I started my study at Yonsei University at age 61. Out of hundreds of students, there were only a handful of us older students. There were precisely 3 older American students, and of course I was drawn to them and got to know their stories.
One, a man about my age, was an English teacher who had been in Korea for many years and had tried to learn Korean at the Yonsei Korean Language Institute before but had given up. He was repeating level 1 again - and failing miserably. He said that during the listening midterm, he could only catch 1 word! He simply could not grasp spoken Korean. He quit again before the end of the term.
The other, Susan, maybe 45 or 50, was doing well in level 2. But imagine - she had been married to a Korean for many years. She and her husband actually lived in Japan, and she said she and her family spoke Japanese there. Now that her kids were grown, she decided to come to Korea to finally learn her husband's language and show her children how much she valued that part of their heritage. She was succeeding at level 2 and would be advancing to level 3.
Susan's relative success may be due to her relatively younger brain or previous exposure to Korean through her husband, but how much greater was the difference in her attitude. Susan clearly loved Korean people and Korean culture, and she knew her learning Korean would mean something precious to her family. The man showed no such love: he judged Koreans by American standards and often found them wanting. He blamed the Korean language, Korean teachers, Korean culture, for his failure to learn. (How could anyone learn such a crazy language in this crazy environment!)
I do think older learners tend to have a harder time, but based on my personal experience and observation, I would break down the reasons something like this:
slower brain (!) - 10%
attitude and circumstances - 90%
Here are a few things I think interfere with older learners' language learning:
Less ability to accept a new culture
We older learners tend to be pretty set in our values. We are no longer experimenting with possibilities of how to live our lives, and are less interested in trying things out. We are more choosey about what we will and won't accept in the new culture. For me, it was very different from when I was younger, and wanted to try out EVERYTHING in the new culture, without judgment. Culture and language go together: food and the way we talk about food, rules of social interaction and how we talk socially, how we express emotion and how we talk about emotions, and so on, so resisting something in the culture can affect our receptivity to the language in some ways.
In Korea, one obvious difficulty I had was with what is called "honorific" language and forms of address. Most of the students at Yonsei are in their teens and twenties, and we were taught mainly the style of language used to speak to someone older. Outside of class, I was often reluctant to start a conversation with a Korean because I didn't have experience in addressing someone younger - or even my own age (and I rarely talked to anyone older!). In addressing me, sometimes Koreans called me the equivalent of "ma'am," and sometimes they called me "grandmother." Grandmother! That was supposed to be honorific? In my younger years I would have been fascinated with these different ways of addressing people and so excited about trying out the different forms of address with different people. But as an older learner I struggled with this aspect of Korean culture and language and its threat to my sense of self and deeply-held values about how people should relate. It affected my comfort and willingness to speak.
Less urgency to learn the new language
For most older learners, learning a new language does not represent the opportunities it does to young people. Older learners will not likely be starting new careers or establishing new significant lifetime relationships. They can already predict the circumstances in which they will, or will not, be using the new language. Knowing a new language may enhance their later years, but it is not as likely to deeply change them. There is not the same sense of excitement and hope in what the new language will bring. Thus the motivation required for deep and intensive study may not be as present for older learners.
Fewer opportunities for significant encounters with Koreans
In my Dec. 7 entry, I wrote about this difference. Young people all over the world over want to meet each other. They organize parties, mixers, events. Young men and women find each other, spend hours talking and getting to know each other, as I remember doing as a young single student and teacher living abroad. That's how I used to practice so much. Now I remember! That's how I got introduced into families. That's how I always had someone from the target culture to venture out with. That's how I came to feel so at ease. In Korea I did get to know a number of Koreans, and did things with them, but sporadically. I had no Korean friend that I saw on a regular basis, someone that I could call up any time, someone that I shared my daily life with, and my language skills remained so poor that I never got to feeling at ease with anyone. I'm sure that with more time I might have deepened some of those relationships - I was only there 4 months! - but the time and effort involved would certainly be greater for the older me than for the younger me!
But - how great for older folks to learn a new language!
Most of us fear various changes as we get older: becoming rigid and inflexible, losing our brain power, becoming bored and unexcited about life's opportunities, becoming disconnected to mainstream modern life, losing touch with the affairs of the broader world, to name a few.
Studying a new language can be an great antidote for all of that!
Though we are not as flexible as when we were young, we're probably a lot more flexible than we would be without facing the challenges of learning a new language. As we teachers receive older learners in our classes, as we perhaps lose patience with them when their learning seems slow, or when they apologize for their inability to "remember anything anymore," or when we feel they are taking the place of a younger student who could benefit more, or when we wonder why they don't just stay home and relax... I hope we can also celebrate their determination to keep learning and respect their special courage to study a new language at an older age. I personally have lots more respect!
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