“If you really want to learn Spanish, you should go to Spain or Latin-America to learn it!“. Gosh, I really hate it when people say that. Since when does going to the country of your target language mean you’ll actually learn the language? Did we forget the large number of immigrants in our own country that don’t speak the national language? Did we forget the countless people that went to Spain to live and enjoy the culture, and still speak no Spanish at all? Okay, going to a Spanish speaking country actually does mean immersion, but only if you do it the right way. But what makes me worry is the fact that some people think that with immersion I mean going to Spain or Latin-America. So let me clear things up: THAT’S NOT THE CASE! Sorry for writing that in bold and capitals, but it’s a very important thing to let you know. What is it then that I see as immersion?
Immersion is simply doing everything in Spanish. If you’re religious for example, you should go to Spanish church. If you like Hollywood movies, you say goodbye to the English language and get the dubbed version (and no excuses!). Immersion also means that you’ll delete your non-Spanish MP3’s and giving away/selling your CDs that don’t contain Spanish music. This here is learning a language, not watching how the toaster is toasting your bread (or collecting socklint from between your toes, whatever you want to call it). It actually means a change of life, dedication, hard work. Going to the hispanosphere isn’t real immersion; you can still slack off in Spain, or only watch English-language movies in Mexico. Spending a few hours per day with natives won’t make you any better, it’s only more likely that you’ll rush your use of Spanish, making errors because you don’t give yourself time to think (or learn Spanish), and therefore destroying any opportunity to really learn Spanish.
If I look to myself (living in Spain) I see a guy who already learned Spanish pretty well and is ready to live here. And it’s great to discover parts of the language I never gave much attention to and which I can really learn now. But moving to a Spanish-speaking country as a beginner would’ve meant that I had quit long ago. Why? There are two possibilities: 1) I would’ve learned Spanish, but in a broken way. This would’ve demotivated me and would therefore have returned to the Netherlands. 2) I wouldn’t have learned Spanish, would’ve felt demotivated and would therefore have returned to the Netherlands. I know several people here in Spain that left everything in their own country and moved to Spain with zero knowledge of the language. They speak Spanish, yes, but in a broken way. Their language is filled with errors and they mispronounce pretty much every word. But returning is impossible as they have nothing left in their own country. What did they expect to find here? Often a job or they moved because they liked the culture. They expected to learn Spanish here in Spain, through immersion, but that turned out the be a fiasco!
This shows that moving to Spain or Latin-America with no or almost no knowledge of the Spanish language and expecting to learn it through immersion is a HUGE mistake. If you don’t create a serious immersion environment in your own home (which can be anywhere in the world), you’re probably not going to learn Spanish. Moving to a Spanish speaking country before you speak Spanish well is another mistake. Although you may know some things, it’s impossible to do everything you need to do in Spanish. It’ll also be difficult to meet natives that only speak Spanish, more or less forcing you to look for other guiris and doing guiri stuff in your guiri language. That’s the biggest sin of every language learner, but it happens every day.
So ask yourself the question: do you really want to learn Spanish? Or most important: do you really want to move to a Spanish speaking country? If so, learn Spanish first, and only then move. Moving too soon and expecting to learn Spanish on the go is the biggest mistake you can make, because it’s more likely than not that it won’t work out like you hoped.
But what if you already live in Spain or Latin-America? Chances are that you went in the hope to learn Spanish while mixing with the natives. But somehow this failed and you’re doing boring grammar exercises or *shrudder* taking a Spanish class. Yes, you speak some Spanish but it sounds more gibberish than a gitano Andaluz speaking at 200 miles per hour. Is there still a chance or is everything lost? Well… there is (a chance I mean)! Really, it’s never too late to switch to a real Spanish-only environment. Not spending time on the street with natives? Then you should be listening Spanish! Relaxing a bit at home? I better hope you’re watching television in Spanish! Everything a serious Spanish learner would do in order to maintain his/her Spanish environment at home (outside the hispanosphere) should be done (and the English social club you’re attending in Benidorm is history as well!). Everything should be centered around the Spanish language. If you’re serious, that is.
If you don’t want to learn Spanish that badly, only want to enjoy the weather in the Costa Blanca and if you’re fine with the fact you’ll only meet old English people who don’t speak Spanish either, you can ignore this advice. For all other people who are serious about learning Spanish; apply it and you’re be a winner in no time!
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!Related Posts:
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How many hours of immersion (of the type you prescribe) would it take to learn Spanish?
I normally hold the number Khatzumoto uses: 10,000 hours of audio input (although this may be a bit less with Spanish) and around 2 million words in reading books. Speaking hours? I have no idea, as I don’t believe in speaking in order to learn the language itself.
Why so many hours for Spanish as well? Although people call Spanish an easy language, it just isn’t. If you REALLY want to learn Spanish, and I mean REALLY, you should get massive input as if it were Chinese or Japanese. 10,000 hours isn’t just a number promoted by language learners/teachers, also in programming (another language) 10,000 is the mark to say you’re more or less “fluent” or with sports, music, etc.
I’ve been living for the last few months in Portugal . I didn’t know the language before coming. Normally I make an effort to learn Portuguese and try to make use of my opportunities or create opportunities for myself to use it. Yet, I’m far away from having an all-immersion type of environment (for example, I am reading your blog in English, aren’t I). I get to use languages other than Portuguese a lot and there some days when I don’t use Portuguese at all.
Still, I think that I have made some quite good progress already. Yeah, well, my Portuguese isn’t perfect but I can speak to people on streets already and sometimes even read newspapers. And all that achieved without having learnt the language before and in just a few months.
Point being, I don’t think it was a mistake for me to come. Sure, it would have been a little bit better to know some more before coming but in terms of time-efficiency, I would much prefer to come without knowing. Another thing is I’d say that full immersion isn’t really needed. You do need to use the language but you don’t absolutely have to go to extremes to learn it. Finally, I think there are just many different ways to learn it and there is not one “absolutely correct” way which alone works.
I’m not talking about learning a bit, I’m talking about learning a language to fluency (near-native) as fast as possible. Everyone can learn some Spanish (or Portuguese, in your case) which will do to live in another country, but will you learn it to fluency and fast? For that you have to be a bit extreme. Doesn’t mean you can’t learn just a bit of a language, just for fun. I’d like to speak some Chinese in the future, but my goal isn’t fluency so I won’t learn it in an extreme way.
It all comes down to your goals when choosing the path you want to take.
I believe that if I had a year or something, I could learn it to fluency.
Now that I have less than that, I’m not sure what level I’m going to learn it to.
Your claims about immersion are misleading and unhelpful to readers.
When I tell people that I went to Spain for 8 weeks and became fluent in Spanish, I have to clarify that in reality I became fluent in a single weekend. That weekend, I experienced such incredibly intensive immersion that it literally made me a Spanish speaker.
Concisely put, intensive immersion is being forced to apply your knowledge in a social situation requiring you to spend every spare millisecond of the day thinking about what you will say next. It is the feeling of near-insanity that results from having Spanish words and phrases flipping through your mind uncontrollably while planning your next quip, endlessly reliving awkwardly-phrased moments — and then delivering your hard thought-out line to a critical native audience.
I was 18 and spent a weekend with a group of college-bound native Spanish teenagers in Seville. Wanting so badly to be sociable and having language as the sole barrier, my mind came alive in a brand new way. There’s no better teacher than necessity — and ask yourself, when if ever does one feel a burning necessity to employ spoken language? Answer: social communication.
Do you need a certain level of knowledge to pull this off? Absolutely. That is why your claims elsewhere about grammar are also misleading. You talk about treating each conjugated verb as a brand new vocabulary item. Well, at its best grammar is a shortcut that teaches you thousands of new “vocabulary items” at once. It’s a gift that keeps on giving, because your goal is to absorb the underlying patterns as quickly as possible so that even unfamiliar words can be employed correctly in a snap — or at least, spoken correctly after frantically planning what you’re about to say next in a demanding social setting.
Grammar? Check. Vocabulary? Check. Idioms? Check. Joseph J. Keenan’s Breaking Out of Beginner’s Spanish? Double-check.
When you’re lucky enough to find intensive social immersion, you won’t even have time to consider whether to watch a movie or listen to tunes in English. You’ll be too busy thinking about how to impress your native Spanish-speaking pals.
So, the biggest problem in language acquisition today is people not having the guts to socialize in a demanding high-pressure setting. Fluency comes from being bold and taking risks. Perhaps that’s why children are the mysterious experts on the subject. We fail to acknowledge the tremendous risks and rewards every young child faces upon opening his/her mouth to speak.
You say my advices aren’t helpful, but on the other hand you’re claiming you became fluent in just one weekend? Yeah, I’m really insane because I say that the best way of learning Spanish (or any other language) is through immersion, just like kids learn. Do you have kids? Did you teach them the past simple, or did you just talk to them and thus giving them input?
Learning grammar in language learning is the biggest joke there is. I agree, later on it’s certainly helpful to concentrate on grammar in order to perfectionate your skills, but not to start. Heck, most language learners don’t even know what’s an inflecting verb or the subjunctive! And still, millions of people learn Spanish without knowing what they are. If you start learning a language through grammar, you’ll always think about grammar first instead of speaking the language freely.
And then your other claim, that fluency comes from the necessity of speaking the language. Do immigrants suddently speak the national language of the country they’re in? No way! Most will always struggle with the language. Why? Because they use faulthy methods and were… yes, FORCED to speak. Forcing someone to speak won’t make him fluent, it’ll only breed bad habits.
You’re welcome to criticize any article on this blog, but you should expect a reply from my side as well. Also, if you come to criticize, please come with valid arguments instead of ridiculous statements.
My points may not have been clear enough. In summary:
Study Hard, Go Abroad, Socialize Even Harder.
Here are the Cliff notes so that hopefully some readers will take away a more realistic idea of the transition from beginner to conversational Spanish. It shouldn’t be a mysterious, gradual process.
1) Mere exposure to is not the same thing as immersion. Intensive social immersion is the only way to achieve conversational proficiency,
2) Which is impossible without socializing intensively with native speakers,
3) Which sadly many people don’t have the courage or drive to do.
4) You need a certain knowledge background before attempting this, and learning grammar is a huge time saver. It takes only a couple months to learn all the essential grammar of Spanish, if you are dedicated to using a good workbook such as Marcial Prado’s Advanced Spanish Grammar. There are equivalent tools for vocab, but most importantly, use a great guide to conversational idioms such as Joseph J. Keenan’s Breaking Out of Beginner’s Spanish.
5) The transition from beginner to conversational Spanish will be swift, recognizable, and unmistakable. During this period, natives will start to describe your speech as “suelto” and you will be unable to quit thinking in Spanish in relevant social situations.
6) Don’t expect this breakthrough to arrive on Day 416 of your hulking 10,000 hour program of listening to Spanish radio and TV. It can happen much, much quicker if you study hard and take bold social risks among native speakers!
Ramses, sorry for the offense. It’s just that I cannot stand by and allow a single reader to cancel their plans to travel abroad to enroll in a language school, because doing so was one of the single most transformational experiences of my life.
I don’t want to call you misleading, but you’re promoting textbook andgrammar study. If you look at the avarage classroom student, is he or she perfect after four years of language instruction without addition -native- input? No way! Immersion is certainly a proven way to become fluent, just take AJATT (http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com), Antimoon (http://www.antimoon.com) and Steve Kaufman (http://thelinguist.blogs.com) as example. They’re all people who have reached fluency in one or more languages with immersion and have proven it.
I certainly agree that you should practice, but not after some dull textbook exercises. They don’t help, I’ve seen too many college students taking language classes and sucking completely. Only the ones who take massive input at home succeed. Also, a breakthrough does happen with a method like the TV method. That you didn’t do it doesn’t mean it’s not effective. Furthermore, studying grammar may let you feel like you’re making a breakthrough, but as soon as you see there are hundreds (if not thousands) of exceptions, you’re most likely to quit because of demotivation. What’s better? You probably know the answer, although I’m sure you won’t express it here (which is a pity),
I have to agree with John W., who doesn’t seem to me to be saying that grammar study is sufficient to achieving fluency; he doesn’t even seem to be saying that it’s absolutely necessary, but rather that it’s very helpful. I agree. I was excellent in English grammar throughout elementary and high school, without even trying, and I know it helped me to pick up Spanish grammar, and that my knowledge of Spanish grammar helped me to make big leaps in acquisition.
It’s not that a person should always have “what part of speech is that?” on their mind. In fact, that would be counterproductive. Ever try to think too hard about walking, while you’re walking, and then find yourself stumbling? I think it’s more about the pattern recognition. That, combined with a good ear and ability to parse (to recognize word roots) can help you acquire faster.
The thing I don’t understand is the fighting between the various camps of learning methods. I’m basing this on nothing but my own gut feeling (ie. I’m not a linguist), but I suspect that different methods are helpful to some and less to others, and vice versa. For me, I probably put more effort into learning French than into learning Spanish, and it was a hopeless exercise. All of the silent consonants tripped me up. So obviously, to me, hearing is important, and being able to match what I hear to how it’s spelled is extremely important to acquisition.
I also think that the other methods and tools, reading, radio, tv., etc., are in themselves no better than grammar and they certainly are not sufficient to achieving fluency. Don’t get me wrong, they are excellent for learning a language. I think a student of language would be wise to do all of the above. But for actual acquisition, there is no substitute for jumping into the deep-end of the pool of immersion, and it does require putting your ego aside. It’s just that when you do immerse yourself, you will be falling back on grammar, things you heard/saw on tv, read in books, etc., without even realizing it.
When I studied in Spain, I didn’t even speak much with fellow classmates. They frustrated me because they spoke English every chance they got. So, I ignored them and I know many thought I was strange or a snob, or both. I didn’t care. And if I went to a cafe and a server insisted on speaking English, I would go elsewhere next time, though I made sure to show my appreciation to the server for making such a kind effort for me.
Well, anyway, hate to see people fight who care passionately about the same thing, and who when you think about it, are mostly on the same page.
I have to say this is the most ludicrous article I have read in a long time. Misleading, off-putting and hugely uninspiring. Jill K and John W make some great points and I only hope that any Spanish learners who happen across this page will read the comments as well – else there’s no hope.
Blah-blah-blah Mark. Show me a YouTube video of someone that got fluent at Spanish through intensive grammar study and I’ll believe you. Oh, you can’t show me one? Pity for you, because I can show you several videos of people that became fluent at several languages without ever bothering about grammar.
Language instruction in high schools is heavily centered around grammar. Who became fluent from that? No one. Who’s being ridiculous here?
The study of Grammar, just my opinion here, is usual AFTER one becomes advanced in a second language, not before. Even in our native (birth) language we do not start learning grammar until we are well into elementary school and then it is done over several years. Many times it is NOT a matter of the grammar, but a lack of sufficient vocabulary. One time as a test I looked up some of the scientific words for certain animals and then asked my “grammar” teacher how to make a proper sentence using these words. She couldn’t do it! Why? She first needed to know the meanings of the words to know how to properly construct the sentence. Grammar is important, but like everything else (listening skills, reading skills, writing skills, oral skills), learning grammar rules has a place and a time that is appropriate. I have, for example, met several Spanish speaking people that have no clue as to the rules of grammar, yet they do one heck of a great job communicating in Spanish. The grammar teachers, of course, call this bad Spanish. I call it everyday, normal Spanish which is how I want to speak. Sounding like a book is NOT my idea of good Spanish.
David
(Capitalization done on certain words for emphasis only because unable to get italics to work. Sorry about that.)
Sorry for commenting on an old post, Ramses, but what is with these readers? They heard you diss grammar and completely zoned out on everything else. I moved to Brazil 5 months ago and had to use my (limited) knowledge of Spanish to get around. Root words and grammar helped me immensely in learning new words and saying things that I had not before heard. They were great shortcuts, and you know what? I speak like a retarded sea monkey! Too much bleeding over from Spanish, too much grammar going through my mind, early speaking ruining some of my accent, bad habits from making my own sentences.
You are right, only a grammar nazi would actually get anywhere studying grammar, everyone else just gives up. Being forced to start speaking a language before you are ready will hurt if you are not “good” at languages to start with. I consider myself very good (lets say I learn fast), but I can’t stand my bad habits.
Fluent in a weekend? Bull. It’s easy to get fluent at conversational spanish, but how could anyone mistake that for lanuguage fluency? Just because you can understand someone when they ask if you speak their language doesn’t mean you can wield that language like a native.
Your article was absolutely true, Ramses, but the haterz shall continue playing around with their grammar books. Why? Because they NEED their English. They are too insecure to actually let go of their native language, despite their so-called fluency in another language. They lack the discipline (remembering what you want!) to drop everything english and actually make another language their sole mode of communication.
Ignore the grammar nazis, dude, and keep rockin’! (not that you need me to tell you
)
No problem James, I always see when new comments are posted on the site
. And thank you for the heads up, it’s good to see a comment from someone that saw the light and actually confesses his Spanish/target language sucks. Luckily there’s still hope if you do things right from this moment.
Something I noticed this week: a classmate of mine went to a language school for the past 8 weeks to ‘perfect’ her Spanish. At the end she received a certificate stating she reached the C2 level.
But now we had some oral exams this week as well. She had do to do some things again, and her speaking SUCKED. There were pauses, bad grammar, bad accent, etc. I passed with an A+ without preparation and just talked with a good accent, good grammar, without thinking about stupid rules, etc.
Not that I’m so good at everything, but it proves that a grammar-centered language school gives you nothing but bad results and a fake diploma.
Jeez, I hope there’s still hope, lol. I found this site along with AJATT, and something just clicked. I couldn’t figure out why little kids could learn a language so fast, and surely I could not be outwitted by a child! Finding this method was like turning on the lights. “Oh, so like, all day?” Before, watching movies and reading books in the target language was a just good idea (I think someone up there said something like this
), but after adding up the actual time someone puts into a language growing up, I had a sharp change of direction.
As of two weeks ago I changed my environment. All music, movies, reading material, websites (except yours, AJAAT and Keiths; I can’t help it, man!) in Portuguese. I listen to something (generally ripped movie audio) in Portuguese at all times. I feel weird when I don’t hear the language! Like something’s wrong. Before starting this method, I was afraid that I would have wasted 6 months in Brazil with little to show for it, but just 2 weeks has improved my understanding of the spoken langauge greatly. In an attempt to get the most of the language before leaving (to Mexico, and back to Spanish, Orale! I’m from Texas
) I’ve been hitting the SRS at a rate of 50 entries/day, and writing out every single sentence for extra practice.
I wish I could apply this method to this language for more than the next two months, but I am very much looking forward to putting in all of your ideas back into my grammar-broken (hopefully not permanently) Spanish. Now, back to “work” with me.
Hello,Ramses!
Thank you for your post!About discussion.I am Russian ,I live in the UK now.You are absolutely right- there is no point to go to the country where targeted language is spoken.Nobody will be interested to speak with foreigner …Shop? Restaurant?Nobody will be interested to surround you by native speakers…No hope for it…Second -about grammar and so.My friend with whom I work with,he is gipsy.He speaks fluent at least 4 languages…but he can’t read in any of them.