So interesting! Thank you for sharing this very useful knowledge! Now I'll know how to teach myself languages better

Jeff has shaped a considerable number of teachers' minds at IZ language school since 2020. Words fail us to thank him!

We are all thankful for Jeff's insights and knowledge he always shares with us with maximum generosity!

When I was just starting to learn English seriously (I was about A2 level at the time), I was lucky enough to stumble upon ESL Podcast, which helped me reach the level needed to understand native content. Now, years and thousands of hours of input later, I'm about C1/C2. If I could change one thing in my learning journey, it would be to learn about acquisition vs learning much earlier, as I only learned about it when I was already about B2/C1. Thank you for your work and research!

Excellent Jeff

Great. Really interesting. I am going to share

@jeffmcquillan

9 ай бұрын

Much appreciated, James! I suck at promotion :).

@christinehydon4436

9 ай бұрын

Thank you so much for sharing that, James. It was amazing.

I can say this without any doubt: I started to see a real improvement in my listening and speaking after starting to listen to your podcast every single day in the last 10 years. It was absolutely vital to truly understand what native speakers say and sound much more natural when I have to talk. You and Dr. Lucy Tse have no idea how much you changed my life! Mainly, the routine of presenting new vocabulary and right after explaining the meaning with examples, all in English, helped me improve my learning so much! Thank you so much Dr. Jeff McQuillan!

Thank you Dr McQuillan. You are a great teacher and great human. Thank you for sharing your knowledge. ESL podcasts are fantastic. I wish you the best

I didn't want that to end. Thank you so much, Dr M. That was an absolutely brilliant lecture.

Dr McQuillan, that was one great video on the subject. Please 🙏 do not stop making these videos. Thank you.

Thanks a lot for share us this information Mr. Jeff Mcquillan.. I'm from Mexico mty.. Your observations are very useful... Regards 🙏

@eslpod

4 ай бұрын

De nada. Pasé un rato en Cuernavaca hace MUCHOS años.

Thanks, great as always.

Thanks ❤

👍👍👍

Which second language did Professor McQuillan acquire by this method, rather than the 'go to university and get a degree' method?

Can we learn a language by using the association method? For example, can we learn the Spanish word 'saltar' by visualising a giant salt-cellar jumping very high on the Moon, where there is little gravity so it jumps high, or remember the German word 'Kopf' by seeing somebody clasp their head in their hands and saying 'Kopf', or learn the German word 'Ohren' by associating it with somebody holding their ears? Could we learn the German word for '2' by seeing somebody draw the symbol '2' and then associating that image with somebody saying 'Zwei'? Or remember the Spanish word for 'bread' by associating it with an image of somebody cooking bread in a pan? Is the association method of learning words effective?

First of all, you've explained things amazingly clearly! Quick question: do you consider output as a form of input? After all, you can hear yourself speak and see yourself write.

@jeffmcquillan

5 ай бұрын

Thanks for your kind comments. For input to be useful, it has to contain something "new" for you to acquire. We sometimes refer to this as "i+1" where "i" is your current level of acquisition and "+1" is something just slightly above it. If the input is 100% comprehensible and contains nothing new for you to acquire, you won't improve your acquisition. By definition, your own output consists of things you've already acquired, so no, it doesn't serve as a source of useful input for you.

Thank you Dr McQuillan. I have a question: I have often wondered why it's called "comprehensible input" and not "understandable input". I think it's because "comprehension" refers to grasping the overall meaning or intent behind an utterance, while "understanding" usually refers to awareness of the role of individual words. I've never seen it elucidated like that anywhere, but is that a useful way of thinking about the terms?

@jeffmcquillaninla

9 ай бұрын

Thanks for your comments. The terms "comprehensible" and "understandable" are used by Krashen interchangeably. I'm not sure about the use of "understanding" to refer to conscious or explicit awareness of individual words. It may be used by some experimental psychologists in this manner (?), but it isn't a commonly used technical definition in applied linguistics. Sorry I can't be of more help!

@jantelakoman

9 ай бұрын

@@jeffmcquillaninla Thank you for your response. It's clearly a rationalization on my part, so I will be careful not to ascribe it to anyone else. I suppose it was mainly motivated by a need to distinguish between TPRS-style comprehensible input, where students can translate every word, and comprehensible input defined as "successful communication" whether achieved through linguistic competence alone or not. Is there any other useful terminology for making this distinction?

@jeffmcquillaninla

9 ай бұрын

@@jantelakoman Not that I know of, but it is an excellent observation. I suppose it is really more a continuum of comprehension, from every word and sentence to something more "global." But I don't know anyone who has treated this carefully. To be fair, most L2 researchers are too busy studying various forms of form-focussed instruction with which to torture their students :).

4:15 1) Learning (Conscious) & Acquisition (Unconscious) 15:39 2) Natural Order Hipothesis 23:03 3) Monitor Hipothesis 38:12 4) Input hipothesis 52:29 5) Affective filter

Thank you so much for the lecture, but I disagree with what you said. When you learn something consciously (learning), after practice, you do it automatically (acquiring). The same is true when you learn to drive a car. I can deliberately study "she or he runs," and after practicing it many times, I will use it automatically without thinking about it! As you said, just acquiring it from input can take you a whole life. Retrieval practice is the most powerful way to learn something, both explicitly and implicitly, according to science. Your approach implies using repetitions (a lot of input); that's not an effective way. Research shows that studying deliberately outperforms studying undeliberately. There's no research that shows that a lot of comprehensible input can beat deliberate learning through deliberate retrieval practice, but there's a ton of research that shows retrieval practice is the best for learning and implicit knowledge. So deliberate learning with a lot of practice and retrieval practice will make it perfect!

@jeffmcquillan

9 ай бұрын

There is a considerable amount of evidence that conscious learning does not become acquisition. See Stephen Krashen's reviews in his various publications, including Explorations in Language Acquisition and Use (2003). Learning to drive a car is not the same as language acquisition. Retrieval practice is not the most "powerful" way to acquire languages. In fact, it won't help very much at all, for the reasons I explained in the lecture (see discussion of the Monitor Hypothesis). Also, I reviewed the evidence on rote memorization and retrieval "practice" for vocabulary at length in a series of interviews with James Stubbs @futuremultilingual6134 of Future Multilingual. See links here: backseatlinguist.com/blog/interviews-with-james-stubbs-on-future-multilingual/

@jantelakoman

9 ай бұрын

I used to think like you. What really helped me was understanding that learning and acquisition are fundamentally different kinds of knowing. I found that there are other examples of tacit knowledge which can only be acquired through experience, such as chick sexing and the "sixth sense" that seasoned experts of many professions use daily but struggle to describe. This all helped to make the learning/acquisition distinction make more sense to me.

@stevencarr4002

3 ай бұрын

@@jeffmcquillan Is teaching somebody the word for something by pointing to it and saying the word for that thing, an example of 'conscious learning'? Or is it more 'explicit instruction'?

@jevogroni4829

24 күн бұрын

conscious learning vs. language aquisition are both results, so direct instruction produces a bit of both, i suppose, but is meant to mainly produce ”learning” in the krashen sense of the word

@redstorm474

24 күн бұрын

@@jevogroni4829 Scientists don't take krashen's hypothesis seriously these days A lot of research showed it's not enough to have input for acquisition

A lot of talk but very little information. HUGE waste of time to listen to the whole thing!

@jeffmcquillan

6 ай бұрын

Glad you enjoyed it, William! :)