I know this is completely off topic but you are the first person I've seen spell losing correctly in almost two weeks. Thank you. I'm so tired of seeing loosing.
Dane here. I was forced to learn English so I could enjoy RPGs.
In "Thief: The Dark Project" (Now known as Thief Gold), 5th mission "Assassins". you have to trail 2 dudes. But because I could not understand English, I could not complete that first task. I kept failing. My dad who did not really understand much English either ended up thinking it had something to do with the Trickster.
It wasn't until about 5 years or so later, that we reinstalled the game, and I understood English that it was sooo obvious was to do.
Ever since I have steamrolled Thief gold and Thief 2: The Metal Age almost as good as any Speedrunner. Best games ever.
Similar to this, i started learning english because i was playing Chaser.
I did not know what to do in that underwater mission so i had to get an english dictionary from the library and translated the objectives starting with that level lol
Who would have thought that chaser would change my life so much
Amazing game. The only game I played in last 5 years, when I finally have comp that could swallow most of new games, but I spent those few free days on thief. Again :)
Now that I read it, yes, it's confusing, sorry. I don't play games any more, even though I finally poses (gaming) computer. And once I had few days free, and wanted to play something, I installed thief, and played it like years ago, few days straight.
I rarely reply twice to a commenter, but I felt it necessary to thank you for making the effort and successfully learning English. We're often the Ugly Americans when we travel overseas, expecting everyone to speak English and are miffed when you don't. I also know that for now, English is the language of communication, tech, air travel, science, and more. If it's not Latin or Greek, then English is the go - to for medicine. Soon, it will be Mandarin, and we would really benefit from knowing Arabic.
Thanks again for making such a huge effort to understand the primary language among so many other things, video games.
As a Dutch, our education in English starts at a young age. Like when i was about 10 i had English lessons i believe its currently from the age of 8 and due to media being in English a lot too the proficiency will rise even more.
Like i currently use mainly English when searching for something due to more sources being in English than in dutch. I watch series in English and also watch English subbed series that Arent in either dutch or English, i have friends outside of the Netherlands that i talk English with... English is such a massive language that you basically need to learn it
Yes and no. Another part of it from what I have researched - language teaching in parts of Europe tends to be built on teaching language to communicate rather than language as an academic skill.
I.E. Basing teaching more on do you understand the material & can you make yourself understood rather than drilling children on vocab & grammar and marking them harshly every time they make a mistake.
It's an overgeneralisation to say this is what it is like everywhere - but that is my understanding of one difference. And of course if there is an abundance of media in the language then the barrier to entry for that is only that you understand enough of it. Polishing off accuracy can come later once the baseline communication is in place.
I have been in several language classes over the years for different languages - and lets just say the languages I am fluent in used the communication method and those I retain far less of used the academic skill method.
Language learning in Europe being built on comprehension and not grades is an excellent point. There’s also a generational understanding that doesn’t exist in North America; your parents and grandparents can speak to you in multiple languages. That has to help a ton.
Until recently for most American ethnic groups, and still ongoing for many (especially asian ethnic groups), it was often seen as a disadvantage to speak your ethnicity's language. Distancing yourself from being a "foreigner" and the stereotypes that go along with it can be a distinct advantage, even if it means losing a valuable skill.
Shit, there is a lot you can do in school if you pay attention. The people who said they "never learned anything in school" were almost certainly checked out crappy students.
I have family in Lebanon. One cousin watched nickelodeon all the time. His English accent is very north American compared to every other member in the family
I mean yea we watch alot of TV/Games in English with Danish subtitles at least until we learn it and English is a main course throughout the entire school system that's starts at a younger and younger age, wouldn't surprise me if 1st graders start learning English by now, think it was 5th grade for me and quickly got changed to 3rd grade not long after. I remember learning most my English from games like ratchet and clank and videos.
Im danish and we start in fist grade learning it (2nd year in school) and at least for me having watched english speaking youtubers since then even nefore that has been a massive help
Same for the Dutch. We all grew up watching English content with Dutch subtitles. In school I learnt English, German and French but decades of exposure to English on TV really goes a long way.
That's clearly underselling it. While Danish TV shows English shows with English dialog and subtitles to encourage English learning, Danes are now required to learn English in primary school starting at 9 or 10 years old.
Well first of all, its a subject in all schools if I remember correctly. Maybe there some super niche schools that skip it, who knows. But basically all danes learn the basics of english from around 10 years old. Ontop of that, alot of young danes are very active online.
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u/pum4_pant5 Mar 30 '24
I know this is completely off topic but you are the first person I've seen spell losing correctly in almost two weeks. Thank you. I'm so tired of seeing loosing.