What is Hardest- Reading, Writing, or Speaking?

[apexa1]

For me speaking is definitely the hardest. Holding a conversation with a native speaker that isn't aware you're still learning is extremely frustrating. Especially when you don't know how to ask them to please slow down lol. But yeah reading and writing is easy enough for me atleast.

[CeliVega]

For me I have more difficulties in speaking and listening compared to reading and writing. Take English for example. The way people from different countries speak English is different depending from where they are from. The accents and tones that they use might be mixed with their own native languages, making it hard to listen or communicate with them sometimes. But it's not a problem if you communicate with them on a regular basis though. I guess the more you talk with someone, the more you get to understand the messages that they are trying to convey.

[fluffyducky]

I find writing the hardest actually, with reading even though you may not know some words you can guess at their meanings, listening somehow has always been easy for me, and speaking is really easy too once I understand enough stuff to form a sentence. My brain just can't remember all the characters to write though.

[Caffajake]

Speaking is definitely the hardest for me. I'm not very good at improvising on the spot - I can express myself much better in writing, where I have time to think about what I want to say, the best way to say it, what words and grammar I should use and I can change it if I get it wrong. In speaking I find it hard to think of the words I want to use and I can't look anything up. I also find listening to a conversation quite hard, especially when the native speaker talks quite fast.

[Linguetronix]

For me, it is definitely speaking at a fast enough pace/listening to fast speech, followed by writing. Though, writing almost always seems tougher.

[qaximor]

Ughh Speaking. For me I've been studying German for the past 2 years and yet I can't speak really well because of the pronunciation and the fear of making a mistake while talking! I can ready and write well and even listen but not speak!

[Lithium]

It depends. If you need to learn a new alphabet, writing is the hardest of all. But usually, speaking is the ultimate test. If you can speak the language, then you can say you master it.

[Gmac9100]

The hardest thing for me to is writing, because have learn a totally different way of spelling, and punctuation. While at the same time desensitizing yourself to your native grammar. It is very difficult to do. Especially at first, but after a while you get the hang of it.

[Diprotodon]

Speaking is, without a doubt, the hardest part for me. I think that's partially due to me being a bit of a perfectionist. I am terrified of making mistakes with a new language, and that's one of the major things I'm going to have to overcome if I want to get a really good grasp on my new languages.

On that note, reading is the easiest for me, followed by writing. I can pick up reading a new language VERY fast, but struggle to "come up with" new words and grammar.

[Victor Leigh]

Ughh Speaking. For me I've been studying German for the past 2 years and yet I can't speak really well because of the pronunciation and the fear of making a mistake while talking! I can ready and write well and even listen but not speak!

Have you tried singing songs in German? I was told that the Germans have got songs for just about everything. Drinking songs, jogging songs, marching songs, etc. When I teach the kids how not to speak Engrish, I teach them via singing. It's helps them to get over the mental block of vocalizing in a foreign language.

[JohnSword]

I'm learning Spanish now, and I would say that speaking is the most difficult aspect for me at the moment. Writing and reading aren't too bad, since English and Spanish both use alphabets. However, I'm having a hard time mastering the pronunciation, such the rolled 'r'.

Hopefully I'll speak better with more practice.

[WeDontSleep]

For me it's speaking, maybe I just have some social barrier that I can't break because of fear of getting laughed at because I will say something that makes absolutely no sense But that's only when I'm not familiar enough, later on, when I have full comprehension of every word I'm about to say, I lose that fear.

[JeronimoMagalhaes]

It depends on the language. But in Asian langauges, writing becomes a real challenge, I actually failed college because of that!

[Victor Leigh]

It depends on the language. But in Asian langauges, writing becomes a real challenge, I actually failed college because of that!

Yes, writing in Asian languages can be a real challenge unless they are using an alphabet similar to English. In this respect, you may not have much problem in learning to write Malay or Tagalog because they use the same alphabet as English. Thai is a totally different kettle of fish altogether.

[thestarsshine]

I would assume that depends on what language you speak natively, and which language you are learning. A native English speaker would probably have a reasonably easy time writing/reading a romance language, but a lot harder time writing/reading one with a completely different alphabet.

For me, listening in Japanese is far easier than any of the other things. I can read okay, but my knowledge of kanji is limited, which causes problems. Even fewer are the kanji that I can actually write. I could probably get by pretty dang well if everything had furigana. 

Kana was all surprisingly easy for me to learn, though! I think the phonetics really helped. I imagine it would be really difficult for someone used to phonetic spelling to learn English. Our rules are so arbitrary and weird!

[GoldRose]

I think that writing is the hardest part of the learning process...Of course it all depends on the language too...I think that pronunciation is also complicated part too...Of course it is also a different story for different languages...In Spanish for example we have a steady rules in terms of pronunciation  and once we learn them we can pronounce almost everything ....On the other hand what is difficult for one person may not be difficult for other...I think that difficulty depends on many aspects...

[ericdlee]

Definitely speaking for me. I wouldn't be able to take time to calculate what is the proper way to make a sentence.

Even when I speak my mother tongue,  u sometimes make no sense. Though when I write, I can always look over what I wrote before send.

[Esperahol]

I am an excellent reader in most of my languages, however I am only an adequate writer in anything besides English. That said I can speak fairly well with my best results in Spanish, but I sometimes have difficulty with listening depending on the language and unfortunately the dialect.

[extrafancyganza]

I definitely think writing is the most difficult. When writing, you can stop and think about what you're gonna write and you don't have to worry about pronunciation.

[Jrh2]

I think speaking I the hardest thing about a new language. Reading is easy as I learn by reading the new words so I have known them by how they are spelt, writing is reasonably easy as like previously, I have learnt them by reading the new words so find it easy to imagine in my head and write down. Speaking is the hardest as it is hard to get the words to sound right when you don't have the accent which it is spoken in. I have tried to say something to a French child once in french, as did the other two people with me, and the child didn't understand anything the three of us said but when we asked her to translate it from English she said the same as us but with the accent. I think speaking it correctly will take plenty of practice.

[sgreenwood]

I think the natural progression of language learning is to first learn to speak it. Personally I think reading it comes next, and then writing.

[greggreggerson]

I would say that speaking is the hardest. Being able to respond to someone else's comments in a foreign language is very difficult to do.

[tinytinsparrow]

It is definitely speaking for me. The Korean writing system (compared to most other Asian languages) is pretty simple and doesn't require a lot time to learn it. When someone is speaking to me, I can catch the different ways their vowels are rounded and the slight differences in certain consonants. However, I'm not super skilled in managing to get those across and sometimes and the creator of confusion. I guess it's just about accents and further acclimating myself to the language.

[IndianapolisJones]

I would argue that it depends on the language that you're trying to learn. I bet that learning how to write Japanese would be incredibly difficult, whereas writing Spanish is relatively easier. Speaking Italian would be difficult for me because it sounds like such a bouncy language. Reading Chinese is quite difficult for me, especially because there's no phonetics. If you don't know a word, you can guess it's meaning based on the characters, but the pronunciation is much more difficult to figure out.

[Lacey]

I think that it would be writing, then speaking, then reading.  There are so many variations when it comes to writing new languages.  There are different characters or accents and to get the conjugation down so it makes sense to a reader is very difficult.  Speaking would be next because you again have to deal with an accent or putting an accent on the correct syllable to make the correct word.  Reading doesn't seem to be to difficult just because once you do learn the sounds, reading is quite easy to do in other languages.