How to say "Happy New Year" in 10 languages

Happy new year!

To ring in the new year, let's do a little bit of language learning, shall we? With a little help from my daughter and the friendly native speakers over on RhinoSpike, we've already covered how to say "Merry Christmas!" in ten languages, so let's do the same for the new year.

After the jump, you'll find native-speaker recordings of "Happy new year!" in ten languages (Chinese, English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish), thanks once again to RhinoSpike.

Speaking a foreign language in a dream when you know next to nothing?

My friend sent me an email relating the following tale of dreaming in Spanish, even though he's studying Japanese and knows pretty much no Spanish. I'm not exactly sure what to make of it, so I'll throw it out to you. What do you think?

My mom asked me this morning what I was dreaming about last night because I was talking in my sleep. I couldn't remember anything so I just shrugged it off and asked what was I saying? Here's the kicker, my mom said "You were speaking Spanish. It was like a conversation going on for a few minutes." I was even doing it with a Spanish-like accent. I can tell you flat out that if hard pressed to say more than please and thank you in Spanish I would drown in a sea of my own ignorance. Also, as you know, the only Spanish I ever took was in high school, with Mrs. Huggins, which I never even opened the book for, so I wouldn't say I learned anything that could subconsciously be festering in the back of my mind. I have never been to a Spanish-speaking country, don't listen to Spanish-language music, rarely watch Spanish films (and definitely not recently), and have had no other interaction or exposure to Spanish-speaking people recently. So where does it come from?

My friend throws out a few of his own ideas, after the jump.

A formula to calculate language-learning success

One of the first formulas you'll learn in high-school physics is that distance travelled (D) equals speed (s) multiplied by time travelled (t), or:

D = s * t

So if you're going 30 km/h for 3 hours, you know you've travelled 90 kilometers.

The same formula can be applied to language learning, where learning (D) equals learning speed (s) multiplied by time spent learning (t). So if you've been learning 1 new item (vocab word, grammar rule, character, etc.) every 3 minutes and your exposure time is 100 hours (or 6,000 minutes), you've learned 2,000 items.

Learning with Texts Review: Great for languages that use spaces, cumbersome but still useful for those that don't

Learning with Texts allows you to copy and paste in a body of text, note which words within that text you do and don't know, quickly look up the words you don't, and create flashcards from them. It was designed with languages that use spaces in mind (to determine where one word stops and the next begins), and works quite well with them. For languages that don't use spaces, like Japanese, it's much more cumbersome (as some elbow grease will be needed to indicate where one word stops and the next begins) but it's still a useful tool. The interface is not very intuitive and there's definitively a significant learning curve to climb before you get your sea legs, but I'd recommend breaking out your climbing gear because the price is right ($0) and there's no other free tool that does the same thing.

In fact, the only place you can do the same thing that I am aware of (to the comments if you know of another!) is LingQ. However, LingQ only allows you to input 100 terms for free; from there, you have to subscribe to get more. While I've found that LingQ is a bit more user friendly and intuitive, it's hard to beat free.

My initial approach to reviewing Learning with Texts was to simply pick some article I was reading, throw it up there, run through the process with it, and then report back in the form of a review. However, the initial article I selected was in Japanese, and it quickly became apparent that the Learning with Texts experience is going to be vastly different depending on whether you're using a language with spaces, like all major Western languages, or a language without spaces, like Japanese. As such, I also decided I'd add the text of a short comment from my blog that was written in Portuguese to test out how it works with languages that use spaces.

Today’s exercise in heresy: In defense of the traditional language course

The following is a guest post by Serge Gorodish, the author of Country of the Blind.

Let’s consider the case of a hypothetical language student, whom we shall call Lenny. Lenny has studied, say, French for four years in high school—what the hell, make it twelve years from 1st grade onwards. After graduation, Lenny travels to France for the first time. He finds with shock and dismay that he can scarcely manage to ask where the restroom is and, what’s worse, finds the answer utterly incomprehensible.

But Lenny is nothing if not resourceful. He is determined to get a handle on this French thing. He joins the Paris chapter of the Jerry Lewis fan club, he watches every episode of obscure French cartoons, he leaves no stone unturned. Eventually, through a combination of luck and inspiration he hits on the magic formula (whatever it is). He finds himself speaking French with increasing facility. French women swoon at his feet, and even snooty maîtres-d’hôtel smile and nod approvingly of his eloquence.

And he thinks: Damn! All that time I wasted in stuffy, traditional language class!

We’ll come back to the case of Lenny shortly. But there seem to be a lot of Lennys out there in cyberspace. Some language gurus will tell you input is the secret; others will tell you it’s all about output—but almost all seem to agree that traditional language courses are the kiss of death. I respectfully disagree. I’ve tried studying languages in class, outside of class, at home, and in immersive environments. I’ve had both success and failure in every scenario. And I find that when embarking on a language I always sign up for a traditional course (if available).

I didn’t need to analyze why until writing this post. On reflection, I find the traditional approach has advantages—and disadvantages, too, but these can be negated if you take the right attitude. Let me start by defining what I call the “traditional” course: a group studying together, guided (and usually evaluated) by a “teacher” not only proficient in the language in question but with training and/or experience in the particular issues encountered by students of the language.

Three of Benny's reasons for not wanting to live in the U.S. boil down to U.S. English being different

You may have recently read Benny's post slamming the U.S. for a bunch of stuff. While I agree with some of it (prices including tax are way more user friendly) and disagree with some of it (Americans hardly have a monopoly on stupid stereotypes—no, I have never owned any guns and, no, I never eat at McDonalds), I've no interest in wading into those debates on this language-learning blog, but I was pretty surprised to see a well-versed language learner like Benny fail so hard in his attitude toward a few things that are clearly linguistic issues.

Let's go through those points.

Input-only language learning is like being in a new city without a map

You'll get to where you need to be eventually. It'll just take longer.

Quite a while back, a reader (let's call him "Sam" because I didn't bother to see if he cared whether or not I published his real name) wrote to me with the following message:

Hey!

I saw your "debate" with Steve K. and I considered myself a 100% input-only guy. For some reason, I started outlining (actually copying word for word) Baron's 501 Spanish Verbs grammar/verb section in the front of the book. After just covering the first 12 or so pages (3 verb tenses), I listened to a Mexican podcast I've heard 20+ times. My comprehension went from 10% to 60% (just general estimates). I was blown away by your approach. I know that everyone learns differently, but I swear by this now. I've been adding phrases to Anki as well, and I "knew" what the phrases translated as, but now I "know" the phrases and can substitute in words and other phrases to form thoughts and sentences. I am thinking more in Spanish now, and now that I have a better working blueprint (i.e., grammar) of the language, I understand far more.

I know that input-only types say that you will learn the language "naturally" from input and you won't need grammar, but I think is kind of like saying, "Don't buy a map of New York City; if you walk around downtown, you'll naturally learn it." Your method says, get the map, learn it, and then pound pavement. You will still learn "naturally" but intuitively you will be light years ahead. I still do 5 hours of input every day, but now it's becoming comprehensible thanks to grammar and your method!

Thanks for your blog and time!!!

Sam

So Sam appears to have used my grammar-learning method with his own twist—and to great effect.

Online resources for nurses to learn Spanish

The following is a guest post by Erinn Stam, the Managing Editor for NursingSchool.org. She attends Wake Technical Community College and is learning about nursing schools in Washington State.

As the Spanish-speaking population grows in the U.S., it is becoming more and more important for healthcare professionals to learn the language to be able to communicate vital information to provide life-saving care. Nurses are on the front lines of patient care and are often the first to see a patient and take an assessment. Knowing how to communicate with patients clearly and quickly can make the difference in a life-or-death situation. Unfortunately, nurses are busy professionals and work notoriously long and stressful hours. Finding the time to learn a second language may not be possible for many. Fortunately, there are a number of resources that can help nurses learn medical Spanish through self-study or part-time study, making it easy to balance with their schedules. A few good resources, after the jump.

Memory as data points embedded in a schema

In the middle of a pretty interesting article on how psychology was used to analyze the wildly varying recollections of the survivors of a WWII naval battle to pinpoint the location of the battle's shipwrecks, the author makes an interesting point about memory:

When a memory is made, the content you're trying to remember is embedded in a schema, or theory of what is going on. Over time, you remember less of the original content and more of the general theory.

One thing about my own language learning that I've noticed is that I seem to retain grammar rules much longer than vocabulary. I've always chalked that up to exposure; if you say there are hundreds or even thousands of grammar rules, there are easily many more words than that, so for a given amount of exposure you'll be getting more exposure to your average grammar rule than your average word.

But what if the actual difference is that grammar rules fit better into the "schema" I'm embedding the memories into?

Livemocha to give away its premium content to contributing users

So there seems to have been a lot of change over at Livemocha since I reviewed their site. In addition to a new logo, the biggest change is that some of their content isn't free any more. I suppose the Livemocha team has to put food on the table as well, so I can't say that change is all that shocking.

What is kind of cool is that they're offering that content for free to people who contribute to the site. Because I seem to have made a lot of good corrections while playing around with Livemocha, I recently got an email from them to become an "Apprentice Expert Reviewer". All I need to do is send in a resume! (Lol?)

The email, after the jump.

International Business Times: Foreign-language skills provide sharp edge in the job market

Want some more motivation for your language learning? How about cash money? From the International Business Times:

Job seekers with bilingual skills could look forward to a profusion of opportunities in the coming year, according to various reports and company hiring plans.

A profusion? If that's not so much hyperbole, that sounds pretty good, given that jobs aren't exactly easy to come by at the moment.

[T]he need for transactional knowledge of languages has become very important in both private and government sectors. … Strangely however, … while proficiency in languages—especially in Chinese and Spanish—seems to be among the most critical skills likely to be sought by recruiters over the next decade, very few workers had plans to invest in language instruction.

Speaking just from my own personal experience, foreign-language abilities are a huge asset in a job search; from my first college internship to my current job, language skills were a crucial part of my sell—and often a prerequisite to even get a position.

Wanna be a polyglot? Might wanna lay off the alcohol

A new study may indicate that the more you drink, the worse you're gonna be at language learning. From Science Daily:

[A]lcohol damage occurs in gradations: the more alcohol consumed, the greater the damage. … Alcohol has an impact on both gray and white matter, with the greatest impact affecting parts of the brain called the frontal and temporal lobes. "These brain areas are critical to learning new information…," said [Catherine Brawn Fortier, a neuropsychologist and researcher at the VA Boston Healthcare System and Harvard Medical School as well as corresponding author for the study]. … "Severe reductions in temporal brain regions most often result in impairments in memory and language function… ."

Learning and memory and language function? Golly gee, those sure sound like they'd be important for language learning!

Your target language should become second nature

A quote about skills in general that would also apply to language learning skills (from Time):

"Once skills… become second nature, you can call them up much more easily when you need them," [theoretical physicist Lisa] Randall writes. "Such embedded skills often continue operating in the background — even before they push good ideas into your conscious mind."

Laokang Tone Test Review: Great, simple app for learning how to distinguish Chinese tones

The Laokang Tone Test (via Laowai Chinese) is a simple, free iPhone app that trains your ability to recognize Chinese tones.

Press the play button on the app's opening page, and you'll hear the two-syllable word mama with one of the 20 unique tone combinations for two-syllable words in Chinese. By doing it this way, it accustoms you to the way tones changes when used together with another tone, something Chinese learners usually tend to overlook.

You then must select the tones for each syllable by simply tapping on a graphical representation of the tones. Each test goes through all 20 tone combinations in a random order, only taking a couple minutes.

Music: Like jet fuel for kids' (and adults'?) language learning?

Some scientists seem to have come up with some darn good stuff for kids' language learning. From Science Daily:

Canadian scientists who specialize in learning, memory and language in children have found exciting evidence that pre-schoolers can improve their verbal intelligence after only 20 days of classroom instruction using interactive, music-based cognitive training cartoons.

And the results are impressive:

The verbal IQ tests assessed the children's attention, word recall and ability to analyze information and solve problems using language-based reasoning. Brain imaging enabled researchers to detect if functional brain changes had occurred related to the cognitive training.

When the children were re-tested five to 20 days after the end of the training programs, researchers … found quite a different result in the children who took the music-based, cognitive training. Ninety percent of those children exhibited intelligence improvements -- five times larger than the other group -- on a measure of vocabulary knowledge, as well as increased accuracy and reaction time. The music group also showed brain changes that co-related to their enhanced cognitive performance.

So what's that mean for us language learners (and our language-learning kids)?

Amanda Knox's tragic path to Italian

The language-learning world is not one that's prone for drama and high crimes, but the murder of Meredith Kercher created just that in a place that is surely close to the hearts of many readers of this blog: a study-abroad program. Meredith was spending a year abroad, studying Italian as an Erasmus scholar, when her life was abruptly cut short in a senseless tragedy, and the aftermath of that tragedy sent Amanda Knox down a multi-year language-learning path that I would wish upon no one, but nevertheless resulted in her fluency in the Italian language.

This post looks at Amanda's language-learning background, how her language abilities may have affected her interactions with Italian authorities, and finally how the long path from trial to conviction to acquittal ultimately led to her fluency in Italian.

GraspChinese review: Pretty good way for Chinese beginners to get started

GraspChinese.com is an online Chinese course for the total beginner. The first 10 lessons are free and for $14.99 (or $12.74 with the 15%-off promo code "GRASP15" that will work through the end of 2011) you can get a month of access to all 37 lessons, with discounts for longer subscriptions (GraspChinese provided me with a free six-month subscription for review purposes, so I had access to all 37 lessons). The short and succinct lessons cover the basics of Chinese vocab, grammar, and pronunciation, with a welcome focus on teaching the four tones. It's a pretty good place to start your Chinese efforts, especially given how quickly you should be able to go through the material, but wholly omitting Chinese characters is disappointing and needing to hear a non-native speaker pronounce Chinese words is not ideal.

GraspChinese's lessons are for the most part organized around doing a bunch of things that a traveller to China might need to do while there (ordering a coffee, shopping, etc.). Each lesson consists of a series of narrated slides, a listening comprehension exercise, dictation exercises for words and phrases, a list of vocabulary and key phrases from the lesson, and—when the vocabulary of the lesson lends itself to visual representation—an image selection exercise not unlike those found in RosettaStone or Livemocha.

Guidelines for guest posts

Guest posts have been a part of this blog for some time now. As I keep getting requests from potential guest bloggers, I've decided to create this post explaining my guidelines for guest posts so I can lazily link here whenever someone wants to do one.

How Steve Jobs made language learning easier

As you may have heard, Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Inc., passed away last week at the age of 56.

Steve doesn't appear to have been much of a language learner (one somewhat unreliable source tells me that he spoke Malayalam, presumably learned during the time he spent backpacking around India), but it's hardly surprising that the course Steve cut through technology has had many reverberations in the way we study languages. The changes are really knock-off effects from what was happening at a higher level, and much of it seems to be "someone would've done this sooner or later" kinds of things, but the big changes are obvious when I compare to the way I learned languages 15 years ago, and I for one am glad those changes came sooner rather than later.

Three ways he did that, after the jump.

Advertise on Street-Smart Language Learning

I've recently been getting some inquiries about advertising on here, so I've decided to test the waters with a monthly banner ad auction. Lang-8 kindly agreed to be my banner ad guinea pig, and you can see what the banner ad will look like above. The first auction will be this month (October 2011) for the advertising for next month (November 2011) with a minimum bid of just $10, which should hopefully make the advertising accessible to just about anyone.

Find out more after the jump.