Language fluency (movies, high school, college)

[k374]

Has anyone here become fluent in a language learning it from scratch? I mean starting with no prior knowledge when they were adult age. If so, describe how you learned the language and how long it took you.

[Huckleberry3911948]

how long to what level?? i did it twice. isolation and total immersion a must.
very painful. military provides very good models of successful fluency program, must have aptitude beforehand. like anything the military does, lots of discipline and no spoon feeding.

[cpg35223]

I became fluent in Russian during college. Got to use it exactly twice. Now, although I can still pick my way through Cyrillic, I don't remember much outside of some Pushkin.

[joelibyan]

i am a native english speaker who didnt start studying spanish til i was 15. for me, it was 3 years in high school, 4 semesters and college, 2 years of living in spain and various trip to latin america that has allowed me to become fluent by the age of 21. in my experience, it was a combination of book work (grammar, conjugation, etc) and life experience (music, movies, books, magazines, friends, etc) that allowed me to learn it.

[hkgal]

As someone who is in the process of learning a second language as an adult, I would say it's definitely tough but do-able if you just slog away at it. However, its best to pick an language that you can use in everyday life i.e. the immersion scenario. I would say it would border on impossible to learn it otherwise. Everything will go in one ear and out the other.

You need to interact with local speakers to pick up the idiosyncrasies of the language. I've found if you are going the 'formal education' route of learning, for some languages you get taught the 'ivory tower' version i.e. the proper version but not necessarily the version that people actually speak in daily life! A combination of formal study and constant real-life usage is the best route to adult language acquisition I believe.

The first step to speaking is to listen, listen, listen. If you can't listen to real live speakers of the target language, then watch TV i.e. the foreign news or movies, radio stations, CDs or podcasts. Listen until it you have an 'ear' for it and no longer sounds like babble and you can identify individual words and sounds. I think it took me about 4-6 months of hearing cantonese every day before the language stopped sounding like babble and started sounding like words. If you can just hear it but not immediately try to understand it, you get a good feel for the rhythms of the language. That's a very good starting point to begin learning to speak.

[irman]

As *Huckleberry* above mentioned, *total immersion* is one of the best ways to become fluent in a foreign language.
OTOH, there is always a silver lining around a cloud, and that is, if you speak two languages, the third and fourth and so on, become easier.
The brain, after learning another language besides your own, has now learned to *flip-flop*, from one language to another.
That is the most difficult part of learning another language.
For any other language after that, all you have to do is build up your vocabulary in the next language.

I have been fortunate enough to have parents who spoke two different languages, so I became fluent in both of theirs. Then, learned other languages due to *moving all over*.

Some advice. If you do end up speaking another language fluent, keep it up, by speaking it at home. Everybody in my family are polyglots now, since we hauled them all over the place for foreign work assignments. The result is that they also have worked in other countries because of their ability of speaking more than just one language.

LBNL, if you are still single, get a girl friend (or boy friend ) who speaks another language ....

[k374]

thankfully I speak 3 languages besides English, I have been trying to learn Spanish. I learned the basics academically in a college class but I felt that there was only so far I could go learning a language in a classroom outside the native environment. On my own I started listening to spanish songs and just listening to radio and such and the amount I was learning was much more than I had learned 6 months in the classroom. My next goal is to try to live in a spanish speaking environment

Spanish girlfriend is a good idea... I am working on it

[shreypete]

If you're planning to do it on your own, I would first of all pick a language that has lots of resources (online) and also lots of good teaching books and videos. I would recommend that you at least get to an intermediate of advanced level and then immerse yourself in a language program abroad where you can practice your target language....you will definitely see the change.

[resettheclock]

It's extremely difficult to learn a foreign language if you start after 21 years of age. I've been toiling with Spanish for some 5 years - and although it's actually not such a difficult language, I'm still not fluent Same goes for Russian and Czech...
It's not a matter of just putting some words together. What's difficult is sounding like you were one of the native speakers. I'd say it prolly takes some 10-15 years of (very intensive) learning to even get close to that level. Then again, as somebody already mentioned, the best way is to find a girlfriend/boyfriend who's a mothertongue. Combining work 'n' pleasure in a way lol

[varduren]

Originally Posted by irman

LBNL, if you are still single, get a girl friend (or boy friend ) who speaks another language ....

uhm...that doesn't always work....my significant other and i have been together for about 8 years and he hasnt' even picked up any of my language. personally i think its just down to aptitude and attitude (didn't mean to sound like Oprah just there)