Transcription
Hello guys, I have a very exciting video coming up today because we are finally going to talk about ALG aka absolute linguistic nonsense. Wait. Oh no, no, that's actually automatic language growth. My bad. If you don't know what ALG is, perfect. This video is for you. And if you do know what it is, we're going to look at the science behind it and whether it actually holds up. But judging by the length of this video, let let's just say I've got some thoughts.
So last week I debunked Dreaming Spanish and we found that while some of it was based on science, a lot of it was based on vibes, confidence, and a strong belief that I wouldn't check. And we also saw that Crussian's theories aren't actually as solid as people like to pretend. If you haven't seen that video, I recommend you do as it'll give you some context for this one. Link in description.
Today we're going to react to and analyze a lecture on ALG by David Long. Now, the full lecture is very long, pun, not intended, so we're only going to look at a portion of it, but trust me, even in the first few minutes, there's already a lot to unpack. But before we get into it, who is David Long exactly? Well, we don't actually know that much about him. I tried to look him up, but Google decided not to cooperate, apparently. But I did find out he was some kind of coordinator or spokesperson for the AUA language center, but as far as I know, he's not a linguist in the academic sense. The clip I'm reacting to is the beginning of a lecture he gave about 17 years ago where he introduces ALG. So yeah, uh it's pretty old, but thanks to AI, I managed to make the audio a bit less painful to listen to. If that doesn't deserve a like, I don't know what does.
Before we start, if you enjoy these videos, please don't forget to like, comment, subscribe. I know I say that a lot, but it's such a small channel and that would help me so much. And if you want to support the channel a bit more, there are some links in the description box below. It's purely optional, but also emotionally encouraged. So, thank you for that. All right, let's go.
"Our program is unique because f on what adults do in order to acquire language. Uh we focus on something completely different. In all recent research that we we are familiar with uh in in terms of brain research or linguistic research, we find a tremendous consistency with our basic foundations and uh what we're learning today in modern science."
So, as usual, we get a reference to modern science, brain research, linguistics, and whatnot. But, as you've probably guessed, research wasn't invited to the party, or at least it didn't make the guest list because nothing is actually cited. No studies, no names, no data, just the claim that ALG aligns with research. And that's a problem because saying this is supported by science without showing any evidence isn't really an argument. It's more of an appeal to authority. So, we off to a great start.
Now, to be fair, ALG does draw on ideas that exist in linguistics, especially input-based approaches, but the method itself doesn't really seem to be backed by a strong body of peer-reviewed or controlled research, or at least none that I could find. So, if there is a solid study out there, uh, feel free to send it my way. But, we really need to normalize not evoking science if we're not going to provide sources. Come on. But what's weird is that even at the time there were already prominent linguists like Merrill Swain arguing that output plays an important role and Michael Long a different one was already emphasizing interaction. So yeah clearly not all science aligned with ALG and spoiler alert it still doesn't really.
"The foundations of ALG are very simple in fact. uh we believe that adults in fact can learn like children in uh uh the historical kind of reasoning of people has always been oh adults can't learn anymore like children the age of four five and six are the years when you have to gain a second or third language to really be proficient."
>> Ah, the good old debate, can adults learn like children? Well, first of all, if your point is that adults can learn through comprehensible input, fine, that's actually a reasonable and defensible claim. But learning like a child is a much stronger statement and a much harder one to defend, especially if you equate getting tons of comprehensible input with learning like a child. Because children don't just sit there and listen. They learn their first language in a very specific environment with um constant interaction, simplified speech, gestures, feedback, corrections, everything is adapted to them. And crucially, they're not just listening, they're constantly pushed to speak. And speaking of speaking, there's another thing people often get wrong. Children don't wait to start speaking. They start trying to produce language as soon as they are physically able to. The reason they're quiet at the beginning isn't because they heard of Marvin Brown, the founder of ALG, and are giving ALG a go. No, they just can't speak yet. Unless you count tantrums and chaos as speaking, I guess. So if adults in the classroom are not throwing tantrums or screaming mommy from day one, then ARG students are not learning like children. Sorry.
Also, this clips runs into what's called the uh critical period hypothesis, which is the idea that there's um a limited window in early life during which language acquisition happens more easily uh especially if you're aiming for native like proficiency. And the broad agreement is that after a certain age, it becomes incredibly difficult to sound 100% native in a language.
>> "Dr. Brown, Dr. uh J. Marvin Brown began ALG when he realized that through years and years of practice, no matter how much the adult practiced, no matter what the background of that adult was, they never could achieve anything close to what the young child could do. Naturally, people have seen this over and again, and we find out that the reasoning that comes from that or the the the conclusions we've drawn from that as a as a society is adults can't learn like children."
>> Right? So, first of all, yes, Melvin Brown was a doctor, but not in second language acquisition. Uh his background was in Thai linguistics and its history. That's not to say he couldn't talk about language learning. Um, obviously he could, but mentioning the title doctor here, um, does kind of give his method more authority than it might actually have, especially when the method itself doesn't seem to be backed by controlled research. Anyway, we're told that no matter how much adults practice, they could never achieve anything close to what children do. But based on what? Because right now, this sounds like trust me, bro. And we don't like that here. We don't know what kind of learning environments uh these adults were in. Were they getting meaningful input? Were they interacting with the language? Or were they just sitting in a classroom doing drills? Because if it's the latter, I mean, yeah, that's not exactly a method known for producing miracles. And the way he brings up society's opinion feels a bit convenient to me because I don't think most people are walking around saying, "I can't learn like a child." They usually say things like, "I'm too old." Or, "I'm bad at languages." So, it feels like he's taking that general idea and reshaping it into something that fits his argument. I mean, maybe I'm just nitpicking too much, but also I didn't come here to not nitpick, but I guess let me know what you think in the comments.
>> "Dr. Brown looked at that conclusion and through the research of men like Steven Crashation and uh many others realized that there was some problems in that reasoning that adults can't learn like children may not be may not be the case at all. The reasoning went something like this. Here are children young children gain a second language or third language. become proficient or very fluent in a short amount of time. Adults trying to gain that same language uh never become proficient and take as long as a lifetime and achieve much less results. The the reasoning seemed to be faulty in that what children do and what adults do completely different things. And so Dr. Brown decided to to to design a program based on the idea that adults need to do what children do in order to gain the same results in a second language acquisition. Uh that's what ALG is. The ALG is the product of that determination."
>> Okay, Steven Crushen we know is a supporter of input-based learning. However, who are the many others he's talking about? um at least a few names would have been useful. Now, regarding this idea that children become fluent quickly, um define quickly because from what we know about first language acquisition, children take years to fully acquire a language. It's not some fast process, but if that's quick for you, um I'd hate to see slow. And when people say children become fluent quickly, we also need to define fluent because children are fluent, sure, but their world is still very limited. Their conversations are basically about dinosaurs, snacks, or whatever kids talk about these days. So, when people compare children and adults, they're not really talking about the same level of fluency. I mean, I like to think that I'm probably more fluent than an 11year-old. Um, arguably. Now, on the flip side, the idea that adults never become proficient is just weird. Adults can absolutely reach high levels of fluency, sometimes quite quickly. And in many cases, they're actually more efficient than children if you compare the number of hours they put in. Because comparing years isn't really fair. U children are exposed to language all day every day, whereas adults might practice for an hour or two, if that. Yeah, David's comparison just feels a bit off. Uh children don't learn that quickly and adults don't necessarily fail. So, I'm a bit confused by the logic here because the explanation we're given is basically that adults don't get the same results as children because they're not doing what children do. And to me, that just feels like a jump to conclusion.
>> "Everyone comes to uh to language learning with some goals in mind. I think everyone wants to speak. Most people, or maybe not most, but many want to learn to read and of course to write. If we look at these these abilities, we say, "Yeah, we're learning a second language to speak or to speak and read or to read and write or to write or to speak and read and write." This is common everywhere. The idea that adults got to must must try in order to to be proficient. Practice makes perfect is the old uh concept, if you will, is what most language programs are actually based on. uh conversational English always seems to focus on how do you say it correctly and it creates many many problems for the student uh not the least of which is a fear of saying it wrong. the self-consciousness and the the tenseness of that kind of a setting that we've often if we've gone through that process of of trying to learn the right thing and remember the right thing then go out and practice the right thing is very strenuous and in all of modern uh uh research and psychological research no one claims that that sort of stress is helpful in the learning process."
I actually agree with the beginning here. Uh most people do have goals when they're learning a language, but the rest isn't necessarily true, at least not in my experience. When it comes to teaching, or at least the way I was trained and the way I teach, um the goal is to give students opportunities to get familiar with the language and play with it. And yes, we do look at the proper way to say things, but I'm not sure why that would automatically lead to a fear of saying things wrong. I'm not saying that has never happened in the history of teaching. Of of course, some people have had negative experiences with language teachers and that's not great. But in teacher training, we're very familiar with something called the effective filter hypothesis, which basically says that learners acquire language more effectively when they are relaxed and not under stress, which makes sense, I think. And there are a lot of ways to create that kind of environment in the classroom. When I teach, I always make it clear that mistakes are part of the process. They're basically inevitable. And in my opinion, they shouldn't be taken so seriously. So, I like to turn them into something light-hearted and funny. I still remember that Portuguese class where I was teaching the difference between p and pow. And then I said, "So, guys, at the bakery, are we ordering bread or boners?" The students couldn't stop laughing and neither could I because I clearly have the sense of humor of a 10-year-old. There are obviously other ways to create a relaxed atmosphere, but humor is my personal favorite. So, no, formal teaching isn't inherently fearinducing. It it really depends on how it's done. Now, to be fair, there is definitely something to say about exams. Um, those can absolutely be stressful for students and honestly for teachers as well. Trust me, no one is having a great time in an exam room. But that doesn't mean the entire learning process is stressful and not all adults learn languages to pass exams anyway.
>> "So when we look at when we look at uh the goal, it's important that we understand how to achieve the goal we seeking to achieve. If you ask a writer, how do I become a very good writer? Everywhere in the world, the writer would say read a lot. So here we have a case where input produces output."
This one is an interesting example because at first I was like yeah that makes sense but then I thought okay let's actually ask people who write. So I checked Reddit and yeah people do say uh things like read a lot but they also say things like write a lot practice actually do the thing even read about writing. So the theory if you will. So it's not just input. Uh the writers have spoken and they all seem to agree that both input and output are important. So his analogy kind of backfires here.
>> "Our program of over 20 years has shown many many students many cases where with large amounts of understanding the experiences the activities that go on they're able to have an output that's both natural and fluent and very easily to understand understood and the whole aspect of practice is completely lost in this in this in this program. This puts the student at ease. We're not required to test them. All we require to do as an organization, as a as an as a a program here is provide the students with the right kind of input so they understand."
>> I mean, putting all the scientific claims aside, this program actually doesn't sound so bad. Um, from what I found, it's basically teachers acting out scenes, using gestures, visuals, everything to make language understandable without translation. If I could find a Japanese program like that, I'd sell my left kidney. But I got curious about something and I don't know, I just needed to know what David's Thai was like because clearly he's tested the method himself and I don't speak Thai myself. So I just went on Reddit and according to Reddit, people consider his tie to not be natural. Whoops. Now, I don't want to turn this into a personal attack, but at the same time, if you're promoting a method that's supposed to produce natural and fluent language, you'd kind of expect to see some clear evidence of that. At least from the person promoting that program. Take Matt versus Japan for example. Um, whether you agree with his approach or not, at least he's clearly fluent. Also, that whole natural thing is a little weird sometimes. Um, ALG is all about learning the natural way. As if natural automatically meant better. But you know what else is natural? Poison, aging, diseases, being monolingual, being straight. No thanks. I'll pass.
>> "I'm here at AUA. Um, we are thinking about producing the best speakers possible. We're looking about becoming fluent in reading and writing. uh um but there's an order here that must be made right. The common order in second language programs seems to be starting with an alphabet, learn to read and write and then to practice words and practice and practice and practice until we build up enough v vocabulary to form sentences and uh so on. And the idea is that forms the basis for second language use. In our experience, the opposite is true. Our experience is that when we provide the student with large amounts of understanding that forms the basis for all these other things to develop in a natural way."
>> I don't know if he explains this later in the lecture, but I'd actually be curious to know how they teach uh reading and writing fluency if the approach is mostly based on spoken input. But anyway, this common order he's describing, that's not really how it works. Yes, we do teach things like the alphabet, pronunciation, vocabulary, but it's not like we do only that first and then eventually introduce input at the end. In practice, lessons are usually structured around a different logic. You start with passive skills like listening or reading and then move on to active skills like speaking and writing. If you want your students to speak, they need to hear the language first. Otherwise, what are they supposed to say? As teachers, we're aware of that. and speaking a second language is already intimidating enough. So on top of creating a relaxed atmosphere, you also need to give students enough exposure so they can build confidence before producing anything. So yeah, I'm not entirely sure what he's talking about here. Um maybe is describing older teaching methods because um this lecture is from around 2008 and that's not really how things are done now.
All right, that's all I have for you today. I hope you enjoyed it as usual. And if you'd like a part two, u because there's still a lot to unpack, I'll consider it. Um but only if this video gets 80 likes. How about that? If you watch the video till the end, first of all, thank you so much. And second of all, um please comment below with a random string of emoji just just to confuse the hell out of everyone. Anyway, I will see you later. That I