I’ve learned a lot about languages over the years. I’ve independently studied the following languages and achieved varying levels of fluency. By competency:
- Spanish
- French
- German
- Swahili
- Russian
- Hindi
- Farsi
- Arabic
- Afrikaans
- Polish
I estimate that there are about 250 players in the space ranging from innovators like Duolingo and Verbling to overpriced behemoths like Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone.
Language learning software is broken in terms of reaching its ‘holy grail.’ I believe the holy grail of language learning is the ability to learn a language outside the country that speaks it, to a level of fluency that puts the user within 30 to 45 days of advanced reading, speaking, and vocal comprehension fluency once they are in the country.
This is a problem worth solving. I read somewhere recently(if you find a link please message me) that the demand to learn English is so great in China that if they hired every US college student to teach English, they would not fulfill the demand.
There are some fundamental reasons why many of these software platforms fail at the attempt to reach the holy grail.
- Flashcard systems don’t work. Whether it’s words or phrases flashcard systems don’t work. Many people who are learning a language need to see two words together. For example, Estudiante de Postgrado denotes a grad student in Spanish. Even if a user sees these words in a flash card system with a picture and a translation, their retention and later usage of the word is unlikely.
- Audio systems don’t work. Language learners often want to see, hear, and understand how the syllables of a word are put together. Teaching systems that rely on audio break this mental image. This puts some language learners at a particular disadvantage. For example if I was learning Polish, the language is extremely phonetic but requires more complex tongue movements. Without seeing how the word is spelled, the user is at risk of slaughtering the already difficult pronunciation. A simple example: Zapomnij o tym (Forget it) (Zapom-nee- Oh- Tim). Even with the pronunciation key, there are elements of it that are lost in translation.
- Language learning schools ‘kind of’ work. I’d probably only take this option if it was learning English or German. If a user has to go live in the country and take classes with a large number of students that are also learning the language it’s often too time and capital intensive for most people looking to learn a language.
- Costly systems. Costly systems aren’t priced for the users who need them most. Worst of all they are usually excessively boring. Rosetta Stone, Pimsleur, and Michel Thomas are prime examples.
My friend and I built a simplistic prototype(Version 0.1- try this link if it doesn’t work) that uses a popular vice documentary about Mormons in Mexico and subtitles to give users viable examples of some of the 1000 most common words in English. If you are building something awesome in the language learning space, please feel free to message me about it. kumarovski( at ) gmail (dot) com.
[...] http://thangudu.com/2013/01/27/language-learning-is-broken/ [...]
The key to success is to mix the methods of learning. Flashcards are indeed useless as long as they are the only activity you perform. You’ll be able to recall the words to answer the flashcards only. Reading in foreign language is as bad, because you don’t learn how to speak and you tend to ignore the words you don’t know. However, if you mix flashcards with reading, you notice that each time you encounter a word from flashcards in a text, it pops up like being highlighted with a red marker. And at this very moment you build the ability to use that word. The flashcards system I use has audio samples for each question and answer. I ALWAYS repeat aloud after all the samples, and I can assure you, my skills boosted with very little effort. Additionally, every time I commute to/from work, I listen to the NPR.com “Most e-mailed stories” podcast. It gives me 80 minut of contact with well spoken english every day with no sacrifice, because that time would be wasted otherwise. As a bonus, I learn a lot about the world and the US. I am aware I’ll never achieve the fluency of a native, yet I got the Cambridge CAE after 3 years of such conduct and two years later I am quite comfortable with spoken and written English.
Getting this while trying to download the prototype:
500 Internal Server Error
The server has either erred or is incapable of performing the requested operation.
Getting this while downloading the prototype:
500 Internal Server Error
The server has either erred or is incapable of performing the requested operation.
Dima, I posted 2 links. Try it tomorrow. My friend and I aren’t incredible coders. Something was up with google app engine and our first iteration has capacity issues. Try both links or try tomorrow.
You didn’t mention Spaced Repetition. Read about it and try Anki and you may change your mind about flash cards.
Tienes mucha razón en todos tus puntos, pero tampoco veo una clara solución.
¿Que crees que tiene que tener un producto que enseñe un idioma?
Click the links Mattias. It’s my super premature stab at the problem. I don’t know the solution.
Flashcard systems are only useful if they also provide sentences where the newly learned words are shown in context. Some language softwares such as Transparent Language offer flashcards that include audio as well. The more you can engage your students, the quicker they would learn. Another great option would be to include a small video or picture of the action or object.
Audio can be very useful if it is song. Thus words that are accompanied by a melody are much easier to remember. Also, songs often repeat words in the refrain etc.
You may have heard about the demand for English tutors in China from Quora (at least that’s where I read it). Link: http://www.quora.com/Career-Advice/What-are-the-best-possible-jobs-for-someone-who-is-extremely-intelligent-but-extremely-lazy
There’s an error in your translation of the name of the language:
It’s called ‘Deutsch’, not ‘Deutsche’
I think the method of learning must vary quite a bit depending on the language itself. For example, once you understand grammar concepts (difficult for the average 8th/9th grader) and can break your pronunciation habits, Spanish is pretty darn easy for an English speaker to pick up. Japanese, on the other hand, requires quite a lot more mind-bending in order to get the word order right, not to mention having to learn three writing systems and multiple ways to read the same character.
As for technology, I would love to see 1) children’s programming in all sorts of languages, since it is obviously easier for someone with the understanding of a 3-year-old to comprehend, and 2) comprehensive integration of speed-controlled video playback (like in VLC), subtitles, tagging and discussion ability (e.g. “why does so-and-so say X at 1:43?”) applied to appealing, mainstream content (like TV dramas, fun game shows, etc.).
The image of the “Twenty-one reasons English is hard to learn” assume the reader has never dealt with a tonal language; e.g. in Japanese there are two tonal versions of niji and niji, one means two o’clock and the other means rainbow (the two o’clock version is quite often written in romaji as ni-ji however). When listening to these two examples they can be easily confused unless you are used/exposed to tonal languages.
I’m doing something cool and new in the language learning space. Where can I message you?
I’d love to hear about it. Shoot me a line at kumarovski(at) gmail.com
I’ve been following the language learning market for some time now. I’m also a linguistics major and have completed my Master’s in Computer-Assisted Language Learning.
The problem with language learning is not that it’s broken, but it stems from a fundamental misunderstanding of the theory of how languages are learned. Most language learning products (startup or otherwise) only provide you with the content (and only a small subset of what you need to achieve success).
But, they don’t tell you HOW you need to learn this and what will be lacking in terms of the content that they provide. Everyone wants to be the ‘holy grail’, but no-one really is.
There are lots of theories regarding how languages should be learned. The famous go-to linguist is Stephen Krashen, however he focuses on a strict input-only basis: that is, reading and listening a lot.
In my research (and language learning endeavors) I found the Paul Nation’s Four Strands of Language Learning to be a great balance for each learner, and is almost required reading if you want to start learning languages. I wrote about this on my Chinese learning blog:
http://confusedlaowai.com/2012/06/four-strands-language-learning/
But let’s be honest here. Theory and apps can take only so far. Language learning is a big undertaking. Time and time again, the biggest success stories in language learning, are people who are motivated. I can show you the theory, I can show you the apps, I can show you the spaced repetition systems, but I can’t make you use them, without you being motivated yourself.
This isn’t something that comes overnight. It’s blood, sweat and tears, but you know what? There are other people out there to help you. That’s why I’ve found the best motivators, not to be the apps or theory or methods, but the community and the people involved. Get a study buddy. Join communities. Find other language learning blogs (I’ve created a directory of language learning blogs to help me find these communities: http://polyglotlink.com)
And you know what, the best language learning advice, won’t come from the linguists or the native speakers, but actually the people who had to struggle to learn it. If you need to find resources and methods, ask them.
In any case, if you want to chat about this some more, or need advice, pop me an email!
I’d love to chat, shoot me an e-mail at kumarovski(at) gmail.com
Proficiency in 30-45 days? What is the target of training? Conversational skill? Reading? Writing? Official or causal language use? Listening skills? All these skills encompass fluency and yet they are very different, often with less overlap than one would hope!
Consider that linguists say that one spends one’s whole life learning a language. And while it’s easy to toss around the word fluency in a marketing brochure, nobody speaks of attaining native proficiency because it’s precisely so difficult. Remember, the famous German grammarian Hammar has a rule, “The Native is always right.” Don’t underestimate the Herculean task that is learning a language.
Todd reread the bolded part about the holy grail of language learning. I think you’ve misread it.
big butts
As we know that Hindi is National language, still in some parts of southern India does not really give importance to this language.But it is the easy language to communicate in India with Hindi than English.
There is a website (www.lingq.com) that I have learned to successfully learn both Italian and Spanish to a high degree of proficiency without ever stepping foot out of the United States (I was hired by an Italian company partly because of my language skills). This website has largely community driven content, which consists of articles, blog posts, conversations, interviews, etc, with a word for word audio transcript attached. While reading and listening you can look up word definitions on the fly and it reminds you of words you have encountered before in future lessons to help you notice and remember vocabulary and constructs while you read and listen to native content. You can also choose to practice speaking and writing later on after you have built up a good comprehension in the language, because true comprehension is key.
Thank you for the article. It is quite interesting.
I think that it is really important to use the vocabulary you learn in a sentence context and then in a dialogue context, otherwise it would be just words with no specific guidance on usage. It is also key to review what you learn. http://www.busuu.com offers a really nice rounded solution where you can learn online but also on mobile with many motivational tools and functions that allows you to chat with native speakers to practice. You can get corrections from other users for your exercises as well. I suggest you try it, they 12 different languages and it is a lot of fun!
Hello! Great post! I am a fellow polyglot of 6 languages and have written my response on my website. Please find here:
http://www.bozenlanguage.com/blog-responses
Hi Kumarovski! I am a fellow polylgot of 6 languages and growing! My response was too large so I posted it on my language website here:
http://www.bozenlanguage.com/blog-responses
Please let me know your thoughts! Thanks!
Blake
You were on the money with a terrific posting with some good info
I have something in the Language Learning space that has a New Orleans relevancy. Actually 2.
You have opened up my eyes right now with this regards
Reblogged this on Language Thief and commented:
Great ideas on the language learning process and where we can improve it.