Good I love reading novels, and I actually find it difficult as a beginner in the language What do you think of what Oxford did and created novels according to level? Do you find that this is wrong and that it would lose the essence of the novel?

Hi Vladimir, I've just discovered your videos, and you present a very thought-provoking view on language that I haven't heard anywhere else. I also really like your presentation style, especially the repetition and emphasis. Thank you for sharing such a powerful, though condemning, message. I’d like to address some points in your video, namely your definition of language and your view of linguistics. You define language as a tool for acquiring knowledge, making a distinction from communication. I can certainly understand how we use language to manage our environment by identifying cause and effect chains (acquiring knowledge). However, based on your definition, what is communication? If communication is the sharing or distributing of knowledge, then it would make sense that a learner could memorize out-of-context words in the hopes of sharing their acquired knowledge. However, you strongly disagree with this. To put it simply, how does communication fit into your view of language as a tool for acquiring knowledge? Secondly, when you list knowledge categories, you don’t include cultural knowledge, which one could argue is best deduced from speaking with locals rather than reading blogs or articles. Wouldn’t that be a reason for someone to speak with an online “teacher”? Or would you say that for this to be effective, the student would need to define, ‘I want to speak about the cultural mannerisms, characteristics, communication style, body language, and social norms of this local person’? Having said all that, I definitely take your point that many learners go into “speaking sessions” without clear goals. And I think your emphasis on this is absolutely fantastic. Next, your argument against TESOL or TEFL seems like a strawman. The field of linguistics isn’t about learning the meaning of words or improving one’s pronunciation, but rather it’s about acquiring knowledge on the ‘invisible’ mechanisms of language, such as its form, function, and how it’s represented in our brains. The field of linguistics is actually a combination of several disciplines, such as social studies, neurology, psychology, anthropology, and anatomy. Having said that, I agree that a master's in TESOL doesn’t necessarily make a good language acquisition teacher. This is because, as you said, acquisition happens through engaging with meaningful content. And most people aren’t interested in linguistics. Language acquisition and linguistics are two separate fields of study. Many people confuse the two, as you have clearly addressed in this video by showing the conflation of studying language form with studying language content. Language acquisition, I believe, is a deeply philosophical area of study, as it deals with uncovering psychological barriers, which, when uncovered, can disrupt current societal norms. Finally, your fundamental point that we learn language through consuming content (meaningful contextual knowledge or information) is certainly true. I think about it like the container and the contents. The language form is the container that delivers the language meaning, which is the content. Teachers worldwide believe that if students have enough containers, they can start delivering meaningful content. But as you’re rightly explaining, we acquire containers through receiving contents. This is certainly a deeply misunderstood point by our language teaching industry.

You raise a great point that when i want to acquire knowledge, I turn to English, and that I want to learn another language to share my acquired knowledge with others.

・発音が英語と日本語ですごい違うから英語を話せない。 ・日本人はシャイだから英語を話せない。 どちらも違うと思います。 I would ask them to speak to themselves in English. I'm sure they can't. But if this theory is correct, they should be able to speak English fluently when they're alone.

This theory! That theory! There isn't just one theory that suits everyone. I personally find that reading alot doesn't really sink in that much, but when I hear something especially if I can attache an emotion, or event then the words or sentences tends to sink in most times and can recall later on. Speaking deffinately helps because it initiates a conversation and in return you get input e, g, new words , different ways on how to use them! and of course improving your listening skills and hearing the pronounciation in which you can imitate.

日本人は英語が出来ないというより、英語をやらないんだと思います。日本語で全て完結できるから、英語話せなくても困らない、生きるか死ぬかで切羽詰まってないですよね。幸せな国なんですよね。 日本は義務教育の3年間で意思疎通するには十分な内容を学べて、高校まで含めると、6年間かなり高度な英語教育をしてもらえて感謝してます。 一方で、政府というより、戦後の大学と大学受験界の利権が絡んでそうですね。 あとは、日本を世界で勝負させたくない、世界から情報を得られるようになったり、ビジネスを世界に広げて行くこと、科学技術もそうだし、日本が一番になること、儲かること、それを快く思ってない人たち、日本を世界から遠ざけておきたい、戦後に利権を得た人達や団体の圧力もあるだろうなと想像してます。 2016年に戦後最大級の英語教育の変革がありましたね。 世界で勝負するにはまだまだ受験英語も変えないといけないだろうし、そこら辺の利権、特権を守りたい人たちと、あとは、日本人自身も急な変化を好まない国民性というのもありそう。 これからの日本のことを考えたら、英語を使いこなせた方が絶対日本にとっていいですよね。 コロナ後の現在、これからは、日本文化、和食や考え方など注目が集まると思うので、英語ができればもっともっと日本にとってチャンスが広がりそうですね。

Totally agree with you, Kevin-san. My daughter14ysold is learning computer science by American text it has written for junior high. At first She couldn't read, listen, write snd speak well but She was excited to learn the first class and improving her English skill surprisingly. Kevin, you are right.

ONE LIFE: DON'T WASTE IT Book: virtuallynative.com

英語の基本は音声です。すべての言語は音声から学習します。テキストならAIで充分に翻訳が可能な時代になっています。

私は、日本人が英語を話せない理由の一つは、英語が聞き取れないことにあると思います。聞き取れない理由はフ、学校教育でフォニックスを全くやらないことにあると思います。英語を習い始めて最初にしなければいけないことは、Phonicsを、できればネイティブの先生から習うことだと思います。

言語は文化。自分の文化圏の言語たる母語で高等教育を受けられるのは恵まれている証拠だと思います。日本という国、2600年以上続いている国の文化、或いは精神性を失わないためにも日本語は守っていく必要があると思います。英語を含む外国語の習得は、情報を得るための手段の幅を広げるだけでなく、異文化に対する理解度の向上や思考の幅を広げる効果があると思います。更には、比較対象ができることにより言語を含めた自国文化に対する理解度を高めることにも寄与すると思います。コミュニケーションツールとしての語学力の向上は、外国語(第二·第三言語)学習をする上でのモチベーションになると思います。ちなみに多言語話者は、比較的認知症を発症しにくいと言われているそうです。

What about having new knowledge via a foreign language (like international students learning at a university in a foreign country)? Is it true that the students simultaneously learn new content (like chemistry, physics, engineering etc,) and how to communicate the knowledge via a foreign language? And can we call this KNOWING HOW to communicate particular subject contents using a foreign language as a kind of improvement of "language knowledge (vocabulary and grammar etc.)", by comparison with their compatriots who learn the same subjects via their native language in their motherland and do not know how to present the content in the foreign language?

Universities aquire such level in such language in order to able to study in'em which makes no sense. Because like you said you'll learn the language through the information and you will learn the information through the subject.

So underrated and the only one I know who knows/tells the truth about learning a language. Respect.

Reading helps, if I hear the language 24h in a day it doesn't help me speak but gives me a wrong sense of fluency, though when I read my speaking gets better

Dear Vladimir thank you for this engaging experience, we are earnestly hopeful that discussions of this kind will occasionally happen here! PS: Did not want to be indiscreet yet asking you for an eventual talk with Dr. Jeff McQuillan or with James from Future Multilingual KZbin channel, where they also want to inspire discussion and reflection on language learning/acquisition. Cheers.

i was restarting studing english, im 39 years, i starting by taken lingoda classes, for conversation, when i've found your videos and book, i read it, now i've stoped lingoda classes and start to read books on kindle, i will try it for some months, after that i will try a new lingoda class and see if i can speak better, smoothly, thank you

Thanks for a great conversation. I’ve been following Dr. Nation for a long time. He’s a giant in the field of language acquisition. I’ve watched several of his interviews and lectures. It would be great if you could interview Stephen Krashen.

Main takeaways: 1:00 Paul Nation claims to be an expert on teaching teachers how to teach foreign languages but he is not happy with the current state of language teaching??? 5:53 Paul Nation claims to be an expert on teaching vocabulary but doesn't know much about teaching grammar??? Nobody should learn individual words! 9:55 Paul Nation believes that a person can be good at reading but not good at speaking. His anecdotal evidence is one of the most unscientific arguments a university professor can offer. The truth of the matter is that a person's reading can only be as good as their speaking, or worse, but never better. Reading is a sufficient but not necessary condition for Speaking. You don't need to be able to read smoothly and accurately in order to speak smoothly and accurately. However, if you are able to read smoothly and accurately, you will be able to speak smoothly and accurately. 16:59 Paul Nation is a big proponent of graded readers. Show me 1 (one) person who has become proficient in a foreign language using graded readers. Just 1. 27:04 Paul Nation has not become proficient in a foreign language as an adult. One Life: Don't Waste It Book: virtuallynative.com

Yes. Agreed that correcting grammar mistakes doesn't work. Another reason why they don't work is because it takes the focus off of meaning and puts the focus on form. Brains want meaning. You retain meaningful things better than things without meaning. And you just wasted some time that could have been spent on meaningful interaction. However, you can have some separate focus on form. For example, learning vocabulary and improving pronunciation. Btw, non-natives often have more interesting ways of saying things that they have imported from their native language into English. "It cost me an arm and a leg" is a cliché and not that interesting. "It cost me a kidney" is unique and therefore actually has more impact than using an overused cliché. So the idea of correcting someone who is using English in a more interesting way does not make sense. And the cost vs. costed grammar mistake does not interfere with meaning. Everyone umderstands exactly what she meant so there was no miscommunication there. If there had been miscommunication, then some clarification would have been appropriate. Some negotiation of meaning. Anyway, thanks for the video.

I would also say that this is controversial. When I first wanted to learn, and encountered Greek, I wanted to read anything, in order to learn more of the language, from user manuals to packages. Anything Greek interested me. I did not learn anything meaningful, or anything at all with this approach because my learning was very disorganised. This did not work for me. Yeah, I loved even seeing the language and not understanding anything, but true learning began with a bilingual dictionary, a book for beginners and... Duolingo. From that point my learning became organised, I began to understand grammar and sentence structure and all the theory. My point is, for organised learning, at some time you need to do simpler things that maybe you do not like as much.

There's an element of truth in this for sure - as adult learners we should certainly be moving on to meaningful native material as soon as we can. But the music analogy breaks down because musicians certainly do NOT learn their instruments by tackling their favourite material at the outset. No violinist begins by working on the Beethoven concerto or the Paganini Caprices. The learning curve is far, far too steep. One KZbinr who tried this approach as an experiment crashed and burned in spectacular fashion. No - what musicians actually do is learn the fundamental mechanics of their instrument and then work on very basic exercises and highly simplified material till they master the fundamentals. They only gradually work up to the real stuff. I suspect that for most of us, a similar approach would work well for language learning.

Excuse me for so many comments, but this video is the best I have seen so far regarding how to learn a language. Everything you say it makes a lot of sense.

As I go along with the video, everything you say makes more sense to me and makes me want to shoot myself

Let's suppose I am interested in Finance, Economics, Calisthenics, Programming and Meditation - Wellbeing. So, should I study those subjects in English to acquire the knowledge and in turn I will be able to learn English as a side effect? I hope your answer Vladimir.

Do you recommend physical dictionary {paper} or electronic dictionary

You have one life. 👏Don't waste it.

L I K E 👍 👍👍 👍 👍 💯 ❣💯 ❣💯 😍 😍😍 😍😍

One Life: Don't Waste It Book: virtuallynative.com

I've never learned to play a musical instrument 😭😭😭

One Life: Don't Waste It Book: virtuallynative.com

No one is here just like you who give us the original suggestions, everyone is just pretending and getting us the greed so that they can earn from us. Make more videos about these topics, I have been subscribing you're channel for 3 years. Thanks a lot for your valuable content sir.🙏🙏😊😊😊👌👌 From India 🇮🇳🇮🇳

I think you just explained why I am so frustrated at learning foreign languages. I learned English because I was geniunely interested in topics presented only in English (e.g. Hollywood movies, American/English culture). I do not learn a language to communicate with others (I am an introvert) or better my career prospects. I have been ttrying to learn Dutch and French for practical reasons. With French it's a bit better because there are some things about French culture that I am interested in, but with Dutch it's really difficult. The Dutch culture really has nothing for me. It sounds silly to me and I feel like an idiot speaking it (Sorry Dutch people I mean no offense). How would you advise me? I also do not learn languages because they sound "beautiful". I think how a language sounds depends entirely on the speaker, not the language itself.

I don't know about english, but I know than mistake corrections are really neccesary in spanish... and it's easy to see if you listen to people who have been living in Spain for a decade, and still have a tough time with subjects as gender...

I agree I have watched all your videos so far, even those that are not on KZbin. When somebody in the group makes a mistake I just say Mate you need to study this and back to fix your own Mistake. I'm not a teacher but of course you know when somebody makes a mistake. Thanks dear Vladimir.

I definitely follow your approach of not forcing speaking and depending on corrections. However, there are people that seem to prove that making mistakes and enduring to move forward, does seem to work, if the person studies like 6 plus hours daily then speaks a ton daily. For example, Benny Lewis seems to have proven that the speak and make mistakes can also work. There are at least 4 reputable language coaches that say that speaking and making like 200 mistakes a day also works.

The word outrageously was spelled mistakenly as autrageously. Really good video Vlad, I agree with you that error corrections are in general very inefficient. But alas students still want to be "fixed".

I love you from Peru 🇵🇪❤❤❤

Excellent like always Vladimir. Greetings from Venezuela 🇻🇪

I respect your honesty sir

Very good explanation.

One Life: Don't Waste It Book: virtuallynative.com 0:13 it costed me a kidney 1:49 Why do people make mistakes? 2:18 Mistake corrections don't work 2:49 Fix my grammar mistakes 4:17 How many lessons to fix all mistakes 7:28 Don't pay for random words and piecemeal corrections 7:33 The job of a language teacher 8:17 Language schools 8:47 Alternative Website: all.virtuallynative.com

This thesis 'language is knowledge' is somewhat flawed. To get knowledge you need to be able to communicate. You can gather as much of it as you want in a language you know, but if it can't be communicated between people it's dead in the water. And this notion that you just set out on a path to acquire knowledge through the chosen medium and it develops, is fantasy island thought. It's just another example of the never-ending conveyor belt of language 'gurus' who think they've cracked the code for learning languages. 'Be specific regarding things you want to talk about', yet 'make as many examples of things you want to talk about'? So practically everything, just like you would in your native language? That rather brings us back to square one doesn't it? The patterns and content for 'talking about' things, aside from topic-specific words, are all the same. As an adult learner these things won't just come to you on a plate through exposure/osmosis just on the back of desiring to talk about a topic and trying to pursue it through that language medium. Knowledge is not tied to any language. Thought is not language, language is a means of communicating thought, it's the other way around. Sure enough it's a great idea to copy the vocabulary and patterns functional speakers use, but that itself is no guarantee that the information is correct or if the language makes sense.

what happened with vladimir is he right

Why did I have to translate "compelling" to understand what that word means? That meaning did'nt come from nothing.

Hi teacher how long it will take me to master English I mean by reading???

Very nice

you are great

O just watched your last video on the absurdity called english teaching

Finally some truth, among all the charlatans on KZbin; you have provided a wonderful overview for me. All of these fake polyglot youtubers have never been able to express these concepts. This video was well composed, said, and conveyed. All of the language learning KZbinrs are often 'snake oil salesmen' who need to keep the lie alive in order for a deluded sense of health, wealth, or prosperity.