7 Years

[Unkotare]

It takes about seven years to go from true beginner to fluent enough to do high level academic work in a second language. So all of you out there demanding that students become Shakespeare overnight need to be more realistic. And no, your great, great grandpappy did NOT walk off the boat and become fluent in a few months no matter what family myth you want to believe.

Bear in mind too that students enter school at varying levels of fluency to start with, just as adult immigrants arrive with varying degrees of facility with the language. "He speaks NO English whatsoever!" is almost never true.

 

[postman]

It takes about seven years to go from true beginner to fluent enough to do high level academic work in a second language. So all of you out there demanding that students become Shakespeare overnight need to be more realistic. And no, your great, great grandpappy did NOT walk off the boat and become fluent in a few months no matter what family myth you want to believe.

Bear in mind too that students enter school at varying levels of fluency to start with, just as adult immigrants arrive with varying degrees of facility with the language. "He speaks NO English whatsoever!" is almost never true.

How true. You have people here for 20 years, who still aren't fluent at a college level.

Even people born here.

Nationwide, on average,
79% of U.S. adults are literate in 2022.
54% of adults have a literacy below sixth-grade level.
21% of adults in the US are illiterate in 2022.

 

[Harry Dresden]

How true. You have people here for 20 years, who still aren't fluent at a college level.

Even people born here.

Nationwide, on average,
79% of U.S. adults are literate in 2022.
54% of adults have a literacy below sixth-grade level.
21% of adults in the US are illiterate in 2022.

hey postman.....were did you carry mail at?....just professional curiosity.....

 

[DGS49]

I believe that means seven years of study and practice, however, people who have gone through it once (second language) seem to be able to be conversant in subsequent languages fairly quickly.

To me, the reason why few Americans are bi-lingual is that nothing forces you to speak the learned language unless you force it yourself. In Europe, you are - if you get out much - flooded with native speakers of several languages.

For Americans, learning a foreign language forces you to learn your own grammar, which is a side benefit. It seems that few Americans, even people who live a public life, understand the subjunctive or how to use it.

If I were a rich man...

 

[TheParser]

If I were a rich man...

Yes, the subjunctive is nice, and many Americans still use it.

What is more distressing, however, is that many Americans say and write something like "I saw a dog laying in the street." I want to ask, "What was he laying?" They simply cannot understand the participle is "lying"!!!

 

[TroglocratsRdumb]

Struggling to learn English is understandable.
However not accepting that America is an English speaking country is just hate.

 

[Unkotare]

Struggling to learn English is understandable.
However not accepting that America is an English speaking country is just hate.

Who is doing that?

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

It takes about seven years to go from true beginner to fluent enough to do high level academic work in a second language.

It'll take about 7 minutes to teach your Hamas asylum seeker students what GUN-FREE ZONE means in Arabic.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

How true. You have people here for 20 years, who still aren't fluent at a college level.

Even people born here.

Nationwide, on average,
79% of U.S. adults are literate in 2022.
54% of adults have a literacy below sixth-grade level.
21% of adults in the US are illiterate in 2022.

Grads' Garbled Grammar

"College level"? You yourself probably don't know advanced English, or you'd be shocked at the ignorance of it by the no-talent bootlickers who pass through our fake universities.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

Yes, the subjunctive is nice, and many Americans still use it.

What is more distressing, however, is that many Americans say and write something like "I saw a dog laying in the street." I want to ask, "What was he laying?" They simply cannot understand the participle is "lying"!!!

Obvious Origin

That comes from the nursery rhyme, "Now I lay me down to sleep." Since "lay me" is an obsolete form, kids think it says the same as "lay down."