Language Learning Strategies.

As I am currently taking up Korean at ICLS (a language school in Malaysia), many of these strategies will come useful as crunch-time heads on in the next three weeks with my language assessment in two weeks from now!

Many of these ideas were posted on FLTEACH. The original list is from the Spanish Department at the University of Kansas.• Make flashcards.
• Repeat aloud.
• Don't be afraid to make mistakes.
• Speak to others in French (Spanish/German.)
• Watch French (Spanish/German) television programs on cable TV.
• Praise yourself for your efforts.
• Listen to lab tapes.
• Don't wait for the teacher to evaluate your progress.
• Go to a French (Spanish/German) restaurant and order in the target language.
• Eavesdrop on people speaking French (Spanish/German.)
• Don't make excuses.
• Name objects in French (Spanish/German.)
• Relax before going to class and before studying.
• Don't worry about your age or aptitude.
• Talk to yourself in French (Spanish/German.)
• Try not to translate from French (Spanish/German) to English in your head.
• Practice speaking French (Spanish/German) with friends.
• Form a study group with classmates.
• Review class notes.
• Reward your successes.
• Guess when in doubt.
• Re-write class notes.
• Record new vocabulary and grammar in a notebook.
• Make review cards grouping verbs, nouns, etc.
• Don't pretend to understand when you really don't.
• Paraphrase when necessary.
• Listen to French (Spanish/German) radio.
• Rent French (Spanish/German) videos and watch them.
• Stay alert; don't "zone out" in class.
• Hang in there; be persistent.
• Read ahead in the book.
• Use mime and gestures.
• Write down words that you don't know, then find out what they mean.
• Keep a language diary.
• Keep your expectations realistic.
• Practice daily.
• Make corrections in class when reviewing homework.
• Memorize using images, sounds, rhymes (mnemonic devices.)
• Attend class.
• Teach someone what you have learned.
• Be assertive in class.
• Participate in group activities in class.
• Use cognates for association with English.
• Have a positive attitude towards class and the language.
• Read French (Spanish/German) newspapers on the Internet.
• Use what you learn.
• Make study sheets.
• Do homework.
• Review the day's lesson after class.
• Try not to use the dictionary too much.
• Ask for help when you need it.

Additional resources
• Tips on Studying
• Learning Style and Foreign Language Learning
• Concepts of Foreign Languages

 Copyright © 1999, 2000 Beverly Larson. All rights reserved.

NCLRC ORG. Extracts are taken from: http://www.nclrc.org/essentials/speaking/stratspeak.htm)

1. Using minimal responses
Language learners who lack confidence in their ability to participate successfully in oral interaction often listen in silence while others do the talking. One way to encourage such learners to begin to participate is to help them build up a stock of minimal responses that they can use in different types of exchanges. Such responses can be especially useful for beginners.

Minimal responses are predictable, often idiomatic phrases that conversation participants use to indicate understanding, agreement, doubt, and other responses to what another speaker is saying. Having a stock of such responses enables a learner to focus on what the other participant is saying, without having to simultaneously plan a response.

2. Recognizing scripts
Some communication situations are associated with a predictable set of spoken exchanges -- a script. Greetings, apologies, compliments, invitations, and other functions that are influenced by social and cultural norms often follow patterns or scripts. So do the transactional exchanges involved in activities such as obtaining information and making a purchase. In these scripts, the relationship between a speaker's turn and the one that follows it can often be anticipated.

Instructors can help students develop speaking ability by making them aware of the scripts for different situations so that they can predict what they will hear and what they will need to say in response. Through interactive activities, instructors can give students practice in managing and varying the language that different scripts contain.

The Playground: Play in developing Social Skill Awareness.

This article Playground describes some of the reasons why kids get bullied and rejected in skills.

As many will know, those who study play in early childhood studies will know that those early skills in the playground are actually essential, and an indicator to an individual's social skills when they are adults.

(will write more on this later...).

Amazing News: 7 Year Old raises £50,000!

According to this news report, this young boy, Charlie Fulham from the UK has raised over £50,000 for the earthquake victims in Haiti.

"Initially only wanting to raise £500, but as news of his challenge spread pledges flooded into his appeal", SKY NEWS reports.

Truly amazing.

I wonder if something similar will happen on Malaysian grounds.

South Korea: High school students come home at 11pm.

When I was in South Korea recently, the schools were having their holidays.

My friend's niece is 13 (Gregorian Calendar) this year, and has just entered Middle School (Junior High). Yet, the holidays is not really a holiday. I was informed that she has to spend at least three hours each day "learning" something. Be it from online learning, or practising the piano, or even Japanese.

It is not that I am against "learning" or "studying", but I am wondering if students there are actually able to apply what they have learnt?

Students stay as late as 10 o'clock most nights for whatever reason it is at school. This I hear too, from the boarding master at the backpackers I was lodging in Seoul . He said it was the norm during his schooling years (he's 27 now). High school students go to school at 6am, and they arrive home at 11pm??

His best friends are the ones he spend the whole day in school at.

Eh?

Have you ever watched the Korean Drama "Delightful Girl Choon Hyang"? The drama starts with students in the high school level.

When I first watched the drama about two years back, they actually have students still in school at around 9 to 10 o'clock. I wondered, who in their right mind would allow their children to be at school at this hour?

Apparently that is the norm in South Korea. 

Related Links:
Education in South Korea.