3 ms·
I'm nearing the end of a PhD and the most difficult classes I took were the totally-unrelated-to-my-study-and-research semesters of Japanese. The classes were r
by psychomugs 5y ago
I'm nearing the end of a PhD and the most difficult classes I took were the totally-unrelated-to-my-study-and-research semesters of Japanese. The classes were really intense, sometimes meeting twice in a single day, but were invaluable for my months-long stint there. I continued classes after I came back, but eventually realized that activities for class (e.g. essay writing, grammar worksheets) were less useful than consuming native material.
It was also a refreshingily daunting experience to throw myself at something I quickly realized I had no talent in and to really writhe and struggle, but to stick through it, motivated not by any external party or marketable skill, but by earnest interest in the topic.
- zarzavat 5y agoLanguage classes should be thought of as dessert rather than the main course. They are useful if you need to answer questions, for example to clarify the difference between two words or an aspect of grammar, but do not help much for the main task of getting words and sentences into your head, as memorisation is a probabilistic process that is unique to the individual and needs to be done individually.
- psychomugs 5y agoImmersion is key, but classes provide the bootstrapping required to know what questions to ask, and are a tremendously useful resource when immersion is not possible. I think the ideal learning scenario is what many of my expats-in-Japan friends undertook: live in the country and take classes at the same time. It also helps if you look foreign enough to where natives don't expect you to know their language, and are shocked when you can say even just "hello my name is..."