Maybe someone could tell me if I should feel beaten or pat myself on the back. To explain my situation:
I am learning Spanish. Generally I have been encouraged and feeling somewhat successful using Lingq. I am currently on a 94 day streak with just under 5k words known. I spend about an hour and a half each day focusing on my Spanish. Sometimes another 30 minutes of passive listening.
I have never learned a language to fluency before. I took 2 years of high school Spanish and learned literally nothing. I donāt know how I made it through because the grading was a joke. Although, I have learned enough Biblical Greek to be able to read through some of the easier books. But Iām not a grammarian. I do speak toki pona conversationally but I dont think that should count as language experience.
I am learning mostly with Lingq. I started day 1 with the mini-stories. After finishing them and without memorizing every word I moved on so as not to get bored. I feel very much accomplished with my consistency and progress. I use podcasts on my level and import YouTube videos to learn from often. My favorite are Dreaming Spanish. I did also complete the first level of Pimsleur but got annoyed with the back and forth between English and Spanish. I prefer to focus on input. I also started the āNo-Nonsenseā Spanish workbook but am only at the beginning. And I purchased āHola Lolaā by Juan Fernandez which I love (only on chapter 5).
I donāt want to get too bogged down in grammar and intentionally memorizing as that causes me to get frustrated and bored. I have given up on various languages a few times before after less than 1 month.
I feel I understand a lot more than I ever thought I would at this point. Im very surprised at how much I can pick up. However, I have mixed feelings about even Beginner 2 Level content that I still donāt know many of the words. Often they are yellow but I havenāt encountered them enough to be comfortable with them yet. I am concerned that too many important things are falling through the cracks. I want to trust in the comprehensible input approach and not give up.
Today I was discouraged when I took 2 different A1 tests online. The one said I did not pass as I only got 7 out of 10 correct when I needed 8. Meaning Iām not even A1??? I have been learning with Intermediate 1 content and at my current pace I should reach that level within about 6 weeks. Even worse though, the other test has 25 questions and I only got 14 correctā¦I felt that I had to give my best guess for several questions as there were some words I didnāt know.
What do you all think? Any advice from those of you who have used primarily Lingq for comprehensible input for learning a language? Is my progress good or does something seem off?
I support Comprehensible Input as the best way to get me to understand Greek in my head, which helps me hear and understand it. itās a long road. Iām not sure Iād do well in tests but i donāt think they really test the sort of understanding that I need to read and listen.
Ministories are great for recognizing the tenses, grammar variations and sentence structure. For these reasons when revisiting or starting a language they are useful.
Some people tend to pooh-pooh grammar study here, but it has its place alongside CI. Besides listening to/reading all kinds of Spanish and French content here, I also use Busuu.com and Iām quite pleased with it. Is that one of the places where you took an online A1 test? If not you can try the site out using their free tier to see what their system is like. Iām a paid subscriber and it only costs me around US $40 annually on sale.
I also use Kwiziq/Lawless French and Spanish, but the best annual subscription price Iāve found for that was US $80 on sale. (You have to get a separate subscription for each language.) They have a vocabulary and grammar-based placement test to help you determine approximately what CEFR level you are. That site drills the grammar hard. Busuu does too ā if you take advantage of their grammar review feature, but I like Kwiziq.com the best for grammar. You really cannot just extrapolate all of that stuff from context using CI alone in a reasonable amount of time.
(I get nothing if you click on those links, except the satisfaction in knowing that they might help you on your Spanish journey.)
It doesnāt surprise me that you did not pass the online A1 tests because only CI as a beginner can get you very good at reading and listening, but to get good at output you also need to train output. Iāve been learning danish for over a year now with a mostly apps and input based approach and have tested B2 in reading and listening, but A2 in the vocab+grammar section (and Iām prob. A2 at writing and speaking as well, they just canāt test that with their online test - itās from the danish institution that also does the official tests for foreigners, itās really good and gives you your level in the different areas they can test online, they have an online test for spanish as well: Language test).
Basically I think with a CI approach your speaking and writing skills will always lack behind, but the idea is that they will catch up very quickly later on when youāre very comfortable with the language already (around 1000-1500 hours of input usually). If you do not want to wait that long, it can help to try to include more output in your language learning - for example by writing texts here in the writing exchange section where you can hopefully get them corrected as well, by looking up some exercises online, joining discord servers where you can talk in spanish or doing some tutoring lessons if you have the money.
Overall Iāve found that trying to produce output can be very beneficial, as it can show you where youāre lacking the grammar or active vocab (because just understanding a word does not necessarily mean you can remember it and use it when it comes time to speak or write). And with learning grammar - you donāt necessarily need to buy a grammar gook, but it can help to look up some exercises and try to actively figure out the rules and patterns of the language - iāve actually used duolingo to train basic grammar for danish, it doesnāt explain anything but it introduces you to one new concept at a time and then repeats it (with small variations) so often, that it basically becomes second nature and you can understand and use that chunk of grammar without ever having been told explicitly how it works. Probably wonāt work for all languages, but it can be worth a try if you prefer learning grammar naturally instead of intentionally memorizing it (i always sucked at that as well, but through the extensive repetitive training with duolingo i actually got the basic danish grammar down pretty well now).
So yeah, donāt be discouraged! A pure CI approach is probably one of the slowest ways to learn a language but also one of the most enjoyable. If youāre getting too impatient you can try speeding up the process with some of the things I mentioned, but itās not really necessarly (unless you have a specific timeframe in which you need to learn the language to a certain degree) - whatās most important is that you donāt give up and donāt have unrealistic expectations. To learn a language takes a long time, no matter which method you use. People often underestimate what it takes to even reach A1 or A2 level and itās completely normal to not reach it within 3 months, especially with a mostly input focused approach. Iāve been learning Mandarin Chinese for almost exactly a year now and Iām still barely A1 (might not pass a test with a speaking component) and struggle with my listening comprehension. But with my danish I also struggled until I had about 1000 hours of input under my belt, so Iām not too worried. Iām not in a hurry and it doesnāt bother me if it takes me 10 years or longer to reach B2/C1 level. As long as youāre enjoying the process, thereās no need to worry - once you can think in the language (which sadly takes a long time usually) youāll make a sudden jump in your abilities. Happened to me with both english and now danish as well.
I generally agree.
You say āA pure CI approach is probably one of the slowest ways to learn a language but also one of the most enjoyable.ā With Greek for me, other messages had me stuck at 2000 words with nothing else going in. CI has more my understanding on much more.
The CEFR describes a very particular path of second-language language learning. Studying by yourself might not necessarily follow the same path they are referring to. For instance, they want you to learn about introductions and everyday expressions early on. But if you decided that first you wanna learn about cooking, then you have strayed from their designated path. I wouldnāt be too worried. I donāt follow their artificial path either.
This is from the Council of Europeās website (link here):
Let say i m not interested in day of the week, month of the year, how to ask age or what time is it i will probably fail a a1 test. I t means i have not focused on what defines an a1 test. Nothing to worry about.
If youāre full on CI you can fail A1 test itās normal. Because they ask - Colors / Animals / Plants etcā¦ I finished duolingo and in an online (non speaking -writing parts) Russian test found myself B2 because I knew patterns. But I started from a conventional A2 course and now Iām going to B2. Iām also using LingQ and some other programs for reading stories. My teacher saying I know some incredible C1-C2 words but I still fail counting (Numbers), Remembering Colors, Animals, Plants.
I believe the A1 test, when passed, moves you up to A2, but i could be mistaken. I think youāre doing great! As you accumulate more hours listening (and reading along in your target language, when possible) itāll get easier. Iāve been using it for three months now (Norwegian), and Iām at B1 now, something I couldnt do in three years with Duolingo. Yes, i learned lots of words on Duo, but couldnāt carry a conversation. Hang in there!
Iāll assume with the online test itās just focusing on āreadingāā¦and not really any output or even listening. At least if I base it off of various online assessment tests.
In any event, I wouldnāt be discouraged. Any test you take is going to be testing on whatever course or material it has (in this case for A1). Entities that give courses or give these tests have a defined vocabulary for A1, A2, etc. And specific topics/grammar items for that level. Likely the mini-stories donāt really cover these. They are good for some of the most used vocab and basic grammar, but A1 often covers certain scenariosā¦can you get and communicate time, get/give directions, order food in a restaurant, etc. None of this is really covered in the mini stories.
You could review some of this type of stuff in something like a Teach Yourself Spanish book.
As a language teacher and also a proponent of CI, I would tell you to skip the grammar tests. They are discouraging and they do not measure your fluency in any way. They measure how well you can conjugate verbs and do other grammar tasks. That is the way I wasted 8 years of my life in school learning French through a grammar approach and then going to France and not being able to communicate. Just keep going; enjoy listening and reading to a variety of content. Eventually, the syntactical features of the language will take root.
One point to be made here is: If you ace an A1 test, that means you are at level A2. So if you almost passed, youāre probably somewhere in A1 and approaching A2. Youāre not below A1.
It also helps to remember that B2 is fluency for all intents and purposes.
According to CEFR definitions, I donāt think Iām at C2 even in my native language, and I donāt think I ever will be. (To be C2, you have to pick up on a lot of subtle body language and things not said and basically be a professional diplomat and human lie detectorā¦ all of which I suck at. In every language.)
Soā¦ A1 and A2 arenāt as lowly as they seem. B1 is actually pretty high up on the ladder.
I think most of the online ālevelā tests are so grammatically oriented as to be largely unhelpful to people learning with CI (comprehensible input). I would literally avoid level tests for a good 6 mos (or at allā¦) and just keep working. Just my 2 cents
A strong orientation to grammar in tests taken isnāt a bad thing for people learning mainly with CI, too. It might even be beneficial to those.
It is a huge difference understanding input, were the grammar used is somewhat redundant due to word order and context, and creating output understandable to others.
One might be able to properly recreate some grammatical aspects of a language after extensive amounts of input, but might fail so on others. A test showing those weaknesses so one may pay more attention to those is propably not the worst thing
I guess Iām one of many voices chiming in, but here are my thoughts:
Language tests (especially the free online versions!) often focus heavily on conjugations and similar āpick the correct form of this wordā-type exercises. What is tested is output. In addition, the vocabulary is often based on stereotypical ābeginnerā fields, such as colors, family, food, ā¦
If youāre learning via comprehensible input, the whole idea is to build a large and varied vocabulary in fields of personal interest, allowing you then to gradually start picking up grammatical points such as endings, use of different tenses, prepositions, ā¦ In other words, the entire point is to pick up āthe basicsā of output later, once you already feel more comfortable with the language.
So youāre not going to do well at tests for quite a while, because whatās tested is precisely what youāre deliberately delaying in order to leave it up to your subconscious!
(If this bothers you, or if you have some particular reason to prioritize output earlierālike an environment where you need at least minimal speaking skills, or even just because youāre personally uncomfortable with the temporary uncertaintyāthere is nothing to say you canāt supplement your comprehensible input with a bit of beginner-level output practice.)
