No Alphabet Needed- pt. 2

Part 2 in a series by Rodney. 

This post is based off another person’s blog that I found particularly helpful. . .

A question that many people ask is, “How long does it take to learn Chinese?”  The short answer is, of course, the rest of your life!  I think the same thing can be said about my journey to learn English – I am still in the process of learning. 

Now what most people mean by this question is how long it will take to become functional in Chinese.  What will it take for you to be able to communicate with other people effectively?  This is a much more difficult question to answer, but there are answers nonetheless.

One of the ways this question is answered is the use of the FSI (Foreign Service Institute) scale that is used by the US State Department who is responsible for training diplomats. The FSI scale divides language proficiency into 5 levels (1, 2, etc.) with corresponding sub-levels (1+, 2+, etc.).   The five levels are:

1 = elementary proficiency;

2 = limited working proficiency;

3 = professional working proficiency;

4 = full professional proficiency; and

5 = native or bilingual proficiency.

Of course not everyone learns a new language at the same pace.  My children, whose minds are still young and able to soak up knowledge faster, learn much quicker than I.  The breakdown given by the Foreign Service Institute is High Aptitude, Medium Aptitude, and Rodney Aptitude (AKA Low Aptitude).

The third important component to answering the question, “How long does it take to a new language?” is what language is being pursued.  Some languages, due to their similarity with English, can be learned more quickly than others.   The languages are broken down into four groups as illustrated in the graphs below.  You can notice the increased of time needed to learn the language as you progress from the Group 1 languages to the Group 4 languages.

For group 1 languages, it will take an average aptitude learner almost 40 weeks for professional working proficiency.

For group 2 languages, it will take an average aptitude learner over 50 weeks for professional working proficiency.

For group 3 languages, it will take an average aptitude learner close to 90 weeks for professional working proficiency.

I think you can see where this is going. . .

From this final chart, you can see that for a person with average aptitude to gain professional working proficiency (FSI level 3) requires over a 100 weeks at 30 hours a week of study.  Full professional proficiency (FSI level 4), at least according to this chart, requires over 220 weeks (over four years at 30 hours a week if no breaks are taken)!  

We may never quite reach this full professional proficiency, but at least a working proficiency is our goal. This information has the potential to discourage us, but we prefer to use it as a reminder to manage our expectations and continue to work hard.

As they say in China: jiayou!

*an expression literally translated “add oil” but carries the meaning “Go!”