Experiences Learning Language
As a non-native English speaker, I’ve had the opportunity to learn a couple of different languages. My first language that I learned was a Chinese dialect called Chao Zhou Hua. This dialect is spoken in the southern, more rural regions of China. It is closely related to both Taiwanese and Cantonese, another southern Chinese dialect. Even though I was born in the United States this was the only language that I knew until about the age of six since it was the primary language spoken at home. At this age, I was in elementary school and quickly enrolled into the ESL (English as a Second Language) program. I am very grateful for this program as it is the primary reason why I am now fluent in English.
As mentioned, my family mostly spoke Chao Zhou Hua at home. I also did not have many American friends at the age of six so I was not exposed too often to English. The last source of potential English language exposure was the media which I wasn’t very aware of because computers weren’t prominent a decade ago and I never watched much television. After reading the material provided from class and taking the learning surveys, I now understand why the ESL class was so effective for me. First off, ESL really catered to its audience. ESL made it fun to learn English by incorporating games, taking field trips, and watching/ listening to English movies. By making the process of learning English fun, it helped me to view learning not as a chore but more as a privilege or game because I was in a sense competing with my other classmates to see who the best at English was. Next, ESL put all of the children that could not speak English proficiently into one class. This forced us to understand other people’s backgrounds and allowed us to work together in order to achieve the same goal of learning English. This aspect was consistent with the readings. The readings talked about being motivated to learn a language and also using the language every way we could. Thus, through this program we were able to practice amongst ourselves and with the instructor in a low-cost environment.
Besides this experience, I was also trying to learn Mandarin over the past six years. I’ve been pretty effective simply by utilizing Rosetta Stone, working in China, and also taking a couple of college courses. Throughout this period I was constantly watching Chinese movies, listening to Mandarin songs, and using what little Mandarin vocabulary I knew in order to try and reinforce my skills. The reading touched upon cognates and how adults can actually be better learners than kids. Without actually knowing this at the time, I was already applying this. Being that Chao Zhou Hua is a dialect of Mandarin, I quickly realized that a lot of words are similar to Mandarin. Thus, if I really took the time to listen to a phrase and not simply hear it, I could probably guess what the meaning was. Also, Rosetta Stone was useful for me because it entailed a “small-wins” strategy. This basically allowed me to record the progress I was making by expanding my vocabulary and formulating more complex sentences with each passing lesson.
From my experiences, the main things that I disliked about learning a language were the non-fun aspects such as memorization and testing. I didn’t like these aspects because I felt that these methods were sort of forced which I didn’t like because I was learning the languages for my own benefit. This is precisely the reason why I am looking forward to learning Korean independently. I receive whatever I put in.
After taking a look at the results of my various learning surveys, I now understand that I learn language in a rational and evaluative manner. This means that I learn best when going from the big picture to the particular applications. This also means that I like more collaborative learning and with less structure. All of these things are consistent with my past experiences.
In order to improve my learning experience, I will look to listen to more real life communication. I have many Korean friends so I will look to them as a resource. I will really focus on a hands-on approach.
