My thoughts regarding "learning" versus "studying" a 2nd language

[Kristina Efimenko]

Actually, this whole debate/discussion seems to reflect what conversations I
went through with my mentor teacher when I was a student teacher of the
Russian language. I was attempting to be brief in my involvement in this
discussion between Greg and the woman speaker (name - Ch__?) and the
distinction between studying and learning a foreign language. In my
conversations with my mentor teacher, we discussed the "learning" versus
"acquiring" a language. He maintained that a language could only truly be
"acquired" through conversational means, not by being taught grammar rules
and memorizing long vocabulary lists. Knowing words and vocabulary would just
come naturally by use in real situations. The views of Krashen and methods of
VAN PATTEN  were shared by my mentor teacher. I, however, was educated in
Russian language (and French and Macedonian) according to the
Grammar/Translation method. I believe that a person learning his second
language needs a base, a structure, to organize his learning of the language.
I do believe conversation with the language as students are "studying" the
language will help them acquire the language. Neither, alone, is enough. Yet,
for some reason this debate continues, one or  the other - to study or to
learn or to acquire - it doesn't matter, all methods, approaches, techniques
are necessary. My mentor teacher and I also had numerous arguments regarding
what constitutes "true" conversation. He did not count as true conversation,
inquiring a stranger how many children he had, their ages, names, etc. Unless
a student was conversing with a needed or important purpose, he contended,
the student would not "acquire" the language.Well, this kind of conversation
is exactly what tourists who are interested in the local poplace enjoy doing
when visiting a foreign country. I have done this in Ukraine, France, and
former Yugoslavia, and even in the U.S. with new immigrants.
    For me, personally, I began studying Russian with a text and a native
speaker of Russian on televison when I was in the fourth grade. The live
teacher who accompanied us to the t.v. room did not know Russian at all. In
addition, I had private lessons with my mother's Russian teacher who was a
recent immigrant from the former Soviet Union. For these private lessons,
this teacher had me read aloud in Russian from a book which was too difficult
for me to understand, served me food and had me ask for things in phrases he
had repeated to me, and I listened to his broken English as he explained to
my mother and me why he escaped from his country - and the hardships he had
endured. I was not able to study Russian again in school until my senior year
in high school, followed by majoring in Russian in college. In college, I was
taught by a strongly Grammar-Translation method. I spent hours every night
translating pages of Russian, using a dictionary an grammar book. In most of
my upper division classes, I was taught by native speakers, especially one
who rambled on and on in Russian at a level too high for most of us to follow
- about the political situation in the former S.U. and the terriible life she
led there. I did acquire an understanding of the Russian culture and soul,
also through reading Russian literature - and usually in English because we
as students were still not expected to be able to read novels or plaays in
Russian, but only short stories, fairy tales, and poems. We did listen to
movies and go to live plays in Russian. We also had a few opportunities to
speak with visiting Russian guests, like a Russian sharpshooter team - even
accompanied by a chaperone who spied on them and spoke for them when asked
anything directly by one of the U.S. students about life in Russia. I also
attended a 3 week summer language camp after studying 3 years of Russian at
the college level. We were not allowed to speak any English while there.
While I was at the camp, I did feel that I was beginning to think in Russian.
But not until 1989, was I able to visit a Russian speaking country - Ukraine
- with my husband to visit his relatives. In college, I remember thinking
that here I had had all these years of "studying" Russian and still was not
able to converse in even a simple way in Russian, however when I waas in
Ukraine I was able to converse. When there was more of a purpose and need to
converse in real situations, my inhibitions began to disappear. Now, after
reading material about second language acquisition in my english as a Second
Language classes, I realize that learning a language - both one's first and
subsequent languages - is a life-long process. Both increased access to
teachers and native speaking opportunities can speed up this process of
learning. I do not believe that just one or the other is enough to help
someone learn a language. I do not believe that an adult, or older child, can
just immerse himself in a new language and culture and simply "acquire" a new
language. Likewise, just having a native speaker around to learn from is not
enough. My husband speaks Ukrainian fluently, and even though I have studied
Russian, I have not learned Ukrainian from him. It's not enough for me to
hear the language, I need to see it written and have the grammatical points
explained, etc. I need structure, which a native speaker can seldom provide.
About finding an Uzbek native speaker - not an easy task. hear in Phoenix, I
know a couple, but they only speak Russian. Richard Feignman, famous
physicist, taught himself enough of the language to get by - for his purposes
- in Tuva by studying from a book and a little from the radio. So, there is
another key point - "for his purposes" - in all of this debate, the student
is often left out - what are his purposes for learning a particular foreign
language. Sometimes, a student wants only to speak some useful phrases, other
times he may need to know understand the grammatical structure, so that he
can read certain kinds of things in that language. And certainly for
pronounciation, someone learning a new language needs to hear that language
clearly pronounced by a native speaker.
    Anyway, enough for now. Kristina

I sent this letter to Greg after some comments between him and another member
of SEELANGS regarding learning a 2nd language. I recounted some thoughts and
experiences with how I "learned" Russian. Greg suggested I share what I wrote
with SEELANGS members.

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