Kids don't want to learn a language...

They just want to communicate. Helena can practically stutter herself into a coughing fit because she gets so excited to tell us something. Her brain is going so fast and her mouth can't keep up. We have to remind her to slow down and "use her words." She's simply so excited to be communicating with people that it's the highlight of her day... okay the highlight of five minutes! It's not the same for adult learners, especially ones who aren't in an immersion based environment. If we happen to be lucky enough to have a friend to try out our new found skills it's no skin off our noses if we don't get it. We take that for granted! I mentally SIGH every single time I see the 「お元気ですか」lesson at the beginning of a textbook. It's so pedestrian and useless, get me to the meat and teach me how to say complex stuff or show me the secrets to being awesome! But I'm honestly unable to imagine just how excited Helena must have been when she realized she could say "How you doooing?" when she wanted to ask us how our day was going.

It must some kind of terrible storm going on inside of a kid's head. When I was in a language exchange we'd meet for dinner and chat. Since my partner was proficient in English we'd spend most of our time on English. Because, that makes sense! I didn't have the temerity or the simple willpower to not slip into English to try to express something. If things got difficult I'd just go back to what was comfortable! Helena can't do that and we can see it when she tries to communicate something she's found important and we're not able to understand her. She squeezes her fists shut, shakes( practically vibrates! ) and starts to cry. It makes me realize that learning to communicate is one of her primary goal in life and she probably doesn't even know it!

Imagine seeing someone(s) day in and day out and not being able to communicate with them and they're you're only contact to the world. If you want food, you have to scream. If you need some attention, you have to cry. Effectively, for an adult version, you'd have to imagine yourself in a foreign prison. Easier yet, imagine you are the foreigner and you're in an American jail - slim luck of meeting a bilingual sympathetic ear! Every single linguistic achievement must generate a sense of relief and accomplishment. Things like this aren't chapters in a book or project milestones, they're major passages in ones ability to communicate.

I've spent a lot of time trying to learn the Japanese Language when I really need to be spending time learning how to communicate in Japanese.