I Learned to Speak Four Languages in a Few Years: Here’s How • Hacker News Board

Re: I Learned to Speak Four Languages in a Few Years: Here’s How

#11

Post by binarycrusader » Thu, Apr 19, 2012, 6:40 PM UTC

5vforest wrote: post #3

This is great -- although IMO not a replacement for programs like Rosetta Stone, as this method requires significantly more dedication.

I often see Rosetta Stone advertised and mentioned, and I even briefly toyed with a demo version in the past, but it didn't click for me.

Can anyone provide their own success story for Rosetta or a competing alternative?

Re: I Learned to Speak Four Languages in a Few Years: Here’s How

#12

Post by why-el » Thu, Apr 19, 2012, 6:42 PM UTC

I speak three languages fluently (Arabic, French, and English), and I have the same advice for anybody who wants to learn a new language:

- Watch their news media. For instance, if you are learning Arabic, then watch Arabic media. It might be tough at first, but just go at it. Be a baby. Babies bombard their minds with input and eventually patterns form.

- Pick a TV show you saw and watch the whole thing again using language-you-want-to-learn subtitles. This can be fun, and well things will be mentioned so often they will stick. This is extremely effective, and my English vocabulary improved dramatically this way. I prefer this to carrying cards and trying to memorize them. Its unnatural.

- Go to a country that speaks it.

Re: I Learned to Speak Four Languages in a Few Years: Here’s How

#13

Post by xiaoma » Thu, Apr 19, 2012, 6:55 PM UTC

graeme wrote: post #5

Another great resource is Pimsleur. I've used their courses to learn Italian and German. It's a half hour of audio each day. The key is that you speak out loud. You can do it while cooking or driving, or any other activity that is routine and non-verbal. They teach you to pronounce phrases very well, and you learn the basic structure of the language. Once you can say "I would like a glass of wine", you can easily lea…

I used Pimsleur for Cantonese in 2010 during a trip to HK and have kind of mixed feelings about it. On one hand, it was good for pronunciation. Many people were shocked by how good my Cantonese sounded and had troubles believing me when I said I'd just gotten to Hong Kong. On the other hand, this caused some problems-- people consistently over-estimated my language abilities, and as a result said a ton of stuff I couldn't understand. Had my speech sounded worse they'd probably have modified theirs a bit and I'd have learned faster. The other wildcard is that I already spoke Mandarin fluently, and definitely had a bit of help from all the cognates.

Another downside to Pimsleur I discovered more recently while working on Swedish. They're all about the same! The dialogues and stories got kind of boring since I'd heard them already in Cantonese.

Ideally, I'd like a resource like Pimsleur plus some kind of podcast (e.g. popupcantonese.com) so that I could build more vocabulary at least at a passive level and understand more of the speech I elicit from native speakers.

Re: I Learned to Speak Four Languages in a Few Years: Here’s How

#14

Post by brucejaywallace » Thu, Apr 19, 2012, 6:56 PM UTC

mtjl79 wrote: post #9

As an American who speaks multiple languages, the thing for me was learning the first. When you learn another language you get a true understand of your own language that other people don't understand who are not bilingual. After you learn a second language, others get much much easier and the learning curve is much shorter.

I also noticed this....it also gets easier depending on the language....

I'm learning Spanish right now, and for example, Portuguese and Italian can at times be very similar

Re: I Learned to Speak Four Languages in a Few Years: Here’s How

#15

Post by huherto » Thu, Apr 19, 2012, 6:59 PM UTC

Learning a second language allows you to appreciate the commitment that it requires. People who has never gone thru the process, don't appreciate it and they think it is a matter of studying six months one hour a day. I had a supervisor who said that he was going to learn Spanish (at 55) so we can tell him stuff that we didn't know how to say in English. I have been learning English for 23 years since I was 21. I felt this was insulting. Somehow he thought he could do it; may be he felt he was smarter than us because his English was fluent. Of course he was never able to say anything in Spanish.

Re: I Learned to Speak Four Languages in a Few Years: Here’s How

#16

Post by acqq » Thu, Apr 19, 2012, 7:00 PM UTC

I just don't believe his claim: "C1 fluency in French in about 5 months" if he started from 0 unless he didn't do anything but learning the language in the target country. C1 is a damn high fluency:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Re...

"Can understand a wide range of demanding, longer texts, and recognise implicit meaning. Can express him/herself fluently and spontaneously without much obvious searching for expressions. Can use language flexibly and effectively for social, academic and professional purposes. Can produce clear, well-structured, detailed text on complex subjects, showing controlled use of organisational patterns, connectors and cohesive devices."

I'm a long-time foreigner in a German-speaking country, learning German after already speaking two more languages apart from my mother tongue, not knowing German before I came here, so I know how many nuances a living language has. Had he say A2, or B1 if he's a language talent, I'd believe him, C1, I can't imagine. I can only guess he didn't actually try to pass some formal verification tests, or he didn't start from 0, there simply must be something he avoided to say. Or he simply lies to himself (and us) that it's actually C1 what he reached in five months.

Re: I Learned to Speak Four Languages in a Few Years: Here’s How

#17

Post by SpiderX » Thu, Apr 19, 2012, 7:01 PM UTC

binarycrusader wrote: post #11

5vforest wrote: post #3

This is great -- although IMO not a replacement for programs like Rosetta Stone, as this method requires significantly more dedication.

I often see Rosetta Stone advertised and mentioned, and I even briefly toyed with a demo version in the past, but it didn't click for me. Can anyone provide their own success story for Rosetta or a competing alternative?

Rosetta Stone worked great for me. I learned Russian in about 6 months, my wife says my pronunciation is perfect. Well, she wasn't my wife when I met her, and she didn't speak any english, so it was motivation enough for me to learn to speak Russian. It helps that I have someone to practice with. I'd say if you are going to be doing Rosetta Stone, it helps if you do it every day without fail for a minimum of 30 minutes a day. When I was studying, I did 30 minutes twice a day. Any periods longer than 30 minutes, and I found that my brain didn't retain as much. But, if I took that hour and split it into two sessions about 3 hours apart, that did the trick. It also helps to study right before you go to bed. Now it's not very difficult for me to speak Russian. I don't think of the english first and then translate it - I just think of the russian words and how to say what I want. Sometimes I don't know the word, and I have to describe what I want to say.

Anyway, I am at a point now that I am learning new words every day just by speaking.

Re: I Learned to Speak Four Languages in a Few Years: Here’s How

#18

Post by showerst » Thu, Apr 19, 2012, 7:11 PM UTC

binarycrusader wrote: post #11

5vforest wrote: post #3

This is great -- although IMO not a replacement for programs like Rosetta Stone, as this method requires significantly more dedication.

I often see Rosetta Stone advertised and mentioned, and I even briefly toyed with a demo version in the past, but it didn't click for me. Can anyone provide their own success story for Rosetta or a competing alternative?

Rosetta has improved quite a bit over the last few versions.

I tried a copy a few years back and wasn't too impressed, then saw it again last year and they actually had working voice recognition that judged your pronunciation! They also have an iPad version out now which seems like a great fit.

The one big thing I've noticed is that they're a bit random on what they teach you. I remember the Arabic 1 program taking quite a few lessons before teaching 'bathroom', for example.

Re: I Learned to Speak Four Languages in a Few Years: Here’s How

#19

Post by TazeTSchnitzel » Thu, Apr 19, 2012, 7:17 PM UTC

acqq wrote: post #16

I just don't believe his claim: "C1 fluency in French in about 5 months" if he started from 0 unless he didn't do anything but learning the language in the target country. C1 is a damn high fluency: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Re... "Can understand a wide range of demanding, longer texts, and recognise implicit meaning. Can express him/herself fluently and spontaneously without much obvi…

Or doesn't realise what level C1 is.

Re: I Learned to Speak Four Languages in a Few Years: Here’s How

#20

Post by sswezey » Thu, Apr 19, 2012, 7:20 PM UTC

binarycrusader wrote: post #11

5vforest wrote: post #3

This is great -- although IMO not a replacement for programs like Rosetta Stone, as this method requires significantly more dedication.

I often see Rosetta Stone advertised and mentioned, and I even briefly toyed with a demo version in the past, but it didn't click for me. Can anyone provide their own success story for Rosetta or a competing alternative?

Competing alternative - do what this guy is doing

Rosetta Stone isn't supported by most linguists who study foreign language acquisition. It is also ridiculously overpriced and never explicitly teaches even basic grammar, something which FSI points out helps almost 100% of learners.