Friday, July 27, 2007

How to Learn Languages Better

Many of you might have taken my recent poll on the factors that contribute to faster learning, and according to the survey, most people feel that motivation is the most important factor . . . even more important that the amount of exposure to the new language.

This is very interesting because this reflects my own experience as a teacher in the ESL classroom. Often, some students who come from overseas to study in the US only see that living in the US is the key to improving their English; however, in some cases, they often do not make much progress because as soon as they leave my class, they pair up with other students from the same country and start speaking their native language again. The problem isn't that they are just associating with people from their country, but that they don't speak English when they do so.

Only the other hand, I have met many students who have made great progress in learning English because they are very motivated to do so and find every opportunity to study and put into practice their new skills. In fact, I know students who have learned English very well without having lived in an English-speaking country.

So, what has your experience been like? What are the factors that help students learn more quickly? Share your ideas.


Randall

1 comment:

  1. Hi. I am Minh from Viet Nam
    According my opinion,learn a other language is not easy, but if we have determine to active, we will successful. I am learning english very much but i don't have chance to communication with foreigner. so i have to find to make my languager skill become better. I maked it throught internet and some famous english study wed. Now i can communicate with somebody who come from many culture. I am vary happy because that. thank for hear myself

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for posting a comment. I appreciate your interesting in sharing your ideas.

Best,

Randall

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