3 Mistakes You Should Avoid When Learning Foreign Languages
Have you been trying to learn a foreign language for a long time but you haven’t made much significant progress?
If your answer is yes, I want you to know that unfortunately, this is such a sad reality among language learners. They take on the challenge to learn a new language but they end up not being able to achieve some of the most basic goals to reach fluency in the language they are learning.
As a language learner myself, a fluent speaker of the English language, and a certified and experienced ESL teacher I have noticed so many mistakes that language learners make but don’t notice that they are making. These mistakes result in students feeling and being stuck in one particular level of the language for a very long time, and not making any significant progress towards fluency.
I would like to show you some of the biggest mistakes that a lot of language learners make, and most importantly, I’ll show you how to avoid them. These mistakes have nothing to do with grammar, pronunciation, or with how they speak the language. These mistakes have more to do with the way students approach language learning, their mindset, and the choices that they make when it comes to how they immerse themselves in language learning.
They believe they aren’t talented enough to learn a new language
The first and the biggest mistake most people make when they start learning a foreign language is to believe that it takes talent to be able to speak the language that they are trying to learn. In other words, to make this way simpler for you to understand, the majority of language learners believe that some people are born with the talent and the capacity to be able to achieve fluency in a new language, and others simply weren’t.
Whether you believe this is true or not, I’m here to say that learning a new language has nothing to do with talent. Speaking a new language is compared to driving a car, swimming, cooking, playing sports, acting, or riding a bike. These are all skills that, if you’re interested in learning how to develop, you need to do a few things to acquire them. Some people are way more passionate about some of these skills than others. But their passion doesn’t automatically make them talented and able to do what they’re into. Imagine if it were like that. Let’s picture you being passionate about eating delicious food. You watch cooking shows on TV during your free time, you try all different kinds of foods when you travel, and you enjoy having conversations about foods. However, you have never touched a single cooking utensil in your kitchen, and you don’t even put time and effort into learning how to make the simplest dish from your country. If you haven’t received any kind of training and put any work into actual cooking, you’re most likely to know nothing about cooking. Your passion doesn’t magically make you a chef. It’s a skill. You need training, orientation, and lots of practice even if you want to be able to cook the most basic dish.
How to get rid of this mindset and make real progress when learning a new language?
Understand that there’s power in receiving training:
Whether you start studying languages by yourself by watching YouTube videos, reading books on how to learn a new language, or by trying to do it through an App, if you don’t look for professionals who can help you go from where you are to where you need to be, you are most likely to feel lost and steady. Again, learning to speak a foreign language isn’t a natural process. It takes training, and part of that training is in receiving orientation on how to do what you need to do.
I’m self-taught. I’m very independent when it comes to learning new things, and I strongly believe every student should learn how to become independent. Whenever I teach a class, I encourage my students to become more independent by providing them with all the tools and the resources that they need to have so they can learn as much as possible outside the classroom because that’s where language happens. When I started learning English I started studying by myself. I bought a collection of books, watched a thousand YouTube videos, and binge-watched my favorite TV shows in English. However, I cannot stress enough how much more progress I made when I had a mentor who helped me go from where I was to where I needed to be. When you receive training from someone who already masters the language you’re learning to speak, you get to learn so much more. Teachers will point out the mistakes you don’t normally notice you make, they will share their personal experiences related to how they used the language abroad, they will also guide you step by step, and they will stimulate you and be your source of help so you can achieve all the goals needed to be achieved when learning a foreign language.
There were many moments when I was trying to learn something by myself, that I felt lost. I didn’t have anyone to ask questions, and I didn’t receive feedback whenever I needed it. So, I had a really tough time keeping track of my progress.
I strongly believe in guidance. I strongly believe in mentoring. I strongly believe in feedback. I believe that having an experienced professional help you get through each step when you are learning to develop a new skill is one of the best things you can do. And I encourage every beginner to look for mentors to help them achieve fluency.
There’s power in connecting both theory and practice when you are learning a new skill
Let’s imagine and pretend that what we had to do to learn how to drive was to read a book full of boring theory and that’s it. Would you feel prepared enough to take the wheel and start driving the first car you saw in front of you?
Let’s also imagine and pretend that on your first day of driving school you were thrown inside a car and told to start driving right away without knowing a single thing about actual driving, how the traffic works, and without receiving any instruction beforehand. Would you feel confident to drive?
I think that too much theory can not only overwhelm students but also lead them anywhere when they are learning a new skill. However, I keep meeting these awesome and enthusiastic students who are very interested in mastering a new language but they think that the only right thing to do is to skip instruction and basic theory to go straight to the practical part of the process. They look for conversation classes when they are still in the beginning steps of the process, and they do not seem interested in learning essential grammar needed to be learned so that they know how to produce even a simple sentence.
I believe that deepening in grammar, and the complexity of language will differ significantly depending on each student’s goal. Some people learn languages for traveling. Others for business reasons, and others for academic purposes. Each reason why you learn a new language requires a certain type of depth into the language. If you intend to master the language and speak well, don’t skip any part of the process. Instead, enjoy every single part of the journey making the best out of everything. Speaking a foreign language is a skill and it needs to have lots of practice time, but we can not forget the fact that theory is also important. Learning the basics of grammar is important so you can understand how to produce language.
These are some of the many mistakes that stop people from learning foreign languages. From now on, don’t forget to avoid them so you can make real progress to reach fluency.
Can you think of other mistakes language learners make? Do you know an efficient way to study languages? I’d love to hear from you!
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