I’ve been studying foreign languages for years. No, I’m not a poloyglot. I’m not even bilingual. I’m just an English-speaking white girl who’s pretty comfortable in Spanish (for the most part, and only if I’m listening to a specific accent). That being said, I’ve made good friends with the my own language learning challenges, and I’ve learned to conquer a lot of them. If you’re still trying to get past a road block, here are some suggestions.
Frustration
For me, this is the number one language learning challenge, probably because it’s so general – you can get frustrated with literally anything in the world. I get frustrated that it takes me so freaking long to learn a foreign language! I see stories of people learning languages within months, and I wonder why I can’t be like that! In the past, it’s definitely screwed up my goals, and I’ve definitely learned that getting frustrated with myself is definitely a giant language learning mistake.
Solution: don’t put so much pressure on yourself! The amount of time it takes you to learn a language is exactly how long it’s supposed to take you. There are people who will learn faster than you and slower; these people aren’t important because you know who they are? They’re not you. And comparing yourself to other people who aren’t you is just a silly way to set yourself up for failure.
It gets boring
Look, nothing’s fun all the time. It’s just not. If it were, you’d get bored all the time – even fun is boring when it’s monotonous. How does language learning break up the fun? Memorization. Grammar. Vocabulary. These tend to be the greatest language learning challenges. While finally hitting that moment where you can really communicate in a foreign language is giant breath of fresh air, getting to that point isn’t very fun for a whole lot of people.
Solution: make it fun and easy! Take new words and concepts in little bitty bites. Give yourself the chance to feel accomplished much more often. If you sit yourself in front of a list of 100 new words, you’ll get flustered and give up. On the other hand, give yourself 5 new words to learn. You’ll get them down in half an hour, and then you have every right to get excited about your progress! 30 minutes of struggle, 5 minutes of pride and accomplishment. Sounds like a pretty good ratio to me!
Overwhelm
You better believe learning a foreign language is overwhelming. Even when I’m just thinking about tackling a language, I look at how many words there are in the language, and how many words it takes to be fluent (‘cause let’s be real, that’s always the goal). I mean, that’s just asking for another language learning challenge. Depending on your source, you’ll generally find it takes tens of thousands of words to achieve fluency. Holy crap! Yeah, talk about overwhelming! Then when you look at sources to use and you just can’t understand a thing because you haven't actually learned anything yet, and it’s even worse. When you get overwhelmed, you know what you do? You give up.
Solution: don’t think so hard! Don’t worry about it. Take a breath. Focus on short term goals. Don’t think about what you want to achieve in the end, think about what it will take this month to work towards that goal. Think about this week, this day, this hour! Give yourself a small chunk to accomplish, tackle it, and keep tackling mini goals. Focus on what you can do here and now, not what you want to be able to do later in some inappropriately-chosen period of time.
I’ve been studying language for years, and these three things have held me back more than I’d like to say. Do you have any other challenges that you’ve had to conquer? What about challenges you’re still trying to conquer?
Jamie
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Very interesting post, I did not know a lot of this.
If it gets up to 104, they need air conditioning!
In England most washing machines are in the kitchen too, it is weird to me, so interesting that is how it is in Spain too.
Yes, I think they need air conditioning as well, but I suppose they’ve gotten used to grinning and bearing it!
I love cultural insights. Being Australian I think we have a lot in common with our expectation of space and airconditioning! In fact, it is the lack of space that really bugs me living in the UK. There are people everywhere and I feel claustrophobic sometimes. Having said that, the focus on family, ‘just enough’ stuff and spending time with each other instead of in our rooms is increasingly important to me now I have my own children. I’m hoping to take ‘the best bits’ of the cultures I experience and make them my own. Thanks for sharing Jamie
Taking my favorite bits of foreign cultures and putting them into my everyday life is one of the most important parts of travel to me, as well. I mention in another post about how living in Europe made me more physically active, even when I’m back home in America. I love it!
Sorry, but as a Spaniard I have to say your impressions about wine and beer make no sense at all to me.
Most mid-budget restaurants upwards, and many cheaper ones definitely have more than just “red wine” or “white wine”. They’ll have at least a few reds, a few whites, and maybe rosés and sparkling wines. In many cases, they’ll be listed in a special section on the menu, in others, mainly in more upmarket restaurants, there’ll be a wine list. I honestly don’t know which restaurants you may have frequented in Spain, where they were and how many different ones to make such baffling generalisations about “restaurants in Spain”.
As for wine being cheap in Spain, sure, if you go for the cheaper ones or order a glass of the “house wine” without asking what is it. Do some research online, though, and see if you find a shortage of more expensive Spanish wines (hint: you won’t).
Never order a “cerveza”? Why not? If you don’t specify, the waiter will ask if you want a “copa”, a “caña”, a “doble” and so on, and you can always order bottled beer if you prefer it. Many cheap regular bars won’t have more than one kind of draught beer, as you say, but even those will probably have one or two other brands of bottled beer for sure. And that’s your more basic neighbourhood bars. Anywhere else, you’re likely to have a much wider choice of both national and imported beers.
I apologize if I come across as a little blunt, but it seems to me you’re making generalisations without having the necessary knowledge and experience to do so.
I understand if you feel I am making generalizations, because I am, quite frankly. These are general trends that I’ve noticed in Spain. That isn’t to say that different restaurants aren’t different, or that someone else might experience something more similar to your experiences! As a foreigner living in Spain, these were things that stood out to me, as they were different from my experiences back home. These were my impressions and nothing else. Maybe I only happened upon the restaurants that did these things, but that is the way of the traveler - it’s hard to truly experience life the way locals do, especially in international cities.
Thank you for your input, it’s important to get a local’s idea of my own experiences as a foreigner!