In the video above YouTuber Tom Scott tackles the reasoning behind why kids are so good at learning new languages and why adults are piss poor at learning new languages. It’s all rather fascinating, so tune in above to find out why you suck big fat donkey balls at learning new languages.
If you’re like me, undoubtedly at some point in your life you’ve found yourself cramming for a Spanish, French, or Latin test and been wondering why in the hell it’s so hard to retain any of the things you just memorized. I’ve always maintained that complete immersion is the only proper way to learn a language. Just learning vocabulary words and how to conjugate verbs won’t do diddly squat for you if you’re never in a situation where you need to actively call on that knowledge to converse. I took something like five years of Spanish in school before ever traveling to a Spanish-speaking country, and I swear I made greater strides in my first week in Panama than I ever did in those classes (combined). But it’s not the same for kids, kids are like tiny snot-nosed sponges for learning languages.
One of the greatest freedoms afforded to bloggers is the ability to stare are you computer and ponder anything and everything. No matter how meaningful or meaningless the thoughts might be, I’ve found that if I invest enough thought into something after a while I’ll get to a place where I’m so deep down the rabbit hole I’ve actually found something both bizarre and interesting enough to blog about. I’ve actually spent considerable amount of time thinking on why I’m not adept at learning new languages, because after becoming conversational/proficient in Spanish I figured it’d be no problem jumping to Italian and French next…it was a problem. I basically gave up because I’ve yet to find a way to learn those languages that truly fits with my learning style (that doesn’t involve thousands of dollars and weeks spent abroad).
Anyways, next time a kid asks you why s/he is so much better at learning languages than you are you can show that child this video, and I hope you learned a little something here today!
[via YouTube]
