Learning a New Language Past Age 10

[scotrace]

It is said that in the United States - we screw up teaching our children a second language by waiting until High School. The part of the brain that readily absorbs language is long hard-wired by that point.

But suppose you want to learn a new language as an adult? I know a smattering of Italian, a teeny bit of German, enough French to find the bathroom. I'd love to learn all three. Russian too, but that's real hard.

What's the BEST way to learn a new lanugage as an adult student?

 

[Miss_Bella_Hell]

Take an immersion class, I think. And work on it a LOT. Memorizing vocabulary is tough and it's the first to go. I'm formerly fluent in French.

 

[Diamondback]

Scott, I found it highly helpful in my college Spanish classes to have a native speaker for an instructor--even though I'm still struggling to remember it all.

I've thought about those "Instant Immersion" tapes or the Rosetta Stone system, but just haven't had much chance to investigate them.

+1 to Miss Bella's advice on vocabulary and practice, also.

I'm probably not being much help, am I?

 

[Miss_Bella_Hell]

Oh yeah, and don't use the tapes unless you have incredible self-discipline.

 

[Hemingway Jones]

I speak just enough Italian to be dangerous and to get a lot of blank stares from the Italians when I am in Italy.

However, I have Rosetta Stone, I have El Vecchio E El Mare by Ernesto Hemingway, and I have several text books. I hope to be fluent one day.

I sincerely wish I had started earlier. I do think that your capacity for language is sharper at an early age. In primitive times, language had to be learned early and fast for survival. You can learn at any age, but it seems harder. Maybe, though, it's because you are approaching it with a more complicated vocabulary.

I think the best way is tenacity; don't give up and watch as many foreign films, speak to native speakers, and read as much as your can.

 

[Elaina]

I don't know. I learned Quenya (yes I KNOW it's not a real language) and got fluent in it by studying it. I just take classes and go from there. Either I like it and will speak it, or I quit and forget enough I'm no longer fluent.

That said, I was fluent in German for a long time. When a woman died whom I spoke it with every day for 4 years, I stopped speaking it. Partly due to no one knowing it. I did meet a German man who's English wasn't very good not too long ago, and I remembered enough to communicate, and so I feel that you don't really forget as it gets rusty and will come back in time.

As to being an adult and being too late to learn a language, I personally think it's bunk. As long as you're not brain dead you can learn, or relearn, anything.

 

[BegintheBeguine]

The flipside of the native speaker-teacher is this lil' story: my ex-boyfriend who was from France (dreamy) learned to speak English as an adult from a Frenchman who taught the class. I can see how this would work: they guy knew how difficult it is for an adult to learn a non-native tongue and would know how to teach it. Anyway, it worked.
I know I learned way more German from an American teacher than Spanish from an Hispanic teacher. (I'm American.)
It's easier for a child to learn languages because their heads are much emptier.

 

[Lady Day]

Cartoons, seriously. Cartoons for kids on learning a language are great tools for adults as well. The thing about how they teach adults languages is they teach adults as if they already know how to speak. We do, but not what we are learning. With cartoons, the visuals are bright, simple and geared for learing a language.

I took Japanese in high school, and could read it fairly well, I even got to a point where I forgot how to 'think' in English. That was freaky, only lasted a few seconds tho.

I want to learn quite a few languages before I die (French, Spanish, more Japanese, Sign Language). For me, I find visual refrences, and learning the root of a word to work better for me, even as a kid.

But I do wish I had more diversity (As Im sure a lot of U.S. new adults do) than what I had a s a kid.

LD

 

[Elaina]

Good point, my german accent (so I've been told) is as perfect as it could have been had I of been born there, and I was taught by a very American teacher.

I'm not convinced learning from someone specific helps, personally.

 

[Miss_Bella_Hell]

You do actually learn language with a different part of your brain when you're an adult. My uncle's friend had a stroke and lost his native English but could still converse in Italian, which he learned in high school / college.

 

[Pink Dahlia]

First, I'm 27.

I took private lessons in Japanese. It is a difficult language to begin with but my teacher was fabulous. To be honest I gave up. I used the money excuse but maybe I didn't give it 110 percent.

The good news is when I was in Japan last year I learned a lot more than I ever learned from the lessons. I think being immersed in the language is the best way to learn it because you are forced to communicate with people who don't speak English (and no everyone in Japan doesn't speak English - I learned that quite quickly). If you have the means pick up a pocket dictionary and head to the country which speaks the language you want to learn!

 

[Diamondback]

I took Japanese in high school, and could read it fairly well, I even got to a point where I forgot how to 'think' in English. That was freaky, only lasted a few seconds tho.

LD, that sounds kinda like how my mother describes being in Germany in the '60s, that she reached a point where she was actually thinking in German when dealing with the locals.

 

[Miss Lucy June]

It for sure gets harder the older you get...I picked up French as a kid and struggled a lot more with languages in my 20s. I think the best thing to do is to learn it from a real person, not a tape/video. That way you know your progress, and you have someone who can answer your questions. That one on one interaction is really important! I would suggest getting a tutor or something. I teach French on the side, so I'm sure there are others who do the same thing! (And I love it so much, I don't charge an arm and a leg!)

 

[Joie DeVive]

It's true that children have an advantage in learning languages over adults, but before you all run out and sign Junior up for lessons, you should know that there have been some studies (I wish I had one at hand to site, but I don't) that suggest that children who are bilingual, actually can end up with more problems in math and science skills. From what I read, they think it has to do with excess "wiring" of the lingual portion of the brain, shortchanging the sections that deal with logic and mathematics.

I learned Spanish in High School, so I can't help you too much on the learning techniques except to say that using it is what keeps it in your head. Elaina is also right, it will come back even after you get rusty, you just have to practice. A lot!

 

[Marc Chevalier]

Cartoons, seriously.

Very true. And soap operas work very well, too. Remarkably well, in fact.


(I'm an ESL/EFL "English as a second/foreign language" teacher. Most of my students are adults.)

.

 

[Miss Neecerie]

I didn't even start learning Portuguese until I was 19 and went to Brazil.

I had taken Spanish in HS though, so I can't say it was a complete 'cold start'

I came back from my first trip to Brazil, took a 12 week 6 hours a day intensive course at UCLA, immersed myself in as much as I could. Music, reading newspapers, anything I could.

I then moved to Brazil for about a year, dealing with native speakers 24-7. I only spoke English to teach people things, or humour those who wanted to show off they spoke it.

When I moved back to the US, I went on to double major for my BA, one of them being Portuguese. This included writing college level papers on literary analysis -in- Portuguese. So definatly not 'survival level' language.

Granted...I have also taken a few years of Russian, Italian, Armenian...etc...

D...the language geek who says immersion is the fastest way....

 

[Rosie]

I say immersion also. When I was in Italy I surprised myself with the amount of Italian I picked up. Watching television, hearing it constantly. The only thing I really remember now is how to order non bubbly water.

 

[Adelaidey]

Rosie: "Agua sin gas, por favor." in Spain! lol

I learned Spanish in an intensive program in high school, and since I don't like the classes available to me at university, I do my best to stay fluent. I like watching novelas (I like Decisiones) and cartoons in Spanish, reading a few of my childhood favorites translated into Spanish (that way I'm familiar with the story-- currently working on Little Women/Mujercitas), but most of all speaking with my friends whenever I can. Spending time in Spain was the best though-- although its not like I can go back whenever I want to practice Spanish!

Or, as my one friend told me in all seriousness when I said that I wanted to improve my Spanish-- "Get a Mexican boyfriend." lol lol lol lol lol

 

[Lady Day]

Or, as my one friend told me in all seriousness when I said that I wanted to improve my Spanish-- "Get a Mexican boyfriend." lol lol lol lol lol

Thats set up is what they called 'sleeping dictionary'

LD

 

[Cobden]

I've always wanted to learn a foreign language, and tried to learn Arabic from tapes before going to live in Egypt, but as I found that everyone I ever talked to spoke English - except our driver, but he didn't even seem to understand Arabic - I gave up. To be perfectly honest, I don't think my brain is wired for languages; at school I was better at Latin (because it's taught almost scientifically) then French (which is taught ... well...like a language). Still, I'm pretty fluent in 1930's British Expat...