Can I Learn a Foreign Language Without Learning Grammar?
Recently, more and more often we have to face the statement that it is possible to learn a foreign language without grammar, as well as children learn the basics of the language. Such statements can be heard from people who provide language learning services. Let’s deal with it!
Is it possible to learn a foreign language without learning grammar?
Children learn a language without learning it: neither words, nor grammar, nor phonetics. The only thing they learn for themselves are speaking and listening skills. Listening here is the source. However, they cannot learn to read or write without help.
Children, until puberty (each puberty comes individually in the period from 10 to 15 years), have neuroplasticity of the brain, which allows them to simply “on the fly” to capture absolutely any information. The child develops, comprehends the world, his brain as a sponge absorbs all the new information about the world around him. The child imitates the society around him. It tries to reproduce everything it sees and hears: the way it behaves, etiquette, playing with toys (imitates repair of a toy car, feeds a hungry doll), reproduces speech. With development, the child unconsciously or consciously understands that the better he can convey his message to the people around him, the better he will be understood. Due to neuroplasticity, the child quickly learns new words, speech turns. He or she can perfectly communicate with the learned household patterns that he or she hears and uses every day. At 6–7 years old, the child has a dictionary of 3500 to 7000 words. By this age, he has mastered the household patterns of speech and, due to general development, including the psyche and intellect, can model his own sayings. By the age of 6–7 the child is mentally and intellectually ready to master the skills of reading and writing! Therefore, it is inevitable to learn grammar, which is so tried to avoid in their classes by people who provide services to learn a foreign language without learning grammar.
So, let’s find out what is promised in language courses where no grammar is taught. And they promise that you will speak as easy and relaxed as a child who does not know the language from birth. In their classes they create a language environment, let’s say French, where there are no words in English. All classes are taught in French only. How many hours a week will you immerse yourself in such a foreign language environment? 2–3 hours. Or maybe you will have an intensive course?! Then every day. Well, not quite every day, the language center is sure to rest on Saturday-Sunday. Therefore, from Monday to Friday to 1 hour = 5 hours per week. Well, that’s not bad! But, they associate their approach with a relaxed and painless approach to understanding the language by a child. So, the child is in his or her language environment. And let’s do the math! What time do kids 3–5 years old wake up? The clock is at 7 am, then you communicate with your child about the morning toilet, then take him to kindergarten. Here with the child are tutors, teachers, speech therapist, nurse, babysitter. He communicates with his peers and practices language skills. In the evening you take the baby out of the kindergarten and spend the whole evening with his family. Go to bed at approximately 10 pm. In total, the child is in the language environment for 15 hours daily! This is 450 hours of language practice every month. In comparison, 350–450 hours is a foreign language course at the university for non-linguistic specialties in 2 years. In courses where no grammar is taught, you will spend a maximum of 20 hours in class (this is assuming 1 hour of class from Monday to Friday) and a maximum of 30 hours per month doing your homework (on the basis of 1 hour each day). In total, 20 classroom sessions + 30 self-study sessions = 50 hours per month.
Can I learn a foreign language without learning grammar?
Basically, 50 hours per month is not bad! It’s not bad at all, but with one huge reservation — for active language learning! There is an active and passive learning of the language. Active — is when you carefully concentrate on learning the material. It takes less time to learn, more mental strength. Passive — you learn the language in the process of your life, especially without bothering, passing. It takes more time to learn, less mental effort. And also ensure a language environment like for children — 15 hours daily! You want to learn the language at ease without any grammar there!?
Now let’s understand how children master the grammar without teaching it on purpose. The fact is that children do not learn the science of language! They just use the language, as well as ordinary people use a car or a computer. You can use things without knowing how they are arranged and what their principle of work is. Today, even a two-year-old child can call another continent with a smartphone without even thinking about how it happens or why it works. You do not need to be a specialist to use something. The same applies to language — you do not need to be a professor of philology to talk. Children learn grammar with experience, trial and error method, spending a lot of time on it. An adult person has an already developed psyche. He just needs to spend at most an hour to put before his eyes a grammatical table with concrete examples, to understand what to do and in what case. It is enough to learn simple forms of time to start combining sentences: in the past tense, present tense and future tense. This is the minimum to start talking. This minimum is enough for many people to travel abroad. The status of the illiterate (can’t write and can read simple things) satisfies them. If you have a thriving entrepreneurial or scientific activity, then, accordingly, you should spend more time on practicing your language skills.
So, are language courses not taught grammar worthwhile? As you and I have counted, in such intensive courses 20 hours of classroom training and 30 hours of self-study = 50 hours per month. Experience shows that after 100 hours of regular classes, a student concludes that they already know the language at the appropriate level. Many even leave because they think that they already “know” the language. Accordingly, in 2–3 months at this rhythm you will reach this level of increased self-esteem. You can talk about everyday topics, something easy to read and not be able to write. In the class you will be playing out scenes from life: at the airport, in a store, in a restaurant, in a hotel, etc. No explanations of grammar. All you have to do is grind the templates!
Hello!
How to go to the store?
Thank you!
Goodbye!
Well, here we are!
Is it possible to learn a foreign language without learning grammar?
If you like such hangouts, we ask for mercy. Usually one level of such a course is designed for 4–6 months, where you will study only this. You will sing children’s songs, tell poems on a chair, play with dolls and a ball… Everything is like in children, relaxed and playful.
What can you really do during these 50 hours of training, if you did it on your own and purposefully? In 30–50 hours you can learn an ordinary pocket travel phrase book. It describes various life situations: at the airport, in a restaurant, in a cab, in a store, etc. The methods of memorization will not be touched upon in this article. It is necessary to teach by different phrases: in paper, audio and video format. With strict self-discipline and a regular schedule of classes you will be able for 1 month of language skills sufficient for living and working in a foreign language country. It is enough to have a vocabulary of 850 words. All teaching materials can be freely found on the Internet absolutely free.
So, let’s summarize our discussion today.
You can and should learn grammar in a natural language environment. Take time to understand and cut parts of the grammar and start using it in your speech. Yes, it takes a couple of hours to memorize and understand the whole grammar. We can afford it. We are adults. Nothing to smear the grammar for many months, let alone use children’s methods to study it. Create your own language environment (5–15 hours a day), for the first time to keep a table with examples of grammar until it is remembered.
However, many people do not have self-discipline and will gladly wear their money every month for courses without studying grammar. They will spend many months working on scenes from a tourist phrase book, talking to a foreigner who has neither a philological nor a teaching diploma.
I would like to learn the memories from people who had experience of learning a foreign language without any explanations of grammar.
The practical manual “Polyglot’s Notes. Practical Tips for Learning Foreign Language” (e-book and paperback) gives a description of methods for developing language skills: speaking, listening, reading and writing. The book also provides information on how to learn grammar, how to correct pronunciation, how to memorise new words quickly and effectively. The book “Polyglot’s Notes” is intended for both beginners and advanced learners of a foreign language. Each person will be able to choose suitable methods and approaches and make the process of learning a foreign language interesting and not boring.
