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Study habits

6 anni fa
How do you study when you are alone?

How do you study when you are in a group?

Which do you prefer?

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I prefer to study alone with a guidebook. After practicing on my own I ask my native speaker friends to correct my work on paper and then after I study alone again.

I feel like I only gain from group activities when I am doing speaking practice. But, when it comes to grammar I learn best on my own with a resource book.

Everybody learns in different ways.


Commenti (2)
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FlagRegno UnitoAcquista lezioni
Hi Alyssa. When I was learning Spanish (living in Barcelona in the mid-90s), I carried my mini grammar book around with me everywhere, to read on the bus, while intermittently eavesdropping on strangers' conversations and trying to work out who is who in the anecdotes I was hearing. I also sometimes watched TV (transmuted, usually either cr*ppy American shows such as The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air or the news), or read newspaper articles.

Whatever I was doing at any given moment, I felt throughout that I was in charge of my learning and that I was using my environment to respond to my own curiosity, so that (as I now realize, years later, having gained knowledge about the best ways for people to learn languages) I was always giving myself the maximum chance of learning stuff that was likely to stick with me (as contrasted with learners who depend on a teacher to bring interesting materials to class to stimulate their learning: that paradigm has a less strong chance of bringing about long-lasting, meaningful learning).

Every once in a while I attended the odd Spanish class, as one school where I was working offered free classes to employees, but -although my colleagues were skillful as teachers- I just noticed that I wasn't learning anything like as much, as fast or as deeply as when I'm out in the street on my own with my grammar book.

All that said, I don't doubt there are plenty of learners (the majority, probably), who are unable to motivate themselves to learn in the way I've outlined above, and who do actually need a teacher to guide their learning and to push them to notice important things.
6 anni fa
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FlagStati Uniti d'AmericaAcquista lezioni
Such a strong point at the end there! I think the reason I've started on any important path in my life has always been for deep curiosity and intrigue. Right, motivation is a huge factor when learning a language! For example, I was forced to take a foreign language in high school and I just wasn't interested. But, now that I have lived in a foreign country I am always self-motivated to learn more Turkish out of my resource book and sitting amongst a group of talkative Turkish people!
6 anni fa
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Talking about studying languages, which requires it's own methods, I too prefer to study alone in, but different ways. Group studies I believe is something left behind in the university days given certain situations.
For example, Working full time, plus doing a lot of other stuff, leaves you with no option but to study alone.
I have been studying Russian here since Apr 2017, In the evenings, everyday, I sit down with a big notebook and start writing short shorties, a lot of them. This helps me visualize the words, the situation, the conversation, the correct sentence structures, and also to find new words.
I have a wonderful teacher, who corrects all that I send across, and very thoroughly too. And then we work on the mistakes and practice on them.
I would also have a lot of exercises to complete in a week and I am sure my teacher now has heaps of pages from my homework printed, occupying her shelves :D
I also watch a lot of videos (Shows / Music / Movies / Culture) on YouTube to get my ear adjusted to the pace and tone of the language.
All the core aspects of the language have been taught by my teacher and anything I learn on my own I make sure to run it by her to remove any misunderstanding.
6 anni fa
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FlagStati Uniti d'AmericaAcquista lezioni
I too feel it has something to do with how I learned at university. Often times people didn't want to participate in a group setting, not because they didn't have answers or interesting things to say, just that they weren't interested, or perhaps too shy, to share their thoughts. But, I also think it has to do with how each individuals mind works. For example, I learn better when I am visualizing something or I am physically seeing letters and words in a book, compared to listening to people speak. I am definitely a visual learner.
6 anni fa
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Fair point on the not wanting to participate in the group settings. This in fact even happens at work places during meetings, where many do not share, either because they think they could be wrong and might embarrass themselves or too shy to express their thoughts. Maybe it's a natural behavior, without exceptions (or very few)!
Interesting to see how the mind works, learning from (or even reading) books would usually be my last priority, but by the end of the day, we both see progress regardless of the methods used.
Would be very interesting to read more replies on this topic and the methods being used.
6 anni fa
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