When I think of speed, I automatically think of a fast car. A red one.
And when I think of speed learning, I imagine that red car driving through letters and words and causing them to fly everywhere.
I recently traded my car for a bike and yesterday I took the bike out for the first time to go shopping at one of the supermarkets just out-of-town. I had driven the road many times, but going by bike gave it a whole new dimension. I discovered a whole side of the town I had never seen by car.
Of course, speed is associated with getting somewhere more quickly, and who of us wouldn’t want to be able to pick up a new language at the click of our fingers. However, the notion of faster is better also leads us to think that less time also means less work or little work.
One of the first things I discovered when I started teaching was how much time it really does take to learn a language. And we are not just talking in hundreds of hours.
Most of my students had followed years of language learning in school followed by language training at their place of work and yet when I first met them they were often barely capable of having a conversation with me.
If any of you have watched my video on my About page, you will know that early on in my teaching career I set out to learn Chinese … in just one year. I figured that if I was going to spend time learning a new language, I was going to make that time meaningful – meaningful being the key word here.
For those of you who are not native-English speakers, the word meaningful comes from the idea of something full of meaning.
If something has meaning, it can give you a reason to do it
If something has meaning, it can make it easier to understand
If something has meaning, it can make it more useful to learn
You see, the ‘one size fits all’ method, quite honestly doesn’t fit all. In some cases, a ‘personalized’ language course is no more than a module created for your sector of work. And it still doesn’t mean it fits everyone. It is the difference between buying clothes on the high street or having them tailor-made just for you.
Regardless of whether the approach is speed learning or traditional learning, if the learner is not given the tools needed to relate that knowledge to him or herself, that knowledge will remain abstract and lack meaning for that person.
When strong meaningful creations are made, that knowledge is more easily remembered, more easily understood and more easily used.
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So, are you ready to experience tailor-made learning for yourself?
Contact me today so we can start drawing up the plans!
