The Tower of Babbling

The First Chapter of My Book

Every author has a beginning, this is mine…

I’ve finally published my book “The Tower of Babbling”. The book was a solution to the problem that I continuously ran into during the last two years as I worked to take myself from language interested to native-like skills in ALL modalities (reading, speaking, writing, and listening) of the Spanish language in order to work as a court interpreter.

As an independent language learner, I was often overwhelmed by the multitude of resources that are available to learn a foreign language (especially Spanish) out there. My attempts to put order and structure to my own learning came too late, only after I had already achieved my goal.

If this is you, and you have struggled for a long time to not just be fluent, but understand any foreign language at a level to where you can use it almost as well as your birth language, then my book will probably help you in some way.

There’s a lot more I could say about it here, but I’ll let the intro below speak for itself.

With that said, if after reading this introduction, you are interested in reading the full version of the book, then go to my website to order a hardcopy of the book. You can also get the e-copy here.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy the first part of the book. Cheers!

THE TOWER OF BABBLING INTRODUCTION

“Focus on conveying meaning, not individual words.” This is advice that I heard time and time again throughout my studies to become a language interpreter, and I often think about it when I communicate in a language other than my mother tongue. In its basic form, a language is a collection of sounds and utterances expressed in a certain way that convey meaning. Each language contains its own code for organizing those elements, but if you can crack the code you can easily add other elements to it (words, intonation, etc.) to make the language mean something. Despite the relative simplicity of what a language is, the task of going from a person interested in the language, to being able to communicate in it smoothly and coherently is monumental.

When we think about the years and decades that it took for us to acquire the modest language ability that we possess in our native language, the thought of having that capability and capacity of expression in another language seems that much more impossible to imagine. But the reality is that people do it, and it usually doesn’t take them decades to do so. How do they do it? Luckily for you, for the past decade I have spent a large amount of time trying to figure out how to learn foreign languages more efficiently. This book is the product of many of those experiences and efforts.

I love foreign languages. I took two years of French in high school and obtained a minor in Japanese in college. After improving my Japanese through self-study, I was privileged to live and work in Okinawa, Japan, for a period of two years through the military. After being in Japan, I moved to Hawaii, where I had the opportunity to pick up some basic Korean, travel to Korea, speak more Japanese, return to Japan a few times, and begin to learn Spanish as well.

I mention all of this to say that, I’m no stranger to learning foreign languages whether it’s in a formal academic environment or on my own. They are a window into the true nature of foreign cultures and have broadened my mind and life profoundly. Which is why in 2016, I decided to dedicate myself to learning Spanish full-time in order to be able to use it as a language interpreter. I didn’t want to just be fluent, I wanted to have an almost native understanding of the language, which included being able to write and read in the language in formal and informal environments.

It was a lofty goal, that I jumped into with enthusiasm; however, even with all of my experience learning languages up to that point in my life, and burning desire and necessity to learn Spanish, I still struggled.

I used nearly every tool imaginable: hard copy books, e-books, webinars, online courses, the latest apps, YouTube videos, private tutors (online and offline), volunteering, I even traveled to Nicaragua to practice my Spanish in a foreign environment. While all of these things did help me progress, the moments when I found them were almost random, and like the pieces of a puzzle, didn’t seem to come together at the right times for my overall language development. Finding these language learning materials was the easy part. It was knowing at what phases of my language training and how to implement them to the maximum benefit that I struggled with.

After nearly two years of trial and error, and thousands of dollars and hours spent, I managed to achieve my goal with Spanish after finally perfecting my study method. Upon reflecting on my language journey, I couldn’t help but think that I could have reached my goal sooner if I had been able to solidify a more reliable and more structured method of learning sooner. I wrote this book to address this issue.

I personally haven’t met any person that became fluent, much less literate, in a foreign language after taking academic classes. The ones who did manage to learn it early on in life when they were of school age and taking language classes, probably spoke it regularly at home with parents and family members, but that fact is of no use for an adult who desires to reach a high level in another language.

The fact is, most people that I’ve met who are proficient in another language either had formal training (non-academic) through organizations like the government, military, or an institution of higher learning or they were self-taught. Since most people have no desire to join some type of federal/government service, or pay a large sum of money for an effective, yet costly, organized language program, this book will serve anyone who wishes to learn any foreign language on their own time.

One of the greatest advantages of living in the information age is that it is very easy for anyone to teach themselves, almost anything, at any time. The dark side of this ;however, is that it can be hard to structure your learning. A lack of structure can quickly lead to a lack of focus, which can result in wasted time and money, two things that most of us have in limited supply.

Much of the information in this book has originated from my experiences of trying to create structure in my own learning after over a decade of teaching myself various foreign languages. During that time, I have used countless language tools, yet I have never seen a practical guide that was designed help take someone from a person interested in learning a language, all the way to language literacy and fluency. My goal in writing this book was to provide you with that very resource.

There are thousands of courses, books, materials, apps, websites etc. to learn foreign languages. The majority are targeted at beginners or people who are “language interested” (the largest market of learners), and market themselves as the “only” tool that students need to become fluent. Most fail to deliver the fluency that they promise, and worse yet, they don’t provide students with a method to structure their own self-study in order to continue on with their training after they have completed all of the available material within that resource. I do not claim that this book will be your golden key to unlocking your language skills. In fact, I will tell you now in this introduction, that this book is meant to be used in conjunction with tools that you have chosen for your target language. This book is as language neutral as possible, but does contain a few examples of Spanish and Japanese, as those are the two languages other than English that I am most comfortable and familiar with.

Furthermore, I wrote this book because the majority of books today tend to focus on the latest technology (apps, programs, methods etc.) that are available to learn a language. These books may prove useful while a new piece of technology is in fashion; however, in the 21st century, technology changes at such a rapid pace that it seems like most books that focus on specific resources related to technology are outdated by the time, or shortly after, they are published. I believe this trend will continue to be an issue from this point forward; therefore, my intention with this book is to make the process of learning a foreign language take center stage, instead of technology. I do mention some tools for anecdotal purposes and provide a small resource section of tools that have been particularly useful for me for completeness. But if you are reading this at some point in the distant future, don’t be surprised if most or all of them are obsolete or even out of use by that time. But don’t despair, the blueprint for learning a language presented in this book was designed to endure the test of time and even be used in the complete absence of modern technology. Although admittedly, it would be much more difficult and time consuming to learn a language without internet access, as long as you have someone to teach you and/or a reliable written resource, and a desire to learn, you can learn any foreign language.

Another problem that students of languages face in the 21st century is an overwhelming amount of information.

It can be difficult to find resources that are appropriate for your unique goals among the myriad of books, videos, online/offline courses, apps, blogs etc. that claim to be able to help you reach your language goals. There are so many options that a student can quickly get overwhelmed by them all and fail to advance or worse, give up all together. This book will help you sort through the available resources for your target language and help you choose the right tools for the right moments of your language training. This will make your self-study as efficient and effective as possible for meeting your personal goals with the language.

We live in the digital information age, and as such, this book assumes that if you have any type of internet connection, you know how to use it to find whatever resources (free or paid) that you need for your learning target language. If you don’t have an internet connection, that’s fine too. The materials in this book will be still be useful if you decide to use books or other written materials exclusively for self-study.

The objective of this book is not to teach you a specific language, but rather to help you design your own personalized study plan that works best for your schedule and language goals. It also provides insight as to why certain activities such as listening to music or learning grammar structures are better suited for language learners at certain levels, and explains simple yet effective strategies for approaching these and other aspects of language that are common sticking points for all language learners, like learning grammar, vocabulary, or finding effective tutors.

Specifically, this book includes proven strategies that will:

• Help you decide how to structure your language learning to your schedule
• Give you advice on how to choose the right materials to fit the level of the language that you possess
• Allow you to get the most out of the materials that you choose to study the language
• Provide ways to assess your progress along the way in order to know when you are ready to move to tougher materials
• Give you concrete exercises that WILL improve your proficiency with ALL modalities of your desired language (speaking, reading, writing, listening) not just speaking with the goal of fluency
• Tell you what NOT to do at certain points of your language training

This book is designed to help students of ANY language answer the question that many language learners ask themselves: “Where do I start?” or “How should I continue or refresh my knowledge of a language?” or “How should I organize my study time?” or “What should I do to practice my listening, writing, speaking, or reading?” If you’ve ever asked yourself any of these questions, wanted to learn a language for the first time, or wanted to improve your skills in a particular language, then there’s something in this book for you.

Finally, from what I’ve seen outside of targeted military and government language training, most attempts to become proficient in a foreign language in a purely academic environment (even with school sponsored immersion trips, the inclusion of native speaker teachers, etc.) fail. I myself took 4 years of Japanese in college, to include a summer immersion trip to Japan and could barely say complete sentences outside of the ones that I had memorized to be able to pass my classes.

When it comes to becoming proficient in a language there are typically only three options to getting there:

1) — Be raised in an environment where the language is spoken

2) — Learn as an adult through constant exposure in an environment where the language is spoken, usually as a result of an organized program

3) — Learn as an adult through sheer strength of will through self-study (take classes or study on your own etc.)

While some people are fortunate to be born into option 1, or have the resources and connections to learn through option 2, most are forced to turn to option 3 as the only means to learn a language. That is where this book comes in.

WHAT THIS BOOK IS

This book is a practical guide to learning a language that is designed to help you structure and focus your language studies.

I have divided language learners into five levels, listed below:

Level 1 — Beginners (includes people who are “language interested”) (A1-A2)

Level 2 — Advanced Beginner (A1-B1)

Level 3 — Intermediate (B1-B2)

Level 4 — Advanced (B2-C1)

Level 5 — Native-like (C1-C2)

At each level, I include the specific activities that you should be focusing on while you study in that level.

More importantly, I include the things that you should NOT be focusing on at each level. This will help keep you focused on systematically improving and crawling before you walk so to speak.

WHAT THIS BOOK ISN’T

This book will not teach you a specific language!

This book does not talk in detail about specific language tools!

This book is not a quick results book!

Done properly, it may take you at least a year and a half or more to reach your goals from scratch, and that still depends on what your goals are. If you have the same or similar ambition that I had (to have an almost native-like understanding of a language), then that will obviously take longer. The techniques in this book must be adopted and practiced ideally daily with discipline in order to function properly.

LANGUAGE LITERACY VS. FLUENCY

Many language learning tools use fluency as the pinnacle of achievement when it comes to measuring the success of learners who use them.

While fluency can mean having overall mastery of any skill, due to many different cultural reasons, in the context of foreign languages, it almost always refers to being able to speak the language well and clearly.

Of course speaking is crucial to communicating in a foreign language, but it fails to account for the other modalities of the language. Being able to understand it orally (listening), understand it in written format (reading), and produce the language in writing (writing), are often left out of the fluency formula.

For this reason, in this book we will speak primarily of language literacy instead of fluency. It provides greater clarity to the broader skill of being able to use the language in all modalities and in a wider variety of situations than simply being able to use it in conversations as a fluent language speaker.

Someone who can speak and understand English, but can’t read or write it would be considered illiterate. We are all illiterate in a foreign language when we begin to study it, which is completely understandable for a language that we have had little to no exposure to throughout the majority of our lives.

By expanding your definition of success in your target language from fluency or proficiency (which both often imply being good at speaking a language) to literacy, it will be easier for you to follow along with the suggestions in this book, because it is designed to include all modalities at all levels of literacy.

Now that you know the why, the it’s time to learn the how. In the next chapter, we’ll discuss how you can get the most out of this book, and go from being language curious to all the way to language literacy as an independent language learner.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Introduction
• Chapter 1: Getting Started/How to Use this Book
• Chapter 2: Beginner (A1) Level
• Chapter 3: Advanced Beginner (A1-B1) Level
• Chapter 4: Intermediate (B1-B2) Level
• Vocabulary
• Grammar
• Verb Conjugation
• Chapter 5: Advanced (B2-C1) Level
• Chapter 6: Native-like (C1-C2) Level
• Chapter 7: The Professional Language Learner’s Toolkit
• Types of Language Jobs
• Language Credentialing
• Standing Out As a Language Professional
• Chapter 8: The Future of Foreign Languages
• Conclusion
• Appendix 1: Language Tool Resources
• Appendix 2: Language Formal Test Index

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Website: https://wayoftheinterpreter.com/