Mango Languages

Guest Post: Brazilian Portuguese – Lesson One

I am very excited to share this post by Guest Blogger, Marina Khonina. (previous post) She is using our online language learning program and will be providing monthly updates on her progress to learn Portuguese.  She approached us with this assignment – to learn the language and blog about it.  We thought…what a great way for us to share how Mango works and see if there are areas where we can improve.

Today I am starting my experiment in learning Brazilian Portuguese with Mango Languages.  I will track my progress with regular blog posts, in which I will reflect on my experience, as a fairly seasoned language learner, with the lessons designed by Mango.

Before I delve into lesson-specific details, however, some background information is in order.  I find Brazilian Portuguese an exceptionally beautiful language, but I have been hesitant about learning it because I could not possibly imagine how I would get my tongue around all these strange, mesmerizing sounds.  I have been exposed to a fair amount of spoken Brazilian Portuguese (my long-time flatmate is from Brazil), yet pronunciation remains for me the most difficult aspect of this language.  I hope that Mango Languages will help me surmount this challenge, which is exacerbated by the fact that I am extremely shy about speaking in a new tongue.

I dabbled with Portuguese about a year ago, listening briefly to a couple of Brazilian podcasts and asking my flatmate to teach me a few basic words.  At that time, however, I had too many things on my plate to start a new language.  Now I have a great opportunity to devote some serious (albeit, limited) time to the study of this language.

Portuguese is not my first Romance language: I studied French in school, achieving upper-intermediate proficiency, but since then my French has gotten rusty.  I also have a basic command of Esperanto, which should be helpful in my study of Portuguese.  In fact, after I started learning Esperanto, I noticed some improvement in my understanding of written Portuguese.

Now on to the actual lesson. Today I completed Lesson 1, and it was absolutely delightful to discover that Mango did not expect me to learn to say “This is a cat” or some other such nonsense before learning how to greet another person properly.  Another thing that I immediately liked about my Mango Languages lesson was how each sentence or conversational unit (e.g. “Hello. How are you?”) is presented with an appropriate English equivalent and a word-by-word translation.  This enabled me to see from the very first lesson how the language is structured and to pay attention to any peculiarities of grammar or word usage.

For example, I discovered that in Portuguese, you say “How goes the Mrs.?” when politely asking a woman about how she is doing.  Furthermore, a literal translation of this sentence shows that Portuguese speakers use the verb “to go” where an English speaker would use “to be.”  Even more importantly, the individual is addressed in the third person (the Mrs./Mr.), rather than in the second person (you).  These two facts, gleaned from a word-by-word translation of a single sentence, can give me, the learner, plenty of insights into the culture and the language:  i.e. politeness is expressed by emphasizing the distance between the speakers through the use of the third person/noun instead of second person/pronoun; a person’s daily life is seen in terms of movement (going) rather than existence (being).  Of course, it’s easy to go too far with this analysis, and my insights may not necessarily be correct, but they certainly motivate me to explore more of the language and to embrace the culture along with the linguistic aspects.  Failure to do the latter often proves to be a major hindrance to language mastery; as was the case with my study of Turkish, until recently.

What I did not necessarily like was the anglicized pronunciation given for each word in addition to the audio.  I would advise you to regard this as a personal pet peeve, however.  As a language geek, I prefer the International Phonetic Alphabet (of course!), but it would be too much to expect a first-time or casual language-learner to learn IPA conventions before starting a language course.  In fact, this requirement is likely to discourage the learner! At any rate, the phonetic help in Mango Languages only appears on mouse-over, so learners like me, who prefer not to use it, can easily ignore this otherwise useful function.

While I initially found the lesson long-ish and repetitive, it was reasonably—and surprisingly—challenging.  When it comes to learning languages, I tend to prefer speed and novelty over repetition. Yet, with Mango Languages I discovered that if I let my attention wander even a little, I begin to flounder.  This means that Mango lessons are comprehensive enough, so there’s no danger of skimming and forgetting soon thereafter.  Most importantly, the built-in repetition algorithm (and my experience leads me to assume there is one) is close enough to the natural memory curve to ensure sufficient retention.

To conclude, I am happy with my first Mango Languages lesson in Brazilian Portuguese.  I like the feeling of learner autonomy, contrasted to the force-feeding of information that characterizes some other programs.  The recordings are clear enough for a first-time learner without being unnaturally stilted.  The pace feels a tad slow for my taste, but I am beginning to see the value of not rushing through the lesson too much.

As for my study plan, I will try to cover one lesson per week.  This is a relatively slow pace, which leaves large gaps between each lesson, but, given my current schedule, this is the only realistic plan.  Looking ahead, I wonder whether the communicative emphasis of Mango Languages will help me, a self-admitted introvert and fearer of native speakers, to overcome the communication barrier.  If I manage to utter something (anything!) in Portuguese to my flatmate, that would be a major breakthrough already.

Question to ponder: How soon should a language learner attempt to speak the new language?  Some learners believe that speaking a language as soon as you possibly can makes all the difference (Benny Lewis, a.k.a. the Irish polyglot, is an ardent supporter of this view).  Others, like Steve Kauffmann, argue that a certain “silent period” is necessary before a learner can converse in a new language.  What do you think?  What has your experience been with trying to speak a new foreign language?

Guest Post: Learning French

I am very excited to have Tanya Brothen providing Mango a Guest Blog Post.  She has spent the last 14 years learning how to correctly pronounce French words.  While living in Paris in 2008 she started Parisian Spring, a blog about the life and interests of a Francophile traveler.  Tanya currently spends her days working in Washington, D.C., and her nights wishing she owned a home in Provence.

Question: What do the words “accident,” “fruit,” and “table,” have in common?
Answer: All three are regularly used in conversation by English and French speakers alike.

Thanks to the Normans who conquered England in 1066, roughly one third of all English words are of French origin (some by way of Latin), with many of those words spelled exactly the same in both languages.   Think of “courage,” “original,” and “million.”  On any given day, Anglophones are regularly using French words without even thinking about it.

Question: Does this similarity of vocabulary translate into ease in learning the language?
Answer: Don’t bet on it.

See, while the words look the same, their pronunciations are often completely different.  When pronounced in French, the word “fruit” sounds more like “fwee” rather than its English cousin, “froot.”  Francophones wouldn’t dream of pronouncing the “t” in “accident,” and you’re going to need to perfect your from-the-throat hacking sounds to correctly say “original” in front of a Parisian.  You could argue that the similar-look/different-pronunciation conundrum is actually a hindrance to Anglophone learners of French, tricking them into consistently mispronouncing the words that look familiar.

Adding to the confusion are the famous “faux amis,” or false friends.  These are words that, while spelled the same in both French and English, not only have different pronunciations, but also completely different meanings.  Take the word “sensible,” for example.   To the English speaker, it means having or showing good judgment, but the French speaker uses “sensible” to describe a sensitive person or thing.

Question: So what’s an Anglophone learner of French to do?
Answer: It might sound daunting, but straight-up memorization is what helped me.  Flash cards are another good option; simply write the word on one side of a card and the meaning in both French and English on the other side.  For help with pronunciation, try watching a French movie with English subtitles, which allows you to see a word like “original” written in English but pronounced in French.

You’ll know your French skills have truly arrived when you start searching for the meaning or pronunciation of a faux ami in English rather than en Français.  By this point, the previously foreign language will probably start coming to you naturally.  And if it doesn’t, you can always blame the Normans.

Guest Post: Preventing Cognitive Overload

I am pleased to introduce Christopher Craft our Guest Blogger this week. He teaches kids Spanish and Latin at CrossRoads Middle School. He is also nearing completion of a PhD in Educational Psychology and Research at the University of South Carolina.  Christopher has a B.A. in Spanish and a Master of Education degree.  He speaks fluent Spanish, his wife is from Peru, and he has two bilingual daughters (ages 8 and 4). Find out more about him here.

Learning a new language can be overwhelming.  As a foreign language teacher I have seen students get quickly overloaded resulting in a mentality that “I’m just not good at Spanish.”  This mindset can effectively hinder the learning of a foreign language.  If you are embarking on the journey of learning a foreign language as a self-directed learner, you must take into account some principles inspired by our knowledge of the human cognitive architecture to make sure you don’t fall victim to the same mindset.

People often tell me that they wish they spoke Spanish.  When I offer them the many resources online to help them do just that (i.e. Mango Languages) they are often excited.  When I follow up with these folks they often cite a lack of time or motivation for the lack of fluency in the desired language.  Underneath it all is likely a sense of overload.

To prevent cognitive overload there are certain principles that you can implement when attempting to learn a foreign language.  First, it is necessary to practice “chunking.”  Chunking occurs when you take information in chunks to avoid overload.  This is precisely why phone numbers and social security numbers are chunked; to make them easier to remember.  Applying this to the learning of a new language is easy; simply make sure that you don’t take in too much at once.  Start slow, and make sure you really learn the first few lessons.  It can be daunting to see that there is so much that remains before you are “finished” learning.  You must remember that the learning of a foreign language never ends.  In order to prevent cognitive overload, first consider chunking your information and taking it slow.

One way to aid your chunking is to rehearse the information you are learning.  Find ways to practice the language.  Find reasons to say the words you are learning.  Teach someone else the new words and phrases you are learning.  This mental rehearsal will aid the information to be transferred into long-term memory and retained for a long period of time.  You have likely experienced this rehearsal before; perhaps when learning a phone number.  When someone tells you their phone number, you have likely found yourself repeating it in your head until you can write it down.  This is rehearsal.  The more you rehearse the basics of a foreign language, the better foundation you are laying for future learning.

A third principle to take into account is the need to take breaks.  Consider your working memory to be a bit like a water glass.  If you are adding water at a steady rate, at some point you will reach the top and water will no longer be able to enter the glass.  Your working memory functions similarly, in that when you reach a level of “fullness,” no more information can enter.  Even more troublingly, if you do not take care to take a break now and again, you can reach cognitive overload.  When this happens, the working memory empties and all the learning that had recently happened will be lost.  It is as though when reaching a level of our glass being too full, instead of just spilling over someone were to dump the entire glass of water out.  This can leave you frustrated and without desire to continue.

Using the principles of chunking, deliberate rehearsal, and regular breaks you can maximize your chances of developing fluency in a target language.  Just as your body needs rest when doing work, your mind does as well.  Take care to be mindful of your learning and adjust as needed.  I wish you the best of luck on your continued journey towards foreign language learning.

How do you prevent Cognitive Load?

Guest Post: Speaking a Foreign Language

We are very excited to have Marina Khonina guest blogging for us. Marina is currently living in Istanbul, Turkey, where she is completing a graduate degree in Byzantine history.  She relocated to Istanbul after a three-year stint as an English-Russian conference interpreter for the U.N. in Kyrgyzstan.  She is determined to conquer the fear of speaking French, Modern Greek, Turkish, and eventually Brazilian Portuguese. Her languages of choice, however, are Ancient Greek and Esperanto (probably due to the limited number of native speakers). Marina shares a great story below.

The bus was about to make a turn, taking us away from the restaurant where we had been planning to have our lunch. My brother nudged me, “Tell the driver to stop!” It was raining in Istanbul–one of those miserable mid-January rains–and walking back to the spot we were now passing as helpless captives of our Turkish driver was not an enjoyable prospect.  I gathered my courage and begged the driver, timidly, “Can you stop here, please?”

“Yabancı! Foreigners!” his eyes flashed, yet he seemed to understand my plea and opened the doors.  Relieved, we stepped out in front of the coveted eatery in Ortaköy, a lovely spot in my beloved city.

While it is true that we are foreigners here, you would expect that after nearly two years in Istanbul I would be able to address bus drivers in their language.  Somehow, it rarely happens.  It is not that I never bothered to learn the language of this country.  Quite the contrary, I arrived enthusiastic about finally being able to delve into a non Indo-European tongue.  I have diligently (if somewhat haphazardly) completed several textbooks in Turkish.  I can follow a general conversation and, on my better days, even understand the news.  My love of cooking led me to learn the names of the most obscure ingredients and spices, and I can generally bluff my way through everyday interactions.  But I’m still terrified of opening my mouth and producing some gibberish.

It’s not that I’m afraid of being laughed at.  Turks are disarmingly easygoing about foreigners speaking their language.  When you make a mistake, they laugh with you, rather than at you.  What frightens me is finding myself in an awkward situation, not unlike the one I experienced in Greece some years ago.

Eager to try out my newly-acquired foreign tongue in Athens, I asked a shop-owner in impeccable Greek, “Poso kaneis?”  He gave me a puzzled look and suggested that we switch to English.  It was only on my way home that I realized that, by inserting the “-s” at the end of the word, I actually inquired the poor chap about how much he would cost!  Had I said “Poso kanei?” it would have been clear that I was referring to the blouse displayed in his shop.  I left Greece without a new blouse and with a reinforced awareness of the distinction between second and third person singular.  And with a reinforced fear of speaking, alas!

It would be appropriate to conclude this tragic tale by lamenting my self-imposed handicap.  Woe unto me, a poor polyglot who can learn any language but can speak none.  And then, can I claim to have learned a language if I had never used it in a real, extensive interaction?

Pity the poor language-learner, except… I seem to have found a cure!  The fear of encountering real native-speakers is, essentially, a self-delusion.  After all, we can be expected to make mistakes in a new language.  Awkward situations are part of the learning experience.  No matter how good your textbook, software, or teacher is (and there are truly excellent ones out there), thinking that you can reach the stage when you are able to flawlessly converse with the natives without any previous interaction is a delusion, and a dangerous one at that.

Since you are already misguided about your language ability, why not try replacing one delusion with another,  more productive one?  Why not pretend that you already speak the language?  If that is too difficult to imagine, place yourself in a situation where you would have no choice but maintain this pretense.  Make new friends among expats and tell them that you speak the local language.  You’ll be forced to interact with the waiters and ask for directions in the street.  Better yet, get a job or open a business in your target country.  Now, going jobless or finding yourself bankrupt is quite some motivation, even for the most hardened language perfectionists.

It certainly helped me.  In fact, this realization has been crucial for getting me out into the real world and helping me interact with the natives.

This was exactly how, seven years after my fateful encounter with the Greek shopkeeper, I found myself atop Mount Lykabettus in Athens one evening, speaking to a lone icon-seller.  In Greek.  The old man was delighted to encounter a Byzantinist from “Konstantinoupoli” (i.e. Istanbul) speaking his native tongue, and, while I’m sure I must have made a fair number of blunders while speaking, it was a thrilling experience!  I have a Greek icon of St George on my bookshelf to prove it.

Two weeks ago, quite unexpectedly, I found myself roaming the streets of Istanbul chattering in Turkish with concierges, maitre d’s, spice sellers at the Egyptian Bazaar, and, most thrillingly, phaeton-drivers and sellers of thermal underwear (don’t ask!).  Surely, some of these interactions had been quite awkward, but I’ve made plenty of friends along the way and my Turkish improved tremendously.  The secret?  I volunteered to show the best of Istanbul to a small group of Russian tourists and found myself forced to use Turkish in order not to lose face—and to be able to get to (and into) the places where I wanted to take these visitors.

Unfortunately (or, perhaps, fortunately), such extreme experiences as climbing mountaintops and guiding helpless tourists are few and far between.  Most days are far less exciting.  So how can a fearful language-learner get out of the shell and into the brave new world of communicating with native speakers?  You can start by speaking to yourself first.  Shadowing (listening to a recording in a foreign language while repeating, simultaneously, what is being said) is excellent for getting your vocal organs used to the movements needed to produce sounds in the new tongue.  Done frequently, it also helps you get used to hearing yourself produce foreign sounds.  Be bold!  Imagine that you’re an actor imitating the native speaker.  Don’t be afraid of overdoing it.  Emphasize each sound and intonation.  Have fun with it!

The next step is to start talking to yourself in the foreign language.  You may find that it’s best not to do this in public (although shadowing while walking in the park, as advised by Prof. Arguelles, may have more benefits to it than simply getting some exercise and fresh air).  Narrate your experiences while you go about your everyday tasks.  If you are looking for your socks, for example, ask yourself, in your new language, “Where are my socks? Could they be in this drawer? Or has the dog eaten them?”  Have you ever noticed how small children tend to talk to themselves while playing?  This is their way of “growing into” their native language.  Be like a child and play with the language, its various sounds and meanings.  If you’re uncomfortable with speaking to yourself, why not try talking to your cat or dog instead?  They’ll surely appreciate the attention.

Eventually, there will come a time when you’ll need to use the language without the “training wheels” of shadowing or solitary soliloquies.  If you’re like me, you’ll never feel quite “ready” to face the real world of native speakers.  Gently force yourself into it.  Take up a job that would make interacting with non-native speakers essential.  Sign up for a cooking class with the locals.  Join a sports team.  The best thing, of course, is to move to a remote village and try to integrate.  The latter can be a lot of fun, but is certainly not for the easily discouraged.  Whatever you decide, make a commitment to regularly step out of your comfort zone and use the language in increasingly diverse situations.  When it gets difficult, remind yourself, “I’m just bluffing it,” and enjoy the game!

You are likely to feel a certain amount of stress doing these activities, but this will only enhance your learning.  We tend to remember things better when they are linked to emotional experiences.  What can be more emotional than telling the coachman to get the horses to slow down, lest you fall out of the carriage and down the cliff into the raging sea?

Most importantly, remember to have fun.  After all, one of the best things about learning to speak a foreign language is the outrageously funny stories you’ll be able to tell your friends back home.  So start collecting yours today!

Do you have any stories you want to share? Please comment!

Guest Post: Tasting your way around the world

We are very excited to have Greg Solomon guest blogging for Mango Languages. Greg works in the fascinating world of structured finance, and gets to travel a lot. His frequent flyer mileage must have built up to the equivalent of the GDP of a small country by now. He has been blogging about his path towards Mandarin Chinese fluency at MandarinSegments.com. Come along for a taste.

Greg is pictured here eating … whaaaaat?

When I was young, I remember my late father used to collect matchboxes from his travels. At home he had a large plastic jar, filled with boxes of different sizes, styles & colours. I used to love playing with them (the boxes, not the matches!), reading the names of the places and countries, and imagining …

So when I began doing lots of travelling in my early 20s, I started my own collection: sugar sachets. I knew some others who were doing that, and it seemed like a good idea. Each hotel, each restaurant, each city – another sachet. Unfortunately, upon returning from a holiday some years later, I discovered my large plastic bowl was filled with ants – they had found the sugar. And that is when my sugar collecting ended.

Then, a few years ago, while planning a trip to Singapore, I found myself thinking that I should make a point of drinking a Singapore Sling cocktail while there. And I did. It was at the famous Raffles hotel, which opened back in 1887. The following day, not far from that hotel, at the Lao Pa Sat market, as I made a huge mess eating an amazingly tasty Singapore Chilli Crab, I realised that I had been collecting something without knowing it …

I had been collecting localised taste experiences, foods and drinks which (by name, anyway) had originated right where I was.

I’ve eaten Boston Cream doughnuts (not one, but two) in Boston USA, very near to where the original “Cheers” pub can be found. In New York I ate a New York Strip steak (the restaurant had a Park Avenue address, but was actually about 5 minutes walk from Park Avenue). Further north in Buffalo New York I ate BBQ Buffalo Wings at a friend’s BBQ. And to the west, in California I ate a California Roll – my first taste of sushi as a 13 year old.

I’ve eaten Swedish meatballs in the cobblestone old town of Stockholm, Sweden. (Which wasn’t as weird as the pickled herring I ate for breakfast that day, but that’s another story.)

In Beijing at the famous DaDong Roast Duck Restaurant I ate Peking Duck – then to prove a point to my host, I promptly ate both the tongue and the (very tiny) brain too.

I was in the South African town of Knysna as I tucked into a massive plate of the freshest Knysna Oysters (with a sprinking of tabasco), in Wales when I ate Welsh Rarebit, in Zürich Switzerland when I ate Zürcher Geschnetzeltes (a white wine mushroom veal dish, which on one trip I ate four meals in a row), in Germany’s Black Forest while devouring an extremely rich slice of Black Forest gateau, and I was in BoKaap (a small colourful suburb of Cape Town, at the base of Table Mountain) when I ate Cape Gooseberries. And, although this feels like a bit of a cheat, I will take credit for using English Mustard in England.

To wash it all down, while I Mumbai I had a gin & tonic, poured with Bombay Sapphire Gin. I drank a huge glass of Bergundy in the Bergundy region, although I didn’t get around to drinking Champagne in Champagne.

I have also not yet had a Danish pastry in Denmark, Feta cheese in Feta, drank port in Porto or Madeiran wine in Madeira. I’ve also not had Jerusalem artichoke in Jerusalem (although to be fair, I’m not even sure it’s available there!) And I am still thinking about the Baked Alaska and Mississippi Mudpie that might be out there, waiting for me.

I don’t think I will have achieved my life’s ambitions until I’ve eaten a frankfurter in Frankfurt, a hamburger in Hamburg, and Yorkshire pudding in Yorkshire. But right now, while I write this, I am sufficiently pleased to be drinking English Breakfast Tea. In England.

Additionally, when I travel – which I’m sure you’ve worked out I do quite a lot – I always like to learn how to say the following words in the local language: hello, goodbye, please, thanks. So while I do speak four languages (although my Mandarin isn’t quite where I’d like it to be!) – it’s amazing how much more fun I’ve had interacting with locals using only these four words, in about 20 different languages. (“hallo, hallo – bitte Black Forest cake, danke danke”)

What is the most unusual thing you have eaten in a foreign country?