Comfort Zones and Efficiency

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Ani
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Comfort Zones and Efficiency

Postby Ani » Mon Apr 24, 2017 1:34 am

These two quotes came up in the thread about FIA.
smallwhite wrote:aka "leaving the comfort zone", which a lot of us refuse to do (and don't even realise it).


blaurebell wrote:Other people leave gaps and spend just as much time trying to close the gaps / correct their learning mistakes later on! And as always there is only a fine line that separates efficiency from sloppiness.


Which got me thinking about how we actually work in relation to our comfort zone and with regard to our needs, or the needs of the language, to progress.

With this in mind:
a) How often do you assess you level and weaknesses?
b) How often do you modify your study plan based on self assessment of need?

Further, what does it look like NOT to leave one's comfort zone? Where does the line between efficiency and sloppiness fall, in your opinion? How can we avoid errors on either side of the spectrum?
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Re: Comfort Zones and Efficiency

Postby blaurebell » Mon Apr 24, 2017 11:11 am

How often I change my study plan depends on my goals and how long term / short term they are. Usually I set myself goals and then try to achieve them. When I achieve them, I set myself a different goal and move on from there. Basically I tackle one or two weak areas at a time per language.

Staying in my comfort zone actually means that I don't set myself any goals and just do whatever I feel like - watch the odd movie here and there, read a book, use the language whenever needed. Progress is usually nil during such times and it might be just about enough to maintain the language. Some 2 years later I suddenly realise that I've made no progress at all although I've spent considerable amount of time watching TV (no challenge) and speaking ... badly, i.e. that's basically called wasting time :roll: Story of my Spanish! I don't know why, but Spanish is clearly the language where I try out all the stupid language learning mistakes by accident. Going back to correct all the mistakes and close the gaps is painful and annoying now because a lot of stuff like that has accumulated now. Fossilised grammar mistakes and gaps, tackling certain accents I need to understand but that I dislike, improving low level formal writing skills, intensive reading because I was lazy and only ever read extensively. Basically all somewhat tedious stuff. Staying in the comfort zone means to avoid that heap of annoying stuff and instead watch another dubbed series.

With French my experience was much more smooth, because I didn't leave those sorts of gaps and progress seems sort of natural. It's just a matter of tackling one goal after another now. In my experience the sloppier the basics, the more tempting it is to stay in a comfort zone where you just do the sort of things that are the most comfortable for you. For some people the comfort zone might be extensive reading when the problem is listening comprehension, reading translations rather than native novels, for others it's watching TV when they should be reading, and some stay in the comfort of courses and dumbed down learner materials when they should be moving on to native material.
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Re: Comfort Zones and Efficiency

Postby aaleks » Mon Apr 24, 2017 12:11 pm

I’ve never taken any serious tests or exams therefore my self-assessment is based only on results of various Internet-tests and my subjective feeling. I don’t have some structured plan either. Usually it is just ends and means, i.e. I have a goal and a preferred approach that could be later modified or/and changed more than one time.
My comfort zone is the zone of passive skills. Maybe I don’t fully understand the term, so I’ll just say that even an immersion in native material doesn’t give me a feeling of discomfort, because it’s interesting and I don’t care if I can’t understand all of it right away.
When I start to communicate, especially write, in a target language I leave my comfort zone. Sometimes it seems I make more mistakes than I’m supposed to make just because I try too hard :)
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Re: Comfort Zones and Efficiency

Postby smallwhite » Mon Apr 24, 2017 1:03 pm

Ani wrote:b) How often do you modify your study plan based on self assessment of need?

I have to swap your questions a) and b).

Many members' study plans are resource-based - "do Assimil then MT then GdUdE". My study plans are ability-based - "become able to understand news articles". So there's nothing to modify as I progress. My study plan works more like a to-do list that I tick-off as I progress.

Ani wrote:a) How often do you assess you level and weaknesses?

I look at my study plan at least once a day because it's my to-do list. I colour in my abilities if they have changed since last time. But abilities don't change every day :P so I don't really assess myself in everything every day. But then often I'd be deciding between 2 skills, 2 tasks or 2 languages. Then I may assess myself in those areas more carefully.

or

I feel some breakthrough during the day, and I would go to my study plan and update it.

Ani wrote:what does it look like NOT to leave one's comfort zone?

Not feel uncomfortable.

Ani wrote:Where does the line between efficiency and sloppiness fall, in your opinion? How can we avoid errors on either side of the spectrum?

Why would there be a line between efficiency and sloppiness? Aren't they the two extremes of the spectrum?
Sloppy -> acceptable -> efficient.
I didn't understand what "avoid errors" refers to anyway.
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Re: Comfort Zones and Efficiency

Postby blaurebell » Mon Apr 24, 2017 3:18 pm

smallwhite wrote:Why would there be a line between efficiency and sloppiness? Aren't they the two extremes of the spectrum?


In the other thread I mentioned the 80-20 rule and diminishing returns on the final stretch to mastery. This means that it might take only 20-30h of watching a series to get to 80-95% understanding of a series, but you might need 150h to get from 95% to 98%. This gets more and more extreme the closer you get to 100%, so you can easily spend 1000h on watching TV, to get to 100% understanding. Efficiency is to spend enough time on an activity so that you get most of the benefit without wasting your time with unnecessary perfectionism before moving on to a different activity. Efficiency is to stop an activity at 95-98% and move on to an activity that might be more efficient for picking up low frequency vocabulary - reading for example. Sloppiness is to stop at 80-90% and move on to more difficult fun activities hoping that magic or time will take care of the rest.

Examples for sloppiness can be found easily in my previous approach with Spanish. Not to be imitated since I really did everything wrong there:
1. Starting to speak about complex topics after minimal grammar instruction without correction before having the internal "that sounds wrong" error detection mechanism in place.
2. Hoping that I can pick up even complex grammar concepts from input only. I now have a 30% chance of getting subjunctives right because of 1 and 2 in combination. Fail!
3. Never addressing weak areas directly and instead hoping to create the context in which they sort themselves out by magic. Like for example hoping that I could deal with the Iberian Spanish accent just by spending enough time in Spain. Wrong, since I don't like the accent much and subconsciously tend to avoid listening to the locals because they're too harsh on the ears. I could also always get away with 80-90% understanding and some good context based guesses.
4. Starting to read extensively before I had my core vocabulary in place and never reading intensively at all. I feel like I'm swimming a little most of the time and audiobooks seem really too much because my literary vocabulary is simply too vague.
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Re: Comfort Zones and Efficiency

Postby smallwhite » Mon Apr 24, 2017 3:58 pm

blaurebell wrote:Efficiency is to stop an activity at 95-98% and move on to an activity that might be more efficient for picking up low frequency vocabulary - reading for example. Sloppiness is to stop at 80-90% and move on to more difficult fun activities hoping that magic or time will take care of the rest.


Thank you for the explanation. Numbers are much easier to understand than words ;)

Ani wrote:Where does the line between efficiency and sloppiness fall, in your opinion?

It falls on point A in the 3rd graph here. Point A is the optimal point. But that's not what you're asking, is it...?

I've been without a CD-reader for several months already. A new one arrived in the mail today. I have 2 textbook-CD kits from the library lying at home today: a Greek kit (I'm a beginner in Greek) and an Italian kit (I'm B2 in Italian). So which CD do I listen to this evening? The Greek one, because I'm furthest from my goal in Greek, and being a newbie, each minute spent on Greek will produce more results.

Comparing options works the same as reading off a graph.

Ani wrote:How can we avoid errors on either side of the spectrum?

Still don't know what "errors" refer to :oops:
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Re: Comfort Zones and Efficiency

Postby tarvos » Mon Apr 24, 2017 4:15 pm

Life begins where your comfort zone ends.

I don't really know what comfort zones have to do with efficiency, but what does rack up the improvement points is very targeted activities designed to solve particular problems that you have. Usually that requires you to do something you weren't able to do before, practice it to hell and then suddenly you realize you've got it down pat.

I'm not sure how that translates into numbers.

I also find that to notice progress you need to work on all areas of language holistically - eventually they all reinforce each other.
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Re: Comfort Zones and Efficiency

Postby iguanamon » Mon Apr 24, 2017 5:08 pm

Ani wrote:... what does it look like NOT to leave one's comfort zone? Where does the line between efficiency and sloppiness fall, in your opinion? How can we avoid errors on either side of the spectrum?

I can't address efficiency as I am probably the least efficient member of the forum. I don't count hours, pages or words. I don't use srs, LWT or memrise. I'll default to others who do who can give you that answer.

As to what it looks like NOT to leave one's comfort zone, I've seen this a lot over the years on the forum, people who stay in comfort zones too long. It usually involves not wanting to wade into native material (and also speaking/writing) and staying with courses, srs and learner-based material instead as the primary interaction with the language. The result is that they stay in a low intermediate level and do not advance their skills. It can happen for a variety of reasons- not knowing how to progress without a framework that a course provides; fear of missing something which comes from not trusting their own abilities to figure out things on their own; perfectionism; and, indeed, not wanting to leave the comfort zone. People who don't leave the comfort zone are often frustrated by this choice and stagnate without advancing. They also know this.

I've seen people post on the forum about their frustration with understanding native TV- something along the lines of "I have no trouble speaking in conversations but I can't understand a novela or film". It's not surprising. Many learners don't place nearly as much of a priority to listening as they place on courses and reading. Listening is harder in comparison to reading, whereas a basic conversation is something over which a learner has some measure of control- what to talk about, a good chance of anticipation of responses, etc., whereas when watching a film or tv show, that control is out of the learner's hands. Films' and shows' vocabulary and conversations can go anywhere. The speakers aren't going to accommodate the learner by rephrasing or repeating something. The learner won't be able to anticipate what comes next as easily.

As blaurebell points out, too much emphasis on native material can lead to gaps in learning when formal study is avoided. As with most things, a balance can be achieved between native material and study. A good foundation in grammar will serve a learner well and nothing prevents a learner from studying grammar alongside consuming native-material and speaking/writing. It's not an either/or scenario. Of course, this is part of my learning strategy with the multi-track approach. Balance between skills does not have to be in equal parts, but all skills should be practiced to some extent. The proportions can vary greatly. Some people don't write much or speak much, or even at all, because it may not be something they are interested in doing. That's ok, a language can be experienced through reading. Of course, if someone who doesn't speak, or doesn't listen, complains about their speaking and listening skills, then... well... they have their answer about why those skills may be weak.

Recently, I felt a need to become more complete in Ladino/Djudeo-espanyol. The language is written in several different scripts, one of which is handwritten and called Solitreo. To someone who hasn't seen it before it looks like Arabic writing. I had delayed learning it because I didn't want to suffer learning it. I knew what was involved in learning a new script and I guess I just didn't want to go through it again for so little gain. I was wrong. I already had most of the skills I needed to learn it- I knew the language already; I could read the printed Hebrew/Rashi script easily. My dread of learning it was misplaced. Sure it was hard at first, still is. Going outside of my comfort zone has allowed me to (with some struggle) read pages from a handwritten journal written by a man from Salonika, Greece from a time before his people were mostly exterminated by the Holocaust. Knowing that the author wrote this journal himself adds a certain joy in reading it. It's as if I am connected to him from that time in a very personal way. Without leaving my comfort zone, I couldn't experience this feeling.

I'm sorry I can't respond to your other questions. I am not really studying a language from scratch right now. When I was, when I noticed I needed work on something, I worked on it. Weaknesses are exposed by interaction with the language and it's speakers. They are overcome by recognition and working to resolve them.
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Re: Comfort Zones and Efficiency

Postby arthaey » Mon Apr 24, 2017 5:26 pm

smallwhite wrote:I look at my study plan at least once a day because it's my to-do list. I colour in my abilities if they have changed since last time.

If you're willing to share, I'd love to see what your study plan / TODO list looks like. I'm always interested in how others here actually organize themselves.
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Re: Comfort Zones and Efficiency

Postby smallwhite » Mon Apr 24, 2017 5:46 pm

arthaey wrote:
smallwhite wrote:I look at my study plan at least once a day because it's my to-do list. I colour in my abilities if they have changed since last time.

If you're willing to share, I'd love to see what your study plan / TODO list looks like. I'm always interested in how others here actually organize themselves.

It's just a 4x4 grid.

A2 B1 B2 C1
x
grammar reading listening speaking

And 3 cell colours to represent my level:
not yet achieved
achieved level but not yet satisfied (eg. low marks)
achieved and satisfied
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