Learn three years worth of English in one month!

“Learn three years worth of English in one month!” No, really. In one month memorize 7000 words, read and comprehend English language newspapers and listen and understand CCTV 9 news.

At least, that’s what the spam wedged into my door claims are the results one teacher from Shandong Teachers University can produce. I wonder what Ken Carroll at ChinesePod.com/blog would think of this ad. He’s not too friendly towards pedagogical rubbish like this.

I like the use of the word “memorize” in the advertisement. Chinese use the word ?, ji, to memorize, in combination with new words in language learning. In other words, in the Chinese language you don’t “learn” new words, you “memorize” or “remember” new words, and there most definitely is a real world and not just some pedantic semantic difference between “learn” and “memorize”. For example, try engaging a typical Chinese university English student in conversation at normal speed and you will find that the student understands little to none of what you have said and is unable to carry out a conversation with you, although she likely knows all the words you have used. Now try engaging a typical German/French/Russian/Arab/Indian/Nepalese university English student in conversation at normal speed and you will find that the student understands everything you have said and is able to carry on a conversation. At least, that has been my experience time and again. I’m not claiming that the language of those nationalities “learns” vocabulary rather than “memorizes” vocabulary, I have no idea what verb they use in this instance, but I am claiming that those students are “learning” the words rather than just “memorizing” the words. Ie., they are “learning” how to understand and use the words, not “memorizing” how to understand and use the words. You don’t “memorize” how to use a word.

In this light then, the spam rings true. I believe the claim that you can memorize 7000 words in four weeks. It wouldn’t be too hard, just 250 words a day, or one word every two minutes eight hours a day. Furthermore, for every verb you learn in English you’ve really learned like three or more different words. Just think: be, being, been, am, is, are, was, were; go, gone, going, goes; call, called, calling, calls; etc.

Of course, there is no way one would be able to read and understand a newspaper or listen and understand CCTV 9 unless she was already about 90% able to do that anyway before she started the course.

In the end, though, it’s unfortunate that an English language learning center connected to Shandong Teachers University makes such meaningless claims.

Tags China, EFL

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