Unanswered Questions
66 questions with no upvoted or accepted answers
13
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What are the various context clue techniques children use to learn a new word?
Is there any literature that discusses in great detail what the various context clues are that children use to learn a new word? I found myself reading a few papers "The development of a ...
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8
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220
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Learn alphabet by replacing letters in native text
I've read before somewhere about a way to quickly learn how to read a foreign alphabet. You take an unfamiliar letter and put it in English words where the sound of that letter makes sense. That ...
CommunityBot
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7
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61
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Are there any studies showing that you will tend to be more fluent in the first L2 you learn compared to your L3?
As an example, take the case of someone who speaks English as an L1, and wants to become fluent in both Spanish and French. If they learn Spanish first and French second, will they tend to be more ...
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6
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4
answers
339
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How to improve my usage of vocabulary
I have been having trouble recently, related to my vocabulary.
While writing essays or whatever writings in English, I recognized that my sentences were mostly consisting of 'simple' words. Such as '...
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6
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59
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I want to train myself to use the Chinese grammar particle 了 correctly: how do I go about doing that?
Motivation: In Chinese grammar, there's a particle 了 which has two main uses: completion 了 (post-verb) and change-of-state 了 (end of sentence). I'm bad at using this particle (see How does someone ...
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6
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What is the proper etiquette for a nonnative speaker who wants to practice Mandarin at a Chinese supermarket in the US?
There is a Chinese supermarket in the US I often shop at. I often hear the staff speaking Mandarin or Cantonese, and occasionally Hakka or Fujianese, amongst themselves and to Chinese customers. I can ...
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Is it more advantageous to learn the writing system or the spoken form of a language first?
There are several primary aspects of a language, including both the writing system and the spoken form of a language. What does scientific research say about the order to learn these two factors when ...
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According to research, how well do speed reading skills transfer to other languages?
According to Wikipedia, speed reading is
any of several techniques used to improve one's ability to read quickly. Speed reading methods include chunking and minimizing subvocalization.
There are ...
- 19.9k
6
votes
1
answer
235
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Evidence that learning radicals speeds up character learning in Japanese?
Characters — in Chinese or Japanese (or Korean Hanja) — can be learnt in various ways, and it is plausible that paying attention to radicals helps memorization and retention. But is there any hard ...
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5
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92
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Based on research, is it better to learn a new language in your mother tongue?
I live in a multilingual country and often people that visit a language course will have the class in one of the languages spoken here, let's say French.
But most of these people do not speak a lot of ...
- 19.9k
5
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1
answer
815
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Resources for learning the Silbo Gomero (Gomeran Whistle)
Here's a fascinating video on the Silbo Gomero, or whistled tongue of the island of Gomera in the Canary Islands of Spain. Today, it's essentially used as an encoding of Spanish that can be carried ...
CommunityBot
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5
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What are general cognitive principles that could explain why Heisig's method works?
This is a follow up to this question on Remembering the Kana.
James Heisig is author of a famous series of books involving learning Chinese and Japanese characters. These books are
Remembering the ...
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5
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0
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117
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Learning second sign language after first sign language
If I have learned a sign language, will it fasten my acquisition on other sign language?
This is because I learned that various sign languages have different syntax and such, and worried if there's ...
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5
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0
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78
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Does ethnic background affect language learning strategies?
Drawing inspiration from the question Does ethnic background affect the speed of foreign language acquisition?, I would like to ask something more specific: Is there any research on how ethnic ...
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required standards for US domestic foreign language education
In reference to my earlier post, I'm going to be teaching foreign languages in some capacity and was advised by a board of education that I ought to understand and incorporate foreign language edu. ...
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