Thread

1. jdw64 · 1789830343 · focus · HN ↗

   The biggest obstacle to learning a foreign language is that it's so much slower and more frustrating than using your native language, right? Compared to your native-language typing speed, even English typing speed is only half...

   So it's really frustrating. how do you all relieve that frustration?

   1. birdsongs · 1789831751 · focus · HN ↗

      The frustration goes away with time. It's always going to be slightly more friction and that's worse when tired, etc, but the cost becomes less.

      As someone who's done a second language to fluency past 30 years old, the largest hurdle IMO is the inverse frequency curve for words (not sure what the real term is).

      But basically, the most common (and therefore most easy to pick up and learn) words carry the least amount of meaning. A, The, Where, Why, etc..

      The most meaning-dense words are the least common, and therefore you learn them much slower when consuming native media.

      It gets to the point where, if you learn a quarter of all the words in a language, you can read every word of most sentences except for one or two, and those 1-2 words carry all the meaning.

      It's incredibly frustrating and the only way through is grinding vocabulary lists, as far as I know.

      English native -> Norwegian C1 in ~ 5 years. The back half of any language learning is brutal, IMO. I had a huge dip where I stopped being able to absorb vocabulary via osmosis and consuming media, and just had to grind. But maybe that's just me.

      1. jdw64 · 1789834479 · focus · HN ↗

         Thanks for the advice.

         For me, reading is fine, but writing and speaking are hard. Especially speaking. What should I do about this?

         Should I change my environment first, after all?

         1. birdsongs · 1789889029 · focus · HN ↗

            My speaking only got better after speaking a lot with native speakers, just, a lot. And focusing hard on vowel sounds. In Norwegian specifically those kill a lot of understanding. If you can't immerse by living there, I really liked 1:1 online interactions. I paid for an italki instructor my first year here.

            My writing is still my weakest point. I'm fine with spell check and predictive text on my phone, but my spelling is atrocious without it. That could be improved with spelling practice like we did as kids in our native language, but I just haven't put in the time, due to how common spell check is.

            Basically just time and effort! Sorry, I know it's not a nice answer. It's just a really hard thing to do, and you have to keep doing it, and a lot of people minimize the effort. Maybe it's easier for some but not most of us.

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