I have a polish friend who couldn't speak any English she could understand a little but would communicate with me via her husband. He is self taught using American and english DVD's She was so determined to learn that she went to work for a small English company and made English friends We have sat many a time laughing while I corrected her sentences In 5 years she went from unable to speak English and now speaks it better than some English people Try and get involved with people who speak the language you want to learn that way you can have conversations rather than talk to a disc Put an advert in the local paper My god daughter had a local Spanish lady to help her with the language and she learnt in leaps and bounds and visits a Spanish family yearly and speaks fluently
I just use the British abroad international language, works in any country, point to the beer you require and speak very slowly and loudly as if they are stupid, seems to work!
It can be very difficult to understand a foreign language if the speaker is speaking rapidly and muttering so you can't pick up the words. Speaking slowly, loudly and clearly genuinely increases the chances of understanding. I can't understand why people so often sneer at speaking loudly and clearly - what's all that about?
I find it quite difficult to learn new languages. English is my second language and while I can write and speak at a decent level (even if I only say so myself ) I cannot learn proper intonation and accent which really annoys me. I tried to learn German for 3 years at school and I can barely introduce myself:/ I also tried to learn Japanese on a couple of occasions but I gave up in the end. On the other hand, my sister speaks 10 or 12 languages and quite a few of them very fluent so a lot depends on the person. Personally I think I can only learn a language to a decent level if I have to use it or have an opportunity to use it on a regular basis (travels, foreign friends etc). I would suggest maybe trying few different methods to see what suits you best. What language do you want to learn?
To start with I took a holiday Italian course at night class, then used Linguaphone CDs which I found very useful. This got me to a good basic level. I have tried Michael Thomas CDs but struggled with them and I have also tried the Rosetta stone demo which seemed OK, but can't quite bring myself to stump up the £2 - £300 for the course. The BBC language web site is good for vocab practice. There's no substitute for being in the country. I get over there at least twice a year. Como and Florence this year already Milan in November for the bike show. Don't be frightened to have a go. Good luck anyway
My ex-wife is half Spanish, we lived there for a while so my Spanish was ok, but as others have said, if you don’t use it you lose it, I can still read a menu and basic stuff but anything else, especially if it is spoken at the natural high speed leaves me lost and frustrated. I have worked for the same German company for the last sixteen years, now that is a language I just can’t seem to get my head round. I can order beer and food, understand written technical terms but other than that it might as well be double Dutch. My partner now is Chinese/Malay, now that is a language I would love to learn, especially as we planning on retiring to Penang. Will I bother; I doubt it, when we are out there even the poorest locals speak better English then me. I will probably just pick up what I need as I go along. The young take it in far better; my youngest son can speak more or less fluent Spanish and did German at school to O Level standard. He is now studying law…… the language of making money
Regular practice is critical, as is really making the effort to speak the language without feeling too self-conscious or embarrassed. The effort is often appreciated, even if the execution isn't perfect. My A-level French and GCSE Spanish have rusted horribly since school, and the Italian I have attempted to learn over the last couple of years (from a good BBC CD and book course called Buongiorno Italia before the WDW 2012 trip, as well as an evening class which started last year) is slipping away since the classes finished in March. I really need another trip to Italy to practice it! I found putting the CDs on in the car, and saving the contents to my phone so I could listen at odd moments was useful, and the evening classes provided a discipline (homework every week) and a chance to practice speaking, and have one's pronunciation corrected, as well as more of the grammatical structure.
I suspect that different people have different ways of learning things. When you look at all the immigrants everywhere - the UK, the US, Switzerland, anywhere- who speak the language of their adopted country fluently: they are often waiters or in menial jobs, not academics. You don't need some special aptitude. It's like learning pretty much anything: practice and determination are all that are required. I could probably learn to walk a tightrope, if that's what I really wanted to do. Language learning comes down to a) vocab b) grammar c) accent - making the right sounds When you know the words, the way they should hang together and how to pronounce it all easily, then fluency is just achieved (like playing a musical instrument) with practice until (like driving a car) you don't have to think about it much, or at all. Everyone translates in their head to begin with, but to get fluent, you have to jump over this stage. You end up just thinking in the language concerned. Might sound tricky stuff, but it isn't. It's just practice. If you do enough of it, you end up dreaming in several languages (or at at least two, from experience). However, learning lists of words and doing grammar drills is not an interesting pastime. Sad, but true. What makes language learning fun is the exercise of power. As you develop the skill, it is the using it that is fun and provides the motivation to learn more, so you have to work out ways from the off where you are going to be able to try out your thing. Frequent Easyjet short hops perhaps? Cost almost nothing if booked well in advance. Or meeting the foreign nationals down the pub. The pub is a great place (if you're not driving) as after a couple of pints you will be friends with everyone and not concerned about all the mistakes you are making. The pint glass will be half full, not half empty. It is well known that people's language oral skills move up several grades after a couple of drinks. In order to keep up my Spanish post university (and I have never spent any real time there) I got a subscription to La Moto where I read all the bike news in Spanish. This is fairly incomprehensible at first, but you get out the dictionary and find out that cigüeñal is a crankshaft. As this sort of vocab appears again and again, you soon learn it. I picked up all the relevant French vocab in the same way - reading Moto Journal and Moto Revue on a weekly basis (even had a star letter published once in Moto Journal - but that's another story). Now I come to think of it, I should be reading German bike mags - at least occasionally - for the same reasons - Motorrad or something. I never did German at school. I did do some night classes once, but it really came on in leaps and bounds when I had to use it every day in my job to speak to the reps, some of whom spoke nothing else at all, so it was all win as far as I was concerned - any information imparted at all and bugger the accent and the grammar. I did rather reach my limit when I had to give a whisky seminar, including production processes, in German to about 40 fee-paying Swiss Germans. Frightening. But the thing is, I like speaking German - or any other language. A Swiss German hi-fi rep came into the shop yesterday. He spoke pretty good French, but when he could see I was happy speaking German to him, he spoke quite a lot of it to me. That definitely deepened a relationship that could be useful in the future. I would think that the biggest hurdle is self-consciousness, especially for English people. You don't want to make a fool of yourself. Well, just ask yourself when was the last time you spoke to a foreigner trying to speak English to you and you had the impression he was making a fool of himself? Right. Pretty much never. So just get on and do it and don't worry about it. The glass may be only 1/8th full, but it's better than nowt and it isn't 7/8ths empty.
If you want to learn Italian, go to the toilets in a Frankie & Benny's. They play some sort of 'listen and repeat' system of learning Italian over the speakers and it's actually very good.
Used my pigeon French earlier today in France when we ordered lunch, the waitress seemed surprised that I bothered and was then ultra friendly and what arrived was what we ordered, so a result all round!
im currently lerning Spanish via the Michel Thomas courses. i went to night school too last year, but i learnt more in a few days using the Michel Thomas courses than i did throughout the entire night school course..the advantage of school is that you can interact with other students. Ive heard pimsleur is ok, but do some research online and you'll find the Thomas courses are the most regarded..Personally i think Rosetta Stone is rubbish and an absolute rip off..the Thomas course is fun, and youre the third student (he teaches two real students on the audio, and you join in and also learn from the students mistakes). He also offers so much useful advice during the lessons..its great. Another tip ive tried is to try and read a spanish paper, gradually trying to increase my vocab..a lot of words can be guessed, and in spanish, literally thousands of words can be converted from english to spanish just by putting on a spanish accent, and altering the spelling for written material..ie English pronounciation would be "political situation"..the spanish would be "politi-cal situ-athion" etc. Also i can highly recommend the BBC's free online language courses...theses are interactive dramas over 22 episodes with tests throughout..really good fun. ive just read Glidds advice some great info there, and he obviously knows what the hell he is talking about!
