Grammar Books Are a Waste of Time! #shorts

📚 Don't waste your time memorizing rules in grammar books. The explanations only make sense AFTER you have already spent a lot of time listening and reading. Your brain automatically makes sense of the underlying rules with enough time and exposure. Reading the rules in a book will not help you understand or use them in real time.

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Don't Study Language Rules!

[AllanLimosin]

I always keep a grammar book nearby to check something precisely and quickly. Obviously, when trying to learn a language mainly with that, it's fastly demotivating. I see these books like linguistic tools more than learning tools.

[olgagicala]

I don't completely agree. Yes, the immersion approach is the best for gaining fluency. But in this process of becoming fluent it's a good idea to read up on grammatical topics from time to time to improve conscious awareness of what we're doing and why.
Personally, I've always had a huge problem with articles in English. I'm Polish and there are no articles in our language. When I was in my mid 20s I spoke fluently in English and had no problem with understanding academic-level books. It didn't help me much when it came to writing essays in English - my grammar was mostly fine, but I was using articles far too rarely. And I was consuming TONS of native-level content in English at that time (both as reading and listening). What I had to do when I realized I have this problem was to a) read up on some rules, b) pay closer attention to how articles are used in the texts that I'm reading c) pay special attention when editing the texts I wrote. And I saw the same pattern repeat with my Polish friends who had excellent levels of English, but still struggled with using articles correctly. My theory is that if the feature of our target language doesn't have an equivalent in our native language, it will be very difficult for us to learn it just by immersion. Also, if I didn't have tutors who pointed this problem out to me, I would probably still be blissfully unaware that anything is wrong with my English. Btw, I still struggle with articles.
Immersion is definitely the most important part of language learning but I still think that some grammar instruction 1) improves the quality of your language and 2) helps you make progress quicker because you're not stuck in a guessing game of why some elements of the language work that way and not the other way.

[yamei]

Personally I find learning about grammar important but only in order to begin parsing the language, because we as adults dont have the total immersion to begin picking up grammar out of thin air. But I do agree the grammar drills are a waste of time.

[Kira-npdf]

I get your point, I truly do, but if you don't study grammar you won't sound natural. I believe it depends on what you want to achieve in the language. I think it's fine to be able to communicate, but it's much more pleasant to talk properly. I believe studying grammar should be to tune your language skill :)

[High_Priest_Jonko]

Totally agree that grammar books are best for people who are already comfortable in the language and want to refine their speech.

[Sake]

I completely agree with you but, I believe if one is trying to learn the language as fast as they can then grammar books are a great option.

But that doesn’t mean it will make you fluent or sound native. Depending on the language, grammar books are either really useful or some are just a waste of time. For example, if you’re a native English speaker trying to learn Japanese without a grammar book and just going purely off of Duolingo. You’re going to be second guessing your self while not actually understanding the overall structure of the language, you would know how to mimic but not be able to improvise with sentence/ make sentences.

[adamekhane]

I 100% agree with your point of view, please could you advise me about learning language. I'm moroccan, currently i learn English and French at the same time, french is a second language in my country, only i want to improve my level in it but English i started to learn it since one year ago. Now i can understand what you say 60% so how i can learn both at same time and get fluent in both. Thank so much all your tips help me a lots to improve fast in learning language.

[veritevraie]

Ok it’s true. I am French and when I see a video for foreigners who are learning French, I hear rules -which may be true, it’s not the point, though I apply these rules naturally, without having learnt them- requiring a high level of concentration even for a native like me. But a bit of grammar, when explained simply (like in the Mandarin online course in which I am) remains appreciable for understanding some basics, as long as the course isn’t fully based on grammar lessons and jumps right after into more practical training.
I have to say I’m very enthusiastic about my online Chinese course. Once in awhile it makes a stop for a bit of explanations, but the rest is all about very efficient tools for jumping from Pinyin to Chinese than to French or the opposite. I just love it.

[Thelinguist]

📲 The app I use to learn languages
🆓 My 10 FREE secrets to language learning
❓Do you find grammar books to be a help or a hindrance?👇🏼

[TheCompleteGuitarist]

People are still justifying grammar like it (still) has a place in language acquisition. If grammar explanations were necessary to learn your native language I could see the point, but they are not. If you still need grammar to explain how you should be speaking and writing (and comprehending) then you're not doing it right.

Non of the science surrounding any type of language acquisition supports grammar in the least. If you like grammar fine, but when you use language you are not relying on grammatical understanding of the language, you are drawing on acquired language patterns that entered your language memory in the way it does so naturally by experiencing them, by participating in the language. Trust your brain. It knows what it is doing. Just give it (preferably comprehensible and enjoyable) input.

What does it mean to 'know' grammar and how exactly are you going to apply that when you 'need' language?

Aprendí Español sin gramatica ... sin profesor. Hay suficientes recursos gratis en youtube (por lo menos) para adquirir cualquier idioma se quiere. No hay excusas!

[lornam]

I agree wholeheartedly! The very best way to underline this point is to try reading a book about language learning or grammar in one's own language like you are doing here. It's such a great way to know what to avoid when learning a second or third language. Other things i avoid, because I've seen the equivalent for English learners are the 'don't say this...say this' videos to 'sound more like a native '. They invariably encourage the misuse of fussy language that is hard to truly use well unless you have encountered it naturally many, many times. Stick with the basics and then naturally expand your vocabulary with repeated exposure in books, conversation and tv/movies.

[Englishworkplace]

hello, what's your idea about pimsleur and Michael Thomas method?

[davidkinnear]

Well I'm a language teacher, and although it's true what you say about them books only being useful when you already know the language, they do help when it comes to dealing with repeated mistakes. Some people need a rational approach to deal with L1 interference.

[Prince.Hamlet]

Steve is like a Larry Bird or Magic Johnson trying to understand Fred Shmoe down at the YMCA.
Love the channel Steve,
What would you consider the easiest language to get a fundamental very basic grasp of? At first glance it seems like Italian to me.
Keep up the great work :-)

[Kapi]

Hi Steve, I have such a very important question for me, what do you think about how I would learn German one day (devote the whole day only to German) and the other only to English and so on and so forth? (On LingQ, of course)

[victorbrown]

Personally I think if you feel / think a grammar book is helping you learn a language, go for it. One is responsible for one's own learning. So I think more in terms of whatever it takes, if that's a grammar book, ok.

[sophiebeaumont]

What about if you don't have any exposure. Grammar is an important part of the French language!. If you don't know the Grammar in any language, people would think you are uneducated

[Ballykeith]

Lol, this review should be on the back cover.

[litozulueta]

I don’t know why you’re saying gramma bks are a waste of time when in another you’re saying language learners should vary their reading. What’s wrong with learning grammar? Am not a native English speaker but I I know correct English grammar so I use that to get to learn other European languages.

[StillAliveAndKicking_]

I am working through your German short stories. If I don’t sometimes refer to a grammar book, how am I supposed to make sense of some of the sentences?