Crosstalk, aka the Star Wars method

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

🤯 THIS HAS BLOWN MY MIND!

The silent period makes so much sense. I'm a mom, so I thought about my kids and they didn't speak until they were 3 or 4 years, so it put it in perspective for me that IT'S OKAY to, like you said, enjoy the journey. This makes me feel so much more relaxed learning Croatian, especially since it's a language with 7 cases!

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Brilliant. Thanks for sharing Cat. It really takes the pressure off learning when I don’t have to worry about the quality of my output

@wolfydorky-chan7832

10 ай бұрын

Croatian is hard and I'm so proud someone is trying to learn my language! Thank you for the perspective as well I'm much more relaxed with my TL now. Samo naprijed! Uspjet češ! 🥰

@catstickler

10 ай бұрын

@@wolfydorky-chan7832 hvala ti! 🥰 My great-grandparents immigrated to the US from former Yugoslavia during WWII, and they came from what's now Croatia, so I feel an affinity to the land and language. It's definitely a challenging language, but I've recently started learning with Pimsleur, so I feel like I'm understanding the sentence structure in conversational context a lot better than when I was using Drops to learn individual words. (I did recognize naprijed from Drops, though, and I got so excited! I admit I had to use a translator for the rest.)

@wolfydorky-chan7832

10 ай бұрын

It's fine using translators from time to time, I wish you enormous luck on your journey. Sretno, nadam se da ćeš jednog dana razumjeti naš prekrasan jezik!

The first time I experienced "Crosstalk" was watching the old John Belushi movie, "1941". There's a couple scenes where Christopher Plummer (playing a German U-Boat captain) is talking with a Japanese commander (Toshiro Mifune), each using German and Japanese (respectively). I didn't notice it at first since I was busy reading the subtitles, but soon realized what they were doing. There are Spanish-native friends of mine whose English is good, so we sort of Crosstalk in Whatsapp, mostly in writing but sometimes voice-messages, too.

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Very interesting! Yeah, I message my Spanish tutor between classes in the same way. Comprehension is more important than output every day of the week in my book

Ah, this is so interesting! I actually do the opposite of this, for writing. Because for me input isn’t the problem, getting enough good quality output is. So my first second language is Swedish, and I’d say I’m at about a B2 level with this. I do language exchanges on HelloTalk for writing purposes; I prefer to speak to a tutor on Italki for speaking; I like that I don’t need to switch to English at all. I figure I can get all the reading input I need from ebooks and podcasts and newspapers etc, what I’m really after is writing practice. So I have agreements with a few of my exchange partners that I always write in Swedish and they always write in English (because let’s be honest, they can also read all they want on their own, they also just need writing practice). We correct each other’s mistakes and it’s been really useful. I’ve started Turkish now and I intend to do the same when I reach a level where that becomes sensible. Do what works for you, right?

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Interesting. Yeah, speaking and writing are also skills which require practice; I think most people start perhaps too early but you’ve got to start some time!

You went from approx. 35 to 1.67 k subs in a matter of days thanks to "Days of French 'n' Swedish"! That is amazing! This shows me that KZread can be very gruesome. You may put in a lot of energy and produce very good stuff but still be "nowhere". Creative minds might give up even though they are doing well. Well in any case... Your content is top notch and I look up to you. I can learn a lot from you from a language learning angle and even more so from a video editing/producing angle. Keep it up and thanks a lot! Greetings from Switzerland, Daniel.

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Thanks Daniel. It's a lot of hard work to get noticed. I've taken the view I'm not entitled to any views and only through learning the craft will I earn them. Good luck with your channel!

Ah, something I know about. Over two decades ago, my wife and I started talking that way, her in Lithuanian, me in American English. It took about 3 months to become used to responding in a different language. I generally do not do it audibly with other people, although I do do it in writing. I can now understand about 98% percent of what she says, but 80-95% of what others say, depending on the situation. We did it so that our child would hear each language properly spoken; she is bilingual and does not mix up the languages. We are starting finally to speak sometimes in the other's language and I usually cannot tell which language she used. Why I notice it is because loan words are pronounced differently in the other language and that is what catches my ear. I do not learn well orally and no one would say I speak without errors or an accent. Of course, people say that my daughter speaks Lithuanian with an accent, probably because she swallows her words like an American. Why do I not understand others as well? Because they are not talking about the same things. One point that was not brought out in this video is that if you go into a conversation knowing only three words in the foreign language, it is going to be a very short conversation. To pick up words via context, you have to understand the context, i.e., the neighbouring words. If you are going for a phrase book language level. that should not be too hard to achieve, but that requires a different skill as well, that of working around a problem. Why do all primary textbooks teach colours? So you can tell the shopkeeper you want the purple one, not so you can describe the sky or read such a poem. This also takes a bit of getting used to. Toki pona was invented for that purpose. But if you learned a language without hearing it and without seeing the accents (Many languages are written without them.), then this method would be a valuable asset as it would help to correct mispronunciations. However, I think I would prefer to listen to a film with subtitles (both in the same language) before I moved to this stage. A film would allow me to repeat a clip until I heard all the sounds and understood all of the words. The problem with a film is that the vocabulary is not going to be tourist level.

This is the first time I've heard of this technique, and like you said, completely takes the pressure off when replying. It's completely focused on imput whilst still letting you engage and interact with a real person speaking your target language in subjects you're interested in. Holy cow! My apprehesion with starting speaking lessons was feeling so self conscious and not fully listening to the other person because I'm trying too hard to think in advance about what I'll say next and how I'll say it. This sounds like an amazing language exchange method once both learners are past the A2 stage. Though I think I would have to have an agreeement with a potential tutor that we both speak slower than normal pace - I'm Aussie and I know we speak faster than most other English speakers, and I've heard French speakers are also very fast compared to other European languages.

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

It really is good. You can do it how you want. Beginners often use drawings or acting and sounds to get the meaning across. Currently if my tutor says something I don’t understand I’ll just ask him to explain what he meant if it seemed important enough

Love this! Found your channel recently and I absolutely love it, keep up the good work!

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Thanks Isaac! That means a lot. Really appreciate it 😊

That makes perfect sense, actually. Gonna try this, thanks!

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Awesome. Let us know what you think!

I've never thought about this method. I should give it a try. Thank you, Matt, keep up the excellent work!

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Thanks so much. It’s worth a go! Especially once you get out of the beginner stage. Conversations can be much more interesting earlier on because you don’t need to have the more complex vocabulary

I really like the sound of this, I always struggle with comprehension and this looks like a great way to overcome it.

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

I’m glad. Try it out. Might be a bit weird at first but very quickly you can have a meaningful conversation with a native speaker of your TL

honestly really satisfied with the video and it’s content, keep up the good work!

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Thank you igi 🙏. Still a lot to learn! 🤓

Glad you brought up beginners. I was beginning to wonder what to do with a limited vocabulary before you mentioned it. Well done!

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Cheers Jeffrey

Thank you so much for talking about this. I've been learning languages off and on for 10 years and I only heard about crosstalk for the first time 6 months ago. Especially for someone with a lot of anxiety around speaking, it's an absolute game changer!! The atmosphere in my tutor sessions is so much lighter when we use the crosstalk method, which actually makes it easier for me to move into producing more of my TL as the lesson goes on. If I don't know a word, or how to phrase something, no worries, I switch to English and the conversation moves on. Then I'm free to look it up after the lesson and boom, learning! Looking forward to seeing where your channel grows from here. Honestly, with how clean everything is, I think you'll be hitting the 100k mark before you know it 👍

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Hi LyraLea. I'm so glad you had the same experience as me. Genuinely surprised it isn't more well known given its effectiveness and how enjoyable it is. Hopefully more people will try it after this video. Thanks for your kind words about the channel - lots to learn still but enjoying the process! 😊

thank you for this 😭😭

This is gold. I've never heard of this as a method, but funnily enough, it is what I default to when I'm struggling with output in a bilingual convo. If my convo partner speaks English, I listen in Spanish but reply in English when I'm overwhelmed. You explained so well why conversational lessons can be absolutely exhausting--the listening to understand while also listening to respond, but also trying to catchup and then recover from corrections. GOOD.NESS. So much going on! I am definitely going to strive to find a tutor who is willing to try this method. Thanks for sharing!

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Thank you! If we make the process more enjoyable we get more input (and fewer headaches!)

Im glad there is a term for this. Has helped me so much. I have asked the members of the Greek family I married into to just speak Greek to me, even if I answer in English, nit switch over to English too. This also helps the conversations move A LOT quicker. And helps with confidence because Im not searching for words or tenses the whole time when replying. And you are right, it just feels natural eventually. I pick up ways to say certain things, and I reply with those sentences or phrases, then switch back to english, instead of trying to construct a sentence the whole time in my mind.

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

That is so cool. What an incredible experience! Thank you for sharing - nice for people to hear it's not just me 😊

Hi Matt, this is my first time hearing about this concept of crosstalk for language learning! I do sometimes find myself so focused on creating a nice sentence in my target language that I miss a little bit of what my exchange partner says, and it's a challenge to express some of my more complex thoughts in a foreign tongue, so this method is very appealing! I'm going to try it out with my language exchange friends. Two questions for you: At what point should we start chatting in our target language? And should we expect to develop something like native speaker's intuition for the grammar and therefore make very few mistakes in our speech after having employed this method?

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

It really is great. Let us know how you find it. So Marvin Brown who invented this said speech will naturally come. Probably after about 700 hours of input using his style of learning. But do what you want at the end of the day. Whatever you enjoy is the right answer. Using this alone we do need huge amounts of input before we speak otherwise we won’t yet have that intuition for the grammar which is why he advocates speaking later

This method sounds great; very interesting concept.

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Hi Rachel! 👋 Yeah, I love it. It is really worth trying. I haven't used it as a complete beginner as I didn't find out about it soon enough but it is worth trying at any level. It takes away a huge amount of the pressure at the beginner and lower intermediate levels. Let us know how you find it!

That's a precious content with only 2 followers 🔥🔥

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Chemssedine, you are my first comment and I really appreciate it 🙏. Thanks for checking out the video

wow, this is the first time I've heard of this technique - it makes a lot of sense to me. I hate trying to talk when learning - I've never understood the value of it - its listening that works.

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Hey Philip! It is soooooo good. Talking isn't input so it doesn't help me acquire the language. It is it's own skill admittedly but early on I would recommend everyone try this

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

@@alwayslearning7672 Yeah, one dude said no to me but the second guy I asked was fine with it. Just message a few people on iTalki - it will also help their English as it is a method for both parties to learn another language without needing to speak it (yet)

Love the channel!

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Thank you so much! 🙏🙏🙏 Still figuring it all out! 🤷‍♂️

I love this idea! There's no stress or pressure to respond in a language you are unfamiliar with, so it would make the input experience more enjoyable. I've always felt uncomfortable replying to my wife (who speaks portuguese) because it would take me ages to think of words. This has always killed the conversation, and we'd end up falling back to English. I'm going to give this a try!

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Do it! You’ll just pick up the language naturally and when your comprehension is high enough you’ll be able to start output as you’ll have a feel for the language rather than learning the rules

This seems like a fantastic strategy! Personally, I've been studying Japanese for a couple of years but haven't taken the dive to hire a tutor for the very reasons you brought up here. But, maybe I'll try to find someone willing to use this method. Where do you usually look for tutors? I've heard of iTalki, and I'm a Lingq patron... so those were the places I was thinking of looking. I'd imagine the Lingq tutors would be willing to try this out since, theoretically, they are also learning a language on the platform. I've watched a few of your videos now, and you've got a new subscriber! I'm really glad Lamont from Days of French and Swedish recommended your videos :)

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Honestly, I rave about this to anyone who listens to me. I use it with an iTalki teacher. Use the search to make sure you find a tutor who can speak English (or whatever you will speak in) and check with them first. It is such a game changer. Thank you for checking out the videos, really pleased you've liked them so far 😊

I would do the opposite. Because the input can be learned easily first with all the material available. But output with someone who could correct you is very rare.

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Each to their own. The benefit of this is that you give someone more attention when you are talking to them; there is no penalty for drifting off when listening to a podcast. Depends on the level and preference of the learner as to when they start speaking

Great idea! In Canada we encourage people speaking the 2 official languages (French and English) but it takes years to get to a good level, since we spend so much time on grammar (I personally like grammar, but I still consider it is not the most important element for a second language) Funny thing, I have said many times we should focus mostly on understanding the target language. If everybody understands, then the meetings could be bilingual, without much effort from anyone. But now that I started learning Spanish, it never crossed my mind I could use that as a strategy to get more input! I was planning on waiting until I can actually speak before getting a language partner... Your approach will probably save me a few months! Thank you!

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

It's a great method, I highly recommend it. That sounds like the perfect use of it. Once people's comprehension gets high enough they they will naturally start to speak the other language when they are ready. Let us know how you get on!

@juicyjfan

Жыл бұрын

Do you do online classes?

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

@@juicyjfan Yeah. I use iTalki with my tutor

@mariefrenchtutor3180

Жыл бұрын

@@juicyjfan Hi John! I don't know if your question was for me or for Matt... But just in case you meant online French classes: yes I do. Right now my schedule is quite full though. You wrote your comment 12 days ago so I guess you have found someone by now. If not, you can contact me in January and I'll see what I can do or if I can suggest a colleague. Have you tried Italki? I have not tried their services yet, but you can certainly find someone in your time zone. Anyhow, good luck with your learning. :)

Thanks. This approach seems quite interesting I’ll definitely try it. Do we need and if we do, at what point, to switch languages so that I will be practicing output of my desired language?

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Whenever you want - I know with ALG (this is part of ALG) they talk about people naturally start producing the language at 700 - 800 hours. Give it a go 👌

@alagunoff

10 ай бұрын

@@matt_brooks-greenIt is hard to find a native English speaker though) I didn’t find anyone) So I want to try this method with non native English speaker. Is it worth to try?

I'm crosstalking with a friend on tandem and it's amazing! It works and it's really fun and it doesn't seem odd at all. We're just sending voice messages tho

@Name-oe4fq

Жыл бұрын

But we're doing it the other way. We're both trying to improve our speaking skills in our target languages so we talk in our target languages. he speaks in my native one and he in mine.

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

That's an interesting approach. If it works for you go for it!

Reminds me of _District 9._

Do you find crosstalk is a good bridge to outputting? It seems like interacting helps bridge to speaking. I'm working with a fantastic italki teacher to help me with beginning outputting but it's so hard to speak to anyone else. Even though I'm at a pretty advanced stage (with input, not output).

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

I haven’t yet started outputting so can’t say. I know that some people start to mix and match between languages to take the pressure off having to output 100% in the TL

I know the polyglot community references Krashen and his comprehensible input hypothesis, but are they're functionally any methods/drills one can use to improve listening comprehension at conversational speed?

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Probably but you would likely get the same from massive amounts of input at the appropriate level. I think the latter would be more enjoyable and is easier to do as you can listen wherever you go, thereby getting more input. We all like different things though so have a look around - I'm sure someone will be selling a course on just that issue

Would you recommend this method for upper immediate to advanced level (learning Spanish) or best for beginners? Thanks

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Yo Big Will! Any level. Beginners will need pictures and things to understand the context, hence what I mention about drawing and noises/ acting. For upper intermediate you can just have a conversation without needing to speak Spanish. That will help with grammar acquisition I think as well as general comprehension. I know people talk about beginning to speak after about 700-800 hours of input so you might find at upper intermediate that you would prefer just to start speaking Spanish

I didn’t know this was a method it’s just what I’ve been doing with my friend I can understand most of what she says in Spanish but I still can’t speak hardly any Spanish back. Any tips on how to improve my output, I’m to the point where my compression of the input is pretty good but the ability of output is nonexistent 😅

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

This method focuses on building comprehension: when it is high enough you will be able to output so the answer weirdly is more input. Once you have a enough vocab this way then start output

7:36 Are you able record this “crosstalk” conversation for later review? If so, how? Are you using italki or zoom?

@matt_brooks-green

11 ай бұрын

Depends on your software. I have Ecamm recorder to record Skype calls. You can probably do it on Quicktime if you are a Mac user. There are loads of programs out there

I may try this. I really want to speak Korean but my level isn’t there yet. Have you used this method as a stepping stone to speaking?

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

I am sticking to just speaking in English but there is no reason you can't jump between the two depending on what you want to say

This is really interesting. How open have you found teachers to be to this method?

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

The first tutor I tried agreed so I got lucky. I did search for a tutor who said they were fluent in English. I tried a second who listed his English as very good but he wasn’t interested and from the way his worded his responses I wondered if his English wasn’t as good as he had listed. The irony is that it would have helped his English with me talking to him in English for every lesson. With the right tutor it’s great

@acido_pty8072

7 ай бұрын

Me, I am not tutor but speak Spanish, beginner, I can draw, you can draw

What do you talk about in crosstalk to run out of ideas

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

My tutor is an interesting dude and has a stash of articles or topics we chat about but we mostly catch up and talk about life

@ryanhowells9301

Жыл бұрын

@@matt_brooks-green what would suggest if I were to look for topics

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

@@ryanhowells9301 Whatever you're interested in. Any topics you found interesting podcasts, current affairs, language learning. If you don't vibe with a tutor you don't have to stick with them and you can always shop around to find someone who feels more like a friend than a teacher

Would you be open to taking a look and doing a review on "Dreaming Spanish"? A 12 part video series is provided with English subtitles for English readers. Everything about this site is 100% in Spanish and based 100% on Comprehensible Input. There are thousands of videos from Super Beginner to Advanced. I started with this site about a year ago with the Super Beginner videos and can comprehend most of the advanced videos at the time of posting this comment. Crosstalk is discussed in the video series as well as in a few of the videos. The creator agrees that crosstalk is the best way to acquire a new language.

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

Hi Paul 👋. I'm using DS at the moment. Currently have just over 600 hours of input on it. Wasn't sure when to do a review as I would like to make sure I have a good amount of experience so I can give the best summary as possible. Definitely will be talking about it soon though

@paulsandlin5811

Жыл бұрын

@@matt_brooks-green Outstanding. Looking forward to your review so I can compare my experience with yours. Mine has been very positive.

@paulsandlin5811

Жыл бұрын

@@matt_brooks-green By the way, I also purchased Ollie's beginning Spanish book recently. It has been useful, but not as powerful as listening and watching videos with drawings, pictures, gestures, etc...But, I do appreciate the added contribution from reading to my acquisition journey.

@matt_brooks-green

Жыл бұрын

@@paulsandlin5811 Yeah, everything helps. I still need to find some REALLY compelling graded readers in Spanish too

I speak Spanish, I am studying English, I am beginner , anyone

Interesting way to learn listening to another language.

Je cherche une personne francaise qui veux faire une exchange crosstalk. Repondez si vous voulez. Merci! I am looking for a French person to do crosstalk with. Respond if you would like to! 🙌