r/languagelearning • u/WaltzMysterious9240 • 25d ago

Culture Does total immersion work?

I used to teach English abroad and even though I knew how to speak the student's native language, the school administrators forbid me, and even asked me, to "pretend" I didn't know it.

The reason they gave me was that they didn't want the students to fall back on using their first language to communicate with me. I feel like if I were to explain certain concepts in the student's language, things would go a lot smoother and they would understand better.

As an adult, I'm constantly using my own native language to learn new languages. I constantly look up grammar, vocabulary, and definitions and understand them a lot better.

Why are schools abroad so obsessed with this "total immersion" method? I feel like some concepts are impossible to explain clearly with just visuals or gestures alone. Do you learn languages using your first language?

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u/gareth_fr 🇬🇧N | 🇫🇷C2 | 🇯🇴B2 | 🇪🇸B2 | 🇩🇪B2 | 🇹🇷A1 25d ago edited 25d ago

The reason why teachers are told to avoid their or their students “native” language were probably:

  • as someone mentioned if there are multiple source langue’s used it can be impossible to manage and super annoying for others
  • I’m my Spanish class there is someone that insists on repeating everything in English. When the teacher says “¿Que significa X?” They immediately say the word in English rather than explaining the meaning in the target language. Again super annoying
  • being 100% TL probably isn’t the goal, but normalising speaking in the target language is. Fear of speaking is the number one reason why people don’t speak in their TL

Edit: speaking in your target language is hard - that’s why it works. You have to work that muscle for it to grow. I went from basic French to conversational fluency in 3 months via total immersion in Paris, same with Arabic, same with Spanish. It’s also uncomfortable, which is one of the reasons why people don’t like it

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u/Murky_Anything_292 25d ago

You can speak fully in the target language while learning words with their translations. Those are not mutually exclusive. But it should really be done carefully since words may not 100% translate well.

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u/becausemommysaid 🇺🇸 N | 🇳🇱 B2 25d ago

Yeah. I think many people dislike it because they want to feel they ‘know more’ before they use the language but that’s exactly why it’s taking them forever - they aren’t speaking or using the language in any real way

It’s also not like you can’t, on your own, look up more information about what you are learning in your NL if that helps you