These are my views, others may well differ. The same strategies will not necessarily work well for everyone.
When I start a language, I become a human sponge, trying to soak up as much of the TL as possible without really understanding much. There are many unknown words initially, which I try to suss out from the context.
This soon gets me thinking in that language, even if haltingly, but from that point, things improve fast. I believe that this is the best way to improve grammar and vocabulary. Sterile words and lists don't stick without context. Parsing the grammar explicitly is not of much use either because it implies back and forth translation, which are real trip wires.
I have the unproven advantage of being trilingual (quadri with some benefit of doubt) from nearly the time I learned to speak. Perhaps that gives some instinct on how to pick up languages, but I don't know for sure.
The other thing is our adult fear of ridicule, which a child doesn't have. They babble any old nonsense and enjoy it rather than being apprehensive of who thinks what of them. If someone can do this, they have got it made.
The two final pointers are regularity and comfortable self pacing. Absence of the first is the surest way of axing oneself in the foot. Regularity here means every single day, regardless of weekends, parties, holudays and life events. The NL gets no such breaks so why should the TL get any? As for pacing, overstretch and you'll just get mental sprains.
That's my general approach. I also use multiple apps and resources but this is not the post to talk about those.
What works for you?
[link] [comments]
from Language Learning https://ift.tt/qDTXkRy
via Learn Online English Speaking
Comments
Post a Comment