At the beginning of the semester, I was an eager student of Turkish; I had been studying it by myself previously for the last year,
although my skills were very limited. I had bought books for self directed study on my own and had been focusing much of my
time on studying the language so that I would be prepared in college (this was before I had been aware that Richmond's Turkish
classes were limited to a self-directed study program). When I enrolled in the class, I knew I was ready for the commitment that
the course seemed to require, and I was very excited to have all of these new resources ready for me to use. However, I became
intimidated; it's quite different to learn a language on your own with no commitment to the language other than your own interest
and to learn a language with utter dedication to it, as I had enrolled myself in a semester where learning Turkish was a must-do.
In high school I was able to put it down and study Spanish when I needed to. In this course, I was required to remain attentive
and an active learner.
My approach to learning Turkish varied then. With all of the resources around me, I began to feel overwhelmed with
the opportunities that were available to me. I also became frustrated when I realized that I would not learn as much
this semester as I considered myself able to before. Now I understand that learning a language takes time, patience
and a great understanding of how exactly the process worked. In order to learn Turkish most effectively, I now know that
I need to slowly repeat things and study tools over and over again, as well as analyze how I am best at learning things,
rather than inundate myself with knowledge until I retain only a small part of it.
My skills as an observer of other cultures greatly expanded over the course of MLC 105. I did not ever previously
consider that languages and culture are intertwined as intricately as they are. Rather, I assumed that they were two
separate articles with very vague relationships to one another. Learning tools such as recognizing if cultures are
collective or individualistic really enhance the process of learning a language because you can analyze the way that
the culture works, then from there work toward a better understanding of how to use the language. After all, language
is simply a way to communicate with others, and how would one communicate with another individual if they do not
understand what kind of environment that person lives in? Furthermore, learning about culture gives the language a
context not previously there, and gives one an incentive to work harder in learning the language, because in my experi-
ence, I have learned a lot of cool things about Turkish culture that only make me want to go there more!
I am not sure if I have completely moved from the very basic information of the language. The book How Language Works
has taught me a lot about different principles of language and I have been able to apply them to Turkish in many ways that
undeniably has made my journey to becoming fluent in the language much easier. However, the book also had so much
information that at times it became difficult to even process exactly what is being said, let alone how to apply it to my target
language. However, I have been able to successfully take a lot of the material and apply it to my own language-learning goals,
making me a better self-directed language learner.
All in all, I very much enjoyed this unique experience. I will not be taking the class again due to a scheduling conflict, but I
am sure that my journey in learning Turkish by myself has not stopped here.
You need to be a member of The SDLAP Ning to add comments!
Comments
Don't worry about the formatting. Please remember that all the resources of the Studio--and the campus--are available to you even if you're not enrolled in a class. Your Rosetta Stone username and password will not expire, and I will be acquiring other resources as well. And you can always sign up for 111 when you have room in your schedule. You've done an excellent job. Keep up the good work.
I don't know why it formatted like this.