Language Exchange User Posts

You have decided to take the leap and find a language exchange learning partner. You have agreed to meet in person or online at a specific time, and now you’re feeling a little nervous. Not only have you never taught anyone a language before, you really do not know where to begin. In essence, you are not really sure how to provide valuable feedback. What follows is a list of tips to help you prepare:

Tip 1: Don’t give fake praise

It is extremely tempting to falsely praise beginning speakers for how well they are speaking, how it sounds like they are almost a native speaker, etc. Now, don’t get me wrong. Praise is good. Positive feedback motivates speakers to keep struggling. False praise, however, helps no one. Your language partner will instantly know if you are lying about their ability; they know they are making mistakes. Instead of helping to motivate, false praise will just make your actual praise seem less legitimate.

Tip 2: Follow the other person’s lead.

Patience is key. It is natural to want to finish your partner’s sentences as they struggle to find the correct words. Unless they specifically ask you for help, resist this urge to jump in and help. Let the other person stand on their two feet and find their language “sea legs”, so to speak. Follow the other person’s lead and you will see that they start to develop that confidence in themselves that is such a vital part of language speaking.

Tip 3: Avoid overcorrecting

If you are helping a native speaker, you will inevitably encounter spoken sentences that are so twisted and grammatically incorrect that you will feel the overwhelming need to perform a detailed autopsy on the sentence in question, listing twenty some odd things that are wrong with it. Not only is this incredibly demotivating, it is also not incredibly helpful. Providing too much feedback at once will inevitably overload the speaker. Instead, just briefly point out one or two things that the person can improve on and continue on. The majority of mistakes will actually never need to be brought into the limelight; most mistakes will correct themselves during the act of listening and the act of practice.

Tip 4: Get the person talking about things they are interested in

I cannot emphasize this tip enough. Is your language exchange partner interested in soccer? Ask him or her a question about soccer. I will guarantee that if you ask enough pertinent questions about their passion, you will find it hard to get them to stop talking. If they are interested in the topics they are talking about, they are much more likely to be motivated to struggle through the language barrier.

Tip 5: Relax

Yes, this is an actual tip. A stressed out teacher quickly leads to a stressed out student, which greatly hampers the learning process. In fact, it is best if you do not consider yourself to be a teacher. Consider yourself to simply be a friend that is trying to help your language exchange partner. A relaxed environment is an environment in which the mind is primed to take in as much information as possible.


Photo Credit: Lee Down

The goal of any Language Exchange is to increase one’s fluency in a language; this is the reason, and often the sole reason, why people choose to exchange languages. There are, however, many additional benefits that you can receive from choosing to partake in a language exchange. What follows is a list of the potential- and unintentional- benefits:

1. An increased understanding of your own language.
   For our purposes, let’s say that you know English and want to know Spanish while your partner knows Spanish and wants to learn English. In helping your partner learn English, you will inevitably increase your understanding of the nuances of the language. Now, you may say that you have really nothing to gain from gaining a heightened awareness of the English language since you are already fluent in it. All I will say in response to that sentiment is to examine the quality of your English writing before and after helping someone learn English. You will be shocked by how big of an improvement you see.


2. An increased ability to struggle
   Learning languages is one of those skills that I have nicknamed “struggle” skills. I call them that because they are so immensely difficult to learn, so taxing on one’s mental endurance. You most likely do not call these skills “struggle” skills, but you can probably list a few more that fall under the same category: learning to play an instrument; learning a computer programming language; be able to run a marathon. These are the skills that are always prefaced in conversation by the phrase “I would like to…”: “I would like to learn a language”; “I would like to be able to run a marathon”; “I would like to play piano”. These “struggle” skills are evidently highly valuable and difficult to learn. I speak from personal experience when I say that the discipline you will cultivate learning with a Language partner will help you learn these other “struggle” skills. Imagine my surprise when I realized that forcing myself to run a few miles every day required a skill set almost identical to what was required for forcing myself to struggle with Spanish grammar on a daily basis.


3. Social skills for Awkward Conversations
   I see two types of Social skills. On the one hand, there is the ability to converse in normal conversation. On the other, there is the ability to navigate socially abnormal situations. These skills are not necessarily the same thing. The first type is the ability to ask a friend over for a house party. The second is the ability to, for example, ask a boss for a raise. This second type of situation is extremely difficult to practice for and it is always associated with a strange feeling in the stomach. You know that feeling I am talking about. It is that feeling that you are having an out of body experience accompanied with a slight dizziness. I see it as fundamentally the act of putting yourself through highly uncomfortable situations. Bizarrely, partaking in a language exchange is one of the few ways that I have found that can train you for these socially abnormal situations. I do not pretend to know exactly why this is. I would guess it has something to do with the fact that you’re putting yourself out there in an unfamiliar situation, learning a language with a partner and struggling to help them learn as well. In essence, learning in a language exchange makes you feel comfortable going outside your comfort zone.


4. A Close friend
   The time you spend with your language partner, the time you spend struggling together, will inevitably lead to some sort of personal relationship. This is not surprising considering your language partner understands better than most how you learn and how you deal with difficulty. I have heard of many cases in which people who learn languages together quickly become good friends, and sometimes even inseparable.

Photo Credit: University of Michigan School of Natural Resources & Environment

Why learn Latin in this day and age? Isn’t it a practically dead language? Despite these common questions, learning Latin is truly a rewarding experience for those who have taken up the challenge to learn it.

Latin is more then an ancient language—it is widely used in the fields of law, medicine, science, technology, philosophy and poetry. Several languages trace their roots to Latin, including English, French and Italian. Because of this, understanding Latin has been crucial to countless historical findings, and is invaluable to the aspiring scholar.

Of course, one of the biggest advantages to learning Latin is the foundation that it provides in learning other languages. Do you know or have you ever met someone who seems to have a strong command of many different languages? Chances are that this person knows at least some of the key languages that give him or her the basis for the others. The “common denominator,” if you will. The advantage knowing that common denominator can bring, particularly in understanding European-based languages, cannot be overstated or undervalued. In fact, many of these words and syllables of Latin are still in use in one form or another today.

To dissect the English language, an English scholar, linguist or etymologist must learn Latin, for it has had an unparalleled impact on the history of English in its vocabulary, its grammar, and its style.

There are many English words with Latin roots easily recognizable by English speakers, as well as plenty that seem completely unrelated. Regardless, the root and the changes undergone in the language’s words can usually be traced back to Latin. As far as grammar, English can thank Latin for having any at all. Learning Latin is necessary to filling in the historical blanks of the English language.

If you have already decided that learning Latin is the right path for you, start collecting resources to use in your studies. Take a look at the options available for online programs, group lessons at a school, a private tutor, etc. by browsing classified listings, phone directories or websites. As you probably know, LRNGO offers a language exchange search platform so that you could even connect with an exchange partner instead of hiring someone to guide you.

The pupils of the classical Latin language have made an educated decision. From history to vocabulary, science to the arts, the Latin language has left a great impression on the world, shaping it to be as we know it today. Latin students continue this tradition, and have the ability to look at the world in a whole new way by understanding its past.


Photo Credit: rabiem22