You hear it all the time and I’m sure you’ve heard it before… The struggling learner with the ‘once a month’ study plan says it. The person that studied Spanish in high school while reading a comic book and not paying attention says it. The ‘average’ L1 English-speaker says it… It’s the monolingual catchphrase: ”I don’t have a talent for languages”
Rubbish.
Everyone has a ‘talent’ for language… it’s an in-built mechanism. We are human. We have language. But what do they truly mean when they say that they “don’t have a talent”? Click here to read more.. »
As many of you will know, the study at university in an English speaking country you’re likely to need the right TOEFL or IELTS score. And that’s a lot of work. Speaking to some of my international classmates though, I’ve come to realise something. Even though they have an excellent command of English and the right score, they don’t always have the tools for the academic setting. They sometimes lack the relevant vocabulary. Vocabulary that many of us take for granted.
So what do they need to study? Endless wordlists to increase their vocabulary to the 20’000 mark or something absurd? Click here to read more.. »
Our friend Ultimate Attainment is back again. He’s someone we’re talking about a lot in my seminars lately and unfortunately, certain people do believe the falsehoods about sounding like “native” being the ultimate. It’s also a fundamental aspect of my dissertation (specifically dealing with English in Korea).. but that’s another story.
When it comes to accentual perfection, I’m of the opinion that it is possible to sound like a native, but the issue is, is it necessary.. Click here to read more.. »
Common question… variable answers.
It all depends on what the learner considers fluent, which language they are learning, the environment they are learning in, how motivated they are, how often they study, and so and so forth.
Let’s set the ground rules at 2 hours study per day. Not unrealistic if you consider the Borrowing Time post and the Power of the Schedule. Everybody can make at least an hour free everyday, most people can find 2 hours if they try just a little bit…. Stop reading about language study and start studying the language! ha Click here to read more.. »
How many words do you know?
Something that in reality, I consider to be, err, a stupid question. I don’t really care how many words I know, and it doesn’t really matter how many words I know. What matters is that I know the words that I need.
Anyway, watching your vocabulary grow is a motivational tool, so perhaps the question isn’t that stupid. Click here to read more.. »
