Officially, I've been studying Spanish since the Summer of 2008, but I have been surrounded by the language nearly my whole life. I took classes in high school and even before that I always had access to Spanish television on cable. I worked with Spanish speakers in my very first job and it was here that my passion for the language developed but when I look back on my early days of working, I see how many opportunities I really missed because I was too timid to talk.
Even to this day, confidence plays a huge role in being able to speak Spanish. I often realize, sometimes too late, that I actually know more than I give myself credit for and will many times shy away from speaking not because I don't know how to say something, but because there is that lingering doubt that maybe, just maybe, I'm not going to say the right thing. Fear in language learning is a silly thing and I attribute a great deal of the fear we feel to the way we are taught languages in school. Like every other subject we face, our language classes are based on a pass/fail grading system. I may very well have been able to carry on a conversation with ease even as far back as my days in high school, but because I was constantly being graded on using the correct verb tense or placing the accent mark over the proper vowel, my overall score wasn't nearly as high as I would have liked and it made me feel as if I wasn't successful in learning. This "failure" at learning left me feeling like I didn't really know the language and for that I didn't want to sound silly attempting to talk to native speakers. Although I may not know the solution to how we can improve our language learning classes, I will say that the way it is done now is simply not effective.
If I had the chance to go back and talk to my teenage self, I would tell myself to just talk. Jump right in and speak. Don't be afraid to use the present tense instead of the preterit, and don't worry if you use the "tu" form instead of the "usted" form. Sure, foreign language can be intimidating, but we can't just dip our toes in the water and hope for the best. If we're going to be successful, we need to jump in the deep end right from the start and learn to swim as we go. I've read countless forum posts debating the value of studying grammar first or memorizing hundreds of vocabulary words before ever uttering your first phrase. Now, I suppose if you're learning a foreign language for academic reasons, then by all means, study that grammar, but if you're like me, trying to simply learn how to talk to other people, who cares if you know why you say it that way as long as you know it's right, or even close enough.
Look, I am a perfectionist when it comes to my hobbies. When I first started out, I bought every book, studied every vocabulary word, hammered home every verb tense in an effort to be a Spanish speaking machine. I didn't just want to speak Spanish, I wanted to be a walking Spanish dictionary. Then it hit me. What's the point? Most of the Spanish speakers I come across will be just like me when it comes to English. Sure, I'm fluent in English, but that doesn't mean I am a walking dictionary or thesaurus. In fact, when it comes to English grammar, I struggle mightily, but that doesn't stop me from writing these endless blog posts!
We have to get over our fear and realize in the real world, outside academia, no one is judging us on how we speak. OK, no one wants to sound ignorant, which is why we ask for help along the way, but I would much rather learn as I go by talking with live people than sit at home with a grammar book all day long, never interacting with anyone. So do it. Jump in the deep end and start talking. Make mistakes. Sound silly. Ignore all those people who tell you you'll never get it. I think you'll find great satisfaction in the conversations you have.
No comments:
Post a Comment