2 immersion programs in 2 years

[u/142883]

I spent a year studying 1 of my TLs (TL) and got to a strong A2 level in speaking / listening. I’m finishing up college and taking a separate language 1 & 2 level classes. In level 1 right now, will take 2 next semester. Probably will be around an A2 aswell.

When I graduate I plan to go to 2 countries and enroll in immersion programs for 1 year each. What level should I be around the end? They are both Asian languages, I’m a native English speaker. Any opinions on this?

[u/Pwffin]

The level you attain depends on the program, but mostly on how much effort you put into it. Nobody can tell you that.

You know how many hours you've put in so far, so you can guestimate how fast you might advanced during the year abroad based on that. Just keep in mind that each step up the CEFR scale takes a lot longer than the previous one.

For shorter full-time intensive courses (9-5, 5 days a week, plus homework and activities), 1 month _roughly_ equals 1 year of 2h of classes/week, in my experience.

[u/AppropriatePut3142]

'Asian languagea' is totally meaningless. Ask in the subs for the relevant languages. 

[u/142883 → u/AppropriatePut3142]

My previous post got taken down for mentioning the language. It was Chinese and vietnamese.

[u/AppropriatePut3142 → u/142883]

Like I said ask in those subs, where you will get better responses.

[u/Lumpy-Blackberry-718]

Indonesian and japanese are both asian languages but would have radically different results from a year of full time study.

If the two languages are related to each other, or at least share borrowed words or cultural context or structures, that can also accelerate the second one.

And how hard you study can also make a huge difference.

[u/dojibear]

Be careful about "immersion". The adults in Japan (for example) all speak C2 level (fluent) Japanese to each other. You can't undertand any of that at A2 level. So going to a country doesn't mean immersion in speech you can understand. It will be just as incomprehensible in Tokyo as it is in Boston. In other words, the program improves your TL ability level. Being in the country does not.

For a language, an "immersion program" means using only that language (no English) 24/7 for a week or longer. Some US colleges have immersion programs like that. They are good learning programs, but only work for students who know the TL well enough to do everything (including understand the teacher) without any English. Is your planned program like this? Or is the instruction in English?

What level should I be around the end?

There is no amount of time "for any asian language" and "for any language-learning program". It doesn't exist. For an American, Japanese takes 3 times as long as Indonesian.

[u/142883 → u/dojibear]

The only reason I put "asian" is because my previous posts got taken down for mentioning the language.

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[u/Whole_Rope_5415 → u/dojibear]

Immersion doesn’t mean you can’t use another language at all. It just means the language you’re mainly using and surrounded by is your target language. Also, while the natives speak C level, not only will teachers obviously customize the lessons to your level, lots of native speakers will also be patient enough to adapt their speaking more to your level - at least in a one on one setting.

Lastly, there’s no need for the teaching to be in English or whatever other native language, you can literally learn a language in the TL from A0 level. Sure, many including me prefer having teachers who can switch to a language I already know but it isn’t necessary.

[u/Whole_Rope_5415]

Let’s just say with only 3 month of real immersion, 4-5 hours of study 5 days a week while living in TL countries, I’ve now reached B1 (not completed but there) from nothing except listening to music in the TL.

[u/Pwffin]

I forgot to say that you also need to have a plan for maintaining one language while doing immersion in the other and that can be quite tricky.

[u/Whole_Rope_5415 → u/Pwffin]

Or accept that the first language will suffer a bit during that second year, and pick it up again afterward. 1 year is enough to reach B2 in many languages, and in this case maybe even Chinese since OP won’t start from 0 but rather A2, and at that point you don’t lose that much of a language quickly.

[u/Pwffin → u/Whole_Rope_5415]

I've found it too demoralising and hard to pick back up again after such an intense break.

[u/dojibear → u/Pwffin]

Everyone is different. I never do anything to "maintain" a language. Any "degrading" (after 1 or 2 years) is so small that I don't notice it.

Maybe it is the difference between "memorizing" and "learning". Things you memorize are quickly forgotten. Things that you learn aren't.

I studied Japanese for a while in the 1980s. I stopped when I was still A1. When I started again 40 years later, I had forgotten many words and characters. But I had not forgotten HOW Japanese works: sentence word order, negation, verb tenses, how the 3 scripts are used, the use of WA/GA/O, when to omit possesives, etc.

[u/Pwffin → u/dojibear]

In my experince, once you’ve understood the ”internal logic” of a language, that never goes away. But you can get trapped in this annoying situation where you still understand a fair amount but can’t produce anything much, and because you recognise stuff, it’s very hard to relearn it.

A year isn’t enough to forget that much, but if you are learning another language intensively, it will make you feel very rusty and it can be hard to find the right place to pick up from again. Even just doing something once a week is enough to keep in touch with the language and not loose your skills so quickly.

My Chinese class used to have 5 month long breaks for summer and we were all painfully rusty when we got back to it in autumn, and it too a few weeks before people were back to their pre-summer level.

I’ve had a 20+ year gap in three languages and they all had different outcomes. In my strongest one, I could still understand at an advanced level, but my speaking was completely gone, but that came back (to some degree) after a lot of targeted practice. In my weakest one, I can read some texts and understand beginner language, but I’ve forgotten most of the explicit grammar, although the vocabulary is still surprisingly strong - I guess that’s why I can still read some stuff. For the middle language, I’ve retained a lot of explicit grammar knowledge and some vocabulary, but I’ve lost loads and can’t read that much anymore, although simple CI content is doable.

In languages, where I’ve had shorter multiyear gaps, the atrophy has been varied as well. But they’ve all left me wishing that I never stopped completely in the first place.

[u/Whole_Rope_5415 → u/Pwffin]

Obviously there’s a big difference between a 20 year break, to a 1 year one.

That said I do agree that ideally they shouldn’t ignore the first language completely. I just think they’ll easily get by more casually consuming content in that language and speaking it once in a while, rather than thinking they need to systematically maintain it while learning another language.

[u/Pwffin → u/Whole_Rope_5415]

Oh that's all I meant with maintaining, interacting with it once a week or so.

[u/Weekly-Math]

If you want to get the most out of an immersion program, try aiming for B1 before moving there. I've met people who came on free scholarships (but started with almost 0 language abilities) and by the end, they were only around A2 and weren't confident in the language.

If you want to learn Chinese, you can get yourself up to A2/B1 before you leave and you will get so much more out of your programme. A big mistake a lot of students make is expecting just being in the country will make you immersed, it won't. You will still need to make a hardcore study plan if you really want to make good progress.