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The statistics you presented may just be true to everyday conversation. As given, they're mostly "common words". While it may be true that someone has memorized or is very familiar with 100% common words of a specific language, that person's word database is at best still limited to "common words". Thus, the words in that list may not be represented nor is commonly used in newspaper reporting. I guess, what's common in everyday language may just be different to what's common in newspaper writing. Thus, it's expected that comprehension of newspaper articles might not be that great yet. As the others said, due to space limitation, reporters tend to use the most 'apt' word for their story. Thus, not much explanation or sample contexts might be given. Also consider the purpose of news article writing. Mostly, newspaper writing's goal is to present 'facts' without embellishments compared to novels where authors are expected to be more descriptive.

Language games help learning only to a certain extent. But this opinion is limited to games I've only used before. Most language games I knew then were most on vocabulary building. In increasing the number of words you know in the new language you're learning, then games help make the learning fun. But if you're talking about being able to help building your writing and speaking skills, I think language games become wanting. That said, language games to me are helpful at the very beginning stage of language learning.

@Mark Skype Teacher Off the top of my head, both sentences are awkward structurally. Problem to me is wrong choice of OBJECT. Thus, both sentences don't sound right. Subject is 'thing' - Are "Spaniards" things? The worst thing is the color. The worst thing is its smell. The worst thing is Spanish. (correct in reference to the Spanish language) Blaveloper's second example is OK, changing 'thing' to 'people'. So, use of ARE becomes correct, and sentence doesn't sound awkward. The worst people ARE Spaniards.

Off the top of my head, I don't think it will work for me. While a higher pay is always a good motivator, I highly doubt it can sustain my interest in learning the language. At least, I don't think I'll start off the language learning journey because of the goal to land a job. However, my response would be different if I'm already part of a company and in the course of my employment with that company a necessity arise and language learning becomes part of my responsibility, I think I can rise up to the challenge when needed. I would want to learn the language to keep the job I already love, hehe.

A good motivation for me would be to establish the goal and make it specific. As in making goals, it's important to set up a date as to when you wish to accomplish that goal. I guess having a set date can provide a sense of urgency. But I guess before anything else, it's best to reexamine the reason/s or your WHYs of learning the language in the first place. When you begin to ask yourself why you want to learn the language, you are reminded of why putting up time to study for it is worth your time. If you don't see the worth of learning the language, I doubt if you'll really put in the time to study. So, a constant reminder of your whys I think can help you motivate. Otherwise, perhaps it's not time yet and your interest lies elsewhere for the time being.

I personally find nothing wrong with the Philippines having as many dialects as there are islands. To me, Filipino and English being two languages widely spoken throughout the archipelago is enough for all the country's citizens to understand each other. True, there are those who aren't fluent in either languages, but I highly doubt fluency in one language is key to a country's unity. There are many countries in the world that observe one language, and yet we still hear of chaos in the news. The many dialects in our country adds more beauty and texture to our culture. I kind of like the diversity going on with us having many dialects throughout the country. If there's one thing I observe, if one is keen on understanding one's neighbor, language is just one component of it. People might be speaking one language, and yet no natural curiosity to get to know the other, in which case there's really nothing language can do to that regard.

Thank you for your generosity! When I first read the thread, I thought something was wrong since there was no FREE coupon as first mentioned. I guess I wasn't too quick and the first 100 was easily snatched by others. Luckily, I came back here. I was about to comment that the classes weren't free, but charged $25 for the lessons, and then your second post mentioning you just added 500 additional FREE coupons got my attention. I just signed up myself. Once again, thank you very much for your generosity.

That's a very interesting motivation! Intimidation works reverse in my case. If people around me acquires the language more quickly and is now able to communicate with each other, I tend to cower and give up entirely. That's probably the reason that it takes me a while to learn a language. I remembered one time in our Korean language class at work, I'm one of the poor performer, as I tend to get lost at the lessons quite easily, haha! That only means I never learned Korean at all. Too bad. If I were to learn a language, my motivation probably is if it's required in my work. Then, I'll be obliged to learn. In my previous work before, it was just for fun, and not really required. It's probably why I wasn't too serious about learning Korean.

I'm curious. What do you mean by 'baby language'? Are you talking about the literal language that babies use? Anyway, off the top of my head baby language to me is part of the natural process of language acquisition. Whatever the language the baby is exposed to, s/he will go through the process of learning from people around. The baby's language is formed through imitation firstly, which the baby does through babbling etc. to learning one word at a time, to phrases, until child acquires the language and starts talking in meaningful sentence.

Hi Hi! I asked a former colleague from work and asked if he could translate it for me. The texts are indeed Hangul, and according to my Korean colleague, the writing means the following: Lee, Youngae 1969.07.16 to celebrate the visit of Gwangju, Korea Hope this helps

Still hopeful that this thread will be revived and more and more people will pitch in. Anyway, one of my favorite books that I came across back while I was a university student was a book called Das Energi by Paul Williams. It was written sometime in the 70s. This was just a very thin book, and what caught me was the form of writing. It wasn't verbose. The thoughts to me are short and direct (at least to my mind). Here's one of the quotes I like in that book talking about GUILT. Guilt is a form of self-hatred ... Also of self-indulgence. No one benefits from your feeling guilty. Except you—you use guilt to shield yourself from the pain of awareness. When you short-circuit your energy, you cheat us all. Then use that as excuse for further short-circuiting. / There is a way out of this trap. Don't feel guilty. Don't cop out. Accept responsibility for your actions. Do what's right. Don't live in the past. Learn from the past. Do right in the present.

Oh, wow! I just checked the link. This museum is pretty neat! This just taps on my love for museums. It looks like the Louvre has a competition now. Of course I realize that there's no comparing the Louvre. But this mundolingua museum is like heaven to any self-professed linguist. Amazing features and only for 7 € as entrance for adults. If I could only fly to Paris now. Oh, one could just dream.

No problem. Hey, you might want to check out the YouTube Channel called SpanishPod101. They offer some lessons that you might find helpful. Some of those lessons include Spanish Words for Every Day Use, Must-Know Spanish phrases, Spanish Listening practice, etc. Also, why look elsewhere, check out this forum's Spanish Thread: http://linguaholic.com/forum/80-spanish-language-learning/ It features the usual General Discussion section, Vocabulary, Idioms, Grammar, Literature, and Spanish Lounge for Spanish only conversations. Good luck, mate!

The technology that is the Internet, and especially YouTube is definitely a game-changer in language learning. In the past, there are too few websites offering free learning resources. But because the technology has improved greatly and many traditional companies have learned and accepted the value of the world wide web, most of them have shifted or at least added being online or having Internet presence to their business model. Gone are the days when we literally have to seek out traditional language learning schools. Not to mention, these schools demand pretty steep prices. Free language learning tools have indeed given traditional school a run for its money. As such, to those who don't have much extra money to spare, seeking out the free online tools become important. While I acknowledge this phenomenon, it is my belief that it will still boil down to how a person thinks about learning. Some people are of the mindset that only paid learning offers results. Thus, they go for that. But there are others who can equally vouch that even with free tools, one can still learn as much as those taught by professionals.

This question makes me recall a co-worker who got worried about his 3-year old daughter. Since they live in our hometown, the main language is Bisaya (Cebuano). Most of their relatives now live in the capital (Manila) where the main language spoken is Filipino(Tagalog). So, they want to teach their daughter this language so she can relate to her cousins when they visit. Lastly, in preparation for school, they want her to learn English. Basically, they spoke and taught the 3 languages at the same time to the child. The child ended up confused, and barely spoke. So, when he came to me, I advised him to focus on one language first. At least to develop a mother tongue. When he did that, the child just started to talk and her speech greatly improved. While I understand that language acquisition is different between a child and an adult, I can't help but wonder that perhaps we are meant to learn a language one at a time. That is, to cement one language first before taking on another language. But then again, as others have mentioned, we all have different learning curves. As for me, I'd go with one language at a time remembering a lesson back in college to consider language as a tree. It won't flourish if the roots (the fundamentals of target language), aren't firmly rooted on the ground.