Rapid passive knowledge acquisition

General discussion about learning languages
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Tristano
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Rapid passive knowledge acquisition

Postby Tristano » Thu Jun 01, 2017 10:07 am

Hi everyone,
as I previously often stated, my main usage for languages is to acquire information, whilst producing information is for me a minor goal.
Many of the users here have a long silent period before that they start to speak the language. My own method has always been to reach the stage where I could read and listen to the language and let the language come to me by exposure in a relaxed and stress-free way.
Unfortunately I still couldn't optmize it in order to arrive to this level the fastest possible.

Up to this moment I mostly study the 2000-3000 top words and learn bits of the grammar, then start to read and when I'm more comfortable reading I start to listen to the language. In this way it should take me one year to reach a comfortable passive level provided I study frequently enough. With related language it takes much less time because I need to learn the differences instead of the whole language. I don't care at all about talking in the first moment.

However I'm not satisfied. Not only I would love to shorten this period of time, but there are also problems with this approach:
- Certain languages are not written like they are pronounced (thanks Hebrew), so I can't start with reading because it would take me too much time
- Certain languages use a much larger vocabulary than others (like Dutch) so it takes more time also
- Other languages have grammars the cause the words to mutate the whole time that makes you think that you encountered a new word when in fact it's just the same

I'm refining my method and I'm seeking improvements. With Romanian I started to use Clozemaster to start reading as soon as possible and see the words in context. Listening is also a tough beast and I have shortage of ideas about how to accelerate reading comprehension acquisition.

Thank you in advance for any contributions!
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Re: Rapid passive knowledge acquisition

Postby smallwhite » Thu Jun 01, 2017 10:51 am

Tristano wrote:
My own method has always been to reach the stage where I could read and listen to the language and...

... it should take me one year to reach a comfortable passive level...

... I would love to shorten this period of time

How many hours has it been taking you in your various languages? / What is the number of hours you're now trying to beat?
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Re: Rapid passive knowledge acquisition

Postby DangerDave2010 » Thu Jun 01, 2017 11:09 am

My quick acquisition strategy is to learn words from a frequency list generated from movie subtitles (i.e. the opus corpus), coupled with extensive watching cartoons and tv serials dubbed in the language, for a rapid development of listening comprehension.

Another productivity method I have developed (but not really used), is what I have called "wholesale SRS", which means re-reading whole texts in an SRS like schedule. You should take simple texts, such as stories for for children, that should be easy to "memorise the meaning" by working through it only once, annotate pronunciation as needed, and set them for re-reading (or re listening if possible) at intervals. You can probably put up with texts that have a large proportion of unknowns with this method.
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Re: Rapid passive knowledge acquisition

Postby Tristano » Thu Jun 01, 2017 11:12 am

smallwhite wrote:
Tristano wrote:
My own method has always been to reach the stage where I could read and listen to the language and...

... it should take me one year to reach a comfortable passive level...

... I would love to shorten this period of time

How many hours has it been taking you in your various languages? / What is the number of hours you're now trying to beat?


I don't log my hours. Anyway, I think that studying 10 hours per day is not better than study 2 hours per day, and that in the case of passive knowledge bootstrapping 1 hour is plenty. Let's say that I study a 4 - 8 hours per week, so I can approximate with 6h per week.
6h per, let's say, 45 weeks because I'm not always that precise, becomes: 270h. I would like to do it in the half or less. Considered that I don't have to drill grammar, write or speak, it should be possible (or not?).
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Re: Rapid passive knowledge acquisition

Postby smallwhite » Thu Jun 01, 2017 11:29 am

Tristano wrote:... 270h. I would like to do it in the half or less. Considered that I don't have to drill grammar, write or speak, it should be possible (or not?).

Hold a competition, name a language, announce a prize, get the more competitive amongst us to join, and you'll know the answer after 135 hours ;)

135 hours is about 6 weeks for me. Maybe I can experiment with something in the next 6WC. You mentioned Hebrew so I'll experiment with a Cat IV language.
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Re: Rapid passive knowledge acquisition

Postby Tristano » Thu Jun 01, 2017 11:35 am

smallwhite wrote:
Tristano wrote:... 270h. I would like to do it in the half or less. Considered that I don't have to drill grammar, write or speak, it should be possible (or not?).

Hold a competition, name a language, announce a prize, get the more competitive amongst us to join, and you'll know the answer after 135 hours ;)

135 hours is about 6 weeks for me. Maybe I can experiment with something in the next 6WC. You mentioned Hebrew so I'll experiment with a Cat IV language.


So you study 3h15m every single day and remember everything what you studied without any decrease of performance after 1h of study?
So if you study 3h per day you learn exactly 3 times faster than if you study 1h per day?
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Re: Rapid passive knowledge acquisition

Postby tommus » Thu Jun 01, 2017 11:53 am

Tristano wrote:Certain languages use a much larger vocabulary than others (like Dutch) so it takes more time also

I am interested in this statement about Dutch. I think it is generally accepted that English has a very large number of words, for many reasons. (Wikipedia: English is the current lingua franca of international business, education, science, technology, diplomacy, entertainment, radio, seafaring, and aviation.) But I never really thought that Dutch had an especially large vocabulary. Maybe it just seems small because English is so large. Dutch, like German, likes to merge words into long words. But those do not really mean a larger vocabulary. At least passively, that just means a lack of spaces between words.

I don't want to hijack your thread by discussing language size, but perhaps you shouldn't be concerned about the size of the Dutch vocabulary. Vocabulary size is hard to quantify because there are so many variables and required assumptions, but here is an indicator that seems to say that Dutch has a relatively-small vocabulary.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_dictionaries_by_number_of_words

EDIT: Perhaps I misunderstood your statement. Maybe you meant that Dutch was one of the "others" with a small vocabulary.
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Re: Rapid passive knowledge acquisition

Postby Theodisce » Thu Jun 01, 2017 12:13 pm

In my experience there is certain threshold and once I've hit it in a language, I begin to really enjoy it. Before, it's a struggle and every single hour of understanding far less than I would like to is energy consuming. The numbers vary, but I guess 150 hours for most languages I've learned to a point where I can understand them without much difficulty would be more or less it (less for German and more for Basilian Portuguese for example). I can't really say much about Hebrew, but doing 12 or 18 hours of Romanian per week should give you the coveted effect in a month. I was able to read Romanian books about modern history after having entertained myself with the input of interest for 60 hours with the comprehension varying from 85% to 30%. Still, I was able to enjoy what I read. Another 65 hours is going to be a big booster. It may be difficult to do 18-20 hours a week, not only because of our busy schedules but because of some apparent cognitive limits (it is much more difficult for me to devote many hours to a language I'm still beginner or intermediate in than to do it with a language I know well). Here you have to rely on interesting content.
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Re: Rapid passive knowledge acquisition

Postby smallwhite » Thu Jun 01, 2017 12:26 pm

Tristano wrote:So you study 3h15m every single day and remember everything what you studied without any decrease of performance after 1h of study?
So if you study 3h per day you learn exactly 3 times faster than if you study 1h per day?

I average about 3 hours a day. 4.5h during 6WCs and 1.5h other times.
I don't remember everything. I need revision, too.
I study in short sessions. Last Saturday, for example, the sessions were 10 44 29 25 7 21 53 29 41 37 15 10 minutes long.
About 20% of that time is not study time at all, but admin time like editting filenames.
Performance decreases during a session but resumes after a break, so yes, I do learn 3 times as much when I average 3h a day compared to when I average 1h a day.
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Re: Rapid passive knowledge acquisition

Postby Ogrim » Thu Jun 01, 2017 1:07 pm

Tristano wrote:- Certain languages are not written like they are pronounced (thanks Hebrew), so I can't start with reading because it would take me too much time
- Certain languages use a much larger vocabulary than others (like Dutch) so it takes more time also
- Other languages have grammars the cause the words to mutate the whole time that makes you think that you encountered a new word when in fact it's just the same


I would say no language is written like it is pronounced. With that I mean that different languages attribute different sounds to the same letters of e.g. the Latin alphabet. Of course, some languages, like Italian, have a greater correspondence between letters and sounds, but you still need to know that the letter "c" may be pronounced /k/ or /ç/ depending on the vowel that follows. I therefore do not think it is a good idea to start learning a language by reading only - I always start out with a course where I have corresponding audio to the text (like Assimil or Langenscheidt). This is also because I sort of "hear" the word in my head when I read silently, and I do not want to acquire a horrible pronunciation because I keep "hearing" it wrongly.

With languages like Hebrew and Arabic, which don't write the short vowels in normal script, I'd say it is even more important to work in parallel with script and audio. At least in Arabic the vowel sound, which is not written, can make the difference in meaning of certain words. For natives I guess it comes with practice and seeing the word in context, but for a beginner it is just not possible to guess what vowel sounds there should be.

If you want to reach a C1 level in a given language you will inevitably need to learn a very large vocabulary, so I do not see what difference the total number of words in a language makes when it comes to learning a new langauge. Much more important is the number of cognates with a language you already know. As you sort of mention yourself, it is obviously much easier for you to learn Spanish or Portuguese than Hebrew, because you get a lot for "free".

For me, grammar is essential. Some people may be able to learn a language well without paying much attention to grammar rules, but I know I learn faster and better if I understand how the grammar works. So although it can be boring, I do recommend spending some time drilling grammar through exercises, especially those points you find difficult.

My experience is that learning a language takes time, no matter what. Like you I also learn some languages mainly for reading and listening, but even then I believe I learn faster if I also work on output, whether it by doing grammar exercises, short translations, "scriptorium" or talking if possible.
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