What perspective should I take towards missions training?
What types of training should I consider?
Can I become a missionary if I don’t want to learn another language?
» more related questionsQ: What is the best way for me to learn a language so I can witness?
A: Go to language school and practice in the culture.
The normal pattern for those of us who are working in other cultures is to go through the hard slogging of learning another language. It is a lot of work and takes a lot of time, but it has very significant benefits. Perhaps the most obvious benefit is that it limits our participation in a culture until we have time to learn about the culture and the ways of understanding and expressing themselves that these people have, which is often quite different from our own. As we work through a language, we learn both intellectual suppositions and cultural niceties of those with whom we desire to communicate the Gospel.
Attending a Language School has its benefits in that it gives the learned a balanced approach to the language and culture, and usually provides a disciplined time frame –- something most of us need! Many of us feel it is false economy to rush too quickly into ministry opportunities before receiving an ample grounding in the language we’ll be working in. (Also, some of us take longer than others to become adequately fluent!)
Attending a Language School has its benefits in that it gives the learned a balanced approach to the language and culture, and usually provides a disciplined time frame –- something most of us need! Many of us feel it is false economy to rush too quickly into ministry opportunities before receiving an ample grounding in the language we’ll be working in. (Also, some of us take longer than others to become adequately fluent!)
A: It really depends on a number of factors.
The right method for learning a new language depends on two key factors:
1. The nature of the language. For example, Spanish is a relatively easy language to learn. It is not nearly as difficult as some other, widely-spoken languages. Because Spanish is so simple, many learners can make considerable progress using tutors, language helpers, or even LAMP (Language Acquisition Made Practical). But other learners beware: Do not treat all languages the same. Not all languages are easy to learn, and anyone who advocates one method for all the languages spoken on earth is failing to understand the differences between languages.
With some languages, using native tutors or a "barefoot" approach like LAMP, without having someone to help you grapple with the grammatical and contextual complexities, can be a recipe for either extreme hardship, or utter failure. Languages like Russian, Arabic, Korean, Hungarian, etc., are very complex and require some intensive work both in and outside the classroom. Becoming fluent in such languages requires some thorough training and grammatical explanation at times. The reason for this is that some languages can be so complex that any attempt to learn such a language by "discovery" fails to create fluency, since the learner does not have anyone who can explain the context of all the many grammatical (case inflections, verb systems, etc.) or contextual changes to vocabulary.
2. Your individual personality and natural ability to learn. The approach you choose should also take into consideration your own learning style, which usually has to do with how your mind processes new information. Understanding whether you are an auditory, visual or perhaps analytical learner is a plus. Similarly, and more importantly, your ability to learn a foreign language (expressed as "language aptitude") must also be taken into account. I recommend that you take a good language aptitude assessment in order to understand how quickly you learn languages. A test like the MLAT might suffice. My organization has developed an aptitude assessment that works very well. See www.strategiclanguages.org. If your assessment indicates a lower aptitude (it is not an assessment of intelligence, per se, but of how quickly your mind processes languages), you might want to augment any method you choose with solid classroom training that will help you to understand and apply grammatical rules, rather than attempt to discover them on your own.
But for other language learners reading this stream, when it comes to the more difficult and complex languages, good grammatical instruction is absolutely necessary if one ever wants to become fluent, since a major part of fluency is speaking the language accurately.
1. The nature of the language. For example, Spanish is a relatively easy language to learn. It is not nearly as difficult as some other, widely-spoken languages. Because Spanish is so simple, many learners can make considerable progress using tutors, language helpers, or even LAMP (Language Acquisition Made Practical). But other learners beware: Do not treat all languages the same. Not all languages are easy to learn, and anyone who advocates one method for all the languages spoken on earth is failing to understand the differences between languages.
With some languages, using native tutors or a "barefoot" approach like LAMP, without having someone to help you grapple with the grammatical and contextual complexities, can be a recipe for either extreme hardship, or utter failure. Languages like Russian, Arabic, Korean, Hungarian, etc., are very complex and require some intensive work both in and outside the classroom. Becoming fluent in such languages requires some thorough training and grammatical explanation at times. The reason for this is that some languages can be so complex that any attempt to learn such a language by "discovery" fails to create fluency, since the learner does not have anyone who can explain the context of all the many grammatical (case inflections, verb systems, etc.) or contextual changes to vocabulary.
2. Your individual personality and natural ability to learn. The approach you choose should also take into consideration your own learning style, which usually has to do with how your mind processes new information. Understanding whether you are an auditory, visual or perhaps analytical learner is a plus. Similarly, and more importantly, your ability to learn a foreign language (expressed as "language aptitude") must also be taken into account. I recommend that you take a good language aptitude assessment in order to understand how quickly you learn languages. A test like the MLAT might suffice. My organization has developed an aptitude assessment that works very well. See www.strategiclanguages.org. If your assessment indicates a lower aptitude (it is not an assessment of intelligence, per se, but of how quickly your mind processes languages), you might want to augment any method you choose with solid classroom training that will help you to understand and apply grammatical rules, rather than attempt to discover them on your own.
But for other language learners reading this stream, when it comes to the more difficult and complex languages, good grammatical instruction is absolutely necessary if one ever wants to become fluent, since a major part of fluency is speaking the language accurately.
A: Take a course and use a language helper.
Many people still advocate using the Language Acquisition Made Practical (LAMP) method which majors on memorizing phrases that are useful and then repeating these phrases to twenty or thirty strangers. Through repetition you learn the phrases and make new friends. However, this method is falling more and more into disfavor nowadays. The LAMP method is useful for standard greetings and phrases but does not teach you how to be creative and develop new sentences you have never spoken before. You must draw upon a list of memorized phrases.
Newer methods suggest that you spend more time working with an individual language helper or assistant. This way you can have more comprehensible input rather than just listening to speakers who use large amount of vocabulary you don't know. Then develop a small circle of friends so you can spend more time talking and interacting with them rather than parroting your phrases quickly to a large group of people.
Newer methods suggest that you spend more time working with an individual language helper or assistant. This way you can have more comprehensible input rather than just listening to speakers who use large amount of vocabulary you don't know. Then develop a small circle of friends so you can spend more time talking and interacting with them rather than parroting your phrases quickly to a large group of people.
