People often take it for granted that the best way to learn a foreign language is to travel or live in a country where the target language is spoken. They believe that being present in a foreign country will dramatically grow their language skills, like water, sunlight, and Miracle Gro to a plant. However, language learning isn’t formulaic. You can’t just plug an individual into a foreign country and expect language mastery to be the result. The environment of a foreign country or city can potentially facilitate language learning, but what’s far more important is the individualized experience of the traveler. When traveling, three main factors influence how much language improvement is likely to take place: 1) the destination country; 2) the traveler’s occupation; and 3) the traveler’s lifestyle.

The Destination Country Influences Language Learning

As a native English speaker, my language is spoken in many countries around the world. When I was in Jordan and Lebanon, there were signs in English posted everywhere, and most natives had some grasp of the language. A lot of foreigners viewed interactions with me as an opportunity to practice or show off their English. Similarly, if they sensed that their English was better than my Arabic, they typically preferred to speak in my native language so that we could have a better conversation. In other words, the practical advantage of speaking English among certain bilingual types can be a complication in the process. 

Students of English as a foreign language, in contrast, do well in most American cities. This owes to the fact that relatively few Americans are bilingual, and many bilingual Americans are eager to speak English, since English is pervasive in American culture. As a result, many foreigners make great progress in English when they come to the US because relatively so few people are capable of, or interested in, speaking a language other than English.

The Traveler’s Occupation Influences Language Learning

The second factor—occupation—is critical because it dictates how travelers will spend the majority of their time.. Travelers on a foreign exchange or language study program may receive daily exposure to the language in the form of classes and cultural activities programmed into the agenda. For example, when I was studying Arabic at Oman’s Nizwa University during the summer of 2014, we had around four hours of Arabic class every day and numerous cultural activities with native speakers who were required to communicate with us in Arabic. As participants, we also had to sign a language pledge only to speak Arabic amongst ourselves for two months (even though we all reneged). Middlebury College in Vermont, USA, is famous for similar immersion programs that are highly effective at promoting language development. 

On the other hand, I know people who live in a foreign country and work a job in their native language. This is actually quite common now with remote work having surged in popularity. A number of people prefer to live in a non-English speaking country for cultural reasons, while earning a salary from an American company or company that otherwise doesn business in English. Given how time-consuming work is, it is typical for people with English jobs to make very little progress in the foreign language, no matter how long their stay is in the host country.

Lifestyle Influences Language Learning

The third factor—lifestyle—is arguably the most important of all. In the Middle East, for example, are you out on the streets or in people’s homes interacting with locals, or do you spend the majority of your free time in the house? According to a February, 2021, survey of Americans, nearly half of respondents reported spending 5-6 hours a day on their phone, and another 11% reported spending 7 hours or more, not including work-related activities. Figures like these are on par with what you might expect in the smartphone era and may even be slightly higher in reality, given that the data was self-reported.

There’s a saying in English, you can take a horse to the water, but you can’t make it drink. When it comes to language learning, what we do is far more important than where we are located, especially now with the abundance of quality electronic dictionaries, references, smartphones, and language exchange applications.  Travel experience can easily amount to a wasted opportunity, in terms of language development, if we aren’t intentional about applying ourselves. Allow me illustrate…

My Japanese Got Worse In Japan 

In the spring of 2015, I spent four months in Tokyo on a study abroad program through Sophia University. What’s ironic is that my Japanese actually regressed during that span. When you break it down, my experience fell short on all three of the factors—country, occupation, and lifestyle—that influence language learning abroad. For one, many people at Sophia University spoke good English. This isn’t true everywhere in Japan, but location within a country matters, too. I had friends who barely spoke any Japanese at all, and they fared just fine. Second, Sophia University was international. English was the language of instruction of all of my classes. You had to specially apply to take classes taught in Japanese, which very few foreigners due to the high probability they would fail. Third, my lifestyle wasn’t conducive to language learning. Like my peers, I chose to socialize primarily with other internationals who shared my dormitory. Communication in Japanese was arduous, and there was no course curriculum or social pressure prompting anyone to do so. More often than not, I and my peers chose the more comfortable route of speaking English amongst ourselves. 

Overall, I had a good time in Tokyo, and I hope to be able to go back one day. I miss the people, the food, the cherry blossoms, the bullet train, the natural landscapes, and the cutting-edge technology. Japan was full of imagination, and it’s unlike any country I’ve ever visited. However, upon returning back home, I decided to abandon Japanese in favor of Spanish and Arabic. I determined that the effort required to get really good at Japanese paled in comparison to the scarce cultural and economic opportunities I was likely to receive in my future. My connection to Latin America and the Middle East was a lot stronger, and I already had my hands full with these languages and my other academic pursuits. 

The Myth Of Immersion?

The myth of immersion isn’t that immersion doesn’t work. Immersion does work. The myth of immersion is that traveling to a foreign country is a necessary step. People can experience the benefits of immersion wherever they are.They can consume media, change the language of their phones, find language partners using apps like HelloTalk, or practice translation throughout the day. And an immersive environment is most useful when we actively engage with our environment. In other words, not just about what we see and hear, it’s about what we are able to understand. 

The American Council On The Teaching Of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) is one of the most popular advocates of foreign language education. ACTFL creates official standards and administers exams to assess language competency in over 120+ languages. Language Testing is their official partner, and they offer official proctored, on-demand exams seven days a week, that test reading, listening, writing, and speaking skills.

You may already be familiar with the CEFR Scale (Common European Framework of Reference), which ranges from A1 to C2. See the following graph for translating results from ACTFL to CEFR.

A quick note on the ACTFL LPT (language proficiency test) itself. The listening exams consist of around ~15 short audio segments ~one minute a piece, followed by three questions each. You may find that your exam gets easier as you progress, more difficult, or more or less stays the same, depending on how you perform early on. The listening, like the reading, is a dynamic exam designed to “probe your level. If you are in the Advanced High / Superior range, the listening “clips” are likely to get progressively more difficult.

Recently I took LPT tests in Spanish and Arabic. In Spanish, I scored Superior (C2), whereas in Arabic I scored Advanced High (C1). I’ve posted the certificates down below, complete with a complete description of each level. I figured I would make a post outlining some important things to keep in mind, both in preparation for, and on the day of, the exam. While the title of this blog is tailored to advanced learners, these tips will help you do better at any level, and some of the tips are transferable to both the reading and speaking exams.

FYI, the first three tips are relevant before the day of the exam, while the last two apply to test day.

5 Pro Tips To Improve Your ACTFL LPT Score

1-) Master The Material You Will Be Tested On. Both the Spanish and Arabic exams, and I’m pretty sure all the listening exams ACTFL administers, are tests of the formal variant of a language. In Spanish, that means the kind of language you will hear on CNN En Español, the news more generally, cultural and educational programs, and some informal exchanges using standard Spanish. What you will likely not hear is any slang characteristic of Central America, South America, the Caribbean, or regional pronunciation. None of my knowledge of Mexican Spanish, which is pretty vast, helped me in any way with this exam.

As far as Arabic, all of the passages are in Modern Standard Arabic. A few passages had superficial traces of dialect, like the Egyptian pronunciation of the letter qaaf, but nothing more substantive than that. Again, knowledge of spoken Arabic will not help with this exam, unless it is also coupled with direct exposure to formal Arabic, in which case the differences between the two can be worked out.

FYI, all of this info can be found in the prep material provided by ACTFL, which you can access here. ACTFL provides sample audios and a complete description of each level for every language.

2-) Practice Active Listening. This tip applies to training. Obviously, during the test day you will be zeroed in on every audio sample. However, in advance of the test, practice active, not passive listening. It’s one thing to hear something; it’s an entirely different thing to listen to it actively. Listening involves focus and concentration. On the other hand, when we are distracted, we only draw on a fraction of our mental abilities, and our practice time becomes much less productive. When we actively listen, we are able to pinpoint the words and the sounds that give us difficulties.

3-) Look Up New Words. It doesn’t matter how good you are at audibly deciphering words. if you don’t know the meaning, you will either be one, totally clueless; or two, liable to make errors (when you think you understood one thing, but the meaning was different or nuanced). In simple terms, having a broad vocabulary is vital to scoring high. The speakers in the recordings speak clearly, so pronunciation is not really a challenge, but you need to know what most of the words mean right away in order to do well. For years, I made a habit of looking up words all the time, both in Spanish and Arabic (see here), and that made exam day a lot easier.

That said, no matter how advanced you are in a language, you will likely not understand every single word being said; or you may understand what was being said only to forget it, so pay special attention to the next two bullets.

4-) Study The Questions In Advance. Each audio recording will play automatically, but you are given thirty seconds to study the questions in advance (just the questions, not the possible answers, so you don’t have to worry about information overload). Context is the most important thing to understanding any communication. These 30 seconds help you establish the context in advance, which knowledge is a huge aid during the listening portion. The title of the clip and the questions are typically short and relatively simple, so meditate on them during those first 30 seconds so you know exactly what you will be looking for when you listen. Since you only get one listen for each section, it is extremely important to be as clued in on the context as possible.

Remember, you do not need to understand everything to pass each section. You just need to know the answers to the specific questions they ask, which range from the main idea to more specific details.

5-) Take Targeted Notes While Listening. During the exam you are provided a notepad to take notes on each section. Utilize it strategically. You don’t want to be typing too much while listening because you may miss important details, and won’t have the chance to go back and listen again. At the same time, you don’t want to neglect what matters. I jotted down a few words during each clip, which helped me stay focus and remember the key details I was zeroing in on having studied the questions in advance.

For the listening and the reading, the results become available right away, as with a complete description of your level. You are supposed to wait 90 days before taking the same test again, but you may be able to take an individual exam a second time before 90 days, so check their policy online, and give them a call if you are not sure.

Lastly, language is far more dynamic than any exam could ever let on. Doing well or poorly on an exam most directly reflects your ability to take that exam. If you do well, enjoy your result, but don’t think a Superior result means you’ve arrived. The certificates, after all, are only valid for two years, during which time your level can go up or down. Similarly, just because you didn’t get the result you wanted, it doesn’t mean you won’t in the future. And it doesn’t necessarily mean your language level isn’t higher, especially if you are proficient in informal, non-standard varieties that speakers of a language commonly communicate in.

Here are my results as promised from September, 2021:

Have you taken an ACTFL exam before? Drop your two cents down below! If you liked this post, be sure to also check out The Psychology of Speaking In A Foreign Language | The Magic Of Speaking In A Foreign Language | I Have Multiple Personalities (Confessions Of A Linguist) | Travel Is Not The Best Way To Improve Your Foreign Language Skills (The Myth of Immersion) | How Long it Takes to Become Fluent in a Foreign Language | This Daily habit will dramatically increase your foreign language proficiency! | Confessions of a Bilingual: Raw Perspective From A Persian-American Linguist.

The conversation among students of a foreign language usually centers on topics such as grammar, vocabulary, and idioms. Or how long it takes to master a foreign language. Or the merits of travel and immersion. Or, yet more creatively, the effect language has on personality. But few have stopped to consider how psychology impacts communication skills in a foreign language. Let me explain. .

People commonly experience fear when speaking in a foreign language. They struggle to find the right words. They are conscious of their accent. And they know they are more prone to making mistakes and looking foolish. Ironically, these fears actually impair their performance in the language. The energy that goes to nursing a fear is energy diverted away from the process of communication. I have friends whose written ability in a language is quite extraordinary, but you would never know due to the complex they’ve built up in their mind over speaking. Psychology, at times, is a greater impediment to clear communication than actual language ability.

I and a number of friends have observed that spoken foreign language ability tends to significantly increases with moderate alcohol consumption. That is, in fact, the bizarre observation that initially inspired this post. We know that alcohol lowers inhibitions, which makes many people more comfortable socializing in general. And that foreign languages tend to generate an increase in fear-based inhibitions. Without these inhibitions, people still make mistakes and have an accent, but they are less conscious of them. The end product is clearer, better, more confident communication.

The first step to overcoming any psychological impediment is recognizing it as such. Remember, no matter how many egregious language errors you ever make, the earth will keep on spinning. Mastery of this simple observation may, in fact, be the fastest way to improve communication skills in a foreign language.

For further reading, check out The Magic of Speaking in a Foreign Language.

In middle school, I had Hispanic friends who would often speak Spanish within earshot of me. For me, it was like watching a magician perform a magic trick. Maybe it was the sound of the language. Maybe it was their ability to seamlessly go back and forth between English and Spanish. Or maybe it was the sheer fact that I didn’t know what the hell was going on yet knew communication was taking place. In any case, this experienced motivated me to study languages, and I’ve been a committed student of Spanish and Arabic for the last 10+ years.

After being in the game for so long, I no longer think of foreign languages as a magic trick. Occasionally, I try to resurrect the childlike wonder that accompanied my initial plunge, but I’d be lying if I told you that nothing has changed after a decade of familiarization. In short, I have progressed from the honeymoon stage to the marriage stage of the relationship.

Language study is something I invest in on an almost daily basis between friends, family, and work-related activities. I can’t imagine my life without Spanish or Arabic. During the last decade, I’ve made countless friends from Latin America and the Middle East and many fond memories that would otherwise be lost in translation. Spanish and Arabic are also an important part of my professional resume. I worked as a translator for a summer and know that being trilingual is a big asset in the 21st century. By my estimate, the thousands of hours I’ve dedicated to this area have been well worth it. I may no longer see foreign languages as a magic trick, but they are most definitely a superpower.

Let me give you a vivid illustration of how attached linguists can be to the languages they study. Last year, I was playing pick-up basketball with one of my classmates at the university gym. His name is Steven. He was a high-motor, high-flying athlete, but after one of his awkward jumps he got clipped by a defender and landed on the side of his head. Thump. Steven was evidently concussed. We took him to the hospital, and after a couple hours of waiting he decided to sleep on it due to the long wait and high cost of treatment. Can you guess what Steven kept on asking us while he was waiting to be seen for a potentially serious injury? He asked us to speak Arabic with him, at least a dozen times! In his dizzied, confused state, his biggest fear was that he had forgotten Arabic, a language he had invested hundreds of hours in and clearly had an emotional attachment to.

Do you study a foreign language (or have an interest)? How has your perception of it changed over time? Has it opened any personal or professional doors? Do you plan on studying it the rest your life? How do you make it a regular part of your life, especially if you do not live in a country where it is spoken?

This language business is definitely an adventure. For further reading, check out the linguist tag and The Psychology of Speaking in a Foreign Language.

This is one of the easiest articles I have ever written because what I talk about has been a daily part of my lifestyle for more than a decade. In high school, I made a habit of looking up all the words I didn’t know—starting in English, and from there progressing to Spanish and Arabic. At first it was frustrating. I had a special dislike for everything I could not understand. And my teachers assigned a lot of reading—both modern and classical—so there was plenty where that came from. But over the course of a couple years, something amazing happened—it got a lot easier. There were far fewer words I did not know. And my intelligence, confidence, reading comprehension, and communication skills increased. I could understand almost everything I read, and I could express myself far more clearly and effectively than before. My habit of looking up words also accelerated my proficiency in Spanish and Arabic, which has been a great asset to my life. In fact, I think my habit of looking up words was the best thing that ever happened to my education.

Ask seven language experts what the average size vocabulary is and you will get seven different answers. And there is a difference between active and passive vocabulary. Active vocabulary are words you know and use. Passive vocabulary are words you know but don’t use. Passive vocabulary is much larger. One lexicographer (dictionary expert) Susie Dent estimates that the average person knows 20,000 words actively and 40,000 words passively. How would your life be different if you were armed with a much larger vocabulary, both active and passive? Without further ado, I present to you 7 time-tested, fact-based, undeniably compelling reasons to look up words you don’t know.

1. We Live In The Era of the Written Word

For most of human history, communication was primarily oral. People didn’t sit down and read for hours on end like they do today for school, work, entertainment, or pleasure. The printing press, mass education, globalism, and the internet changed all of that. Now knowledge has accumulated more than at any other point in history–by a large margin. And we are exposed to that knowledge on a routine basis. As knowledge increases, vocabulary needs increase because language is the medium through which knowledge is understood and transmitted. In a word, the more vocabulary you know, the better you are able to thrive in the 21st century.

2. You Will Save Time and Energy in the Long Run

When you see a word you don’t know and choose not to look it up, one of two things will probably happen. A) You will see that word again in the future and look it up; or B) You will spend time trying to decipher the meaning of the word and the meaning of the sentence in which it appears. Being able to derive meaning from context is a good skill that you will naturally get better at over time. But in many cases, you simply don’t know unless you look it up. And you run the risk of inferring an incorrect definition, which comes with its own set of problems. When it doubt, get it out. And I’m talking about the dictionary.

3. Your Communication Will Be More Effective

Have you ever had a hard time expressing yourself in words? Of course you have — we all do on a regular basis. The bigger your vocabulary, the easier it will be to express yourself and understand others when they express themselves. Sometimes we want to say more and sometimes we want to say less. Sometimes we want to confront head-on and sometimes we want to exercise finesse. Having a big vocabulary affords the best chance to nail our communicative objectives, whatever they happen to be. Also, new words are often coined to capture concepts that would otherwise take a long time to describe. For example, if we didn’t have the word election or marriage, it might take us three or more sentences to explain the meaning every single time. As a result, the more words we know, the more efficient our speech is. In sum, vocabulary facilitates communication, and communication is power.

4. Your Communication Will Be More Artistic

The primary purpose of language is functional, but it is so much more than that. Language is art. And the more words you have in your arsenal, the more you can produce and appreciate language’s aesthetic value. Words sound differently, and some go better together than others (For further reading, Google “collocation”). The bigger your vocabulary, the better your language will sound, both orally and in writing. And the more vividly and imaginatively you will be able to express yourself. Do you know anyone whose speech is a joy to listen to owing to their rich vocabulary? A few names jump to mind. In fact, I think artful communication is one of the most underappreciated products of education.

5. Your Confidence Will Increase

Understanding is a combination of smarts, experience, and education—all of which we value as human beings. As a result, it is easy to lose confidence when we don’t understand something. Why are so many of us afraid of lawyers, calculus, and the future? It is the primitive fear of not knowing or not being able to understand, which was often a matter of life and death for our ancestors. In high school, I loathed not being able to understand partially because it felt like a knock on my intelligence. Of course, that wasn’t true—I just needed to take time out to learn the language that was being used. Understanding makes us feel good about ourselves, while ignorance has the opposite effect. One of the main motivations for having a big vocabulary is confidence.

6. It Is Easier Now Than Ever To Learn New Words

In the old days, if you wanted to learn a new word, you had to consult a thick hard-back dictionary, spend minutes flipping through it, and hope the word you were looking for was there. Or you had to ask someone who claimed to know the word, and hope they were leading you down the right path. Some of you, like the author of this post up until middle school, grew up in an era before major advances in technology forever changed the game. Now it is easier than ever to look up words, and you can throw hope and wasted time out the window. Of course, there’s dictionary.com Or if you’re like the vast majority of people reading this, you can effortlessly install a built-in dictionary on your smart phone (iOS or Android). See the image I uploaded of my phone, (iOS 13). I simply highlight a word and click “look up.” It is the most laziness-proof process ever invented. And it would have been a pipe dream for many people of past generations for whom learning new words was a time-consuming process.

7. Your Ability To Master Foreign Languages Will Exponentially Increase

This one doesn’t apply to all of you, but it applies to enough of you. The greater mastery you have over your native language, the easier it is for you to acquire a foreign language. And every experienced language learner knows it. For example, the Spanish word for forceful is “contundente.” If I know what the word forceful means, then I can make a one-to-one connection and learn the new word with ease. Otherwise, the process of learning the word for the first time will take many times longer. This may not sound like a lot, but if you’ve ever studied a foreign language, this amounts to a difference of hundreds of hours in the long run. Bottom line: The better you are in your native language, the easier you can pick up a new one. And it isn’t even close.

Tell me what I missed down below and whether you agree that looking up new words is the way to go.

Today I came across an intriguing map that lists the most popular language spoken in every US state (excluding English and Spanish). Many people think the only useful foreign language in the US is Spanish. But in reality there are myriad expats communities across the US in which international cultures flourish. The US, after all, is a nation of immigrants. Does anything on the map below surprise you? Everything on it surprised me with the exception of a few states. For example, I knew there was a large Arab community in Michigan, but I had no idea German was an important language in Ohio. Be sure to check out the full Business Insider article full of fascinating insights.

Experienced linguists knew exactly what I meant when they read the title. The biggest goal of beginner and intermediate language students is to become fluent. The benefits of fluency are myriad–complete conversations, more professional opportunities, and less dictionary action. However, challenges don’t suddenly disappear when you attain fluency. Your older challenges merely get swapped out for newer, better ones. I don’t always coin terms, but today I’m going to make an exception–linguistic personality disorder (LPD).

LPD is the phenomenon whereby a student of a foreign language(s) has a different, typically inferior, personality when operating in a non-native language. Symptoms include frustration, bewilderment, and a burning desire to make further improvement.

Healthy people who speak only one language have only one personality. People know what they’re getting when they have a conversation with that individual. They can express themselves effortlessly in any context. They are themselves all of the time. If studying a foreign language is war, then not studying a foreign language is peacetime.

Linguists have many personalities corresponding with how many languages they speak. Almost all of those personalities are inferior to their native-language personality. That’s because people always have the greatest command of their native language, unless they lived abroad for an extended period of time. And personality is a function of communication more than any other single factor.

Personality is a function of communication more than any other single factor.

All students of a foreign language have LPD. It’s simply a disorder that people consent to when they take up language study. Symptoms of LPD are obviously worse in beginner and intermediate students, but they also affect advanced speakers. When a student is beginner- or intermediate-level, social expectations for that individual are low. They’re expected to make mistakes and regularly switch back to their first language, and native speakers go out of their way to facilitate conversation. Non-advanced students experience a big drop-off in personality when they speak the foreign language, but they are rarely capable of having a complete conversation.

Advanced speakers, on the other hand, are expected to understand everything, handle every situation effectively, and operate exclusively in the foreign language. Native speakers often communicate with advanced speakers like any other native speaker. And so wherever there is a gap in knowledge, that gap necessarily affects their personality because they have no recourse in their first language.

Let me give you a concrete example. A few years ago, I participated on a summer program in Arabic at the beginning of which all participants had to sign a language pledge–no communication except in Arabic for two whole months. Arabic ability varied greatly and students were divided into a number of groups. In the beginner and intermediate groups, I saw people, some of whom had advanced degrees, find it difficult to express themselves and were a shell of their usual selves for the duration of the program. Some of the native speakers who participated on the program had no idea these individuals were advanced professionals. They were acquainted only with their Arabic-language personality and formed their perceptions accordingly.

In the beginner and intermediate groups, I saw people, some of whom had advanced degrees, find it difficult to express themselves and were a shell of their usual selves for the duration of the program.

LPD is partially why I decided to stop studying Japanese. I had been studying Arabic and Spanish for several years, and I felt that with the addition of Japanese I was spreading myself thin. I completed two years of coursework and spent a summer abroad in Tokyo, and I have absolutely no regrets. But I discovered that I value depth more than breadth, and I didn’t want to become a social child again like I had been every time I spoke Japanese. I opted instead to invest more time and energy in Arabic and Spanish, two languages I am passionate about that have broader application.

I have a Chinese friend, on the other hand, who embraces LPD. She studies Arabic and French and is constantly picking up new languages, even if it means spreading herself thin. This system works perfectly for her because no two people are alike.

There’s another dimension of LPD that I haven’t yet elaborated on, and it involves the new personality traits people sometimes adopt when they learn a foreign language. For example, I’ve seen people express themselves more freely and openly in Spanish, and I’ve seen others become total clowns in Arabic. Studying a foreign language is an opportunity for self-redefinition. This happens when the people that know us best and think they have us figured out don’t speak the foreign language and can’t limit us by how they expect us to act.

Many people find this facet of foreign language study liberating. The anonymity can also have a therapeutic effect. I remember times in college when turning on the radio in Spanish or Arabic gave me a much-needed emotional break from the English-speaking world.

My purpose with this post is to shine a light on LPD. Let me know in the comments if/ how LPD has affected your life.

#LPDProblems #LPD

Sometimes we need help from others. And sometimes others need help from us. Whether it’s with the big things or the small things in life. In fact, it’s rare to go an entire day without thanking someone or being thanked. Carrying groceries, giving rides, and sharing knowledge in an area of expertise are common ways people in community help one another. My grandparents regularly ask me to fix their computer and solve any technology-related problems. A common response to being thanked is “No problem.” The issue with this response is that it contains two of the most hated words in the English language–“No,” and “Problem.” Sure, order and negation matter, but simply saying a word can subconsciously trigger negative associations. And admitting something is “not a problem” doesn’t make anyone feel exceptionally good. The world is not going to end if you keep using this expression. But you can respond in a much more effective way with a simple phrase.

Say “Happy to Help” Instead

“Happy to help” or “I’m happy to help” communicates to people that helping them is something we personally value. We don’t help out of a sense of compulsion but because we joyfully choose to. This can be a perfectly sincere response given the myriad benefits of helping others. Helping others diverts attention from our own problems. It gives us confidence knowing that we are high-value human beings. And it leads to reciprocity down the road from those we live in community with, be they family members, friends, or neighbors. Let alone the instinctive satisfaction of receiving gratitude from others.

The next time someone says “Thank you,” consider it an opportunity to leave an impression. The single best way I have found to do that is with the expression above.

Fluency is the ultimate goal of studying a foreign language. Fluent speakers can express themselves with ease in any context. Fluent speakers can use their language skills in professional or service capacities. Fluent speakers don’t need a dictionary by their side 24/7. Once a learner has achieved fluency, operating in the language is far more enjoyable as anyone who’s been on both sides can attest. If you’re already studying a foreign language, thinking about getting started, or just plain curious, keep reading for what the experts have to say on how long it takes to become fluent.

How Long is Measured in Hours of Study

People often want to know how many months or years it will take them to achieve fluency, but both of these are the wrong unit of measure. There is nothing magical about the passage of time when it comes to language acquisition. What takes 6 months for one person may take 6 years for another depending on the weekly investment they make in the language. This is why hours of study is the correct unit of measure for estimating language mastery. If I told you it takes 700 hours to master Spanish, then you could accurately estimate the years and months it would take you to get there based on your average weekly investment. Another thing to take into account is the background of the student. A student highly proficient in their native language or with experience studying another foreign language will require less time to reach the same benchmark. For those with no experience or little natural language ability, the process of language acquisition is more time-consuming.

There is nothing magical about the passage of time when it comes to language acquisition. What takes 6 months for one person may take 6 years for another depending on the weekly investment they make in the language.

The Foreign Service Institute (FSI), an organization of the US State Department, trains American diplomats in foreign languages so they can effectively serve US interests abroad. The FSI has published estimates based on 70+ years of experience of the average length of time it takes a new language student to achieve “professional working proficiency” (link). Professional working proficiency is based on the Interagency Language Roundtable Scale and takes into account both reading and spoken capabilities. Here is the complete description (link):

Professional working proficiency is the fourth level of five in the Interagency Language Roundtable (ILR) scale of language proficiency, formerly called the Foreign Service Institute (FSI) scale. This level is sometimes referred to as S-3 or Level 3. A person at this level is described as follows:

• able to speak the language with sufficient structural accuracy and vocabulary to participate effectively in most formal and informal conversations on practical, social, and professional topics.

• can discuss particular interests and special fields of competence with reasonable ease.

• has comprehension which is quite complete for a normal rate of speech.

• has a general vocabulary which is broad enough that he or she rarely has to grope for a word.

• has an accent which may be obviously foreign; has a good control of grammar; and whose errors virtually never interfere with understanding and rarely disturb the native speaker.

The FSI has divided languages into four categories of increasing difficulty with respect to the time it takes native English speakers to achieve professional working proficiency.

Category 1 Languages: ~600-750 Classroom Hours

Category 1 is for languages most similar to English. It includes Spanish, Italian, French, Portuguese, Swedish, Danish, Dutch, Romanian, and Norwegian. According to FSI, the average native English speaker needs ~600-750 classroom hours of study to achieve professional working proficiency. With one hour every single day of the year, it would take a beginner about two years to become fluent.

Category 2 Languages: ~900 Classroom Hours

Category 2 is for languages more distant to English than Category 1. It includes German, Haitian Creole, Indonesian, Malay, and Swahili. According to FSI, the average native English speaker needs ~900 classroom hours of study to achieve professional working proficiency. With one hour every single day of the year, it would take a beginner almost 2 and a half years to become fluent.

Category 3 Languages: ~1100 Classroom Hours

Category 3 is for “hard languages,” languages with significant linguistic/cultural differences from English. The extensive list consists of the following:

Albanian, Amharic, Armenian, Azerbaijani, Bengali, Bulgarian, Burmese, Czech, Dari, Estonian, Farsi, Finnish, Georgian, Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Icelandic, Kazakh, Khmer, Kurdish, Kyrgyz, Lao, Latvian, Lithuanian, Macedonian, Mongolian, Nepali, Polish, Russian, Serbo-Croatian, Singala, Slovak, Slovenian, Somalia, Tagalog, Takiki, Tamili, Telugu, Thai, Tibetan, Turkish, Turkmen, Ukrainian, Urdu, Uzbek, and Vietnamese.

According to FSI, the average native English speaker needs ~1100 classroom hours of study to achieve professional working proficiency. With one hour every single day of the year, it would take a beginner more than 3 years to become fluent.

Category 4 Languages: ~2200 Classroom Hours

Category 4 is reserved for “super-hard languages,” languages that are exceptionally difficult for native English speakers. It includes Arabic, Chinese-Cantonese, Chinese-Mandarin, Japanese and Korean. According to FSI, the average native English speaker needs ~2200 classroom hours of study to achieve professional working proficiency. With one hour every single day of the year, it would take a beginner more than 6 years to become fluent.

Conclusion:

Learning a language is an art, not a science. No two languages and no two language learners are the same. Figures from the FSI provide a good estimate of the time it takes serious students to achieve working-level proficiency. Keep in mind that professional classroom instruction was assumed in the creation of these estimates. If you are self-studying, it may take you longer depending on your independent learning ability and the resources you have at your disposal.

Based on my experience with Spanish, Arabic, and Japanese I believe the FSI’s estimates are an accurate reference.

Your accent is the first thing people notice when you speak in a foreign language. People’s perception of your language ability varies depending on how closely your accent resembles that of a native speaker. Both native speakers and those with no knowledge of the language use accent as a measure of language mastery. This association is problematic given that the two are often unrelated. I know people with near-native accents whose foreign language ability is minimal, and I know people with heavy accents who have near-native proficiency. However, the better your accent, the more comfortable native speakers will be speaking to you in their native language. Other students will also be more eager to practice their skills with you. And it just may be that you yourself will be more comfortable operating in the language. People with solid language skills are often timid about speaking due solely to their poor accent. It follows that a better accent can lead to better linguistic development. And, most importantly, it can make the process of acquiring a foreign language that much more enjoyable.

Fortunately, there are steps students of all levels can take to improve their accent. For this segment, I thought it would be best to consult my friend and university professor David Contreras. Professor Contreras has been teaching English in Colombia for 10 years and has had the opportunity to provide language instruction to more than 500 students. He is currently based in the Business Department at La Universidad del Magdalena, a research university located in the coastal city of Santa Marta. Here is a transcript taken from our conversation on WhatsApp.

Q: Professor Contreras, thank you for agreeing to participate in the conversation. One of the first things I noticed when I met you is how closely your accent resembles that of a native speaker. Is this how you sounded when you first started speaking English?

A: Speaking was actually the last language skill I developed. When I first started out, my accent wasn’t the best and I would often mispronounce words.

Q: What are some observations you have made about developing a good accent from personal experience and from all your years teaching English?

A: The best way to develop a good accent is to imitate native speakers. This is how I improved my accent. Over the years I have had many students who spoke English with a beautiful accent even though they had no formal training. These students learned the language by listening to songs and watching movies and television.

Q: So would you say that listening is the key to imitation hence the ability to speak a foreign language with a good accent?

A: Yes.

There you have it, folks. If you want to improve your accent in a foreign language, you can start by listening to native media and imitating native speakers. You may not see results overnight. Take my mother, for example, who moved to the US when she was 22. She had studied English in Jordan throughout her educational years. When I heard a recording of her speaking English when she first arrived to the US, I was surprised to discover how much her accent has improved. I attribute this progress to her regular interactions with native speakers. Being immersed in an English-speaking environment all those years enabled her to imitate native speech patters better than she could when she lived in a country whose native language is not English.

Relieving Tension in the Voice

Another factor that influences accent quality is tension around the vocal cords. Tension influences the ability of an individual to speak or sing clearly in any language, including his or her native language. The effect of tension is magnified when speaking in a foreign language due to a relative lack of experience with its pronunciation. When tension is released from the voice, a marked improvement in accent quality is often the end result.

There are a number of techniques to clear tension in the voice. These techniques are regularly used by singers before practice sessions and performances. And they are equally effective with the speaking voice. One of the most common of these techniques is an exercise called the lip roll. The lip roll is a popular warm-up favored by professionals and amateurs alike. See the video below in which professional singer and celebrity voice coach Eric Arceneaux demonstrates the technique.

Another technique endorsed by the experts is yawning. Yawning naturally relieves relieve tension in the voice by contracting the muscles in and around the vocal cords. With practice, anyone can learn to yawn at will. In the video below, Academy Award-Winning Actor Morgan Freeman, renowned for his clear, resonant voice, explains how yawning improves sound quality.

There are a myriad of other techniques you can find online. The lip roll and yawning just happen to be my favorite. Remember that stress is a common source of tension in the body. Any voice coach will tell you that tension in the neck, shoulders, and back negatively impacts resonance. Keeping stress levels low enables you to generate the best sound your organism is capable of producing.

Let us know what you think in the comments. Has your accent at all evolved since you first began studying a foreign language? What strategies and exercises have you found most effective at improving the quality of your accent?

For further reading, check out Linguee, the free app every foreign language student should download and this daily habit will dramatically increase your foreign language proficiency.