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I have heard of Rosetta Stone and seen a bit of it. It is a multimedia based system that uses no or minimal translation and does not explicitly teach grammar. I guess in a larger sense, it is what it is: another language learning tool. Like any tool, it's usefulness depends largely on the user.
I got started with my investigation of language learning when I read through this web site:
http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/all-japanese-all-the-time-ajatt-how-to-learn-japanese-on-your-own-having-fun-and-to-fluency
This guy mentioned linguist Stephen Krashen and his input hypothesis quite a bit, so I also started reading Krashen's books and articles (http://www.sdkrashen.com/).
One thing I have come to realize is that while there are an endless number of issues you need to be concerned about when acquiring a new language (what language you are coming from, your goals, motivation, pronunciation, writing systems, culture, etc.), the acquisition process really boils down to one very important point:
input before output
To put it another way, if you can go to Japan and ask for directions in Japanese, that's great but can you understand the answer? Nearly every language learner I ever met (and myself included) had that experience. Not because they were slow or bad learners, but because they did not take appropriate note of this principle (and in many ways they cannot be blamed because traditional teaching methods do not emphasize it).
If you think about this, it is a very profound point.
When people want to learn a new language their goal is almost always communication. They want to be able to speak and be understood, and understand others. This is fine, but it ignores the essential part which is how human beings ACTUALLY acquire a language. They DO NOT acquire languages by learning grammar rules, memorizing vocabulary or otherwise using rote, manual, non-natural/realistic techniques. It just HAPPENS.
Think about it. When you were born you basically had one language facility built-in: when you were hungry or otherwise needed attention you could cry. That was it. You couldn't form a word, you couldn't form a proper sound in any language, you could do next to nothing to meaningfully communicate with anyone. Overtime your language abilities developed, and they developed largely WITHOUT any deliberate teaching. Now, how did this happen?
Constant input.
At first, things were just gibberish. Sounds that had no meaning to you. Slowly, over time, your brain began to naturally notice things about the sounds. Oh, when this sound is a made a person smiles. When this sound is made I get food. When this sound is made someone opens a door. This is the human brain beginning to recognize patterns.
More time passes, and you pick out more and more words from the gibberish. Eventually, you are able to pick out small phrases from the gibberish. You are starting to understand strings of words together and the messages they convey. Then, finally, you start to understand sentences (whole and complete messages).
Really, this process is never ending.The sentences you can understand at 18 are remarkably different in terms of order of difficulty from those you understood at 8. But the point is, this learning happened without you really being aware of it and without any real deliberate action on you or another person's part.
The secret was the constant stimulation your brain got. You constantly heard people speaking the language. Everywhere you went you couldn't help but hear it. Eventually you reached a point where you were able to read the written word and that opened up a whole other input facility. You could now get input from the printed word (voracious readers tend to be much better users of the language).
The most convenient thing about this whole process is that it is repeatable when you are an adult. I think many people assume that only small children are capable of learning languages in this natural manner. If you think about things carefully you can see this is ABSOLUTELY NOT the case (in fact an adult can learn much faster than a child ever could because they already have a base knowledge of concepts that doesn't need to be built along with language).
The key to the whole process is the brain instinctivly forming new pathways in response to new stimuli. It doesn't happen instantly, but with REPEATED and REGULAR repetition of input the brain will eventually codify that input and you will be able to recall and use it instantly, without manual effort. In other words, you will be able to output without thinking (the goal of every language learner).
When people asked me how to learn Japanese I used to just reccomend a textbook or two. Since this paradigm shift I have had from reading the linguism and language aquisition literature, I now believe I would simply say: immerse yourself with input. Listening and Reading before anything else. The output will come naturally, with a little bit of time. Don't output when you are not ready. You will know when you are ready.
Lastly, there are three important points that go along with input theory:
(1) Optimal input should be n+1
(2) Input must be enjoyable to you
(3) Input must be repeated
Point 1 is perhaps the most critical. Basically, it says that input must be comprehensible. This may sound pretty obvious and in fact it is! If you don't at least understand the sense of what you are taking in then it is difficult to actually learn from it. Krashen adds in this notion of n+1. He defines "n" as your current level of language proficiency. He then reccomends that your input should be n+1 in difficulty. That is, it should be just a **little** bit more difficult than the level you can comfortably input at (n). For example, if you can read the material and basically understand things but there are a few words and sentences you can't understand then that is ideal input for increasing your language proficiency.
Point 2 also falls into the common sense department (really, all of this stuff does!). If you don't have an interest in the input you are going to find an excuse to ignore it. Textbooks are boring. REAL, authentic language materials about subjects you enjoy are not! Those should be your PRIMARY study materials (at least 75%, I would say), not grammar dictionaries, workbooks or drill software. The goal is to understand real stuff anyway, so you might as well start there. That is, where you started with your first language anyway!
Point 3 I mentioned before, but it is worth repeating. You need to allow your brain to have many chances to see the patterns of the new language. The only way to do that is continous, DAILY repetition. You CANNOT learn a language by just working on it a couple days a week. Likewise, you can't cram it all in for three months and then go away for a year and come back expecting to be right where you left off. You need the input coming in every day. Spanish music in the car on the way into work, Spanish newspaper to read during the lunch break, Spanish podcasts on the MP3 player when you are jogging, Spanish movies and TV to watch at night. This is immersive input.
Well, I see I have really gone on a long time here. I probably gave a much longer answer than your question really asked for!! But, this is my basic line of thinking that I am developing from all my research into the matter.
Lastly, to really answer your question: I don't know anyone who ever finished Rosetta Stone or claimed to actually learn a language with it. But, when I stop and think about it no one I know who can speak another language TRULY learned in the classroom or from a book or software or whatever. They all said the same basic thing when I asked how they really learned the language: INPUT(*)!!
Here are a few websites to look at if you are curious for more details/background:
http://www.sdkrashen.com/
http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com
http://jp.youtube.com/user/lingosteve
http://thelinguist.blogs.com/how_to_learn_english_and/
http://www.antimoon.com/how/input.htm
Well, bye for now!!
Colin
* Some actual quotes from friends:
- "I studied Japanese in Japan, but I really learned it from living with my host family."
- "I like computers so I read English PC magazines. That's how I really learned English."
- "I learned English by watching Star Trek."
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