I’ve been learning languages for many years, starting with a Spanish class back in middle school. Though I’ve always enjoyed my language classes, I never really felt like I got everything I could out of the time I spent studying. In fact, after about 6 years of studying Spanish off and on, I still find myself way below the fluency mark, even with my short stints of self studying (I lost interest very quickly). But does that mean classroom learning is useless? Or that self-study is only possible for highly motivated individuals? Not exactly.
I think that both classroom learning and self-studying for languages are both very valid ways of learning languages, and both have their place. In fact, as far as I’m concerned, they should be intertwined when possible. Together, they help your language skills improve amazingly.
Just sittin’ in my house, studyin’ some languages…
For people that truly love languages, self-study is the most common way of studying their target language.
There are many benefits of self-study, including:
- Self-study lets you get through material faster, you can take things at your own pace without a teacher dictating how fast you go.
- You can also study things that are more interesting to you. For example, if you are teaching yourself Russian, and if you are a nurse, you can teach yourself medical terms and phrases in Russian. You would not necessarily be able to do this if you are in a classroom setting.
- Another cool thing about self-study is that you can use your own study method – if you like grammar books, you can use grammar books. If you like talking to others, get on Skype and find some language exchange partners. If you learn best while listening, listen to music from your target language or use programs such as Pimsleur or Assimil.
A negative aspect of self-study is that if you aren’t highly disciplined, you may find yourself not studying in favor of other activities. You must be disciplined, very interested in the language, and willing to work hard to get to the level you would like. Unless you have a definite reason to be learning your language (going to a country where it is spoken or needing to speak it for a job, for example), many students find themselves not really succeeding in their language studies.
Just sittin’ in the classroom, takin’ some tests…
Classroom learning, however, has both negative and positive aspects as well.
- If you are in a classroom, you are forced to learn – there is no skipping to go do something else (well, technically you could, but that would be a waste of your hard earned money).
- The teacher keeps you moving forward, albeit at a slower pace than if you were self-studying. There is no ‘getting stuck’ at a certain point – you have to move past it if you want to stay at the same level as your class.
- Classrooms also give you a lot of forced speaking practice. Some silence, in the beginning, is good, but at some point you need to move on and start speaking. If you don’t speak, you won’t survive in a country where your target language is spoken. You must practice, practice, practice. In a classroom, you are forced to talk in at least simple sentences, and you can start figuring ways to get your ideas across, even if you can’t speak your target language perfectly.
- You can also get a good basis in any language – the foundation is the most important part if you want gain fluency in a language. If you have problems understanding a concept, you have someone there to easily talk to and figure it out.
- Another good thing about classroom learning is that your teacher will often be a native speaker, or at least someone who is very good with your target language. Both can be beneficial, or not as beneficial. A native speaker is good because you will get the native accent down, and they will be able to easily tell you what does or doesn’t sound right. A bad thing about native speakers is that they don’t always know how a language work – they just grew up with it. They don’t know exactly why something works how it works, unless they did specific research on this topic. This is why non-native speakers would be better, in some ways. Though they may not have a native accent (even though it probably will be pretty good), they will know how a language works inside and out because they had to work harder to get it. They probably read many grammar books, and have studied this language for years. They will be able to explain why things work how they work.
Find a happy medium
Perfect solution? A little bit of both. Use the classroom to keep you moving forward and self-study so you can study what really interests you.
I’ve found that not one thing works better by itself – if you mix and match you often can get the benefits of both options and decrease the negatives.
You can always often ask your instructors to modify the class a bit – ask them to put on some foreign music, ask if you can watch movies once a week, or come in during office hours to get help with fields that interest you more.
A bad thing about classroom study is that you often stall and stick with what the class is learning, even if you could easily jump ahead. There is the feeling that “hey, I’m already doing a hour a day, why should I study on my own?” This is currently a problem that I’m having with my Russian study. I study a hour a day in class and I love it. However, since I’m doing so well in that class, I don’t feel the necessity to study on my own all the time. So, I’m at the same level as the class, not at the level that I really could be by now.
This is why I’m starting to incorporate more self study into my routine, and spend more than the ‘required’ amount of time studying. Now, when I listen to music, it’s in Russian. When I am using Facebook, it’s the Russian version. I’m not necessarily studying grammar (as I can easily get that in the classroom), but I’m learning new vocabulary by exposing myself to contexts where that vocabulary is actually used.
Which do you prefer? Self-study or classroom learning? How do each, individually, hinder or help you?
