Ever Get Frustrated

[Lin]

Have you every met upon anything in particular that makes you frustrated when learning languages?  :frozen:For me, it is my inability to understand the spoken words in the particular foreign language (especially when it is spoken fast).

I find it much easier to read and understand, than to listen and understand. What about you?

[steve1]

For me, it was the unique peculiarities of each language. For example, Spanish has the "r" tongue rolls and the "n" wave sounds. These threw me off a lot when I first started learning the language and really deterred me from speaking for quite awhile until I got used to them.

I agree with you about it being easier to read than to listen. Reading you can do at your own pace, and there aren't any local accents that can throw you off. Most native speakers tend to speak relatively fast and make it frustrating, albeit unintentionally, for people trying to learn the language.

[TheJamal]

I struggle greatly with the aural aspect of a new language, especially when it comes from a native speaker. My original Spanish teacher in high school was not a native speaker, so it was really difficult for me to pick up the "slang" and the accent of a native speaker.

Also, I had some troubles adjusting to the speed of just a normal conversation not with a fellow student or teacher.

[Antiquarian]

I get frustrated when learning Japanese, for the language has many different styles of speaking. In Japanese, you have Formal Speech where you are required to speak with politeness and utmost elegance. Then you have separate speaking styles reserved for men and women only. In Japanese, women and men have their own style of speaking - which makes it even more complex.

And the tricky thing is that if your language teacher is a female, and if you end up speaking Japanese like a female would, then locals would find your Japanese curious and mistake you for being feminine 

In addition, there are many cases where you cannot get direct translations from English to Japanese. Because in Japanese, one word can have a multitude of meanings.

Another language which I get frustrated on is Sanskrit. Sanskrit itself is considered to be an ancestor of formal grammar - and grammar can get really, really complicated. To make situations harder, Sanskrit is an extinct language not spoken by many today.

Vice versa, Japanese people get frustrated when learning English. They would complain that English pronunciations (especially consonants) are hard and they feel pressured when talking fast in English 

Lastly, I always get frustrated when learning another language's alphabet. Bah.

Regards,

The Antiquarian.

[pandandesign]

I don't usually get frustrated because I often manage to learn the language by using various sources. I do get frustrated when I don't understand what people say sometimes because I want to be able to fully understand. I guess no matter how well you know the language, you still have to keep learning. If I can't keep learning the language for some reason, I would just quit learning because frustration will only make things worst.

[True2marie]

I get frustrated with accents and speed. As with my native language of English, understanding what someone's saying to you if they speak extraordinarily face or have a strange accent is hard. You have to develop an ear for it and/or ask the person to slow down or speak more clearly.

[Humbleman]

For me, it was the unique peculiarities of each language. For example, Spanish has the "r" tongue rolls and the "n" wave sounds. These threw me off a lot when I first started learning the language and really deterred me from speaking for quite awhile until I got used to them.

I agree with you about it being easier to read than to listen. Reading you can do at your own pace, and there aren't any local accents that can throw you off. Most native speakers tend to speak relatively fast and make it frustrating, albeit unintentionally, for people trying to learn the language.

That is so true. When reading, you can do it at your own leisure in most cases; and for a word or a phrase that you are not able to immediately grasp, you can also review it. The other thing about it though, is that you have persons who study foreign languages and they are, for some reason, better at quickly understanding a statement by virtue of how it sounds, and are slower at getting what is being said just by the look of things. I don't know if that's what Lin was talking about?

[Humbleman]

Have you every met upon anything in particular that makes you frustrated when learning languages?  :frozen:For me, it is my inability to understand the spoken words in the particular foreign language (especially when it is spoken fast).

I find it much easier to read and understand, than to listen and understand. What about you?

I think it's quite human and ok to get frustrated. It's just what we allow the frustration to lead us to. When studying a foreign language, I naturally get frustrated at the things that cause me to fumble and itch, however this frustration usually leads me to work harder. What I do is to take a break, and come back again. I sometimes even seek counsel from someone who already knows the language.

What gets me frustrated most times is just the meaning of words. There are some words that you can immediately look on/listen to and connect them to a native English word; whilst there are words that are the exact opposite of this. I usually end up having to repeatedly revise words and this frustrates me. Memorization is my problem.

[sidney]

I get frustrated with learning how to pronounce certain words and how to properly form a correct and fluent sentence, because those things are best learned with a tutor or a person who speaks that foreign language fluently.

[pandandesign]

Yes, same here. I am better with reading and writing than speaking, well, probably not understand because I am able to understand well enough because I have learned my second language for a long time. I do practice my speaking skills, which is the reason I take debating classes to practice myself. That way, I am not afraid to speak the language like I used to.

[Trellum]

I feel very frustrated right now with Dutch in general, but what upsets me the most is the pronunciation of most words!  Gosh, the words are spelled in a way you could never guess how it should be pronounced!!! Is it me or this language has way too many consonants together?!  It's nuts!!! 

This is one of the aspects that frustrate me the most about this language. I wish I had to learn norwegian instead   For some reason learning norwegian was so easy, and the pronunciation of the words was so natural. I noticed this since the start. Dutch is the opposite   No idea what I'm doing!

[Rosa]

I too get a little frustrated at the speed of which a native sometimes speak. I also have trouble with accent sometimes too. In high school,I would do terrible at listening to the audios in order to translate but surprisingly I did very well with the writing exercises.

[fredkawig]

I don't get frustrated with language interplay. I actually get excited and it gets me going and on the hype. With exception to Chinese and Korean, those kinds of language really infuriate me. It's like a couple of Chickens talking. No offense though XD

[LivetoErr]

I find almost everything about Spanish frustrating.

It's such a fast spoken language and some of the words mean so many different things. How are you supposed to know the meaning of "como" when you can't really understand what the rest of the sentence is?

I hear everything in Spanish sounds like one word. Even when I use Duolingo, which doesn't speak as fast as native speakers, I have to repeat the sound bite two or three times before I'm catching every word. I try and close my eyes while listening to her speak so, I can learn to hear better. It's slowly starting to work.

I just find it extremely frustrating how a lot of their words mean so many different things. Sometimes, when you look up a word in the dictionary, you find 15, completely different, uses for the word. My dad likes to say, they threw a bunch of words in the air and whatever one came down first means whatever they were trying to define. Sometimes, it really feels like that's how it is and that is frustrating.

[marmunmrhundun]

I use to get frustrated when I could not understand what was being taught to me in a different language then I had to do the work on a english worksheet. However I have not faced this problem since I was in highschool. I mean who wouldn't get mad if they could not understand a certain language.

[thekernel]

Oddly enough, I found learning Spanish to be the exact opposite of frustrating. Everything makes sense in Spanish. Accents only indicate emphasis, all the letters always sound the same...The only challenging part was understanding native speakers because of their natural speed with their mother tongue, but that's a challenge everyone faces with language learning.

[Peninha]

I think we all were frustrated in the process of learning a language, simply because it's not easy, it's really a hard process that requires effort and determination from our part, so when we put in all we have and even so we seem to be getting no where, surely it's frustrating!

[kitkat0124]

There are times that I still get frustrated if can't recall the correct term to be used in the middle of a conversation. Another reason is when I can't understand some of the words being used by the person I'm talking too. It makes me feel so stupid.

[Baburra]

Pronunciation often frustrates me. I want to be as accurate as possible when speaking a foreign language and on some languages closer to my mother tongue, I can mostly pull it off. However, when it comes to languages that are very far from my own, namely French, it's hard to correct my own tongue and even with lots of practice it's hard to get right.

[wander_n_wonder]

I get frustrated when I'm trying to learn a new language and when I try to speak up using it, people laugh.  That's really frustrating because I can feel that people are not supportive of my initiative to learn.  I also find that rather rude.

[Rosa]

Learning a new language is never an easy journey. I too get frustrated when studying Spanish. My frustration came from trying to roll the r and forgetting a word or two when making sentences.When I got over that everything was smooth sailing.

[Daimashin]

Learning the grammar of a language is the part that most frustrates me. It's so complicated sometimes like when to use a certain word, adjective, and etc. Basically, to construct a grammatically correct sentence be it spoken or written is always frustrating to me.

[SarahRTW]

Learning a language, especially a complicated one like English or French, is definitely frustrating.    I find the most frustrating period is when I know enough to understand what is being said, but  not enough to properly respond.  I feel so inadequate but also encouraged that I do understand what's being said.

[dorannmwin]

For me, the thing that I find to be the most frustrating is when I am trying to converse in Spanish and I just completely lose a word that I'm looking for. I hate it when I have to stop in the middle of what I am saying and ask how you say a specific word.