Category: Language learning

Language barrier

By Simon

According to an article in The Guardian, a man who planned to walk 9,000 miles to Mahatma Gandhi’s birthplace in India without money found the language barrier insurmountable when he arrived in France.

His aim was to show that a world without money is possible, and he thought he could obtain food and shelter in return for helping people, a philosophy he promotes via his website, the freeconomy community. The walk went well until he arrived in France, when he realised that the little French he could remember wasn’t sufficient to explain his mission and his dietary requirements – he’s a vegan – and people thought he was a refugee or a beggar.

He now plans to travel around the UK offering his help to people and brushing up his language skills with members of the Freeconomy network, and would like to try the walk to India again eventually.

Have you ever had trouble explaining your mission and/or dietary requirements in a foreign language?

I don’t drink alcohol and sometimes find it hard to explain this in other languages, especially when asked why. I discovered recently that you can apparently avoid drinking in Japan if you cover your glass and say kyōkai (church) – no one will mind as long as you keep their glasses topped up. Does anyone know if this works?

Happy New Year!

Language of the month

By Simon

On a recent edition of Word of Mouth, the BBC Radio 4 programme about language, they talked about an interesting scheme at a primary school in London where over 40 different languages are spoken by the pupils. Each month one language is chosen as the language of the month, and a pupil who speaks that language teaches the other children and the teachers some words and phrases in their mother tongue both in person and via video and audio recordings. The pupils also tell people about their culture. The recordings are also made available to other schools via the web.

The school sees the multitude of languages spoken by the children as an opportunity and asset rather than a problem. The children can share their own languages and cultures, and learn about the languages and cultures of others, and they become familiar with the sounds of the different languages.

Maybe we could do something similar here. Would any of you like to share some of your native language(s) with the rest of us? This could involve audio and/or video recordings of useful words and phrases, information about your language and culture, and anything else you think would be interesting.

Lang-8

By Simon

A useful-looking website I heard about today is Lang-8, which describes itself as a a social networking service site for language exchange and international communication. Users can write journal entries in a language they’re learning, and get them corrected by native speakers of that language. There are also groups for particular language combinations, e.g. Japanese / English or Chinese / English, and discussion forums.

Learning Hebrew

By Simon

A visitor to Omniglot has contacted me on behalf of a relative who recently moved to Israel. The relative is finding Hebrew a very challenging language to learn and is looking for an alternative to Ulpan, the total immersion courses for immigrants to Israel. Any suggestions?

An article I found in The Jerusalem Post reports that 60% of immigrants to Israel who are over 30 finish their initial Ulpan courses consisting of 500 hours of instruction without fully mastering Hebrew. Many such immigrants are unable to find work, or have difficulties doing so. The article dates from 2006, and I haven’t been able to find any more recent ones on this problem.

Have any of you been through the Ulpan system, or something similar in other countries?

Adjusting to a new language environment

By Simon

Research undetaken at Michigan State University has found that girls can find it more difficult than boys to adjust to a new social and linguistic environment, according to an article on Science Daily.

The study was of 3-6 year olds at an international school in Beijing where the children, from 16 different countries, are in immersed in Mandarin and English. Most of them are learning at least one new language, and the researchers found that the girls generally had more trouble adjusting to the new environment than boys.

Previous studies have found that girls usually have better social and linguistic abilities than boys, however the girls in the Beijing study who could not understand their teachers or the other children tended to have more behavioural problems than the boys.

The study also showed that children find it harder to learn a new language than is generally thought. The popular idea is that children soak up new languages like sponges without too much effort, however this isn’t necessarily true.

Anybody can learn a language

By Simon

I came across an interesting article on Michel Thomas and his methods for teaching languages in the Guardian today.

Thomas believed that “there was no such thing as a bad student, only a bad teacher” and that with the right teaching method, anybody can learn a language quickly and easily. However was very reluctant to explain his teaching methods with others. He believed that people would only take parts of his ideas if he shared them, which would dilute them and make them much less effective. It was only in the 1990s that Thomas was persuaded to record language lessons by Hodder Education.

In a new book, The Language Revolution, by Jonathan Solity, an educational psychologist, discusses how Thomas taught languages and the psychological prinples that underpin his methods. Solity believes that if such methods were adopted in schools, they could made a huge difference.

The article mentions some of Thomas’ methods, which include breaking down languages and explaining how they work in easy-to-understand ways; teaching relatively small amounts of material at any one time; and going over things until the students really understand them and can use them. There is also a link to a BBC documentary about Michel Thomas on YouTube.

Have you tried any Michel Thomas language courses? How effective have they been?

I haven’t tried any yet, but am thinking of having a go at the Russian course.

eduFire

By Simon

eduFire, a language learning site I heard about recently. It’s designed to bring together language learners and tutors via the web using what they call ‘live video language learning’. Tutors can set their own fees, a small proportion of which is retained by the eduFire people as service charge, and students can try sample video lessons and talk to other students before deciding on a tutor. The most popular languages are Arabic, English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Mandarin, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish.

eduFire are giving away free one-hour tutoring sessions for readers of this blog. The first ten people to email freetutoring@edufire.com will receive a coupon code that allows their session to be complimentary.

Don’t forget the My favourite kanji competition, by the way. I said that the closing date for entries is today, but as I’ve only received two entries so far, I’ll extend that to the end of July.

Apologies for the lack of language quiz yesterday. This was due to server problems. As I know you enjoy these quizzes … here’s a recording in a mystery language. Can you guess or do you know which language it is?

Play and learn

By Simon

A professor at Michigan State University has created a free online role-playing game that teaches you Mandarin Chinese, as well as introducing you to Chinese culture, according to this report.

Within the game you inhabit a virtual version of China where you can visit markets, read newspapers, watch television, chat and trade with other players and even get a job, and there are plenty of help with the language the culture. Players start out as tourists and can become residents or even citizens of the virtual China.

This sounds like a good idea that might appeal to quite a lot of people.

Do you know of games that teach other languages? Have you tried any of them?

My favourite kanji

By Simon

The author of a site offering online Japanese lessons has kindly offered one full account for free to Omniglot visitors. The site offers Japanese lessons for beginners, plus some material for more advanced learners. Some of the lessons are free, once you’ve registered, others are available after payment of an annual subscription. The account will give you access to all the material on the site.

The “My favourite kanji” competition is your chance to win an account. Entries can take the form of a explanation of which kanji you like the most and why; a piece of calligraphy or art featuring your favourite kanji; a story or poem about your favourite kanji; or anything else you can think of based around your favourite kanji. Let your imaginations run wild and get those creative juices flowing!

Please send entries by email to the usual address. The closing date is the end of this month (30th June). The best entries will be displayed in the Omniglot gallery.

Forvo

By Simon

Forvo is a site I heard about recently which contains recordings of tens of thousands of words, phrases and names in over 70 languages. The site is free to use and anyone can submit recordings, which means that their quality varies quite a bit. It looks like it has potential to become a useful language learning tool.