Looking back over my learning journals, it is interesting for me to observe how my ideas about self-directed language learning have progressed. In one of my journal entries, I talk about how I saw the most progress in my ability to speak Spanish when I was immersed in the culture. While this is true, I used it to justify my decision to direct my study towards more broad, extensive listening tasks while avoiding the task of working through a grammar textbook. I know now that without at least a basic grammar base the benefits received from extensive listening are minimal. Truly effective language learning must have a good balance of listening, speaking, and grammar study if the learner is to progress with any kind of speed.
I liked the self-directed learning structure because it allowed me to approach the study of the language from the areas of my learning strengths. The evaluations we took at the beginning of the semester confirmed my previous knowledge that I was a solitary learner who learns best from the written word. Also from these evaluations, I saw that my weakness was Aural learning, and I was able to work on improving this area with listening to Hebrew clips online and watching Israeli TV and film. In short, I have learned that teaching yourself a language is a balance of using different types of mediums for study.
Also, an area I had not put much thought into before this course is that of understanding how a language is used by a culture, such as which conversational topics are culturally acceptable, and how cultures can range from those who are very explicit in expressing themselves to those who leave much unsaid. Thus, to truly be able to communicate in a culture and participate in conversation smoothly, one must understand the way the culture uses their language. Short of actually going to the country where the language is spoken, I feel like one of the best ways of learning these types of cultural patterns is by watching television from that culture. Between interviews, news reports, and drama there are many examples of cultural interaction that can be studied and understood by watching TV.
In summary, I feel the skills I have learned regarding how to teach myself a language will be useful in the future as I continue to study languages. As an example of how I will be and have been able to apply these skills to life, I recently had a conversation with my suitemate, who was born in the U.S. to Filipino parents. She explained how her parents raised her only speaking English so that she would have no difficulty assimilating to American culture, but as a consequence she can only understand the Tagalog language but not speak it. A few days later after doing a little research in the same way I had been doing for Hebrew, I was able to say a few phases to her in Tagalog. Her face instantly lit up, and it was rewarding to me to see how meaningful it was for her to hear me speak her language. I know the skills I have learned through my journey of self-directed language learning will continue to be applicable to many kinds of situations throughout my language learning career.
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