An experimental way in learning new language

In the last 20 years, the approaches that I have been using for language learning are always the same, the traditional ways in which one learns the language through spending hours after hours, days after days memorizing what is shown in the textbooks. My past experience showed me that it is not the efficient way of learning a language. Only 5-6 years after I obtained my JLPT level 1 that I found how to improve my Japanese conversation and started talking to others in Japanese the ways I wanted to be since I first started learning the language. The same thing happened on me in Cantonese. Having been exposed to the Cantonese language for years, I never made a real effort to use it in my daily life until I met a Cantonese speaker from Shenzhen that was willing to talk to me in the language. After more than 5 hours of conversation, I found that I was able to express myself well in Cantonese using the words that I learnt from drama, movie and the conversations of others. I should have been aware of the possibility long time ago.

Also, another language - Malay. I  learnt it for more than 15years when I was in school but I didn’t use the language in daily life except in the language classes or when I must submit an assignment in the language. However, after spending some time to read a Malay language phrasebook, I recalled and regained many things which I was once familiar with. An attempt to talk to native malay/Indonesian speaker in mobile apps, opened a new door for me to practice the languages. Without the use of textbook and memorizing, the direct conversation that I have had with the native help me to polish up my language and familiarize myself with the languages again. Also, I am more motivated now and ready to improve my language proficiency to better communicate with people. The biggest change that I can observe is that the process of learning language is more enjoyable because of the use of the new approach.

 

In fact I still don’t have a clear picture of how can I learn a language in short time and I am in the process of trial-and-error to find out the method that best suits me. Right now, in my mind, I would like to try out a method which places great emphasis on conversation, practices and  interest-orientation. A brief explanation of how it is done ---

• Prepare a list of a few topics that I want to share with the native speakers
• Use the existing grammar and vocabulary that I know, write down the things I want to talk to the native.
• Talk to as many people as possible through meetup or mobile apps using what I have written and get feedbacks, inputs, questions etc from them.
• Use the feedbacks etc from them to expand the content and add in the new grammar and vocabulary that I learnt from news, books etc.
• Talk to as many people as possible using what I have and the same process is repeated.
• The list of topic is growing and slowly, I will be able to talk more in new topics in which I can apply the grammar and vocabulary that I learnt.
   
  I have decided to allocate a period of time (Now to CNY in 16Feb18) to try out this method by using Korean and Spanish that I am working on. I shall share my findings next month here to prove whether this method is practicable and helpful in language learning especially in conversation.