My Spanish teacher couldn't understand anything but Spanish... and when she asked me a question I was like *blink blink* seriously?

by Anonymous 14 years ago

I know right, those English teachers are SO confusing

by Anonymous 14 years ago

That's the best way to learn it, believe it or not. I learned English by the textbook for around 4-5 years before I came to America. Once I started living with only-English-speaking people, I understood NOTHING they said and would always just go around being mute and deaf. I had to rely on basically hand gestures for the next couple years. But I stopped learning by the book, and in about 3 years I had already complete fluency in the language. It's quite a cool story bro, but it's true and it's proof just speaking the language makes you learn it.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

It took you about 3 years to learn English? That's odd... It took me a little less than 6 months, but then again, I'm really good with languages/accents. For example, if someone says something a certain way (accent), more often than not, I can imitate it perfectly, and I speak 3 languages fluently, without an accent in any of them.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

Lol in half a year you completely understood English and could say practically anything? Sure, you probably learned to say your favourite colour and how old you are, along with understanding same few phrases, but knowing the language completely in 6 months is impossible. I didn't say for 3 years I was an idiot, and then learned everything in the last day, I spoke for 3 years about as well as you did after your 6 months. It's only after 3 years that I could declare myself fluent, because unlike you I've got some modesty.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

I give you credit, there's no way I could learn English as a second language. There are WAY too many random and pointless rules

by Anonymous 14 years ago

Believe what you want, I moved from Brazil in Dec. 2005, and by May 2006, I was fluent. And I wasn't trying to be rude towards you, so if you took it that way, I apologize.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

Oh, also I moved from a Slavic language-speaking country, which is FAR from a language like English. I do know Spanish is closely similar to English, English is even easier since it has so fewer verb conjugations and nouns haven't got grammatical gender. It's probably very easy to learn from Portuguese because of this, so you might be actually telling the truth.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

And I don't understand why I would lie about that, so I don't know why everyone's hating on me.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

They probably thought you learned it from Japanese or something, and were just bragging. But it's cool, now I believe you.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

Hahaha, do I LOOK Japanese? :p But nah, thanks bro.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

That's nothing. It only took me one movie to learn whale.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

Not if you want to pass your tests in the class. But it's good if you want to learn on your own.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

It's frustrating trying to learn that way, but you'd be surprised how much you actually pick up. I used to complain about the same thing until I realized it actually does help you in the long run. Even if you don't understand something, you can use context clues to understand it; that's a skill you'll need to have if you plan on speaking with someone fluent in the language because I am almost positive you will never know every single word in a language.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

Isn't that how everyone first learned their primary language. I know for sure that I didn't pop out of my mom's vajayjay speaking English.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

You didn't? I distinctly remember saying "wow, I've got that new baby smell, amirite?" the moment the doctor cut my umbilical cord. I remember that day like it was 19 years and 3 months ago.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

Yeah I have to second the people above me. I mean what'd you think they were doing? Just picked a random way to teach the subject? There's been a lot of study done and lots of work put into the topic of learning a second language....

by Anonymous 14 years ago

It's useful learning like that if you are trying to become fluent, but when it comes to grammar and writing, then it's just frustrating.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

This is my experience from student teaching French: their regular teacher had a policy of no English in the classroom starting in French 2 (French 2!! All they know how to say by that time is oui and bonjour!). I would grade the French 4 work and they were still making the most basic mistakes because the teacher had never explained to them in English why what they were doing was wrong. Your classroom is not a foreign country, and pretending that you don't speak English isn't going to force them to use your language. They're just going to daydream until the class is over if it's too hard to understand. That's how it works. Sorry for all you immersion fanatics, but it's impossible to artificially create that kind of a situation for a bunch of lazy teenagers who don't want to take your class anyway. You have to use English sometimes.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

I know! My french teacher graded a class test in front of us, and she was just like "Ca n'est pas bon, ca n'est pas bon." Yeah, the thing is that you're marking it incorrect, so we know it's not good. Maybe we got it wrong in the first place because you never taught us to conjugate the damn verb.

by Anonymous 14 years ago

My Spanish teacher a couple of yeas ago tried that, mainly because she didn't know how to speak English very well. We spent twenty minutes trying to figure out a what she was talking about when she she forgot the English word of "fork".

by Anonymous 14 years ago

Oh my...the stuff that goes on when you don't go on amirite for a week...

by Anonymous 14 years ago