Language Learning Archives

Multilingualism is popular and a personal goal for many of us. What exactly makes multilingualism so special? What are the main benefits of multilingualism? In our most recent blog article, you will find out about the advantages of speaking various languages.

Cognitive Benefits

Learning and knowing several languages sharpens the mind and improves memory. It even acts as a protection against various diseases.

A study published by researchers at the Center for Brain and Cognition at the University Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona revealed that multilingual people are better at observing their surroundings. They investigated the differences between bilingual and monolingual people by observing structural images of both types of brains. They can easily detect anything that is irrelevant or deceptive. They’re also better than their monolingual peers at identifying misleading information.

Another study conducted in Luxembourg investigated the protective effect of multilingualism on cognition in seniors and found that “practicing multilingualism from early life on, and/or learning it at a fast pace is even more efficient. This protection might be related to the enhancement of cognitive reserve and brain plasticity, thereby preserving brain functions from alterations during aging.”

Improvement of Ability to Multitask

Being able to speak in multiple languages allows you to perform better in many ways. A study by a cognitive scientist at Pennsylvania State University found that multilingual people who can juggle languages are more proficient at multitasking. As multilingual people are used to switching between different systems of speech and grammar, they are able to switch between multiple tasks faster. Another study by Ellen Bialystok, from Toronto’s York University shows that bilingual children are better at prioritizing tasks than monolinguals.

Another study by Ellen Bialystok from Toronto’s York University shows that bilingual children are better at prioritizing tasks than monolinguals.

Improvement of Communication Skills

Research shows that exposure to multiple languages enhances communication skills. As illustrated in a study by Liberman F. et al., children growing up in multilingual environments were better at understanding other people’s perspectives, a driver for good communication. Multilingualism can also bring heightened sensitivity towards cultural awareness. Speaking different languages makes you more open to dialogue with other cultures and allows you to talk directly to people from other countries and backgrounds, which improves intercultural communication skills.

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Would you like to learn a foreign language with a motivated and experienced trainer? inlingua has 50+ years’ experience in teaching languages in over 200 regions around the world. Get in touch here!

Sources:

Burgaleta, M. et al. (2016). Bilingualism at the core of the brain. Structural differences between bilinguals and monolinguals revealed by subcortical shape analysis, NeuroImage. Doi: 10.1016 /j.neuroimage.2015.09.073

Liberman, Z. et al. (2016). Exposure to multiple languages enhances communication skills in infancy, PubMed Central. Doi: 10.1111/desc.12420

Klein, D. et al. (2014). Age of language learning shapes brain structure: A cortical thickness study of bilingual and monolingual individuals. Brain and Language, 131, 20-24. Doi: 10.1016/j.bandl.2013.05.014

Perquin, M. et al. (2013). Lifelong Exposure to Multilingualism: New Evidence to Support Cognitive Reserve Hypothesis. PLoS One, 2013, e62030. Doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0062030

Scientific American (2011). Being Multilingual Helps with Multitasking. Retrieved from: https://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/being-multilingual-helps-with-multi-11-02-18/

Gong Communications (2021). WHY COMMUNICATORS SHOULD EMBRACE MULTILINGUALISM. Retrieved from: https://gongcommunications.com/why-communicators-should-embrace-multilingualism/

Are you thinking about learning a new language? In this blog series, we would like to inspire you with interesting facts about different languages. Today, we will share the top 3 reasons why you should consider learning German:

German-speakers Are Everywere

Learning German can connect you to 120 million native speakers around the globe! German is the or one of the official language(s) of Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Luxembourg and Liechtenstein. It is also the native language of a significant portion of the population in northern Italy, eastern Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, eastern France, parts of Poland, the Czech Republic, Russia and Romania as well as in other parts of Europe. Furthermore, Germany ranks third among the countries with the most travellers abroad. Germans travel wide and far and are some of the world’s biggest spenders when on holiday. Knowing German allows you to connect with them and better understand their culture.

Career Opportunities

Are you striving after a global career? Knowledge of German increases your job opportunities with German-speaking companies in your own country as well as abroad. Furthermore, being fluent in German helps you to work productively for an employer with international business connections. Being able to interact with your German-speaking business partners in their mother-tongue improves your relations and leads to success. Would you like to work in Germany? Special visas are offered to skilled professionals and working holiday visas are available for young foreigners from a range of countries.

Enjoyment of Literature

Whether you are interested in studying German literature at University or just enjoy reading in your free time: German is the language of many famous writers and poets such as Goethe, Kafka, Hesse, Schiller, Dürrenmatt and Brecht. Must-reads include “Die Verwandlung” (“The Metamorphosis”) by Franz Kafka, “Der Besuch der alten Dame” (“The Visit”) by Friedrich Dürrenmatt or “Faust” by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Indulge in reading their works in the original language.

So what are you waiting for? Immerse yourself in a new world whilst staying at home!

Can we help you create a personal learning path? inlingua offers flexible e-learning as well as blended learning options tailored to your needs. Contact your local center for more information.

What is a Virtual Classroom?

In my previous blog, I referred to the virtual classroom used in conjunction with inlingua Online Learning (iOL). In this blog post, I am going to be looking at the virtual classroom itself. Technical details will be dealt with in the next blog post.

There are various forms of virtual classrooms . These may include non-trainer classrooms such as iOL, classes given to groups using a large single screen or trainer-led, computer-based classes attended by one or more learners. What I am referring to here as the inlingua virtual classroom is the latter.

Lessons are conducted in the inlingua virtual classroom in much the same way as in the live classroom. The inlingua method is very well suited to the virtual classroom environment as it is principally speaking-based. The trainer can use the same Trainer Resource Pack (TRP) lesson plan as with a live class.

Trainers have access to a wealth of online material specifically developed for the virtual classroom by inlingua International. The content is based on the same content as in the published course books. This enables lesson and course standardization and a mixture with live lessons if required.

What are the Advantages of a Virtual Classroom?

The greatest advantage of virtual classrooms is that participants can be in any part of the world to join a lesson in real time, and do not need to travel to an inlingua center.

Some may argue that time zones can be an issue with virtual classrooms because of the international potential: a lesson you wish to attend may not be held at a convenient time for you.

However, there are so many different sessions available, a learner is bound to find something suitable. This has the advantage of a much broader market base for the center and a much more interesting experience for the learner. Different cultural approaches to language learning can be experienced firsthand, and discussions can have a far more real-world feel to them. Another advantage is that sessions can be recorded (always with permission of all concerned) and reviewed by the learner and the trainer.

In many ways, virtual lessons can be quicker to organize because an online booking system can be used. There is also the possibility of one-to-one communication outside or during a lesson e.g. the trainer can chat with an individual or deal with them in a breakout room, where available, offering live audio-video support.

The electronic whiteboard in a virtual classroom allows instant interactivity without the need for learners to walk to the front of the classroom as they would have to in a traditional lesson. The virtual classroom also enables the trainer and the learners to share material onscreen.

Although the virtual classroom is controlled by trainers, learners can participate more actively in the lesson as control can be delegated at a click and learners can share their material or ideas with the trainer and other participants directly.

Virtual classrooms can also be used for live technical support for other systems like iOL or the inlingua Academy.

For more on advantages click here.

Disadvantages?

Inaptitude of the learner or trainer with the technical aspects of a virtual classroom can be a disadvantage. External technical issues associated with the internet can also disrupt lessons at times. Centers must ensure that sufficient technical training is given to the language trainer and that on-going support for the learner is part of the package. inlingua international provides extensive support here, but centers need to consider support for their individual clients and trainers when setting up a virtual classroom offer.

For a further discussion click here.

Online Material

inlingua International has developed material based on our printed books for lessons of all levels in the main European languages. Business as well as general language lessons are packaged in courses much in the way live lessons would be packaged. The online materials system is also very flexible allowing mixing and matching of various learning paths or lesson topics to suit a given situation or offer.

Conversation Classes

In addition to the standard virtual classroom lessons, inlingua also offers topic/level specific conversation classes live. These can be booked by a learner to suit their personal requirements or timetable. The trainers have access to conversation aids in the form of topic-based slides to ensure the conversations stay on target and complement the virtual classroom or traditional classroom course.

Webinars and Meetings

The inlingua virtual classroom can also be used for meetings and webinars for a broad variety of pedagogical or business purposes. New trainers can be interviewed or observed doing a virtual language lesson, clients or colleagues can be contacted with a few clicks of a computer mouse.

How it Works

Initially, the client can check out the offer from a center via the internet website. They can then contact the inlingua center in the area via email, phone, message service or in person to discuss offers and requirements. The individual learners will be asked to do an online placement test to confirm their levels and the possible offers further discussed. Once a course has been agreed, the learner is sent access and joining instruction as well as access to technical support.

For further general discussions click here and here.

Next blog: Focus on the Virtual Classroom: Part 2/2 | The Technical Aspects

In the following series of 12 blogs, I am going to discuss language and how we can best learn a language. Initially, I will be looking at language itself and the learning process, and I will argue that language is speaking. This will be followed by showing how this process has guided the creation of inlingua books and other inlingua language learning material.

A further examination of inlingua’s online learning solutions will follow. I will illustrate how inlingua’s online language programs can be used as an integral part of blended learning or other customized learning schemes and how they can enhance the learning process.

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What is Language – and How do you Begin to Learn a Language?

Language is speaking! This may seem a bit of a rash statement to begin with, but I would like to point out here that I am not writing about computer language or how artificial intelligence conveys information, just simply human communication in its raw form.

Clearly, there must be the process of listening included here, but what we are listening to is essentially the spoken word. I agree that human communication is, indeed, far more complex: requiring the ability to respond to body language and may include other senses in the observation of facial expressions and so forth. However, what can be best learned in a language learning classroom (live or virtual) must start with beginning to speak the language (see Further discussions below).

This may be obvious, but it seems to have been ignored, for the most part, in formal education for the last hundred and twenty years or more (see the next paragraph). Millions of us have been subjected to being forced to conjugate grammar tenses in another language in a language class full of disinterested pupils and expected to be able to magically speak the language. It just doesn’t work like that! You need to learn to speak the language first.

The Direct Method of language learning, on which the inlingua method is based, focuses primarily on speaking. It was first presented to the world as early as 1880 by the French linguist Gouin and later developed by Paul Passy and others at the end of the nineteenth century. More details of the Direct Method can be found here. The inlingua method has grown since our inauguration in 1968 and many more recent developments in language learning have been integrated. This will be discussed in a later blog post.

Starting to Learn a Language

When we start learning languages, most of us will begin by translating the word into our native tongue to extract some meaning from the new utterance. Learn a New Language This is rather like adding synonyms to what you already know in your own language. At a certain point, there is a breakthrough where new language seems to create a separate set of language labels for the concepts and sounds being learned and the new language can be used without continual reference to the mother tongue. But you have to begin by speaking it…

Some research has been done from the physiological point of view. Though it is rather inconclusive.

Reading and Writing

Right, now what about reading and writing then? Is that not also language? Well, for me, no. Writing is a set of symbols we use to illustrate the utterances we produce. This may not be so in some languages where pictorial images are used to convey a concept and the relative sound is inferred, but, at least in most European languages, this seems to be the case.

[See the Further discussions section at the end of this blog for additional discussions on this specific topic.]

Reading and Writing Reading then, for the purposes of this discussion, is the interpretation of those symbols. Can we not learn languages simply by reading then? Initially, this is very difficult. Even a language that is more or less phonetically written, like Italian, takes a long time to learn for the vast majority of people if it is not heard and used in context. Here is a discussion from the Messofanti Guild you may find interesting. Some polyglots disagree. I think these are very special cases and in the small minority, however.

Activating a New Language by Speaking

It seems that, unless the language is activated by speaking, the words stay on your internal temporary folder until deleted a short time afterwards. I am writing here about the early stages of learning. Language is Speaking Perhaps the reading part of your brain forms some sort of synapsis with the speaking part of your brain in time. It is true that you can often understand written words that you never use in the spoken form, but this is at a more advanced stage. See the video from Britannica.com for a physiological position.

Some people only ever need to write a language and manage quite well until you try to communicate orally with them. They have learned the symbols, but not the sounds. It’s a bit like being able to read music but not being able to play an instrument. This is not very useful for language training.

In Conclusion

The point I am trying to make here though is, speaking is the main essential ingredient and we need to start there. Once a word or phrase has been produced correctly in the spoken form, then it is certainly of no disadvantage that the adult learner is exposed to the written form as soon as possible. To do it the other way around is really ‘putting the cart before the horse’ for the beginner. When all is said and done, language is speaking!

Further Discussions and Reading

This evidence of why learning a language should begin with speaking is discussed in more detail here and here.
A discussion about reading as a basis for learning languages.
You may be also interested in the discussion from the Oxford English Dictionary about emojis and the role they play in language.
Broadly, you may argue, of course, that the term ‘language’ is used to cover all forms of communication as presented on the Natural Language Processing website.

Next …

In the next blog. I will be looking at how languages are learned in a bit more detail and how the inlingua method of language teaching has been developed to facilitate rapid and thorough language learning. I will deal with the discussion regarding grammar in the third blog in this series: Grammar versus lexis. I will make a comparison with other approaches and methods. Peter Lambie, Method and Materials Consultant, inlingua International.

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