Alkanadi:People who finished Part 1 - 17,266
People who finished Part 8 - 3,394

14 thousand people started but didn't finish Ana Pana. Can we say that the water is clean when people don't want to drink it?

You'd have to compare the start versus finish rates for other language courses to see whether this particular course has unusual numbers. Do you have similar numbers for Pimsleur, Rosetta Stone, other courses that you were referring to as "high quality"?

Alkanadi:So why do eternal beginners exist in any field? Ego drives us to be the best that we can be. Ego doesn't want us to be mediocre.

Are you saying that you became proficient at every skill that you ever started learning? If so, that is truly remarkable.

There's a force on this earth that is more powerful than ego, and it's laziness and inaction. Why yes, I COULD spend 30 minutes working on a language course or working out at the gym or cleaning my house this evening - or else I could sit and watch television or read a book instead! Which do you think most people choose, based on rates of obesity, language proficiency, and clean houses, versus TV ratings for popular programs?

There is a Jewish practice that involves counting 49 days at a certain time of year. It is a commandment and if you are observant, you try hard to get it right. To do it correctly, you must say a blessing and count the day each day. Literally all you have to do is say two sentences (one blessing and one sentence counting the day), every night or morning for 49 days. If you miss a day, then you've messed it up, and while you can continue to count, it no longer really counts for the commandment, so you can't continue with the blessing, you'd say only the second sentence but not the first. A LOT of people mess it up and don't make it to 49 with the blessing. They have free and paid counting calendars to remind you, people put counting apps on their phones and subscribe to e-mail alerts and use cell phone reminder alarms and signs on the wall, whatever works for them. And people STILL mess it up, and throughout the period, beginning to end, you hear people share frustrated stories of how they messed it up and missed a day.

This is a religious requirement, meaning people take it seriously and try hard to get it right. It is nothing but saying two sentences a day for a month and a half. And lots of people still don't manage to do it, in spite of the high quality infrastructure of support resources for not messing up your count.

If learning a new language required nothing but saying one sentence every day for a year to become proficient, there is zero doubt in my mind that many people still would not manage to do this and the completion rate would still be less than 50%.

dbob:
You would need to ask each of those 17 266 persons why they didn't finish that course in order to know if the "water" is the problem. I am one of those 3 394 who finished the course. For me the "water" is ok and that makes me think the problem lies elsewhere.

I finished it too, mostly out of bloody-mindedness or masochism, take your pick. I had no desire to go on to Ana Renkontas. I prefer methods aimed at intelligent adults (or even intelligent children), when and where such methods can be found.

Bruso:

dbob:
You would need to ask each of those 17 266 persons why they didn't finish that course in order to know if the "water" is the problem. I am one of those 3 394 who finished the course. For me the "water" is ok and that makes me think the problem lies elsewhere.

I finished it too, mostly out of bloody-mindedness or masochism, take your pick. I had no desire to go on to Ana Renkontas. I prefer methods aimed at intelligent adults (or even intelligent children), when and where such methods can be found.

It's exceptionally hard to make a fun and interesting beginner course for a language. It's hard to incorporate an interesting story when there's a certain amount of boring vocabulary that needs to be taught. Or you can go with random phrases (no story) and some people like that better, and some are bored to tears by it.

Ana Pana won't be around anymore (except in the library as a reference for whoever wants it) in the new lernu, it will be a different and much longer story, and we hope, one that is more interesting. But this was something we and the author struggled with, how to make an interesting story that is still grammatically basic enough to be used as a beginner course.

Gerda Malaperis is an example of this. It bored me to tears and I finished reading the story (no exercises, I was already an experienced speaker) only out of an insane masochistic desire to say I'd read it. Some people love it! Not everyone will love every story, and Gerda was a more serious attempt than most to make an engaging story out of a beginner course.

erinja:
Gerda Malaperis is an example of this. It bored me to tears and I finished reading the story (no exercises, I was already an experienced speaker) only out of an insane masochistic desire to say I'd read it. Some people love it! Not everyone will love every story, and Gerda was a more serious attempt than most to make an engaging story out of a beginner course.

The early chapters of Gerda Malaperis are mind-numbing unless you're a complete beginner, but the rest was a reasonably interesting story for learning purposes. Gerda trumps Ana in my book.

Alkanadi:This thread is starting to shift focus towards me.

You got it quite late, but you got it.

Alkanadi:Putting me aside, I think that we have a lot eternal beginners because people need to be spoon fed.

What you feel yourself that doesn't have to be same your fellows feel.

Alkanadi:The tools are inadequate.

Or the tools are not handeled properly.

erinja:Gerda Malaperis is an example of this. It bored me to tears

Bruso:The early chapters of Gerda Malaperis are mind-numbing unless you're a complete beginner, but the rest was a reasonably interesting story

All of this is subjective. Ultimately, what matters is to learn. What works for some, may not work for others, so the more learning tools available, the better. However, as cliché as it might sound, the best tool for learning something is your own motivation.

I am not an 'eternal student' yet but I do not think the problem are the educational materials. I got into Esperanto because I wanted to learn more about conlangs and I decided to start learning the basics of the most well known. I read "Teach Yourself" and now I can read or write with help of a dictionary.

But now, what?

I cannot keep a conversation well, so no point in Pasaporta Servo or the big Esperanto meetings yet. I was going -and I am going- to try something like Koresponda Servo, maybe I will ramble in this forum a bit too, and read some of Esperanto literature. Maybe there is more, but it does not seem to advertise itself well.

I came here to learn the grammar of the language and I enjoyed it but I can see other learners feeling lost a probably dissapointed. They need to jump into the action at some time.

buruno:I cannot keep a conversation well, so no point in Pasaporta Servo or the big Esperanto meetings yet. I was going -and I am going- to try something like Koresponda Servo, maybe I will ramble in this forum a bit too, and read some of Esperanto literature. Maybe there is more, but it does not seem to advertise itself well.

Even if you do not converse well, I really encourage you to attend an Esperanto event. Maybe not a very large Esperanto meeting (it is easy to get lost in the crowd) but a smaller one would be great, or else one of the events, like SES in Slovakia, that is like a combination of a week-long course and an Esperanto event with concerts and excursions.

If you are in Europe, there are multiple choices. SES is not being held this summer, due to the UK in Slovakia, but Castle Gresillon in France is having a similar event. There is a week-long course in the UK that is pretty low-key and friendly, it is smaller than some other events and there aren't that many excursions but the people are really nice and it's a relaxed atmosphere. There is a week-long summer course in the US, NASK, and there used to be a week-long summer course (in January) in Australia, but I'm not sure if that one is still active.

But if you're in Europe, travel isn't that difficult or expensive and it's easy to arrange to go to a smaller event. People are used to beginners attending, you don't have to be fluent, and if you go to something outside your home country, it helps force you to speak more Esperanto and you will progress faster than you think. I know a few of these smaller events in the US and Canada, I am not so familiar with the European ones. At any rate you should perhaps contact your national association and ask them about smaller meetings, if you haven't done that already. Interacting in person is the best way to learn once you have completed a course, even if at first your attempts at conversation are terrible.

Because many English-speaking people are monolingual, they have no idea how to proceed past the basics. They may know nothing about ordinary practices such as mentally rehearsing conversations, building vocabulary in "clusters" that go from most general to most specific (I.E., learning "bird" before learning "sparrow" or "wren", etc.), and they've possibly never thought about the real meaning of abstract grammar concepts. People who have never studied a foreign language to any great extent usually only have a shallow understanding of the underlying structure of their own--so when faced with the prospect of relying on their background knowledge to ferret out the intricacies of another language's grammar (particularly one that they're trying to teach themselves out of a book or off the Internet) the task gets daunting.

Esperanto is often billed as being "easy", and that is misleading. People assume that "easy" means "quick and effortless". Esperanto grammar is comparatively simple, but there is still a learning curve, and that curve is somewhat steep at times. There is really no such thing as an "easy" language--there is always some "grunt work" involved, and it's a marathon rather than a sprint. Autodidacts (people used to teaching themselves or learning on their own) tend to know how they learn and what to do; however, most people are not autodidactic.

So what about available materials? There definitely IS a need for mid-level, intermediate material. Grammar exercises (that include the answers and explanations) and good, CONTEMPORARY readings (particularly about current events or interesting topics) would be fantastic. But ultimately, two factors are key: 1) how badly do you really want it, and 2) are you "in it" for the long haul? Those two factors trump natural ability, availability of good materials, and even self-teaching ability. If you want to bad enough, you'll keep at it till you find a way.

When I was a teenager, I REALLY wanted to learn Spanish...in the worst way. I was not a good student (ADHD, disorganized, sloppy and not into paperwork...), but I really wanted to learn Spanish. I asked my Spanish One teacher how long it would take to be able to use the language...she said "three years". I BELIEVED HER! Nobody had told me that most language students just dabble with the language and never really acquire any workable skills.

When I wasn't satisfied with my progress, I started going home and listening to shortwave radio broadcasts. I'd listen to international news--catching ever word I could, looking things up in the dictionary...and I read, pushed myself, and I read everything I could get my hands on. We didn't have the Internet back then, and my Spanish Three teacher at school couldn't speak Spanish to save her life. The result, by the time I was 17 or 18, I was able to hold my own in Spanish. Then I made Hispanic friends and started hanging out with them, I was well on my way.

All of that to say this--Esperanto is NOT so hard to acquire as Spanish, and there is a wealth of resources available...for FREE no less. Yes, there is room for improvement in material development and availability, but no factor is more important than individual initiative.

Polaris:When I wasn't satisfied with my progress, I started going home and listening to shortwave radio broadcasts. I'd listen to international news--catching ever word I could, looking things up in the dictionary...and I read, pushed myself, and I read everything I could get my hands on. We didn't have the Internet back then, and my Spanish Three teacher at school couldn't speak Spanish to save her life. The reasult, by the time I was 17 or 18, I was able to hold my own in Spanish. Then I made Hispanic friends and started hanging out with them, I was well on my way.

Effort makes such a difference, doesn't it? I saw so many classmates go through four or six years of classes in a foreign language and still not be able to really operate in that language. And then the one or two, a small percentage, who actually put effort into it and came out speaking well enough to go to study abroad programs in countries that spoke the language they studied. They all took the exact same classes but it was so easy in class to just skate by and not really learn. The effective learning took place outside of class, in the effort not just to do exercises out of the book but to go and encounter the language in authentic settings (tv, music, periodicals) and use it with real speakers.

Incidentally it's amazing what an influence teachers can have, positive or negative. A well-known Esperanto speaker once told me that he learned Esperanto because his school German teacher told him that he would never be capable of learning a foreign language, and he set out to prove this teacher wrong, so he picked the easiest language he could think of, which was Esperanto.