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This proposal is now in the Beta phase — example questions are locked!

61 Example Questions (1 closed)

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up vote 15 down vote

added by michau Feb 6 '15 at 17:13

What is silent period? Wikipedia has it but I don't understand. Why they have to keep silent? – Ooker Nov 26 '15 at 16:21

up vote 14 down vote

added by Flimzy Feb 5 '15 at 17:22

up vote 11 down vote

added by M.A.R., edited by Flimzy Mar 12 '15 at 2:22

up vote 11 down vote

added by Nicolás Mar 3 '15 at 14:32

up vote 11 down vote

added by Pavel V. Mar 11 '15 at 15:45

I think evaluation of popular language resources is pertinent despite being somewhat subjective. This will probably end up being an advantages/disadvantages question. – brandaemon Aug 5 '15 at 14:53

DuoLingo claims it is efficient. They compared the results of some of their users to language tests to the results of university students to the same test. If there are independent studies, the question could be answered. The question may likely have to be edited to precise what "useful" means though. – John Butler Oct 24 '15 at 2:31

@JohnButler: precision of the term "useful" should be in the question body - example questions can't be long enough for this. And I know about the study you mentioned - that's why I specified "speaking in the language" - the study measured efficiency at translating written texts, not speaking. – Pavel V. Oct 26 '15 at 7:02

I think we could change "useful" to "effective". – michau Nov 11 '15 at 12:14

@michau: or "efficient". Editted. – Pavel V. Nov 11 '15 at 12:25

show 1 more improvement suggestion

up vote 11 down vote

added by Earthliŋ May 8 '15 at 19:44

up vote 10 down vote

added by Flimzy Feb 5 '15 at 17:20

Incidentally, I already asked something like this some time ago on Linguistics.SE. – Flimzy Feb 7 '15 at 17:17

up vote 10 down vote

added by michau Feb 6 '15 at 17:09

"Some good" sounds a bit vague. Is it fast? Free? Logical? Audial? Visual? Mnemonic? Vocabularies can be profession-specific and need another method. Also, language-specifics may impact the answer. – bytebuster Apr 8 '15 at 17:01

How about "effective"? – michau Nov 10 '15 at 12:37

up vote 10 down vote

added by michau, edited by Flimzy Feb 7 '15 at 17:10

up vote 10 down vote

added by Flimzy Feb 7 '15 at 21:53

Better is fairly subjective. it might be more concrete to ask specifically about research comparing the two, pros and cons of each, or to more precisely define your learning goals. – L. Blanc Sep 6 '15 at 13:53

up vote 10 down vote

added by Nicolás Mar 3 '15 at 21:30

up vote 10 down vote

added by Ooker, edited by Flimzy Dec 10 '15 at 14:23

up vote 10 down vote

added by L. Blanc Sep 6 '15 at 14:08

up vote 10 down vote

added by Ooker Sep 8 '15 at 7:51

Can you be more specific? – OldBunny2800 Nov 14 '15 at 21:50

@OldBunny2800 she has spent a lot of money to study English, yet still struggle to remember vocabulary – Ooker Nov 15 '15 at 14:58

I still don't understand. What has or hasn't she done to learn? What's not working? – OldBunny2800 Nov 15 '15 at 19:21

she went study in a center. It provides a lot of service to help her. She also spent time every week to review the words. Yet she still felt hard to remember. I guess that's natural, but this made she lose her patience. – Ooker Nov 16 '15 at 8:44

@OOker The problem with this question (in my mind) is that it's highly subjective - how your mom learns/what hasn't worked for her may not apply to others. A more generic version (and more widely applicable) of this question might be "How can I help an older learner who is having difficulty learning a language?" But that's my opinion. – tonysdg Dec 2 '15 at 18:55

show 6 more improvement suggestions

up vote 10 down vote

added by Gwenn Sep 17 '15 at 15:05

up vote 10 down vote

added by alvas Sep 25 '15 at 21:01

up vote 10 down vote

added by alvas Sep 25 '15 at 21:02

up vote 10 down vote

added by Nathaniel Sep 26 '15 at 17:42

up vote 10 down vote

added by Nathaniel Sep 26 '15 at 18:04

up vote 10 down vote

added by 9t. Oct 12 '15 at 9:13

Some examples of [known] and [learned] languages would be handy, this might be too broad. Depends on how closely related and what are the difficult parts of the language learned. – Pavel V. Oct 22 '15 at 13:06

This is definitely too broad. It is trying to cover a really wide swath of what this entire site is about in one question. – Robert Cartaino Dec 18 '15 at 0:07

@Robert I think we can learn a language without using another language – Ooker Dec 23 '15 at 16:13

up vote 10 down vote

added by ANeves Oct 18 '15 at 0:28

That sounds a bit broad to me. Some languages have rules, some don't. – gmauch Dec 1 '15 at 14:54

Do you think, @gmauch , that it would be more appropriate to have one of these questions for each language (or set of similar languages)? There would be common techniques. For example, for me it's hard to learn German genders because plenty of them don't match the gender of that word for any other language I know. – ANeves Dec 2 '15 at 16:52

@ANeves, Exactly! It seems very sepcific to a language, and SE has a site (or a proposal) for many (most?) of them. Just to name a few, German has a few heuristics (substantives ended in "-ung" are feminine, but not every feminine substantive ends in "-ung") but no fixed rule. English has no gender declension. Portuguese has a fixed rule (substantives ending in "a" are feminine, ending in "o" are masculine with very few exceptions). So it seems to me that there is no general rule. – gmauch Dec 2 '15 at 17:07

up vote 10 down vote

added by ANeves Oct 18 '15 at 0:39

I think this question is better in Linguistics – Ooker Oct 26 '15 at 14:02

@ooker would it be on-topic on Linguistics, though? I think language learning is specifically off-topic there, and I can't find any similar examples of questions like this. – jimsug Nov 3 '15 at 21:44

@jimsug: I think it's on-topic there. It can be on-topic here, but in my opinion you will get better answers there. The IPA is not only used for language learners, but also lexicographers. – Ooker Nov 4 '15 at 4:53

@Ooker Lexicographers, even if they use IPA, usually don't need to know how to produce particular sounds. And language learners definitely need that. – michau Nov 11 '15 at 13:18

up vote 10 down vote

added by RexYuan Nov 2 '15 at 12:23

Rather than asking if it's a good idea, perhaps asking the main reasons to do so would be more objective. – Flimzy Dec 19 '15 at 9:52

up vote 10 down vote

added by michau Nov 10 '15 at 12:41

up vote 10 down vote

added by michau Nov 10 '15 at 12:42

up vote 10 down vote

added by Damkerng T. Dec 18 '15 at 14:04

I asked about this because I'm curious about the myth that children are better than adults at language learning related tasks. – Damkerng T. Dec 18 '15 at 14:05

up vote 9 down vote

added by anna s Mar 13 '15 at 17:26

A definition (or link to one) of "sound deaf" should be added to this question. – user3169 May 13 '15 at 23:08

up vote 9 down vote

added by Andrew Grimm Jul 5 '15 at 4:59

up vote 9 down vote

added by Ooker Jul 10 '15 at 5:51

This has to do with listening to lyrics in foreign language music, not the music itself. Perhaps the title could be reworded. – user3169 Dec 18 '15 at 4:49

up vote 9 down vote

added by Ooker Aug 6 '15 at 16:24

up vote 9 down vote

added by Nathaniel Sep 26 '15 at 17:52

up vote 9 down vote

added by Nathaniel Sep 26 '15 at 17:55

The body would link to wikipedia and describe how the direct method is an inductive approach in which only the target language is spoken/read. – Nathaniel Sep 26 '15 at 17:56

up vote 9 down vote

added by 9t. Oct 12 '15 at 9:27

up vote 9 down vote

added by Muzaffar Nov 13 '15 at 14:43

up vote 8 down vote

added by Flimzy Feb 7 '15 at 17:19

I hope this isn't too subjective. Although of course there is always room for some opinion, I hope that some compelling, objective arguments can be made. I've read a couple of essays along this line, which make me think it might be possible to answer objectively. – Flimzy Feb 7 '15 at 17:20

up vote 8 down vote

added by Nicolás Mar 3 '15 at 21:38

up vote 8 down vote

added by Nicolás May 13 '15 at 2:09

up vote 8 down vote

added by Anachor Aug 23 '15 at 5:50

up vote 8 down vote

added by L. Blanc Sep 6 '15 at 13:57

	I'd suggest using slightly simpler language, e.g. "What circumstances are helpful for rapid learning of spoken language? Are there any scientific studies on this subject?" – michau Nov 10 '15 at 13:01
	@michau: That's an entirely different question. – Flimzy Nov 12 '15 at 10:45
	How is it entirely different? Perhaps I didn't understand what is meant by "factors", but that means that the question could be formulated a little bit better. – michau Nov 13 '15 at 16:46