Learning a foreign language

Learning a foreign language

            Learning a foreign language is now necessary due to Globalization. Indeed, countries are more and more opened and submitted to new requirements, such as new markets or the increase of immigration. A lot of people begin to learn another language during adulthood, which is more complicated because the brain is less capable to assimilate information. In order to facilitate this problem, some strategies can be used for learning a foreign language. First, it is important to educate the ears to a new accent and pronunciation. And then, it is better to understand the meaning of the words with examples without using a dictionary.

            Reading and listening are two different skills. We can understand the majority of the words when we read, but if we listen to the same information it could be more difficult because we probably do not know how to pronounce a word. That is why, it is a necessity to accustom ourselves to new sounds and accents. For instance, in my case, watching a movie with English subtitles permits me to be familiar with the American accent. Another technique would be to listen to American songs with the lyrics and try to recognize the words while the song is playing.

            When we do not understand the meaning of a word, our first reaction is to translate the word in our language with the dictionary. But this is not the best method. Before using the dictionary, it would be better to try to understand the meaning with others similar words or with examples of the current life.

            To sum up, I can say that two good ways to learn a foreign language are, to accustom our ears to the accents by watching movies or listening to music, and to understand the meaning of a word with other similar words or examples. We can notice that if we want to know another language, learning in a classroom is not enough. We must be opened and still be curious to improve.

John Le Parc