阅读理解
Love
for language
Very few of us become fluent in another
language by studying it in high school. I went to university and then moved
across the country, pursued a demanding career, married and raised children.
I made an effort to maintain the little bit
of French that I learned in school, but eventually realized that this was
pointless. I was well aware that new languages are best learned when young, and
that our abilities in that regard decline with age. However, just before my
50th birthday, I signed up for French classes. After I was tested to see which
group I belonged in, I was placed at almost the introductory level. When I looked
around at my first Saturday morning class, I was struck by how many of the
students were learning French as a third, fourth, or even fifth language.
Contrary to my assumption that learning a
new language was impossibly difficult, there were people who learned new
languages as a matter of course. I found that it really was true that certain
linguistic (语言的)
abilities fade with age.
While I'd always thought of myself as a
quick learner, that was no longer the case. I absorbed new vocabulary very
slowly. What I learned one week seemed to slip away as soon as I learned the
next skill. I looked up the same words and language structures over and over
again.
Now, a couple of years in, I can listen to
the news in French and catch 90 percent of it on the first try, read a novel if
the language is not too difficult, and hold up my end of a conversation if it
doesn't go too fast.
Who knows what I might still accomplish?
I've learned so much beyond grammar and
vocabulary. I've met people from around the world and all walks of life who
have the courage to make fools of themselves in order to learn something new.
I've been taught by patient and
inspirational teachers from many corners of the world, including France,
Eastern Europe, the Caribbean and Africa.
Listening to the news as it is presented to
the people of France, I have a renewed understanding of how something can look
completely different from another perspective. I've learned that a language is
not just a set of words, but a way of thinking. But most of all, I've learned
that it really is never too late to learn something new.
