How I Would Teach Languages in a Classroom

[@Thelinguist]

If you were a language teacher, how would you motivate your students to spend time with their target language? The app I use to learn languages -> bit.ly/3S8WZvH My 10 FREE secrets to language learning -> www.thelinguist.com

[@amstabomitdembabo5984]

Do you know Dr. Liam Printer? He has an inspiring podcast on CI based foreign language instruction "The Motivated Classroom". Would be interesting to see you both having a conversation.

[@internalizequotes]

@@amstabomitdembabo5984 thanks for the recommendation!

[@johnharutyunyan2901]

I would apply the same technique. In every single class, I would expose my students to the authentic language, however challenging it may be. I would arrange (as you have mentioned) meetings with native speakers or even trips, if possible. Thus, the students would be able to both practice the language and test themselves and see what progress they have made so far.

[@anwa6169]

Hi Steve, this video is really important, we need the different approach.

[@countryballspredicciones5184]

Hello, I think I am a subnormal, cause each time I learn another language, I imagine that I am the president of Peru and I am creating a new language for my country and I enjoy it, this will not work for "normal" people. I am 15 yo and I speak fluently Spanish, French, English, Russian, and Portuguese.

[@SpartanChiefNL]

Language learning in high school was dreadful. After that it took me 10 years to realize that I actually enjoy learning a new language

[@YamatoTre]

I always heard Spanish was easy, and I wasn't good at it in school, so I thought I wasn't good at languages. 5 months into Japanese, and I can say more than I ever could in Spanish, because I actually care about it.

[@Klinoklaz]

not only language learning, basically everything about schools is the same

[@Klinoklaz]

YamatoTre The polarization in school students is half artificial, since the school system is quite industrialized, treats all its students the same way while everyone needs different approach. Bad or good are just labels in school actually

[@Acendnt]

@@YamatoTre same thing, except I finally understand why I never learned stuff in Spanish.

[@LanguageSimp]

I recommend dropping out of school. Real polyglots don't go to school!

[@FilipP88]

Best advice for true multilingual gigachads 💪

[@tomdoesstuff1978]

Your 15 minutes are up buddy, the joke's wearing a little thin now.

[@WriterScience]

This is spot on, Steve. As an EFL professor, I try to never get in the way of student learning. Whenever I introduce students to Krashen’s natural approach and LingQ, I pretty much tell them that I shouldn’t have a job because if they spent our class time just reading and listening they would go farther than I could ever take them through direct instruction.

[@NinPossible]

I'm a teacher too and I feel the same way too. If students really know how important the comprehensible inputs are, they will never need us again, except, of course, for talking and hanging out. :)

[@WriterScience]

@@gee8883 We agree about that! A teacher can be a great mentor and guide, showing you HOW to learn the language and keeping your motivation up. But that's different than the direct method, in which the teacher imparts information for the student to learn.

[@spage80]

I took french from fourth grade until twelve. I never learned to speak but I could conjugate verbs well. Didn't recognize them when spoken but I always thought it was that I am bad with languages. The only time I learned anything was we had a substitute teacher because our teacher was pregnant. This lady was the mother of a friend of mine that was actually french. She spoke no English in class and we started actually learning to understand and speak this was in the seventh grade. Unfortunately the regular teacher came back and that was the end of my French. I am slow with languages but I can learn. The US Army sent me to Germany and I am now fluent in German.

[@ralfj.1740]

Ausgezeichnet! Ich hoffe es gefällt Ihnen in Deutschland 🙂

[@innewynn]

I'm so grateful for your videos on language learning; they are a lifesaver amongst all the misinformation that's out there! Your videos are the holy grail of language learning.

[@rosminazuchri636]

Very useful n interesting . Thanks for quality content.

[@marcoarrieta4983]

Steve, I'm gonna take on a challenge just like your 3 month challenges. I'll shaddow your videos as a way for me to get closer to your entonation and perform better when I pronounce. Your videos are a great help for me, thanks for your impact on language learning throughout the globe!

[@petecam3949]

I think at least for me, anyway, learning enough to be able to read something in the language, and understand what I was reading without really having to translate, but just read it and know what it said that was motivating for me. So reading something at my level and being able to understand it had really motivated me to want to learn more of the language.

[@StillAliveAndKicking_]

I did six years of French at school in England, which I hated, and later on four years of evening classes. I could not speak French. Move forward thirty years, and after four months using an iPad application and regularly listening to podcasts for native French speakers, I can speak far better than I could before, and I can understand spoken French as long as it is clear, and not street French. The problem with school language lessons is that most students are not motivated, and the goal is to box tick. Thus learn the present tense, tick, learn the past tense, tick, learn the future tense, tick, and so on. I feel that real progress requires significant time actively listening to the target language, which is an activity that does not tick boxes. I also believe that the student must listen to many different native speakers, in order to separate the language from a given person’s version of it ie their physiology, and psychology.

[@marttlrrs2597]

I find fluent non-native speakers much more inspiring when learning a language. Becoming friends with a fluent Japanese speaker was enourously helpful. At last I had someone I could identifyh with, that I could really try to imitate and to use him as an example of how good my Japanese could be if I continue. And creating a new sense of identity is so important. Before I would only talk to Japanese people and I always felt the gap is just too great- I could not use the example of native speakers as a basis to build my new Japanese-speaking self. Also, people who have learned the language and the culture from outside often have a better knowlegde of the culture, of the history, of the literature.. at least they can articulate certain things better. Native speakers often have an intuitive understanding that they cannot put into words.. Of course takling to natives can be tremendously enjoyable.. But ever since my experience with Japanese I try to look proficient non-native teachers when learning a language.

[@OneAdam12Adam]

I agree 100%. As long as they have Advanced High to Superior proficiency on the ACTFL Oral Proficiency Interview... Certified rating. Native speakers only can help with some pronunciation.

[@mariannerichard1321]

As a French Canadian who had to learn English for 10 years, not being close to fluent at the end of the journey, I share your feelings. I only really started to progress when I began to read book series in English (the translations were not too regular and the original version was on display in the libraries, ready to buy on the fly xD). It was a struggle, but I made progresses like never before. Since then, I studied Spanish, Japanese and German, but I'm only really fluent en English for now.

[@icysamurai1485]

This is a great video! I think the idea to have a teacher motivate their pupils and monitor their activity in LingQ is genius. It would make the role of a teacher much easier, and almost too easy, which is perhaps why instructors have hesitated to adapt this method. They would be more limited to answering student's questions, which would still be very helpful. I might teach at a small classical school. Because the school is privately owned, and I will probably teach multiple different subjects, I might be able to implement this!

[@yagmurcamd]

Discipline and perseverance and immersion.

[@internalizequotes]

Almost every perspective you share on here I just find myself nodding yes, yes! Thanks for putting this content out there. My hope is that you and others that push similar perspectives will gain traction and wider familiarity so that it hopefully percolates into traditional educational institutions.

[@valerieayla4687]

Thank you, perfect timing! I'm set to teach in person 2x weekly, college level. I have reevaluated my approach many times, and work very hard to avoid the dreaded pitfalls in the classroom experience. One problem that French teachers have is these "bench marks" posted by the ACTFL. While it's supposed to create "standards" and sort of "protect" a learning experience it ends up driving a "teaching for the test" approach. In order to move out of this mindset I ask myself, what if there were no test to this, what would i do ...and it lead me to the world of polyglots and all kinds of other resources and ways of thinking about language learning. Keep posting these supporting videos 🙏💯

[@OneAdam12Adam]

ACTFL clearly states that any benchmark is not to be used in that way. Neither proficiency guidelines not performance guidelines should be used in that way. Also, that doesn't give instructors an excuse to teach isolated verb conjugations or have students learn grammar points out of context. There are far too many grammar schoolmarms out there!

[@OneAdam12Adam]

I think you miss his point though. Universities and schools ask for grades. Unless you just do pass/fail. Your approach must produce communicatively competent learners.

[@sakurachaan972]

Thank you so much for this video. I'm French and I've been wanting to teach English to native French speakers. Actually, I'm just starting my tutoring business. This video came at the right time because very recently, I started doubting myself because even though I can speak and understand English very vell, for me I wasn't fluent and proficient enough to be allowed to teach that language (imposter syndrome). But now, I know that I still can do it even if I'm not 100% fluent. I just have to be a good motivator!

[@tomdoesstuff1978]

Let me tell you a tale of my high school French experience here in the UK. The teacher was so poor and weak in his control of the classroom that the children in the older years would physically attack him, put pins on his chair, wave lighters in front of his face as if they were going to set him on fire. Consequently, zero french was learnt. That teacher left with stress. He was replaced by a female teacher who quickly realised the whole school knew no more than bonjour and so it was decided that we would not sit GCSEs (probably to avoid the school returning a 0% pass rate). Instead we were entered in for some meaningless certificate. Here's where the fun begins. The oral assessment for the certificate consisted of course of speaking French. The teacher took us students one by one into the corridor outside of the classroom with a tape recorder and proceeded to give instructions: "In a moment, I am going to say X, when I do you're going to say Y". She literally told us word for word what to say in response to the questions she was about to answer and even gave the opportunity to run through it once or twice before she pressed record on the tape machine. Even as a child of 15 or so, I remember sitting there in disbelief at what was happening. Suffice to say, after 5 years of high school French I could only say bonjour and ask for an oragina. Five years! It took a trip to Italy in my 20s to really experience another language and gain the desire to want to learn it. I guess my point being that a whole generation of children in the UK, in fact most likely every generation, has been robbed of the chance to gain a foreign language through completely ineffective study methods and a collective cultural laziness that thinks because the rest of the world speaks our language, we don't need to learn theirs. Having since gone on to reach a decent level in Spanish, I can attest that it has opened up a whole new world for me. I can see the world from a different perspective now, not only in terms of how I absorb content previously incomprehensible to me but also through the untangling of my mind from the rigid thought patterns that are so often expressed in English. By that I mean sure, English is an incredibly expressive language but once you realise that Spanish has two verbs for "to be" then it can change your whole perception of reality if you stop and think about it - at least it did in my case. I felt like I'd been unplugged from the Matrix. My own thoughts on what would be an ideal classroom environment are akin to the ALG /TPRS classrooms with lots of comprehensible input. If the English speaking world invested heavily in great teachers who were able to provide great content in this manner, then I'm certain we would have many more multilingual native English speakers in the UK and elsewhere around the world.

[@nostalgiatrip7331]

In middle school, my French teacher was a British/American woman who spoke French as a second language. I screwed around in that class a bit, but I was still somewhat interested in learning the language. But when I went to high school and my new teacher was an older French man, it definitely added to my inspiration and interest in the culture and language. Tu me manques, Monsieur Q

[@sara_s_]

I'm Australian and we were forced to learn French in highschool even though the language is irrelevant in my country. The teacher was arrogant and rude and didn't respect our lifestyle. There were no ethnic French students at our school- all the kids thought it was a waste of our time. It's important to teach relevant languages.

[@OneAdam12Adam]

Relevant is a problematic word. Everyone has a different motivation for why they want to study a language and culture. Folks are being forced to learn Chinese in some schools. Why would we want to become proficient in Chinese. The Chinese government is trying to rid the world of anyone standing in their way. They kill and abuse their power.

[@20quid]

I think there is space for a lot of different digital tools to help with multi-lingual teaching in the classroom. So for example the teacher could set the lesson up to teach a particular concept, and on each of the kid's laptops the relevant vocabulary, grammar, reading and listening for that concept or scenario is displayed in all of the kid's chosen languages. Or maybe a type of messaging program where kids from several schools who want to learn the same language can work together while in their distant classrooms. In a sense, once the teacher has they tools, their role changes to teaching the kids how to learn rather than what to learn.

[@theartfuldodger5326]

Except for the fact that teachers must have some sort of assessments, they must be certified to teach in public schools, they must be able to teach to the least motivated students who have no interest in actually acquiring a language, and enormous class sizes which challenge the mettle of the most veteran teachers. Ideally, classes could be immersion style & more holistic, but that's not the reality for 99.9% of us. And we're teaching proficiency based (not with a textbook)- we have kids for 4 months, maybe 2 semesters total, that's it.

[@calvinchristopher9046]

Great observations Steve let’s hope these ideas take hold

[@speakrussian6779]

There are so many ways to teach language in a classroom. You cannot limit yourself by using only one way!

[@slicksalmon6948]

Always good to give advice on something you've never successfully done.

[@BryanAJParry]

IMHO as a BA Hons and MA in the subject and as an English teacher for 15 years, I don't 100% agree with Steve here. However, I am completely with him as seeing the teacher more as a motivator; I constantly tell my students to see me as a gym trainer or football coach, and like in those areas the weight falls on them to live what I hopefully inspire in them.

[@ColonelDoYouReadMe]

As an experiment, a school could offer this way of studying a language as an optional alternative to the traditional classroom studies. One could encourage the less interested students to try it, knowing that the old school way is likely to be a waste of time to them. Through that, they could freely choose which language to learn and find motivation; it is after all better to speak ANY second or third language than none, it doesn't have to be a major one. So the school would keep teaching good old German, French, Spanish etc. in the traditional way, but only to those who opt for that - those who believe in the tried and tested method, or those who care more about grades for future goals, for example. Those who don't really care for language studies, let them instead sit down and watch films and still learn something useful, to whichever degree they can manage. Of course, since actual measurable progress is what's important to the schools, the students would probably need to be graded in some way, but that's a different debate. I'd love to see this experiment.

[@jacobsoto7228]

I'm trying to become a public school ESL teacher..One thing teachers online always did was translate instead of immerse. They also started just teaching the language in my native language. I wanted to see if they can after they teach the alphabet to just speak it like the direct method and series method.

[@lulosanu]

Thank you I Loved the idea

[@TopDogIK]

Steve, what would you say to setting up the immersion classroom more like a home theater, with a nice LED bigscreen, comfy seating, 5.1 sound and spending most of the classroom time watching the first one or two episodes from a wide variety of TV shows? This way, if a show catches the attention of a learner, they can keep watching it at home or on their own time.

[@nostalgiatrip7331]

I don't think an anime theater is quite the same as a classroom

[@MarKeLiuZ]

I believe that both native an non-native teachers can provide their own piece of knowledge to the students, but a native teacher is not always the best and believing that because they are native they are better is a big mistake, in my opinion. Obviously in regards of speaking, listening, etc they are probably better that a non-native, but, I do not think they can fully understand the different struggles that the students have throughout the learning process of that language, the frustation, how to remember words, patrons, etc, because they didn't studied it, they just simply learned it. For example, I myself, as a spanish native probably I am better at pronunciation (in spanish, obviously), do not make gramatical mistakes, in comparisson to those who are not native but studied it several years that inevitably sometimes make few and non-important mistakes . I do not think I am the right person to tell somebody how to study spanish because I have never studied it, I simply do it. I think that a mix of both, if possible, would be ideal, or maybe change the teacher depending on your level or what you want to achieve. Amazing video as always!

[@futurez12]

We had the most beautiful French (native) teacher at my school in the UK. I don't think any of us learned a lick of French. I'm still not sure to this day if it was us being distracted, if it was the methods, or whether we just couldn't care less about speaking French. Probably a little of each. 😂

[@Tehui1974]

Another good video Steve.

[@aprilmunday1152]

I'm not sure that children at school have much motivation to learn a language at all. I had the good fortune in the early 70s to be taught French and German by native speakers who were also really good teachers. Learning these languages wasn't my idea, but it was on the curriculum, so I had to learn them. For the first couple of years I didn't really enjoy French, but then it started to make sense and there was no holding me back. The same thing didn't really happen with German, but I persevered until I reached a good level. I went on to study French at university and to work in Germany. I think being taught by native speakers is really important.

[@tuinglessinmiedo4732]

I believe that both native and non-native teachers have the same chance to become great teachers. It is true that a native speaker can introduce and explain his culture and pronunciation the best, but, on the other hand, a non native speaker could be more motivating since students can see him as someone who was once a learner too. In any case, the passion for teaching and researching the right content for your students is the keypoint for both of them.

[@iostad]

🙏Useful and practical

[@sotmMrPants]

Reminds me of what Lydia Machova did for language learners once, do things in the language that you like to do.

[@bryan143]

Steve doesn't understand is kids today and what motivates (and how technology - social media and phones - and sports activities get in the way). Actually, in our local high schools in the US there are very good language teachers and I've spoken in foreign languages with some of these kids in these classes and they're pretty good. Teachers are aware of novel internet resources like KZbin and use them. They take trips to foreign countries where the languages are spoken, and some bring some of their kids to foreign language conversation clubs in the area. The classroom experience today is in no way like the classroom experience from 60 years ago, though there is variation according to the teacher and the teacher's own motivation to teach the language.

[@gherissibelkacem1209]

So we,re ready to follow you right now please let, s start

[@namstee]

I have to say that sometimes having a native speaker as a teacher isn't the best option, if they themselves aren't fluent in your native language. Everyone's mother tongue leaves an imprint and creates unique challenges to pronunciation of the target language. Having someone who has overcome these same challenges teach you can be really beneficial. For instance if your mother tongue is monotonal, having a native speaker of a tonal language teach (even as a trained teacher) you how to make these sounds isn't as helpful as someone from shared background gone through the same issues.

[@tebby24]

Coming from a kid learning Chinese, I would respectfully dissagree. I think that the idea of being "taught how to make sounds" will inevitably result in confusion. If one wants to acquire languages the way Steve does, good pronunciation comes from hours and hours of listening, and then spending time on your own trying to replicate what you've been hearing. It could be that other people find this more difficult that I do, or that they feel silly doing it, but I personally spend a lot of time just pronouncing induvidual Chinese syllables. I say them over and over, I try making them brighter or darker or moving the formants slightly. Tbr it's not to try and 'fine tune' my pronunciation, I just want to familiarize myself what which mouth/throat positions produce which sounds, so that when I'm trying to speak Chinese, I have a good enough understanding of my own mouth in order to reproduce what I hear during my immersion (I think this is kinda like how babys babble and say goo goo ga nonsense for a while).

[@namstee]

@@tebby24 There are a ton of people who cannot escape the frame set up their mother tongue, take English native speakers and the letters/sounds a , i and e. They almost never map 1:1 to these sounds in other languages, no matter how much people hear the language spoken daily. Everyone in the ex-pat communities in South-East Asia or Japan for example know of someone who pronounce the foreign language just like their mother tongue. I think this is where a non-native teacher can really point stuff out to you better than a native speaker, they know exactly what their mouth/tongue/throat is doing wrong, where as a native speaker might not. This is just my experience with some languages like Thai and Chinese.

[@StillAliveAndKicking_]

When I lived in Montreal, someone who spoke English and French to native level regularly corrected my French. He was dreadful, told me the obvious, and missed the real problems. I stopped speaking French as I became demotivated. A bilingual person probably learnt both languages when young, and has no memory of learning them. Thus they have zero understanding of the difficulties faced by an adult learner, and can be worse than useless because they think they are an expert teacher, but know nothing.

[@tebby24]

​@@namstee Understood. I don't mean to sound pretentious, but I think its possible my lack of empathy in this regard could be because I have a background in music, more specifically close musical listening (I don't read music vry well and spend lots of time playing "by ear" whatever that means). It's non unlikely that doing this a lot as a kid will increase your potential to catch fine differences when comparing native speech to your own.

[@jackuzzi5251]

The more I study any language the more I'm convinced concentrating on the beginner and intermediate levels will get you to the level of daily communication faster than chasing higher vocabulary. The grammar, word order, pronunciation, tones are all the same from level to level, it's just matter of getting your ears and brain used to them. Greater vocabulary can be built overtime by using the foundation the lower levels have provided.

[@mikaelfarro]

True lol thanks for the advice

[@michaelabercrombie7698]

2:38 Frustration is a universal response to language learning.

[@squaretriangle9208]

Language learning has changed so much in the last decades but not to test or grade them only works with motivated students and as we know not all are😢😂 and maybe even become less motivated in all subjects as now we're all on the instant gratification train

[@commentarytalk1446]

When I was learning a mandatory foreign language not of my choosing as a child, it was not clear to me: 1. I had never gone abroad and so had no real experience of how useful it really is and how rewarding it feels to speak successfully to a native speaker in their language because I want something. 2. Doing the above enhancing my holiday and sense of adventure in the world is an enormously rewarding experience. Fundamentally I had no concept of how useful and rewarding and how opening up of possibilities a language can be to learn. We learnt from a textbook in black and white and it was very academic. In addtion the recording was very scratchy and being sensitive to noise I hated listening to the tapes playing in this way of the language. It had an echoing effect. The best example would be being abroad and ordering food because I was hungry successfully and being understood. In addtion to choosing a language that had a culture that interested me a lot is also important and the language itself sounds very good to my ear is also important. Again most of time at school I was too young and naive to know how useful a language is. If I had been in a family who spent time abroad I could have put "2+2 together" and then studied at higher level being an older student and with a mature outlook understood how useful it was to put time in studying and meeting people of the culture I wanted to visit. Finally, a teacher who knows the culture and is very enthusiastic and friendly would have helped a lot also. My teachers were more worried about classroom control and grades unfortunately. That detracted from the fun of the language and the fun the teachers could probably find in teaching also. A good source of inspiration in later adult life was discovering Foreign Films with wonderful stories with subtitles. I learn to hear the "sound" of a lot of languages that way and learn what languages I liked: The sound of, the behaviour of the people, the interest of the culture from this. This narrowed down to focus my interest specifically in a given language or two a lot before I was able to go travelling around the world. The internet could change a lot of things now making it easier to hear foreign languages and pick up what individuals want from a language. I think learning a foreign langauge might help me understand communication better as well so that is another meta-interest to do so.

[@paulorobertodacosta5270]

Very good teacher

[@valentina_fantasy]

GREAT!

[@cuber-zx9ho]

Current ALT in Japan. Not the main teacher, but my teachers are all bogged down with bureaucracy and having visible evaluations to report. So providing massive amounts of interesting input isn't a priority. Think you can make a video on this topic?

[@pierreabbat6157]

Did the students have interesting reading material about mulch and tillage, or were they trying to memorize word lists? I've been playing Fictionary by email; one of the words decades ago was "bagasse". Once in a Toastmaster club, someone who didn't know about the game gave a speech about bagasse and stover.

[@deepmind591]

Who want to learn English and practice with each other

[@ChandraClassesMujholi]

Wonderful sir

[@PedroMachadoPT]

I learned French in school. Three years. In the end I was fluent. But I’m a Portuguese native speaker, so it’s easier.

[@BryanAJParry]

To everyone commenting that native teachers don't understand the struggles of somehow learning our language has no idea how language teaching works. I am highly knowledgable and understanding of the different challenges posed to learning English related to various factors including the student's L1. We are trained. We're not all iTalki Community Teachers in this profession, you know. Haha.

[@annarboriter]

One fof the most disheartening lessons I took away from my time working towards certification was hearing the number working HS foreign language teachers admit to me that they didn't believe that their main goal was teaching a foreign language to any degree of utility. They often stressed that they felt that it was just as valid to teach foreign cultures. I saw this as a copout. They took the easy route because nobody, certainly no monolingual administrator, would ever call them out for their incompetence. As for the value of motivating students, this assertion goes against the notion that language acquisition requires internal motivation. Any time that a teacher spends on motivating is time that can be better spent on instruction. I would have much better appreciated better instruction in high school. I've given much thought on this topic and thought about just how few tools existed when I was in HS. If I were in a foreign language classroom today, I would spend much more effort on teaching students about their first language of which they are already experts, the manner in which they acquired it, and how the ability to learn languages define us as human beings

[@arenglish8906]

What should I do to really help them all learning English?

[@smu2mu2]

I don't see what value language classes add. It just comes down to hours spent listening and reading. I think it would be much more beneficial to just teach kids how language acquisition works. Then if they really want to, they'll be equipped to go out and learn on their own

[@taysontenazoavela1267]

amazing

[@kevinhull7925]

You say your ideas may not be practical and you are just throwing them out. Throwing ideas out and postponing considerations of practicality is step one to improving the system. Perhaps others will make videos in response to offer ideas to make yours practical and other ideas that can add to yours. Most of my language-learning has been self-taught, but I did take Arabic classes in college. (I started studying on my own and then took the classes. I still brought my self-learning resources to class, even though they weren’t used, in consideration of the fact that different resources may explain things differently.) I think my classes were a nice complement to add to my being self-taught. For me, this is of interest depending on how I go about seeking my Masters: if I do it in a country where I need a GA to find it and get it in Arabic translation (my Bachelor), this will influence how I teach (as will Gabriel Wyner’s Fluent Forever process).

[@arenglish8906]

I'm teaching esl young learners ( first and fourth gardes) I'm trying to use different tools like songs , games and stories to motivate them but it seems invain 😔

[@IceCenders]

There's nothing about you (Steve) and sign languages anywhere that I can find on the net. Uninterested? If you've never tried, I really think you should, it'd be a new territory to explore, I've just barely started but there's so much to learn, so many features largely absent from spoken languages, it's fascinating. There are also very interesting links with the local spoken/written languages to explore, like potential connections between say Japanese grammar and Japanese SL vs ASL/BSL/etc, or how Japanese and almost surely Chinese SL incorporate signing Chinese characters into their communicative toolbox. It would definitely require from you to find new strategies to learn languages since for example, sadly, you can't quite write sign languages down as of yet (prototypical attempts aside). But given how many spoken languages you speak, I think you should try a couple signed languages as well, perhaps once you're done with your current projects. Obviously it's just a proposition, to each their own. Keep up the good work, you're an inspiration!

[@SolennAudrey]

Je suis d'accord avec toi ! J'ai appris la langue des signes française (LSF) et c'est très différent d'une langue orale. Ça demande d'être à l'aise avec son corps mais tu apprends à bien te faire comprendre et être clair dans tes propos. Les langues des signes vont droit au but, les idées sont exprimées au plus simple. C'est très enrichissant et je me suis fait pleins d'amis sourds ! ;)

[@IceCenders]

@@SolennAudrey As-tu appris sur internet ou bien plutôt dans une salle de classe ? Si tu as trouvé de bonnes ressources sur internet, voire si tu as des recommendations de bons endroits en France où apprendre la LSF en "présentiel", ça m'intéresse ! :)

[@SolennAudrey]

@@IceCenders j'ai appris en présentiel dans un organisme à Paris qui s'appelle IVT c'est l'international visuel theatre. Il y a aussi l'organisme visuel lsf qui proposent des formations partout en France.

[@IceCenders]

@@SolennAudrey Merci bcp, j'irai voir tout ça ! :D

[@ariohandoyo5973]

I would tell them to learn basics things about the english languange first, i'm gonna give them access to Native english speakers then i will use their materials to teach my students, i'm not a teacher though.😊

[@Robert-xm3zh]

What would you do for written/historical languages like Latin and Greek?

[@Thelinguist]

We have Latin and modern Greek at LingQ.

[@jestemkotem2070]

ayo right down corner 😆

[@PedroMachadoPT]

Do I hear a subtle French accent when you speak English?

[@minifridgemedia]

Steve you gotta get rid of that swastika book on the bottom right. Bad vibes!!!

[@sobanosilva8585]

I teach languages through poetry

[@NaturalLanguageLearning]

I'd have everyone doing a lot more reading and listening and no grammar exercises, that for sure

[@bensomes7662]

It's crazy that language classes have been disappointing (for most people) since the 1960s! Something's got to change

[@gaileverett]

Well, if those were your experiences with being taught languages, no wonder you want something different. But I think a native speaker as a teacher is highly important for motivation, especially for what I might call affection for a language. One of the reasons I love German is that my college German teacher was a quirky Austrian who told us great stories. If your teacher doesn't love the language they're teaching, why should you? This idea of having the teacher there just as a sort of mechanic sounds very boring to me. At a bare minimum, you should be able to converse with your teacher in the language.

[@Limemill]

High school language instruction is atrocious almost everywhere in the world (also with the amount of lessons per week you normally have learning any language is a tall order).

[@elliotserruys]

Was this teacher from the UK Australian? 😂

[@mr.lawyer3972]

Deutchland

[@djangoflyfar2633]

HA! French-language education in Canada is so broken. Imagine being in Montreal and having a French teacher from the UK. And honestly - having grown up in Ottawa - it’s like our government is ashamed of Canadian French, with the number of teachers in high schools and universities that come from France or Belgium or wherever. Great, not only is language education in school ineffective to begin with, but the language they’re attempting to teach us differs vastly from the actual spoken language in our region, so even when we think we’re doing well, we get into the real world and can’t understand a word being spoken to us, and of course we believe it is OUR fault because how could the school system be wrong. Gaslight much??

[@valeriemcdonald440]

I'm from Ottawa and my french teachers were all from Quebec. I'm not as old as Steve, though.

[@carolinefreudenreich7407]

I stopped at "the teacher doesn't have to be proficient in the language" ... 🙄

[@Thelinguist]

Preferable but not a condition. There are lots of resources available for a motivated learner. A good language learning guide/coach can really help a learner in a language which he/she doesn't speak.

[@knmid]

Oh boy...Wait till you hear about Talkbox mom.

[@teoteo3522]

Nice swastika you got there Steve

[@mookielagaras9195]

Steve and other comment-goers, I was a very big fan of yours back in the day, but as I learn more about linguistics, educational psychology, and language pedagogy, I've come to realize that the videos you make and the methodology you promote are simply inefficient at best and harmful at worst. This video is full of extremely poor ideas and it seems to be made at the cost of devaluing classroom education--which is extraordinarily helpful--in order to promote your program, which is simply a text reader. As a teacher, I find this to be degrading and misleading for the viewing audience that simply doesn't know better. Sincerely, a fellow linguaphile.

[@mookielagaras9195]

I’ve just posted a video detailing my thoughts further on my channel. It’s my first time writing and recording a video, but I think it summarizes well the results of my pondering.

[@Thelinguist]

I constantly get messages from people who were never able to learn in a classroom and were encouraged by my videos. To dismiss these people as "not knowing any better" is arrogant to say the least. There is ample evidence that what happens outside the classroom is much more important than what happens in the classroom. French language instruction in the Canadian school system is but one example. "linguistics, educational psychology, and language pedagogy" have done less to help language learners than the Internet, youtube, Stephen Krashen, and anything that motivates people to spend time with the language they are learning.

[@mookielagaras9195]

@@Thelinguist Steve, “Not knowing any better” refers to the people who turn to you as a guide with regard to concepts that you’re not very well versed in. I’m also not saying that your methods and KZbin personality and presence don’t encourage anybody or help at all in any way; you certainly encouraged me when I first stumbled upon your videos! You know a lot about practical approaches to language learning using simple to use and easy to acquire tools; that’s certainly a plus! However, there are much more efficient ways to go about learning a language than simply using a text reader-a tool better suited for learners in the intermediate and later stages of learning-from start to finish. Implementation of phenomena-based learning, to take one example, is a well-researched domain which is employed in classrooms (there are good studies documenting this in Minnesota USA, if I’m not mistaken) wherein students’ progress skyrockets - in a classroom facilitated by teachers. I’m not saying that what goes on outside of a classroom is any more or less important than what happens on the inside. As for your ample evidence of out-of-class content being leagues better, please cite some. Or, considering your investment with your own product, do participate in some kind of controlled study comparing your text-reader-based study to some other proven-to-work method like TPR, phenomena-based learning, or perhaps classrooms like those in the current US Foreign Service Institute. It’s good to encourage students to learn outside of the classroom and authentic materials are a good way to do it, but explicit instruction can speed up the process by a very large margin. As a side note, you mention Krashen and Chomsky every so often, but (1) it doesn’t seem like you understand the core of what they offer in their work and (2) while they offered a substantial amount of good quality thought to realms of linguistics, thought, language study, and reality, there have been many other major contributions before and, more notably, afterwards. Linguistics is a hard science with many disciplines; it would be unwise to discount it so thoughtlessly. This is the last I’ll say on the matter here.

[@BryanAJParry]

Worst. British accent. Ever. HAHA

[@Breakfast_of_Champions]

You don't understand the social process of teaching class at all.

[@hannahli4873]

Am I the only one who thinks that this man is talking nonsense? A teacher who is not proficient in a language? What?

[@Mr.S65]

Canada is a multilingual country, why not learn the language that kids have access to? It seems we’re always reinventing the wheel

[@Thelinguist]

People learn the language they are motivated to learn. In today's world all languages are accessible. For most people in English speaking Canada, French is only accessible via media, as are other languages of the world.

[@Mr.S65]

@@ThelinguistIn the US I worked in multilingual classrooms where English was the lingua Franca. In some states kids learn in their mother tongue and then transfer their literacy skills to English as they become older. There also two way bilingual classrooms ( Spanish -English ) that work very well. English and Spanish are spoken literally in all of the US. English in the US becomes a subtractive model when the mother tongue is eliminated and only English is taught. That’s the ESL model, the least successful of all programs. I hear what you mean concerning French, however, Quebec also has the same mandate as they are all obligated to learn English.

[@Thelinguist]

People in Quebec are more motivated to learn English than English Canadians elsewhere are to learn French. Note also that Swedish kids learn English well because they watch so much English language media.

[@StillAliveAndKicking_]

@@Thelinguist Yes, because English is more useful, but most Quebecois speak English with a strong accent and poor grammar. The children of the elites go to bilingual schools.