About World Languages

Language Difficulty for English Speakers

How long will it take to become proficient in a foreign language?
People often ask: "How long will it take me to become proficient in language X?" This question is impossible to answer because a lot depends on a person's language learning ability, motivation, learning environment, intensity of instruction, and prior experience in learning foreign languages. Last, but not least, it depends on the level of proficiency the person wishes to attain.

Different language skills
There is no such thing as across-the-board proficiency in a particular language. Proficiency is usually measured in terms of four skills:

• speaking
• reading
• listening
• writing

Learners usually have different levels of proficiency in the four skills. Consequently, the four skills cannot be assessed by one test. Each one requires an independent evaluation.

Levels of proficiency
Two widely used guidelines identify stages of proficiency, as opposed to achievement. Both guidelines represent a hierarchy of global characterizations of integrated performance in speaking, listening, reading and writing. Each description is a representative sample of a particular range of ability, and each level subsumes all previous levels, moving from simple to complex.

It is important to understand that these guidelines are not intended to measure what an individual has achieved through specific classroom instruction but rather to allow assessment of what an individual can and cannot do, regardless of where, when, or how the language has been acquired.

ACTFL (American Council of Teachers of Foreign Languages) has guidelines for speaking (1999) and preliminary guidelines for writing. The ILR (US Government Interagency Language Roundtable) has guidelines for speaking, reading, listening, writing and translation.

The two sets of guidelines for speaking only are given side-by-side below. Note that the ACTFL scale goes up only to the Superior level, while the ILR scale includes Advanced Professional Proficiency and Functionally Native Proficiency. ...more

via aboutworldlanguages.com

World Languages is a commercial site but also a one-stop information website "dedicated to the world’s most important and populous languages... and language-related IT,"

OK so it's not about learning English, per se, but information about languages in general and learning languages does relate.

In particular, the chart for assessing different language skills and levels of proficiency seems adaptable to skills and levels in others languages.

Also a source about individual world languages, language families, fascinating language factoids (which always made language learning more interesting for me)

Posted via email from Meanderings

Language learning methods

Here's an interesting article titled "On the mortality of language learning methods" that discusses how methods for learning foreign languages appear, prosper, disappear, and then reappear.

Over the past century many different methods or approaches have been applied to the teaching and learning of foreign languages. Since the 1960s, for example there has been a shift from approaches that concentrate on learning grammar, vocabulary and on translation, to approaches the emphasise communication, especially speaking. The same thing also happened in the second half of the 19th century.

Much research has been undertaken into language learning and teaching, but as far as I can discover, no single approach or method has been found to work significantly better than any other, in spite of claims to the contrary by the inventors, founders and promoters of particular methods and approaches.

Moreover, each new development in technology, whether it be the phonograph, radio, television, computer or internet, is expected to transform the way people learn languages. However this doesn't necessarily happen.


le plus ça change, plus ce la même chose! = the more things change, the more they stay the same

how to learn a language

How to learn a foreign language is the million dollar question, but actually there is no magic answer. Many factors should be taken into consideration, as well as tools useful for learning a new language. The good news is that there are methods and techniques to use.

Language Components	Language Tools
Vocabulary Grammar Writing Listening and Speaking	Memory Practice Motivation

Is English necessary for today’s Japanese workers?

from the Mutantfrog Travelogue: Is English necessary for today’s Japanese workers? via Global Voices Online

What do you think of this policy? I find it very disturbing. It is one thing to chose to learn a language because you think it will help your career or because you just want to. Compulsion is another matter.

Global Voices Online is an international network of bloggers and "citizen journalists" that translates and reports on blogs around the world. Do you follow any blogs in your native language? What are they about? Do you follow any English language blogs?

Another of its projects, Global Voices Advocacy, reports on and campaigns against internet censorship around the world. I think that forcing or requiring speakers to use a particular language is another kind of censorship. What do you think? What experience have you had with censorship?

"Globish" is another term for global English. In a more benign way, its rise is related to the story I opened with. Here's a story about it on NPR that you can also listen to: "Lingua Globa: How English Became 'Globish'"

On ILY and learning English

Do you know what ILY is ? If you do, tell us about it. If not, your assignment is to do some research and then post what you found. What do you think ILY might have to do with learning English and New Year's Resolutions? 

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From DC Blog at http://david-crystal.blogspot.com,Tuesday, 1 January 2008

On learning English

A correspondent from the Czech Republic asks a powerful question: 'How would you encourage English language learners at secondary and postsecondary schools; what do they have to be careful about and what joys can they expect when dealing with a language of some 2 billion speakers worldwide?'

I would say to them...

In a way, the question answers itself. English enables you to communicate with a third of the world's population, and that has to be a plus on the agenda of anyone with an international outlook. That third, moreover, is hugely diverse. English is present, as a first, second, or foreign language, in every country in the world. So, in using it as a tool, you have an unparallelled opportunity to explore the individuality of nations and peoples.

The metaphor of the tool is important. English is not a prism, through which you see others. It is a tool which enables you to have a close encounter with others. Culture is not wholly dependent on language, but it does need language to explain its uniqueness - an experience all travellers have had, as they watch, say, a local folkdance and wonder what it is all about.

However, the metaphor of the tool only goes so far, because you can change the character of the tool to suit your purposes. If you have adopted English as one of your languages, then you are able to adapt it - to take personal ownership of it. One of the great joys of making headway in a new language is that you can use it to talk about what you want to talk about - and if that means inventing new words, to express your local experience, then do not hesitate to invent them. Just translating the culture of your school and town into English - such as the names of localities and personalities - will immediately add dozens of new expressions. Don't restrict yourself to the words that are already in the dictionaries. English is yours now. The words and expressions you and your fellows invent today might be in the dictionaries of tomorrow, if they catch on.

You're doing nothing that hasn't already been done thousands of times before. New words were added to English within days of the first settlers arriving in America from Britain, and the same pattern has been observed in all countries where a community of users has evolved. What you find yourselves doing you will see being done elsewhere. So - to adopt the motto of the scouting movement - be prepared. Be prepared for linguistic diversity, change, playfulness, and creativity wherever you listen and look - on radio and television, in the press, literature, film, pop music, the internet... Develop a sense of the kind of English that is appropriate to particular circumstances - American, British, Australian..., informal, formal, literary..., scientific, religious, journalistic..., emails, chatrooms, blogs.... And make it your major aim to be so in control of your own English that you can vary it to suit the circumstances in which you find yourself. Your goal is not to learn English, but Englishes. The same principle applies to any language, of course, but it is particularly important in the case of English because of its global reach.

And use English in another way - as a means of appreciating the uniqueness and richness of your own language(s). The critic George Steiner once said, 'Is it not the duty of the critic to avail himself, in some imperfect measure at least, of another language - if only to experience the defining contours of his own?' I think that is exactly right. Each new language-learning experience tells us something about our own linguistic identity.

You ask if there is anything to be careful about. There is one big thing: to remember that a language spoken by 2 people is just as wonderful a creation as a language spoken by 2 billion. Never let your love-affair with English make you dismissive of your own language, lessen your concern for minority and endangered languages, or forget the extraordinary richness of the human linguistic tool-cupboard.

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The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges... (Voltaire)

Book Review: How Languages are Learned

Book Review: How Languages are Learned.

By Patsy M. Lightbown and Nina Spada.

Oxford : Oxford University Press, 1996. 135pp.

ISBN 0 19 437169 7

This book is yet another state-of-the-art survey of second language acquisition. It is the result of the two authors' extensive experience in classroom-centred research on second language acquisition. The book is organised into six chapters. The introduction, the recommended readings concluding each chapter, the glossary of the words that have special or technical meaning within second language acquisition research and language teaching, the bibliography and the index are all admirable. In the introduction, the authors make what seems to be an unusually commonsense point. We are told that 'One important basis for evaluating the potential effectiveness of new methods is, of course , the teacher's own experience with previous successes or disappointments. In addition, teachers who are informed of some of the findings of recent research are better prepared to judge whether the new proposals for language teaching are likely to bring about positive changes in students' learning '. In this introduction, we are also invited to reflect upon (1) twelve popular views about how languages are learned and (2) what the implications are in respect of how these languages should be taught. The questionnaire used for this purpose has been professionally executed. I outline these views below as they are, taken as a whole, an organiser for five chapters (1-5) of the book and as they engage us personally throughout the remainder of the book.

1. Languages are learned mainly through imitation.
2. Parents usually correct young children when they make grammatical errors.
3. People with high IQs are good language learners.
4. The most important factor in second language acquisition success is motivation.
5. The earlier a second language is introduced in school programs, the greater the likelihood of success in learning.
6. Most of the mistakes which second language learners make are due to interference from their first language.
7. Teachers should present grammatical rules one at a time, and learners should practice examples of each one before going on to another.
8. Teachers should teach simple language structures before complex ones.
9. Learners' errors should be corrected as soon as they are made in order to prevent the formation of bad habits.
10. Teachers should use materials that expose students only to those language structures which have already been taught.
11. When learners are allowed to interact freely ( for example in group or pair activities), they learn each other's mistakes.
12. Students learn what they are taught.

Getting Started

Once more into the breach - I leap into blogdom again. The operating principle is to use the blog as a teaching tool for my online ESL class for EFI. I was at the point where I have to try something new or cancel the class.

But blogging English is not just about learning (or teaching) English as a Second (or other) language. It is also about the language itself and the apparent fascination it holds for me. If the blog is only about ESL and the class, then I will only get frustrated when none or few participate. My students no doubt have their own feelings and frustrations about English. They can vent them here, either as original posts or as comments.

I will blog resources, links, lessony stuff - write some posts in language more accessible for beginner readers. On the hand, they can also work on stretching their reading skills.