The necessary hours to get to B2

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Re: The necessary hours to get to B2

Postby Henkkles » Mon Apr 24, 2017 5:55 am

I would say that given optimal(tm) study with good materials and concentration, a seasoned language learner with knowledge of historical linguistics and phonetics could expect to pass a B2 test after 720 hours of study.
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Re: The necessary hours to get to B2

Postby aokoye » Mon Apr 24, 2017 6:10 am

reineke wrote:The Association of Language Testers of Europe (ALTE) has provided a reference for the approximate total number of guided teaching hours that language learners would need to have been exposed to in order to fulfill the aims of each CEFR level. This table is usually seen in reference with English proficiency exams. I have also seen these ALTE figures used in connection with other European languages.

A1 = 90-100 hours
A2 = 180-200 hours
B1 = 350-400 hours
B2 = 500-600 hours
C1 = 700-800 hours
C2 = Mastery: 1000-1200 hours

Is this another one of those "I'm going to quote an article from somewhere but the quotation marks might not match up" because if so then this disregard my question. If not, I'm pretty sure the two major English testing organizations don't use CEFR levels in their results. If you look at things like English proficiency requirements at English speaking higher education institutions you won't generally see CEFR levels. IELTS and TOEFL both use a number system (that doesn't involve letters). Given that you're talking about ALTE (or perhaps quoting someone who was talking about them) they're likely teaching students English with the aim of at least some of some students taking the IELTS or the TOEFL.

English is actually one of the few commonly spoken languages in Europe where I don't often see language proficiency test levels ranked in a CEFR type of way.
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Re: The necessary hours to get to B2

Postby Voytek » Mon Apr 24, 2017 10:11 am

aokoye wrote:
reineke wrote:The Association of Language Testers of Europe (ALTE) has provided a reference for the approximate total number of guided teaching hours that language learners would need to have been exposed to in order to fulfill the aims of each CEFR level. This table is usually seen in reference with English proficiency exams. I have also seen these ALTE figures used in connection with other European languages.

A1 = 90-100 hours
A2 = 180-200 hours
B1 = 350-400 hours
B2 = 500-600 hours
C1 = 700-800 hours
C2 = Mastery: 1000-1200 hours

Is this another one of those "I'm going to quote an article from somewhere but the quotation marks might not match up" because if so then this disregard my question. If not, I'm pretty sure the two major English testing organizations don't use CEFR levels in their results. If you look at things like English proficiency requirements at English speaking higher education institutions you won't generally see CEFR levels. IELTS and TOEFL both use a number system (that doesn't involve letters). Given that you're talking about ALTE (or perhaps quoting someone who was talking about them) they're likely teaching students English with the aim of at least some of some students taking the IELTS or the TOEFL.

English is actually one of the few commonly spoken languages in Europe where I don't often see language proficiency test levels ranked in a CEFR type of way.


It they mean hours spend with an individual tutor or teacher, I could agree with this assertion but if you're studying by youself and using exposure it takes far more time than that.
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Re: The necessary hours to get to B2

Postby smallwhite » Mon Apr 24, 2017 12:04 pm

Hugo wrote:FSI suggests that 800 hours is the amount of time necessary for getting to "mastery."

I think they just run 24-week French courses, 5 days a week, 5 hours a day, give 3 hours of homework, and then "most of the time we must score a 3 in speaking and a 3 in reading" which "equates to approximately a C1".

Source 1: http://www.effectivelanguagelearning.co ... difficulty
Source 2: https://www.fluentin3months.com/diplomat/ (First-hand account of an FSI graduate).

Hugo wrote:Could any of the professional polyglots around here tell me if 3,000-5,000 hours is a more reasonable amount of time for getting to B2 in my French?

No! :P Don't worry! :P I got to B2~C1 with about 1000 hours of study (about 450 to 500 days x about 2 hours per day), plus from the 7th month onwards I often had French radio playing in the background (for maybe 3 hours a day, so 1000 hours, I don't remember). French was the first language I taught myself properly. I'm Chinese but I already spoke English before learning French.
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Re: The necessary hours to get to B2

Postby aokoye » Mon Apr 24, 2017 1:29 pm

Voytek wrote:
aokoye wrote:
reineke wrote:The Association of Language Testers of Europe (ALTE) has provided a reference for the approximate total number of guided teaching hours that language learners would need to have been exposed to in order to fulfill the aims of each CEFR level. This table is usually seen in reference with English proficiency exams. I have also seen these ALTE figures used in connection with other European languages.

A1 = 90-100 hours
A2 = 180-200 hours
B1 = 350-400 hours
B2 = 500-600 hours
C1 = 700-800 hours
C2 = Mastery: 1000-1200 hours

Is this another one of those "I'm going to quote an article from somewhere but the quotation marks might not match up" because if so then this disregard my question. If not, I'm pretty sure the two major English testing organizations don't use CEFR levels in their results. If you look at things like English proficiency requirements at English speaking higher education institutions you won't generally see CEFR levels. IELTS and TOEFL both use a number system (that doesn't involve letters). Given that you're talking about ALTE (or perhaps quoting someone who was talking about them) they're likely teaching students English with the aim of at least some of some students taking the IELTS or the TOEFL.

English is actually one of the few commonly spoken languages in Europe where I don't often see language proficiency test levels ranked in a CEFR type of way.


It they mean hours spend with an individual tutor or teacher, I could agree with this assertion but if you're studying by youself and using exposure it takes far more time than that.

I actually wasn't questioning the hours at all in my post. That said I know at least with the Goethe Institut, they're estimated hours are based on "45 minute teaching-units", so a 45 minute hour. The German course I'm doing this Summer also has 45 minute hours.
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Re: The necessary hours to get to B2

Postby reineke » Mon Apr 24, 2017 2:05 pm

aokoye wrote:
Is this another one of those "I'm going to quote an article from somewhere but the quotation marks might not match up" because if so then this disregard my question. If not, I'm pretty sure the two major English testing organizations don't use CEFR levels in their..


Thank you for your comments. Feel free to address your punctuation concerns about the article in question to Scott Thornbury. The block quotes from that article didn't display perfectly on this site but I doubt that I can possibly satisfy your high standards. I remember that you had issues with Giancarlo Conti's expertise. Actually, you referred to his arguments as "complete bull", you were wondering where he was getting his data from and whether he took the right classes. Since I've shared his and other people's educated opinions here to your apparent annoyance, and since no one cared to share his reply with the forum, let me do the honors:

Conti (to a HTLAL member) :

"I am aware and I admire your intellectual courage and stamina, my friend. I tried to register but they would not activate my forum membership, so I cannot join in. To be honest, you are dealing with a lot of intellectual stubborness and stiffness in there not really supported by much knowledge or understanding of language acquisition or research. I hope you do not mind if I keep a distance to what looks more like a ‘brawl’ than a productive, objective and well-informed discussion about research . Thanks again for pleading my case. Much appreciated.

I love to stir a bit of controversy of the kind that I sparked off in your forum. After all, regardless who is wrong or right, the whole point of my blog is to get people to talk about and reflect on language learning. Hence, it really does not bother me who wins or loses the argument :-). I have actually enjoyed reading the forum posts and found some of the interventions quite astute – if very subjective and discounted by scores of research studies. I would be grateful if you could relay the following points to the forum:

(1) firstly, to that gentleman who keeps saying that I am a romance-language-only specialist and I would consequently be some sort of ‘second league linguist’, please tell him that I speak German fluently, Swedish fairly well and have solid foundations in ancient Greek. Throw in there Malay, too, the official language of Malaysia.
(2) Some of the people in that forum are not familiar with literature and research constructs; hence they misinterpret some of the terms I used and notions I referred to..

(4) We all have hunches and beliefs about language learning but a researcher needs to verify that what worked for us – or what we THINK worked for us – is true of the wider population. There was a lot of me-me (self-centred) talk in that forum. That doesn’t help other people and one need to understand that one’ beliefs and one’s own behaviour like many other things we believe about ourselves may be skewed and erroneous as our perceptions are bound to be subjective. Labelling oneself as a ‘visual learner’ is a self-perception, not necessarily the truth.
(5) Correction can be effective; but not the one usually carried out by teachers. Please ask your forum mates to read my relevant blogs. Correction works when it involves deep processing and intentionality + extensive remedial practice;
(I have left this since someone has recently asked about error correction)...

(6) Finally, just because someone is an excellent driver, it doesn’t follow that he/she knows how to design, build or repair an engine. Similarly, a great linguist may not necessarily know as much about the cognitive mechanisms involved in language processing and acquisition; not as much as a researcher, psycholinguist or applied linguitics scholar does.

Thanks for the invite to join in your forum. I have tried to join it on a dozen of occasions. I have finally given up. I invite you and your fellow forumsters to comment on my blogs; that would be more efficient for me. Thanks for your insightul remarks about language learning. If you read my blogs, not just the one you guys discussed, you will find that we are in sync with regards to most of your points."

https://gianfrancoconti.wordpress.com/2 ... achers-do/

With regards to your CEFR comment, Cambridge English Language Assessment is "a founder member of ALTE (Association of Language Testers in Europe)". "Cambridge English Language Assessment was involved in the development of the CEFR and we continue to work towards its future development through projects such as SurveyLang and English Profile."

Ielts and the CEFR
"In fulfilling its purpose as a common reference tool, the CEFR was not designed to provide the basis for precise equating, nor was it intended to be a prescriptive tool to impose standardised solutions. Rather it was designed as a common framework of reference, primarily intended as ‘a tool for reflection, communications and empowerment’"
https://www.ielts.org/ielts-for-organis ... -framework

I never saw you trying to correct any of the many posts referring to FSI expectations and CEFR levels (sometimes in the same sentence) . The general idea behind my posts was to help people by sharing outside opinions and points of view on this forum. The idea here in particular was to point that not everyone is a language learning machine nor a a high aptitude civil servant working face to face with a native speaking instructor.
Last edited by reineke on Mon Apr 24, 2017 2:53 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: The necessary hours to get to B2

Postby Carmody » Mon Apr 24, 2017 2:50 pm

Thanks reinke, your posts to help others with outside references was clearly communicated and greatly appreciated, as always.

I guess my question should have been more clearly defined and specific. I was asking how many hours for an individual without a teacher but applying oneself diligently with self-study and the proper mix of native materials, courses(FIA, Assimil NFWE, grammar study, reading, etc.?

My thanks for the guidance.
Last edited by Carmody on Mon Apr 24, 2017 2:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: The necessary hours to get to B2

Postby aokoye » Mon Apr 24, 2017 2:53 pm

reineke wrote:
aokoye wrote:
Is this another one of those "I'm going to quote an article from somewhere but the quotation marks might not match up" because if so then this disregard my question. If not, I'm pretty sure the two major English testing organizations don't use CEFR levels in their..


Thank you for your comments. Feel free to address your punctuation concerns about the article in question to Scott Thornbury. The block quotes from that article didn't display perfectly on this site but I doubt that I can possibly satisfy your high standards.
....
With regards to your CEFR comment, Cambridge English Language Assessment is "a founder member of ALTE (Association of Language Testers in Europe)". "Cambridge English Language Assessment was involved in the development of the CEFR and we continue to work towards its future development through projects such as SurveyLang and English Profile."

Ielts and the CEFR
"In fulfilling its purpose as a common reference tool, the CEFR was not designed to provide the basis for precise equating, nor was it intended to be a prescriptive tool to impose standardised solutions. Rather it was designed as a common framework of reference, primarily intended as ‘a tool for reflection, communications and empowerment’"
https://www.ielts.org/ielts-for-organis ... -framework

I never saw you trying to correct any of the many posts referring to FSI expectations and CEFR levels (sometimes in the same sentence) . The general idea behind my posts was to help people by sharing outside opinions and points of view on this forum. The idea here in particular was to point that not anyone is a language learning machine nor a a high aptitude civil servant working face to face with a native speaking instructor.

My standards aren't actually high at all. However I am not going to know if you quoted an article if there are an uneven amount of quotation marks (unless it's in block quotes). You have, in the past, chastised me for questioning if you were quoting something or not by telling me to look at the quotation marks.
In terms of my criticism or lack there of of FSI numbers, I've done it before (I think within the past month) and had no real desire to write a post about the the validity of their numbers.
Good to know the IELTS and Cambridge. That said I still rarely see CEFR levels applied to proficiency tests that are often required by higher ed institutions in which English is the primary language of instruction.

In regards to the rest of your post, a. I don't actually recall what you were talking about in regards to Conti (and Im not sure that most of the points could be attributed to me anyways). b. since when is it somehow against the rules to question someone's reasoning c. I actually have been avoiding talking about linguistics in depth on this forum for some time now. I find that I don't get the enjoyment or depth of discussion here that I would in person and I, thankfully, have a lot of opportunities to talk about linguistics in person. I'm not going to pretend that it's all butterflies and rainbows because it isn't, and I sure as hell am not going to pretend that I think I'm always, or even often, right (for better or worse). That said, given my major and my involvement in the department I do actually get to talk about this in person a lot with people who have been studying, teaching, and researching areas of linguistics for longer than I (and many people on this forum) have been alive. Because it is academia it's also not as if they all agree with each other so I'm not getting the echo-chamber effect which is nice.

edit: now that I'm at home I did a search for any posts of mine that contained the phrase "complete bull" and I couldn't actually find any...
Also the reason why the quotes are important to me is because if I have a question about something that you've quoted I'll either not ask you or I'll ask you in a different way than had you yourself said it.
Last edited by aokoye on Tue Apr 25, 2017 2:20 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: The necessary hours to get to B2

Postby tarvos » Mon Apr 24, 2017 5:25 pm

It's not just about the time you have, it's also about what you do with it.
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Re: The necessary hours to get to B2

Postby -JM- » Mon Apr 24, 2017 5:41 pm

I don't believe in the time scales. Not everybody has the same understanding in languages or anything. Some people are better or worse at some specific things. I have never seen something like "you need 50 hours study to solve differential equations." Maybe I won't understand it in 100 hours and my friend will get it the first time he hears it. So I think the numbers are too abstract and they shouldn't be paid much attention.

It can be argued that language learning is more of a memory thing which doesn't require much intellectual input (something with which I don't agree). Then the numbers might mean something.
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