Yesterday – An Eccentricity, And Today – Is A Pressing Need
Before our eyes, the globalization has transformed a planet into a uniform information and communication space on which promptly move not only letters and other cargoes, but also their senders – the people. About several decades back, studying the foreign words and the grammar, directly is not connected with a profession of the linguist or planned emigration, it was considered as an eccentricity, but now the knowledge of languages – is a necessary condition of a survival, armature of the professional career. Even with decent knowledge of one foreign language nobody will be already surprises at the labor market. «How many languages do you know – that many people you worth», — said the emperor Charles V ruling nearly by the half of Europe . There is no more favorable investment of time and money, than expansion of a linguistic outlook.
Why our “brother” knows foreign languages so badly?
There are a lot of people learning foreign language for 6-7 years at the Soviet/Russian school and 3-4 years in the high school, but not capable to make a simple sentence and not understanding oral speech. They are not guilty: such were programs and – with the rare exception –the teachers. At the Israeli school things are not the best too. The system of training Hebrew in state ulpans has failed (fortunately, there is an alternative to it).
And being abroad you envy the dealer who easily is expressing on 5-10 languages (and in practice knowing only every day phrases, forms of politeness and numerals). And also solve (wrongly!) as if you are deprived from linguistic abilities…
However, Russian outside of the former USSR is known by few people, and the whole world speaks English. So why the ordinary Russian citizen does not know any languages, except Russian? Because it is not necessary for him? Until recently —it was not necessary. Understanding this, Soviet state constructed the teaching of live foreign languages the way as it was taught in pre-revolutionary grammar schools dead Latin and Ancient Greek: grammatical rules, cramming of words, tiresome exercises . For reading even more dead was used and even not classical, and idolizing material. That way worked the best courses in Moscow. The person with free spirit who was speaking the foreign language was alien and dangerous to the Soviet system.
There are ‘easy’ and ‘hard’ languages? Which order are they should be leanrt?
The complexity of studying of a certain language depends on what language is native for you and what else is familiar for you. According to the author and his colleagues, for the Russian-speaking pupil are the most simple are Slavic, Latvian, Netherlands, Spanish, Italian, Turkish and Esperanto. English language is simple for studying at elementary colloquial level – and to seize it in perfection quickly is impossible.
More simple languages which are inside some linguistic family or group are better for studying after more difficult. So, English will be easier at preliminary knowledge of German and French. Netherlands and Scandinavian – after German and English. Latvian – after Lithuanian. Slovak – after Czech. Italian and Spanish – after Portuguese, Romanian and-or Latin. Yiddish – after German and Hebrew. Hebrew and Persian – after Arabian. Japanese and Korean – after Chinese.
These days the world is more interactive than ever. The borders of many countries are open providing people with nice chance to visit them. Besides, the Internet technologies provide us with a unique opportunity to discover countries even without visiting them. But all this needs possessing foreign languages. Those who are searching materials on Spanish, are welcomed to check out this learn to speak Spanish site.
Remember there is no need to invest a great deal of cash in order to understand a foreign language. The Internet network today is a great storeroom of materials. Search Google and other search engines for “learn speaking Spanish“. You might be surprised how many online courses and tutorials are accessible online. You don’t need to enroll in a class or hire an overpriced tutor. It is possible to learn to speak Spanish online at no cost.

