How to study foreign languages?

While we often know or read about people who have mastered a foreign language, we still fall into one of two extremes: we either think that we can do it very quickly with minimal effort or it seems as if an impossible task that would devour all our time and energy. I have been on the journey of learning a foreign language many times, and my experience has taught me that the journey gets considerably easier and shorter with each new language. Once you have gone through the many stages of learning a language, they become familiar and therefore less tedious. You also become more patient and forgiving with yourself. Here are those stages in learning languages:

1) The reasons that motivated you to learn a specific language make you excited and eager to start the process of learning. You enthusiastically sign up for a language class and start devoting a lot of time and energy into this new type of learning. You catch every word your instructor says. You meticulously do all the homework. You are so excited to learn about the country where this particular language is spoken. You are making long-term plans to go and study in that country. It is the honeymoon stage in your relationship with a new language.

2) Just as in romantic relationships, the honeymoon stage does not last forever. It is soon replaced with uncertainty and myriads of doubts. The initial burst excitement has passed and now you are faced with the laborious process of repetition and memorizing incomprehensible rules. In this stage, no matter how much you try, it seems hopeless and you do not feel that you are making progress. You still do not understand a single sentence of what native speakers say. When you try to apply the abundance of rules you stuffed your head with, they often fail because languages are full of exceptions. Unfortunately,  many students quit during this stage because they cannot fight their sense of profound disappointment with the world of languages and themselves. 

3) The students who were able to overcome the calamitous second stage now enter the transitional stage. They become more patient with themselves and slow down, but do not stop completely. They might take breaks, but they do not quit. They can now understand and communicate on an everyday level and they have learned how to apply grammatical rules. They have settled into their routine and they accept the fact that they are in for a long voyage across the unending sea that is a foreign language, knowing the small, continuous rewards will eventually lead to sublime satisfaction with themselves and the language.

4) The fourth and the final stage is the culmination of all the prior efforts, but it first comes unnoticed. In this stage, you suddenly realize that you can express what you want; your stress of participating in a discussion is replaced by the enjoyment of being understood by other speakers of the language. You suddenly get access to an entirely different vision of the world because every language out there is not only a collection of rules and vocabulary, but an expression of different values, mentalities, and histories.

How then can knowing the psychological aspects of learning a foreign language specifically help you to go through this lengthy and challenging process? My primary advice is not limited specifically to languages, as it can be applied many spheres of life. The advice is simply to keep going, even if you only study a few minutes per day, you will eventually reach your goal. In other words, the most important part of this process is consistency.  Unfortunately, contrarily to what many websites claim, there are no quick ways to learn a language. Just think about how complex each human’s life truly is. Is it really possible that someone can go through all possible interactions with other people, memorize vocabulary, and be able to construct sentences to explain complex ideas in a short period of time? You need to experience many everyday situations and learn what people usually interact in a given situation. Time is certainly the most important aspect of learning a language. 

Now let’s talk about different methods. Over the centuries, people all around the world have used the grammar-translation method. Even today, in many countries and in many American high schools the same method is used which leads to students memorizing very complex grammar rules, yet not being able to construct a simple sentence and certainly cannot understand the dialogue of a native speaker. Another method is a communicative approach in which students learn how to repeat sentences without knowing any grammar rules. This approach mimics how toddlers learn their native languages. Many websites and individuals claim that you do not need to know any grammar and can just learn a language like that. The truth is actually somewhere in the middle in that you need a combination of both approaches to be able to master any language.

Olga Sylvia, PhD