Second Language Strategies Core Principle: Language Recovery
There is rarely a reason to start from zero
Welcome, aspiring polyglot! When it comes to developing language skills there are a near infinite way to approach things. Between the multiple ways you can get comprehensible input into your day to how much time you dedicate to it, you can truly customized your second language acquisition to fit your personality and learning style. There are, however, three core principles that you should keep in mind when designing your language learning framework. The first of these principles can be found in the below article:
Learning a new language is difficult, but if you use these three principles when deciding what to do and for how long you will enhance and accelerate your second language acquisition. How you implement them is where you will be able to best individualize your plan. This week will be discussing the idea of language recovery. At its core, this means never starting at zero and taking advantage of all the latent knowledge you have developed in your years alive.
What is language recovery in second language acquisition?
When I say never start from zero what I mean specifically is that you have knowledge of more languages than you think. Irrespective of which language you are learning, there are loan words and language patterns that you can take advantage of when embarking on your second language acquisition. Adding these new words immediately to your vocabulary is one of the most effective strategies to get off the ground.
Doing this starting out will give you a little breathing room and, ideally, a bit more confidence as you broach more complex vocabulary words and grammatical structures. The important thing to keep in mind is you are doing these things to get the ball rolling and build momentum.
This is the best way to start stacking wins early in your second language learning. If you are having trouble deciding what does and does not constitute a win in second language acquisition, check out this article and pick your favorites:
This is far from a definitive list, but it should be enough to get you started. Stacking wins is an effective strategy to keep your language learning going even when you do not exactly feel like going back and working on it on a given day.
Almost all of these involve writing and that is important because from the very beginning you are going to want to start thinking in your target language. Speaking and writing are pretty much the only way to make this happen so the earlier in your language learning process you start to work on written language skills the better.
Doing these things in conjunction with the other two core Second Language Strategies principles will enhance and accelerate your second language acquisition. Taking advantage of your background knowledge when working with a new language is powerful, but so is the ability to develop ways to surround yourself with the language throughout your day.
Integrating it seamlessly into your life as if you were living abroad. Once you have those two things on lock, it is time to start looking for patters. However, we will come back to that at a later date. For now, a step by step process to language recovery is in order.
How can you leverage language recovery in your second language studies?
Starting out, the first thing you want to do is get to writing the words you already know. In this example we will primarily touch on things in Spanish, but the principles hold true across languages. It is possible that you will have more latent knowledge of some languages than others, but you should still work through these exercises. They will help you not only determine your current language level, but also provide you with a roadmap to further develop your language skills down the line.
As you are writing down words, think about loan words. For example, many of the words used in the English language are words taken from other languages. Just from Spanish you have all of these words you already know:
If you are looking to accelerate your Spanish language acquisition, I have created a document that will help. The Spanish Language Patterns guide is filled with wins you can capture early on and throughout your second language acquisition and it is available to you using the link below:
Adding new vocabulary words early on in your language learning is important and can help you build some confidence to take on different challenges later down the line. Most of these are words you have heard or used in your first language and when you realize they are the same in both languages you can begin to use them in your second language or even your third. Moving along from these, it is time to dig down deep and think back to your younger years.
Most people have sat in a second language class for any number of years. In the United States the average tends to be a minimum of about two years. However, a fair number of people also go on to spend another two to four years behind a desk repeating and regurgitating vocabulary words to an aspiring PhD who came into class hungover. Whether or not you took these courses seriously, you did come into contact with far more vocabulary and grammar than you may think. So, start writing down everything you remember.
Think about these questions as you go:
Which words do you remember?
Which verb tenses do you remember?
How did you use them?
What were the irregulars?
What are the roots and what are the suffixes?
Do the suffixes hold consistently or do they change depending on the tense?
What other grammar rules do you remember?
How did you use them?
How would you use them?
Do they correlate to your first language if you try literal translation?
How did you describe things? How would you now?
What were the basics?
Colors
Foods
Animals
Counting
Adjectives
Adverbs
Verbs
You will amaze yourself with how much you are able to put together when you truly sit down and put the time in to work on it. The human brain is an incredibly powerful thing. All you need to do is give it a reason to remember all of the things you have learned and it will start to work.
It will take time, but if you continue this process for a week or two you will amaze yourself. Much of what you have encountered in your life will benefit you, but without a reason to remember your brain will choose to push things to the back to store and more easily recall information that is more pertinent to your daily life.
All of this is work geared toward laying a solid foundation to develop your second language skills. The greater your foundation, the easier it will be to build upon in the long term. Adding new vocabulary words to an existing repertoire is easier than developing from scratch.
Compounding your understanding of grammar is easier than starting with nothing and trying to memorize rules. Pronunciation is easier when you have a comprehensive grasp of the alphabet and how letters interact with one another. Use Language Recovery to lay a foundation for yourself that will facilitate your second language learning for years to come.
Using the momentum you are building
After laying your foundation, the last thing you want to do is slow down. At this point the building becomes far more enjoyable as you are able to add in things you enjoy. You can start listening to music in your target language and pointing out the times you are able to recognize words.
Audiobooks will slowly begin to make more and more sense. Watching television and movies suddenly becomes a form of studying. Yes, you need to keep writing down the things you are learning and the new words you come across, but you do not need to sit down and read out of a textbook.
From there, it is time to start stacking your wins and keeping track of them every step of the way. When you can see and remember how far you have come from week to week it becomes easier to come back on the days you feel unmotivated. Most language teachers rely on the student's desire for a good grade or at least a passing grade.
If you are working alone, it is going to be incumbent upon you to find ways to keep language learning in your rotation day in and day out. A language learning journal is perfect for this and if you are learning French or Spanish I have already developed something that might be perfect for you. You can pick them up using the links below:
Once you have worked through both Language Recovery and building a Localized Immersion environment, it is time to move onto Pattern Recognition. There are several articles already on this, but there will be a comprehensive breakdown coming in the coming weeks.
For now, continue doing everything you can to recover the latent knowledge you spent years behind a desk developing. Your brain is powerful, give it a reason to remember everything you need.
Conclusion
When it comes to language recovery, the more time you have spent exposed to the language, even tangentially, the more enjoyable the process will be. It is entirely possible that you only recognize loan words or you only know one verb tense. That is okay.
Ultimately the goal is to ensure you are never starting at zero and having even a few things in your mind is better than having absolutely nothing. Combine this with the other strategies listed and watch as your foreign language skills advance in ways that mainstream classrooms could only dream of replicating.
Whether you think grammar or vocabulary is more important, you need to focus on both throughout your language learning experience if you want to develop your language skills to be well rounded. Learning a foreign language is no easy feat, it will be difficult irrespective of how you approach it. But you can do difficult things and be great, so continue to do difficult things and be great. I will be here by your side endeavoring to do the same.
Eager for more Second Language Strategies?
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