# How do people learn a foreign language? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 13, 2014, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-people-learn-a-foreign-language/704527 "2014-11-13T14:58:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 11:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-people-learn-a-foreign-language/704527/21 "2014-11-16T11:37:39Z")
ETA: change “native speaker” to “knowledgeable person”. I hate it when people make “native” a higher requirement than “good teacher”, and then I go and do it! :smack::smack::smack: ---
**Author:** ![Onomatopoeia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/onomatopoeia/32/4145_2.png) [@Onomatopoeia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Onomatopoeia)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-people-learn-a-foreign-language/704527/22 "2014-11-16T17:10:26Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > Being with people who are willing to help is also key. If the people you’re with mock your pronunciation but won’t tell you what’s wrong about it, you won’t get better. If they stare at you like you’ve got horns but don’t tell you what did you just say and what should you have said instead, you won’t get better. **A single native speaker can do more for a stumbling foreigner with a few well-timed explanations than all the language tapes in the world.** The bolded part above has been my experience in both France and Japan. Although Japanese people tend to be much more reserved than French people, both are willing to provide constructive criticism and corrections when I say something incorrectly, whether it is pronunciation, grammar, or word usage, especially if I ask. Of course, with French people you typically don’t have to ask. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-people-learn-a-foreign-language/704527/23 "2014-11-16T17:14:17Z")
> [@Onomatopoeia](#): > > Of course, with French people you typically don’t have to ask. 🙂 That’s funny, because my experience is the same so long as there is enough time for the explanations, but we’ve had people complaining about the French and others switching to bad English when they (the complainers) tried their bad French. I guess in my case since I’m used to explaining and getting explanations, the “if there is enough time” is just an automatic consideration - for those who aren’t used to it, it’s not. My current MMO guild is in Spanish, and I’ve stopped correcting bad spelling mistakes from people whose spelling is otherwise fine after one of the Americans got mad at me ☹ Now I only do it for people that I know from previous interaction are happy to get corrected. ---
**Author:** ![Onomatopoeia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/onomatopoeia/32/4145_2.png) [@Onomatopoeia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Onomatopoeia)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-people-learn-a-foreign-language/704527/24 "2014-11-16T17:58:02Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > I studied Hebrew all through Hebrew school, just like every Jewish kid does… I don’t mean to be an annoying pedant, but the quoted part above jumped out at me because it is really not true that every Jewish kid learns Hebrew. I would agree that it is true for the observant, but there are Jewish people who consider themselves nominally Jewish, who don’t go to temple, even during the high holy days, don’t observe שבת (shabbat), or פסח (Pesach), don’t even celebrate or acknowledge ראש השנה (Rosh Hashanah), and don’t send their children to Hebrew school. ---
**Author:** ![Onomatopoeia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/onomatopoeia/32/4145_2.png) [@Onomatopoeia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Onomatopoeia)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2014, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-people-learn-a-foreign-language/704527/25 "2014-11-16T21:49:30Z")
Clarification: In my post #24 above, instead of stating that not all Jewish kids learn Hebrew, which is true, I should have stated that not all Jewish kids study Hebrew, which is also true. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2014, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-people-learn-a-foreign-language/704527/26 "2014-11-17T13:39:12Z")
> [@Greg\_Charles](#): > > In bed. 🙂 I lived in Indonesia for a while and took a crash course in conversational Indonesian. It was incredibly useful, but the fact that I was “sleeping with my dictionary” was even more useful. 😃 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-people-learn-a-foreign-language/704527.md?page=1)