Between Words and Winds

چندوقت پیش که دنبال کتاب‌ قصه‌های کودکان به زبان دانمارکی بودم و پیشنهاد فیلم‌ و سریال‌هایی که سبک باشن رو بررسی می‌کردم، به پست فردی در reddit رسیدم که برای یادگیری زبان دانمارکی به plateau رسیده بود، درخواست کمک از دیگران داشت و توصیه‌هایی که دیدم برام الهام‌بخش بودن.

اون‌ها رو یک‌جا جمع کرده‌ام که هم دسترسی به‌ش برای خودم ساده باشه، هم شاید برای کس دیگری که در مسیر زبان‌ه مفید باشه؛ چون به نظرم بخش زیادی از توصیه‌هاش ربطی به نوع زبان نداره و از قضا افراد زیادی که دیگر زبان‌ها رو یاد گرفته بودن هم تجربه‌شون رو به اشتراک گذاشته بودن.

لینک اصلی مطلب هم این (How the hell did y'all manage to learn Danish?) هست.

 

چندتا صحبت بودن که دوست دارم ابتدا و زودتر از بقیه بنویسم که گاهی برگردم و به خودم یادآوری کنم. این‌که یادگیری یه زبان هم می‌تونه به آدم‌ چیزهای زیادی درباره‌ی دیسیپلین، استمرار، مواجهه با ترس‌ها و خروج از محدوده امن یاد بده و هدف صرفا گرفتن نمره‌ی مشخص و عبور از سد زبان نیست.

یادگیری زبان تلاش مستمر می‌خواد و مثل قطع‌کردن بزرگ‌ترین درخت با کوچک‌ترین تبره؛ راه میان‌بری هم نداره و صرفا باید به‌ش بپردازی و همون‌طوری که مگنس کارلسن می‌گفت، you need to put in the hours no matter what.

Learning a new language can teach you so much about resilience, prioritizing curiosity and learning above your own comfort. See it as a self-development exercise. Devote yourself to the process of learning rather than to any results you could get out of it.

I pictured having to cut down the world’s largest tree with a tiny, tiny axe. There are no shortcuts - just going about it the right way and giving it absolutely hell until you’re successful.

زبان برای برقراری ارتباط‌ه و فهمیدن و فهمیده‌شدن هدف اول اون‌ه.

If you can make yourself understood, you are speaking Danish.

شخصیت‌ آدم‌ها در هر زبانی می‌تونه فرق ‌کنه. من این حس رو داشته‌ام، اما با دیدن صحبت‌های بقیه این رو پررنگ‌تر حس می‌کنم.

When you become more fluent, you will realize that you actually have a different personality in different languages.

بیش‌ترین چیزی که به‌ش اشاره شد، نترسیدن از اشتباه‌کردن یا fool به نظر رسیدن بود. درست‌ه که عدد سنی‌ت شبیه به بچه‌ها نیست، اما به لحاظ موقعیت زبانی شبیه به کودکی هستی که اشتباه می‌کنه و اون‌قدر آزمون‌وخطا می‌کنه که بالاخره یاد می‌گیره. همه‌ی نقل‌قول‌های پایینی یه حرف رو می‌زنن، اما تکرارشون کردم که یادم بمونه چه‌قدر اهمیت دارن.

 

What helped me the most with learning other languages had to do with my ego, I was too afraid to put out my words because I was too ashamed, that I will look as a fool. I told myself that I'd rather be seen as a Danish toddler learning than a pedantic expat and that was what helped me at the beginning.

 

People mostly fail, because they don't want to sound stupid.

You have to be okay with sounding stupid.

You also have to be ok with the possibility that you, as an adult learner, are gonna speak a with broken grammar or with an accent indefinitely, as many immigrants do when they learn a new language. 

 Those who have learned Danish to the point where everyone understands them have a much easier and more enjoyable life in Denmark. The key has largely been that they have been “indifferent” about pronunciation and grammar.

So do not get stuck to pronunciation or grammar, just talk and write. People will understand or ask if they do not.

The students who do best are those unafraid to make mistakes. 

Stick with the education, keep trying to speak Danish in your daily life, try to speak it in your mind, accept that you’ll make mistakes.

The biggest hurdle people have when learning (and that I've had myself) had been the fear of messing up. To learn a language, you need to actually use it and fail at it, so you can be corrected. And when learning, there's nothing wrong with failing. It's more of a rollercoaster than a straight curve, but allowing yourself to try, forget words or grammar, laugh it off and try again will do wonders, both for your learning and for your motivation!

In a nutshell; you have to be willing to push through the experience of feeling like an idiot!

The only way to learn how to speak Danish is to speak it. You simply can't learn it by reading it. My advice is to focus on listening and speaking, even if you know only a little.

DO NOT be afraid of making mistakes. Correct yourself, mid-sentence if necessary. You’ll see in their eyes or their ‘hvad siger du?’ That you fucked up, but determine to learn from those situations and go away thinking ‘next time I’ll get it right!’

The key thing is not to get hung up on mistakes when you're practicing at home. You can deal with that later. The first goal is just to communicate.

Make a lot of mistakes, talk a lot and have fun. If you don’t know the word, say it in your local language, we might guess what you’re trying to say.

Make mistakes without shame.

You have to speak with terrible grammar with your whole chest. 

موضوع مهم بعدی مصرف محتوا و افزایش inputه که توی پست‌های قبلی (یادگیری زبان – یادگیری زبان بخش دوم) هم به‌ش اشاره کرده‌ام.

Watch loads of Danish children's television. Good fun and you'll learn a lot. My focus was on consuming as much media as I possibly could, and then trying to use it occasionally.

Use the Danish you have at home. Have an hour every weekend where you only can speak Danish. Agree to only speak Danish while doing a certain chore or while being out in public. Keep adding new words and taking small risks every time. Have the same small talk conversation 50 times if you need to. Even when not practicing you can constantly ask your partner how to say things in Danish, use new words in a sentence a couple times immediately to cement them in your vocabulary.

I watched thousands of hours of Danish TV with Danish subs and I read around 100 full-length novels of increasing difficulty in the first year of being here and it laid the groundwork, and I haven’t really worked on it actively since that first push.

Children’s television, old Danish Movies and series and the old Queen’s New Years speeches have been a great help getting to know about social and cultural life as well as pronunciation.

Switch all your services to Danish, and watch Danish TV.

As more actionable advice, maybe when watching some Danish shows and movies, try to mimic the characters lines, inflections, pronunciation. Keep going over it to get not just the words right but the emotion and tone as well.

Watch movies in Danish, transition from subtitles to Danish subtitles to no subtitles.

Just listen for a while, Danish TV, podcasts, children’s programs, watch adverts and try to figure out what they’re on about and then next time around, see if you were right, etc. That’s what kids do - they can’t understand what’s being said or speak back, so they have to listen. And I guarantee there will come a time when the bricks suddenly all fall into place. 

Change all the settings on your phone to Danish.

Others have recommended Dronning Margrethe’s old New Year’s Eve speeches. Any type of public speech, like a press conference, is likely to have clear, slower speech. Try the evening news, watch it every night. As for children’s television, Sprinter Galore is delightful. It can be hard to get the humor or follow the conversation in fast-paced comedy, so children’s shows that are actually funny are good for getting a feel for humorous banter.

We have something like 'sprog kaffe' where you can speak with others. Remember to do that when you go to sprogskole.

طبیعی‌ه که وقتی بحث افزایش input می‌شه، باید درجه سختی محتوای وارد شده رو هم تنظیم کرد.

Look into Stephen Krashen and comprehensible input theory. It is very difficult to learn a language as a set of rules and lists of words. And it is borderline impossible to learn it if you feel pressured and nervous when exposed to the language. Rather try learning the way kids learn: Exposing yourself as much as possible to the language at a level you almost understand (you should be able to understand ~90% of what is being said) and avoiding speaking if you do not feel comfortable speaking.

و مهم‌تر از اون، به افرادی نیازه که تو رو در مسیر یادگیری همراهی، کمک و تشویق کنن. نیازی نیست با فردی که اشتباهات گرامری و تلفظ تو رو مسخره می‌کنه یا انگیزه‌ات رو پایین می‌آره، تمرین زبان داشته باشی. از منتورهای زبان و sprogland توی بابل‌برگ استفاده کن.

My spoken and listening skills came on in leaps and bounds when I started paying for 1-on-1 lessons with a native. They were so kind and encouraging, and I found that after a couple of weeks of full body sweats and anxiety I started to calm down, relax, and naturally was able to speak more fluently.

Find the people who make you comfortable while you speak, the ones that actually try to adjust to you, and take it slowly in one-on-one conversations whenever you can.

و با یه دست، چندتا هندونه بلند نکن.

What you are talking about, is doing 2 things at once: social integration and passing the exam. Get the exam out of the way first. Then you can relax and have some fun with it socially.

 

و مهم‌تر از هر چیزی این‌که یادگیری عمیق زمان‌بره اما به مرور مهارت و توانایی‌ت به‌تر می‌شه و به تبع‌ش، شرایط به‌تری رو هم خواهی داشت؛ چه به لحاظ اجتماعی، چه به لحاظ شغلی و چه روانی. افرادی که زبان کشور مقصد رو یاد گرفته‌ان، زندگی راحت‌تری خواهند داشت. چندتا توصیه از افرادی که یا موفق شده‌ان و مسیری که در پیش گرفته‌ان هم این پایین گذاشته‌ام:

For me, the best way to learn has been by try to talk and read as much as possible. First, my partner spoke Danish and I answered in English to improve my passive vocabulary, and then after 6-8 months I started saying some simple sentences. It felt horrible, I hate being bad in something, I am highly educated and there I was talking some toddler-level sentences. But he was so encouraging so I spoke more and more. Then also with his family and then finally at work. Everyone was super supportive. And now after 3 years I dare to speak Danish to anyone and understand what people are saying. It can be that I mix words or cannot pronounce everything but I have learned to laugh to that and try different way and then another. Or just say it in English. I have read books and magazines and watch regularly Danish TV. I would have never reached this level of language without talking. Danish classes were not a great help either. But I also need to confess that I have learned Swedish at school and grammar is apparently the same.

 

I live here for 6 years now, but started learning Danish 2 years in. I did Danskuddannelse 3 through kommune, I started with module 2 (first A2B, then Clavis at the time for modules 3-6). I didn't though start and stop on and off, I did it continuously as I could do that, and I took some module tests earlier. I cannot explain well what I did - I followed the lessons, and I personally have had nice teachers, especially module 4 and 5, which I would say are most intense and important for progress. I did a lot of reading exercises, listening exercises, tried to read newspapers, articles, and I often referred to my grammar books. I repeated words/sentences after listening exercises like 10 times as well. I felt stuck at module 3 myself, like I was not learning or progressing, but on module 4 I would say is when it really took off for me. My boyfriend is Danish, but we speak English at home, though I would ask him to check my writing (I felt asking about grammar was useless, I know more about grammar than him lol). I also did all the PD3 exams that we got as practice, when reached module 5. I finished PD3 with 12, 10, 10. I started speaking Danish outside class during module 5, but I'd say I spoke way more after finishing PD3. I continued to Studieprøven after, and I think that also gave me much wider usage of Danish, although Studieprøven's only focus is preparing for the exam, as you use it just as language proof for studying in Danish at a university. I am studying in Danish now, I still have an accent and words I struggle with, but people understand me and it happens very rarely that they do not. I am sure you will get to the point where you feel you progressed and learnt something, you may just did not reach that point yet. :)

 

To remove the pressure, start out by talking to only yourself first instead. Find some videos or audio files with clear pronunciation, and try to speak the sentences out loud. Record yourself so you can hear yourself afterwards. Make note of where you sound different compared to the original native speaker.

conjure up your 'second' inner monologue, the one in Danish. Try to describe to yourself everything you are doing as you go about your day, everything you see, everything you plan to or want to do, or just random thoughts you have.

Start with simple sentences first, then build up. Likely, the problem is that you are going at a pace that is too fast for you right now, so your brain gets overwhelmed.

After you are starting to feel comfortable with this, try to move on to doing voice messages with other native Danes. This gives you the opportunity to practice what sentence you want to say as many times as you want to before sending the message. In other words, it removes some pressure again. Again, start small, build up to larger sentences when you feel comfortable with easy sentences (comfortable speaking them fast).

Talk to yourself in Danish. Have imaginary conversations with yourself, narrate what you're doing, whatever. No pressure that way.

 

I was 44 when I started. I applied the above ideas. I’d worked as a creative director in an ad agency so I decided ‘ok, how do we get Steve (me) to learn Danish?’ What does it all boil down to at its absolute simplest? It’s just remembering a load of stuff! I can do that, now, take me to the Pixie books! I got a job, with the interview in Danish after 18 months at language school. I got citizenship three years back. I’ve been here 20 years. And I agree with others that learning to speak Danish has opened a whole new dimension in social situations. it is hard, but worth of all that work!