[Steve]

"Foreign Language Acquisition the Easy Way" Stephen Krashen

from my blog

My recent conversation with Paul Nation got me thinking. I decided to re-read Krashen. I picked up "Foreign Language Acquisition the Easy Way" which is a short book, fifty or so pages long. It is available from Amazon. I recommend it to everyone involved in learning or teaching language. It is full of insight and research results. I agree with much of it.

The gist is that comprehensible input is the most important thing in language learning, that explicit grammar instruction is relatively unimportant, and even output is relatively unimportant, since learners do so very little of it. What influences learning the most is access to a lot of comprehensible input. This approach has the added advantage of enabling the learner to do a lot on his or her own. It is an approach that makes the learner independent, which should be the goal of every teacher.

Krashen pointed out that "narrow listening", the repeated listening to interesting conversations, was very effective and popular with learners.

Krashen also refers to narrow reading or sticking to one subject matter or author for periods of time.

Krashen mentions a number of examples of learners who struggled to learn grammar for tests and did not improve their communication skills, whereas those involved in "lighter" and more enjoyable input activities improved in all areas, including output. There were some studies that showed input-only students did more poorly on grammar, but it appears that these studies only reflected that fact that there was a much higher drop-off rate in the grammar based or traditional classes. More people stayed with the program when it was made more interesting, so overall the results were much better since more students learned. The strong learners, who did well in the traditional program, probably did a fair amount of reading or listening on their own, in addition to what they learned in class.

Krashen also confirmed my view that comprehension tests, reading strategies, and similar teacher interventions only served to decrease the enjoyment of reading.

There was much wisdom in this little book.

I feel that output can be important in helping learners notice their own problems and notice words and phrases in the language. It is just that you do not need a lot of it. A small amount of conversation and writing goes a long way. The input activities are easier to do, whenever and wherever you are, and by and large are more stress free and more enjoyable.

I would love to see an experiment with different categories of learners, immigrants, school children, independent adult learners, corporate learners, etc.. I would like to see which of these two factors most influences language success, in other words the ability to communicate effectively.
a) hours of instruction
b) hours spent listening and reading.

In other words, regardless of whatever else the learners did, the only factor to be measured would be a) hours of formal instruction and b) hours spend listening and reading in the language. I wonder which factor would correspond more closely to language improvement.

I think I know the answer.

[happysatan]

i think i know the answer too.

[Whitecapsfan]

Opposing most of your political opinions, I am all for this advice in learning foreign languages. It reminds me of an intersting story.

The late Chinese econmist Xiaokai Yang, whose research highly regarded as worth of a Nobel, recalled how he managed learning English during the Chinese Culture Revolution. (read a brief biography of Professor Yang at:http://www.monash.edu.au/news/monashmemo/stories/20040721/vale.html ).

Prof. Yang recalled that during the Culture Revolution he was imprionsed in a cell and had nothing to accompany him but a novel "The Great Expectations". When the revolution was over, he rose to become a top economist in China. He was once confronted by a curious foreign fellow scholar how come his English was very decent but somewhat strange. The English speaking scholar found Yang spoke very gracefully and correctly, but seemly outdated English of the 18th centuray. Then they laughed over Yang's story.

This adds a further convincing example of the impact of input.

[Steve]

Soccerfan

Interesting. There are many such examples of people learning from reading. Audio makes it even better.

I personally like reading and listening to 19th century and even earlier novels in languages like Russian, French, Italian etc. I like 评述 but have not found any transcripts so that I can learn the words that I keep missing.

I like Chinese novels of the 1920s and 1930s and would be keen to find audio books of them.

Also, I wonder if you know if the modern novel Serve the People (为人民服务) by Yan Lianke (阎连科) is available in a book store in Vancouver.

[青城]

Usually after English, it could be easier to learn the second western language although people still needs lots of time to remember its words. I spent 3 weeks to read Spanish grammar, and found it's similar to English. Some people also tell me actually Spanish is most similar to French, but I have no idea on French. Perhaps this is why one people could understand 5 or more west languages, but I am still wondering if he or she really remember lots of words in different languages.

I can write or read simple Spanish now, but pronunciation is always a problem for me. Perhaps little chance to speak and listen.

[Steve]

青城 _BBCODE_WROTE:

Usually after English, it could be easier to learn the second western language although people still needs lots of time to remember its words. I spent 3 weeks to read Spanish grammar, and found it's similar to English. Some people also tell me actually Spanish is most similar to French, but I have no idea on French. Perhaps this is why one people could understand 5 or more west languages, but I am still wondering if he or she really remember lots of words in different languages. I can write or read simple Spanish now, but pronunciation is always a problem for me. Perhaps little chance to speak and listen.

Similarity of vocabulary is a great help in learning another language. Knowing Chinese helped me with Japanese even thought the structure is different. Over 60% of English is based on Latin origin words, therefore similar to French.

The structure of Spanish is similar to French and the vocabulary is well over 80% related.

You can work on Spanish and French and English at LingQ, free of charge as long as you do not need a tutor. You need to do a lot of listening, reading and systematic word learning.

I have been studying Russian on my own at LingQ for 18 months and am quite comfortable reading and listening to 19th century Russian novels although there are usually about 20% unknown words for me (according to the system.).

[青城]

Thanks, Steve!

I just signed up. lingq.com is interesting website to learn foreign language. Perhaps I also need to take some time learning another official language: French.

[Steve]

青城 _BBCODE_WROTE:

Thanks, Steve! I just signed up. lingq.com is interesting website to learn foreign language. Perhaps I also need to take some time learning another official language: French.

Just let me know if you have any questions on how to use the site. Enjoy!

[snugedate]

读起起来依然很累。