This thread is permanently archived
Translation is a bad way of teaching language
| Thank you for coming to my slightly frustrated TED Talk.
| Who hurts you, op?
I'm a translator professionally, and yeah no shit you're not supposed to "translate" to learn a language. Translating is its own thing.
But you do have to start somewhere when learning a new language and a lot of words ARE 1 on 1. Like, Une Chaise is A Chair in French, and saying that it means a chair is easier than, idk, showing a picture of a chair and then getting into a philosophical argument of what is or isn't a chair.
| Grammar is a whole different beast, though. Once you've got the hang of the language, reading and writing fully in that language is a lot more educational.
But it does require a real life teacher to look over your work, so self-taught people can be pretty lost here.
| >>697118
The school system anon. The school system is hurting me.
I agree that you have to start somewhere, but teaching English to 8th graders through "this word = this word", even when the word has multiple definitions and uses, it's just fucked.
I learned the very basics in elementary school and the rest is self-taught essentially, through media and curiosity.
My sister who's in 8th grade can't even basic grammar, and here we start learning English in 1st-2nd grade!
This thread is permanently archived
| Why do so many people in this day and age not realise that translation is a horrible way of teaching language?
People who don't speak English natively aren't going to become fluent in English from writing a word in their native language next to the English equivalent to that word!
Languages aren't 1 to 1. They're different in sentence structure, ways of using certain words etc.
Association is way better than translation and nobody uses that to teach language! It's idiotic.