12.

Learning foreign languages

Learning foreign languages is an important part of our life. It’s a compulsory subject in school
but quite a lot of kids start it even earlier, in kindergarten or in nursery school. The sooner
someone starts learning a foreign language the better it is, but it’s never too late to start,
success doesn’t depend on age.

The motivation for learning a language can be different at the different stages of life. Small
children don’t even realise that they are learning a language if they start the language learning
process early enough. They find it natural to speak and to understand the words they hear
from day to day and they learn the language almost without any effort. For elementary school
children language learning doesn’t come as natural as that. Often it’s just a school subject
among others that they have to learn whether they want to or not. They are usually not old
enough to be able to realise that it’s useful in life to speak foreign languages. It’s the
teacher’s responsibility to make the teaching process rewarding and interesting so that the
students make progress and don’t lose their motivation, if they have any. Motivating children
is not always easy. They like to play and sing, so in the beginning, songs can be a great help.

Grown-ups normally start a new language because it is a must for them. They need a language
exam for their degree, or for work, or they want to travel to the country where the given
language is spoken. They don’t have enough time to enrol in a language course, and even if
they attend a course they are tired after a long day’s work so their progress is slow. They can’t
seem to find the time to learn the words necessary for communication. Even if their
motivation comes from within it’s not easy to keep it up. The key motivating factor is success.
If they feel that they make progress they will stick to their aim and won’t give up their
language learning goals.

There are various and numerous methods to learn a foreign language. The bookshops are
stacked with better and better course books, grammar books and graded readers. On the
Internet, you can find language teaching webpages, YouTube videos, films, songs – whatever
you are interested in.

Studying on your own isn’t always the most convenient way to learn to speak a language.
Lots of people need others’ help to be able to communicate and to see that they’re on the right
track. If you attend a language course the other students can motivate you to speak and to
learn more than you would on your own so that you can keep up with the others. It’s fun to
learn together with mates, you can even make new friends in a language group. If you want to
progress fast or you want individual treatment you should find a private teacher. It’s a more
expensive way of language learning, but it’s also a more effective way.

Wherever you learn a language and whatever methods you use always keep in mind that you
have nothing to lose. Even a few foreign words you’ve learnt may prove useful somehow and
somewhere, you never know when.