery
The CEFR describes what a learner is supposed to be able to do in reading, listening, speaking and
writing at each level.
(end of quote)
On this forum a member's languages are divided into those that are spoken and those that are studied,
and each of these are subdivided once again, so that the complete system from the highest to lowest
becomes Native, Advanced fluency, Basic fluency, Intermediate level, Beginner.
But every system of this kind suffers from the defect that it attaches just one level of skill to a person
for a given language, but the reality is that you probably are much better at some activities than at
others, - for instance my speaking ability will always be the lowest, while writing abilities are more
problematic for others (including native speakers). Passive skills will almost always be better than active
skills.
(from http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=16190&PN=6&TPN=4 -
How Krashen will delay your fluency , 31 July 2009)
If you have learnt a passive language to a high level you need to have a steady stream of input to keep
the language alive. In the case of Latin it means reading Latin on a daily basis - the only active thing
you can do with a totally passive language is memorizing poems and things like that (which I don't do).
So no input, no activity. This reduces your chances of keeping the language alive during a dry spell.
Learning a language as an active thing simply makes it more robust because you always can think in an
active language wherever you are.
The activation of passive languages is precisely the thing I described with my Latin as an example. All
the grammar and the words I had learnt in the 70s had in fact hibernated, and when I started to relearn
my Latin I didn't have to hammer through everything again from scratch, I just needed some repetition
rounds, and then I was ready to start thinking and writing in Latin. The only catch was that I wanted to
think about things that didn't exist while Latin was still alive, - for instance this forum, my computer,
trains, modern townplanning and nuclear physics. So I have been busy modernizing my conception of
Latin. But everything I learned about Latin as a passive language have come to good use now where my
goal is broader. (!%)
In retrospect, my first period with Latin was so lopsided because the teaching - as most teaching of
Latin - followed an ancient and venerable method called grammar-translation, i.e. an outdated theory
where the main goal was to be able to read certain venerable classical authors, but not to be able to use
the language. Now I battle against other theories that dismiss explicit learning of grammar and
vocabulary, such as the methods of Krashen and other protagonists of socalled natural learning.
(end of quote)
My current position is that you always should try to develop active skills, even in dead or 'undead'
languages like Latin, but of course the consequences of having a 'bad' accent are less obvious if
younever have to speak to anybody. With a language like Latin this implies that you should try to find
dictionaries and homepages and other sources which try to update Latin. My preferred source for
reading in NeoLatin is the web-newspaper ephemeris.alcuinus.net - Ephemeris , and I have found
wordlists and dictionaries that make suggestions about words that cover contemporary phenomena. Not
only will it be more amusing to spend time on Latin when you see it as a living thing, but all aspects of
your Latin knowledge will be more robust.
Languages or dialects that you can understand because you know something that ressembles them falls
in another category because it isn't an immense, but fragile skeleton of grammatical rules and passive
vocabulary that keeps them accessible for you, but something which you actually use. However there is
a difference between understanding and actually being able to use such a language or dialect - and the
consequences of disregarding this distinction can be quite unbearable.
If you want to make a passive language/dialect of this kind active then my advice would be: do the
same things as you would do with an unknown language - i.e. supplement your listening and reading
with explicit grammar studies, vocabulary acquisition et cetera. The good news is that each phase will
last for a much shorter time.
About the later stages of learning a language
Until you have learnt the at least the fundamentals of your target language you will have few
possibilities to work extensively unless you use the LR method or other translation-based methods. But
when you have reached an advanced state of fluency the situation is the opposite: you will rarely have
to work intensively with a text to understand it ! except if you are dealing with the interpretation of
difficult poetic, philosophical or juridical texts. So in general terms you will start with a situation where
intensive interpretation of texts dominate to one where it is almost absent.
Several people have wrote fine posts about ways to move from basic to advanced fluency and beyond
(see for instance FrancescoP's checklist in http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=13202&PN=0&TPN=2 - this thread ). However most of the
advice in those threads dealt with types of texts and situations where you can add to your linguistic
AND cultural skills. To this I would like to at that the thing that really can slow down your progress is
complacency ! and this also happens at much lower competence levels. To counteract this the most
important point ! in my mind ! is sometimes to tell yourself to stop reading or listening for content,
and instead to concentrate on HOW things are formulated. And you should also continue doing some of
the things that originally brought you to the advanced level, such as active working with grammar and
doing wordlists or flascards or whatever, else those skills may actually deteriorate. The new thing is that
these activities now should be supplemented with studies in the more elusive stilistical and cultural
elements of language, but not to the exclusion of the study of more 'basic' elelements.
And of course living in a land where your target language is actually spoken will be the best possible
background for perfecting any language. The better you are, the more profitable such a stay will be
(said by someone who has no intention about emigrating).
Total and less than total immersion
I have been reading an old http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=6420&PN=1&TPN=1 - thread about the idea of total immersion. The title "Total Immersion is a
Crock!" gives away the opinion of the topic starter (TerryW), and basically I agree with his warnings. I
found that a couple of my own contributions to that thread fit seemlessly into this guide, so I have
repeated them below. However total immersion may be relevant for advanced learners, and partial
immersion is valuable for everyone.
(from "Total Immersion is a Crock", July 2 2007)
It all boils down to the notion of comprehensible input. For a total 100% novice nothing is
comprehensible, so either you 'cheat' by offering a few words with translations in the beginning or you
indicate the meaning by non-linguistic cues. In my opinion there is nothing gained by avoiding the
translations.
After that there comes a stage where you can learn new words or expressions if they come in a context
where their meaning is clear. For a 95% novice this means that you only can use special prepared texts,
graded very carefully, or contexts where there are sufficiently clear non-linguistic clues ("this is a..."
pointing to an object). Even at this stage I find that that it is unnecessary masochism to avoid two-way
dictionaries and other external sources of information. Besides I don't trust guessing, especially not the
guesses of a novice - Kikenyoy's example with the soccer player pinpoints the problem (Pel thought
that "pelato" was the name of a player). Besides I personally abhor the situation where I depend on a
teacher or textbook for providing meaningful input, and every trick that can bring me out of that
situation as fast as possible is permissible.
For a person who already is fairly advanced it is less harmful to rely on monolinguistical settings
because you already have some idea about which guesses are credible, and you are capable of
processing much larger quantities of input. Nonetheless I still trust a good dictionary or grammar more
than my own judgment even at this stage.
So basically I don't see the advantages of a 100% monolingual setting for vocabulary or grammar
learning. Where it does have a role to play is in training fluency (=fluent language production). It is
much easier to think in a foreign language and maybe even utter a few sentences here and there when
you are immersed in a monolingual setting, for instance when you visit another country. Besides it is a
perfect setting for training how to pronounce the language, especially if everybody around you are
native speakers.
I would like to add a little history from my own school days: when I was 15-17 years old and studied at
the local 'gymnasium' (grammar school, high school, lyceum) I also had classes in French. Our teacher
was a firm believer in the immersion method, but the class was following the mathematical line - so
they were not very motivated to learn languages.
For two and a half year this teacher - one of the most brillant teachers I have ever met - tried to teach
this class French by the total immersion method, and he used all the tricks in the book plus a couple
more. But he failed. So just half a year before the final exam he blew us all off our feet by suddenly
speaking Danish to us for the first time ever. He told us that quite frankly most of us had learnt close to
nothing until that point, and almost all of us were going to fail miserably unless he did something
drastic.... so from now on he would do a strictly traditional course. No more modern antics, just old-
fashioned black schooling with translations, grammars, dictionary and all that stuff that he otherwise
tried to avoid.
The very same teacher succeded in teaching this miserable bunch of half-boiled mathematicians enough
French to pull most of us through the final exam just three or four months later. We learnt more in the
last short period than we had learnt through 2$ years of entertaining, but fruitless immersion.
My belief in pure immersion has never been the same since then.
(end of quotes)
It is however quite another matter with partial immersion. Again the point is the need to learn from
comprehensible input, so the better you are the higher the proportion of native materials can be. And at
the bottom of the ladder I cringe at the antics you have to live with in order to avoid using your
knowledge of other languages, including your own. The idea of letting newbies guess the idea of
drawings or situations and (presumably) learning foreign words and idioms while solving riddles is based
on a false premise, namey that the learner doesn't involve his/her own language in the guessing
process. Is the brain of a newbie a vacuum with just a few foreign words floating around in the
pitchblack emptiness? Of course not, it is full of expressions from your native and other languages, and
you can't avoid that these are used as models for your guesswork. So the whole circus of trying to make
a purely 'foreign' experience for a newbie is silly. In fact giving the newbie a translation may involve a
shorter involvement with his/her native language than letting him/her ponder for a long time in his own
language over a problem - and maybe even guessing wrong.
So total immersion is a crock, but partial immersion is a blessing. I personally mostly experience this
during my travels, and making an AJATT ('All Japanese all the time") environment isn't feasible when
you have to tend to several languages. But there is a big advantage being in a place where all your
'external' input for a time is in your target language, and all input is genuine. When you listen to a
native speaker you can trust that this way of speaking is used by at least one 'professional', whereas
speaking to your classmates in a classroom or course setting is hampered by your wellfounded distrust
of their capabilities. Learning from a native speaker means that you can lower your parades, listening to
another mediocre learner means that you have to raise them. And of course that has an effect on the
effectiveness of the experience.
The same applies to posters, books, newspapers and menus in a foreign place: if you already have the
ability to think in the local language it is fairly easy to exclude disturbances (i.e. messages meant for
tourists) and use the written texts around you as prompts for further target-language thinking. Your
supply of relevant reading materials, TV programs and potential conversation partners is also bound to
be larger than at home, but there is one thing more: you have less reason to drop back into your native
language. And that may be the most important of them all.
I normally carry relevant language guides and dictionaries and maybe even grammars with me when I
travel, or I buy them in situ. But you can't expect to use these things while you are having a
conversation with native persons. So even in a immersion setting I set aside time for studying (five
minutes here and there can be enough), and the rest of the time I try to become more and more
monolingual in the target language. When I can live for several days thinking, speaking and writing the
local language whenever there is a local person around then I know that I have passed a treshold. Just
before I can do this, I pass through a stage where I try to think in the local language, and where I
silently translate all my conversations. This shouldn't be a habit, but it is better than just speaking your
native language (or English).
But even when I can stay monolingual while communicating I still use bilingual dictionaries, not
monolingual ones, because a translation mostly is more informative than a monolingual periphrasis. And
if the best grammar is written in English then so be it - grammars written for natives rarely focus on
the points that are relevant for language learners.
Iversen on 24 June 2010
The little gnomon
Quoted from the thread "Automaticity and language learning"
Cainntear wrote:
As an absolute beginner in language (French) I had to think things out -- I relied on conscious
knowledge to construct the sentence. After a while, I started to notice that while I was thinking
about how to form the correct sentence, there was a fully formed sentence appearing in parallel.
It seemed like that voice had been there for a while, but I was just thinking too hard to notice it..
This is a very interesting statement, and one I can recognize from myself. And of course I tend to
formulate my own perception of it in terms of learning strategies.
I have written about intensive and extensive strategies and activites again and again, mostly - but not
exclusively - in the realm of passive learning. And I have stated that intensive activities are most
important in the beginning, whereas the scales tip more and more in the favor of extensive activities the
further you progress in your learning process. And the reason that this happens is mainly that more and
more of the knowledge you get through intensive activities is covered by automatic and even
subconscious mechanisms.
One example of this is that you don't have to run through a conjugation table to find an ending and
construct a certain form of a word - you have seen this form so often that this particular form is stored
as an individual item. Other examples are the influence of one sound on surrounding sounds, the choice
of preposition after a noun or verb and the choice of case after a preposition. But even though these
individualized reflexes are the end goal they don't have to be absorbed as single items, which would last
forever. Tables and list of rules are there to show you where all those scattered pieces of information
belong.
In the beginning of a language study there is basically only one active extensive activity available for
you: parroting. You can hear an expression (in a situation where you can guess the meaning), and then
you repeat it. Actually you don't even need you left brain with its language centers for this - the right
brain can store this kind of unreflected fragments. The intensive language production starts already
when you make the first minimal change - you have to know something about the mechanism of the
phrase to make that change. And unless you continue along the parrot trail most or your active
language production will consist of constructed utterances for a very long time.
But lo and behold, at a certain point you may experience the same thing as Cainntear, namely that
some little gnomon in the back of your mind will start making sentences on his/her own, and then you
can start your extensive language production career.
The problem is that this is more likely to happen if you do a lot of language production the hard way
first. For those of us who rarely speak in foreign languages at home this can partly be solved through
silent thinking and (for the more energetic ones) by speaking to yourself - I remember an excellent
advice about pretending that you speak into a mobile phone, if you are to shy to walk around speaking
to nobody in public. However I personally mostly stick to silent thinking.
Nevertheless I have found one trick that might be worth exploiting for others: I listen to something on
TV or on the internet in a language I know fairly well, and then I make a simultaneous translation to a
related weak language on the fly. Of course it will be totally rubbish in the beginning, but just having to
hammer through something like a translation at the speed of a native speaker will mean that I don't
have time to construct anything - and then the little lurking gnomon has the chance to appear without
any interference from my internal schoolmaster. And with time the little fellah may even be able to
speak in somewhat sounding like the real thing - but only because the systematic part of me constantly
feeds him with information about the language in question.
And no, I don't feel like a victim of multiple personality disorder.
END OF THE FIRST PART OF THIS GUIDE
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=16946&PN=1 - part 2 (about
translations)
grammar studies)
wordlists and vocabulary)
understanding speech and strange languages)
Iversen on 20 March 2011
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Posted By: Iversen
The use of translations as nutcrackers
This thread is part of a series of guides to language learning, and no. 1 thread in this series is found
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=16932&PN=1&TPN=1 - HERE .
The necessary caveats can be seen there.
The general theme here is 'Translations' - and how to use them to get through the first stages of
learning a new language.
(quote from http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=14709&PN=15&TPN=3 - Difficulty of Learning Languages , 18 April 2009)
Reading something in Basque or Finnish is close to impossible if you haven't learnt those languages, -
but you may have a guess concerning a few scattered loanwords, Making sense of this meager
information IS hard work, at least for me. On the other hand reading Chinese is not merely hard, but
impossible if you don't know those pretty Chinese signs. Which actually makes it less hard because you
just have to give up.
Reading something in a language where you have to look up several words in each sentence feels
frustrating, and doing something that makes you feel frustrated also makes you feel tired, and then it is
'hard' in my book. But I still do it in order to 'crack the code' in a new language.
If it's a matter of missing a few words here and here in order to get the meaning then it isn't too bad,
and only then I would use the term "comprehensible input". And if I can read all of it without having any
doubts then it isn't hard at all - even if I haven't really learnt the language or the dialect in question -
but then I also wouldn't learn much from it.
(end of quote)
The idea of using bilingual texts to overcome this problem is not new, but with the advent of the
internet it has become much easier to find short bilingual texts to use in intensive reading (finding
transcripts/translations of texts is not quite as easy, but still better than in the evil old days). I haven't
mentioned the modern electronic 'pop-up' dictionaries, but they exist and will become more and more
userfriendly and inevitable in the near future. So far I prefer doing all my intensive work on paper
versions of the texts, and I also use oldfashioned paper dictionaries and grammars. But at some point
even I may decide to switch to purely electronic materials.
Replies:
Different kinds of multilingualism?
To prepare for the following entries about translation I would like to quote
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multilingualism - Wikipedia :
Even if someone is highly proficient in two or more languages, his or her so-called communicative
competence or ability may not be as balanced. Linguists have distinguished various types of multilingual
competence, which can roughly be put into two categories:
For compound bilinguals, words and phrases in different languages are the same concepts. !"
For coordinate bilinguals, words and phrases in the speaker's mind are all related to their own unique
concepts. Thus a bilingual speaker of this type has different associations for 'chien' and for 'dog'. In
these individuals, one language, usually the first language, is more dominant than the other!"
A sub-group of the latter is the subordinate bilingual, which is typical of beginning second language
learners.
The distinction between compound and coordinate bilingualism has come under scrutiny. When studies
are done of multilinguals, most are found to show behavior intermediate between compound and
coordinate bilingualism. Some authors have suggested that the distinction should only be made at the
level of grammar rather than vocabulary, others use "coordinate bilingual" as a synonym for one who
has learned two languages from birth, and others have proposed dropping the distinction altogether
(end of quote)
If this is correct then it has some consequences for the way different language learners use translations
and relations between languages in general. For me these things are quite innocuous while you are
trying to conquer a new language, and I can drop at least the use of translations without problems
when I don't need them any more. I'm as negative as everybody else about the idea of formulating
every single thought in your native language and translating it before speaking - almost as if you were
reading a speech from a piece of paper. It won't function, you haven't got time for that while speaking
(and it is a bad habit even when writing). However I have never had problems dropping the umbilic
chord when the newborn doesn't need it any more, so I don't understand why some people are so very
much against using translations at all. But the difference in brain organization suggested above might
explain it.
I have in a few cases been writing in languages or dialects which are clearly outside my scope, such as
March 15 2009 where I had been listening to something in Scots and decided to make an entry in my
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=12983&PN=1&TPN=63 -
Multiconfused log . How did I do that? Well, first I sketched in plain English what I wanted to write, and
then I delved further into whatever Scots I could find on the internet, written or spoken, with those
formulations in the back of my head that I wanted for my post. I found enough to make a fair travesty,
though in some cases I hade to drop an intended formulation because I didn't stumble over a suitable
translation I could use. This took a lot of time and I haven't tried it again (with Scots), but it represents
one possible way to use concrete translation tasks to learn a target language.
I probably don't have to remind anybody about the venerable traditions of this technique. The new thing
is that you should be flexible about the text to be translated - the important thing is the chase for good
expressions, not whether a certain text was translated with its original meaning preserved, leave that to
the professional translators who get paid for their job. But tell this to an old-time school teacher, and
you would be slaughtered.
A wellknown/native language interspersed with elements from target language is called an
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interlanguage - interlanguage , and it is not something that I would
recommend in general. But in the phase where you want to get a foothold in a new language it does
serve a purpose. When I formulated my plain English text and successively changed sections of it into
Scots I learnt quite a lot about Scots, not least because I got some quite concrete needs - certain
formulations which I wanted to incorporate. This made me much more attentive to the genuine
materials in which I made my searches.
There is another, more general perspective to this: if you have two related languages(or dialects) and
you don't know explicitely to formulate something what is then your best bet? Well, it would be to
assume that it would be 'the same thing' in the other language. So if I don't know a word in Afrikaans
then I would assume that it is the same word as in Dutch, with some minor changes due to another
sound system and simpler morphology. The problem is of course that you may forget that this was just
a guess, and that you MUST try to check whether your guess really is correct in the target language.
Often it isn't (so it was just a 'false friend'), but more often it is correct, especially when we talk about
somewhat technical words. The risk of making grave errors is larger when it comes to expressions than
it is with single words, but sometimes the odds are on your side.
The compensate for this bit of heresy I would mention that I generally prefer to work on genuine
materials - both intensively and extensively - and with time you will develop a sense for what can be
said or written in the target language and what can't. And with time you can also scrap the stadium
where you need a sketch for your utterances.
How to make side-by-side parallel texts
This is easy. You make a table with two columns and a few rows on an empty page in your
wordprocessor (Word or another program). Then you find a text with a fairly literal translation. Now cut
out pieces of the original and put it in the left cell in row no. 1, until it expands to fill almost the whole
page. Then take the corresponding part of the translation and paste it into the right cell. You will
probably find that the text takes up more space in one of the languages than it does in the other. The
trick now is to move the vertical line between the cells until the paragraphs left and right roughly stand
side by side. Chances are that this position also will be fairly correct for the following pages, - though
you may have to do some minor adjustments. And then just do the same thing for the next pages.
You could also use columns, but at least in Word the text from the left column has a tendency to invade
the top of the right column, - you don't have that problem with tables.
How to make interlaced parallel texts
The following text was written for the http://learnanylanguage.wikia.com/wiki/Interlaced_parallel_t exts
- learnanylanguage wikia 25 May 2008:
There are two kinds of parallel text: side-by-side and interlaced. The name of side by side is more or
less self explaining, though is should be said that it normally are whole paragraphs that are juxtaposed
rather than single lines:
language1language1language1language1 . . language2language2language2
language1language1language1language1 . . language2language2language2
language1language1language1 . . . . . . . . . language2language2language2language2
You can make these in a word processor using either 'sheet' columns or columns in a table. To make the
sections fit you can put in empty lines, but it looks prettier if you force to the sections to have the same
number of lines by regulating the width of the columns.
An interlaced text has one line in the target language, then one line in the base language and so forth.
Ideally each line should contain one sentence (or another natural unit), but sometimes you have to cut
in the middle of something or you have to leave half a line empty.
They can be produced using a word processor (Word, OpenOffice writer, WordPerfect) plus a
spreadsheet (Excel, OO Calc, QuattroPro). You take a text and its translation into a better-known
language. Put each of them in its own word processor window and put one window above the other on
your screen.
Then you start subdividing the texts in parallel chunks of about 2/3 of the width of the screen, each
chunk on its own line. Take care that each chunk in one language as far as possible corresponds to one
chunk in the other. It is not as difficult as you might think if the translation is faithful to the original, but
in a few rare cases you may have to move something away from its context - do this in the base
language version, not in the target language version as there may be some syntactical reason for the
changed order of the components.
Then open a spreadsheet (for instance Excel) and put one text in column C, the other in column F. You
should fill column A and D with numbers 1,2.... , and afterwards fill column B and E with respectively a's
and b's. At this point check that the two versions of the text really correspond line for line to each other.
You should also give each language is own color and font for easy recognition later. Then you cut out the
content of the three columns D,E,F and place it below the content of columns A.B,C. The idea behind
this arrangement is that you now can sort the whole thing according to columns A and B, which gives
this result:
1 a blahblah (language 1)
1 b blohblohbloh (language 2)
2 a blahblah (language 1)
2 b blohblohbloh (language 2)
...
The last thing to do is to copy the content of column C (i.e. the interlaced texts) to the word processor,
where it appears as a table whose dividing lines can in principle be removed without harming the
content of the cells, - but it is not really necessary to do it. That's all.
So far the method. But in practice you probably won't use it often. The problem is that even with this
technique it will take a very long time to prepare a whole novel. Personally I only use the interlaced
texts for active reading in my 'worst' languages, and then a few pages per session are enough. With a
better known language you can understand most of the text and most of the words, and then there is
no longer any reason to use interlaced texts, and you can settle for side-by-side texts which are much
faster to produce. And eventually they also become irrelevant.
Hyperliteral translations
The following text was written for the http://learnanylanguage.wikia.com/wiki/ Hyperliteral_translations
- learnanylanguage wikia 4 May 2009:
Hyperliteral translations are translations from language A to language B that try to stick to to the words
and the constructions of language A, even when this means that the result in language B isn't
grammatical and in some cases not even meaningful when judged with the standards of language B.
It is a known fact that languages aren't parallel. If you say that "cheval" in French is a translation of
"horse" in English, then it just means that both refer to a certain fourlegged mammal. However there
may be cases where 'cheval' in French doesn't correspond to 'horse' in English. Take for instance the
expression "tre trs cheval sur quelqu'un" = "to be strict with someone", "be a stickler with
someone". Often these derived meanings have some connection with the 'core meaning' (in this case
the fourlegged animal, - to be strict with someone is almost as sitting on them as on a horse), but some
words don't even have a single dominating core meaning, and then there is no reason to expect that
their meaning(s) can be covered by one single word in another language.
This situation is also found with grammatical constructions. For instance many languages have reflexive
pronouns, i.e. pronouns that by definition refer back to an explicit or implied subject. In Danish "tage
sin hat" means "take the speaker's own hat" (reflexive "sin"), while "tage hendes hat" means "take her
hat", i.e. some (other) female person's hat. In English there aren't reflexive pronouns so the context
will dictate the meaning in a concrete sentence. (PS: in this case I have decided to write a generic
reflexive 'self', just as in Old English)
Ordinary translations systematically try to cover up these problems by reformulating phrases or
guessing at the intended meaning and choosing one out of several possible interpretations. Depending
on the skill and ambitions of the translator this can mean that the general meaning is preserved, but all
direct parallels between the original and the translation are lost. This can be a problem for a language
learner who wants to understand the role of each element in the original version. A hyperliteral
translation has no literary pretensions at all, but tries to 'imitate' the original version at all levels.
So "tre trs cheval sur quelqu'un" would in a hyperliteral translation be something like "(to) be
very on horse on someone", and you would add a corresponding idiomatic expression in language B if
the meaning can't be guessed ('be a stickler'). However even this version isn't a perfect hyperliteral
translation: the 'to' is normally necessary in English, while the French infinitive can stand alone, -
therefore the word 'to' is put between parentheses. Even this simple example shows that there is some
judgement involved in making a hyperliteral translation, just as in making an ordinary 'literary'
translation. When explaining exotic constructions in remote languages you may even have to add
morphological markers in some places. This has to be decided in the concrete case.
It is also clear that hyperliteral translations only should be used in the early stages of learning a new
language. They are much better than ordinary translations to convey the structure of the phrases in the
original language, but as soon as you can understand the general meaning of spoken and written texts
in language A the best strategy would normally be not to make or use translations at all, except when
you look up unknown words or idiomatic phrases in dictionaries and other sources. From that moment
on translations would primarily be done for the benefit of others, and then it is logical to try to make
translations from language A that are exquisite even in language B.
Hyperliteral translations in combination with 'normal' translations have been used in some language
guides, such as the German series Kauderwlsch and the small guides from Lonely Planet.
The following is a quote from http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=31479&PN=0&TPN=3 - Translation direction , 05 March 2012
On example more: a sentence from Irish Gaelic (from Kauderwelsch, which has pronunciations, word for
word AND ordinary translations - I give the English equivalents in my own notation below):
Is fuath le hEils caife
Is! hated with [h]Eilis coffee
Eilis hates coffee
The exclamation sign is my own invention. It helps me to avoid the nagging feeling that the sentence
ought to be a question because of the inversion. The [h] (a variant of the system of consonant changes
known as aspiration or lenition) reminds me that there is aspiration/lenition in this context ([h] is used
with initial vowels after certain 'grammar words' - here the preposition "le" - while a h is put after most
consonants in the writing: d -> dh etc.).
Maybe you don't need this kind of procedure, but for me such a hyperliteral translation has (or rather
had) a mnemotechnic function akin to the translations of isolated words - I so to say formulate a
translation af the Irish construction rather than a direct translation of the words. Which is one reason for
using the term "hyperliteral" instead of "word for word".
It is fairly evident that the 'ordinary' meaning oriented translation into English not only doesn't tell you
anything about how the Irish language functions - it is simply misleading because it tempts you to make
a gross translation error if you trust it. You may like hyperliteral translations or not, I don't mind, but
free translations are something any language learner should avoid like the plague.
Hyperliteral translations as a means to learn expressions and proverbs
Quote from my http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=3435&PN=0&TPN=12 - profile thread , written 03 July 2009:
I have written a lot about memorization of single words and word combinations through word lists. I
have written very little about stylistics because I find that it only can be learned through reading,
listening, thinking, writing and speaking. There are books with advice about style, but they can only tell
you how to deal with genuine language, apart from a few tips and tricks that have more to do with
psychology than with language. But in between there is the dark uncharted land of the idiomatic
expressions.
I have read some of the pages in a French Dictionary of Idiomatic Expressions (in the series Livre de
Poche), and it struck me that it was very amusing, but I didn't learn much. So I started to speculate
about what the problem was. And I found at least one thing that irritated me, namely that both
examples and explanations were in the same language. The problem is that the two expressions
compete, - I let the original expression slip away because the explanation takes its place.
OK, one logical reaction to this would be to point out an equivalent expression in another language. This
is a very relevant technique, but from the other side: I may use a certain expression frequently in
Danish or English ... so what would a Frenchman say in the same situation (probably with totally
different words)? I should long ago have started a collection of such expressions, preferably on my
computer so that I could make full text searches, but nobody is perfect. The material is in principle not
too difficult to find in ordinary good dictionaries, which are full of idiomatic (or at least fixed)
expressions. But I would probably need to do it on a PDA or something like that, because my time at
the PC generally is spent on other projects, and I would prefer collecting those expression while
reading.
But today I got an idea which might be worth exploring, namely using hyperliteral translations. The
point is that if I just could remember those pesky expressions I would probably also remember their
unexpected meaning (it is the unexpectedness that makes an expression idiomatic, otherwise it would
just be a fixed expression). By having a hyperliteral translation I so to say point out its weirdness, and
that seems to function as an effective memory crutch and the worse the translation is, the more
effective it is probably going to be.
For example "compter sans son hte" is explained as "se tromper". But I'm much more likely to
remember the expression with the help of the English translation "count without one's host", precisely
because it is nonsense. I even doubt that I need to note down 'se tromper', because the problem is
remembering the expression, - whenever I just see it from now on I immediately will remember that it
means 'se tromper'. Actually the crutch language doesn't have to be your native tongue or even a
wellknown language. For instance "heure d'horloge" in French means 'exactly one hour', but the
hyperliteral expression in Icelandic is in fact the normal expression for a hour, "klukkustund" - so now
these two expressions can support each other. But mostly you are more likely to find a good, funny
hyperliteral translation in your native language than in any other language.
There are cases where the classical word list method is relevant, namely where the expression contains
at least one unusual word. For example "sous la houlette" means 'sous la conduite de' ('under the
control of'). The 'houlette' is the shepherd's crook (or a little garden spade), - if I can learn that word
then it will be difficult NOT to remember its use in the expression "sous la houlette". The problem is
rather those many expressions that don't have such a 'gimmick word', and that's where I think that a
funny hyperliteral translation might help. Or a drawing for the visual thinkers. But definitely NOT an
explanation in the original language.
Copying by hand:
One of the techniques proposed by professor Arguelles is the socalled "scriptorium", which he has
demonstrated in a video - see more about it in http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=9493 - this thread :
ProfArguelles wrote:
:
I have made a short video to demonstrate the proper form for transcribing languages by hand as
I do in my !scriptorium! exercise. In order to do this properly, you should:
1. Read a sentence aloud.
2. Say each word aloud again as you write it.
3. Read the sentence aloud as you have written it.
The whole purpose of this exercise is to force yourself to slow down and pay attention to detail.
This is the stage at which you should check all unknowns in grammars or dictionaries, although
that would have been too tedious to show in the video.
His other famous technique is of course "shadowing", which likewise is illustrated in a video (see
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=9492&PN=1&TPN=1 - this thread
. I once described them as follows in a thread called http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=9574&PN=0&TPN=6 - Language learning series video
reviews :
I wrote:
As far as I can see the common factor in both your shadowing and your scriptorium methods is
that you transform something that normally is done in a purely passive way into something
active, namely listening and reading. In your case it is done in a very active way, crf. your
recommandation of speaking loudly and walk at a brisk pace. When I do similar things I do them
silently and sitting in my chair, which suits me better - the basic idea is the same, but there is a
distinct difference in style, which probably can be blamed on temperamental factors.
However there is another, more fundamental difference: apparently you have moved from a more
conventional way of using dictionaries and grammars to a position where you actually do produce
such books yourself, but essentially you assume that the absorption through shadowing and
'lectoriuming' is the main ingredient of language learning. The main difference between your
methods and the so called 'natural learning' is that you don't need somebody to speak to because
you use preexisting materials, and that you prefer heavily structured learning instead of relying
on the hazardous nature of immersive experiences or even chance encounters with suitable
natives.
I am convinced that the two methods work, but as I mentioned they don't quite suit my temperament. I
do a lot of copying by hand, but strictly without vocalization.
There are two cases: the one where you don't have a translation and the one where you do have one.
In both cases copying is something you do in order to slow down your perception AND to appeal to one
more sense. This also means that the use of a keyboard isn't quite as effective.
Case 1:
Let's first take the case where you don't have a translation. I would then first copy a couple of lines,
then make a hyperliteral translation of them - and it HAS to be a hyperliteral translation. One of the
blunders of classical language teaching is the erroneous idea that the translation has to be in your most
exquisite native language. But this not only is irrelevant for the task of learning the target language, it
actually is counterproductive because it forces you to think in the structures of your native language,
where a hyperliteral translation forces you to consider the structures in the target language. Of course
there are cases where you can't guess the real meaning from the hyperliteral translation, and then you
can make a note to explain the intended meaning - however my experience with mainly Indoeuropean
languages shows that this is the exception, not the rule.
At the right side of the paper or below the translation I make notes of the unknown words or expression
I have found. It is not very important to note the precise translation of the words here because I can
see it in the translation, if I can't remember it. But making this list is relevant because I'll transfer them
to a wordlist for thorough memorization.
The result could look like this (and as usual I fold a A4 sheet once to make it more handy):
OriGiNaltext- OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext-
-OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext-l--OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext-
OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext- -OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext-..
my-hyperliteral-translation- my-hyperliteral-translation- my-hyperliteral-translation-
my-hyperliteral-translation- my-hyperliteral-translation- hyperliteral-translation-...
my-hyperliteral-translation- my-hyperliteral-translation- my-hyperliteral-translation-
word1 word4=translation word3
word2=translation expression word5=translation
Case 2:
If I do have translation (which I never ever copy) or if I am sufficiently advanced not to need one then I
normally reserve a column at the right to these words:
OriGiNaltext- OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext-Ori GiNaltext-OriGiNaltext-... | word1
-OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext-l--OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext- ................ . | word2=translation
OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext-OriGiNaltext- -OriGiNaltext-.. .|
But why make a copy at all if I'm sufficiently advanced to understand the text wiithout a translation?
Answer: because I need to concentrate on the details in the language to absorb them fully. I did this
even with Swedish, which I had been watching on TV and reading for many years and could understand
without any problems at all. Without doing this I would never have wondered why there was an a-
ending here or an article there.
Extensive reading and listening is also very important, but in this post we are dealing with an intensive
activity where details matter. Copying is slow, but it is efficient. But max. a page or less in a row, -
otherwise even I get bored!
Using Google translations* in language learning:
The main point right now are sources for fairly short texts with translations, which you can use for the
kind of detailed study I described in the preceding post.
Translations in bookform can be useful for extensive reading: you sit down in your comfy chair, open a
page in the translation and read a paragraph or a page (depending on your level and that of the book).
Then you take the original and read the corresponding section, which shouldn't be too difficult given
that you have read the translation.
But we were going to talk about intensive reading with a translation, and here it is more practical to
make printouts with both the original and the translation on the same page.
Even with a good translation you need easy texts when you are a beginner. You can find many literary
texts in translation on the internet and make them into side-by-side bilinguals (se above), - but for
reasons of copyright this mostly applies to older literature. Besides they may be too difficult for a true
beginner. Many homepages are found in several languages, not least those that belong to international
organizations or which cater to tourists.
However I recently found out that even the translations of Google and other automated websystems can
be used. I had ordered a travel to the Balkan Peninsula, and I wanted to prepare myself for a bit of
Serbian. I had one month and many other things to do, so I had to find a 'quick and dirty' learning
method. I tried to find some interesting things in Serbian (or even in Croatian) with a translation, but
literature isn't my favorite occupation, and I didn't really find anything.
Then I got the desperate idea of translating some Serbian homepages with the help of
translate.google.com - translate.google.com . I have often been among those that scorned these
automated translations, and it is true that they often are ridiculous or worse (for instance I have noticed
a general tendency to ignore negations and trifles like that). However when translating FROM Serbian
TO Danish then all the nonsense will be formulated in Danish, where my chances of discovering and
dealing with it are much better than in Serbian. So I found some interesting stuff and translated it.
When I tried to copy the translation I got a surprise. As you probably know the original of each sentence
can be seen in a box by keeping the cursor over it. When I marked and copied an article and pasted it
into Word then each sentence came first in the original version and then in translation. That was
excellent on the screen, but when I printed this page only the translation was printed. So I had to paste
it 'as text only' (which may be a problem with other programs), and then everything was visible, even in
the printout. The final step was to paint all the translated parts in another color for clarity, and then I
had something just as good as an interlaced bilingual.
The problem with the quality of the translations is not as annoying as you might expect. In fact they are
sometimes surprisingly good or at least fully understandable, and when they aren't then the idiocy is
mostly so gross that it can be spotted - erroneous translations made by human translators can be much
more insiduous! If it is clear that there is an error then you can simply use your dictionaries or some
common sense to solve the problem.
* translate.google.com, but there are several others. However the described method to make 'semi-
interlaced' pages by copy/pasting the translation of whole internet pages is specific for Google translate
EDIT 2013: I have stopped making interlaced or interspersed bilingual texts. Now I just use two
columns side by side. It functions just as well, and it is much easier to make the texts in this way.
Learning one language through another
Quote from the thread http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=15759&PN=0&TPN=2 - Learning one language through another , 02 July 2009:
There are several issues involved in learning one language through another. The first problem is that for
a certain target language you may sometimes find better textbooks, dictionaries and grammars in
another language than your native one. And of course this is more likely to hapen if your native
language isn't a big one (I as a Dane should know that). However I wouldn't want to do this if I didn't
know the base language of those books very well. Learning an unknown language through a badly
known language is in my eyes not only a waste of your time, but quite simply a receipt for disaster.
The other issue is the one of interference, which includes that you hear two languages simultaneously in
your head while studying a target language through a foreign base language (or maybe even three,
because you might also have thoughts running in your native language). This sounds confusing, but I
actually have used this language mingling proces consciously in two ways: hyperliteral translations and
'intermediary' languages.
When I have started to study new totally new languages I have found it helpful to make translations
where the translation is extremely close to the original, even to the point of including grammatical
annotation (I was inspired to do this by the German Kauderwlsch series, but you also see it in some
language guides). It is best to do this with bilingual texts where you also have a 'normal' translation to
avoid gross misunderstandings, but the point is that you afterwards can read through the target
language text in almost normal tempo because the hyperliteral version functions as crutch. This would
ideally be performed with your native language as a base, but I normally let the language of the
available 'normal' translation decide the language of the hyperliteral translation.
The other technique is to learn a new language through a closely related language which you already
knows fairly well, for instance Afrikaans through Dutch or Portuguese through Spanish. The idea is that
to get a language activitated in your brain you have to learn to think in it, starting with single words and
short phrases and ending up with complete sentences. If you want to kickstart this process then you
can use the better known language as a skeleton to which you can attach the words and phrases you
learn in your new language in order to get a continuous stream of thinking. Of course there is a grave
danger in this, namely that the structures from the better known language become part and parcel of
your version of the new language, but if you know what you are doing and stay focused on cutting down
on the use of the 'crutch' language then it is in my eyes permissible - for a short time! But most
teachers would probably not trust their pupils enough to let them try this technique.
Here is in all all situations I have mentioned so far translations are something that is intended to help
newbees. It is only when you are quite advanced that you need to speculate about job opportunities as
translator or interpreter, and then of course the rules concerning translations are different.
Retranslation as a variation on text copying
Follow-up to " Copying by hand" on the preceding page.
I have for a long time used copying by hand as a learning tool, and as I mentioned on the preceding
page I have included lines with a homemade hyperliteral translation in the copy if the language was so
new/difficult that I couldn't do a complete semantic integration of all the elements to a purely mental
translation in my head while reading. And also if I had so hard a time doing this that I didn't want to
start again from scratch in case I returned to the text later.
However this phase has always been fairly short, and after it I just copied the text after having checked
all unknown words and murky points of grammar so that I knew the exact meaning while writing.
As many other language learners I have also made free translations from L1 to L2, but mostly to check
my level because it has seemed to me to be more relevant to learn to produce new content on the base
of my existing knowledge ! for instance in order to add to my already bulging multilingual log. Doing
a translation of a text from L1 to L2 is harder because somebody else chose the content, and it is
frustrating if you take chances and can't check it against an original or get a detailed evaluation. At best
this type of exercise serves the purpose of pinpointing weak points in your knowledge of your target
language.
To solve these problems I have long ago experimented with a sequence of consisting of a translation
from L2 to L1 and then a retranslation back to L2. But this was frustrating because the gap between my
skills in translating from L2 into L1 always were way better my skills in translating the other way, and
the retranslation rarely matched to original. And if it didn't then I didn't know whether I had made a
busload of gross error or just expressed myself in a different way than the original author.
Lately it has occurred to me that the problems only occured because the time lapse between the two
phases was so large that I totally forgot the orginal version, and then it was of course hard to produce a
retranslation which matched it 100%. So now I translate the sentences one by one (and look words up
etc. in the process), and after each sentence (or two) I retranslate while I still vaguely remember the
original and all the new words and grammatical riddle solutions. But on the other hand the chunks
should not be too short and easy ! they should be precisely so long that I couldn't remember them
without the help of my translation, but when looking at this translation the original words should pop up
in my mind without to much ado. Effectively this means that it isn't a 'clean' retranslation ! it is
heavily infused with recall.
(quote from the thread http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=36234&PN=1&TPN=3 - Content + wordlist + anki, opinions/help (slightly amended), 22-23 June
2013 at 8:25pm
As a summary I'll mention the phases I recently have used with my intensive text studies, not because
they necessarily all will be necessary, but just to show the progression:
1) copy the text sentence by sentence and write a hyperliteral translation underneath or after each
sentence - even if you use a bilingual text. Include grammatical remarks if you have had problems with
something. All new words go into one (or two columns) to the right of the paper for later inclusion into a
wordlist.
2) same thing, but drop the translation (unless some passage has been so difficult that you want to
retain your complete solution).
3) read the original and look up all new words, then write your own translation and try to reconstruct
the original with the help of the translation.
4) Drop the copying and the written translations, but keep a sheet of paper or booklet (or even some
electronical gadget) within reach for new words and interesting grammatical observations.
The purpose of the hyperliteral translations is to show me exactly what the meaning and role of each
element in the original text is. A freer 'idiomatic' translation would have to conform to the rules of the
base language, and for some reason my teachers during my school and study years found that
important. I don't - the one and only purpose of the translations is to help be to keep the all meanings
and grammatical observations in the original text available to me until I can do this trick directly from
the original. They are not meant for the prying eyes of literature aficionados.
The Assimil and Kauderwelsch language guides give both a hyperliteral and a 'free' meaning oriented
translation. But using hyperliteral translations is enough for me because I normally remember fairly well
what I thought when I wrote them down, and can I insert hints in the text if an idiomatic expression
seems especially opaque.
I know about Luca's back-and-forth translation method, and if he hadn't recommended doing
retranslations I might not have reverted to the technique. However it seems that he uses it for longer
texts and with a substantial time lapse between each round. I prefer compressing the whole thing into
one process just as I have done with the wordlist method.
Luca Lampariello speaks about retranslation in http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6SH2U_rO6c - this
video, but there is an ultrashort written summary http://www.thepolyglotdream.com/an-easy-way-to-
learn-foreign -languages/ - here :
Four components are required to learn a language:
! Listening
! Repeating
! Writing
! Translating*
(* Translating from your own language into the target language (the opposite of what people often do)
is vital.)
My method allows me to retain 80% of what I study.
(end of quote)
Finally let me summarize my own phases:
In the 'copying and translating' phase (no. 1 above) I look at a sentence in my text, write the unknown
words in the right column on a folded sheet of paper (folded to make it more handy) and look them up.
Then I copy the text by hand while adding the hyperliteral translation between the lines. Sometimes I
have to look more words up than it seemed at first, and sometimes there are tons of new words and
grammatical details that deserve a short comment. Then I may have to write the text once more before
I feel that I genuinely have mastered it.
In the 'pure copying' phase (no. 1 above) I look at a sentence in my text, write the unknown words in
the right column on the folded sheet of paper and look them up. Then I copy the text by hand while
making sure that I understand every detail of it. If necessary if look more words up, but at this stage it
is rarely necessary to write a sentence twice. I may have however a homemade 'green sheet' with
morphology within reach so that I can check endings etc. on the spot.
In the new 'translating and retranslating' phase I look at a sentence in my text, write the unknown
words in the right column on the folded sheet of paper and look them up. Then I write not the text
itself, but a hyperliteral translation of it on the paper. If necessary I look at the original text to make
certain that I understand it, but after that I only look at the hyperliteral translation while writing down
the retranslation, and it must be identical to the original. I have actually noticed a bonus effect: having
the original sentence 'on hold' in my head gives me almost the sensation of having invented it myself,
so I expect that this will have an effect on my active skills which I don't get from the simple copying-
while-making-a-translation-in-my-head method. And subjectively I feel it is a harder exercise than
phase 2 copying (which still can be done in order to relax)
At stage four it doesn't feel necessary to make text copies, but it can still be worth working in a detailed
way with a short snippet of text. In this the paper will still have a right column for new words, but apart
from this it will be filled with potentially useful idiomatic expressions, grammatical examples in a concise
form and other notes.
Personally I can't see myself doing serious, intensive study of anything without having the possibility to
take notes. If I can't take noters then I'll just do extensive activities ! which also is necessary and
mostly pleasant.
THIS IS THE END OF THE SECOND PART OF THIS GUIDE .
learning languages in general)
grammar studies)
************************************************************
Iversen on 28 June 2013
on your own.
Posted By: Iversen
This thread is the third part of a series of guides to language learning, and no. 1 thread in this series is
found http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=16932&PN=1&TPN=1 -
HERE . The necessary caveats can also be seen there.
Grammar in general:
Quoted from my http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=3435&PN=0&TPN=4 - profile thread , 09 January 2008:
When it comes to learning grammar you should consider two cases: the easily specifiable morphology
and the more elusive syntax (and the even more elusive idiomatics).
To learn morphology I make simplified tables according to my own ideas. I normally write them on thick
green paper so that they don't get lost among all the white paper I soil every day. While I'm still
learning the morphology of a language I keep these green sheets within sight so that I can always
check an obscure ending when I need to, - that's as least as efficient memorywise as repeating
conjugations and declensions all day long. But of course I have to study the tables in the books
throroughly in order to write my own green sheets, and that is also part of the learning process. When I
write "simplified" I take it to mean that I cut out everything that are only based on a few words.
Exceptions should be learnt as exceptions, they shouldn't clutter your 'general case' tables. I normally
don't use example words, but just indicate the infixes and the endings, plus maybe an indication of
forms with likely vowel changes etc., but that has to be decided for each language.
Syntax should generally be learnt in close conjunction with actual reading and listening. You take a
problem area and then look for cases in real life. Of course you have to get an overview over for
instance types of subordinate phrases with their conjunctions even at the early stages, but to master
the details and make them productive in your own speech and writing, nothing beats spending some
time with your attention tuned in to a certain kind of grammatical phenomenon.
If you have learnt the basics of grammar in your target language (i.e. the whole morphological system
plus the use of conjunctions, infinite verbal forms, the cases that goes with specific prepositions and
things like that), then the learning the rest of the syntax will be fairly close to learning the idiomatics of
a your target language.
And that can be done through reading, provided that you stay alert to these things and don't focus
entirely on the meaning. One trick to do this is to choose a certain grammatical phenomen and then
keep that on your mind while reading or listening. It really doesn't matter which phenomenon you
choose (it could for instance be prepositions after verbs in English or aspect in Russian), because being
alert to one phenomenon will also make you notice other things in the grammar of the message. The
imporant thing is to avoid being focused entirely on the meaning.
But those things in grammar that can be formalized and put into a system will be more efficiently
learned if you do consult a grammar when you are intrigued by something. And you can only consult a
grammar efficiently if you know where to find what in at least one specific grammar book.
Replies:
How to learn morphology
Quoted from my http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=3435&PN=0&TPN=5 - profile thread , 16 July 2008:
Morphology is dominated by tables. Nobody in their sane mind believe that you can learn a language by
memorizing these tables plus x words, but the reaction against learning morphology by heart has in my
opinion gone too far. If you compare old editions of for instance Teach yourself with newer editions then
the authors have tried to hide the tables by dividing them into bits and pieces so that you never get the
full picture. Other systems avoid giving you the canonical names for cases and verbal forms. Instead
they use circumlocutions and homemade descriptions in the base language of the courseware, which is
even more idiotic than using the old Latin-based systems which could at least be used again and again.
I'm aware that many classical and traditional distinctions with Latin names are too detailed and to
irrelevant to be taken seriously, but using an international set of case names for (roughly) equivalent
cases is a blessing for those that try to learn several languages, and if those names are Latin then that's
just fine with me.
The alternative to learning the formal names and tables by heart is to expect everything to sort itself
out if you just get enough input (and make enough errors to elicit a sufficient number of corrections).
I'm aware that children learn their first language in this way, and I have nothing against these activities
- on the contrary! However as grown-ups who can read we have to chance to use some tools that
children can't yet use, and as long as we remember that these tools aren't the main point about
learning languages I don't see why we shouldn't use them to speed up the process and avoid
misunderstandings.
And now for the more practical side of morphology learning. When I want to get a first impression of a
new language (even if I don't intend to learn it) the morphological tables are among the first things I
check out. I want to know which forms I can expect to meet later and what the regular forms look like,
- the different kinds or irregularities don't interest me at this point, except in verbs like 'to be' and 'to
have' which are fundamental in the language. I also read about the different uses of the different forms,
but without going into details. Getting an overview before learning the details is important for me.
If it is a language that I intend to learn then the next step is to make my own tables, preferably based
on several books. At this point I decide how the presentation should be (with the option of changing my
opinion later). That is not necessarily the way that things are set up in the grammar books. For instance
I prefer to have the nominal case order Vocative Nominative Accusative Genitive Dative Instrumental
Prepositional/Locative[/ablative in Latin] ... so far I haven't learnt languages with more cases than this.
The reason that I want to have exactly the same case order in all languages I know is that I use the
spatial arrangement as a visual memory tool, and having a lot of fluctuating sorting orders would totally
spoil that.
In some cases my analysis lead to a result that is different from those in the books. For instance it is
evident that Greek verbs have two stems, and there is a present and a past simple form for each of
them (in active and passive). However the 'present' of the aorist isn't really used as a present, but with
and ! it is used as future resp. subjunctive (there are a few cases where it can be seen in
isolation, but a beginner can ignore these). So we get a simple 2 x 2 x 2 matrix, where the endings to a
large extent are reused or - in the passive - a set of endings inspired by the passive of the verb 'to be'.
The books tend to use other setups based mainly on historical principles, but I can learn those when I
decide to learn old Greek - I can ignore these considerations now.
Another example: in Russian my preferred grammar denies that perfective verbs have a present, -
instead they have a future, that happens to look exactly like the present of the imperfective verbs. What
really happens is that the present tense of perfective verbs take on a futuric meaning, but it is exactly
the same form as that of the imperfective verbs and it should be treated as that. The only true future is
a compund formed with the verb """ (to be) + the infinitive, but only imperfective verbs need
to use this form - the perfective use their present instead for semantic reasons.
Complex verbal forms should generally be learnt as some auxiliary verb plus an infinite form of the
regular verb - so there is absolutely no reason to write all the forms in a table for the regular verbs.
Auxiliary verbs are few and generally irregular so you should learn those in a process separate from the
study of the regular verbs. There are certain exceptions where the finite part of a composite verbal form
can't be used in isolation. For instance in the case of the Romanian futuric forms with (v)oi + infinitive
there aren't any simple verbform voi or oi, even though these forms historically come from the verb for
'to go'. Nevermind, just learn these forms as the forms of a any other irregular verb.
The real problem with complex forms is how to draw the line between constructions that really should
be mentioned in any conjugation table because they are used instead of simple forms - versus
constructions that more look like idiomatic expressions. And while we are at it, I am surprised that
those grammars I have seen don't stress more clearly that English has developed two complete sets of
parallel verbal forms: simple form + compound forms with a past participle versus the 'progressive' (or
'imperfective') forms based on a present participle (or 'gerund'): "I have done" vs. "I have been doing".
The general tendency in the modern Indoeuropean languages is that compound forms invade the realm
of the simple forms, and this is something that can be illustrated graphically. But everywhere I just see
tables with a mixture of simple and compound forms.
Truly irregular words don't belong in tables for regular verb declension or noun conjugation. They should
be studied one word at a time with a table containing all their forms, combined with lots of examples
drawn from reality. In fact these words are often so common so that you will meet them in almost any
text so it's easy to make a collection. But don't let them clutter your tables.
Systematic irregularities based on phonological criteria are best learnt with each word in the language.
But you have to know where the irregularities occur, and luckily there are mostly a systematic side to
this. For instance Spanish verbs with 'o' normally have 'ue' in certain forms, and this is so regular a
feature that you have to make room for it in your regular tables. But you don't have to clutter your
tables with each and every type of phonological alternation because they generally run in parallel - so it
is enough to mark those forms in your table where these alterations occur, and then the plethora of
possible changes can be shown in a note to the table.
Another case: Russian nouns and adjectives. There are different sets of endings that corresponds to
situations with a preceding soft sound vs. situations with a hard sound, - which in practical terms just
means that you have either " or " in the endings (resp."# or "$/). This is different from cases
where there is a non-phonological irregularity (""""!""!, where the suffix "!""!
disappears in certain forms), and cases where one form only is affected. You can make a note in your
table that certain masculine nouns have -a in Nominative plural insted of " or ", but put the actual
list of such nouns somewhere else, don't quote it in your table.
There are in fact cases where two sets of endings exist, each for a certain class of words. For instance
all the Germanic languages have strong and weak verbs and strong and weak nouns. A strong verb
generally uses a vowel shift to indicate its past tense (swim swam) while a weak verb relies on the
ending (jump jumped). Of course there are irregularities (do did), but as usual: learn the system as a
system and learn the exceptions as exceptions one at a time. Classically oriented grammars make
separate classes for each and every combination of vowel changes in the strong verbs, but you don't
have to make tables for all these. Learn the endings for strong verbs in general, learn the most common
vowel combinations and finally learn with each new verb what its present, it preterite and its participle
is, then you don't need a name. I remember when I learnt Latin in school we had to memorize the main
forms of all verbs and the irregular verbs in particular. Just do the same thing with the strong verbs in
the Germanic languages.
There are also strong and weak nouns in the Germanic languages, but in spite of most grammars it is
nonsense to speak about strong and weak adjectives in for instance the Nordic languages and German.
What happens is that in some cases there is a definitive determiner of some kind (typically a definite
article) and then ALL adjectives have another set of endings - called weak - than in the absence of such
a determiner. So there aren't too classes of adjectives, but only two parallel sets of endings. It is idiotic
that the same words (strong vs. weak) are used to describe so different phenomena.
I won't say more about this kind of analysis because it will inevitably be different from language to
language, and there are just too many things to mention here. The main point is that you should
identify truly irregular cases and kick them out of your regular tables, you should identify groups of
minor irregularities and mention them - but write the list of affected words somewhere else, and if there
are really two or more sets of regular endings then you have to include them.
One beneficial sideeffect of this analysis is that you may accidentally learn the forms, but to be sure I
have made it a habit to write my final versions af the tables on green sheets of cardboard which I try to
keep within sight whenever I work with a certain language. If I then see a dubious ending I can check
the table, and in this way I will soon learn all the regular forms without doing any memorizing in the
strict sense of the word.
Besides I make a limited number of morphological annotations when I make word lists: in Greek I make
a note of the form af the aorist with any verb unless it is formed in a trivial way, in Russian I make a
note of the gender of nouns on - and I always learn imperfective and perfective verbs in pairs. I
rarely make lists of German words, but when I do I mark feminine and neutral nouns, but not masculine
ones - because most German nouns are masculine so unless there is an indication to the contrary your
best guess will be that any given new word is masculine.
As I wrote in the beginning you don't learn morphology for its own sake. The positive thing about
morphology is that it CAN be learnt from a combination of reading + listening and a wee bit of old
fashion black school table trashing.
Green sheets
Quoted from my http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=3435&TPN=9 -
profile thread , 16 July 2008:
I am going to write about analyzing and learning grammar. I haven't had time to check out my old
posts, so I may be repeating myself (or worse: repeating myself). Besides I have to warn you: some
people can't get my methods to work for them. No problem, provided that that you have an alternative.
First, if you want to learn grammar you have to be able to make at least a rough analysis of a sentence
in its main parts (subject, direct and indirect object, verb, etc) and you have to know what nouns
(substantives), finite and infinite verbal forms, cases and such things are. If you already know one
foreign language then you have probably learnt the correct terms and analysis techniques there,
otherwise you you have to learn these things from scratch with your own language as an example. But
you HAVE to know at least the basic grammatical wordstock before you set out to learn a new language
with the help of grammars, otherwise it will be a complete waste of your time. When you open the
grammars for your new language then be prepared to add some terms and even revise your
conceptions about other terms to suit the new language, but you have to start somewhere.
Next: try to get more than one grammar. If you can't get more than one full size grammar then even
the short sketchy grammatical sections of travellers' language guides will be better than nothing. Your
first task will be to look through the morphological sections and compare them. Do they agree on the
terminology? The order of cases? The number of declensions? Do the divide the verbs into
corresponding groups, and do they list the same verbal forms? Probably not, which may come as a
nasty surprise to many learners.
Now look at the adjectives and the substantives. Do their endings in the different cases - if there are
cases at all - look almost similar or not? Are there articles? Look at the verbs in the same way, - try to
get a comprehensive view of the whole morphology in this way. Then leave the morphology aside and
read the syntactical sections with the same critical attitude. Which kinds of subordinate sentences are
there, and which constructions with infinite verbal forms do you find, which may or may not correspond
to subordinate constructions and vice versa in the languages you already know. Remember, you are not
supposed to learn any of these things by heart yet, just find out what there is to learn later.
Next step, - you have to learn something by heart, sorry. But don't do it without also having some texts
to use at the same time. I say texts because I find it easier to read than to understand spoken words in
the beginning, - if you have a teacher then by all means listen to him/her, but find some things to read
also, - preferably bilingual texts. The internet may be a good source for parallel texts, or you can get
some from text books or touristical guidebooks, but DO try to use bilingual texts in the beginning, it will
spare you a lot of misunderstandings and a lot of half-understood constructions along the way. And
most translations aren't so precise that they will do all the work for you - you will still have to look
things up. If you can find hyperliteral translations then just be happy, but they are rare.
Among the first things to learn by heart would be the main forms of the most common verbs til 'to be'
and 'to have', the personal pronouns and things like that. You will have to learn them by heart
eventually so you can just as well start now. Do what most people do: read them aloud many times,
write them, find them in your texts and identify the forms, make associations (if you can) and so forth.
Do the same kind of forced slave labour with some of the forms of articles and substantives (you don't
have to learn everything by heart now, but you should be aware of which forms you have left for later -
unlike the way most text books work!).
But do one thing more: get some coloured paper and write all the main forms down on such paper for
reference. You are now entering the next phase.
As you probably have noted your grammars aren't in total agreement. Maybe you can even spot some
inconsistencies. Now think hard about a way to organize the forms of articles and adjectives and nouns
on one sheet (maybe two), and all the verbal forms on another - and do it in a logical fashion. For
instance all Germanic languages have strong and weak verbs (the first group basically change the verb
through the tenses), so your tables should show that in some way - use colors or special signs or
different kinds of dividing lines for such things. Don't put irregular forms into your tables for the regular
forms, - if a set of endings is used only by two or three verbs then leave them for a list over irregular
nouns or verbs or whatever - these tables aren't meant to contain everything, but only the basic things
which you must learn soon.
The idea is that you keep these colored sheets whithin in sight whenever you work with the language -
personally I use a note stand. If you see a form that bothers you (or you need it while writing) then look
at your collection of coloured sheets. Making these sheets yourself makes you think about each single
form, and looking at them daily for maybe a month will make them into something like an extension of
your brain. Therefore it is also extremely important that you settle for a specific way of presenting the
facts, because you then have the added possibility of remembering for instance a certain verbal form as
a specific spot on a specific sheet (but only until you can remember the form without help, of course).
When I first wrote about my 'green sheets' almost everybody criticised that I only wrote the endings.
But this criticism was misguided: by using whole example words you tie the tables to some irrelevant
example words. However in practice you will almost always have a specific word in mind when you use
these tables, so it doesn't matter that they only contain the endings. And with only the endings you can
make the tables much more compact so that you ideally can fit the whole regular part of the
morphology of any (friendly) language into maybe 4 or 5 sheets. Plus a number of sheets for pronouns
and other more or less irregular adjectives, nouns and verbs.
To learn syntax you can to some degree make 'green sheets', for instance for the verbal forms used in
different kinds of subordinates or the different kinds of pronouns. But most of the syntax has to be
learnt using other methods. One of these is to first compare a few descriptions of some problem to find
out what the main issues are, and then make your own collection of examples, using some from your
grammars, some from your own texts - though you probably won't be able to illustrate everything
without perusing hundreds of pages - don't spend your time on that, but just go through for instance
ten pages. If the thing you are looking for is common then it is there, and otherwise it isn't common
and then it is less important to know about it (!) But even looking for something without finding it will
help you to remember what it should look like.
One little, but important warning: don't waste time on writing down the examples in their full length,
but cut them down to the important part - and don't try to remember the examples you find as as full
sentences, but cut them down to short mnemonic formulas such as "to do something to somebody"
(with suitable dummy words).
Later on you should keep a notebook for funny syntactical items, not least those that you have been
looking in vain for. This will keep you alert, and being alert is one of the most efficient things when it
comes to learning languages. This also applies to idiomatic expressions, which is in a sense the
continuation of syntax when it has become too individualized to put into a fixed structure.
(end of quote)
Quote from my http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=3435&PN=0&TPN=6 - profile thread , 16 July 2008:
Here are a couple of 'green sheets' to illustrate the method sketched out in the preceding post. The first
is the table of regular Russian adjectival and nominal endings, the second is the table for regular
Modern Greek verbs. And no, these tables are not meant for memorizing - otherwise I would have used
full words in the Russian table. They are meant for learning while I make them and for later reference,
and therefore it is enough to indicate the regular endings if space is scarce. And because they until now
only have been for my personal use I have also dropped long case names and things like that. Of course
these sheets are just meant as a memory aid for one specific person on this planet - but hopefully they
can inspire others to take a more independent look at their study materials.

How to learn syntactical patterns
For me the key to memorizing syntactical patterns is reduction of these patterns to something I can
visualize. To take a concrete example: let's assume that I have seen the French relativ pronoun 'lequel'
for the first time, and now I want to learn to use it. My grammar tells me that it is both a relative
pronoun and an interrogative pronoun, and a big fat old grammar like Grevisse would also give some
examples from venerated and famous authors, - including examples written in a style that even in
written French has become obsolete. I am perfectly aware that these quotes are necessary for the
linguist who has to research something before writing a paper about it, but they are too complicated for
me who just want to learn the use of the word "lequel". So what I want to see is the morphological
information that "lequel" is inflected ("laquelle" if the reference is feminine, lesquelles in plural,
"duquel", "auquel" when combined with the prepositions "de" and " ") plus some simplified examples
of its use in different constructions:
As interrogative pronoun:
Lequel?
Lequel des [noun phrase in plural] %& - which among a number of things %& (partitive use of 'de')
As relative pronoun, nominal function:
[antecedent], lequel %&.
[antecedent], lequel %&.
As relative pronoun, adjectival function:
[antecedent], lequel [noun]%&. (stonedead, but can be seen in older litterature)
This simplistic requirement means that it may be difficult to find suitable quotes from world famous
authors, but who cares? Then the author of the grammar just has to produce some examples
him/herself - I'm here to learn grammar, not to read nobelprize-winning literature.
OK, I have become interested in "lequel", and based on the grammars I have conconcted a list of the
constructions it is supposed to occur in. Next phase in the evil old days would be to be on the lookout
for examples for several weeks, and during that time I would check all occurences of "lequel" against
my list. With the advent of the search machines and the internet this has become much simpler: I still
have to know the different forms of lequel, but I can now make a quick search for each of them. Let's
try not "lequel" itself, but the feminine form "laquelle". Leaving aside company names and references to
dictionaries and wiktionaries and other rubbish, I find these quotes:
Histoire des insectes; dans laquelle ces animaux sont rangs suivant un ordre mthodique%&
(book title from 1799, so maybe a bit oldfashioned) -- relative pronoun
PERCUSSION! MAIS LAQUELLE? - interrogative pronoun, - used without "de", but in a very short
question
Laquelle des trois M te ressemble le plus? - interrogative pronoun, - used with "de" in a nominal
phrase in a more extended phrase
Raison pour laquelle je blogue -- relative pronoun, but the whole thing is part of an implied main
phrase ("[this is the] reason for which I blog")
This should be enough, - the following examples are just repeats of these patterns. But looking through
such a series of examples with the simplified patterns in your head is one sure way of making you
understand the mechanics of at least this corner of French grammar. In my opinion it is the combination
of a simple catalogue of patterns and a lot of relevant examples is the best way of learning syntax.
The example with 'lequel' was easy because you could search for a single word in a limited number of
shapes. Other syntactical phenomena are less easy to find through a simple search, - such as rules that
concern word order. But the proposed method is still to consider how the rules should be formulated and
then to have a look in the real world to check the usefulness of those rules. To formularte the rules it is
necessary to know a number of grammatical terms, and I prefer using the Latin ones across language
borders (insofar they can be adapted to the different languages).
The poor newbie who never has learnt anything about grammar has of course a problem, but you have
to start somewhere. You may say that a small child doesn't know Latin syntactical terms and yet the kid
somehow learns a whole language - but it is with these grammatical terms as it is with other words: you
can't describe the content of a typical house without learning the words for bed, chair, table and lamp.
But once you have learnt these terms you can use them to describe a lot of very different houses.
The alternative to learning grammatical terms is that you have to analyze absorb syntactical patterns
without knowing how to call the things you see. It is too late for me to experience this, but I think I
would feel like an aphatic person in a conversation club.
My own hybrid kind of grammar
Warning: the following rant is a bit technical
In a post in another thread I briefly mentioned that I had concocted my own kind of grammar, and I was
asked by a member what I meant by that. So at 3.10 in the night July 31 2007 I began to sketch my
system. It isn't really a system for learning the grammar of a specific language, it is more like a tool to
judge and organize the understanding of written grammars.
There is a general thought: sentences are organized like Chinese boxes (or Russian dolls), and at each
level the central 'organizer' normally is a verb, - at least in the Indoeuropean languages. Attached to
this verb are some fields, which can be filled out with other organized structures, generically known as
syntagmas (syntagmata in correct Greek), and the most important type of syntagmas is the nominal
syntagma which has a noun as its core. So I personally see a sentence as a system of boxes with
concrete words at different levels, and these words are connected by rods. One kind of rod connect a
verb and for instance a direct object, another kind connects pronouns with their 'antecedents', i.e. the
things they points to (with interrogative pronouns this is expected to occur in the answer). Ths helps me
to understand the structure of sentences, and it also gives me a framework to understand grammar
books. However I am aware that the following text is somewhat technical, and I don't expect the
readers just to gobble it all up and start analyzing sentences in the same way as me.
ID=6743&PN=0&TPN=1000 - A hybrid kind of grammar ,
31 July 2007:
I don't want to assume the responsability of making a language-machine that can produce all correct
sentences and only those. That was Chomskys lofty dream (at least before he gave up and became a
minimalist), and the result was a kind of grammar that I can't use when I try to learn a new language
because it is too abstract. Maybe some of the programmers who try to make translation software carry
that dream on, but that's their project, not mine, and I won't interfere in their choice of methods. I just
noticed that the words - which in my world are the main carriers of meaning - are much more central to
old-fashioned grammars, and that makes them easier to use during the learning process - in spite of
some deficiencies that can be repaired.
The most talked-about grammar in recent years has been the transformational grammar of Chomsky. I
have never liked it: it starts out with some empty symbols and through a series of transformations it
ends up with empty symbols that corresponds one-to-one with the elements of a meaningful sentence
in a real language. My gut feeling tells me to start with something that has meaning (basically words,
but affixes and certain combinations of words also qualify). The entities have certain construction
possibilities, and on that basis I want to construct all the sentences in the universe. This is in fact how
an old-fashioned grammar functions. Chomsky has coined the term constituent-structure for this kind of
grammar, but some of its adherents prefer to speak about fields, and therefore you could also call it a
field structure grammar. But sometimes it is evident that sentence structures have some kind of internal
connection, that cannot be expressed in a more elegant way than through transformations. So the ideal
grammar for me is basically a field structure grammar with the addition of transformation possibilities.
The transformations can be something as simple as adding an adjective to a nominal phrase, but they
can also transform a whole sentence. The most complicated field structures are organized around finite
verbs, and in any field structure a sentence is basically seen as the field around one or more finite verbs
with all the subfieklds included therein. However there are cases where a sentence lacks a finite verb,
for instance the Russian combinations of a subject and a subject predicat without any verb at all to
connect them. That construction is called a nexus. Or it could be a sentence structured around an
infinite verbal form like an infinitive ("Que faire?" in French). Or even just a nominal phrase, if the
context is clear enough to interpret it ("Two one-way tickets to Tombouctou, please"). But let's for
illustration purposes - and because the time is now 3.29 a.M.) just consider the true sentences that
have a finite verb as their center. This verb is the main ingredient of the verbal field, and around this
you find infintie verbal forms, subjects, several kinds of objects and something called adverbials. We'll
return to those later.
If a field of any kind (except the verbal field of the complete sentence) contains a finit verb as the
center of its own verbal field, then we have a construction with a subordinate sentence. This sentence is
inside the 'big' sentence like a Chinese box inside another box, and it can contain its own subordinate
sentences.
Pronouns and the structure of subordinate phrases
Warning: the following rant is also a bit technical
Amended quote from the thread http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=6743&PN=0&TPN=1000 - A hybrid kind of grammar (continued), 31 July 2007:
There is something called an pronoun and another thing called a conjunction. An pronoun is a word that
points to something else. If it has an implied reference in the real world it is a demonstrative, if the
reference is just something vague somewhere then it is an indefinite, if the solution is expected to come
in an answer to a question then it is interrogative, and if the reference goes to something in the (main)
sentence then it can in certain cases be a relative pronoun, or it can be a demonstrative. I'm not going
into any philosophical hairsplitting about these traditional categories, - show me a language where they
are irrelevant, and we'll work out a solution from there.
Conjunctions are things that tie subordinate sentences to something in the main sentence, or they can
tie two or more elements together within one sentence. Some pronouns are also conjunctions but there
are a few seemingly meaningless conjunctions, as for instance "that" in English completive sentences.
However historically these often can be traced to demonstrative pronouns that pointed to a whole
phrase: "I see that he has come" <--- "I see this: he has come". "If" is more enigmatic: it probably
derives from a form of the word for "give": "given that%&, (then)%&..". But here and now "that" and
"if" are seen as an empty conjunctions, and we analyze them as part of the subordinate.
We also have to broaden the definition of the word 'pronoun'. This word literally says that it is
something that replaces a substantive, though most grammars in spite of the name also accept
adjectival pronouns. For me there is no reason to exclude words that typically have adverbial functions
from the pronouns, so I consider words like "then", "how", "so" and "sometimes" as just as much
pronouns as "me" or "what" or "somebody".
I will now just sketch the main types of subordinate clauses, using the notions that I have just
introduced.
The first group is called the 'partial' interrogative clauses. Their conjunctions are interrogative pronouns
(but not "if"), and the whole clause functions in a substantival role somewhere inside the main
sentence. The typical case is "Subject + (transitive) verb + interrogative clause", but it can also be the
regimen of a prepositional clause, - the prepositions of these constructions tend to 'slide' into the verbal
field, leaving the subordinate clause outside, but basically it is still a combination of a preposition and
an interrogative clause. It is important to note that the function and meaning of the
pronoun/conjunction inside the clause cannot be predicted from the rest of the main clause, - the clause
so to say forms it own little world.
The same applies to the next group: the completive clauses, in English typically with "that" as the
conjunction (though I include the interrogative clauses with "if" in the same group). Here the reference
of the conjunction/pronoun is in principle the content of the subordinate clause, but in practice you don't
care about this reference, you just see a completive or interrogative clause with a conjunction (that can
be missing).
If you have a 'partial' interrogative clause then the conjunction/pronoun has a role in the subordinate
clause. In "I don't know where she is" it is an indication of a place, which normally is seen as an
adverbial funktion. You could detach the subordinate clause and insert an indefinite or demonstrative
pronoun instead: "she is SOMEWHERE" or "she is HERE" (note that when the function as a conjunctional
is lost the field is no longer tied to the start of the sentence"). A subordinate sentence that has been
treated like this could be called an "intrapositional sentence" (I have put something inside it!), and of
course there must be a welldefined transformation that takes this figment of the imagination and
transforms it back into a subordinate clause inside a main sentence.
With the relative clauses the reference is somewhere in the main clause: "I don't know the house that
she has bought". This "that" isn't empty, it refers to "(the) house" and the whole subordinate clause has
the role of a complement inside a nominal phrase. In many cases you could use another kind of modifier
instead: "I don't know HER house". The intraposition sentence is something like "She has bought A
HOUSE", i.e. the reference can replace the relative conjunction/pronoun. This is the defining
characteristic of relatives, and - the funny thing is that it also works with adverbial stuff: "She has found
somewhere where she can hide" --> "she can hide somewhere".
The really funny thing is that 'correlative constructions', typically comparisons, generally can be seen as
relative constructions. Here you normally have a demonstrative pronoun as a modifier (in my extended
definition) in the main clause and a relative conjunction/pronoun in the subordinate clause: "He is not
SO BIG as his sister is" ---> "His sister is SO BIG" In Latin and its offspring, the Romance languages,
you often have a neat pair of a demonstrative versus a relative pronoun: talis - qualis, tantus - quantus,
but the mechanism is the same. However comparison constructions have a tendency to degenerate:
first you skip the verb, and with time certain constructions develop into something that can hardly be
seen as clauses: "as good as new".
The last kind of subordinates are the "independent clauses". Many traditional grammars speak about
"independent relative clauses" in a case like this: "Whoever enters through this door must be shot
without warning". We don't know who it is, so we make up an intraposition sentence: "Somebody enters
through this door". Whoever it is can also be smuggled into the main clause, - "That mister somebody-
who-enters-through-the-door must be shot without warning". So the characteristic feature of this
construction is that the whole subordinate clause has a role in the main sentence that is compatible with
the role of the pronoun/conjunction alone in the subordinate clause, - and there is nothing 'relative'
about that, so I prefer to use the term 'independent clause'. Again we can make the same kind of
construction with adverbial elements: "I leave when that man enters through the door" ---> "that man
enters ... sometime tomorrow" ---> "I leave tomorrow". The whole subordinate clause indicates a point
in time, and so does the conjunction/pronoun ("when"). Normally the pronoun in an independent
subordinate clause is an interrogative pronoun or a variation of one of these. There are complications
(which I have studied in detail in the case of French long ago), but now it is 4.57 in the morning, and I
have to stop soon.
So the only thing that I have left to say is that there is a connection between the independent clauses
and the relative clauses: if you take something neutral, for instance a demonstrative, and put into the
main clause, you can transform almost any construction with an independent clause into a construction
with a relative clause. That explains for instance the French constructions with "ce qui", "l o'" and so
forth. But now it is 5.01 and I have to get some rest. Goodnight.
The rhythm of grammar study
When you start learning a new language you basically need a little of everything: morphology, syntax
and idiomatics. But you have to start somewhere. Contrary to most text books I prefer getting a total
overview from the start, but without trying to learn the specific forms - and certainly not the exceptions.
A language guide like those from Berlitz or Lonely Planet are quite sufficient for this, but if you already
have some experience with real grammar books then reading cursorily through one of these is even
better.
But sooner or later you have get some flesh on that skeleton, and for most people reading through the
whole grammar and then trying to apply it isn't the way to go.
Some things like morphology can to a large extent be put into tables, and I have earlier described how
you can make 'green sheets' to learn this part of the grammar. However even morphology should be
learnt with some real texts within reach (or a person who is willing to speak really slowly and repeat
endlessly, such as the average parent). Lets say you see a verbal ending and you wonder what it is. OK,
check your green sheet (or if that isn't enough, consult your true grammar). When you have found it
then look at some related forms while you are at it. If it was a 3. person singular preterite indicative
form, then run through the other forms in the same tense, and maybe you should also briefly remind
yourself of its uses - if you are in doubt then consult your grammar. Now back to the example: did your
identification function in the context? Did your general impression of the uses of this form suit the
present case? If not, then back to the sheets and books again. Maybe it is a totally different form,
maybe it is a known form in a new context, maybe you can't make up your mind and have to leave the
case for later, but you have definitely learnt something now.
And this is of course also the right moment to look for more examples of the same kind. At least with
morphology it is likely that similar forms will pop up soon so you just have to read or listen on with your
attention focussed on this particular form (and being alert in general is a good thing). With syntax you
may have to be patient, or you can try to figure out a way to find more examples (for instance through
Google or by consulting one more grammar).
The same technique can be used on syntactical patterns. Now syntax is the part of grammar that isn't
as prone to table building as the morphology, but still so regular that you can infer rules. Try to think
about those rules in the same terms as I described for morphological green sheets: which are the
central rules? Which are the exceptions? What do you most urgently need to learn?
(amended entry from the thread http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=17061 - Can you master grammar by reading a LOT? , 22 September 2009:)
Learning the more fluid part of syntax will be fairly close to learning the idiomatics of your target
language - i.e. you have to do it from real texts. And that can be done, provided that you stay alert to
form and don't focus entirely on the meaning. One trick to do this is to choose a certain grammatical
phenomen and then keep that on your mind while reading or listening. It really doesn't matter which
phenomenon you choose (it could for instance be prepositions after verbs in English), because being
alert to one phenomenon will also make you notice other things in the form of the message. The
important thing is to avoid being focused entirely on the meaning.
But those things in grammar that can be formalized and put into a system will be more efficiently
learned if you do consult a grammar when you are intrigued by something. And you can only consult a
grammar efficiently if you know where to find what in that book. That's one more reason for looking
through a true grammar book before even trying to learn the language - and yes, I know that there are
people who can't stand reading about grammar, but I dont like celery, and yet there are people who eat
the stuff and pretend that it is good for you. It is exactly the same thing with language learning
methods.
From http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=17259 - Tips for grammar
focused studies , 04 October 2009:
Try to imagine how you can write all the most important regular morphology on a few pages - you
obviously have to cut it down, and thinking about this is part of the memorizing process. Leave out the
irregular words and learn them separately, but keep your 'concentrated' tables within reach. I write
mine on green paper in order to separate them from ordinary notes. Doing this may also help you to
remember the forms, but the purpose is to force you to become aware of what there is to learn, so that
you can spot relevant structures in genuine texts or things you hear.
The same basic idea should be used for syntax. Don't try to learn everything by heart fra a grammar or
textbook, but concentrate on a certain phenomen: read about it, search for examples, write some of the
better ones down for later reference, and then go back to see what the rules are for the things you have
been looking for. The main point is to get into a rhythm where you look for the syntax hidden in things
you read or hear, then you go back to the grammar to get the rules ironed out, then back to your
genuine texts to try out the rules you just have learnt and so forth.
(end of quote)
Grammar shouldn't be seen as something you learn by rote memorization, - instead see your grammar
book as a source for interesting things to look for AND a place to get your own assumptions confirmed,
rejected or maybe reformulated in a way that also takes examples into account which you haven't even
seen yet.
Iversen on 06 October 2009
Drills
Most people hate them - me too. And because they are used to check the pupils and cement those
things they already are supposed to know - rather than teaching them new tricks - they can't be funny.
Drills are basically requests for very standardized, repetitive output, and some study methods are based
upon the idea that repetition is good for you - and there is indeed some truth in this. But just as simple
repetition is relatively inefficient for vocabulary learning, it is also inefficient for learning syntactical
patterns. You would have to get through a lot of expressions one by one to learn them by blind
repetition. What you really need is a machine that can produce those patterns, and here some way of
introducing suitable amounts of variation is necessary - preferably without introducing a lot of irrelevant
stuff.
So let's first eliminate two cardinal sins in modern language teaching: multiple choice and pairing (or
whatever it is called). Multiple choice is a methode where you give 2,3 false answers to a question and
add one and only one that is true. So basically you show the pupils 2,3 errors for each correct
construction - this can't be healthy! And you invite to blind or partly blind guessing, which is almost as
silly and demoralizing. But there is something even worse, namely the very popular 'game' where you
have two columns and are told to couple the elements in pairs. So you are looking at nonsense most of
the time, and the rule "garbage in, garbage out" will of course also function in language learning.
OK, what then?
Let's take a detour: can language guides be used for language learning? I have already written (in the
preceding post) that their grammar sections can be used for a quick overview, and their touristical part
may in theory be useful during actual travels if you have to ask a local person about something - though
in practice you rarely get the chance to use them for this. But can you learn anything but fixed
expressions from them? I doubt, and the reason is that they aren't repetitive enough. If you want to
study something non-repetitive then go for a genuine text (if necessary with a translation) - it will
almost certainly be more interesting and probably more informative than than any language guide. To
suck out any grammatical information from a text it should be fairly repetitive so that you can see the
pattern. I once wrote something about a http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=12983&PN=0&TPN=26 - Cebuan language guide that was
so repetitive that I could learn a lot about this language from it just by comparing the examples. A more
complete discussion is found in the thread http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=14399 - Armchair field linguistics experiment (with Turkish
as the unknown language).
OK, now let's return to the world of textbooks. In those that I have seen there is little consistency in the
input. Either the 'empty space' can be filled with just about anything without changing the
surroundings: "What's your name? My name is____" (fill in the blanks). Or the whole thing looks like a
translation exercise in the old black school, because there isn't any pattern that is common to
successive items.
So ideally a drill be built in such a way that you can't take the rest of the sentence for granted: "My
name is James Bond", and then the text book author could suggest some items that challenged this
pattern (for instance suggest two persons, someone who has got a new name, 'you' etc.) It is the
capability to make systematic changes to preexisting patterns that is the real goal behind doing drills,
not mere repetition for memorization. And of course you should limit the exercise to constructions
where the mechanics behind the relevant transformations already has been taught. Drills are not meant
for learning new things, but for training the old ones.
How to learn use a grammar book
Quote from http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=25316&PN=1&TPN=1#292750 - Krashen and beginners , 23 February 2011
When we speak about grammar we tend to think about morphology, and if we ever continue to thinking
about syntax it will be in terms of messy hierarchies of obscure rules - and everything has Latin names.
Learning grammar then will be learning complete tables or rules that resemble juridical texts. I can
understand if this seems less attraktive, but it doesn't have to be like that.
My personal preference is to run quickly through the grammar of a language at an early stage "to see
what is there". However after that stage I mainly take two approaches: studying isolated examples
through concrete examples and making my own summaries, which in the case of morphology results in
"green sheets" which I use for reference.
If you for instance want to study the use of ablative on Latin then check the possible endings and then
go through a page or two of Latin text (preferably something fairly simple). Note down all passages
where there seems to be a possible ablative and in if in doubt check with your grammar whether it
should be an ablative and not for instance a dative, which often has the same form. Ask yourself
whether you understand why there is an ablative in each and every case, using your grammar as a
reference book rather as something to be learnt by heart. There are of course constructions in your
grammar which aren't represented in any given text, but it is valuable to get a feel for which things are
common and which are rare - and just looking things up to solve concrete problem cases will make it
much easier to remember the different possibilities you have to choose from.
It should also be clear why reading through your grammars before venturing into the 'real' world is a
good idea: it makes it much easier to find things later when you look up a concrete construction or
form.
Morphology can often be analyzed in structural terms, maybe even as combinatorical games or
geometry. The things Cainntear mentioned [in the original thread] for Scottish Gaelic are also valid in
Irish, and there I have noticed that the distribution of certain changes of initial consonants (lenition) is
complementary between masculine and feminine words. Seeing such a pattern is part of understanding
what is actually going on beneath the surface. And memorizing a simple geometric pattern instead of a
lot of forms may be easier for some learners.
The big problem is in my view all the things that have to memorized word for word, not those that have
some kind of regularity. The morphology of a language is more or less those things that are regular
enough to be put into tables - actually you should be happy that some things are that regular and start
worrying about the things that are too confused for that treatment. Speaking like Tarzan is easy in a
morphology-low language, but only because you don't notice all your blunders.
Which brings me back to the Krashen problem. I wonder what kind in general of grammar study he and
his followers actually are thinking about when they are so much against grammar. If it's all rote learning
for them then their attitude may be understandable, but even then it would be more constructive to find
ways to work with the regularities in our languages than just giving up and let people find their own way
through the fog.
How to learn grammar, step by step
From http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=3435&TPN=9&KW=syntax#146454 - 'Iversen' , 08 March 2009
I am going to write about learning grammar. I may be repeating myself, and I have to warn you: some
people can't get my methods to work for them. No problem, provided that that you have an alternative.
First, if you want to learn grammar you have to be able to make at least a rough analysis of a sentence
in its main parts (subject, direct and indirect object, verb, etc) and you have to know what nouns
(substantives), finite and infinite verbal forms, cases and such things are. If you already know one
foreign language then you have probably learnt the correct terms and analysis techniques there,
otherwise you you have to learn these things from scratch with your own language as an example. But
you HAVE to know at least the basic grammatical wordstock before you set out to learn a new language
with the help of grammars, otherwise it will be a complete waste of your time. When you open the
grammars for your new language then be prepared to add some terms and even revise your
conceptions about other terms to suit the new language, but you have to start somewhere.
Next: try to get more than one grammar. If you can't get more than one full size grammar then even
the short sketchy grammatical sections of travellers' language guides will be better than nothing. Your
first task will be to look through the morphological sections and compare them. Do they agree on the
terminology? The order of cases? The number of declensions? Do the divide the verbs into
corresponding groups, and do they list the same verbal forms? Probably not, which may come as a
nasty surprise to many learners.
Now look at the adjectives and the substantives. Do their endings in the different cases - if there are
cases at all - look almost similar or not? Are there articles? Look at the verbs in the same way, - try to
get a comprehensive view of the whole morphology in this way. Then leave the morphology aside and
read the syntactical sections with the same critical attitude. Which kinds of subordinate sentences are
there, and which constructions with infinite verbal forms do you find, which may or may not correspond
to subordinate constructions and vice versa in the languages you already know. Remember, you are not
supposed to learn any of these things by heart yet, just find out what there is to learn later.
Next step, - you have to learn something by heart, sorry. But don't do it without also having some texts
to use at the same time. I say texts because I find it easier to read than to understand spoken words in
the beginning, - if you have a teacher then by all means listen to him/her, but find some things to read
also, - preferably bilingual texts. The internet may be a good source for parallel texts, or you can get
some from text books or touristical guidebooks, but DO try to use bilingual texts in the beginning, it will
spare you a lot of misunderstandings and a lot of half-understood constructions along the way. And
most translations aren't so precise that they will do all the work for you - you will still have to look
things up. If you can find hyperliteral translations then just be happy, but they are rare.
Among the first things to learn by heart would be the main forms of the most common verbs til 'to be'
and 'to have', the personal pronouns and things like that. You will have to learn them by heart
eventually so you can just as well start now. Do what most people do: read them aloud many times,
write them, find them in your texts and identify the forms, make associations (if you can) and so forth.
Do the same kind of forced slave labour with some of the forms of articles and substantives (you don't
have to learn everything by heart now, but you should be aware of which forms you have left for later -
unlike the way most text books work!).
But do one thing more: get some coloured paper and write all the main forms down on such paper for
reference. You are now entering the next phase.
As you probably have noted your grammars aren't in total agreement. Maybe you can even spot some
inconsistencies. Now think hard about a way to organize the forms of articles and adjectives and nouns
on one sheet (maybe two), and all the verbal forms on another - and do it in a logical fashion. For
instance all Germanic languages have strong and weak verbs (the first group basically change the verb
through the tenses), so your tables should show that in some way - use colors or special signs or
different kinds of dividing lines for such things. Don't put irregular forms into your tables for the regular
forms, - if a set of endings is used only by two or three verbs then leave them for a list over irregular
nouns or verbs or whatever - these tables aren't meant to contain everything, but only the basic things
which you must learn soon.
The idea is that you keep these colored sheets whithin in sight whenever you work with the language -
personally I use a note stand. If you see a form that bothers you (or you need it while writing) then look
at your collection of coloured sheets. Making these sheets yourself makes you think about each single
form, and looking at them daily for maybe a month will make them into something like an extension of
your brain. Therefore it is also extremely important that you settle for a specific way of presenting the
facts, because you then have the added possibility of remembering for instance a certain verbal form as
a specific spot on a specific sheet (but only until you can remember the form without help, of course).
When I first wrote about my 'green sheets' almost everybody criticised that I only wrote the endings.
But this criticism was misguided: by using whole example words you tie the tables to some irrelevant
example words. However in practice you will almost always have a specific word in mind when you use
these tables, so it doesn't matter that they only contain the endings. And with only the endings you can
make the tables much more compact so that you ideally can fit the whole regular part of the
morphology of any (friendly) language into maybe 4 or 5 sheets. Plus a number of sheets for pronouns
and other more or less irregular adjectives, nouns and verbs.
To learn syntax you can to some degree make 'green sheets', for instance for the verbal forms used in
different kinds of subordinates. But most of the syntax has to be learnt using other methods. One of
these is to first compare a few descriptions of some problem to find out what the main issues are, and
then make your own collection of examples, using some from your grammars, some from your own
texts - though you probably won't be able to illustrate everything without perusing hundreds of pages -
don't spend your time on that, but just go through for instance ten pages. If the thing you are looking
for is common then it is there, and otherwise it isn't common and then it is less important to know
about it (!) But even looking for something without finding it will help you to remember what it should
look like.
One little, but important warning: don't waste time on writing down the examples in their full length,
but cut them down to the important part - and don't try to remember them as as full sentences, but cut
them down to short mnemonic formulas such as "to do something to somebody" (with suitable dummy
words).
Later on you should keep a notebook for funny syntactical items, not least those that you have been
looking in vain for. This will keep you alert, and being alert is one of the most efficient things when it
comes to learning languages. This also applies to idiomatic expressions, which is in a sense the
continuation of syntax when it has become too individualized to put into a fixed structure.
Grammar is a giant built on sand..
But it is necessary to try to build it. And we should be happy that someone did spend time doing it, but
we should also be aware that grammatical descriptions are written by humans who had specific ideas,
termperaments and theoretical background.
from http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=35563&PN=1&TPN=1 - Are
you a rebellious grammar student? , 24 March 2013
I have in my log written about my qualms about the distinction between infinitivo pessoal and the futuro
do subjuntivo in Portuguese, which to me seems almost to have joined into a new symbiotic partnership
which covers territory taken from both the finite verbal forms and from the standard (infinite) infinitive.
And thereby it puts a question mark at not only between a too strict separation between infinite and
finite verbal forms, but also for instance between prepositions and conjunctions.
I have earlier refused to accept the traditional claim that imperfective verbs in Russian don't have a
synthetic future and perfectives don't have a present. The situation is actually that the synthetic futures
and the present have exactly the same endings -it's a purely semantic consideration that has led the
grammarians to give them distinct names and identities.
And I remember a thread where I with no aberdabei proved that the rules given in my grammars
concerning the possessive 'a-' particle in Romanian were wrong - modern Romanian simply doesn't
function as I was told it did.
I even remember that I drew a question about adverbials at my final exam in French at the university in
rhus in 1981, and I proceeded to declare the whole category meaningless because its supposed
members belonged into different structural groups. Luckily my teacher and my censor could see that I
had a point..
And then I came to wonder why people here seem to be content with their grammars (except that it is
hard work to refute them). Am I the only one who can't see a grammar without thinking about better
ways to structure the data - even before I really master the language in question? There must be
members here who have questioned the sacrosanct principles and claims in their grammars. But maybe
this irreverent attitude is more common among parttime linguists than it is among people who consider
themselves just to be practical learners. Maybe the rebellious learners don't use grammars much, or
they reserve their grammatical treatises to scholarly magazines or other homepages. Ah dunno..
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=35861&PN=1&TPN=1 - German
accusative? , 01 May 2013 (slightly modified)
Actually the rules and paradigms in grammar are the result not only of observations of hard facts like
case endings, but also of 'softer' semantical observations .. like: what happens if we change the word
order. The effect is so to say measured on a semantic scale. But even the presumed hard facts are
anything but hard. They are based on genuine examples found for instance in literature OR constructed
for the purpose by a native speaker - and in both cases it is only the gut feelings of the author that
guarantees that a certain formulation is grammatically correct.
Let's take a look at the constructions built upon a copula verb. Actually English is lucky just to have
one ("to be") - Irish has got two, one for claiming a quality of something, the other to point out which
one it is. It is commonly accepted that the copula has a subject, although in many languages this is can
be implicit: "[io] sono Danese" ("I'm Danish" in Italian). The subject can also be a mere place holder
with a reference to something which follows later or is known already: "it is obvious that this is a
sentence" ---> "[that this is a sentence] is obvious".
Languagesponge writes that "In English we say "that is her" - "her" is a direct object in English.".
Actually you could claim that, but only because you don't have 'true' direct objects with copula verbs -
and of course because the only accusatives in English are those of the personal pronouns, where "it's
me" is far more common than "it is I". But almost all grammars for other languages (even those written
in English) would state that the 'number two thing' attached to a copula verb is a subject predicative
(except those influenced by Chomsky, because in his school the subject is a NP and the rest is a VP -
verbal predicate - which includes the verb itself). In most languages with cases the subject predicative
is in the nominative case like the subject - although often with the accusative if it's a personal pronoun.
However there are exceptions. For instance in Russian, where there is an ongoing fight between the
nominative and the instrumentative case. So even though you don't have to differentiate between
subject predicatives with "to be" and direct objects with other verbs in English you do have to make
the distinction in other languages - and inevitably that spills over into English, where you actually
could defend that there is a direct object with the copula verb, as done by Languagesponge. The
argument against doing this is that this function in the sentence just as well could be filled out by an
adjective, and that's rare with other kinds of verbs than copula verbs - the exceptions are contrived
things like "he likes to play hard to get", which do have a copula-like ring to them without having a true
copula verb. So for this reason I stick with the distinction between direct objects and predicatives.
Something similar can be said about certain constructions with a direct object and one more element,
which could be called an 'object predicative': "I call him a fool". Here "him" is the direct object, and the
person referred to is "a fool" (compare "he is a fool"). This is a different situation from the one with an
indirect object: "I gave the pope a lollipop". The item given is not the same thing as the man or a
characteristic property of the man. So what is the direct object here? One test is to put the sentence in
the passive because direct objects then supposedly become subjects (at least in English). The trouble
is that also indirect objects can become subjects through such a transformation: "a lollipop is given to
the pope" or "the pope is given a lollipop". So in the absence of case markers you have to resort to your
semantically based gut feeling (or the sneaky little "to", which shows that we don't want an obvious
misunderstanding to occur). In this case the thing which is given is a sweet, and the receiver is a living
person - not the inverse. So the lollipop must be the direct object of the original phrase, and the pope is
the indirect object.
So verbs may have a direct object and sometimes an indirect object, or they a combined with
preposition clauses wich can be more or less standardized. Or they can stand alone. For the grammarian
the general rule would be be to call the thing attached to the verb a direct object if it is a substantive
with some attachments or a personal pronoun, and if there are two then the second one could be called
an indirect object. This neat system is upheld by languages like Latin, where direct objects are in the
accusative and indirect ones are in the dative case. But in most languages with cases there are verbs
which 'take' other cases - like the German "freut euch des Lebens" (enjoy youplural the's life's), where
"des Lebens" is in the genitive. And in Russian you can have verbs that commonly take complements in
just about any case.
But outside the simple direct objects you find the murky waters of adverb(ial)s. Actually the are specific
word or word forms which always act as adverbials (NB: 'adverbial' is a role, and 'adverb' is a specific
word which takes on that role). But in some cases there is a gray zone, as for instance with expressions
of measure and time and price or manner. What is "a ton" in "The car weighs a ton"? Well, you could
say "the car weighs a lot" or "the car weighs too much", and the general consensus is to regard the final
element in such expressions as adverbials. But in "The man weighs the car" the car is without a doubt
the direct object so fundamentally the problem is that the verb "to weigh" can behave in two very
different ways: it can function as an intransitive verb with an adverbial or as a transitive verb with a
direct object. You need extra arguments to claim that one is an adverbial and the other is a direct
object. And where do you find those arguments? Either in the use of different cases OR in semantic
considerations.
Besides you need to be able to distinguish a subordinate phrase inside a main phrase. Basically phrases
are organized as boxes: you can have a box inside another box, which can be inside a third and much
larger box. In those cases where the innermost box has a verbal of its own it will be the verb at this
level that decides the roles of the elements that are attached to it, not the verb which is functioning as
the verbal of the outer box.
But sometimes the innermost box hasn't got a finite verb, but for instance a participle or an infinitive.
And even infinite verbal forms can have other elements attached to them. For instance "to buy a house
is very expensive". The outermost verb is "is" (a copula verb), and "very expensive" is the subject
predicative (cr. the discussion above). The subject is "to buy a house", which has an inner structure
where "a house" is the direct object of "to buy".
When you build a grammatical description of a language you try to find recurring patterns, and you are
most at ease if there is some clear indicator which divides all your examples into two or more nice
heaps in such a way that members of one heap also in other respects clearly are different from all the
members in other heaps. Unfortunately reality isn't always like that. Languages are basically chaotic
phenomena where some kind of order imposes itself, but leaves areas where you have to draw arbitrary
division lines or face descriptions which are too complicated to be useful.
OK ... maybe this also became a wee bit complicated. And then I didn't even consider dialectial or other
variations or the need to simplify things for the beginners or those who just don't care about the details.
This is the end of Guide no. 3.
translations)
==================================== ====== ==================
=========
Iversen on 01 May 2013
on your own.
Posted By: Iversen
This thread is part of a series of guides to langage learning, and no. 1 thread in this series is found
The necessary caveats can also be seen there.
How many words do you need to learn?
Quote from the first post, written by Administrator, in the thread http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=267&PN=0&TPN=1 - How many words do you need to
learn? , 24 March 2005:
I have a file of lexemes in Russian sorted by frequency. Lexemes are 'unique' words, that is for instance
'to be' instead of counting 'is' 'was' 'are' are a different word each time.
(...)
The result is that:
the 75 most common words make up 40% of occurences
(end of quote)
ProfArguelles (in the same thread):
The maddening thing about these numbers and statistics is that they are impossible to pin down
precisely and thus they vary from source to source. The rounded numbers that I use to explain this to
my students I usually write in a bull's eye target on the whiteboard:
250 words constitute the essential core of a language, those without which you cannot construct any
sentence.
750 words constitute those that are used every single day by every person who speaks the language.
2500 words constitute those that should enable you to express everything you could possibly want to
say, albeit often by awkward circumlocutions.
5000 words constitute the active vocabulary of native speakers without higher education.
10,000 words constitute the active vocabulary of native speakers with higher education.
20,000 words constitute what you need to recognize passively in order to read, understand, and enjoy a
work of literature such as a novel by a notable author.
(end of quote)
My own contribution to that thread, p. 6 (25 January 2007):
C the main obstacle to reading and listening fluently is lack of vocabulary. For some people it may be
difficult to remember words without contexts, but my own experience with wordlists have shown me
that I can learn words much faster by using structured methods. By this I mean that it is not enough
just to read a long list of words with translation and maybe repeating each combination fifty times. You
can use different methods, but writing the lists in small chunks and memorizing, immediately followed
by control in both directions, does the trick for me, and then afterwards I use the same repetition
techniques that I would use on passive words to make the words stick, - in my case it is dictionary
checks, but flashcards is a viable alternative. I have written extensively about that in other threads.
When you first have the words inside your head, reading and listening is necessary to get the nuances,
construction possibilities and idiomatic uses, but all that is only possible when you already have a
nodding acquaintance with the word in question.
The funny thing is that for once it is a thing that is measurable: I originally started my concentrated
work on dictionaries and word lists because I just wanted to known my passive vocabulary in Romanian.
But then I discovered that my vocabulary thundered upwards by relearning those half forgotten words.
Later I experimented with techniques to learn new words, and now I can not only feel, but even count
the effects. And reading/listening has become much more pleasurable now that I can do it without
looking up ten words in each sentence. Now I can focus on syntax and idiomatics.
10000 active, 20000 passive words would be a good estimate of where you are leaving basic fluency
and moving towards advanced fluency, but of course only in conjunction with a firm grasp on grammar
and idiomatics, plus easy active use of the language in question (at least if you want to claim active
fluency, not only passive fluency). And to get there dictionaries, word lists and flashcards are not
enough, - you have to meet real living language (and produce it yourself).
(end of quote)
Quote from http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=15568&PN=1&TPN=5
- How many words do you learn per day? , 05 September 2009:
Not to discourage anybody, but take a small dictionary with about 10-15000 words and try to look up
every unknown word from some ordinary text in a language you don't already know too well. How many
did you find? My own experience with a Greek scientific magazine is maybe half the words I didn't know
weren't included in the dictionary either - so apparently even 10-15000 words isn't enough. And here
I'm not talking about specific scientific terms, because they often are international and therefore not
among those I had to look up. So a daily word intake of at least 100 words is not only possible, but it
really is what you MUST aim for if you want to learn a language within a reasonable time (but of course
this will be more difficult if it isn't closely related to something you already know). Good luck!
Replies:
Learning words from context
ID=7476&TPN=9 - Strategy: Learn 600 words a week , 09 October 2007
The assumption behind wordlists, flashcards and things like that is not that two languages are 100%
connected on a word to word basis, - and you would be hard pressed to find anybody who seriously
believe that. The purpose behind such systematic learning tools is to familiarize people with enough
words to get through genuine texts without stumbling over unknown words all the time. The meaning
that is associated with a given foreign word is for practical reasons its approximate translation into
another language, which may or may not be the native language of the student. But it could also be a
drawing or an explanation in the target language or a translation into a third language if there is
suitable term there. The important thing that you get just enough feeling for the meaning of the word to
understand it when you meet it in 'real living language', and having a dictionary translation (with
examples, if necessary) as a background is much safer than believing that you know all about it just
from seeing it once in context. Many things in language are idiomatic, but it doesn't imply that
languages are purely idiomatic. It is still valid to note that a English horse is the same as a French
cheval, even there are idiomatic expressions with both words that can't be translated directly.
My position is - and will continue to be - that languages are not purely idiomatic, and therefore it is
perfectly legitimate to use tools that ultimately are based on translations. In fact, I find it strange that
there are people who are unable to or refuse to use such tools. But we are clearly different, and
everybody should use the methods that work for him or her. In the end we all expect to get to a
situation where we use the target languages without translating mentally, - we just can't agree on how
to get there.
ID=267&PN=0&TPN=6 - How many words do you need to learn? , 25 January 2007:
Let me add to this old text that I remain sceptical about learning words purely from context. If I meet a
word in a certain context then I may feel that I can guess the meaning, - or at least determine its
category. For instance I might suspect that "usignolo " is some kind of bird in Italian, and I might also
be able to guess that it is the same as a "Rossignol" in French. But I would feel much more certain if I
saw in a dictionary that it is a nightingale ("nattergal" in Danish). And I would understand the Italian
text much better if I already knew this when I saw the word there. Now the name of a bird is something
very concrete, but the principle is valid also for more abstract words and words with more meanings.
Even the possession of a translation can't give the same sense of security as a simple look in a good
dictionary, because the translation is targeted towards one text, while the dictionary is intended to be
used more generally - and if it is a good dictionary it will also list other meanings of the word. Of course
I don't expect that you learn 20.000 Italian words before you read a single line in the language, but
getting a fruitful alternation between the use of dictionaries and similar sources and the use of genuine
texts gives in my opinion a much better base for learning foreign words than guesswork based only on
those texts.
Word lists
("Iversen's method")
A word list is in its most common form a list of words in a target language with one translation of each
word into another language, here called the base language. However you can use short idiomatic word
combinations instead of single words, or you can give more than one translation into the base language,
and it will still be a word list. You can also add short morphological annotations, but there isn't room for
examples or long comments in a typical word list. Lists of complete sentences with translations are not
word lists.
There are also word lists with just one language (frequency lists) or with more than two languages. The
so called Swadesh lists (named after Morris Swadesh) contain corresponding lexical items from a
number of languages, typical 100 or 200 items chosen among the most common words. Both these lists
can be valuable for a language learner who wants to make sure that s(he) covers the basic vocabulary
of a target language.
Dictionaries can be seen as sophisticated word lists, where the target items (lexemes) are put in
alphabetical order, and where the semantic span of each lexeme is illustrated through the use of
multiple translations, explanations and examples, sometimes even quotes. In addition good dictionaries
give morphological information about both the target language and the base language words. However
the amount of information in dictionaries varies, and the most basic pocket dictionaries are hardly more
than alphabetized word lists.
Using word lists
The most conspicuous use of word lists is the one in text books for language learners, where the new
words in each lesson are summarized with their translations. However they are also an important
element of language guides used by tourists who don't intend to learn the language of their destination,
but who need to communicate with local people. In both cases the need to cover all possible meanings
of each foreign word is minimized because only some of them are relevant in the context, - in contrast,
a dictionary should ideally cover as much ground as possible because the context is unknown.
Using word lists outside those situations has been frowned upon for several reasons which will be
discussed below. However they can be a valuable tool in the acquisition of vocabulary, together with
other systems such as flash cards. The method that is described below was introduced by Iversen in the
how-to-learn-all-languages forum as a refinement of the simple word lists, and it was invented because
he found that simple word lists weren't effective when used in isolation (except for recuperation of half
forgotten vocabulary).
Methodology
One basic tenet of the method is that words shouldn't be learnt one by one, but in blocks of 5-7 words.
The reason is that being able to stop thinking about a word and yet being able to retrieve it later is an
essential part of learning it, and therefore it should be trained already while learning the word in the
first place. Normally people will learn a word and its translation by repetition: cheval horse, cheval
horse, cheval hose... (or horse cheval cheval cheval cheval....), or maybe they will try to use puns or
visual imagery to remember it. These techniques are still the ones to use with each word pair, but the
new thing is the requirement that you learn a whole block of words in one go. The number seven has
been chosen because most people have an immediate memory span of this size. However with a new
language where you have problems even to pronounce the words or with very complicated words you
may have to settle for 5 or even 4 words, - but not less than that.
Another basic tenet is that you should learn the target language words with their translations first, but
immediately after you should practice the opposite connection: from base language to target language.
And a third important tenet is that you MUST do at least one repetition round later, preferable more
than one. Without this repetition your chances of keeping the words in your long time memory will be
dramatically reduced.
This is the practical method: Take a sheet of paper and fold it once (a normal sheet of paper is too
cumbersome, and besides you need too many words to fill it out). If you have a very small handwriting
you can draw lines to divide it as shown as b) below, otherwise divide it into two columns as shown
under a). The narrow columns are for repetition (see below). Lefthanders may invert the order of the
columns if that feels more comfortable. Blue: target language, red: base language. Curvy top: original
column, triangle top: repetition column

Now take 5-7 words from your source and write them under each other in the leftmost third of the left
column. Don't write their translations yet, but use any method in your book to memorize the meanings
of these 5-7 words (repetition, associations), - if you want to scribble something then use a separate
sheet. Only write the translations when you are confident that you can write translations for all the
words in one go. And use a different color for the translations because this will make it easier to take a
selective glance at your lists later. If you do fail one item then look it up in your source, but wait as long
as possible to write it down - postponement is part of the process that forces your brain to move the
word into longterm memory.
OK, now study these words and make sure that you remember all the target language words that
correspond to the translations. When you are confident that you know the original target words for
every single translation you cover the target column and 'reconstruct' its content from the translations.
Once again: If you do fail one item then look it up in your source, but wait as long as possible to write it
down (for instance you could do it together with the next block) - the postponement is your guarantee
that you can recall the word instead of just keeping it in your mind. So now you have three columns
inside the leftmost column, and you are ready to proceed to the next block of 5-7 words. Continue this
process until the column is full.
There isn't room for long expressions, but you can of course choose short word combinations instead of
single words. It may also be worth adding a few morphological annotations, but this will vary with the
language. For instance you could put a marker for femininum or neuter at the relevant nouns in a
German wordlist, - but leave out masculinum because most nouns are masculine and you need only to
mark those that aren't. Likewise it might be a good idea to indicate the consonant changes used for
making aorists in Modern Greek, but only when they aren't self evident. In Russian you should always
try to learn both the imperfective and the corresponding perfective verb while you are at it, and so
forth. You can't and you shouldn't try to cram everything into your word lists, but try to find out was is
really necessary and skip the details and the obvious.
Sources
You can get your words from several kinds of sources. When you are a newbie you will probably have to
look up many words in anything you read in the target language. If you write down the words you look
up then these informal notes could be an excellent source, - even more so because you have a context
here, and it would be a reasonable assumption that words you already have met in your reading
materials stand a good chance of turning up again and again in other texts. Later, when you already
have learned a lot of words, you can try to use dictionaries as a source. This is not advisable for
newbies because most of the unknown words for them just are meaningless noise, but when you
already know part of the vocabulary of the language (and have seen, but forgotten countless words)
chances are that even new unknown words somehow strike a chord in you, and then it will be much
easier to remember them. You can use both target language dictionaries and base language
dictionaries, - or best: do both types and find out what functions best for you.
Repetition (added aug. 2012)
As mentioned above repetition is an indispensable part of the process, and it should be done later the
same day, but better one day later. The repetition can of course be done in several ways, but in the two
layouts above there are special columns for this purpose, - it is easier to keep track of your repetitions
when they are on the same sheets as the original wordlists. However these column are only subdivided
in two parts, one for the words in the base language, the other for the target language words. So you
copy 5-7 base language words from the original wordlist, cover the source area and try to remember
the original target language words. If you can't then feel free to peek, but - as usual - don't write
anything before you can write all 5-7 words in one go. An example with Latin and English words:

The combined layout was the one I developed when I had used three-column wordlists for a year or so
and found out that I had a tendency to postpone the revision - having it on the same sheet as the
original list would show me exactly how far I had done the revision, and I would only have to rummage
around with one sheet. And for wordlists based on dictionaries or premade wordlists (for instance from
grammars) it is still the best layout. But I have since come to the conclusion that it isn't the most logical
way to do the revision for wordlists based on texts, especially those which I had studied intensively and
maybe even copied by hand. Here the smart way to work is to go back to the original text (or the copy)
and read it slowly and attentively while asking myself if I know really understood each and every word.
I had put a number of words on a wordlist because I didn't know them so if I now could understand
without problems them in the context then I would clearly have learnt something - and I would also get
the satisfaction of being able to read at least one text freely in the target language. If a certain word
still didn't appear as crystal clear to me then it would just have to go into my next wordlist for that
language. So now I have dropped the repetition columns for text based wordlists.
Then what about later repetitions? After all, flash cards, anki and goldlists all operate with later
repetitions. Personally I believe more in doing a proper job in the first round (where there actually are
several 'micro-repetitions' involved), but it may still be worth once in a while to peruse an old wordlist.
My advice here is: write the foreign words down, but only with translation if you feel that a certain word
isn't absolutely wellknown - which will happen with time no matter which technique you have used. The
format doesn't matter, but writing is better than just reading - and paradoxically it will also feel more
relaxed because you don't have to concentrate as hard when you have something concrete like pencil
and paper to work with.
Memorization techniques and annotations (new)
When you write the words in a word list you shouldn't aim for completeness. If a word has many
meanings then you may choose 1 or 2 among them, but filling up the base language column with all
sorts of special meanings is not only unaesthetic, but it will also hinder your memorization. Learn the
core meaning(s), then the rest are usually derived from it and you can deal with them later. Any
technique that you would use to remember one word is of course valid: if you have a 'funny association'
then OK (but take care that you don't spend all your time inventing such associations), images are also
OK and associattions to other words in the same or other languages are OK. The essential thing in the
kind of wordlist I propose here is not how you do the actual memorization, but that you are forced to do
it several times in a row because of the use of groups, and that you train the recall mechanism both
ways.
It will sometimes be a good idea to include simple morphological or syntactical indications. For
instance English preposition with verbs, because you cannot predict them. Such combinations
therefore should be learnt as unities. For the same reason I personally always learn Russian verbs in
pairs, i.e. an imperfective and the corresponding perfective verb(s) together. With strong verbs in
Germanic languages you can indicate the past tense vowel (strong verbs change this), and likewise you
can indicate what the aorist of Modern Greek verbs look like - mostly one consonant is enough. There is
one little trick you should notice: if you take a case like gender i German, then you have to learn it with
each noun because the rules are complicated and there are too many exceptions. However most nouns
are masculine, so it is enough to mark the gender at those that are feminine or neuter, preferably with a
graphical sign (as usual Venus for femininum, and I use a circle with an X over to mark the neutrum).
This is a general rule: don't mark things that are obvious.
Arguments against using word lists
Finally: which are the arguments against the methodical use of word lists in vocabulary learning?
One argument has been that languages are essentially idiomatic, and that learning single words
therefore is worthless if not downright detrimental. There is a number of very common words in any
language where word lists aren't the best method because they have too many grammatical and
idiomatic quirks, - however you will meet these words so often that you will learn them even without
the help of word lists. On the other hand most words have a welldefined semantic core use (or a limited
number of well defined meanings), and for these words the word list method is a fast and reliable way
to learn the basics.
Another argument is that some people need a context to remember words. For these people the
solution is to use word lists based on words culled from the books they read.
A third argument is that the use of translations should be avoided at any costs because you should
avoid coming in the situation that you formulate all your thoughts in your native language and then
translate them into the target language. But this argument is erroneous: the more words you know the
smaller the risk that your attempts to think and talk in the target language fail so that you are forced to
think in your native language.
A fourth argument: word lists is a method based entirely on written materials, and many people need to
hear words to remember them. This problem is more difficult to solve, - you could in principle have lists
where the target words were given entirely as sounds (or as sounds with undertexts), but you would
have serious problems finding such lists or making them yourself. But listening to isolated spoken words
is in itself a dubious procedure because you hear an artificial pronunciation and not the one used in
ordinary speech. However the same argument could be raised against any other use of written sources,
except maybe listening-reading techniques.
A fifth argument: there is a motivational problem insofar that many people prefer learning languages in
a social context, and working with word lists is normally a solitary occupation. It might be possible to
invent a game between several persons based upon word lists, but it would not be more attractive or
effective than the forced dialogs and drills used in normal language teaching
Alternatives
Of course there are alternatives to wordlists: the most extreme is the exclusive use of graded texts as
the most vehement adherents of the natural method propose. I don't understand their motives, but
respect their bravery. However I do understand the unorganized use of dictionaries plus genuine texts,
but frankly I think there is room for improvement in that method.
Finally, there are wellstructured alternatives like paperbased flashcards and electronic versions of these,
all based on the notion of 'spaced repetition': Anki, Supermemo. However I can't give advice concerning
these systems because I haven't tried them myself.
Active and Passive Vocabulary
I would say that wordlists, flashcards and looking up unknown words in dictionaries all are 'active
activities'. But no matter how you initially learn a word or phrase it isn't garanteed that it will be learned
so efficiently that you can be sure of being able to recall it in the next relevant sitation. And that's
another just way of saying that those words became part of your passive vocabulary, but not yet of your
active vocabulary. To convert passive words into active ones you normally have to relearn them several
times, and then you also have to use them.
As I have written in other threads my experience is that the better I know a certain language the larger
my passive vocabulary will be, - but the proportion of my vocabulary that also can be used actively also
goes up. In Danish, which is my native language, I could probably see myself using just about every
word I know (and that's quite a lot). In Russian I know a fair amount of words, but when I write
something in that language I have to use a dictionary almost at every sentence because I can't recall
the words when I need them. But when I then see them again I'm quite aware that I already knew
them. This happens again and again, and it clearly illustrates the nature of a passive vocabulary.
Amended quote from http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=251&PN=0&TPN=3 - All I need to know is 2500 words , 18 September 2006:
If you want to know your proven active vocabulary, in principle somebody has to write down everything
you have ever said (in a certain language), take everything you have ever written, grind it through the
lemmatization mechanism used by lexicographers and finally subtract everything that you have
forgotten so effectively that you wouldn't be able to recall it by yourself. Then add all those words that
you could have used if you had got the chance. No way that you can make a rocksolid estimate of that!
Learned people have tried to quantify the written heritage of great men like Shakespeare, but I don't
think anybody will do it for neither me nor the other honorable members of this forum. So we have to
guess or use other methods.
After a couple of months as a member of this forum I spent a couple of hours (unwisely, maybe) on
collecting every single English utterance that I had ever put on this sprawling forum. I had not been
discussing cooking, African wildlife, astronomy or gardening here, and I had only very briefly
commented on music, history, law and modern electronic gizmos. Nevertheless I had during the
preceding two months written quite a lot (28.000 words in English) about quite a lot of strange
subjects, and I had suspected that it all in all would amount to thousands of 'lexicals entries'. And then I
found that after applying all the tools of the trade I had only used about 2400* different English
words!
Deep frustration!
At least it makes it more realistic that you could do quite well with a limited active vocabulary in even
quite demanding surroundings. Add a couple of hundred birds, plants, industrial brand names, kitchen
utensils, swearwords and other essential terms, then living happily on say 2500 words suddenly doesn't
seem unrealistic.
By the way, at the time the estimate of my English passive vocabulary - based on a dictionary with
approx. 75.000 entries - amounted to around 35.000 words, and I could have probably boosted it even
more if I had removed the taperecorder that back then was standing on top of my fattest dictionary -
bigger dic, higher estimate! (se below). But does it really matter? I think that this small exercise already
has shown how little of my passive vocabulary I actually use in my daily life, and this in my opinion
undermines the whole concept of active vocabulary. How can you prove that some part of your
vocabulary is potentially active, if you don't actually use it?
A warning against frequency lists
Quote from http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=7514&PN=0&TPN=2 -
Lists of high freq. words , 17 October 2007:
I'm not too fond of frequency lists because they have problems at both ends of the scale.
For the very common words it is evident that you have to learn the words, but you will see them
everywhere so you don't need a list to point them out. Furthermore those words are often irregular
(pronouns) or they are essential 'glue' at the syntactical level (conjunctions), so that you need more
than just a nodding acquaintance with these words to use them correctly. In fact it may be difficult to
translate them in isolation because their meaning is very contextdependent and therefore also very
diffuse. Such words are best learnt as part of your grammar studies in combination with profuse reading
and listening.
For slightly less common words the frequency lists may be relevant, i.e. words that tend to pop up here
and there, but not so often that you see them all the time. Besides these words normally have a more
welldefined meaning, which you can learn - but never without the risk that they are used in idiomatic
expressions. The more common a word is, the more likely it is that it has some ultra idiomatic uses that
you have to learn individually.
For words beyond, say, the first 1000 items on the list the frequencies are so low that it really isn't
worth learning them from a list. If you have some special interest, as for instance history or music or
zoology or exotic cuisine, you will in all likelihood meet the 'special' terms of your chosen interest much
more often than item 1001 on a general frequency list. For instance the history buff will meet the words
for different kinds of weapons, the gourmet will have to learn the names for different kinds of meat, and
the birdwatcher will be confronted with the words for each and every part of a bird plus the names of
typical habitats. It is however unlikely that such words will figure on any frequency list, - and if they do
it will probably be due to a methodological flaw (a too small or skewed sample), or the word is on the
list because of a less specialized use.
Above those first 1000 words or so you will be better served with word lists that you have compiled
yourself.
Some doubts about the use of thematic word lists
Heavily amended quote from my http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=3435&PN=0&TPN=4 - profile thread , 09 January 2008:
For somebody who is a total beginner it is too early to think in semantic theme groups. A total beginner
should first and foremost learn the 'grammatical' words: pronouns, the auxilliary verbs, prepositions and
things like that, some 'common expressions' of the kind you need to keep the conversation going and
just enough 'content' words to be able to formulate simple sentences. Unless you are a tourist who
needs to ask for the loo then it doesn't matter too much which content words you know, because you
are still not ready to engange yourself in deep philosophical discussions.
This means that word lists based on the texts you use during your first stages of learning are the most
relevant, far more relevant than any lists drawn from dictionaries or thematic word lists. Word lists
based on actual texts are also good for another reason, namely that you then always have seen the
word in context at least once, which is a good help for the memory. This means that text based word
lists can be relevant for people who can't remember words without a context, but who nevertheless note
unknown words down and who might need a way to make sure that they don't forget these words
again.
Word lists based on thematic lists, such as the different sections of language guides, are useful when
you want to extend the vocabulary you have learnt in phase 1, - i.e. you know the word for apple, so
now you want to add the words for pear, orange, apricot and cherry. However you shouldn't take all
words in each and every list in one go. I.e. don't learn the names of 100 fruits and after that 100 spare
parts for cars, 100 birds and so forth, but pick for instance ten very common fruits and then return to
the subject 'fruits' later on, - 100 diffferent fruit names in one session will just confuse any person with
a normal brain.
Until you have tried them you may think that word lists based on dictionaries only are for the real
aficionados (OK, call them nerds). But when you already know some words you will soon discover that
new words are easier to remember when you learn them in bulk, using some inbuilt technique for
repetition. This may be either because you already have met them but just forgotten all about it, or
because you can recognize the parts they are made off, or you may have seen something similar in
another language. In fact some of us actually enjoy just adding word upon word from a dictionary
precisely because we don't feel them as isolated words.
Personally I prefer learning in bulk from a bilingual target language dictionary, because I then see the
foreign words as headwords, not as explanations or as a lot of alternative translations. Monolingual
dictionaries are much less practical - the process of condensing a long explanation will disturb the 'quick
and dirty' memorizing (and beginners will probably not even understand the explanations in such a
dictionary).
I normally just take a random page and select maybe half the words on that page, and if there are a lot
of related words I focus on the most common or the simplest of them, plus maybe one or two more -
there is no need to memorize every member of the family at once.
You should generally use dictionaries with some indication of morphological classes and clear indications
of idiomatic uses (such as the prepositions used with English verbs) - but not actual quotes, which
tend to be too long and filled with irrelevant stuff. Even if you don't copy all of this to your wordlists it
helps to see it, and you can decide to put a marker on for instance irregular verbs for later reference.
But no dictionary can give you the kind of feeling for a language that you get from reading and listening
to genuine texts and speech by natives. You learn the words from dictionaries as a preparation for 'real
life' so that you can read and listen and think and speak without feeling that there are unknown words
and holes in your vocabulary lurking at each and every footstep. And the reason to do it from word lists
is that this is by far the fastest way of adding new words, - but only IF it functions for you.
Wordcounts and active/passive vocabulary
ID=14608&KW=travelling&TPN=8 - How many words do I have to learn ? , 27 April 2009:
As I have written before the number of words you actually use is much less than the number of words
you potentially could use (= your active vocabulary). If you avoid complicated discussions then you
probably could end up using just 5-600 words. The problem is that you don't know beforehand which
words you need outside the fundamental core of 'grammar' words (pronouns, auxiliary verbs etc.), so
you definitely need a larger active vocabulary.
In March-April 2009 I did a mini test for my own passive vocabulary in different languages (which of
course is larger than the active vocabulary): I took a couple of midsize dictionaries for each of my
languages and made an estimate based on something like 10-20 pages. I incorporated the results in my
log file, and when I was through the project I listed them all in http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=12983&PN=0&TPN=106 - one post for comparison (NB:
newer and more comprehensive version from November 2013 http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=12983&PN=1&TPN=428 - here - and this list will kept
updated).
In my earlier word counts I just calculated an estimated number of known lexemes, but this time I also
calculated a percentage for each dictionary. The logic behind this is that irrespective of the definition of
'lexeme' in different dictionaries representing different languages, it must be meaningful to say that I
know for instance a third of the lexemes in a midsize dictionary. It would then be a plausible guess that
I would then also know a third of the words in both smaller and larger dictionaries and dictionaries
where 'compound lexemes' are listed according to different principles.
However one thing that has surprised me is that in a couple of cases I knew a larger proportion of the
words in a large dictionary than in a smaller one, - you might expect the percentage to be lower with a
large dictionary because it contains rare and outdated words, but many of the supposedly rare words
are international scientific terms, and I know quite a lot of those.
I could in principle also try to assess the number of words I actually might use (=active vocabulary), but
that would be based almost purely on guesswork. In many cases it is already difficult to tell whether I
really know a certain word from experience or just expected it to be there because it has a parallel in
another language. So right now I just count my passive vocabularies, and then I'll to find a suitable
setup for estimating the active part of those.
(end of quote)
Generally the results from the wordcounts in April-May corresponded fairly well with my private and
subjective assessment of my level in those languages, but I got a few strange results. For instance I got
unexpected high numbers in Portuguese, which I basically learnt during a short, but intensive study
period in 2006 - in fact higher than in French, where I have a university degree and forty years of
experience. But this is probably a result of my study methods, which even in 2006 leaned heavily
towards mass consumption of words directly from dictionaries. The fact that I feel more at home in
French because my horizon in that language is wider: I have read more books, seen more TV and (until
recently) travelled more in Francophone countries than in Lusophone countries. This just goes to show
that your vocabulary size isn't the only relevant factor in determining your level.
How to count words
Amended quote from http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=3435&PN=1&TPN=10 - my profile thread , 10 March 2009:
advice no. 1: don't be too worried about those numbers, they are good for measuring your progress,
but there is more to speaking a language than knowing a lot of words passively - and word counts
primarily show passive words
advice no. 2: use a midsized dictionary (30-50.000 words) from the beginning, and use the same
dictionary for all your consecutive counts in a certain language. The number you get is very dependent
on the size and organization of the dictionary, so it is basically meaningless to quote any number
without saying how you got it.
advice no. 3: choose a dictionary where the lexemes really stand out from the background, - otherwise
you can't avoid reading the translations, and then all your counts become dubious.
advice no 4: decide how you will deal with combinations of several words. Some dictionaries don't have
a clear separation between 'words in several parts', idiomatic expressions and example phrases
Method: write down the number of pages in your dictionary. Take a sheet of paper and two pencils of
different color. Now open the dictionary somewhere, look right or left as chosen before. Write down (in a
long column) all the words on that page that you are certain that you know, leaving out those that
you're unsure about and those that you can guess but didn't know beforehand. Exclude proper names,
except in cases where the word is utterly different (such as Londres in French for London). If you see a
word that you would like to remember for later then write it down in another color than the one used for
counting known words. Now count the known words and write the result (you can transfer the rest to a
wordlist).
Choose a number and go that number of pages back or forth and count the page you are directed to -
don't be tempted to count any other page. Run through this process for at least half a dozen pages or
so. Sum the results you have found, divide by the number of pages used and multiply with the total
number of pages in the book - that's your estimate.
And then take this number, multiply by 100 and divide by the number of headwords in dictionary (if you
can find it, - some dictionaries just give a number for headwords AND expressions). This gives you the
percentage of the words you know in this dictionary, and that percentage can be just as relevant as an
absolute number.
Personally I find it most rewarding to do these counts in the phase where you really struggle with your
vocabulary, and even there they should be used sparingly. If you can see that your counts have grown
from for instance 2.000 words to 5.000, then it is probably a sign that your knowledge also has grown
proportionally in other, less easily quantified areas. And for some people - not all - it is beneficial to
have some benchmarks, even if they don't tell the whole story.
The sentence method
Quote from http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=6088&PN=1&TPN=2 -
How to study? , 08 June 2007::
I have made some experiments with the 'sentence method', - mostly because I found myself in a
situation with Russian where I had spent too much time on words and too little (and too late) on
sentence construction and 'flow' of the language. Of course I have tried to remedy this by doing the
ordinary intensive reading (where you look up words etc.) and - to some extent - extensive reading of
simple texts, mostly from the internet.
I have found that the following method is more effective for me, - not surprisingly as it is derived from
my preferred word list method.
I find a text somewhere and read a passage in it intensively, - that is, I check unknown words and
mysterious constructions. Then I write a hyper-literal translation of one or two sentences on a separate
sheet of page, and with this as a guide I try to remember the original text. When I can do it I write it
down and continue to the next sentence. Of course some people with extraordinary memories can
remember a sentence in a half-known language without any tricks, but we don't all have that ability (it
is easier to remember sentences in a language you know well).
I think that making the hyper-literal translation and using that as an intermediary memory tool makes
me focus more on the weird things in the Russian language. I have been working among other things
with the http://gloss.dliflc.edu - G.L.O.S.S. texts (where audio is provided with a transcript and a
translation), and it has struck me that the semantic components of the English version more often that
not come in the exact opposite order of the same elements in the Russian version. Writing down my
own hyper-literal seriously unidiomatic Danish translation does more for my understanding of the
vagaries of the Russian language than reading a version in bland, but correct Danish.
And afterwards I use the words I have encountered as basis for word lists, - of course!
With languages that I know well I sometimes use a totally different 'sentence method': I collect
"specimens" with interesting grammar or weird idioms just as a linguist would do and put them in order
according to my own homegrown principles for grammatical analysis. But I don't use this approach with
single words, unless they are part of idiomatic expressions or unexpected constructions.
Learning idiomatic expressions (and 'chunks')
The notion of 'comprehensible input' is mostly seen from the perspective that it permits you to guess
the meaning of unknown words or expressions without having to resort to a dictionary or grammar or
whatever. And that may be correct in the sense that you often can guess the meaning of something
more or less correctly and more or less precisely. But you can't know beforehand whether a certain
combination of words is in common use by natives - it takes time to get a feeling for this, and
comprehensible input may be your best source for these expressions, given the scarcity of good
collections of those expressions.
'Chunks' are fixed expressions that you can use to construct your utterances so that you don't leave too
many pauses and holes, - this technique is something that even native speakers use (often far too
much), but for a newbie who wants to communicate it is extremely important to learn these
prefabricated elements before you spend your precious time learning proverbs and quotes from famous
plays. It is much more important that you can say "by the way" or "tell me" than that you can quote the
whole of Hamlet by heart. Because they are so common you can learn them by reading conversations in
literature or by listening to actual conversations, - dictionaries can contain them, but for once they
would not be the best and most trustworthy source..
Linguamor (now Lingua) once wrote a splendid post about these chunks in the thread http://how-to-
learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=7617&PN=6 - Lexis and lexical chunks , where
she defined a lexical chunk as "any pair or group of words which is commonly found together, or in close
proximity". She also defined a "collocation" as "a pair of lexical content words commonly found together.
Following this definition, 'basic' + 'principles' is a collocation, but 'look' + 'at' is not because it combines
a lexical content word and a grammar function word.". The definition is useful, but it would be probably
more relevant to find a name for those chunks that consists of a 'content word' and a 'grammatical
function word'. However I don't know any commonly used term for this.
Personally I use most of my time at the lower skill levels learning single words, and because all
expressions are composed of single words it will be easier to learn them after you have learnt their
constituent words. But to achieve something remotely ressembling native language you have to learn
these expressions, and the question then is where to find them - apart from relying on picking them up
one by one from comprehensible input.
Of course you can find many expressions in good dictionaries, but those cited there are mostly those
that couldn't be guessed from the words alone. But many expressions are fairly easy to decode - the
problem is which word combinations the natives actually use among all the possible combinations. The
idiomatic expressions are simply those that are used, rather than some other ones that just didn't get
as popular at some stage in the development of the target language. So idiomatic expressions land
somewhere in the void between lexigraphy and syntax, where few authors venture because they can't
write exciting books about something that is thoroughly banal for any native speaker of the language in
question.
There are some areas where you do find books. For instance there are collections of proverbs for many
languages, but these are complete sentences which mostly are quoted in their entirety, and therefore
they really belong into the genre known as "bevingede ord" in Danish ('winged words', i.e. collections of
quotes). Slang is also an area favoured by language book authors, probably because these expressions
ofte are funny, rather drastic or downright dirty, and that makes such books entertaining even for the
natives.
I own a few books that purports to list idiomatic expression. For instance I have got a French
"Dictionnaire des expressions idiomatiques" (Livre de Poche). My problem with this book and its
companions in French or other languages is that I doubt that the expressions are used often enough to
warrant that you learn them by heart. How often will a French person say "se mettre dans le cornet"
(=eat)? I suppose that a native Frenchman will know them, but they are 'rare et prcieuses' if you
look at how often they really are used. But still worth knowing!
Another book by A. Bryson Gerrard "Beyond the dictionary in Spanish" is closely to the thing I am
looking for. It is in principle an ordinary Spanish-English dictionary, but with comparatively few words
that are explained in depth. For example "avisar, aviso" gets this commentary: "Unreliable; they only
mean 'to advise', and 'advice' in the sense of 'to inform', and even then imply warning. Avisar is the
normal verb for 'to warn', and aviso is the word for an official notice which lays down the law; no
question of giving advice. (etc etc....) 'To advise' in the sense of giving advice is aconsejar ('advice',
consejo) ...." (15 lines). You certainly need ordinary dictionaries too, but they should be accompanied
by such systematic in-depth guides to troublesome words and expressions.
But you can't expect to be spoonfed like this, and therefore you need to absorb the information from
your casul reading and TV and from natives you meet.A notebok for jotting down expressions is a
valuable tool, because just as with single words any normal person needs repeated exposure to
remember things. But don't waste your time on writing the meaning (as you can gather it from the
context), - mostly you remember it when you see the expression again, and if not then Google is your
best friend. Even more important is being alert to the way natives formulate their phrases, - and that
can only be at the expense of listening for content. You may come over as being absentminded if you do
this in a real conversation, because native persons expect you to listen for content, so it is probably
better done in other situations, but being on the outlook for useful expressions is a major factor in
getting better.
In the guide to learning grammar I mention something parallel. You are only top motivated to read
about something in a grammar when you have gotten frustrated by things you have met in genuine
texts, such as when you get curious about the use of "i" in Albanian because they seem to use it all over
the place, but sometimes it is absent in situations where you would have guessed that it would be
there. It is a little thing that is put after nouns to connect them with adjective or (more cinsitently) non-
adjectival compelementizers. OK, that's one thing that I would like to see explained in a systematic
fashion by someone who knows the language - and grammarians belong to that cathegory.
So be on the lookout for expressions that might be relevant for yourself, such as how to ask for an
icecream in Italian, and because alertness is a generalized attitude you will then also catch many other
useful expressions which you really weren't looking for.
EDIT: partly rewritten and moved from guide no. 1
Associations
One of the most contentious questions here has proved to be the one that words always should be
learned in context. In this part of the guide I'll try to give my 2 cents on this problem (but please don't
respond in the thread - I'll be happy to participate in discussions elsewhere).
Let's first consider the impact of the learner's level.
Many of the types of associations that I mention below are not easily available to a total newbie:
etymology, similar words in the target language, quotes from publicity and TV series etc. As a general
rule a newbie will have to base his/her 'memory hooks' primarily on things outside the target language,
- but this phase will of course be shorter with an easier language (which typically is a language that
closely ressembles one you already know).
First problem: how do you as a beginner discover the meaning of a word or word combination? Well,
somebody can point to a fourlegged animal and say "cheval". That's what French parents do, and after
100 repetitions (with different kinds of horses) their child has constructed a mental image of what a
"cheval" is. But if I'm learning French as an adult chances are that I will see the word in a textbook with
a wordlist, and if not, then I'll look the word up in a dictionary and get the information that a "cheval" is
a 'horse' (or in Danish: 'en hest'). When you already have learnt some very simple words you can use
them to learn less obvious words, as "ici" in "cheval ici". This is however not just a longterm training of
reflexes as postulated by the behaviourists, but rather an active construction process which you feed
with chunks of language, almost like you feed a child with cheeseburgers and carrots and chocolate.
When speaking about associations, which you can use as 'memory hooks' the simple imagery method is
the one that is closest to the way the word "cheval" was taught above. And one of the simple things you
can do as a language learner is to imagine the things you learn. So while memorizing the word "cheval"
then draw mental images of big horses, tiny horses and famous horses from paintings. With verbs like
"fight" or "eat" you can imagine small videoclips showing mighty battles or heavy eating, etc. The only
catch is that some persons seem to have problems making up those mental images.
Mental imaging is also possible if you make wordlists from dictionaries, and it might take out some of
the potential dreariness of that method. When you use dictionaries a simple trick is to 'see' the spelled
word at the same time you imagine (or actually say) how it sounds.
These uses of imagery resemble, but aren't quite the same thing as the use of puns to remember words
and expressions. A pun is not an image of the thing itself, but a joke based on its written or spoken
forme. Fanatic gives an example of this method http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=18830&PN=1&TPN=1#208127 - here :
"Cochon is pig in English. How do we remember that? Cochon sounds like cushion. We join the sound
alike, cushion, to the meaning, pig. I picture having small pigs on my lounge instead of cushions and I
tell my visitors, pull up a pig and take a seat. That reminds me of the meaning of cochon. It tells me
that cochon is French for pig."
As you see it is the outer shape of the word "cochon" that is used for the pun, which then incorporates
or is combined with the meaning in a base language (here English). I do believe that many people can
profit from this method, but personally I find it somewhat disruptive and cumbersome to have to invent
those irrelevant puns while studying a list of words. For me simple imagery has the same effect, but it is
worth trying both methods.
Another related technique is the use of limited contexts. I simply can't see the advantage of using long
sentences to remember single words or expressions, but remembering a short phrase is quite another
thing - though I personally prefer cutting it down to the bare basics that show the morphology without
'random' references, cfr. ex. 1,2 versus 3 below:
- se helt ny ud (look totally new)
- optrde som forsvarer i retten
(function as defender in court)
/ - gres til nogen/noget (make into somebody/something)
These examples are taken from H.C:Srensen's "Russisk Grammatik" (in Danish), and I actually
recently used the long lists in this book to memorize which verbs are associated with which cases. This
is of course a grammatical motivation, but such lists in grammars can also be used to learn single words
or expressions. As I said, the shorter the better, and I simply can't see any reason to use long quotes.
Long quotes - or rather the texts they come from - should be used to extensive reading, where you are
expected to know enough elements to grasp the meaning while you read or listen.
The associations can be taken from a base language, and the preeminent example of this are the of
course translations in a dictionary.. To grasp the meaning of 'complicated' words the beginner should not
try to learn all meanings or uses, but concentrate on one or two central meanings. Adding new
meanings and uses to a word you already know is much easier than learning a whole cloud of partly
related meanings.
In some memory systems you try to establish associations that follow a prelearned pattern, and this can
be used for fast memorization of long rows of data, - for instance packs of cards or numbers. But it is
hard to see any sensible use for this technique in ordinary language learning.
For the advanced language learner those memory tags that are based on target-language information
becomes more important, but also easier to use. I have pointed to the fact that wordlists function better
for a learner that already is at least intermediate and maybe more. One reason is of course that the
words you choose aren't really unknown - you may have seen them many times, but didn't remember
them. Another reason is that a given word or expression may remind you of other target language
words and expression - for instance through shared prefixes, etymology or similar meaning.
This is not very different from remembering a word through its translation(s) in a dictionary. Higher skill
level means that you can avoid references to other languages, but sometimes it pays to keep referring
to other languages, - for instance when you have to memorize the gender of French (an example used
in a http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=20409&PN=0&TPN=1 -
thread about "myths in Language learning"). Which just goes to show that any kind of memory hook is
allowed if it works.
There is one way of using other languages which may be somewhat unexpected: through my practical
work with wordlists I have recently found that one of the fastests and easiest ways of memorizing words
without any relation to known words is to put them instead of their translation in a sentence or phrase
in your own native language. The result may sound silly, but even this can be a help to your memory.
But this method has of course been used by others before me - see for instance http://how-to-learn-
any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=9173&PN=32 - this thread, where Slucido describes it
under the name "diglot weave".
Finally there is a whole world of situational associations: you can remember a word because you didn't
know what to say in a certain situation, or you may remember it because some special person used it.
But there are people who are much more dependent on human interaction during their language lerning
- and therefore probably also better to utilise it to provide memory hooks. I do know that I remember
words better when I use them, but that's about as close as I get to use situational hooks.
Pictoral dictionaries
Quote from http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=5307&PN=1&TPN=29
- Super-fast vocabulary learning techniques , Jan 9, 2012.
What about pictoral dictionaries? I own one old pictoral dictionary and have seen several others, and the
idea has been used sporadically in several of my 'normal' dictionaries - mostly the monolingual ones
which have secret, but unrealistic ambitions about becoming true encyclopedias.
So why use pictures in dictionaries? The use in monolingual dictionaries is logical because the
alternative would be a verbose explanation in the same language. There re two cases: pictures with one
motive and pictures that illustrate a 'semantic field'. For me there is no doubt that the latter can be
useful. For example you can show an old ship with sails, and you can point to each sail and give its
name. Even though you didn't know that those sails even had names you now learn both that they have
names and what thoe names are. Such a picture has the same value for a learner as a tematical
wordlist, and at least for those learners who remember pictures reasonably well they may be more
effective than a list with twenty words with explanations -
and they are certainly more effective than a list of twenty words without explanations. But in the
example you still don't know whether the terminology is general or restricted to ships of a given type or
from a certain period.
Now move this idea to a bilingual dictionary and assume that you give the name for each sail in both
languages (with a comment if the naming conventions in the two languages aren't parallel or if there
are restrictions on period and type of setting). In this way you fuse just about every kind of memory
hooks into one complex spurce, and that's just about everything a learner with a taste for images can
wish for.
What about pictures of just one thing? This is a completely different story. If you don't know the thing
on the picture it doesn't help you much. A multiword picture wouldn't help you either if you much if you
didn't already know the general setting, but if you could see for instance five different kinds of Greek
vases with a name for each one you would be able to distinguish them later. With just one vase you can
see that it is some kind of pottery, oh yeah, but you don't have a clue whether the word attached to the
picture is a general word for pottery or a specific word for for instance a big vase from Attica with two
handles. In the bilingual case yoou can at least be lucky to know the name in your own language, and
then you may be so extremely lucky that the foreign word covers the same set of uses - but you are
just as likely to misinterpret the picture unless there also is an explanation. For abstract notions an
explanation in words will normally be more effective (or maybe a film AND an explanation).
So in the monolingual case a picture with several concrete items can be useful, but it is a hit or miss
operation to show pictures with just one item. In the bilingual case both are useful because you have a
lifeline back to your base language in the form of a translation, but the multi-item picture is by
definition more useful because it allows for comparisons, subdivision of semantical fields and for filling
out lacunes in otherwise known semantical fields - even when these don't correspond exactly with the
organisation of the semantical field in your base language.
With pictures that don't show concrete things the usefulness is more than questionable. The old adage -
the one that claims that one picture say as much as 1000 words - may be caused by cases where the
picture left you totally perplex, and even 1000 words of babble couldn't hide that. Which is one reason
why systems like Rosetta Stoned fail - if you don't know exactly which element or interpretation you
should look for in a picture then it has utterly and completely failed its task. And the more abstract the
notion you want to illustrate is, the less likely it is that any picture can help you.
We have sometimes discused learner types, and one of the types that has been discussed is the 'visual'
learner. In the few tests I have seen described the researchers believed that this could be tested by
showing a learner a picture of something and saying a word (as an alternative to saying a word and
giving an verbal explanation or a translation). But then we are back in the case with one word and one
kind of Graecian Urn from above, which I characterized as less useful. It would be much better to test
the effectiveness of visual clues by showing five Greek vases and the corresponding words, as opposed
to five vases and five definitions in words. If you operate with one word one picture then it is in a totally
different situation, namely the one where a learner uses an image as a memory hook. But then the
learner should supply the image him/herself to make it work - and the funny thing then is that the
image doesn't even have to be a picture of the thing you want to remember, which no researcher to my
best knowledge has noticed. For instance you could remember the word "royaume" (Kingdom) in French
by using a picture of Siegfried and Roy with their tigers as your trigger, just to give one example. The
verbally oriented learner would prefer a reference to the English word "royal", maybe with an element
that pointed to the element "-aume" ('royal rhum'?)
PS: I wonder whether a pictorial Latin dictionary would use pictures full of Roman soldiers in full armour
or Medieval monks.
Iversen on 03 February 2012
Simple grammar and simple vocabulary
As mentioned earlier the most common words in a language make up a surprisingly large part of all
ordinary texts and speeches in that language, and many or most of these words are 'function words'
rather than 'meaning words'. Besides they are often irregular, and the result is that you more or less
automatically will work with these words when you study grammar. Among the function words you will
meet things like pronouns, conjunctions and prepositions, and it is obvious that you can't use the
language actively without learning these words.
The large majority of words beyond the most common ones will be regular, which means that they
follow some regular paradigm. You just have to know which one, which in itself can be a major task -
just think gender of German or French nouns!
And then there are an Oort's cloud of very rare or very specialized words, including leftovers from past
stages of the history of the language or dialect or slang words which only were used during a short
period or in some remote region.
So basically we can divide the words we have to learn into three groups:
1) The very common words, which may irregular and often are entangled in the basic workings of the
language. You can use wordlists to memorize relevant lists (for instance of prepositions that govern the
dative in German, though you can also learn such lists by chanting them - "aus, bei, mit , nach, von,
zu" still hangs in my ears forty years after I learned that list in school), but then do it in conjunction
with intensive studies of their morphology and syntax, not in a void and not just by reading or listening
- you nead to listen and read a lot to sort out even fairly simple paradigms, and that's silly when you
just could get the solution from a book.
One irritating (or maybe fascinating) feature of certain short and very common words is that they are
used in a number of ways, often to the extent that you have to count them as homonyms rather than
just words with a wide and fuzzy range of related meanings. OK, then treat them as homonyms - but
you would probably also see those different roles illustrated in your grammar.
The way to study the use of short and unremarkable words with very varied uses is to find or make up
with simple, standardized patterns which illustrate the different roles, and to explore them through their
role in syntax and the morphological tables that sum up their pecularities. The use of standardized
dummy words like the indefinite pronouns makes it easier to remember such patterns (at least that's
my experience), but you can't fit ten different constructions into a wordlist. So you stick to the one you
found in a concrete text or maybe mention one more from your dictionary if you find it interesting
enough, but that's OK - memorizing just one pattern here and now will make it much easier to learn
other variations later.
3) very rare words may have weird restrictions on their use (sometimes even morphological
restrictions), and maybe you don't even know the thing they denote in your own language. So the best
way to add such words to your vocabulary is to read specialized literature, and if you then meet them
you can note them down and check them in a dictionary. If you think it is worth the effort, that is... It
will often be enough to learn one single expression if that's the only context where you can risk finding
them. And the logical assumption will be that it will be the pattern you found the construction in a
genuine text.
2) And in between we have the thousands of words which you actually may meet in practice, which
have one central core meaning (OK, maybe two or three) and whose morphology follows some fairly
common pattern. So basically you just have to memorize which paradigm that is, then you are on safe
ground. For instance you could choose to memorize nouns with some element (article and/or an
adjective) which discloses the gender. In wordlists I often add simple graphical signs or single letters
because they take little space and it becomes really tedious to repeat "der,die,das" again and again. But
when I memorize I do hear "der,der,da"s in my mind. And to mark strong verbs in the Germanic
languages it is mostly enough just to write the vowel in the past tense, which by definition is different
from the one in the present forms.
The same thing could be said about the range of prepositions that follow English or Russian verbs, and
which in the latter to boot call for different cases (which also happens with verbs without prepositions).
The optimal solution would be always to mark at least the most common constructions in some concise
notation, but this is one advice which I haven't even put into practice in my own wordlists. An
alternative technique would be to make simple 'dummy' examples with pronouns - not long contrived
sentences, and certainly not long and contrived sentences by some famous author. You can do this in
wordlists, but then you have to use extremely wide columns or spend several rows on each word. The
simple, brutal and mostly sufficient solution is just to learn the most common or most characteristic or
most memorable variant and then leave the rest for future study. After all the purpose of wordlists isn't
to learn you everything about each and every word in the language, but just to reserve places for as
many of them as possible in your memory. Then you can add more information later.
(The following is a quote from the thread "Misuse of Prepositions", 09 August 2012
I would put misuse of prepositions and wrong gender or case in the same group of errors: they occur
because you learn a word without its morphology/wordrelated syntax, and you can run into this problem
whether or not you use structured vocabulary methods or simply rely on lots of input.
Ahem. Shouldn't lots of input teach you how to learn a word correctly? Yes, in the long run you will
develop some sixth sense for what you can say and what you can't. But prepositions (especially with
phrasal verbs) and articles and case endings are fairly anonymous so you can read and listen for hours
on end and get the general meaning from the content words alone without even noticing all those small
pesky words and word fragments. So some kind of systematic approach is definitely useful.
The problem is that you also can commit the error of making wordlists and Anki cards just with
interesting 'content' words, and then you don't learn anything about the morphology or word-bound
syntax of those words. The solution is of course to indicate the most important things in a concise way
and learn them with the main words. Trying to add them later isn't nearly as efficient.
In the case of gender or paradigm where one a simple rule can give you sufficient information the rule
is: learn that simple rule as soon as possible, for instance by making a short example list for it, which
both will teach you the rule and some new words.
If there isn't a simple rule you have to make annotations in your wordlists or on your anki cards, but
this task can be simplified: if one category is much more numerous than the other(s) then just make
annotations at the words from the rarest category (or the rarest categories if there are more than one).
For instance most words in German are masculine so just mark the feminines and the neutra (and don't
ever mark "-chen" -words because they are always neutrum). I use simple gender graphical signs, but
during the memorization I read these as der, die ,das.
Another example is the aorist of Greek verbs. When you have seen enough aorists you just need a hint
to guess the correct form, and therefore I just note down one single consonant in my wordlists. Actually
I also ought to indicate the past passive form and the last vowel in the ending for verbs with the accent
on the final omega of the 1 person singular active form, which is the one used in dictionaries. But that
would be too much even on a good day, so I normally just write the aorist consonant, and only if it is
another than the one I expected at my current level of knowledge).
And finally: I always write the accent in my Russian wordlists precisely because it isn't written in normal
texts. Maybe I could develop a sixth sense for stress in Russian words by listening to enough spoken
Russian, but it would take a long time and I don't hear nearly enough Russian to make the miracle
happen within my lifetime.
So the rule is: make the absolute minimum of annotations in your wordlists or on your anki cards - and
leave matters there.
Then what about example phrases? Personally I have a memory that doesn't support long winding
phrases, but it can just about deal with short phrases with a dummy word: "go for something" - "go
somewhere" - "go down/up" - "go to Hell" (OK, the last one is an exception, but it can be used because
I see and hear it fairly often). So if I want to remember the prepositions of phrasals verbs I may
indicate one or two prepositions in my wordlists, but never more than that. Rome wasn't built in one
day, and neither was my English (or Latin) vocabulary.
Contexts are good, but you can't always get the necessary unequivocal information from them. So
seeing a word in a genuine text helps me to remember it, but I may still have to use a dictionary see
how it is inflected. Besides you basically need to understand all the elements of a long expression to
remember it, unless you are endowed with something I haven't got. If I wanted to learn the word
"sling" in a context I would start out with "slings and arrows" and postpone "Whether 'tis nobler in the
mind to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep; No more; " as a certain venerated bard wrote in Hamlet.
Some people like to learn things by heart, and god bless them, but don't expect me to follow in their
footsteps.
Iversen on 08 August 2012
More about idiomatic expressions
It is obvious that conversational skills depends on a reservoir of common idiomatic expressions as much
as on sheer vocabulary size, and among those who have written about this theme and even made
Youtube videos about it I think Splog deserves a honourable mention. For I time I thought that the word
"chunks" referred to the kind of small, but indispensable expressions which he describes, but then I was
told that it has a slightly more fuzzy meaning. However inside my head I still think "chunk" = "some
simple expression or construction I definitely should learn here and now". And that's how I'll use the
word below.
But there are also expressions which may add colour to your speech, and which you definitely should
learn at least passively - but you can survive without them, and if they are slightly outdated it may not
even be a good idea to use them.
The first category can to some extent be found in language guides, but else you should simply take the
expression you use in your native speech to keep a conversation flowing and find some parallel to them
- maybe using a dictionary, but if you read literature with a lot of informal speech you may also make a
collection from the things you see there.
The second category can for some languages be found on certain homepages or in books like the 'big
red book of Spanish idioms' which I sometimes read for fun. However I have tried a couple of times to
check the frequency of such expressions through Google, and it turns out that the spread is immense -
some expressions are hardly ever used, and others are fairly frequent. And even though such books
often mark certain expressions as antiquated you cannot assume that expressions without annotations
are common in practice.
The first category does in a sense continue the fundamental parts of syntax, where you find pronouns
and conjunctions and things like that. And the chapters on adverbials and exclamations definitely point
in the direction of 'chunk' idiomatics. The difference is that the systematics of these expressions should
be more along the lines of logic and conversational flow than structure. So you will meet things like the
Romanian "iar" which is somewhere between "and" and "but", you will need expressions for different
degrees of scepticism, and you should know how to express things like 'because', which in French would
mean that you should know the difference beqteen "parce que" and "puisque" (and "car", to boot). All
these things can in my opinion best be studied by staying alert while reading and lstening AND doing
the things you would do while studying grammar, i.e. making a systematic collection, thinking about
general principles and writing down your concluisions in some concise form - maybe even on the same
green paper which I have recommended for morphological tables.
On the other hand the 'pittoresque' idiomatic expressions should in principle be learned like the bulk of
your words - but that can't be done. Even if you make wordlists with very wide columns it wouldn't be
the same thing as learning single or compund words. I have tried different techniques, some of which
deal with with the memorization process. The one thing I find absolutely necessary is that you always
should be aware of the literal meaning of the words in an expression. It is not only easier to remember
a series of words if you know their individual meanings, but you also learn something about the way of
thinking of the native speakers. For instance "tre dans les choux" in French is translated by
reverso.net as "be in a mess, be screwed-up" - but in the French version there is neither screw nor
mess. "Chou" is simply cabbage, and seeing somebody sitting in a pond of rotting cabbage is both
memorable and indicative of the hopeless situation of that person. So always go for the literal meaning
in addition the general sense which you might try to convey through some supposedly parallel
expression in your own langage.
One problem with expressions is to remember a good parallel to find a suitable expression for
something you know how to say in your native or another. Dictionaries can sometimes help you, and the
kind of expression collections in bookform or on the internet I referred to for Spanish can too. But
personally I still crave some kind of systematic way to memorize such things systematically (as a
supplement to picking them up haphazardly while reading or listening to genuine sources). I have come
to the conclusion that the wordlist method needs one simple element more to be relevant for the
memorization of idioms, and that is the notion of 'keyword'.
If I want to express something in for instance Spanish and I know a good English expression, then I
can in principle grab my 'big red book' and look an English keyword up, and then I see a number
of English expressions and some (more or less close) renderings in Spanish. Inversely, if I want to
memorize a nice expression in Spanish - which I may have found in a magazine or by listening to TVE -
then I should jot it down and if necessary look it up. But on top of that I should choose one keyword in
the 'translation' (or rendering) which can function as my memory hook later. It is also good to
remember the foreign expression through one of its main words, but while working in the foreign
language it is easy to forget that you may need something in your own language to nudge you in the
right direction when you are standing somewhere on a street corner frantically trying to remember a
certain expression. For instance the Spaniards can say "No se gan Zamora en una hora" where
Anglophones say "Rome wasn't built in one day". OK, by all means do remember the Spanish expression
by the town name "Zamora", but you should also stick the Anglophone label "Rome" to the box where
you store the Spanish expression. Because chances are that you will remember "Rome was not.." long
before "no se gan Zamora.." pops up in your memory, and then it would be nice if "Rome" could be
used to trigger "Zamora".
Iversen on 13 August 2012
How many times should you repeat your word lists?
my log file , May 28 2013
Question from Sterogyl: How many times do you repeat your word lists? Twice and then hop, la
poubelle? Or do you store them and repeat them from time to time?
Answer: I make one repetition round, normally one day after thee first three columns have been
written. But there are exceptions. I have recently made a run through the Greek alphabet during my
holiday in Cuba in January (finished a few weeks after), and then I have done a similar marathon
through the Russian alphabet during my trip this month between Venice and Budapest, and I finished it
just before Budaest (where I hardly used my limited active Russian). With such general perousals the
goal is to get a brushup on the whole vocabulary of a language, and the extent will be around 4-5000
words. It would break my neck to do repetition rounds here, but every Russian or Greek wordlist I make
from now on will be a repetition of some part of the general one.
The normal procedure with wordlists based on dictionaries is to reserve 2x2 columns on the same sheet
for repetitions, and those should - as I said - be done one day after the first round. If they are done the
same day you haven't forgotten the words well enough (notice the irony, but I mean it), and if it takes
too long you could just as well find some other words to study.
With wordlists based on manual textcopies I can do the same thing, but I have come to favour anther
method: I go back to the original textcopy with its annotations in the right margen. Now I should be
able to read the text and understand everything, and I can check with the annotations whether I have
learned the words that gave me trouble in the first place. I can't say whether this is as efficient as a
'normal' repetition, but it helps my reading skills which the column based method doesn't.
I don't throw the finished wordlists away right away. I put them into a heap, and then I throw them
away later, but in the meantime I may have a peek at some old wordlists to get my memory refreshed.
However this isn't a regular part of my routine - after the first couple of days I like to look at some
other words, and then my regular extensive reading will be responsible for keeping my passive
vocabulary in shape.
The wordlist method in itself has some inbuilt repetitions: one from the original source to column 1 (in
the foreign language), and then two within a few minutes. And then there is the repetition round one
day later as described above. There may be a third and even fourth round , but they are not obligatory
and mostly rather cursory.
In contrast the SRS methods have potentially an unlimited number of repetitions of each word, spaced
over maybe several months. However each repetition is done as a control question without previous
exposure. Whether this is more efficient than control shortly after an exposure is a moot point, but it is
certainly more difficult. I can see a point in combining the two methods. The wordlist method is like a
short intensive course, but hasn't got a longterm component. The SRS methods haven't got a short time
component, but they make sure that your words don't disappear below the event horizon into a black
hole before you have learnt them (although the words may still be forgotten once you have 'proved' that
you know them because then the inquisitive questions stop). The problem is to transfer words from a
handwriten wordlist to an electronical system - maybe they can be transferred as graphics, but not to
Anki.
For my own part I accept that words learnt through wordlists have to live as they best can after the two,
maybe three rounds. If I see them often enough in my general reading (or hear them in my more
limited oral exposure) then they will survive, and any casual exposure will serve as a reminder. If I
never see them again then the harm done probably is limited.
THIS IS END OF THE FOURTH PART OF THIS GUIDE .
translations)
grammar studies)
************************************************************
on your own.
Posted By: Iversen
Date Posted: 17 September 2009 at 12:34am
This thread is part of a series of guides to langage learning, and no. 1 thread in this series is found
The necessary caveats can also be seen there.
Listening and understanding NOTHING:
A quote from the thread http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=11744&PN=33&TPN=2 - Listening and understanding NOTHING , 25 August 2008:
I see two strategies for the beginner. The first is using comprehensible input from the beginning, and in
the very beginning that means single words or very short expressions in short conversations - such as
those of a tourist who can't speak a certain language, but who learns how to say "beer", "no thanks",
"where is the toilet (ladies/gentlemen)", "go away" and "I want your money" from the local people. The
second is using listening-reading techniques where the use of translations and spoken words together
gives you the opportunity to sort of understand some genuine utterances which are objectively seen
above your level. Listening to somebody speaking an unknown language is not totally idiotic if you have
an idea about the content from a written translation because you can to some extent pinpoint where
you are in the text based on loanwords, intonation and other factors.
When you have absorbed the 'sound' of the language to the extent that you can pronounce the words
you may think that the next step would be to understand the meaning of what is being said. But no, the
next step in understanding a foreign language in its spoken form is to be able to parse the stream of
words into single words and grammatical structures, and while you are training that you don't have time
to ransack your memory for the meaning of words or idiomatic expressions. You have to know
something about the pronunciation and know at least the most common words to perform this task so it
is not for the absolute beginner, but you can do it before you understand the meaning in detail. Some
day - if you keep up your efforts to learn new words and expressions using whatever techniques you
prefer - the meaning will suddenly pop up into your mind without any particular effort. In other words -
learning how to parse spoken words and and learning words/expressions should not be seen as one
task, but as two, that will eventually merge.
With written texts the situation is easier because you can read at your own pace. You can do intensive
reading where the goal is to understand every word or expression and every grammatical feature,
morphological as well as syntactically, and you can gradually introduce extensive reading where you
don't let minor problems of understanding deter you from hammering through the text. The smart thing
to do in the beginning has for me been to do literal translations, if necessary with the help of bilingual
texts, followed by intensive reading where I just skip writing down the transation but demand the same
level of understanding. If I have worked my way through a text in this way (using the unknown words in
word lists) then that text will be useable for extensive reading until I get to the level where I can
directly attack new genuine texts. In this way I can avoid having a teacher speak baby talk to me which
is one thing in this world which I absolutely can't stand.
Replies:
"Listening like a bloodhound follows a trail"
Quoting http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=16380&TPN=2 -
Additional listening practice? , 18 August 2009:
Let me understand this: you can pick out every syllable, but they don't combine into words? Not even if
you actually know the words?
When I ask this it is because one reason for being unable to understand spoken words from f.eks. TV is
that people are obsessed with understanding what is being said, when the basic problem may be that
they can't even parse the stream of sounds. Parsing is precisely the process of dividing the stream of
sounds into syllables and words on the fly, and to understand this you must be able to perform the
operation automatically. If you try to understand everything at this stage then each unknown word will
block you, and you will loose the next couple of sentences. Therefore 'listening like a bloodhound follows
a trail' can sometimes be a help, even though it goes right against all the other good advice about
listening to films, music etc.
However this only applies if your parsing isn't automatic, and therefore it is a problem that you say that
you can catch the syllables, but not the words on the fly. But even in this situation it might be worth
trying to separate the words without bothering about the meaning (even though this sounds crazy to
many people). If you in fact can do this operation without problems then at least one possible cause for
your problems can be eliminated.
Quoting http://www.how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.a sp?TID=9627&PN=0&TPN=3
- Passive Listening , 31 March 2008 at 12:35pm:
You can listen for meaning if you understand enough of the language, or you can just have something
running in the background, which is the truly passive kind of listening. Then there is the L-R listenning
where you try to follow a translation with the help of clues in the form of international words and proper
names, combined with clues in the intonation (of course you can also use a transcript, but personally I
prefer using a translation in this situation).
And as the last form you can do active listening even with languages that you can't understand yet,
provided that you know the written form. Here you deliberately don't care at all about the meaning, but
try to parse the stream of sounds into sentences and words, following the speaker 'like a bloodhound on
a trail'. As your vocabulary grows and you become adept at reading the language, you will discover that
the meaning of the spoken form suddenly becomes crystal clear even though you haven't tried to
understand it.
When I have done this I have sometimes seen a string of grey words running across my inner field of
vision, though blurred so that only the shape of the words is seen. At other times I just listen for the
borderlines between words, phrases and sentences. In both cases you should focus on changes in
intonation, pauses, words you have heard before and common endings and affixes, which means that all
those things will seep into your mind. Then some day the meaning appears, and you will have learnt to
understand that language without passing through the perilous stage of translation.
Phonetics - how to learn the sounds of a language
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=7536&PN=6 - Phonetics and
language learning? , 08 October 2007:
I think that several members have recommended that budding polyglots get a solid foundation in
phonetics. I have personally made the recommandation several times that the sounds of a certain
languages should not be learnt by comparing them to sounds in other languages, but rather by placing
them in a theoretical framework based on the shape of the mouth. In many books about phonetics you
find a polygon that illustrates a 'wowel space' based on oppositions like back-front and open-closed
(with a second polygon for the nasal vowels). Simple vowels can be identified with one dot in such a
figure, while diphtongs can be identified with a short line from one position to another. The consonants
have rarely been described in the same succinct way, probably because there are all kinds of tongue
shapes, flaps and pressure points to take in account. However I tend to think in such graphical terms
when I compare different languages, rather in the traditional terms like apical, velar, spirant, fricative
and so forth. Back in the seventies I learnt all the words needed to describe the French language, and I
still remember most of the terms, but I don't use them, and they don't help me to remember how to
make a certain sound in a new language.
(end of quote)
The vowel polygon I'm speaking about is shown in the article of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vowel -
Wikipedia , but it should be mentioned that there really are two polygons, one for the ordinary vowels
and a parallel one for the nasal vowels. If you want to compare the sounds of two languages or dialects,
then you can show their position in such a table - diphtongs will then be arrows going from one from to
another in the polygon. As a supplement to recordings of the sounds in question this will pinpoint
exactly not only the sounds, but also how they are produced.
What I would like to see are similar graphics showing schematized mouthpositions for subgroups among
the consonants. I deliberately say subgroups because I think that a table showing all consonants at
once would be too complicated for comfort. However it might be worth showing exactly where and how
for instance the French and German r-sounds are produced, - this forum has lots of threads where
people lament about their problems with these sounds. And frankly I don't see how you can learn the
produce them just by listening (because the action happens within a closed mouth), - but a combination
of exact articulatory directions and recorded sounds would be an excellent help. A scientific description
with the usual terminology is irrelevant unless you already know the reality behind the words: nasals,
plosives, fricatives etc. - pure 'flatus vocis' until you already know the sounds. And the same can be said
about sound-alphabets like IPA: you can't learn the sounds from either the terminology or IPA, those
things are meant to organize knowledge you already have from other sources.
So in purely practical terms, what should you do when you se a textbook or language guide define the
sounds of a language in this way (with inserted dots to keep the columns tidy)::
Phonetic
transcription Pronunciation . . Notes
. . . . . . as in cat
ah . . . . . . as in father
ai . . . . . . as in hair
(....)
r . . . . . . as in her . . . . No exact equivalent in English. Round the lips as if to say oh but say ah
etc. etc. (quoted from "Say it in Danish", Dover Publications)
What happens here is that the authors don't dare use IPA because it is a simple language guide. Instead
they introduce their own phonetic alphabet for use exclusively in this book. And no, I won't criticize that
decision, - many language guides etc. function on this principle. But as the user of such a book who
might want to learn how to pronounce Danish this is of course not enough. As a minimum you should
listen to some of the words that contain each of the sound signs, and the easiest place to do this is in
the absence of a teacher is definitely a textbook system with a CD or tape. Some sites on the internet
offer recordings of single sounds, but even though this sounds smart it doesn't function in practice -
sounds simply don't sound the same when pronounced in isolatiion, you need to hear them in complete
words.
There is another system, which was much more common earlier, namely a list of the letters of the
letters with pronunciation directives:
Symbol English Indo.letter/ex. Translitteration
a . . . . .park . . . a . lagu . . . . . la-goo
ai . . .. .aisle . . . ai . ramai . . . . ra-mai
e . . . . .bed . . . e . . helm . . . . helm
This is nearest I can come to a rendering of the start of a list taken from the Lonely Planet Phrasebook
for Indonesian, and the only reason that this doesn't go terribly wrong is that the writing system of
Bahasa has an extremely regular orthography with an almost perfect 1-to-1 correspondance between
letters and phonemes. Phonemes are roughly speaking the equivalent of letters, but in the spoken
language, and you distinguish two phonemes on the basis that there is at least one sequence where
exchanging one sound with another results in a difference of meaning. In other words: each phoneme
covers a range of actual sounds. So a good orthography is one where the letters and the phonemes
match. And it is no secret that one of the most rotten orthographies on this planet is the English one,
which forces learners of English more or less to learn the pronunciation with each new word.
But even in this sad case you need to know exactly what the phonetical transliterations in your
dictionary mean, and this will be practically impossible without listening to words while comparing the
sound with the transcribed version.
I probably don't need to stress that English can be learnt without reference to writing - millions of kids
have done it - and let me add that the English sound system in itself isn't particularly messy. In
fact English would be easier to learn if it was written in IPA. But this is not going to happen, and
therefore it serves no purpose to speculate about learning English from books written in IPA - they
don't exist.
Prosody etc.
Now I ought to write something about tones, but I leave that to the specialists. However there are other
more or less localised elements in speech which you have to learn. Vowels (and sometimes consonants)
can be long or short, and syllables can be more or less stressed. I remember that while I was trying to
learn Modern Greek I had a simple rule of thumb: the stress must lie on one of the three last syllables
in any word, and a always guessed at the wrong one - so it had to be one of the other two. Since then I
have developed a modicum of knowledge about stress in Greek words, so now I sometimes guess at the
right syllable (with the paradoxical result that the true stress now can be of any of the three last
syllables). Well, at least the Greeks write accents in all words with more than one syllable, and since the
latest orthography reform they have even reduced their repertoire of accent signs to one and thrown
out some aspiration markers that had lost any shred of justification in the modern language.
Not so in Russian: here the accent can be anywhere, and it has a tendency to move around even in the
forms of a single word. Ultimately you have to listen to a lot of Russian to get a feeling for the correct
placement of the stress, but luckily good dictionaries mark the stress (and the really good ones even
indicate whether a concrete word is one of those that have a moving accent); this means that you can
mark the stress in your wordlists (or flashcard etc.) and learn it that way. There are also pedagogical
editions of some books where the accents are included, even though this isn't the normal way of doing
things in Russian. Be happy if you can find one of those.
Btw. in many European languages differences in stress can lead to differences in meaning, so either
should stress in itself be seen as a phoneme, or stressed versus unstressed vowels are different
phonemes. This problem is almost always ignored in the phoneme lists that you see in books and on the
net. The same applies to for instance the glottal stop, which occurs as the 'std' (literally 'push') in
Danish. It is never written (unlike Arabic, where there is a letter for it), but can separate words with
different meanings, - so it effectively is a phoneme in Danish. But it is rarely mentioned.
Stress on a broader scale is called prosody, and our Nordic brethren the Swedes and Norwegians are
notorious for the active use they have of their prosodies -to the extent that some regard their languages
as tone languages, which probably is to go a bit too far. How do you learn these intonation patterns?
Not by listening strictly for meaning, but rather for the 'melody' in specific sentences. If you can get a
transcript of for instance some Swedish sentences, then try to draw the melody line through each
sentence as a line above the text, - and try to figure out what the typical patterns are. I have yet to see
a just minimally useful description of these things, so you probably have to make the empirical research
yourself if you want to get a truly Swedish intonation. Or rely on shadowing and similar techniques,
where you supposedly can absorb the relevant patterns without ever involving your conscious mind.
SHADOWING
It would be absurd to discuss listening on this forum without taking ProfArguelles' Shadowing method
into consideration. Among the first references to it is this one:
Quote from a post by ProfArguelles from the very old thread http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=410&KW=shadowing - Shadowing vs Echoing , 18 April
2005:
Let us define:
Echoing = listen, then repeat
Shadowing = listen and repeat simultaneously
I believe that echoing can be an invaluable technique when you are working one on one with a
phonetician who can correct your pronunciation and intonation. However, when you are working on your
own, you really have no way of determining the accuracy of your rendition. When you shadow through
earphones, however, you should at least instinctively and immediately perceive when you are "flat," and
with constant repetition of the same material, you will begin to automatically compensate by modifying
your pronunciation.
(end of quote)
Three years (10 March 2008) later he made a video, and in the introduction to this on the forum he
wrote these lines (from the thread http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=9492&PN=0&TPN=1 - Shadowing demonstration video :
In order to shadow most effectively, it is important to observe three points:
1. Walk outdoors as swiftly as possible.
2. Maintain perfectly upright posture.
3. Articulate thoroughly in a loud, clear voice.
(....)
In the video, you see me initially shadowing without looking at a book, then while looking at one. You
will want to shadow without a book when you are in the very initial stages of language study, focusing
on phonetics only (= !blind shadowing! ), before you study any individual lesson, and then again
finally after you have worked through your lessons thoroughly.
(end of quote)
In one of his videos on accent formation he explicitely states that shadowing gives much better results
than echoing. Nevertheless echoing is the technique that is used not only in classrooms, but also in the
kind of language labs I remember from my study years - and I doubt that they have changed.
Unfortunately 'shadowing' is one of the methods which I haven't found congenial to my mentality and
habits. In the thread http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=9033&TPN=3&KW=shadowing+Iversen - How does shadowing improve fluency? I wrote this (10
November 2008):
(I have) tried out the shadowing method as described here (except that I didn't walk), but it didn't
function for me. However there is a reason for this, namely that when I speak mostly hear my own talk
and all the details in what is said from outside get lost in the process. Besides I find it very tiring to try
to compete with somebody else, even if it is a recorded voice (or maybe that is even part of the
problem, because it just keeps going and going). This problem is probably something that could be
eliminated through hours of training, but right now I haven't got time. Instead I have concluded that I
have to do two things instead of one, namely shadow-THINKING and reading aloud, partly things I have
heard, but mostly things I only have in their written form.
Reading aloud is necessary because it takes stamina and practice to pronounce all those foreign sounds
(even if I have a pretty idea about what I'm aiming for I still have to be able to do it). So I'll just have
to leave some time for that, - and for talking to myself, which I can do when I'm walking to the bus or
alone at at home. It is a fairly mechanical function, not something with deep theoretical ramifications.
However shadowing silently is more congenial to the way I function. It struck me that I have described
something similar in another context (namely how to learn to understand without translating mentally):
I then described this kind of listening as 'following the speaker like a bloodhound follows a trail', i.e.
without deliberately trying to understand what is said, but just parsing it into words and sentences and
hoping for the epiphany moment where the meaning seemingly just appear out of the blue. In reality
this moment only comes when you already know quite a lot of the language, and for me it certainly
won't occur until long after I had learnt to read fluently. But this concerns only the meaning aspect, - to
me the basic activity of listening, parsing and and even 'writing' the words on some kind of mental
subtitle line does seem to have something in common with shadowing, except that you have to open
your mouth to shadow.
For those who can speak and listen carefully at the same time shadowing may be a very efficient
technique, but I feel that I get a better result when I separate the actual talking from the listening
process. And I can think for much longer than I can speak without getting tired.
To know NOTHING but still understand something:
If you read or listen to something in a dialect or language that is closely related to something you
already know then you will often be able to understand it. THe reason for this is that most words are the
same in the two languages, just with some differences that reflect the different sound developments in
each language. The historic linguists of the 18th century worked out long lists over the systematic
changes of different sounds in different surroundings that led to the modern languagesd, and by rolling
backwards through these changes and comparing different languages they have even been able to
propose something called http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proto-Indo-European_language - Proto-
Indoeuropean , - and it was apparently very different from the modern languages on several points. But
the relevant thing here and now is not how people spoke many thousand years ago, but the fact that
the changes have led to parallel sound systems, so that you just have to find out which sound
transformations lead from one language or dialect to its neighbour.
Lets for instance take High and Low German. They really separated from a common stem during the
socalled http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_German_consonant _shift - second Germanic consonant shift
, which for instance changed p into ff or pf, depending on the context, - there is a long list of similar
changes which have been traced back to this event. Add to that some changes in the vowels, that for
instance changed long u into au, and then it is suddenly not surprising that the following sentence from
"Geiht das ok 'n beten fixer?" of Ines Barber ...
Suurkruut schmeckt opwarmt erst richtig goot.
... looks like this in standard High German:
Sauerkraut schmeckt aufgewrmt erst richtig gut.
When the systematic side to sound shifts was discovered the lingvists hoped that all differences
between the sound systems could be explained through series of shifts, which could be put in
chronological order for each and every dialect or dialect. The world turned out to be more complicated
than that, but finding the resulting systematic differences is still the basis for understanding any foreign
speak through something that ressembles it. But notice also the word "richtig" which is the same in
both languages. I am fairly sure that the original form - if it existed - in Low German must have been
something like *"riktig" (similar to "rigtig" with a hard first 'g' in Danish), because 'ch' in High German is
another typical result of the second consonant shift. Such loanwords will of course not adhere to the
normal transformation rules. Notice also the missing "ge" in Low German. Unlike both Dutch and High
German this prefix isn't used in Low German, - and on this point it ressembles the Nordic languages.
The reasons for this are not relevant for the ordinary language learner, - just notice that things are like
they are.
If you have learnt a number of simple conversion rules, some tips about grammar and some of the
more conspicuous false friends, then you are ready to read and understand Low German
('Plattdeutsch'), and that is probably more than you can expect of most people from the Northern part
of Germany, especially among the younger generation. You can discover much of this without really
doing any formal studies, but to learn to use Platt actively you should de the same things as you would
do to learn any other language. The good news is that each phase will be shorter.
Now let's consider a slightly more distant relative, - Albanian. Here the conversion rules aren't simple at
all, so you have to use other methods. I recently visited the country and there I bought some bilingual
guidebooks to Albanian towns. Below I quote a passage and its translation into English (slightly
'hyperliteralized' by me, - and first used in my http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=12983&PN=0&TPN=161 - profile thread ):
Pozite gjeografike
Position geographical
Rrethi i Kors shrtihet n psn Juglindore t Shquipris, n Krahinn Malore
Qndrore.
District of Kora* lies in [Eastern South]** of Albania, in region-mountain(eous) Central

Prfshin tre qytete: Kora, qendr e rrethit, Bilishti e Maliqi dhe 27 komuna.
(it) contains three towns: Kora, center of district, Bilishti + Maliqi and 27 communes.
Qyteti i Kors sht nj nga qytet kryesore t Shqipris.
TownThe of Kora is on of (from) town(S) mostimportant of Albania.
* the name of the town is Kor, the -a is a postclitic definite article, which is used here because
that's what you do to feminine town names in Albanian, - and is a schwa sound, mostly silent in the
final position of a word
*** deliberately erroneous translation by me - see below
You can probably already now see the parallels between the two versions, helped by the geographical
names which are easily recognisable. If you want to find texts which almost can be understood alone
from their loanwords then don't look for common babble or serious literature, - check out scientific or
historical or geographical magazines, because it is here you have the highest proportion of loanwords,
and with an unknown language you need those to grasp the structure of the foreign sentences. And
often this will be enough to let you guess at the general meaning of the foreign texts, - in particular if
you have got some context (such as you have when you are looking at a thing in a museum and there is
a label telling you what it is called in Albanian).
With a bilingual text you can almost start building your own dictionary: "Pozite" = 'position' (noun),
"gjeografike" = 'geographical', "rrethi" = 'district' etc. etc. I have assumed that "juglindore" meant
South (because it ressembles "jug" in Serbian, which means 'South') and "psn" would then have to
be "Eastern", - but the capital letter in just one of the two words was confusing. I therefore took a peek
in a dictionary I bought in Kosovo last year and the thruth was revealed: "Juglindore" alone means
"Southeastern" and "psn" means 'five' (which doesn't appear in the English translation). So I had
nearly misunderstood the word "psn" - but the dictionary saved me.
This example suggests that Albanian sentences aren't totally incomprehensible if you have some
loanwords and proper names to start with. You can guess the meaning of other words ("i" = 'and', "n"
= 'in' etc.), and by simple logical thinking and some guesswork you can soon extend your knowledge of
Albanian, and you can even begin to dream about reading extremely hardcore stuff, such as books for
youngsters and silly gossip magazines.
However I also tried the same technique on the bilingual inflight magazine of Maleev, and I soon had to
realize that Hungarian isn't nearly as close to English as Albanian apparently is, - but after looking up
most of the words I'm still fairly sure that you could learn much about Hungarian by comparing the
Hungarian and the English versions of a simple airline magazine.
I have since my Albanian/Hungarian experience tried the same technique on TV-programmes.I have for
instance watched a program in Finnish at TV1 (Swedish TV), i.e. with Swedish subtitles whenever a Finn
spoke and in Finnish whenever a (Finland)Swedish spoke, i.e. a member of the Swedish speaking
minority in Suomi. I don't speak Finnish (yet), but I have recently read the Kauderwlsch guide to
Finnish. So I didn't try to understand what the Finns said, but I set myself a much more limited goal:
trying to catch some words here and there and determining whether the words in Finnish seemed to
follow in roughly the same order as those in the Swedish subtitles. And it was not totally impossible to
do this: for instance there was a passage about "the next trends", and almost at the same time I heard
something like "kommia hottia" (as usual with stress on the first syllable and long double consonants). I
could also recognize some numbers and placenames and the word "ruotsi" (Sweden or Swedish).
OK, would I be able to learn Finnish by listening to TV programs? My guess is that it would take forever,
and I would end up speaking Finnish like a Spanish donkey. But as a preparation for learning to
understand spoken Finnish it would function very well (mycket br!), and you could probably also pick
up some of the language melody and individual sounds with your right brain hemisphere while trying to
find recognizable words with the left one.
Speed reading
Speed reading is not one single technique, but several tricks that all have one goal: to bring up a
person's reading speed without sacrificing (too much of the) comprehension. There are many places
where you can read about it, so I'll just give a few examples: a
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_reading - Wikipedia article, http://www.learning-
tech.co.uk/Reading%20Tutorial%201.html - a tutorial , http://english.glendale.cc.ca.us/methods.html -
a method list . There are even offers of commercial courses in speed reading, but it is not really
something that you need to pay for.
It should not be confused with skimming, where you deliberately skip irrelevant information. However
when done properly it does ressemble extensive reading, which I described in the first part of this guide
as follows: "The other kind of reading is the extensive reading. Here the goal is not to understand
everything, but to acquire a kind of momentum while reading, and to get through as much genuine stuff
as possible."
Many of the tricks that are used for speed reading can also be used with extensive reading, but the goal
is different: speed reading is done exclusively to absorb the content, and the formulation of that content
is just something like a necessary evil - and the phonetic side of the text is even seen as an
unnecessary evil (that's why you are urged to suppress subvocalization while speed reading). However
in extensive reading you should of course find something interesting to read, but your focus should be
on understanding the general meaning of the text WHILE sucking up the way it is written. If you can't
keep up the momentum then the text is too difficult; you can then either find something easier or
prepare yourself by looking up some words before and or reading through a translation and then trying
once more. But it is the steady, but not excessively fast pace that defines extensive reading.
So what role does true speed reading have in language learning?
(the following section quoted verbatim from http://how-to-learn-any-
language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=17190&PN=1&TPN=1#186217 - Speed Reading for faster
learning? , 30 September 2009)
If you read something to find something specific then you can of course do speed reading, but if your
goal is to learn a language then it is just about the most silly thing you can do. The principle behind
speed reading is to pick out just enough of the text to be able to piece together the meaning, - and you
should certainly not start looking at the formal side of the text. In other words you skip exactly those
elements in the text that are relevant for a language learner.
Reading for general content is another matter, and I have done my share of that. The most extreme
case was probably when I was writing my final dissertation at the university about a grammatical topic.
If I needed an illustration of a certain phenomenon and I didn't have a suitable example in my notes
then I would look through book after book, turning the pages at a rate at about one page per 2-3
seconds, first looking at the right side pages, then the left side pages. But this (skimming) has nothing
to do with language learning, and I didn't even notice the content(so it was not even speed reading) .
The fastest true 'pseudoreading' I have done was done while I studied literature and came unprepared
for a lesson where I should have read a whole book (it happened fairly often as my interest in literature
was waning already during my study years). In this situation you can actually zip through a few
hundred pages of a standard paperback novel in 15-20 minutes, catching some of the plot, noting down
some pages where there are things that probably will be discussed, getting a sense of the writing style
in general and so on. This was actually enough to be able to participate in the discussion even at a
university level course, and paradoxically I still remember some of the content of books I have peroused
in this way. But it is clearly not enough to really learn anything new, and certainly not to learn anything
of the language because you already have to know it well to speed-read like that.
Speed reading has its uses, but not in language learning.
(revised quote from the thread http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=8232&PN=0&TPN=12 - "Perfect pronunciation" , 07 December 2007 - and it should ideally have
been placed midway through the preceding page, near message no. 3):
Trusting pronunciation directives in text books
Comparing your own pronunciation against a standard you aren't quite sure of is notoriously difficult.
You have to learn it, but the question is how. Nobody would probably deny that this involves listening to
as much native speeach as possible. I would however like to point to one major problem, namely the
tendency in many text books to compare the sounds of one language to English or another irrelevant
base language. When you have to come to grips with the sound system of a new language it may be
practical to explain it like that at the very beginning of the study just to gain a foothold, but when you
later have to refine your listening skills it is just about the worst thing you could do.
Instead you should listen to the sounds on their own terms: how open is this vowel, how many flaps are
there in this R, is there a whiff of air in connection with this T and so forth. Paradoxically this does not
really involve the meaning, - meaning is not really a product of single sounds, but of some standardized
abstractions called phonemes. This means that the phoneme lists in textbooks by definition have to cut
out a lot of that information about the sounds that you need to pronounce the language. So you have to
learn those variations by listening.
I remember that we once had a discussion on the relationship between nasalised and non-nasalized
wovels in French. The central problem here is that to my ears the two series are gravely out of synch
(and have probably been so for at least 600 years). However the text books describe the situation as if
'a' corresponded to 'an', 'ai' to 'ain' etc. The details are not important, but this is just one case where I
have to choose between trusting the text books or trusting my own ears - and then I trust my ears.
However the question is whether a listener without experience in listening for sound can hear the subtle
differences that may separate not only different phonemes, but also the purely phonetically differences
that may characterize different dialects or idiolects. In message 3: "Phonetics - how to learn the sounds
of a language" I wrote something about the things that would help people to learn this. As usual my
credo is that you need to deal with as much authentic language as possible, but also that your chances
of catching the relevant details is much bigger if you take care of getting some theoretical ballast. For
vocabulary this means dictionaries, for grammar grammar books, and for pronunciation it means getting
some hardcore knowledge about phonetics, both in general and related to your chosen language.
However the quality of phonetical annotations in texts books, language guides and dictionaries is
generally nothing to write home about. I have already given one example where the proposed model as
far as I can hear simply is wrong, but this is overshadowed by the many cases where the information is
totally inadequate - for instance Russian or Danish dictionaries without indications of stress.
Unfortunately the obvious solution, a phonetic alphabet like
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Phoneti c_Alphabet - IPA doesn't solve the problem. It is as
complicated as Chinese writing, and there is absolutely no connection between the graphic
representation of anything and the articulatory reality behind it. And the treatment of intonation
patterns is generally dismal - a red line over a written sentence would be better than any description in
words, and the combination of a spoken version plus the written form PLUS a thin red line would just be
perfect.
Similarly the main problem with serious treatises on phonetics is that they spend more time on
attaching Latin labels to families of phonemes than they do on the graphical illustration of how to move
your own mouth. Maybe you need the words, but only as labels to a graphical illustration.
For these reasons I don't think that the problem will ever be solved with books on paper, so we have to
hope for a digital solution (which includes that portable dictionaries etc. must be able to both play the
sounds, show graphical representations of their production and attach mnemotic symbols to them - and
here I believe more in stylized graphics than in Latin names.
Iversen on 20 December 2009
Close listening while notating the sounds
(Revised quote from http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=32048&PN=1&TPN=3#374025 - 21. april 2012 )
I have started to do detailed listening while notating the individual sounds and (to some extent) prosody
- cfr. my log thread for the last month or so. This technique fills out a hole in my previous practices by
forcing me to learn how a language actually is pronounced. If you listen in a casual way or listen for the
meaning you won't notice all the small details (unless you have some natural gift which I haven't got) -
you need to know the variants below the phonemic level to pronounce a language well, and for me that
means making them conscious.
I have had my share of well-meaning teachers telling me to pronounce something like this, not like that
- and it has had little effect because I tend to close my ears when a person starts yelling at me, even if
it is done in a hypocritical friendly way. Listening and relistening to a prerecorded sound recording while
analysing it as detailed as possible is much less distracting and stressful, and then I can start
communicating with living humans when my own skills have been built up to the necessarily level. And
that pattern of course also holds water with all other parameters of language learning - at least for me.
Others may have other preferences.
(Amended quotes from http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T
ID=12983&PN=0&TPN=360 - 27/26 March 2012 ):
Of course I have listened to speech before and done some parroting of the usual kind, but seeing how
long time it takes me really to hear what is said is shocking because it tells me how much I have missed
earlier - even when I have replayed a certain passage several times. It is like walking from platform 9 to
10 at King's Cross, and suddenly you discover that there is something weird in between.
Let's take a few concrete examples:
Is promhoide teagaisc m
/Ish privdj t"g"shm"/
Is! principal (of)teaching I
I am a teaching principal
Irish Phonology is a study in itself. I have for some time used the Cab#ign speech synthesizer at
http://abair.ie - abair.ie , but it has occurred to me that I have used it the wrong way - I have just
listened to the voice as any other fool would have done. What a waste of time! Actually I should have
realized this long ago, because I have for years copied small samples of text manually in order to slow
myself down and really catch all details - and that's of course also how the intensive study of the sounds
of a language with a voice recording or synthesizer should be conducted: transcribe short passages and
mark everything you can hear as precisely as possible without caring about the phonems of the
language in question. The ideal conterpart to this would be to try to pronounce the sounds, but that's
phase two (or seven or whatever in the case of Irish). I ought to use IPA for my transcriptions, but I
prefer my own homemade transcription system, with the result you can see above. I learnt some of the
special signs during my courses in French phonetics in the 70s, while others are snatched from special
signs in other alphabets.
Or let's try a bit of Dutch. I took a Dutch sentence from a zoo-page and put it into https://acapela-
box.com/AcaBox/index.php - Acapela Box - another fine speech synthesizer which contrary to Abair
offers several voices* for most languages - which gives you the opportunity to explore the variations
within those languages:
* I wonder how they got Queen Elisabeth to speak her parts!
U kunt tegenwoordig een combi-kaart voor Burgers' Zoo en het Nederlands Openluchtmuseum kopen
/e knt tevoRde en kmbikRRt foR BRhrs so "n t nedlans-
pnletmysem kub /
/y knt tevoRRde en kmbikRRt foR BRgs so "n-t nedlaRns
opltmysem kop /
/y knt tevoRde en kmbikRt foR BRgs so "n (h)t nedlans
op(R)lRtmyz"m kb/
/y knt tevRde en kmbikRRt foR BRRs so "n t nedla(R)ns
op(R)lRtmyz"jm kup/
I vaguely remember having done something like this during my study time long ago, but with prescribed
signs - this time I'm just trying to find out how to write something which I as a Dane with a certain past
automatically will 'hear' as something close to the real McCoy.
At this point it should also be stressed that this is a speech synthesizer based on sampled sounds and
not naturally flowing speech. However I have some time ago done a special study of Dutch diphtongs,
where I noted down variations in the pronunciations of ui, ei etc. in podcasts from Dutch Zoos, and I
also found enormous differences in that experiment (where I didn't go into extreme details as I have
done here).
For a number of languages the only available speech synthethizer is that of http://tranlsate.google.com
- Google Translate which especially in the beginning sounded like an evil robot in an old science fiction
film. But at least for some major languages the sound quality has improved.
(end of quotes)
You can also go for short sequences of genuine speech by humans - for instance from Youtube or other
sources. I have of course also tried this out (with Icelandic). The main problem is to be absolutely
certain about what is said, and with languages where the orthography isn't crystal clear and the
pronunciation even less this can be a problem. In any case: you should listen to max. one sentence at a
time (or less), otherwise the whole point of the exercise is lost. And this is easier to achieve with
synthethizers than with true flowing speech. And what about the CD's which accompany many text book
systems? Well, can you roll the same short snippet again and again then it's OK, but my CD player can't
do that - so you have to rip it first. And besides the speech on those CD's tend to be even more
unnatural than that of a speech synthesizer.
Of course this listening technique doesn't make extensive listening to massive amounts of spoken
sources superfluous. Even I know that. To get truly active (i.e. being able to have free conversations) I
need to listen and read extensively in massive amounts - the language has to be 'buzzing' in my head,
and I get that by watching TV, reading for hours and (if possible) travelling. The irony is that I don't
necessarily have to speak to natives during this phase - the 'buzzing' is the thing I need, not
communication in se (actually it could cheat me into parroting prelearned phrases).
However extensive listening has a tendency to develop into listening mostly for meaning. The technique
above functions as a way to slow you down and force you to listen to your target language as it really is
spoken - and then you know at least what to aim for - even if it is a moving target..
Iversen on 22 April 2012
Training phonemic awareness
Phonemic awareness: transcriptions , 8. Oct. 2012)
Personally I don't think that the transcriptions in language guides and textbooks and dictionaries are
precise enough - and those in IPA are only relevant if you already have spent a lot of time first learning
the signs, then using them passively and actively. The problem is that we have to do a phonematic
reduction of the information to get the meaning of the things we here, and in this process we
deliberately disregard the details and variations and intonations and everything else that isn't absolutely
necessary for the choice between different meanings. So phonetic awareness means going back to the
original sounds and listening to them. You need to know which words were intended in order to know
which phonemes are intended, but at this level the meaning itself isn't important. If we speak about
intonation you need to consider larger blcks of speech and you need to know the grammatical structure,
but even here the general meaning is a background rather than your study object.
The most efficient technique I have used for studying minute differences is problematic because it
demands concentration and absence of outside disturbances. The idea is that you find a short snippet of
speech which you can repeat again and again while you try to write down exactly what you hear. Ideally
you should do this in a recognized transcription system like IPA, but then you have to learn that first. I
use homebrewed 'alphabets' and keep telling myself that this is OK because I don't have to
communicate the results to others - the important thing being the listening process itself.
When you have learnt how the sounds in a language really sound you can translate the rough
indications in dictionaries etc. to real sound which you have heard with you own ears.
But few people do this exercise, and instead they rely on an automatic osmosis mechanism which
means that the correct pronunciations seep into their system, where they replace erroneous
preconceptions based upon standard orthography and even the supposedly phonetical spellings in
dictionaries etc. And this doesn't always work out as intended because you hear what you expect to
hear and not what really is said. You may be one of the exceptional individuals who can remember and
repeat any spoken spoken sequence with 100% precision, but don't count on it.
At the other end of the scale we have got the suprasegmental intonation patterns, which almost never
are indicated in language learning materials - you are (once again) expected to absorb them from the
things you listen to through some kind of unconscious pattern building. Again there is one thing you can
do to to make this process partly conscious: get some text in both a spoken and a written version and
print out the written version with large spaces between the lines. Now mark up two things: stress
patterns and tone level (in practice you may have to do one thing at a time).
Write a wawering red line for the tone level - and check this against the type of sentence. Is it a
question? An order? A triumphant conclusion? Sometimes there a jumps in the tone level which
seemingly don't have any grammatical explanation, but they may still be necessary for the authentic
'nativelike' sound.
With the stress patterns the main error is to assume that there are a few localized stressed syllables
and then no stress at all around them. But there are many levels of stress, and different languages have
different patterns - some have large variations, some have small variations and some have regular
intervals like telegraph poles in a landscape, others aren't nearly as regular. We all try to learn these
patterns by listening and listening and listening, but my claim is that you can listen more efficiently
when you have made clear what you are listening for. And having to notate exactly what you hear is an
excellent way of forcing yourself to listen carefully.
Can you learn a language only by reading?
(from the http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=35307&PN=1&TPN=1 -
thread with that name)
My preferred and most efficient learning methods are all based on the written language, so I know that
you can get far - but you can't get all the way. Just as you can't learn to read just by listening to speech
(millions of analphabets testify to that!) you can't learn the sound of a language just by reading
phonetical renderings of a language. What you can do is to push your writing-based knowledge so far
that a relatively small investment in listening and speaking can give a very fast development in those
areas.
There is however one more aspect of this. Some people (including a number of of misguided linguists)
claim that writing isn't language, only speech is. That's nonsense, but it is a fact that speech is more
fundamental than writing - we learn it earlier, and even when we read we hear speech in our heads. So
having to learn a language totally without hearing it is against nature - and I guess that even those who
study extinct languages develop some kind of phonic representation of the weird cuneiform of
ideogrammatic signs in order to be able to read the stuff. But this doesn't mean that writing can't be an
efficient way of accumulating vocabulary and grammar, it just says that the process can't be based on
writing alone.
For me there is one state of consciousness which is almost a necessity if I want to activate a language. I
think of it as 'the buzz' (no Danish name, sorry). This state occurs when you get so much input that
your head starts spinning. If you accept this chaotic state you can try to turn it in the direction of
organized thinking, which is just one step ahead of speaking. I primarily achieve this with a combination
of extensive reading and listening to comprehensible sources. The snag is that without a lot of
preparation those sources wouldn't be comprehensible at all - and at least for me, intensive work
primarily with written sources is my principal tool to make them comprehensible.
On the other hand, writing without 'the buzz' is possible because the speed is so much lower - actually
so much lower that you have time to look things up and reread the things you already have written. But
even writing isn't enough to activate your thinking and your speech - it's a valuable part of the
preparations, but you need to hear a language not only to know how it sounds, but also to get an idea
about the speed you need to achieve.
************************************************************
THIS IS END OF THE FIFTH (and last) PART OF THIS GUIDE .
translations)
grammar studies)
Iversen on 18 February 2013

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Guide to Learning Languages, part 1

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