Transcript: IWTYAL #096 on Learning German

[Olly Richards] This is the I Will Teach You A Language Podcast Episode 96.

[Music jingle]

[Female voice] Welcome to the I Will Teach You A Language podcast. Weekly motivation and language learning tips to help you become fluent in any language. Now, it's your host, Olly Richards.

[Jingle ends]

[Olly Richards] Hello, welcome back to the podcast. Now, I've got a confession to make about a big secret to tell you. [Wheezy giggle] Which is, I've started to learn a new language. I've started to learn German a few weeks ago. And in this episode I wanted to talk a little bit about, my experience it's like what's what I've could have felt what I've discovered over the last two weeks, of learning German.

And before we get into that I'd like to thank the sponsors of the show iTalki where I will be getting my German lessons from when it comes time to speak and you guys get a free lesson, with the teacher of your choice, in the language of your choice. You simply go to I Will Teach You A Language dot com forward slash free lesson and you can sign up there.

[1:00]

So yeah, I decided to learn, to start learning German and there's a lot of reasons behind this and I'm gonna try not make this so too long but I did just want to put this out there cos you know like it's gonna be interesting to lots of people. Because obviously as you know I'm learning Cantonese, which has been my long-term project and I know that I always say, you know, don't learn two languages at the same time.

But with German the thing is for me that it's been years now that I've wanted to learn, and I also go to Berlin every year throughout May for the Polyglot Gathering, and oh by the way you want to come to the Polyglot Gathering. You absolutely sure it's in, it's in May it's in a few weeks' time.

So if you are living near Berlin and you'd like to come and hang out with a load of language enthusiasts and, meet me and a bunch of other people, then you definitely should go. You just google "polyglot gathering" and you'll find it there. So I've had this you know I've been wanting to learn German for a long time, and

[2:00]

I've kind of felt okay, look, it's time now just to learn a bit of the language. Also, at the same time, with my Cantonese I have been kind of running up against a brick wall. I've kind of been, like I felt like I've hit a bit of a plateau and often one of the best things to do when you're struggling with a language is simply take a break. Do something different.

And so I thought, well, why not just dedicate one month to German. I can learn German in April and not make it this long project which say, in April the month of April from the beginning to the end I'm going to learn German, and then, I'm going to stop and I'm going to go back to Cantonese.

And then, the reason I decided to do that was because I thought it would be, I like the fact that it's defined. Because so often people ask when do you stop learning a language. When do you move on, when do you know it's the right time. And the truth is that it's,

[3:00]

For me it's always a gut feeling. You learn a language for some reason in your life, and then eventually, your life changes and your languages change. That's always been the case for me. But I do know that if I get into German I'll take it seriously and that's gonna become a big project and I don't want that because I want to keep focusing on Cantonese.

But at the same time, I thought like a month, one month learning German would be cool because it would gonna satisfy that desire that I have to learn German and also give me a bit of a mental break from Cantonese. And also it would have a good effect when I go to Berlin in a few weeks' time and I'll be able to use a bit of German.

So, I intentionally didn't mention this on a probable podcast before because it's just a very kind of small project, it's not like my aim is not to speak really good German, my aim is just to learn about the language. Yeah, as much as I can in one month, that's it.   

[4:00]

So it's very kind of low-pressure thing. And my strategy really for this one month, was to get as, a good foundation in the language. I'm actually not speaking. I am just using textbooks to study by myself. And the reason I'm not speaking is simply because it's a one month project and I don't, like, it's not my aim to speak.

My aim is simply to get to know the German language. And so in this one month I'm aiming to kind of cover the foundation of German and, just get a good understanding of the language. And to do that I chose two books to help me. And I went to Foyles which is (unintelligible)

An amazing one of the best language bookstores in the world here in London and I looked through all the German books and, you know it's really important to find books that you like, that you want to use yourself. That's so important and I looked through all these German books. And I just didn't want to use any of them. I thought they were far too like, I don't know, like the,

[5:00]

The way that the books were were not interesting to me. Often what happens is that they just, they try to, like textbooks try to simulate lessons. They say "Do this! Now do that and now do this then..." Which can be cool but the problem is that often these exercises, they're just, they're too inconsequential. I don't know. They say do this exercise to practise the days of the week and it's like "Oh yeah that's great." But I don't want to spend half an hour practising the days of the week cos I'm gonna learn it naturally anyway.

And so I ended up choosing one book that I thought was really good, and since I've started using it now, I can confirm that it's really good and it's Colloquial German from Routledge. And yes it's called Colloquial German: The Complete Course for Beginners. And the reason I like this book is because, they have in every chapter, two really good long dialogues with fairly natural language. And so that, it provides the real

[6:00]

basis for the study. So many of these other books, they have these tiny short dialogues, and which are just, you know, nothing to sink your teeth into.

But of all else, in the case of Assimil, which is another popular series, long dialogues but very, with who am I supposed to use this language, you know, very kind of literary language. You're not gonna want to use what you're not likely to hear.

So I find the Colloquial German really, really good. I'll put a link to this and one of the other things I mentioned in the show notes by the way, which will be at iwillteachyoualanguage dot com forward slash episode 96.

And I also chose a, I wanted to balance that out, with a, the grammar book. Because German grammar is, I know it's quite tricky. So I wanted to get a good grammar reference book. So I chose another Routledge book. I really like Routledge books in general. This one is called Basic German: A Grammar and Workbook. And, there you go, Basic German: A Grammar and Workbook.

[7:00]

And again, that's just it's exactly what I wanted. It's a kind of an overview of German grammar for beginners without being too complex. Just giving the main rules and references and anything that one should look up at hand.

So I chose these two books to go to be complementary. So the Colloquial German has got loads of dialogues which I can use to learn, and then the grammar is for quick reference where I can look up rules when I need them.

And so what I've been doing is very, very simple. Every morning, when I wake up I sit down and do forty-five minutes of German practice. German study, I should say. And I use the Colloquial German book for that.

My routine is, what I do is, I simply, I go through a dialogue. And, there is, I've released a bunch of posts recently all about my core language time. Core language routines. How I, how exactly I use textbooks, and how I study dialogues.

[8:00]

So I'll put a link to those in the show notes as well. You'll definitely check those out. And that's basically what I've been doing. So I open up a textbook. I go to the dialogue I was looking at before. I revise that, and then I move on to the next one.

And what I'll do is I'll listen to the dialogue many times, trying to understand as much as possible. And then I'll listen and read at the same time. Many times. Then I'll look up any new words that I don't know and then I'll close the book and I'll listen to the dialogue again without the text so I can kind of test myself to see how much I've understood.

That's the foundation of it. Now in the Colloquial German book, like in lots of textbooks, there's a lot of exercises. Well, I tend not to do that. And the reason is, if you're gonna do it, every exercise in the book, it really slows you down. And obviously they're useful. But what I found with German is that

[9:00]

there is so much in common with English that you've got a different opportunity with German. Now for me I think there's a different opportunity, learning opportunity here, than what I've found in other languages.

So the major thing, for me personally, is that with the last few languages I've learnt, I haven't been able to read. Japanese, Cantonese, Arabic. Very, very difficult to read especially at the beginning. And so what I've found is that all of my learning has been based on oral work. It's all listening and speaking.

Now the huge thing with German is that finally I can read again. So I can just sit and read through these texts and understand. It's amazing. But there's also a massive similarity with English and this is a big opportunity. Because when I kind of looked over the one month that I'm gonna be studying, I think about how I can make the most out of this month. 

[10:00]

And like for me the big opportunity here is not to like really understand the grammar or really learn all the difficult cases or prepositions, all those things. I could do that, but for me the big opportunity is the fact that German is so similar to English.

And so my aim is kind of what I'm just gonna go over the last couple of weeks is that because it's so similar and there's so much that's mutually intelligible, with a bit of help obviously, that the big opportunity for me is to just read and listen to as much as possible over the month. And by doing that, you kind of, you get exposed to all these different parts of the language. This different core vocabulary, all the different main grammar.

And I kind of feel that over the course of the month, by just reading and listening to as much as possible, I'm gonna really get a good understanding of the language and how it works and so, that's what I'm trying to exploit most of all. And so in order to

[11:00]

do that, consciously ignoring most of the exercises in the textbook, and instead aiming to just cover all the dialogues and the text. And so basically my aim for April is, has become, to simple cover all of the dialogues in the Colloquial German textbook. Now I think that's gonna give me the biggest bang for my buck as in the biggest use of my time.

The only other thing that I would do is actually I do read the grammar explanations because they are pretty important to raise your awareness of the language. Like I'm not trying to learn all the grammar rules and do all the exercises, but I find that when you read the grammar explanations, later on then you can recognize those things in the texts, in the dialogues when you read them. That's a very, very good way to help you notice different parts of the language. So there we go.

[12:00]

I hope that was gonna be interesting to you. It's been very, very interesting for me to start learning a new language from the beginning after all these years. It's been a long time and I'm definitely gonna talk more about this right, a bit more about this experience on the blog.

And, but yeah, if you've got any questions about that, come over to the show notes and let me know what questions you have, I'm very happy to come and answer and then you can get there by going to iwillteachyoualanguage dot com forward slash episode 96.

Now, as you know, I keep hanging on about coming up to episode one hundred of the podcast and I'd like to do something very special which is to go come a compilation of those of you guys talking. Because you've heard enough from me and I'm sure you're sick to death of listening to me talking. So I would like to hear what you have learnt from the podcast. From me or from the blog or anything like that. I would like you to tell me what it is.

[13:00]

And you can go to iwillteachyoualanguage dot com forward slash ask, and you can leave me a quick message on there. You can give me your name, where you're from, and then tell me one thing you've learnt from listening to the podcast. That would be really, really cool.

And what I'm gonna do for Episode 100, if we get enough submissions, hint hint hint, is to put everything all together in a collage and that's gonna be really cool to listen to everybody from around the world talking about things that they have learnt and things that have effect on them. So I hope that was helpful and that was interesting for you, and I'll see you in the next episode of the podcast.

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SOURCE: http://www.iwillteachyoualanguage.com/olly-strategy-learn-german/

Transcript: IWTYAL #066 on CEFR levels and speaking

[Male voice] This is the IWTYAL language podcast, episode 66.

[Female voice] Welcome to the I Will Teach You A Language podcast. Weekly motivation and language learning tips to help you become fluent in any language. Now, it's your host, Olly Richards.

[Olly Richards] Everyone, welcome back to the show, thank you ... for listening. I've ... sound quality is a bit different today, I'm actually not in London, I'm staying with a friend ... recording is here, this kitchen is a little bit echo-ey. So apologies for that.

We've had a fantastic weekend of language learning in London, and then last week we had the first ever polyglot pub event on Friday at a fantastic pub nearby Waterloo Station. Twenty-five, thirty language learners come down, people come from all over the world especially for that event. We had people from lots of different countries. Fantastic thing going on.

We also had the polyglot workshops on Saturday and Sunday, where we took about a hundred and fifty people each day to get them through this fantastic programme of language learning stuff that we put together.

[1:03]

On the topic of virtual immersion, like how to learn a language from home when you're living in your home country and not abroad. But anyway let's get onto the topic of today's show. Before we do that I'd like to thank the sponsors of this show, iTalki where I get my language lessons every single week. If you'd like to get a free lesson, you can go to iwillteachyoualanguage.com forward slash, whatizzit... forward slash free lesson. Yeah I've got it right eventually. So, let's dive into today's question from second-time questioner Andy. 

[Andy]

Hi Olly, Andy here again from the centre of England. Thanks for answering my question about extensive listening back in Episode 57. One of the things you've mentioned is your level in a language, and not maybe ... to think about when you're starting out, it's very difficult to know what the next level should look like, and what you should be able to achieve.

For instance when you start anew, you achieve that A1 level, what would you be able to do there? Then with A2, is it really a big achievement in terms of talking to native speakers, B1 B2, C1 C2, and onwards ...

[2:14]

What is your experience having gone through this process many times? I wonder if you could give us an idea about what each of these different steps along the way look like to you. Thanks a lot, Olly. Bye.

[Olly]

Okay Andy. Thank you very much for a great question. I really like this one, "What does it actually feel like at different stages of the process of learning a language?" And yes, it's something that, I guess when you're doing it, you're learning a language for the first time, you don't really know, right? I mean, what should it feel like? How do I know that I'm there or when I'm not?

And yea, I've got a, I've got a really good ... of this and, erm, what it does feel like. So I'll talk through my experience about that. Now Andy mentioned a few different numbers there, A1 A2, B1 B2. To someone who's not familiar with that, it's something called the Common European Framework of Reference.

[3:01]

And this is a framework, it's a very good framework that describes different levels of language proficiency. I'll put a link to this in the show notes. Andy wants to check it out, which will be at iwillteachyoualanguage dot com forward slash Episode 66.

And it's very well-documented actually, you know, the CEFR levels and what they mean. So I think what I'll do instead, instead of just reading off in those different many descriptors, I'll just tell you what it's like for me and how I identify the different levels.

First thing that I'll say is that, you know, I never mention my progress according to these CEFR levels. They, I mean, it's useful in the sense of, kinda you know, being able to describe your level and being able to analyze different levels of proficiency. But personally, you know, I've never really judged myself on these terms, because I generally have one goal when learning a language, which is to learn how to speak.

[4:02]

And I see it as one very long organic process. And it is outlined and described in the CEFR so you can have a look at that. Interesting. But instead for me, I like to think of the different levels of proficiency in a language in terms of what you're capable of doing. Right.

So starting from the very beginning, you know, you have a zero, and I don't think you can have, ... this isn't an official level ... A0 is essentially when you're a complete beginner. Maybe you've learnt a couple of phrases you can say "Hello," "Goodbye," like that. Essentially you're not able to use the language at all.

After that, around the A1 level, this way you've studied for a bit, maybe a short course, or half a textbook or something like that. And you're able to kind of give very basic self-introductions. But you can't really use the language yet at this point. You know, when you first start learning a language, you're like in the honeymoon period at the beginning when you first learn how to say "Hello, my name is ..." and to ask basic questions. And you feel pretty pleased with yourself, right?

[5:10]

And there comes a point fairly quickly, when you realize, that "I don't know anything, I can't actually interact ... There's so much I don't know." That to me is the A1 level. You really can't do much. You can say some things. Just trying to get an idea of what the language is.

Now moving on from that to A2, this is for me the most frustrating stage of a language. This is where a lot of people get stuck. And this is where you have studied through a fair bit, you've, you can't really speak yet. You can't hold a conversation because there's too much you don't know. Communication is difficult. You might be able to express yourself to say a few things, but you probably can't, there's a lot that you can't understand so that makes a conversation difficult.

The problem with this stage, the reason that this stage is so tricky is because you've got this greater, heightened awareness. You realize how much you don't know.

[6:06]

And so it can be very, very frustrating. It can be you lack vocabulary for this and that, the grammar is just not up to speed. And that's the stage that I dislike the most. And it's also the hardest to break through because the next step is gonna be one level, and this is where you're gonna be able to hold a conversation.

B1 is the point where you can actually functionally start to use the language for good, reliable communication. So at B1 you can hold a conversation and it's kind of cool. But the problem is that you can't, your range of expression is really restricted. There's, you've still got a big hole in your vocabulary. There's lots you can't do and really, the things that you can talk about, they're very limited to concrete things.

[7:00]

You can't really handle any kind of abstract thought, abstract concepts. It's all stuff, very functional. So you can have a conversation and it only serves as the basis of ... good communication. And if you've got into that stage you know really well that a lot of people don't actually make it that far.

Now moving on from there we get to B2. And this is where, B2 is where you can kind of hold conversations on a variety of topics. And, and, that includes things like more abstract topics, things that are more difficult to explain, and also less common things ... things that you don't encounter that often.

Now how long to get to the B2 level, erm, it's kind of difficult to say how long it'll take. It really depends on the language. But for me B2 is where you can really, it's where you really have ownership of ... You're not speaking perfectly, making a bunch of mistakes.

[8:00]

But your vocabulary and knowledge of grammar is about that, you know, you can communicate without too much difficulty. Now there's a kind of nice rule of thumb that I have for B2, which is this.

If you can go to the pub with someone and enjoy time in the pub with someone, they're at B2 level. Okay, that's my, that's the bar that I put at ... If you could go to the pub with someone, they've probably got a B2 level. At anything less than a B2, and you just can't, you can't really interact enough to have an enjoyable conversation.

Now after that comes C1. And C1 for me is where really for all intents and purposes you fit in naturally in any or all social situations. You can express yourself perfectly well, you can understand most things, you won't make ... You will still make mistakes but not that many. And conversation is just generally easy.

[9:01]

This can only really come from spending, you know, a lot of time in the company of native speakers. It's a fantastic stage to reach because you've just, you can just really have fun with the language, enjoy every bit of it. You no longer get those headaches that are associated with trying to hold longer conversations.

And that's for me if I can get to C1 in a language, I'm happy. I don't generally need to go beyond that. The next level of course is C2 which is where you've got a strong command of the language. You've got almost all situations. That includes academia as well.

One of the things that really separates a C1 from a C2 is your ability to function in academic topics. Things like literature, academia, you know, stuff that you kind of specialize in knowledge, in order to really be fluent in that kind of, those kind of topics. This is only something that really comes at C2 level.

[10:01]

And it's important to know that there are really plenty of native speakers who don't necessarily have a C2 level. You know, if you're someone who never really studied much in school, maybe you've dropped out of school or you've never really read at all, then you probably won't pass a C2 exam. Because there's just too much academic language you didn't learn.

So for me, I wouldn't, it's really difficult to say whether a language level is a C1 or C2. It kind of fluctuates as well. I'd certainly be at B2 level. But it's ... I think for me I probably wouldn't confidently say that I have a C2 in languages at the moment simply because most of the way that I use my language is just conversational. With friends in social situations. I've never used a language in a university, in an academic context, you know.

[10:58]

So the lines do begin to blur, and it's important to note that because all of these different spectrums. And the lines are very, very blurry, you know. You could look at what I've just said. What you need to be C1. To be fluent, whatever that means.

But then you know, I've known people to be very low level, A1 A2, still being able to make lots of friends and have a really good time. So it's very kind of blurry. My main benchmark is that of B2, going to the pub, you know. A B2 is also really the level that you have to be at in order to get into a university.

So I hope that kind of gives you an idea of the command of what you need to be able to prove in that language. I also hope that gives you an idea of what to expect and what's to come for you in your languages if you haven't already got there yet.

If you'd like to ask me a question, please do. I love to get voicemail questions. You can go to iwillteachyoualanguage dot com forward slash asktodothat  … I've also really appreciate a star rating and review on i2 because that helps other people like you to find the podcast.

[12:08]

And if you'd like to do that, then you can go to iwillteachyoualanguage dot com forward slash review.

Now I'd like to thank once more the sponsors of the show. iTalki where without iTalki I wouldn't be able to get these high levels in a language because they just make conversation practice so easy. iwillteachyoualanguage dot com forward slash start speaking is the place to go for a free lesson.

And at the end of every episode I'd like to leave you with a resource of some kind on the topic of the show. And what I thought I'd do this time is leave you with an interview that I did in Portuguese with Jimmy Mello who's a guy who runs mypolyglot, which is another great language podcast.

And the reason I'm linking you to this is because we have this very long conversation in Brazilian Portuguese. It's pretty long, you won't have to listen to all of it. But this topic came up, you know, "What Level Are You in a Language?" And I would say to him, you know, I don't consider myself to be a C2 in Portuguese because I've never really used that academically.

[13:15]

And he kind of responded with "No, I agree with you, but you definitely have a C1 level in Portuguese." So if you'd like to check that out, have a listen to that. That gives you an idea of what a C1 level would be in a language. Obviously you'd have to speak Portuguese to ... But then again it's just another way to give you a guideline, an idea what a C1 level might sound like. I'll put the link to this in the show notes.

iwillteachyoualanguage dot com forward slash episode 66

And thank you so much for listening. I'll see you in the next episode of the podcast.

[13:50] ENDS

SOURCE: http://www.iwillteachyoualanguage.com/feel-like-at-different-levels/