presentation about learning second language

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Explaining Second Language Learning

This is the slide presentation on explaining second language learning for master students in Teaching English as a Foreign Language Programme. Department of English Faculty of Letters National University of Laos

Related Papers

The Modern Language Journal

Claudia Gutierrez

Applied Linguistics

This book, a follow-up to the editors’ successful guide to second language (L2) teacher education (Burns and Richards 2009), is a clear and concise introduction to the research and scholarship across 36 topics related to learning English as an L2. Although the title indicates that the focus is on English, because many of the authors discuss L2 learning and second language acquisition (SLA) more generally, the book should find an audience with scholars who are interested in research on learning other languages as well.

Alexandria, VA: TESOL Press. ISBN 978-1-945351-04-4

Michael Lessard-Clouston

Second Language Acquisition Applied to English Language Teaching offers teachers of English language learners an overview of second language acquisition (SLA) theory while allowing readers to reflect on their own classroom practices. It defines SLA, outlines how it helps teachers understand their roles and those of learners in their classes, and introduces major concepts and issues. The book argues that input, output, and interaction are essential for English language learning and teaching, and touches on questions of age, anxiety, and error correction. Finally, SLA Applied to ELT encourages readers to use teaching materials that reflect SLA principles and explains what the field of SLA offers practicing English teachers, including encouragement. The book is written in a straightforward, easy-to read style, complete with reflection questions so that busy teachers can apply what they are reading to their own classroom teaching. As such, it’s a must have for any teacher who wants to understand student learning better so that they can teach their English language students effectively. [Note: The attached file includes the Table of Contents and a sample of Ch. 5.]

Lina Mukhopadhyay

Course Description The course will begin with a historical perspective on English Language Education (also commonly referred to as English Language Teaching) from ancient days of teaching the language like other classical languages as Greek and Latin up to the 21 st century trends. Basic principles and procedures of the most recognized and commonly used approaches and methods for teaching English as a second (or a foreign language) will be presented. These are the Grammar Translation Method, Direct Method, Audio-Lingual Method, Communicative Language Teaching, Content-Based Instruction and other alternative approaches. Each approach or method will be discussed in terms of their theoretical orientation, teaching practices and learning activities designed to reach the specified teaching goals and learning outcomes. Candidates will examine and analyze the teaching methods and compare whether the methods reflect similar or opposing views of language learning principles. Through course readings and sample video lessons, candidates will reflect on what constitutes language use, and the role of teacher and learners in each of the teaching methodologies. The analysis will help them to gain a fuller understanding of the principles and practices behind the choices teachers make regarding particular methods. In all, the course will enable learners to look for the rationale for the different techniques that have been used in the course of language teaching history and learn to critique the practices and materials designed to teach English and many unresolved issues in the domain. The course will not espouse any particular approach to second language teaching but rather present an overview of the many approaches to teaching second and foreign languages.

Syeda Bukhari

Lazaros Kikidis

Mark Feng Teng

Firda Bachmid

Language and Education

Nicole Ziegler

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These are the benefits of learning a second language

In the US, just 20% of students learn another language. Image:  REUTERS/Christian Hartmann

.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo{-webkit-transition:all 0.15s ease-out;transition:all 0.15s ease-out;cursor:pointer;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;outline:none;color:inherit;}.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo:hover,.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo[data-hover]{-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;}.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo:focus,.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo[data-focus]{box-shadow:0 0 0 3px rgba(168,203,251,0.5);} Sean Fleming

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Stay up to date:.

There are many advantages to learning a second language. Some are fairly obvious. If you find yourself lost in a foreign country, being able to express yourself clearly could help lead you to your destination. Similarly, if your job requires you to travel you may find it easier to vault language and cultural barriers.

But there are other benefits that are not so immediately apparent. For example, learning another language could improve your all-round cognitive ability. It could help hone your soft skills, and even increase your mastery of your mother tongue, too.

Some studies have apparently identified a link between being multilingual and fending off the onset of dementia . Others indicate that being able to speak more than one language can help you become better at multitasking in other aspects of your daily life, too.

Deciding on which additional language or languages to learn is often a matter of chance and personal preference. Maybe you have a parent or grandparent who is a native of another country, so you were brought up being able to speak their language. Perhaps your family regularly took vacations in a particular foreign country when you were a child and that sparked your interest. Or it could just be that you had a very engaging teacher who instilled in you a love for languages.

But deciding whether to learn one at all would appear to be determined more by your mother language than anything else. In short, native-born English speakers are far less likely to learn a second language than many other people.

In the US, just 20% of students learn a foreign language . Meanwhile, in parts of Europe that figure stands at 100%. Across the whole of Europe the median is 92%, and is at least 80% in 29 separate European countries investigated by Pew Research. In 15 of those 29, it’s 90% or more.

Down under, around 21% of people can use a second language , although only 73% of Australian households identified as English-speaking in the 2016 census. In Canada, only 6.2% of people speak something other than the country’s two official languages , English and French.

Have you read?

These are the world’s most spoken languages, our language needs to evolve alongside ai. here's how, here's why we like some words more than others.

In the UK, fewer school students are studying languages to exam levels at ages 16 or 18. Since 2013, the numbers of studying a language at GCSE level – the end of secondary schooling examination taken by most 16-year-olds in England, Wales and Northern Ireland - have fallen between 30% and 50%. Scotland has its own exam system but the drop off in language study is comparable.

The UK has a long-standing tradition of teaching French and German at secondary school level, although not always with tremendous success: Brits are not famed for their multilingual skills. However, the popularity of both those languages has plummeted in UK schools. Less than 20 years ago, just 2,500 students were taking a language other than French, German, Spanish or Welsh – which is a mandatory curriculum requirement in Wales. But by 2017, according to numbers acquired by the BBC, that had shot up to 9,400.

Two languages that are growing in popularity in the UK are Spanish and Chinese, the BBC found. Chinese, of course, is the most widely spoken language in the world. However, in the online sphere it’s a close second to English. Online, English is used by 25.4% of people. For Chinese, it’s 19.3%. Both are way ahead of third-placed Spanish which is used by 8.1% of internet users.

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The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

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How to learn a second language: A comprehensive guide

Learning a second language involves understanding how its sounds, words, and grammatical patterns are used to express meaning in different situations. Second language learning is a long journey that has many stages, but can be extremely rewarding: studies have shown that knowing two or more languages can slow cognitive decline . What’s more, knowing a foreign language also looks great on your resume! However, it can take a long time to go from a beginner to an expert language user. The time it takes to become fluent in another language partly depends on which language you choose to learn, as some will be easier than others. But even if you’re learning an easy language, you’ll probably run into problems at some point in the language-learning process. That’s why you should know what to focus on when learning, what factors affect the learning process, and what myths about language learning are floating around out there. At the end of the day, learning a second language is a great way to learn about a new culture, and a fun way to spend your free time. And since these days there are so many tools you can use to learn a second language (like the Mango app !), there’s no reason not to give it a try!

So where should you start? Well, with the Mango Languages Guide to Learning a Second Language, of course! The guide you’re about to read is designed to be a roadmap for your language-learning journey. We’ll talk about what goes into language learning, give you some tips and tricks for how to learn a language quickly, and answer common questions about the language learning process. We’ll also point you toward additional resources that will help you along the way.

You’ve got some work ahead of you, but we promise the view from the other side is worth the climb!

Table of Contents

What are the different parts of a language.

There are two main parts of a language: language structure and language use. The structure of a language includes its vocabulary (words), grammar (rules to put words together), and pronunciation (sounds and ways of putting sounds together). Language use, on the other hand, refers to how you use your knowledge of language structure to understand and express meaning in the real world. Knowing a bit more about these parts will help give you an idea of where to start with language learning!

Speaking is another big part of using a second language. And perfecting your pronunciation is just one part of speaking; you’ll also need to learn to have a conversation! This can be difficult since different cultures might have very different expectations about things like, “how to be polite” and “how to take turns when speaking”. They may also have different ways of using physical behaviors (e.g., gestures, eye contact) to communicate meaning. And of course, to really sound fluent in conversation, you need to learn to use filler words like “um” or “so” or “y’know”.

So as you can see, language is made up of a lot of different parts that need to be applied in the real world. And if this seems a little intimidating, don’t worry! In the next section, we’ll give you some tips to help you learn and practice everything we’ve just mentioned!

What should You Focus on When Learning a Second Language?

When learning a second language, you should focus on studying the structure of the language (vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation) and on figuring out how to use those structures in the real world. Let’s take a look at how you can best approach each of these.

Language Structure

Learning new words is one of the most important things to focus on when learning a second language. Why? Well, studies have consistently shown that learners who know more words are more fluent speakers . A great way to increase your vocabulary size is through reading or listening to something that you find interesting and can mostly understand. This could be a book you find at the library, a magazine you pick off the shelf, or a TV series on a streaming service that catches your eye. In fact, it doesn’t matter what you choose as long as you try to maximize your exposure to second language words! Producing language (speaking, writing, or signing) can also help you increase your vocabulary size because if you want to use words that you don’t know, you might be motivated to look them up. Chatting with native speakers and keeping a diary in your target language are great activities that can promote this behavior. You can also make and study flashcards using pre-made lists of important vocabulary.

Once you learn the basic meaning(s) of a word, you will also need to figure out how that word is used in the real world. This means that you’ll need to learn the different aspects of a word, like how it sounds or is written, what other words it relates to, and how it’s used in context. While you’re likely to pick up on some of this information just by using your second language, you can help yourself learn even faster if you use strategies and study habits that help you organize and remember information about new words. Check out our post, “14 Easy Ways to Improve Your Vocabulary Skills” if you’re interested in learning more!

You’ll also need to focus on grammar to learn a second language. The grammar of a language refers to the rules that speakers use to put words together. Grammar gives us information about how words are related to one another and about how individual words can be changed to express different meanings. Learning grammar is often emphasized in foreign language classrooms, and for good reason: Studies have shown that instruction can improve grammar skills , and that grammar is a key part of becoming a skilled reader, writer, listener, and speaker .

In general, there are 2 main ways to learn second language grammar: implicitly and explicitly. Implicit grammar learning happens when you pick up on a rule without realizing it, typically while you are using your target language (e.g., reading, having a conversation, etc.). Explicit grammar learning, on the other hand, happens when you are aware of the fact that you are learning. This may involve intentionally memorizing a rule and practicing it again and again until you have it down pat. Implicit and explicit learning are both important parts of improving your grammar skills, but for different reasons. If you learn a rule implicitly, you may eventually be able to access and use it automatically. However, this process can take a long time, and may still result in mistakes from time to time. Explicit grammar learning, on the other hand, is quick, effective, and can help you notice how rules work. This could in turn help you be more accurate when using the rule. However, if you exclusively focus on explicit grammar learning, you may have trouble becoming a fluent language user, simply because you may not have enough experience using the rule. Thus, to fully develop your second language grammar skills you’ll need to learn both explicitly and implicitly! You can read more about implicit and explicit learning in our post from our Science Behind Language Learning Series, “ Can I learn a language without trying? ”

Pronunciation

Pronunciation is another key part of language structure to focus on when learning a second language. Improving your pronunciation involves becoming familiar with the phonemes (i.e., individual speech sounds) and phonology (i.e., how sounds should be combined) of your target language. Learning how to pronounce phonemes could be a difficult task, depending on how similar your target language is to your first language . For some languages, you might have to learn entirely new ways of moving your mouth, lips, and tongue.

If you’ve ever tried learning Spanish, for example, you may have found it difficult to make the rolled “double r” sound (called a “trill”) in the words arroz ( " rice " ) and perro ( " dog " ) . For other languages, you might simply need to adapt movements you already have in your first language. For example, the “r” sound in Japanese (called a “flap”) is very similar to how American speakers pronounce the first “t” in the phrase “get out”.

You can learn the phonemes of your target language through explicit study (e.g., using information from the internet or a textbook), or better yet by actually practicing producing them. Some good activities for practicing phonemes include reading aloud and studying the mouths of native speakers .

In addition to learning phonemes, you’ll also need to learn about how they change depending on what sounds come before or after them, or where they are in a word. For example, did you know that there’s a different “t” sound in “top,” “cat,” and “kitten”? (Go ahead, try it!) You’ll also have to focus on other phonological rules like stress (which parts of a word or sentence to emphasize), rhythm (the time between syllables), and intonation (how to properly change the pitch of your speech). Some good activities for practicing the phonological aspects of your pronunciation include shadowing (i.e., listening to and imitating the way someone speaks), transcribing and analyzing speech, and even singing songs.

It may sound surprising, but listening activities are also a great way to improve your pronunciation. Some speech researchers have even suggested that you won’t be able to pronounce new sounds until you are able to perceive them ! We recommend the following listening-for-pronunciation activities:

Talk with native speakers so that you can hear how they pronounce different words and compare your own pronunciation. The Mango voice comparison feature is great for this. It lets you record samples of your own speech and see how they align with that of a native speaker!

Watch TV series or educational YouTube videos in your target language and see if you can pick up on pronunciation patterns.

One thing to keep in mind is that having an accent does not mean that you have bad pronunciation. In fact, in the United States alone, there are at least six different regions with millions of people who speak in different accents. Besides this, second language speech researchers have shown again and again that people can still understand you even if you have an accent! Above all, it’s important to set realistic goals for pronunciation learning. So try to focus first on being understood instead of sounding like a native speaker!

Language Use

Focusing on how language is used is a key aspect of learning a second language. This means learning how to read, write, listen, and speak in that language. Although each of these skills develops differently, you will need to master all four if you want to reach an advanced level of language proficiency. Read on more to find out how you can become a master of language use!

Learning to read in your target language is an important part of becoming a skilled language user. Reading is one of the best ways to increase your exposure to new words and grammar, and is a fun activity to boot. To learn how to read in your second language, you’ll first need to become familiar with the writing system of your target language. This may be easy or difficult, depending on whether this system is similar to the one in your native language. For example, if your native language is English, you would have an easier time learning to read Dutch , whose alphabet and spelling are very similar to English, than learning to read Arabic , which uses an entirely different set of letters and rules for combining them. Luckily, most textbooks offer some information about the writing system of your target language, and there are tons of online resources available.

Once you learn about how your target language is written, you can start working towards becoming a fluent reader. Fluent readers are able to quickly recognize words, connect them with each other, and relate the message they express to what they already know. The first of these three processes is particularly key to focus on. One way to become better at recognizing words is to make word learning a part of your study plan. For example, try using flashcards to memorize the written form of words and set up a regular time to quiz yourself. This can help make sure that you’ll be able to spot words when you see them in context. Another way to build your sight vocabulary is to simply read something in your target language every day. And if you’re just starting out, don’t worry—you can start small and work your way up. Try reading a short passage from a textbook, a news headline, or even just a few text messages. Eventually, you can move on to reading short stories or novels written for native speakers!

There are a number of other steps you can take to accelerate your development as a reader. For instance, you can try reading the same book in two different languages to compare how sentences are translated. Or, you can discuss what you’ve been reading with a friend who shares your language and reading interests. You can find more tips like this in our article on how to improve your reading skills in a second language . Why not have a look?

Learning how to write is another important aspect of mastering language use, even if you only want to have conversations. When you write in your target language, you’re actually practicing stringing words together (i.e., using grammar rules), which can actually help you form sentences in speech . Writing can also help you identify gaps in your ability to express yourself fluently, and lead to language growth. As with reading, you need to learn the writing system of your target language to learn how to write it. If you are learning an entirely new writing system, try practicing writing the letters of the alphabet (or characters) by hand or typing your language on a computer.

Once you’ve learned the writing system of your target language, you can start to write to practice your language skills. The simplest way to practice writing is to pick a topic you like and put your pen to the page (or your fingers to the keyboard!). You could also try keeping a journal, finding a pen pal (websites like InterPals , PenPal World , or Lang-8 are great places to find a pen pal), or starting a blog about your language learning process. Because writing is a slower-paced activity, you can take the time to find the words you want to use to express yourself. And if you can’t find those words, you can use an online dictionary like Reverso to fill in the gaps!

Learning how to edit what you have written is another important part of learning how to write in your target language. Try asking a native-speaking friend to make sure what you’ve written is accurate, or simply use an online spelling and grammar checker . Once you get feedback on your writing, it’s important to both apply it and understand it. Ask yourself, “Why was what I wrote corrected?” and “How can I make sure I remember to write it this way next time?” For more, check out our post on tips, tools, and resources on writing in a foreign language .

You’ll also need to develop your listening skills to use your target language in the real world. But becoming a skilled listener can be a challenge, especially if you are just starting out. You might have trouble picking out words, and feel that what you’re hearing is so fast that it goes in one ear and comes out the other. The best way to overcome these problems is to become familiar with the sounds of your target language so that you can recognize words and phrases. But that’s not all it takes to become a skilled listener. You’ll also need to quickly understand how the words you hear relate to each other and to what has already been said.

There are many activities you can do on your own to develop your listening ability. For instance, listening while reading is a great way to learn the pronunciation of words you can recognize by sight. You can also try listening to your favorite podcast while reading a transcript, or watching your favorite TV series with the subtitles on (in your first language at first, but eventually in your target language!). You may also find it helpful to concentrate on getting the bigger picture of what you’re listening to instead of focusing on understanding each individual word. This way, you can practice filling in what you haven’t understood by using what you have understood. If you are interested in learning more, check out some other techniques you can try to improve your foreign language listening skills .

Learning to speak in a clear and natural way is important to focus on, especially if you want to have conversations in your second language. Fluent speakers are able to apply their knowledge of language structure  – so vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation – in their daily lives. This takes time and practice, so you should try to speak in your target language whenever you have the chance. The most straightforward way to access speaking opportunities is to immerse yourself in a country that speaks your target language. But there are plenty of ways to practice speaking in your home country as well. For example, you can grab a coffee with a friend who speaks your target language, or set up regular video chats. Don’t have any friends who speak your target language? No problem! Try setting up a language exchange using a website that helps find people in your area looking for conversation buddies. Having trouble finding anyone to talk with in your target language? You can still practice speaking by talking out loud alone or imitating what you hear while watching your favorite TV series. This can help you get a feel for what kinds of mouth movements you need to speak the language. Be sure to check out our tips on other unique ways to practice speaking in a foreign language .

One good way to accelerate your speaking progress is to practice using memorized phrases (e.g., “Can you please repeat that?”, “Where is the bathroom?) Just open any phrasebook, choose an expression, and say it to yourself over and over again. Then, when you’re out in the real world, try using what you’ve practiced and see how people react. Even if you get it wrong, the feedback you receive could help you know where and how to improve in the future. But since you can’t learn how to speak from a phrasebook alone, you should definitely keep an eye out for any phrases that you hear over and over again in conversation. Make sure you try to memorize these (writing them down helps!) and then experiment with them in your own speech.

If you want to become a really proficient speaker, however, you’ll need to understand when and where it’s appropriate to say certain things. Try observing conversations in different settings (e.g., informal vs. formal) and look out for differences in language use. Ask a native-speaking friend about how to express yourself differently in different settings. Be on the lookout for YouTube channels designed to help explain linguistic and cultural differences! Or better yet, head on over to our post on “ 11 Unique Ways to Practice Speaking a Foreign Language .”

What is the Best Way for Beginners to Learn a Language?

If your goal is to reach advanced proficiency in a second language, you’ll eventually need to master aspects of language structure and language use. But if you’re just getting ready to embark on this journey, where should you start? Well, a good first step is to learn the most common words and phrases in a language, since these are what you’re most likely to run into. To get you started, try downloading a freely available list of common survival vocabulary curated by language researchers, make some flashcards, and practice on a regular schedule. You can also find some children’s books in your target language and start reading as much as you can. Remember: Reading is a great way to learn new words! Apart from vocabulary, you should also start learning the basics of grammar. Find a textbook, take a language course, or better yet, check out the Mango app , which introduces you to the language you need to have authentic conversations in over 70 languages bit-by-bit. Speaking and writing are other great ways to practice grammar, even if you are still just getting your feet wet. Just remember to keep it simple to start with: Try memorizing some basic conversational routines (like greetings and farewells) or writing simple messages to your friends in your target language. And to practice listening, try watching your favorite TV series or movies in your target language with subtitles in your first language. 

One last tip if you’re just starting out: Don’t worry too much about making mistakes. Instead, keep your head up and remember that there are opportunities for learning every time you use your target language, including when you make mistakes ! So get out and start studying!

Now that we’ve taken you through some of the best ways for beginners to learn a language, let’s talk about some burning questions learners often have about second languages. In this section, we’ll give you the short answer to each question, and direct you toward some resources that can help you plan your language-learning adventure.

What are the Stages of Learning a Second Language?

In broad terms, second language learning involves three different stages of proficiency: beginner, intermediate, and advanced. Language educators often use frameworks from CEFR and ACTFL to tell learners at different stages apart. These frameworks describe what language users can or cannot do in a language at each stage of achievement. Generally speaking, learners at the beginner stage can understand the basics of a language and communicate using simple words and memorized phrases, but may not be able to use language independently. Learners at the intermediate stage can generally understand and produce enough language for everyday language needs, but may not be able to handle complex topics and situations. Learners at the advanced stage should be able to understand nearly everything that they read or hear, and should be able to discuss complex topics with ease. 

It’s important to keep in mind that these are just broad descriptions of the different stages of second language learning. Make sure you check out our article on this topic to read more about the standards used to determine language proficiency !

How Long Does It Take to Learn a Language?

How long it takes to learn a second language depends on a number of different factors, including what language you are learning, what methods you use to learn it, and how you measure language fluency. For the easiest languages (those similar to your native tongue), with intensive study, it takes 24 weeks to reach professional working proficiency . (With Mango languages, it can take as little as 8 hours to go up one ACTFL proficiency step!). Harder languages (e.g., Mandarin for native English speakers) may require between one and two years to reach the same level. Keep in mind that these estimates are based on high-achieving, highly motivated adults who are able to dedicate a lot of time to studying — in other circumstances, language learning can take several years, decades, or even a lifetime. Interested in learning more? Mango’s got you covered! Take a look at our article, “ How Long Does it Take to Learn a Language? ”.

What are the Factors that Affect Language Learning?

There are many factors that affect language learning, including:

Your native language

Your personality

How often you study the language

The environment you are learning in

The learning strategies you use

These factors can affect not only how quickly you can learn a second language, but also how proficient you can become in the long run. Other factors which have been shown to affect language learning include your level of motivation and how good your brain is at processing information. Are you interested in learning more about why these factors can matter for language learning? Wondering how you can get these factors on your side? Check out our article on the factors that influence language learning !

What are the Myths about Learning a Language?

As a language learner, you’ve probably encountered quite a few myths about language learning such as, “it’s always costly to learn a language” and “you need to have a great memory to learn a foreign language.” Once you understand the truth behind many prevalent myths about language learning, you’ll have a better sense of how language learning really works. This will allow you to focus your energy on learning your target language in the most productive way possible. Are you asking yourself what other myths might be out there? Head over to our page on the myths of learning a new language  to find out!

What are the Best Sources and Tools to Learn a Language?

There’s no one tool or source of language knowledge that’s going to be perfect for everyone. But let’s talk about some of the most common sources and tools people use to learn a language. We’ll talk a little about the pros and cons of each method, so you can get a better idea of what might work best for you.

Can You Learn a Language from a Course?

You can definitely learn a language from a course. Are you a person who needs a little extra motivation to keep to regular practice schedules? Do you learn best in a social setting? Then a language course might be the right choice for you.

A language course can take different forms:

An in-person group course, of the sort they offer in high schools, libraries, or community centers.

Private, in-person tutoring, where you hire a person to sit with you and practice.

A synchronous online course, where you meet with a teacher or private tutor over video chat.

An asynchronous online course, where a teacher assigns and grades work that you complete on your own schedule.

There are many benefits to studying a language with a course. For example:

With most formal courses you’ll have the hands-on attention of a teacher who can help you organize your learning, model correct language use, and give you feedback.

Language courses are good for people who need something to give them a little external motivation to study. It’s easier to remember to spend an hour practicing your vocabulary when you’ve got an exam next week!

Courses are also a good way to connect with other people during the language learning process. Some people learn better when they’re doing something social!

Some drawbacks to language courses are:

They usually cost money. The cost can vary depending on the type of course you take. If you’re taking a group class at your local library, the price might be quite affordable or even free at the beginner level, but enrolling in university classes or hiring a private tutor might be more expensive.

Depending on the type of course you take, you might have just a few hours of contact with your target language per week. For example, most university language courses meet for about 3 hours per week! That means that unless you’re taking an intensive (high-speed) course, you’ll still have to put in some time practicing at home!

Here are some tips to keep in mind if you are thinking about signing up for a language learning course:

If you can afford it, skip the course and go with private tutoring or live private instruction. The individualized feedback you receive can really help your learning progress.

If you’re looking for cheaper options, many libraries and community centers can connect you with reduced-price language courses, especially if you’re learning one of the more commonly-studied languages in your area.

If you’re having trouble fitting a regular language class into your schedule, an asynchronous class can be a good way to get feedback on your progress and save you some planning effort. It might not get you as much speaking and listening practice, but it can give you some accountability and a chance to receive feedback, so you don’t keep practicing something incorrectly.

Can You Learn a Language Online?

Yes, you can learn a language online. There are lots of resources online that can help you learn a language on the internet. It is very possible to become an excellent speaker of a new language without ever needing to leave the house. We’ve already mentioned online language courses above. Some other helpful resources you can find online include:

Free written articles on grammar and vocabulary

Dictionaries

Video lessons (try searching YouTube!)

Other forms of media in your target language (movies, social media, radio, books, music, podcasts, newspapers…)

Some language learning apps and online programs are free or have free versions to get you started! Does your library provide access to Mango?

Here’s one quick tip for finding the best online language learning resources: Rather than searching for broad terms like “Learn French” try searching for specific resources like “French-English Dictionary,” “Practice French pronunciation,” or “Forming the past tense in French.”

Can You Learn a Language from an App?

An app can be a great way to learn a language. Like other learning methods, apps have advantages and disadvantages. Some advantages of learning a language through an app include:

Apps are one of the best ways to keep yourself practicing your language daily. They usually come with daily goals and study reminders, and can make learning a language feel like a fun game.

Apps are especially useful in teaching you vocabulary and helping you practice new phrases and sentence structures.

Apps can provide you with good exposure to the spoken form of words — but make sure you find an app that using authentic recordings from actual speakers of the language you are learning.

Apps can help you plan your language learning process. An app will introduce you gradually to new skills, vocabulary, and even cultural knowledge!

Apps are often free or inexpensive.

Apps let you learn on a schedule that works best for you. If you have lots of downtime while you work the night shift at a hotel desk, you can study then!

Some disadvantages of learning a language through an app include:

Most apps don’t provide authentic speaking and writing practice. Apps can help you with speaking and writing to a certain extent, but they mostly focus on teaching words and phrases. If you want to practice speaking off-the-cuff you’ll have to supplement your learning with real practice.

Apps aren’t particularly good at correcting your pronunciation. They can model pronunciation and sometimes detect whether you’ve said something entirely wrong, but they won’t be as good of a judge of your pronunciation as a native speaker.

Apps can’t give you rich, customized feedback like a teacher can.

Apps can sometimes fool you into thinking you’re more fluent than you are! You can get to a high level on an app and have very good theoretical knowledge of a language, only to realize that your ability to actually use the language is lagging behind.

Even though an app can be a great replacement for a language textbook, the best way to learn with an app is to complement it with real-life practice.

Can You Learn a Language on Your Own?

The short answer to this question is, yes, you can definitely learn a language on your own! The long answer is that some skills are easy to learn on your own, while others are more easily learned from a teacher or a native speaker.  Apps and online learning tools are great for learning on your own because they can help organize your learning. You can also work through a textbook or a workbook on your own to work on your language skills. And of course, you can learn a language on your own by consuming written or spoken media in your target language.

The one thing that’s hard to do on your own is practicing speaking, or having conversations. For this, you’ll need to find someone to talk to, be it a classmate in a language course or a live tutor. Nevertheless, there are some things you can do on your own that will help you practice speaking naturally:

Record yourself giving a speech in your target language and play it back.

Put on a play with yourself playing both parts, and play it back.

Narrate what you’re doing as you’re cooking dinner as if you’re on a cooking show. Record yourself and play it back.

When you play back your recordings, pay attention to any sounds, words, or grammatical structures that interrupt the flow of your speech. These techniques will help you smooth out your speech for when you’re ready to use your language out in the real world!

What are the Best Practices of Learning a Language?

There are a number of best practices you can follow to optimize your language learning experience. Some of the best practices we recommend include:

Practice a little bit every day. Though you can learn a lot through binge-studying, the best way to keep it in your memory and to help keep that knowledge fresh over time is to spread out your studying and practice!

Practice all of the practical skills you want to have. Just because you have a good vocabulary doesn’t mean your grammar is keeping up. Just because you’re good at reading doesn’t mean you’ll be great at speaking. Just because you’re good at talking about what you did yesterday doesn’t mean you’ll be great at giving a formal presentation for work. You need to practice the skills you want to build! If you don’t sound perfect on your first try, you’re in good company! Keep practicing!

Expose yourself to real-world use of the language you’re learning through immersion. How people use a language “in the wild” in their own country is quite different from how it’s used in a classroom.

Get help from advanced or native speakers when you can! Highly proficient speakers will be able to immediately hear or see your mistakes and can provide you with feedback.

Learning a language is more than just reading a book about the language and memorizing some facts! It’s going to take some practice and you’ll probably have to push through some embarrassment in the early stages, but it’s worth it in the end. Interested in learning more about the best practices for learning new languages in general? Have a look at our articles on the most effective language learning strategies!

What are the Most Popular Languages to Learn?

English is the by far most popular language to learn in the world. More than 2 billion people speak English worldwide , and less than a third of those are native speakers. This means that over a billion people speak English as a second (or third, fourth, or fifth) language! 

The next most common languages people learn (with the number of second language speakers, according to Ethnologue ) are:

Modern Standard Arabic (274 million)

Hindi (258 million)

Mandarin Chinese (199 million)

French (194 million)

Urdu (161 million)

If we’re just talking about what people from the United States tend to learn, though, the list of most-learned languages doesn’t quite look the same. In the United States, the languages people tend to learn (with the number of college enrollments in parentheses) are:

Spanish (712,000)

French (176,000)

American Sign Language (107,000)

German (80,000)

Italian (57,000)

That’s a pretty big difference! People in different parts of the world have different reasons for choosing to study different languages. Want to learn more about how to choose the language you want to study? Check out our article on the best foreign languages to learn .

What are the Hardest Languages to Learn?

The hardest languages to learn are those which are very different from your native language. A language can be harder to learn if it contains unfamiliar vocabulary, grammar rules, pronunciation, and/or writing systems. For example, native English speakers might have difficulty learning:

There are also languages that could be very hard because they belong to an entirely different language family. Some languages that are very hard for English speakers to learn include:

Although these languages can be a bit trickier to learn, they could also expand your language learning skills in ways that will help you learn other languages more quickly in the future! What’s more, because they are more difficult, they may also be in higher demand (think: jobs in the US government). Thus, studying these languages could be a benefit to your future career!

If you’re interested in learning more about what makes a language hard to learn or which languages are hardest for English speakers, check out our article, “ What are the Hardest Languages to Learn? ”

So there you have it! We hope that this guide has been helpful for your exciting journey towards language fluency. And we hope that you make Mango a part of your language learning experience. Be sure to check out the pages we’ve linked in this article if you are curious to learn more about a particular topic. Thanks and so long for now! Au revoir! Chào nhé! Aloha!

Adams R., Nuevo, A. M., & Egi, T. (2011). Explicit and implicit feedback, modified output, and SLA: Does explicit and implicit feedback promote learning and learner-learner interactions? The Modern Language Journal , 95, 42–63.

De Jong, N., Steinel, M., Florijn, A., Schoonen, R., & Hulstijn, J. (2012). FACETS OF SPEAKING PROFICIENCY. Studies in Second Language Acquisition , 34(1), 5-34.

Derwing, T., & Munro, M. (2009). Putting accent in its place: Rethinking obstacles to communication. Language Teaching , 42(4), 476-490.

Flege, J. (2003). Assessing constraints on second-language segmental production and perception. In N. Schiller & A. Meyer (Ed.), Phonetics and Phonology in Language Comprehension and Production: Differences and Similarities (pp. 319-358). De Gruyter Mouton.

Nation, P., & Yamamoto, A. (2012). Applying the four strands to language learning. International Journal of Innovation in English Language Teaching , 1(2), 167-181.

Norris, J. M., & Ortega, L. (2000). Effectiveness of L2 instruction: a research synthesis and quantitative meta-analysis. Language Learning , 50(3), 417–528.

Weissberg, R. (2006). Connecting speaking & writing in second language writing instruction. University of Michigan Press .

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Why You Should Learn a Second Language and Gain New Skills

May 12, 2020

In The News

One of the most practical ways to make use of your spare time nowadays is to start learning a new skill. 

People who always succeed are those who are keen to learn something new every day - be it learning about other cultures or learning a second language.

At Middlebury Language Schools, we are strong advocates for the importance of mastering a second language. Both personally and professionally, being bilingual can bring you several advantages.

In this article, we will break down some of the benefits of learning a second language and why this skill is one of the most overlooked skills in the world.

LEARN A NEW LANGUAGE !

Why is it important to know more than one language

We live in a multilingual world, where connections are now more important than ever. The world is becoming increasingly globalized and knowing a second language can always give you an unfair advantage.

There are tangible benefits to being bilingual:

• It can help you in your career;
• It can improve your memory and brain functions;
• It can help increase your understanding of the languages you already speak.

A second language can drastically change your career. Living in an interconnected world means that more and more jobs are advertising positions where knowing more than one language is essential. 

As more companies trade internationally and create relationships with other countries, employees are often asked to travel for work, enhance these relationships, or be relocated abroad. 

Besides having more chances of landing a good job or advancing in your career, learning a second language can also give you an insight into other cultures. You will be more prepared and confident to travel the world and explore other people’s ways of living.

Lack of integration is a real problem for most countries. More often than not, this is due to the language barrier. People outside of their home countries end up being isolated, hanging out only with people from similar communities where their language is spoken. 

Learning a second language opens up the opportunity for being part of a community with a different culture, and learning more about the world around us. 

Did you know that being bilingual can also help you master your own language? For example, learning a new language with similar roots can help you learn other languages as well. Take Spanish , Italian , and French from one summer to the next!

LEARN MORE ABOUT OUR LANGUAGE PROGRAMS !

What are the benefits of learning a second language

As mentioned before, learning a new language is a wonderful benefit in a globalized world. Let’s have a look at some of the benefits of learning a second language.

1. It improves your memory

The more you use your brain to learn new skills, the more your brain’s functions work. Learning a new language pushes your brain to get familiar with new grammar and vocabulary rules. It allows you to train your memory to remember new words, make connections between them, and use them in contextual situations.

2. Enhances your ability to multitask

Time management and multitasking are two skills that will always help you. Multilingual people have the ability to switch between languages. Their ability to think in different languages and be able to communicate in more than one language helps with multitasking.

3. Improves your performance in other academic areas 

Fully immersing yourself in a language learning environment means not only learning the basics of that language. It means learning how to communicate in another language with your peers or participating in extracurricular activities in that specific language. 

What languages are the most useful to learn? Middlebury Language Schools recommends 3 of our 13 languages

Since 1915, Middlebury Language Schools has been one of the nation’s preeminent language learning programs. 

Whether you’re a beginning language learner or working toward an advanced degree, our time-tested programs offer a range of options and opportunities.

Taking the Language Pledge at Middlebury Language Schools means committing to communicate only in the language of your choice for the duration of the program. You will live, play, and learn in a 24/7 environment. 

We offer a wide range of languages you can choose from. Here are just a few of the languages we offer.

Due to many geopolitical reasons, the Russian language is not very closely related to English. It is a very challenging language to learn, with complex grammar and syntax rules. However, it is an extremely culturally and politically relevant language. 

At the School of Russian , you can experience the most effective method for rapid language acquisition. An immersion environment is a promise that you will read, write, speak, and listen only in Russian throughout the duration of the program. Some of the benefits of learning Russian at Middlebury Language Schools include interpreting poetry, learning about the culture, and mastering the Russian etiquette.

LEARN RUSSIAN !

Arabic has been one of our most popular languages. It is a high demand language because it can get you ahead in a government career, but also give you endless opportunities in business and international relations. 

Arabic is spoken by more than 300 million people and is one of the top 5 most spoken languages in the world. Learning Arabic as a second language can help you learn about the Arabic culture and religion. It not only gives you opportunities to expand your connections, but also offers great travel opportunities. 

A summer at the Arabic School will help you experience the immersive environment on campus. At Middlebury Language Schools, the focus is on Modern Standard Arabic, with optional Arabic language classes in dialects such as Egyptian, Syrian and Moroccan.

Check out our Arabic graduate programs and Arabic 8-week immersion program for more information.

LEARN ARABIC !

A lot of people agree that Spanish is one of the easiest languages to learn, due to the fact that you read words as they are written. Spanish is the most spoken language in the world after English and is used by more than 400 million people. 

Spanish skills can be a strong asset for communicating and creating relationships not only in Spain, but also in Latin America. 

At the Middlebury School of Spanish , you can engage your mind with topics of interest, from Spanish history to arts and cooking. 

Ready to learn Spanish? Check out Middlebury Language Schools’ 7-week immersion program or the graduate programs .

LEARN SPANISH !

Reminders on why you should learn a second language now

We have broken down the benefits of learning a second language and becoming bilingual in a highly globalized world. 

The truth is, learning new skills every day enhances all aspects of your life. By learning new skills, you can increase your career opportunities, find out more about the world around you, and be a better person overall.

We highly encourage you to start learning a new language as early in your life as possible. However, you are never too old to learn! The world moves fast, and we must keep up with the changes - by developing new skills, learning more about ourselves, and also, learning a new language!

ENROLL NOW !

Learning Languages

Learning a language is a complex, time-intensive task that requires dedication, persistence, and hard work. If you’re reading this, then you probably already know that.

What you might not know is that there are strategies that can help you study more effectively, so that you make the most of your time and energy. This handout first explains some of the key principles that guide effective language learning, and then describes activities that can help you put these principles into practice. Use these tools to create a strategic study plan that helps your language skills grow.

Key principles of language learning

The Basics: 

First, let’s talk about the basics. Research in this area (called “second language acquisition” in academia) suggests that there are three key elements to learning a new language.

• The first is comprehensible input , which is a fancy way of saying being exposed to (hearing or reading) something in the new language and learning to understand it.
• Comprehensible output is the second element, and unsurprisingly it means learning to produce (speak or write) something in the new language.
• The third element is review or feedback , which basically means identifying errors and making changes in response. [1]

Fancy terms aside, these are actually pretty straightforward ideas.

These three elements are the building blocks of your language practice, and an effective study plan will maximize all three. The more you listen and read (input), the more you speak and write (output), the more you go back over what you’ve done and learn from your errors (review & feedback), the more your language skills will grow.

DO : Create a study plan that maximizes the three dimensions of language learning: understanding (input), producing (output), and identifying and correcting errors (review/feedback).

Seek balance

Learning a new language involves listening, speaking, reading, writing, sometimes even a new alphabet and writing format. If you focus exclusively on just one activity, the others fall behind.

This is actually a common pitfall for language learners. For example, it’s easy to focus on reading comprehension when studying, in part because written language is often readily accessible—for one thing, you have a whole textbook full of it. This is also true of the three key elements: it’s comparatively easy to find input sources (like your textbook) and practice understanding them. But neglecting the other two key principles (output and feedback/review) can slow down language growth.

Instead, what you need is a balanced study plan: a mix of study activities that target both spoken and written language, and gives attention to all three key principles.

DO : Focus on balance: practice both spoken and written language, and make sure to include all of the three key principles—input, output, and feedback/review.

Errors are important

Sometimes, the biggest challenge to language learning is overcoming our own fears: fear of making a mistake, of saying the wrong thing, of embarrassing yourself, of not being able to find the right word, and so on. This is all perfectly rational: anyone learning a language is going to make mistakes, and sometimes those mistakes will be very public.

The thing is, you NEED to make those mistakes. One of the key principles of language learning is all about making errors and then learning from them: this is what review & feedback means. Plus, if you’re not willing to make errors, then the amount of language you produce (your output) goes way down. In other words, being afraid of making a mistake negatively affects two of the three key principles of language learning!

So what do you do? In part, you may need to push yourself to get comfortable with making errors . However, you should also look for ways to get low-stakes practice : create situations in which you feel more comfortable trying out your new language and making those inevitable mistakes.

For example, consider finding a study partner who is at your level of language skill. This is often more comfortable than practicing with an advanced student or a native speaker, and they’re usually easier to find—you’ve got a whole class full of potential partners!

DO : Learn to appreciate mistakes, and push yourself to become more comfortable with making errors.

DO : Create opportunities for ‘low-stakes’ practice, where you’ll feel comfortable practicing and making mistakes.

Spread it out

Studying a new language involves learning a LOT of material, so you’ll want to use your study time as effectively as possible. According to research in educational and cognitive psychology, one of the most effective learning strategies is distributed practice . This concept has two main components: spacing, which is breaking study time up into multiple small sessions, and separation, which means spreading those sessions out over time. [2]

For example, let’s imagine you have a list of vocabulary words to learn. Today is Sunday, and the vocab quiz is on Friday. If you can only spend a total of 30 minutes studying this vocab, which study plan will be the most effective?

(A) Study for 30 minutes on Thursday. (B) Study for 10 minutes at a time on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. (C) Study for 10 minutes at a time on Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday. (D) Study for 30 minutes on Sunday.

If you look at the total time spent studying, all four options are exactly the same. But research suggests that option C is the most effective way to manage your time: instead of studying the vocabulary all at once, you’ve spread out the time into several shorter sessions, and you’ve also increased the amount of time between study sessions. (And yes, this is also why “cramming” isn’t a good study plan!)

DO : Break up your study time into shorter chunks and spread those sessions out over time.

Bump up your memory

Memory is a critical part of any kind of studying, and effective memorization is strongly correlated with success in foreign language classes. [3] But if you’re not “good at” memorizing things, don’t despair! Although people often think of memory as a fixed quality, it’s actually a skill that you can improve through deliberate practice.

There’s a considerable amount of research on how memory works, as well as a wide range of strategies for improving memory. For example, scientific experiments show that our short-term memory can only hold about 7 pieces of new information at once. So if you’re working on a long list of new vocabulary words, start by breaking it up into smaller chunks, and study one shorter section at a time. Additionally, research also suggests that recall-based study methods are most effective. This means that actively trying to recall information is more effective than simply reviewing information; essentially, self-testing will help you more than re-reading your notes will. [4]

The best way to start working on your memory is to build on the techniques that you already know work for you. For example, if associating a word with a picture is effective for you, then you should incorporate images into your vocabulary practice. However, if you’re not sure where to start, here’s a “beginner” formula for memorizing a new word: use the word at least five times the first day that you learn it, then multiple times over the week, at least once every day.

If you’re interested in more tips for improving your memory, check out our resource on memorization strategies .

In addition to figuring out which memorization techniques work best for you, it’s also important to actively protect your memory. For example, experiencing a strong emotion has been shown to sharply decrease the ability to memorize unrelated content. (So if you’ve just watched a horror movie, it’s probably not a great time for vocabulary review!)

To get the most out of your study time, here’s a list of common “memory killers” to avoid:

Stress and anxiety : Just like other strong emotions, stress and anxiety drastically reduce your ability to make new memories and recall information.

Information overload : Studying for hours at a time might seem like a great idea, but it’s actually a really ineffective use of time. In fact, taking a short break every 30 minutes helps improve focus, and after 2 hours you should consider switching topics.

Fatigue : The more tired you are, the less effective your memory is. Chronic sleep deprivation is particularly detrimental, so those late-night study sessions might actually do more harm than good!

Multitasking : As you may have noticed, all of these “memory killers” are also things that disrupt focus. Multi-tasking is probably the most common source of distraction. In fact, here’s a great rule of thumb for protecting your memory: if you’re not supposed to do it while driving, then you shouldn’t do it while studying. (Yes, that means drinking, texting, and watching Netflix “in the background” are all NOs.)

DO : Increase memorization by breaking information into small chunks and studying the chunks one at a time, and by using recall-based strategies like self-testing.

DO : Focus on protecting and improving your memorization skills, and build the memory techniques that work best for you into your study plan.

Vocab is king

Want to know a secret? Vocabulary is more important than grammar. DISCLAIMER: This does NOT mean that grammar is unimportant. Without grammar, you won’t know how to use your vocabulary, since grammar tells you how to combine words into sentences. And obviously, if you’re in a foreign language class, you’re going to need to study ALL the material to do well, and that will definitely include grammar. The more vocabulary you know, the more quickly you can grow your language skills. The reason is simple: understanding more words directly translates into more input, producing more words means more output, and more output means more opportunity for feedback. Additionally, when you’re interacting with native speakers, vocabulary is more beneficial to communication than grammar is. Being able to produce words will help get your meaning across, even if what you say is not perfectly grammatical. [5]

Of course, in order to become fully fluent in your new language, eventually you will need strong grammar skills. But once again, this is something that having a strong, well-developed vocabulary will help with. Since grammar dictates relationships between words and phrases, understanding those smaller components (aka vocabulary) will help improve your understanding of how those grammatical relationships work.

DO : Design a study plan that emphasizes vocabulary.

Now that we’ve talked about the general principles that you should incorporate in your language study, let’s focus on activities: practical suggestions to help you find new ways to grow your language skills!

Find real-life sources

Since one of the main 3 components of language learning is input, look for ways to expose yourself to as much of the language you’re learning as possible. But this doesn’t mean reading more textbooks (unless your textbook is a fascinating read that you’re excited about). Instead, look for “authentic” examples of the language, things you’ll actually enjoy and look forward to practicing with, even if you don’t understand every word!

Here are some examples to get you started:

Newspaper articles, magazines, & blogs : Many of these are freely available online, and once you’ve tried reading them a few times, it’s easy to translate the key parts to check your understanding. Look for a topic you’re already interested in and follow it with a news reader app!

Books : Children’s picture books and books you’ve read before in your native language are easy options for intermediate/advanced beginners. The library often has great options available for free!

TV shows and movies : Try watching them without subtitles the first time, starting in ~15 minute segments. Another great option is to watch first without any subtitles, then with subtitles in the language you’re learning, and then finally with subtitles in your native language if you need them. Soap operas are also great options (especially if you like lots of drama!), since the plot lines are often explained multiple times.

Songs : Music, especially popular songs, can be especially well suited to language practice, since you’re likely to memorize the ones you enjoy. Ask a teacher or native speaker for recommendations if you’re struggling to find good examples. Children’s songs can also be fun practice tools.

Podcasts and audio books : There are a lot of options for all sorts of languages, and as a bonus you’ll often get exposure to local news and cultural topics. To get you started, we recommend this site , which has a great list of podcasts for many different languages.

Also, consider tweaking some of your media settings to “bump up” your casual language exposure. For example, changing your Facebook and LinkedIn location and language preferences will force you to interact with the language you’re learning, even when you’re (mostly) wasting time.

Improve the effectiveness of this activity by using the following suggestions!

Slow it down : If you’re listening to a podcast or audio book, try slowing down the speed just a bit: 0.75x is a common option, and the slowed-down audio still doesn’t sound too strange. Also, make sure to take breaks frequently to help you process what you’ve just heard.

Combine your senses : In many cases, you can combine types of input to help create a more learning environment: reading and listening to a text at the same time can help you improve your comprehension. For example, for TV shows and movies, turn on subtitles in the same language. Other options include:

• Radio news stories often have both audio and transcripts available online, especially for pieces that are a few days old.
• Amazon’s Kindle offers an “ immersive reading ” option that syncs audio books with text.
• TED talks come in many different languages, and often include an interactive transcript .
• If you’re an ESL student, the ESL Bits website has some great resources that link reading and listening, and it also has adjustable audio speeds!

Get hooked : To make this strategy as effective as possible, find a source that you really enjoy, and commit to experiencing it only in the language you’re learning. Having a go-to program that you love will help keep you motivated. For example, if you love podcast/radio story programs like “Radiolab” and are learning Spanish, check out “ Radio Ambulante .”

Hold shadow conversations

A key part of learning a new language involves training your ear. Unlike written language, spoken language doesn’t have the same context clues that help you decipher and separate out words. Plus, in addition to using slang and idioms, native speakers tend to “smoosh” words together, which is even more confusing for language learners! [6] In part, this is why listening to real-life sources can be so helpful (see the previous activity).

However, even beginning language learners can benefit from something called conversational shadowing. Basically, this means repeating a conversation word-for-word, even when you don’t know what all of the words mean. This helps you get used to the rhythm and patterns of the language, as well as learn to identify individual words and phrases from longer chunks of spoken language. Another great strategy involves holding practice conversations, where you create imaginary conversations and rehearse them multiple times.

Both of these strategies are great ways to help you learn and retain new vocabulary, and they also increase your language output in a low-stakes practice setting!

Example : If you’ve got a homework exercise that involves reviewing an audio or video clip, take a few extra steps to get the most benefit:

• After you’ve listened to the clip once, shadow the conversation in short sections (think ~20-30 seconds). Focus on reproducing the words as accurately as possible, paying close attention to rhythm, intonation, and pacing.
• Once you can accurately shadow the entire clip, then focus on understanding the meaning of the material, and answer any homework questions related to the clip.
• Now, use the same vocabulary to create a new conversation: think of what you would want to say in a real-life situation like this one, and practice it until you can respond confidently to any side of the exchange.

Become a collector

Since expanding your vocabulary is so important, identifying new words is a big priority. This is especially true when you’re in an immersion environment (studying abroad, etc), but it’s also something that you can do on a regular basis even when you’re at home.

Basically, you need to collect words: any time you encounter a new word, you want to capture it by recording it in some way. The easiest way to do this is in a small pocket notebook, but you could also put a note in your phone, send a text or email to yourself, or even record yourself saying it. The key point is to capture the word as quickly and easily as possible. Also, don’t worry too much about spelling or definitions in the moment: you’ll deal with those later.

Whatever your recording system is (notebook, phone, voice memo, etc), it’s only the first part of the collection process. Next, you’ll need to review each of the words you’ve recorded. This is something you’ll do on a regular basis, so that you can actually use the words you’ve recorded. Depending on how many new words you’re collecting, it might be every day, every few days, or once a week. This is the time when you find the correct spelling, write down the definition, maybe find an example, and so on.

To make this process as effective as possible, you also want to have some sort of system that helps you record and organize your word collection. If you like paper-based methods, then flashcards can be easily organized in index card boxes, though you might want to include some alphabetical divider tabs to help yourself stay organized. However, digital tools are particularly helpful with this kind of information, and there are tons of apps that can help you organize a large vocabulary collection. But you don’t need a fancy app or program: a simple spreadsheet also works great for most cases.

Finally, you also want to make sure to use your word collection! Not only do you need to learn new words once you add them, you’ll also need regular review of old words to maintain your vocabulary. This is another place where digital tools shine, since it’s easy to access the entire collection at any time, making it easier to study and review on a regular basis. In any case, make sure that you incorporate review along with learning new words.

The 4 basic steps of word collection

• Capture new words. Listen for them in class, seek them out in conversations, find them in your “authentic sources,” etc. Record them in the moment, without worrying too much about spelling and definitions.
• Review your new words. Establish a routine so that you regularly “empty out” your recording tool and add the new words to your collection.
• Record and organize your collection. Create an organized system for your collection; common tools include digital flashcard apps, spreadsheets, and traditional index cards.
• Use your words! Make sure you’re learning new additions and also periodically reviewing older words.
• If you’re struggling to find new words to collect—or if you feel overwhelmed by the number of words you could collect—then try working “backwards.” Instead of looking for new words in the language you’re learning, think about the gaps in your vocabulary. For example, think about the topics you frequently discuss in your native language. Do you know how to talk about those things in the language you’re learning? Hobbies and other classes are often great places to start.
• If you’re in a foreign language class, you can use the same word collection system to help you learn and review assigned vocabulary. Consider color-coding or tagging words that are class-related if you want to give those words extra attention. If you’re using a digital flashcard app, you might consider creating different card “sets” to help you organize them.

Flashcard zen

Flashcards are one of the most common tools that language learners use. There is a good reason for this: they’re easily portable, they’re excellent for learning short pieces of information (like new words), and used correctly they’re a great recall-based study strategy. However, flashcards are not without problems. For example, it’s far too easy to devote excessive time to making elaborately detailed flashcards, and then spend comparatively little time actually using them! The following tips describe ways to use flashcards in a strategic and effective manner.

Less is more

The more time you spend making flashcards, the less time you spend using them…but if you don’t make flashcards, then you don’t have any to use. The point behind this paradox is that you want to minimize the time and effort you put into the flashcard set-up process. This is a situation where perfectionism can really harm you: if you focus on making absolutely “perfect” flashcards, then you’re really just wasting time.

Similarly, you also want to minimize the volume of information you put on each flashcard. Flashcards should not be pages of notes in a smaller format, especially when using them for vocabulary. Instead, each card should have just enough information on it to test your memory. Instead of containing many details, a good flashcard will serve as a “cue” that triggers your memory. This way, you’re forcing your brain to work to produce the information, which helps build and maintain strong memories.

Another common flashcard issue is that they promote rote memorization, so that information is divorced from context. But in real life, you’ll be using your vocabulary in a wide range of contexts. Only practicing vocabulary in rote drills may end up slowing you down when you need to actually use the words. [7]

One example of this is the “translation” phenomenon: instead of learning to associate new words with their meanings, they become associated with the word in your native language. If you’re always translating word-for-word in your head, then it takes much longer to understand and interact. A great way to reduce this issue is to change the type of cues used on your flashcard: instead of written words, you might represent the meaning of new words with a picture—or for digital flashcards, you could even use audio files.

Example : Imagine a beginning student (and native English speaker) learns that the Arabic word for door is “bab” (باب). She could make several different flashcards for this word:

• Traditional flashcard: the written word in Arabic on one side, and in English on the other
• Audio flashcard (digital): the spoken Arabic word on one side, and the spoken word in English on the other
• Pictoral flashcard: a picture of a door on one side, and the word written in Arabic on the other

You can also combine these types to make different hybrid-style flashcards. Once again, don’t try to make elaborate, perfect flashcards—just something that will push you to associate words with meanings, instead of just their translations. Not all of your flashcards have to use non-written cues, but it’s a great way to add variety and prevent “translation” memory.

Additionally, make sure to practice using both sides of the flashcards as cues. In other words, if you’ve already gone through a set of cards starting with the English side, flip the stack over the next time you use it, so that you’re getting prompted by the language you’re learning.

You can also avoid the pitfalls of rote memorization by making sure to practice using the words in context. For example, in addition to testing yourself with each card, follow that up by using the word in a sentence. This is particularly good for words you’ve already learned and are now reviewing. You can also turn this into a game, where you make up “mad-lib” style sentences by randomly drawing cards and combining them. If you’re working with a partner or study group, you can also use flashcards to play games like charades or Pictionary.

Make it a habit

Ultimately, flashcards are just a tool, albeit one that is ideally suited to vocabulary practice. And as with any kind of practice, the more time you put in, better your results will be: flashcards work best when used frequently and consistently. If you want to get the most out of your flashcards, turn using them into a regular habit. Here are some tips to keep in mind:

Small sets, many reps : To improve memorization when practicing new words, create sets of 7 flashcards or less and practice each set several times before moving on to the next one. Also, make sure to space out your flashcard sessions, and once you’ve reviewed a set of words, put it aside for a day or two before reviewing it again.

Increase portability : Make sure you take full advantage of the portable nature of flashcards. If you’re using paper, then consider using a binder ring and hole punch to keep small sets together. You might also use smaller cards: since you’ll be making simple cards (minimalism!), you could probably cut a regular 3”x5” index card into halves (or even quarters) and still have more than enough room! Even if you use full-sized paper cards, you increase portability by being selective in the number you take with you. Remember, you want to space out your sets and reps, so it isn’t necessary to carry all your cards with you all the time. If you’re using digital tools, look for apps that can sync to all your devices—phone, tablet, computer, web, etc.

Wasted’ time : Since flashcards are so portable, they’re a great way to turn “wasted” time into useful time. How much time do you spend riding the bus? How about stuck in line at the grocery store, or waiting for an appointment at Campus Health? Instead of checking your Twitter feed or hopping on Facebook, open up your flashcard app (or pull out your flashcard stack) and do a quick vocab review. If you’re doing small sets it won’t take very long to go through one, and you’ve just bumped up your number of reps for the day! Create a routine : Habits are powerful. Once you’ve established a behavior pattern, you find yourself doing it without thinking about it. So think about how you can create a daily routine for using your flashcards. Finding and using “wasted” time is a good start, especially if you have a daily bus commute. What about taking 5 minutes every morning to do vocabulary review while you drink your coffee? Or making it your first “after-dinner to do” once you’ve finished eating? Once you find ways to make vocabulary flashcards part of your daily routine, you can use the power of habit to help grow your vocabulary.

Periodic review : Once you’ve learned new words, you’re not done with those flashcards—instead, use them to keep your vocabulary strong. Each week, randomly select a few words to review. You might do a review set once each day, or the review words can be mixed in with your current learning sets (this is a great way to keep your word collection going strong!).

Make it fun

Learning a new language is a lot of work, but that’s not what motivated you to start studying it in the first place, right? Instead, you probably want to travel or work abroad, or be able to talk with people from other countries, maybe even study literature or history… Whatever got you interested in this language in the first place, it’s probably a lot more fun than all this studying is.

Here’s the thing: whenever you can do something that connects you back with the reasons that motivate you to study your new language, or you find something new and exciting about the language you’re studying or the cultures that use it, use your excitement to boost your motivation. It’s what will keep you going—and that kind of persistence is a key factor in language learning success. [8]

But in addition to staying focused on what you enjoy, you can also deliberately create fun social activities that also help you grow your language skills. For example, try hosting a dinner and movie “theme” night with friends who are studying the same language. Create a “mini-immersion” environment: watch movies in the language you’re learning, cook some authentic cuisine, and try to speak only in your new (shared!) language. It’s a great way to get some authentic, low-stakes practice. (Plus, it’s a great excuse for a party!)

Parting advice

In addition to this handout, there are lots of resources to help you with your language learning goals.

• If you’re in a language class, your professor, TA, and/or other instructors often have great advice for study strategies—in addition to their teaching experience, at one point they were learning a new language, just like you are!
• Check out what the language department offers: perhaps there is a peer tutoring program, or conversation tables (aka “language coffee hours”), or cultural events that can be great authentic sources for practice (and fun motivation boosters ). Language departments often have online resources as well, so be sure to check out their websites.
• Look for other campus organizations that offer language learning resources, such as global studies and student groups.

UNC language departments, programs, and curricula

• Department of Asian Studies
• Department of African, African American, and Diaspora Studies
• Department of Romance Studies
• Department of German and Slavic Languages and Literatures
• Curriculum in Global studies

Works consulted

Murphey, T. (1998). Language hungry!: An introduction to language learning fun and self-esteem. Japan: MacMillan Language house.

Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K. A., Marsh, E. J., Nathan, M. J., & Willingham, D. T. (2013). Improving students’ learning with effective learning techniques promising directions from cognitive and educational psychology. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14(1), 4-58.

Brown, H. D., & Gonzo, S. T. (1995). Readings on second language acquisition. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall Regents.

O’Malley, J. M., Chamot, A. U., & Küpper, L. (1995). Listening comprehension strategies in second language acquisition. Readings on second language acquisition, 138-160.

Oxford, R., & Crookall, D. (1989). Research on language learning strategies: Methods, findings, and instructional issues. The Modern Language Journal,73(4), 404-419.

Nunan, David. Second Language Teaching & Learning. Heinle & Heinle Publishers, 7625 Empire Dr., Florence, KY 41042-2978, 1999.

Son, L. K., & Simon, D. A. (2012). Distributed learning: Data, metacognition, and educational implications. Educational Psychology Review, 24(3), 379-399.

[1] Brown & Gonzo, 1995; Ellis, 1997; Nunan, 1999

[2] Dunlosky et al, 2013; Son & Simon, 2012

[3] Oxford, R., & Crookall, D. (1989). Research on language learning strategies: Methods, findings, and instructional issues. The Modern Language Journal,73(4), 404-419.

[4] Dunlosky et al, 2013

[5] Murphey, T. (1998). Language hungry!: An introduction to language learning fun and self-esteem. Japan: MacMillan Languagehouse.

[6] Nunn, 1999; Murphey, 1998

[7] Nunan, 1999; Oxford & Crookall, 1989

[8] Nunan, 1999; Oxford & Crookall, 1989, Brown & Gonzo, 1995.

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Explaining Second Language Learning

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THEORY OF SECOND LANGUAGE LEARNING

Krashen’s “monitor model” The acquisition-learning hypothesis The monitor hypothesis The natural order hypothesis The input hypothesis The affective.

Second language learning

Second Language Acquisition

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How Languages Are Learned 4th edition Patsy M

Theories of Second language Acquisition

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Explaining Second Language Learning I

Constructivism Constructivism — particularly in its "social" forms — suggests that the learner is much more actively involved in a joint enterprise with.

Second language acquisition

Education of English Conversation

Stages of Second Language Acquisition

Main Branches of Linguistics

PROCESSING APPROACHES

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Frontiers for Young Minds

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What are the Benefits of Learning a Second Language?

Bilingualism, which means speaking more than one language, allows a person to communicate with a larger number of people. Some research suggests that speaking more than one language may also improve brain function. We wanted to see whether the relationship between improved brain function and being bilingual differed based on how well or how much a person uses their second language. To ask our question, we recruited a group of high school students who spoke both Mandarin and English. Because speaking two languages is thought to improve how well a person performs on certain tasks, we thought that the students who were better at their second language would have better performance on those tasks. Our findings support the idea that developing your second language, especially if you speak it well, can improve the way your brain functions. Keep reading to learn about our research!

Why Use Your Second Language?

Most people on Earth can speak at least two languages—they are bilingual . Speaking more than one language allows a person to communicate with a larger number of people. Bilingual people have an easier time when they travel to other parts of the world. They can also work and study outside of their home countries. Research shows that both languages a bilingual person speaks are active in the brain at the same time [ 1 ]. This means a bilingual person must inhibit or “turn off” an unneeded language to communicate successfully. The experience of inhibiting an unneeded but active language may actually help the brain by improving a person’s executive function , which is a set of mental processes that coordinate our thinking and behavior [ 2 ] (To learn more about executive function, see this Frontiers for Young Minds article .). Scientists who study this topic call this brain boost the bilingual advantage .

Not all scientists agree that speaking two languages helps the brain [ 3 ]. Even those that do agree are not exactly sure how being bilingual improves brain function. Some claim that bilingual people have better inhibition . In other words, they are better at ignoring distractions like noise when they are having a conversation. Others say bilingual people are better at monitoring , which means they are better at paying attention to their environments. For example, they might be better at noticing when a person switches from using one language to another. The way that speaking two languages improves brain function seems to depend a lot on the person and their individual language experience [ 4 ].

Do People Have Different Language Experiences?

It turns out that bilingual people differ a lot in their language experiences including how well they use their languages and how much they use them. For example, a teen from China who speaks Chinese (Mandarin) and English might never use English in their home country. However, they would use it a lot if they attended school in the UK. Bilingual people in the same city also differ a lot in their language habits. A Mandarin-English bilingual person studying in the UK might have a group of friends who always speak Mandarin, while another might have more diverse friends and may communicate in English more often. We wanted to see if these differences between bilingual people influenced executive functions. This means we had to find a way to measure language experience.

How did we Measure Language Experience?

There are many ways to measure language experience. We used a survey called the Language History Questionnaire [ 5 ]. This survey requires a person to answer questions about each language they use. These questions ask things like how well the person can speak, listen, read, or write in each language. The survey also asks how many hours each day the person uses a language. This survey gave us three separate scores that we used to measure language experience: 1) proficiency —how well a person can speak, listen, read, or write in a language; 2) immersion —how long a person has used or been exposed to a language, and; 3) dominance —how often a person uses a language. Together, these scores allowed us to describe a person’s language experience in a lot of detail.

How did we Measure Executive Function?

To test for differences in executive function, we used two popular tasks. The Simon task requires a person to press a button as quickly and accurately as possible when a certain color shape is shown on a screen ( Figure 1 ). For example, a person might be told to press the “Q” button on a computer keyboard with their left hand when they see a brown square, or the “P” button with their right hand when they see a blue square. What makes this task tricky is that the shapes are shown on either the left or right side of the screen. This means that sometimes a person will have to press a button with their right hand when a shape is on the same (right) side of the screen. These congruent trials are easy. However, sometimes a person will have to press a button with their right hand when a shape is on the left side of the screen. The conflict between the side of the screen the shape is on and the response key makes these incongruent trials more difficult. The flanker task is similar to the Simon task, only the conflict is due to a center arrow pointing in the opposite direction of the four surrounding arrows ( Figure 2 ).

• Figure 1 - (A) On the Simon task, students had to press the left button when a blue square appeared.
• This is easy when the square is on the same side as the button. (B) However, this task is harder when the square is on the opposite side as the button! Dashed lines show the response button location.

• Figure 2 - (A) On the flanker task, students had to press the left button if the center arrow was pointing to the left.
• This is easy when all the arrows face the same direction. (B) However, this task is harder when the center arrow is pointing in the opposite direction from the other arrows! Solid lines show the information the student needed to pay attention to, and dashed lines show the information that may help (A) or distract (B) the student.

How did we Answer our Question?

We worked with an international high school in Southern China to conduct our study. This school is special because all the students are native Mandarin speakers, but all their courses are taught in English. We recruited 41 students between the ages of 13–19 and had them complete a few tasks on the Internet. First, each participant filled in the Language History Questionnaire and answered other questions about how often they play video games or musical instruments. Next, they completed the Simon and flanker tasks in random order. Even though these tasks are very similar, studies like ours normally ask people to do more than one task to see if the results are the same. Finally, the students answered a few questions about their stress levels. For each task, we measured how quickly students gave their responses, and whether their responses were correct or not. We included video game and musical instrument experience as well as other variables like age and stress in our analyses to control for their influence on task performance. This helps us to be sure that the results we see have to do with language experience and are not due to other factors.

What did we Find?

Our results were different for each task and each measure of language experience. On the Simon task, higher English proficiency was related to better inhibition, even when we controlled for the influence of other variables ( Figure 3 ). This means students with better English ability were faster on the more difficult, incongruent trials. In other words, they were better at inhibiting the automatic response of pressing the button that matched the side of the screen the shape was presented on. When controlling for other variables, we found the same result when we looked at the number of hours people spent playing musical instruments. This means playing an instrument might further improve inhibition. For the flanker task, higher English proficiency was related to improved monitoring. This means students with higher English proficiency were faster on congruent, incongruent, and neutral trials. In other words, they were better at monitoring the task in order to identify which response was appropriate.

• Figure 3 - (A) Higher English proficiency was associated with better inhibition (faster responses on incongruent trials) on the Simon task.
• (B) Higher English proficiency was also associated with better monitoring (faster response on all trial types) on the flanker task. The colored lines represent the trial types. The blue lines show the difficult, incongruent trials. If we conducted our study again, we are 95% confident that our results would be somewhere in the shaded area around each line.

Surprisingly, students who reported using English more were slower on the flanker task. We did not expect to see this! We think this finding might mean that people using English more are trying to improve their proficiency and might pay more attention to the words they use—which would slow them down. However, this is just our best guess. We will need to conduct another study to see if our guess is correct. Finally, our results were a little different between the Simon and flanker tasks, even though these tasks are very similar. This finding also requires more research because it suggests that these tasks might be measuring slightly different things.

Why Are Our Findings Important?

Our results show that developing proficiency in a second language may improve executive function. We also saw additional improvements in executive function from playing musical instruments. This suggests that bilingualism is just one of many possible experiences that can benefit the brain. These findings are important for young people, especially those in bilingual homes. Sometimes, children do not feel like learning their family’s home language. This might be because it is not the language that the child uses when they go to school. More research is needed to better understand the benefits that using a second language has on the brain. This is especially true for high-school-age bilinguals because only a few studies have been done. We hope that our results highlight the potential benefits of learning a second language. While becoming bilingual is not easy, it is likely worth your time and energy. Who knows? You might even make a new friend!

Bilingual : ↑ A person who can use at least two different languages.

Executive Function : ↑ A set of mental processes, like updating, inhibition, and monitoring, that coordinate a person’s thoughts and actions.

Bilingual Advantage : ↑ A benefit in brain function from speaking two languages.

Inhibition : ↑ Component of executive function that helps people ignore distractions.

Monitoring : ↑ The ability to pay attention to the environment.

Congruent : ↑ Trials where there is no conflict between the stimulus and the response such as a flanker task trial where all arrows are pointing in the same direction.

Incongruent : ↑ Trials where the stimulus and the response conflict such as a flanker task trial where the center arrow is pointing in the opposite direction as the surrounding arrows.

Variable : ↑ A characteristic, like language proficiency, that can change and be measured.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Original Source Article

↑ Privitera, A. J., Momenian, M., and Weekes, B. S. 2022. Task-specific bilingual effects in Mandarin-English speaking high school students in China. Curr. Res. Behav. Sci. 3:100066. doi: 10.1016/j.crbeha.2022.100066

[1] ↑ Kroll, J. F., and Bialystok, E. 2013. Understanding the consequences of bilingualism for language processing and cognition. J. Cogn. Psychol. 25:497–514. doi: 10.1080/20445911.2013.799170

[2] ↑ Friedman, N. P., and Miyake, A. 2017. Unity and diversity of executive functions: individual differences as a window on cognitive structure. Cortex. 86:186–204. doi: 10.1016/j.cortex.2016.04.023

[3] ↑ Paap, K. 2019. “The bilingual advantage debate: quantity and quality of the evidence,” in The Handbook of the Neuroscience of Multilingualism , 701–35.

[4] ↑ Privitera, A. J., Momenian, M., and Weekes, B. 2022. Graded bilingual effects on attentional network function in Chinese high school students. Bilingual. Lang. Cogn . 1–11. doi: 10.1017/S1366728922000803

[5] ↑ Li, P., Zhang, F., Yu, A., and Zhao, X. 2020. Language history questionnaire (LHQ3): an enhanced tool for assessing multilingual experience. Bilingual. Lang. Cogn. 23:938–44. doi: 10.1017/S1366728918001153

Individual Differences in Second Language Learning: the Road Ahead

• Published: 07 October 2021
• Volume 45 , pages 237–244, ( 2021 )

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• Wen-Ta Tseng 1 &
• Xuesong (Andy) Gao 2  

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Introduction

In the past few years, several special issues on individual differences (IDs) in language learning have been published in the field of language education [ 6 , 17 ], Oga-Baldwin, Fryer, & Larson-Hall [ 24 ]. These publications range from a broad scope of theme collections to a specific focus of topic modeling. For instance, the contributions to the special issue edited by de Bot and Bátyi feature a wide range of IDs constructs including age, aptitude, attitude, and motivation. On the other hand, the contributions to a more recent special issue edited by Oga-Baldwin et al. focus on language learning motivation as modeled and interpreted through a diverse lens of mainstream motivational theories such as expectancy-value theory, self-determination theory, personal investment theory, and goal theories. A much more recent special issue edited by Gurzynski-Weiss places a predominant emphasis on the investigation of the dynamic nature of individual differences in L2 learning. The empirical studies featured in these three special issues not only point to the ongoing and enduring commitment collectively embraced by IDs researchers, but also underline the challenges concerning whether IDs in language learning should be structuralized or systematized with reference to exclusively one particular theoretical framework or dual conceptually distinct yet implicitly complementary theoretical underpinnings. To elaborate, unlike IDs constructs such as anxiety, aptitude, or willingness to communicate, which receive relatively few conceptual challenges, research on both language learning motivation and language learning strategies (LLS) has undergone different stages of transitions regarding the theoretical frameworks behind the two IDs constructs [ 1 , 29 ]

Language Learning Motivation

The major theoretical transition in L2 motivation is featured by moving from operationalizing L2 motivation via a social-educational modeling approach to adopting a self-based viewpoint to modeling L2 motivation (e.g., [ 31 ]). The central construct underlying the social-educational model refers to integrativeness or integrative motivation , whereas the pivotal factor underlying the L2 self model refers to ideal L2 self . Despite attempts over the years to reinterpret or even replace integrativeness with ideal L2 self, as theorized by Dörnyei and his associates, it is important to note that the two conceptually distinct L2 motivational models receive equal credits from academia. Over the years, the fundamental discrepancy regarding theoretical underpinnings between the two L2 motivational models has become even clearer. As Gardner [ 16 ] critically remarks:

Cognition and affect are parallel systems. One is not superior to the other… The L2 self is a cognitive model while that of integrative motivation is an affective one… Their utility is in the validity of the models, not in their superiority over others (p. 226).

A decade later, Dörnyei [ 13 ] also explicitly recognized the theoretical divide between the two L2 motivation models:

[T]he type of identification adopted in the L2 Motivational Self System – identification with a projected future image within the person’s self-concept, rather than identification with an external reference group such as the L2 community as was the case with the notion integrativeness – can serve certain purposes (p. xx).

After nearly 30 years of numerous rounds of theoretical debates and empirical testing, readers interested in L2 motivation research can finally obtain a clear picture that integrative motivation and ideal L2 self are in actuality isomorphic and complementary. This is especially true concerning the pragmatic valences in describing and explaining learners’ motivated language learning behaviors. Integrative motivation and ideal L2 self also differ in essence both in origin and by target, leading Claro (2020) to suggest that “the ideal L2 self cannot replace integrativeness” (p. 253). Dörnyei [ 13 ] also expects to see a wave of “renewed vibrancy” (p. xxi) in bringing integrative motivation back to the spotlight. As expected, one of the aims of the present Special Issue is to respond to the urgent call to action that has yet to be answered in the two prior IDs special issues.

Language Learning Strategies

The other aim of the present Special Issue is to address a similar research controversy which has remained in the field of LLS for more than 15 years. Interestingly, analogous to the debate over the concept of integrativeness and integrative motivation, the criticisms levelled against LLS are mainly twofold: one centers around the definition of strategies , and the other revolves around the validity of the rating scale structure underlying Oxford’s [ 28 ] Strategy Inventory of Language Learning (SILL) [ 8 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 32 ]. As with the case of L2 motivation research, Dörnyei and Skehan argued that the operational definitions of learning strategies theorized by Oxford [ 27 , 28 ] and O’Malley and Chamot [ 25 , 26 ] tended to be “inconsistent and elusive” (p. 608). Dörnyei [ 12 ] took a bold step to equate learning strategies to “idiosyncratic self-regulated behaviour” (p. 183). Critically, Dörnyei never shows any substantial empirical evidence to prove learning strategies are idiosyncratic at all, and nor does Dörnyei ever theorize why strategies should be conceptualized as behavior rather than as technique or influences in the way he defines motivational strategies [ 9 ]. For instance, Dörnyei ([ 9 ], p. 28) defines motivational strategies in the same paragraph as “techniques that promote the individual’s goal-related behaviours” and “ those motivational influences that are consciously exerted to achieve some systematic and enduring positive effect [ emphasis original],” respectively. Following these two definitions, it is clear that Dörnyei equated strategies to techniques and influences, but not to behavior. It is by no means clear and consistent as to why techniques can be equivalent to influences in an operational sense. Following this line of thinking, it seems fair to say that the unjustified criticisms such as “inconsistent and illusive” thrown onto learning strategies may become equally relevant and valid to motivational strategies. In this way, should motivational strategies be likewise considered idiosyncratic as in the case of learning strategies? Furthermore, Hadfield & Dörnyei [ 19 ] created the term achievement strategies to refer to “study techniques that can be used across a range of tasks to improve learning” (p. 146), and on the same page further argued that it was imperative that learners be introduced to the “techniques that might help them to work more productively, getting them to discuss and evaluate these and finally selecting those that work best for them” (p. 146). Notably, it is clear that Dörnyei also formally associates strategies with the construct of learning achievement, which by definition is equivalent to the concept of learning strategies. When taken together, a careful review of Dörnyei’s work on motivational strategies published between 2001 and 2015 seems to show that Dörnyei has been forbidding others to do what he is doing himself. Two sets of standards might have been applied to learning strategies and motivational strategies respectively, the constructs of which are, to a certain extent, interrelated.

Dörnyei [ 10 , 11 ] further introduced the term self-regulation , a term which he argues is more capable of reflecting the concept of strategic learning. In particular, he proposed a five-factor model to indicate the possible underlying construct of self-regulatory capacity of language learning. The proposed five-factor measurement model was initially sent into empirical testing in English vocabulary learning [ 32 , 33 ] as an attempt to complement SILL, which is in principle operationalized by behavioral items. Indeed, the call for the paradigm shift has received enormous attention from the field and raised practitioners and researchers’ awareness of the divide between the quality and quantity dimensions of strategic learning. Over the years, it has been observed that the coexistence of strategy use (the quantity dimension) and proactive control of strategy use (the quality dimension) have greatly advanced readers’ understanding of the underlying theoretical underpinnings of strategic learning. The empirical findings of gender differences have shed light on how the two complementary forms of strategic learning may become integrated to support brain study. The effect of gender differences on strategy use started to draw researchers’ attention with the rise of SILL in the 1990s [ 14 , 18 , 30 ]. Notably, in their very large-scale empirical study ( N  > 1200), Oxford and Nyikos [ 30 ] noted that females reported more frequent strategy use than males on a latent factor called formal rule-related practice strategies . This strategic factor greatly capitalized on learners’ cognitive ability to analyze and understand the linguistic codes and rules of a target language. In another study, Ehrman & Oxford [ 14 ] further found that females also reported more frequent strategy use than males on metacognitive strategic behaviors such as checking, monitoring, and planning one’s learning performance. Importantly, the findings of significant gender differences in both cognitive and metacognitive strategy use in these early primary studies provide indirect yet critical support for the later findings uncovered by functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) techniques [ 2 , 20 , 22 ]. Overall, females showed a stronger and wider response than males not only in the amygdala, which is responsible for emotional regulation, but also in the prefrontal cortex areas, where cognitive processing and higher order mental functioning such as planning, monitoring, and problem solving occur [ 3 ]. The above discussion suggests that the quantity dimension of strategic learning as operationalized by SILL can offer diagnostic information regarding gender differences in cognitive and metacognitive functioning in the task of language learning.

On the other hand, Tseng, Liu, and Nix [ 34 ] developed and validated an instrument to tap into the quality dimension of strategy use (i.e., the proactive control of strategy use) in language learning: Self-Regulatory Control Scale for Language Learning (SR lang ). Unlike what Dörnyei [ 10 ] has hypothesized, a four-factor measurement model consisting of boredom control , awareness control , goal control , and emotion control was procured. Importantly, the naming of the four factors was essentially theories-referenced, rather than intuition-guided, which allows for the inferencing of gender differences in the proactive control of strategy use in language learning. In their second phase of validity study, Tseng et al. employed latent regression modeling to further check the way in which gender difference would modulate learners’ control of strategy use over the four dimensions in SR lang . Results indicated that females had significantly stronger and better proactive control of strategy use than males in boredom control, awareness control, and emotion control, but not in goal control. Essentially, because boredom control and emotion control are intrinsically associated with emotion regulation [ 4 , 21 ], the neurobiological function of which the amygdala is responsible for. Sensibly, therefore, Tseng et al.’s findings can be credited with being significantly, indirectly notwithstanding, convergent with those by fMRI [ 2 , 20 , 22 ], in which the responsive magnitude in emotional regulation was directly observed in the brain and more active in females than in males. Critically, the foregoing discussion further suggests that the quality dimension of strategic learning as operationalized by SR lang may provide useful information concerning gender differences in emotional regulation in the task of language learning. In sum, the recent research findings based on fMRI studies clearly suggest that both the frequency component and the control component of strategy use can be considered complementary regarding their theoretical value in depicting and explicating gender differences in strategic learning of a language.

Introducing the Special Issue

The orthodoxical stance of learning strategies, as well as the unique empirical significance of the two complementary forms of strategy use, has yet to be articulated and showcased in prior special issues. To address the research gap, therefore, the second aim of the present Special Issue is to inform and update readers in a timely manner of the academic merits which have been historically built-in, but have yet to receive sufficient justice from the field. In total, the current Special Issue features 7 articles which offer a balanced report and insightful update of empirical research in relation to L2 motivation and LLS research. The first section includes three articles addressing the research on L2 motivation. The first article (Kim & Shin) examined the mediating role of integrative motivation in the causal link between self-efficacy and English achievement in a Korean sample. Through the aid of the bootstrapping technique, Kim and Shin found that the mediating effect exerted by integrative motivation was significant and meaningful. Kim and Shin’s research findings suggest that learners’ affective identification with the L2 community group works in synergy with learners’ cognitive belief of how well they can achieve in studying a foreign language.

The second article (Cheng) in the first section investigated the effects of grit and L2 self on willingness to communicate (WTC) in a Taiwanese sample. In Cheng’s study, the scale targeting grit—passion of and persistence toward a specific ultimate goal—was conceptualized by two dimensions: consistency of interest (COI) and persistence of effort (POE). The instrument measuring L2 self was operationalized by four factors: Ideal L2 self own , Ideal L2 self other , Ought-to L2 self own , Ought-to L2 self other . By using hierarchical regression modeling, Cheng found that three types of L2 self-images (ideal L2 self own , ideal L2 self other , and Ought-to L2 self own ), taken together with grit, could jointly exert explanatory power over WTC. Cheng suggests that both establishing a gritty attitude and shaping an ideal L2 self vision carry equal weight in sustaining L2 motivation.

In the third article of the first section, Soltanian and Ghapanchi approached L2 motivation from the viewpoint of “investment,” a concept that views L2 learning as an entity of social practice. Soltanian and Ghapanchi’s study explored the factors that might affect Iranian EFL learners’ investment through a qualitative inquiry. The results of their study revealed that the economic, social, cultural, and symbolic capital jointly influenced varying degrees of Iranian EFL learners’ willingness to learn English. The reason for including a paper which focused on investment is that both investment theory [ 7 , 23 ] and Gardner’s [ 15 ] socio-education model underlined language learners’ connections to the social world they live in.

The second section of the present Special Issue contains the other three articles with a focus on strategic learning. The first article (Nathan et al.) was featured by constructing a systematic review of the core components of LLS research conducted in Taiwan. Upon an extensive, thorough search of literature via numerous databases, Nathan et al. successfully extracted 100 empirical studies eligible for systematic review. The 100 primary studies were analyzed based on three evaluation criteria: (a) contexts and participant characteristics; (b) theoretical-conceptual aspects; and (c) methodological characteristics. The researchers observed that, as a whole, there was a pendulum shift from a predominant adoption of survey tools to a more diversified deployment of multiple research approaches and recognized the shift as positive. Nathan et al. suggest that situating LLS in a social-politically unique context (i.e., Taiwan) helps move the research on LLS ahead in an even more global context.

In the second article of the second section, Haga and Reinders investigated the emotional regulation of feedback on language learning in a sample of diverse L1 backgrounds including Bulgarian, Hungarian, Mexican, Polish, and Russian. Haga and Reinders applied dynamic systems theory (DST) to record and systematize a large set of interview data collected from 25 participants. Their findings showed that although participants experienced a wide range of positive and negative emotions, negative emotions could have facilitative effects on language learning, particularly on shaping learners’ multilingual identities. Haga and Reinders suggested that future research needs to be oriented to a deeper understanding of emotions and emotional regulation in language learning.

The third study (Koenig & Guertler) included in the second section conducted a two-phase large-scale consecutive survey study to explore German learners’ thoughts and perceptions of improvement and satisfaction regarding their self-regulated language learning. Sample 1 and sample 2 involved 1646 and 796 participants situated in the German higher educational context. The results of the phase I survey study showed that time investment in self-regulated study could lead to greater language skill improvement. The results of the phase II retrospective survey study further indicated that German college learners had not yet cultivated enough required capacity to self-regulate their language learning strategies. The findings of Koenig and Guertler’s study pointed to the individuality and variations observed at the nexus where the quality dimension (self-regulatory capacity) and the quantity dimension (use of language learning strategies) of strategic learning intersected.

The present Special Issue concludes with an updated critical review of the role of individual differences in language learning and teaching from a complex-dynamic and socio-ecological perspective. This wide lens allows readers to holistically visualize the road ahead of IDs research in language learning. Griffiths featured 11 salient IDs factors considered to be important in L2 classrooms. Based on the results of an empirical investigation with L2 teachers, Griffiths pointed out that motivation and strategy use were ranked as the most important factors and the other factors such as aptitude and gender as at least somewhat important. The findings led Griffiths to suggest that there is a need for future research to take a holistic approach to advance the understanding of the potential interplay among the 11 salient IDs factors in language learning.

To conclude, we believe the 7 articles collected in this Special Issue have made unique yet valuable contributions to the field of IDs research in language learning. Upon the publication of the Special Issue, we hope that researchers and practitioners alike can be enlightened in a timely manner by the theoretical clarifications critically needed in the field. Readers should look forward to not only renewed, but also heightened vibrancy regarding innovative applications and integrations of different IDs factors deemed to be significant and critical in the field of language learning.

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Tseng, WT., Gao, X.(. Individual Differences in Second Language Learning: the Road Ahead. English Teaching & Learning 45 , 237–244 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42321-021-00097-z

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The Great Read

The Foreign Language That Changed My Teenage Son’s Life

I worried about his ability to fit in. But then he fell in love with Russian — and on a trip to Central Asia, he flourished.

The writer Paul Tough and his son Max. Credit... Gueorgui Pinkhassov for The New York Times

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By Paul Tough

• March 17, 2024

Even as a little kid, my son Max had a way of immersing himself in the subjects he cared about. The first one I can remember was Thomas the Tank Engine. Max had a hand-me-down wooden train track set up on a low platform in our living room, and at age 3, he would spend hours toddling around the outside, pushing trains and telling made-up stories, lost in the world of Thomas and Percy and Gordon. “Hamilton” came next, the soundtrack on repeat in the car for months, then a brief but intense dive into Mixels, a discontinued Lego collection, and then another into a Roblox game called Bee Swarm Simulator. With each one, Max would go deep, finding satisfaction not just in the playing but also in the experience of plunging himself into a new and unfamiliar world and mastering all of its contours.

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When he wanted company on these journeys, I was often the one who went along. I logged serious hours by his side, shunting wooden trains onto sidings and leading my digital bees on a search for pollen. I hunted down old Lego packs for him on eBay and took him to Washington to see the Jefferson Memorial. I occasionally would try to steer him away from the video games and toward the history books, but mostly it didn’t matter what I thought. His interests were his interests, and he explored them the way he wanted, not the way I did.

There was a part of me that felt proud of his deep dives, but if I’m being honest, they often made me uneasy. When you’re a kid, knowing a ton about obscure subjects can be an early sign of intellectual curiosity, but just as often, it can be a symptom of misfiring neurons, an omen of future mental struggles. Sometimes the child who can tell you everything there is to know about dinosaurs or baseball statistics or the solar system grows up to be a groundbreaking scientist or a brilliant entrepreneur. Sometimes he just grows up to be a guy who never moves out of his parents’ basement.

As Max got older, his explorations grew more solitary, which led me to a new worry: that his interests were pulling him away from his fellow humans rather than toward them. (To protect his future privacy, I’m calling him by his middle name in this article.) Max was always a shy kid, slow to warm up to new people and content to spend long stretches on his own. The pandemic, which hit when he was 10, didn’t help. Academically, remote school worked out fine for Max, but socially, it added to his isolation. When in-person classes began again, he kept to himself more than ever, quiet behind his mask. At home, with his family, he was thoughtful and funny and quick, telling stories and asking endless questions. But when he got to school in the morning, it was like a curtain came down between him and the world.

A new subject came along in those pandemic years to once again capture his imagination: birds. Who knows why? Maybe creatures that could fly and soar were an appealing notion during endless lockdowns, or maybe birds were just another vast universe for him to map. In Texas, where we live, there are 47 species of warblers alone, each with its own markings and songs and migration patterns to analyze and commit to memory. Max borrowed bird books from the library and lay in bed reading them, absorbing facts and patterns, gathering arcane knowledge. He hung out on nature websites, posting photos and trading IDs with birders many times his age. He walked through fields at dawn, binoculars in hand. Once again he descended (or maybe ascended, this time), and once again I followed him. We spent many weekend mornings together walking beside the lagoons at our local sewage-treatment plant, looking for ruby-crowned kinglets and crested caracaras.

I liked too that bird-watching connected him with other people. Mostly people in their 60s and 70s, sure, but still: people. We joined our local Audubon chapter and went on group hikes through local cemeteries and nature preserves. While everyone else watched birds, I watched Max. When he and I were out in the world together, I felt that it was my job to serve as his translator, speaking up for him when he seemed shy or tongue-tied, nudging him forward when he was hanging back. Among his fellow birders, though, he began to find his own way into conversations, sharing sightings, asking for help with identifications, weighing in on the distinctions between cliff swallows and cave swallows. On the way home in the car, he would talk to me about birds, and I would talk to him about people: why they like eye contact, what questions you can ask them if you want to keep a conversation going. My work as a translator sometimes went both ways.

Over Christmas break when he was 12, Max’s curiosity led him in a new direction: He started learning Russian. I don’t know why he chose Russian, and if you ask him, he doesn’t have a good answer, either. Our family is not Russian. We don’t have any Russian friends. It’s possible that the absurdity of the pursuit was exactly what appealed to him about it. Whatever his motivation, he began practicing on a language app for an hour a day, sometimes more, and by New Year’s, he knew all the Cyrillic letters, every backward R and N. In a few weeks, he could recite simple sentences. My wife and I would walk past his room and hear him repeating Russian phrases into his iPad in a low monotone. It was like living with a 12-year-old spy. He biked to the main library downtown and took out a Russian dictionary, and then biked back a week later for a book of Russian grammar and a history of the czars. Another deep dive was underway.

That fall, Max enrolled in a Russian-language school that met on Sunday afternoons at a Methodist church in Northwest Austin. Apart from Max, the students were mainly children of recent Russian immigrants, and for them and their parents, the school was a way to keep their culture alive in an alien land. Each week their tribe would gather, a few dozen blond, round-faced children playing chess and practicing Russian penmanship, while the parents set up steam tables and sold each other piping hot piroshkis, reminiscing about Moscow winters while sheltering from the blazing Texas sun.

During the week, in his regular school, Max was still keeping a cautious distance from his classmates, but in Russian school, he was a different person: friendly and confident, speaking up in class (in Russian), chatting up the other kids in the hallway (in Russian). At the end of each Sunday, he would emerge from the church doors wearing a shy smile.

Driving him home one Sunday afternoon, I asked him to help me understand this mystery: Why did he feel so much more comfortable among the students at Russian school than the ones at his actual school?

He replied, without a hint of irony, “Because they’re more like me.”

I didn’t see how that could possibly be true — but somehow it felt true to Max. Was it their gloomy Slavic fatalism? Their love of borscht? Or was it that they, like Max, spent their days trying to find their way in a strange and foreign land, a place whose customs sometimes seemed bizarre and impenetrable?

I still had my worries, as I always did when Max descended into a new realm, but this time did seem different, as if Russian might be taking him toward human connection rather than away from it. He discovered that his English teacher at school was born in Belarus and asked her if they could start meeting once a week to speak Russian together. She introduced him to Russian poetry and literature, and soon he was heading back to the library for books by Anna Akhmatova and Mikhail Bulgakov. He found a Russian conversation hour at the University of Texas and began to show up on campus once a week to play Cyrillic Scrabble with a handful of undergrads on the couches outside the Slavic Studies department. Walking one day through the Austin airport, he peeled off from our family when he heard someone speaking Russian. We found him at the Tacodeli next to Gate 23, deep in conversation with a family of Kazakhs.

Max and I began to talk vaguely about taking a trip to a place where he could try out his Russian for real. I had never been particularly drawn to the countries of the former Soviet Union, but as we talked, the idea of a trip grew on me. If spending his Sunday afternoons speaking Russian made Max feel more alive and less alone, what would it be like for him to be surrounded by the language? In the back of my mind was the fact that Max was now 13, the age when young men and their fathers often begin to pull apart, and I didn’t want to miss our last chance for an adventure together. The war in Ukraine had made it impossible for us to think about visiting Russia or Ukraine or Belarus. But Estonia had plenty of Russian speakers, Max informed me, and so did Georgia.

Then one afternoon, he peered at me from over the top of a world atlas. “What about Uzbekistan?”

A few months later, there we were, riding into Samarkand from the airport in a $4 taxi. Dawn was breaking, and Max was staring out the window at the minarets and minimarts and Soviet-era apartment blocks, a big grin on his face, translating the Russian-language shop signs for me.

“I can’t believe we’re really here,” he said, turning to me. “Are you seeing all this?”

In the past, flying would sometimes bring out Max’s anxious side, but arriving in Uzbekistan seemed to produce in him a deep sense of calm. He looked relaxed and content, certain that here in this ancient, foreign, rundown city, nothing could possibly go wrong.

I, by contrast, was distracted by thoughts of everything that could go wrong on this trip, and indeed, by what already had. The airline had managed to leave my suitcase in Houston. Also, my iPhone screen seemed to be cracked, and I was thousands of miles from the nearest Apple Store. Also, the only person I could turn to for help was 13 years old.

From the beginning, it seemed a little risky, this idea of traveling halfway around the world to a place where I couldn’t speak to anyone but Max. The reality was that he and I often drove each other crazy. We argued a lot. The enthusiasm he showed when he was mastering a new subject could quickly turn into frustration when things didn’t work out exactly right. Early in his Russian studies, he realized he couldn’t roll his R’s properly, and he spent many angry hours staring at his tongue in the mirror, trying to will it into a Slavic trill, furious at its lazy Western ways. He didn’t like talking about the intense feelings he sometimes experienced, so instead, at home, he would take out his anger on me or his mother or, more often, on his little brother, which would spark my own fury. My temper was just as short as his, and neither of us liked to back down. Our blowups were sometimes followed by icy silences that could last for days.

Things were better, usually, when we went on trips together. When it was just the two of us, our disagreements and the stress we caused each other would recede. Max was curious about everything, and when we were driving, or stopped somewhere for dinner, he would grill me about our friends or our extended family or about the Cold War or how the stock market worked. He was a keen observer of whatever was around us — not just birds, but also people and billboards and menus — and if I was lucky, he would share his insights and oddball theories with me. Those hours, when our guard was down and we were just trading stories and making each other laugh, were some of my favorite moments.

So, together we planned a two-week trip with an itinerary that would begin in Samarkand and include stops in Tashkent, Uzbekistan’s capital, as well as Almaty, the biggest city in neighboring Kazakhstan. On his last day of middle school, I picked Max up in an Uber, and we went straight to the airport.

Our flights from Austin to Samarkand took a total of 24 hours, and I spent the time either sleeping or in a state of agitation. Usually when Max and I traveled together, I felt responsible for him, not just in the standard keep-your-kid-alive sense, but responsible for his mood, for his mind, for his emotional well-being. On this trip, somehow, our roles had reversed.

“Everything is going to be fine,” Max told me.

That was supposed to be my line.

But it soon became clear that Max was right. Everything was, in fact, fine. In Samarkand we had booked rooms in a $45-a-night guesthouse at the back of a courtyard off a dusty side street. Our neighborhood, packed with low buildings and small shops, was known as the Russian Quarter, and it dated back to the era when the czars ruled Samarkand from St. Petersburg. We arrived to find chickens pecking in the yard next to us and a stray kitten at the door who wanted to follow us inside. Everything smelled good.

After dropping off our backpacks, we set out to explore. The city was still waking up, children holding hands on their way to school, shopkeepers sweeping the sidewalk. Max bought us some bananas from a corner market and ordered me a coffee from a curbside cart with “Chicken Shazam” written on the side, and we walked to the Makon Mall, a former Soviet department store transformed a few years ago into a five-story shopping center full of cellphone stalls and clothing shops.

I needed to replace my travel wardrobe, which was still in Houston. At the Terra Pro store (official slogan: “Everything What You Need”), Max urged me to buy a T-shirt that said on the front, in large English letters, WHAT IS GOING ON? I declined. Pants were a separate issue. I quickly learned, looking through the sales racks, that Uzbek men like their trouser legs tight and clingy. I do not. Long conversations ensued between Max and various salesmen, all of them pointing at my legs, puzzled expressions on their faces. Apparently there is no term for “relaxed fit” in Russian.

Gradually, though, my new Uzbek outfit took shape, and Max and I spent the next two days poking around the back streets of Samarkand, wandering through museums and parks, eating grilled meat and boiled dough. Max loved Samarkand, with its odd juxtapositions of old and new, East and West: a shop selling traditional Uzbek headscarves and skullcaps next to a children’s store called Baby Boss, the sign out front topped with the smirking blond infant in a business suit from the movie “Boss Baby.” Wherever we ventured in the city, Max was drawn to whatever seemed most foreign, strangest, hardest to translate.

I had heard Max speaking Russian a few times before we set off on our trip, but only in brief snatches: chatting after class in the hallways of the Methodist church; ordering our meals on the rare occasions we managed to find a Russian restaurant in Texas. In Samarkand, at first, his conversations in Russian sounded halting and uncertain to my ears. As our trip wore on, though, he grew more confident, and before long he was speaking, at length, with everyone — mosque attendants, taxi drivers, money-changers, booksellers, strangers on trains. In Tashkent, I watched from a distance as he haggled with a variety of vendors at the sprawling Chorsu Bazaar. For a few dollars, he scored us a half pound of almonds, a bag full of delicious red cherries and a fresh, warm lepyoshka, the region’s traditional flat round loaf of yeasty bread.

It wasn’t easy for him to do all that talking. He was clearly stretching the boundaries of his Russian language fluency, as well as his comfort with face-to-face human interaction. But I could tell he was pleased he could communicate so well in this new place — and pleased too that I could not.

“Does it ever bother you,” he asked me one morning as we set off on our day’s wanderings, “that you’re the spitting image of a tourist?” It hadn’t, until that moment. It seemed pointless, to me, to try to pass as a local, but Max was determined to fit in, carrying nothing with him while we walked, cringing whenever I pulled out a guidebook or a camera. Uzbeks and Kazakhs have a distinctive ethnic look, their faces shaped by China, their neighbor to the east, as much as by Russia, their neighbor to the north. Max, with his round face and soft features, seemed as if he might belong. I lost count of the number of people who asked him if he was a Kazakh or an Uzbek.

Max’s teenage Russian did occasionally lead us into difficulty. In Tashkent, we visited the Central Asian Plov Center, a huge restaurant devoted to the national dish of Uzbekistan, a savory mixture of ingredients that can include meat, rice, carrots, raisins and chickpeas. The plov at the Plov Center is cooked for hours on giant round metal pans that measure 10 feet across, tended all day by a team of plov masters. Max and I took a table outdoors, where I listened to the calls of the quail suspended in covered cages over our heads while he tried to figure out the menu.

I had told Max that I was game for a culinary adventure, but my one stipulation was that I didn’t want to eat horse meat. Our waiter came by, and after a long conversation with Max involving lots of pointing, he left and returned with two plates piled high with plov, plus the tomato salad and lepyoshka that Max ordered.

It looked delicious, except for a suspicious-looking dark oval of pressed meat in the center of each plate. I asked Max to ask what it was. The waiter returned, and Max interrogated him.

“Is there meat from horses?” he asked in Russian.

Nyet, the waiter replied.

“But is there horse’s meat?” Max went on. “Meat of horse?”

“What is this meat here?” Max indicated the dark oval.

“Konina,” the waiter answered. It was a word Max didn’t know, so he nodded, and then after the waiter left, borrowed my phone to look it up in Google Translate.

“Horse meat,” the phone reported.

I slid my konina onto Max’s plate.

“It tastes oddly familiar,” he said after finishing both helpings. Maybe he’d secretly been eating Uzbek horse meat all his life.

A week later, riding in our rented car through the foothills of Kazakhstan’s Tien Shan Mountains, we decided to stop for fuel. I saw a gas station on the opposite side of the two-lane highway we were on, signaled, turned left and pulled in. There was a brief, loud blare of a siren behind us, and in the rearview mirror, I saw the flashing lights of a Kazakh police cruiser. I pulled over, and a large man in a navy blue uniform approached our car.

I turned to Max. “Get ready to translate.”

I rolled down my window and stared up at the face of authority. Max leaned over me. “My father doesn’t speak Russian,” he said, a phrase that by that time he had had plenty of opportunity to practice. The officer ignored him and continued speaking to me. I had no idea what he was saying, but he seemed angry. Max tried to figure out what I had done wrong, while I pulled out our passports and my international driving permit and handed them over.

The officer spoke quickly and with a thick Kazakh accent, and Max struggled to keep up, but he was able to convey the gist to me: Apparently, it’s illegal in Kazakhstan to make a left turn into a gas station. The penalty for my crime was unclear to Max. The officer kept miming ripping up my international driving permit and throwing my Texas driver’s license away, and Max explained that he was saying that I wouldn’t be able to drive for the next five years. That seemed extreme for a wrong turn, but I recalled that we were in a former Soviet republic known for arbitrary arrests and detentions.

The officer instructed me to come sit in his police car with him, while his partner continued to interview Max back at our car. I know I should have been worried about my 13-year-old son, but I was mostly worried about being separated from my translator. My guy kept talking to me at a rapid pace, which seemed like a bad idea, since I didn’t understand a word he was saying, and he kept miming throwing my documents out his window, which also seemed like a bad idea.

Eventually, Max convinced his interrogator that I was not an enemy agent trying to sow chaos in the Kazakh countryside with my illegal left turns, but instead, just a run-of-the-mill confused foreigner. I promised never to make a left turn again, and they let us go and let me keep my driver’s license.

Later, Max told me he considered this encounter to be one of the best parts of our journey.

Mostly we stayed in cities, but halfway through our itinerary, we spent three nights in a remote guesthouse near the Aksu-Zhabagly Nature Reserve, which is in the mountains along Kazakhstan’s border with Kyrgyzstan. Our sleeping quarters were a yurt, the large domed tent-like structure used for millenniums by Central Asian nomads. There were three other travelers staying in their own yurts that week, all from Paris and all in their 30s — two management consultants, Alan and Elisabeth, who were taking a break from their careers to backpack across Europe and Asia together, and Shahul, a corporate auditor, world traveler and paragliding aficionado.

The Parisians spoke excellent English but knew almost no Russian. The owner of the guesthouse, a Kazakh named Ruslan, arranged hikes for his visitors in the nature preserve, where the rules mandated that we would need to be led by an official park ranger. Those guides spoke Russian, so the Parisians recruited Max as their interpreter, and we decided to hike together.

Our trek the next day was up a river gorge into the mountains that surrounded our guesthouse. It was a beautiful morning, the air cool and clear, the mountains capped with snow. Horses grazed in mountainside pastures. Occasionally we would stop and the ranger would explain something in Russian, and Max would translate for the rest of us. The Parisians were athletic and sturdy, and as we climbed, I grew worried about Max’s stamina. He was not only younger than the rest of us, he was also smaller, and I thought he might have a hard time keeping up. I checked in on him from time to time as we hiked, asking if he needed a break or water or sunscreen, but each time he brushed me off.

That night, as we lay next to each other in our yurt, listening to the metronomic beeping of a Eurasian Scops Owl in the trees overhead, Max spoke up.

“Dad, you have to stop asking me if I’m all right. It’s really annoying.”

“Why? What’s wrong with it?”

“It doesn’t make sense,” he said. “Does Alan ask Elisabeth every five minutes if she’s all right?”

“I guess not.”

“Exactly. Because that would be weird. Just like it’s weird when you ask me.”

Lying there in the dark, I realized that he and I were seeing our situation differently, and not for the first time. I counted our band of hikers to be four mature adults and a child, while he saw us as four young adults and an old man. I did some math in my head and realized that he might have a point: The Parisians were probably closer in age to Max than they were to me.

Though I was tired from our long climb, I didn’t sleep well that night. The bed was hard and the yurt was cold, and I woke up the next morning with a sore throat as well as sore joints. Our scheduled trek that day was along the rim of the Aksu Canyon, a 20-mile drive from Ruslan’s guesthouse. After breakfast, we loaded into a rickety Lada 4x4 and hurtled down rutted dirt roads through wide-open grasslands, not a tree, house or building in sight.

As we began our hike, I was still feeling the effects of the previous day. My throat was raw, and the Achilles’ tendon in my right leg started to ache. I limped along for a few miles, but when we stopped for lunch in the shade of a tree on the edge of the deep canyon, I told Max and the Parisians that they should go on without me and pick me up on the way back.

As I watched Max walk off with a group of foreign strangers into an unknown land, it felt like a glimpse of my future, and his. I was slowing down, and he was speeding up. I spent a couple of hours sitting there on the ridge, watching the swallows and the mountains and looking down at the turquoise waters of the Aksu River. It was the longest I had been apart from Max since we left Austin, and I missed him. It was a little hard to acknowledge that he, almost certainly, did not miss me.

When the group came back into view a couple of hours later, I could see Max and Shahul leading the way, with Alan and Elisabeth trailing behind. After we reunited, the four of them decided to hike down to the river. It was a long, steep descent to the bottom of the canyon, with plenty of tight switchbacks, followed by a long, steep climb back to the top. I knew my ankle couldn’t take it, but I walked down a bit of the way, gingerly, and watched as Max and Shahul descended below me into the lower reaches of the canyon and then disappeared from sight.

In Almaty, Max decided he wanted a haircut. He found a place called City Barber (its slogan, written in English out front: “I am not a hipster”). We stood outside, listening to Ray Charles drifting from the open door, while Max borrowed my phone to look up various hair-related vocabulary words on Google Translate. His Russian thus fortified, he walked in on his own, exchanged a few words with the girl at the front desk and shook hands with a tall, tattooed young man who proceeded to give him a vigorous shampoo. His barber, Max told me later, was a Russian who moved from Siberia to Almaty when the war began in order to avoid the draft. He gave Max what I can only describe as a Russian haircut, clipped close on the sides, puffed up a bit on top.

It was our last evening in Kazakhstan, and Max had a ticket for a play about the famine that struck the country in the early 1930s, killing more than a million people. I bought a ticket for myself as well but didn’t quite feel up to sitting through a long historical drama in a language I couldn’t understand, so I walked Max to his seat and left him there. It was a small, black-box theater, and he was sitting alone, surrounded by Kazakhs. The two rows behind him were occupied by young military cadets in uniform.

Afterward, Max and I met in a coffee shop across the street from the theater, and we decided to walk back to our hotel down one of Almaty’s broad, tree-lined avenues. Almaty is more cosmopolitan and modern than Samarkand, and as we strolled, we passed sushi bars and boutique hotels. When we stopped for a moment to look in a shop window, Max heard some young people behind us speaking English. He ran after them. I watched as he caught up and introduced himself. There were five of them, all in their 20s, all friendly and welcoming, three young women from Almaty and two male teachers visiting from abroad.

We were all going the same way, so we walked together for a few blocks, Max a bit ahead of me speaking Russian with one of the locals, a college student named Assel. I kept an eye on him as we walked, checking to see if he needed help. He didn’t. Thousands of miles from home, speaking a foreign language to a person he’d never met, he looked more rooted and comfortable than I could remember seeing him.

A big part of becoming a teenager is figuring out how to fit in. Sometimes that means papering over the stranger parts of your personality, suppressing your uncommon enthusiasms, but sometimes, if you’re lucky, you find a place where you are accepted despite your idiosyncrasies. I wasn’t sure Max would ever feel entirely at home in the place and time where he was growing up, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t find other places to belong. The next time he took a deep dive into a new realm, I might not be going with him. But I had a feeling he would not be traveling alone.

Paul Tough is a contributing writer for the magazine and the author, most recently, of the book “The Inequality Machine: How College Divides Us.” Gueorgui Pinkhassov is a Russian-French photographer from Moscow known for his vivid global documentary work and series of city portraits. He has been a member of Magnum Photos since 1988.

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Explaining Second Language Learning Chapter 2

Nov 09, 2019

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Explaining Second Language Learning Chapter 2. A child or adult learning a second language is different from a child acquiring first language in terms of :. L earner characteristics. Learning conditions. 1. Learner Characteristics: Knowledge of another language Cognitive maturity

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• language learners produce errors

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Explaining Second Language LearningChapter 2

A child or adult learning a second language is different from a child acquiring first language in terms of : Learner characteristics. Learning conditions.

1. Learner Characteristics: • Knowledge of another language • Cognitive maturity • Metalinguistic awareness • World Knowledge • Anxiety about speaking

2. Learning Conditions: • Freedom to be silent • Ample time & contact • Corrective feedback: (grammar, pronunciation) • Corrective feedback: (meaning, word choice) • Modified input

Differences in learning L1 & L2 (summary): SLA (Second Language Acquisition) theories need to account for language acquisition by learners with a variety of characteristics and learning in a variety of contexts.

What is behaviorism? The term behaviorism refers to the school of psychology founded by John B. Watson based on the belief that behaviors can be measured, trained, and changed.

Four characteristics of behaviorism: • Imitation • Practice • Reinforcement • Habit formation

Second language applications: Mimicry and memorization. • 1. Nelson and Robert Lado influence directly the development of Audio-lingual teaching materials. • Language learning is based on a collection of habits. • It was assumed that a person learning a second language would start off with the habits formed in the first language and that habits would interfere with the new one needed for the second language.

2. Behaviorism was linked to the Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis (CHA) Second language acquisition would be easier if the first and second language were similar. Some second language learners produce errors and mistakes that are not based on their first language. The influence of the first language is so important and it affects the second language.

Errors in Behaviorism • Errors are seen as L1 habits interfering with L2 habits. • Behaviorists develop a procedure known as: CAH (Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis) • A comparison is made between the native language and the target language to identify similarities and differences. • Then, a prediction is made of when certain errors will occur. • The CAH predicts as follows: o Similarities will lead to ease of acquisition. o Differences will lead to difficulty in acquisition.

Criticism of CAH • Not all errors predicted by the CAH are actually made. • Learners do make many errors not predicted by the CAH. • Adults L2 learners produce sentences that sound more like a child’s. • Many of their sentences would be ungrammatical if translated into L1.

The simple structures they use are very similar across learners from a variety of backgrounds. • For example, • ’ no understand’ • ‘yesterday, I meet my teacher’ • They are utterances produced by learners from different backgrounds. • By the 1970’s, many researchers were convinced that behaviorism and CAH were inadequate explanations for L2 acquisition. • This arose as a result of the growing influence of INNATIST views of language acquisition.

Innatism • Universal Grammar (UG) in relation to second language development • Competence vs. Performance • Krashen’s “monitor model”

UGand SLA • Chomsky argued that innate knowledge of the principles of UG permits all children to acquire L1 during a critical period of their development. • Chomsky did not make any claim about the implications of his theory for L2 learning. • Other linguists (Lydia White) differ in their views about the framework of UG .

Some argued that UG offers the best perspective from which to understand SLA. UG can explain why L2 learners eventually know more about the language than they could reasonably have learned (i.e. UG can explain L2 learners’ creativity and generalization ability). • Others (Robert Bley-Vroman and Jacquelyn Schachter) argue that it is not a good explanation, especially by learners who have passed the critical period. (i.e. CPH does not work in SLA). • In their view, this means that L2 acquisition has to be explained by some other theories, perhaps one of the more general psychological theories.

Vivian Cook said that many learners fail to master the target language. • Researchers said that instructions and feedback deeply affect second language learners. • Researchers who studied second language acquisition are interested in advanced learners with complex grammar rather than simple language of beginners.

How UG works in SLA: Two different views - • The nature and availability of UG are the same in L1 and L2 acquisition. Adult L2 learners, like children, neither need nor benefit from error correction and metalinguistic information. These things change only the superficial appearance of language performance and do not affect the underlying competence of the new language (e.g., Krashen’s “Monitor Model”).

UG may be present and available to L2 learners, but its exactnaturehas beenaltered by the prior acquisition of the first language. L2 learners need to be given some explicit information about what is not grammatical in the L2. Otherwise, they may assume that some structures of the L1 have equivalents in the L2 when, in fact, they do not.

Competence vs. Performance • Competence: It refers to the knowledge which underlies our ability to use language. • Performance: It refers to the way a person actually uses language in listening, speaking, reading, and writing. Performance is subject to variations due to inattention, anxiety, or fatigue whereas competence (at least for the mature native speaker) is more stable.

SLA researchers from the UG perspective (innatism) are more interested in the language competence (i.e., knowledge of complex syntax) of advanced learners rather than in the simple language of early stage learners. • Their investigations often involve comparing the judgments of grammaticality made by L2 and L1 learners, rather than observations of actual language performance (i.e., use of language).

Second Language Applications: Krashen’s ‘Monitor Model’ • Influenced by Chomsky’s theory. • The implications of the innate theory for L2 learning • This theory has had the most influence on L2 teaching practice. • The theory, ‘MONITOR MODEL’ is proposed by Stephen Krashen (1982)

Five Basic Hypotheses of Krashen’s ‘Monitor Model ‘ • The Acquisition - Learning Hypothesis • The Monitor Hypothesis • The Natural Order Hypothesis • The Input Hypothesis • The Affective Hypothesis

The Acquisition-Learning Hypothesis • Acquisition: we acquire L2 knowledge as we are exposed to samples of the L2 which we understand with no conscious attention to language form. It is a subconscious and intuitive process. • Learning: we learn the L2 via a conscious process of study and attention to form and rule learning. • Krashen argues that “acquisition” is a more important process of constructing the system of a language than “learning” because fluency in L2 performance is due to what we have acquired, not what we have learned.

2) The monitor hypothesis • The acquired systemacts to initiate the speaker’s utterances and is responsible for spontaneous language use, whereas the learned systemacts as a “monitor”, making minor changes and polishing what the acquired system has produced. • Such monitoring takes place only when the speaker/writer has plenty of time, is concerned about producing correct language, and has learned the relevant rules. 3) The natural order hypothesis • L2 learners acquire the features of the TL in predictable sequences. • The language features that are easiest to state (and thus to ‘learn’) are not necessarily the first to be acquired. e.g. the rule for adding an –s to third person singular verbs in the present tense

4) The input hypothesis • Acquisition occurs when one is exposed to language that is comprehensibleandthat contains . • If the input contains forms and structures just beyond the learner’s current level of competence in the language, then both comprehension and acquisition will occur. 5) The affective filter hypothesis • “Affect” refers to feelings, motives, needs, attitudes, and emotional states. • The “affective filter” is an imaginary/metaphorical barrier that prevents learners from acquiring language from the available input. • Depending on the learner’s state of mind, the filter limits what is noticed and what is acquired. A learner who is tense, anxious, or bored may “filter out” input, making it unavailable for acquisition.

Summary • Krashen’s “monitor model” (i.e., acquisition vs. learning, monitor, natural order, comprehensible input, and affective filter) has been very influential in supporting communicative language teaching (CLT), which focuses on using language for meaningful interaction and for accomplishing tasks, rather than on learning rules. • Krashen’s hypotheses are intuitively appealing, but those hypotheses are hard to be tested by empirical evidence.

Thank you for Listening • Supervised by • Dr. Amira Kashgary • Done by • Amra Alamari • & • Sara Atteya

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