Becoming fluent in a second language is not easy

Becoming fluent in a second language is not easy. If it were, everyone would do it. Truth is, it takes a lot of effort. More effort than most people are willing to put in. Then there is the time. The traditional way of studying a language requires you to take classes that move along at a snail’s pace. You can only learn as quickly as the slowest person in the class.

Teachers tend to spend precious class time promoting “fun” activities and games in the classroom. These are geared more toward class retention than challenging students to become to become fluent. When you pay for a class, you want immediate value. And while you may not be able to learn very quickly, if the teacher plays their cards right you will be having so much fun that you will forget your main objective. At the end of the day, you are getting something out of the class, even if that something is not paving a pathway to fluency.

There are several factors that make learning a second language more difficult than learning your first. It can feel awkward and unnatural to produce sounds to which you are unaccustomed. Producing strange and unfamiliar sounds requires you to develop a new relationship with your mouth. Your teeth and your tongue will likely need to get to know each other in a new way. You may be called on to use your throat to produce new sounds. You might feel like you are hissing and squawking instead of just talking. As a result, until you have practiced manipulating your mouth and become comfortable making sounds in some wild and wonderful new ways, it can be too embarrassing to speak in front of others. You might give up before you try.

And when you are called on to try, only your teacher knows if you are doing it right. But you get feedback from a dozen or more others in the class who feel equally awkward and who, in response to you but driven by their own fears, will often giggle and lowkey make fun of you for your efforts. It is enough to make anyone give up on their dreams of fluency before they have even begun!

As in boxing, in learning we must learn to bounce back after failure

But you know what? Suck it up, buttercup. When you lack the confidence of correctness, it is normal for adults to feel weird speaking in front of other learners. It is easy to get caught up in negative thinking. “They know better than I do. It’s easier for them than it is for me. They’ll laugh at me if I get it wrong. I feel and look like a fool!” But remember, perfection is the enemy of good. So the quicker you chill out and accept your flaws, the quicker you will learn that your failures are actually the building blocks of learning. 

Another problem with learning a language in a classroom setting is the constant fear of academic failure. In academics, students almost get addicted to their teacher's judgement. They rely on them to tell them if they are right or wrong. In real life, you will know you are correct when you are able to convey your message to others and be understood. You will be able to listen to others, and you will understand.

Perhaps ironically, academic success in a language class is not always a successful pathway to fluency. You can get all the answers right on written and even oral exams, but your unaddressed fears will keep you from meaningful interactions with native speakers, when and if you ever get a chance to meet any, that is. I know many people who studied Spanish for four years but never spoke the language outside a classroom.

 

Meanwhile, students who fail in traditional language classrooms are often the quickest to achieve fluency when faced with the need to speak the language in the real world. This is because those who fail in school come to rely on their instincts and develop street smarts to solve problems in real time. They skip the theoretical and move straight on to the practical. Classroom learning has that scenario flipped around.

In school, a person may be able to pick answers from the book and fill in the blanks to finish your homework. They may level up academically, but that same person's pride in perfection may lead them to avoid interactions with native speakers that are likely to make them feel like the know little to nothing at all. They never break through to the next level of fluency because they skip the more practical aspects of learning. Until you gain practice in the real world, where both the stakes and the rewards are higher than they are in the classroom, you will never come close to achieving the fluency you desire.

Why does it have to be so complicated? The first language came so easy to you, right? Well, that is because it was part of a natural biological and sociological process of trial and error that took place at a time when your brain had not yet developed a sense of embarrassment or shame. Babies and children learn quickly because they could care less if someone laughs at them. They love to laugh! Their developing brains cannot fathom that a laugh is something to be scared of. But as we get older, our brains register that same silly laugh as something to be afraid of. 

To become fluent in a second language, you must embrace the laughter of others when you make a mistake. It is funny, after all, when a person utters something nonsensical. So have fun with learning. Program your brain to realize that laughter as an opportunity to try again. Maybe ask the person who is laughing for advice on how to make the sound better. To truly and deeply learn new things, we must be bold at our first attempt, fearless in our failure, and curious enough to seek correction, Then we must be resilient enough to try and fail over and over again until we finally get it right.

Become like a child when you are practicing new language. Children seem to not care when they do something wrong. They are happy to simply babble on and on, mimicking the language spoken by those around them until they recognize in the expression of others that they finally have got something right. Then they repeat that thing over and over again until it becomes rote.

Soon, they throw in the other, more complicated sounds. Trying. Failing. Trying again. And the next thing you know, there is a major breakthrough in their ability to speak and be understood. Sounds become intelligible. Breakthrough. Words make their way into sentences. Breakthrough. Sentences become paragraphs. Breakthrough. In no time, the adults in the room who used to laugh at the cute nonsense coming out of their child's mouth long for some peace and quiet!

Adults can learn this way, too. But, we have to trick our brains to think like children in order to do it. You may feel like your brain is going to fight you every step of the way. But by skipping the traditional classroom setup and using the self-directed methods described in this book, your brain will learn to face discomfort and embrace the process. Your ability to overcome embarrassment and incorporate fear-free trial and error into your everyday life will catapult you to fluency more quickly than you ever thought possible.

First Days of Spanish, Oct 1996

I was first exposed to Spanish in the summer of '96. I was staying at a youth hostel in Fort Lauderdale after dropping out of college my senior year. To pay my way, I was making and selling hemp jewelry while hanging out at the beach. Every now and then, I would make extra cash giving shuttling international tourists to and from the airport, to local shops, and to nightclubs throughout South Florida.

My best mate at the time was Bo, a laid-back buzz-cut Brit who was in town for the last month of his gap year trip around the globe. Bo had money to spare, so he was always up for a good time. He kept my tank full during our adventures. And we got as close as two guys with not a care in the world could get.

One Friday afternoon Bo, wearing nothing more than a pair of linen trousers and a Panama hat, asked me to give him a ride to Miami to get some weed. I said sure. Next thing you know we were filling up the tank at the local BP and barreling down I-95, chasing the sunset.

When we reached the Golden Glades - the gateway to Miami - we opted for the commuter lane, a flyover route that rose dramatically above the confusing traffic knot below to provide a panoramic view of the twinkling Magic City and its beaches, strung along the coast like diamonds on a necklace stretching as far as the eye could see.

The view at dusk left me breathless. The sky was at once orange, purple, and black. Bo looked over at me, shook his head and said "damn, mate", and we just took it all in. South Beach was lit up and laid out as if a gift before us, and we were both ready to bathe in its twinkling lights.

Beyond the Glades, we shot over to Bal Harbor at 125th Street and cruised down A1A the rest of the way. Literally seconds after I found a parking spot along Ocean Drive, Bo hopped out and was already chatting up two Latin party boys hanging out on the patio of the Adrian Hotel.

I approached after feeding the meter, and Bo already knew their names. The tall, dark-skinned rasta dude was a Nicaragua dude named Ricardo. The other was a smooth-talking Domincan named Jhonny. Both spoke English well enough to communicate the basics of their trade. But just like everyone in Miami, they mostly spoke Spanish mixed with heavily accented English.

It was obvious these were the guys to ask for drugs, but when we asked for weed they said sorry, offering us coke instead. But we only wanted weed. So someone was going to have to go get it from the park, Richard said. I was about to hand over a twenty so they could go get it, but Bo was more street smart and said he was go with Richard while I stayed here by the car with Jhonny.

After they left, Jhonny convinced me to follow him to a nearby market to buy us all some food. We walked into the grocery and were blasted music as loud as you would hear in any night club. The vibe was electric as Jhonny got kisses he got from the cashiers and began dancing with one of them down the aisle to the back, where a steam table buffet full of things like rice and beans and big hunks of meat was laid out.

Everyone was speaking Spanish and I just watched as the checkout girl packed a single to-go container full of enough pork chunks, rice, and beans to feed all four of us. Then as I went to pay, not knowing how to ask how much it cost, I gave her a 20 dollar bill hoping it was enough. To my shock, she gave me $17 change.

MORE TO COME

Teaching and Learning is a Never-ending Cycle

While in the classroom last night, the second night of a five-week intro to computers class for adults here in the Charlestown neighborhood of Boston, I was brought back to the first real computer class I ever took in 1991. I was a freshman at a large liberal arts college located in Western Pennsylvania. The classroom was huge and filled with the latest PCs, all linked to a mainframe. The teaching style of my instructor was impersonal, but he got the job done. And we all seemed to learn fairly quickly, even though many of us were absolute beginners.

Sure, I'd been exposed to computers a few times before then - in elementary school we'd watched amazing documentaries about how computers were becoming personal, I'd played Zork on an Apple IIe, I'd sat at a friend's house and watched as he used the Atari 2600 to learn the elements of basic programming, and I'd even learned how to count with ones and o's in math class. But prior to that class - Introduction to Microcomputers - I could do all the school tasks I needed to with a GE typewriter or Brother word processor and a library card.

The typing skills I'd learned in 10th grade served me well for learning computers. Meanwhile, most of my students are hunt and peck types. I have an outline for teaching this class. I've created lesson plans. But the classroom has a life of its own. And this week I find I need to figure out how to get two of my students to simply use the mouse correctly while the rest of the class is chomping at the bit for something they don't already know.

I love my students. There's something so soft and human about teaching. There's that point every human reaches when he has to admit he doesn't know something that he desperately wants to know, but doesn't know how to get there. Then, the teacher lights the path.

Teaching computers is similar to teaching spoken language in many aspects. For both there are the technical subtleties of body posture and movement - in the mouth, face and hands primarily for language and the hands, back and eyes for computers. And for both of these, there is the foundational aspect of guiding the student to a more perceptive life, a life awakened to ongoing, moment-by-moment learning.

It excites me to think that in a few years these folks will be fully proficient and doing some amazing things that will make them feel more connected with the rest of the world, and be somewhat more on the "inside" of modern times. That's all any of us wants, is to not be left behind.