"Learn a language like a child" is the most terrible advice in the history of language learning

I’m sure we have all heard it at least once. It’s horrible advice, yet it’s given by pretty much everyone. Well, it’s time to debunk it. Let’s think for a moment what children do when they learn their first language, or any subsequent languages.<br><br>Children are excellent at acquiring a language passively. They are excellent at learning new things by themselves. And that’s what they do. A baby sits in a room and listens to adults speaking. He/she/they/it learns the sounds and rhythm of the language. They do that for a few months. Then they start making an effort to communicate, but they still spend most of their time listening. As time passes they start to say some words, then sentences, then paragraphs, then a full conversation. They may make a few mistakes along the way, but an average person ends up speaking their native language fluently. And besides the conversation they have with people, they still spend most of their time listening.<br><br>But how does this apply to an adult language learner? Well, it doesn’t. Sure, an adult language learner could learn a language like a child, but doing so would require devoting your entire life to the process. It would mean moving to the target country and surrounded by the language 24/7. It would also mean no longer having a job, as you couldn’t put in the amount of time even a part time job requires and still have adequate time to learn the language and live your life. And it would require not speaking to anyone in any other language. Do you know anybody who could realistically do that?<br><br>Of course not. So then the advice is to learn it like a child, but the process has to be sped up significantly. Try to talk to people in your target language. And then make an effort to learn grammar and vocabulary. And then listen to the language as much as possible. And then watch TV or films or streams in your target language. And then make sure you have time for a job. And then you need to have time to relax and have some entertainment, or your brain will literally explode from the stress of it all.<br><br>So if we can’t learn a language like a child, then we need to stop pretending that we can. Instead what needs to be done is to figure out how an adult learns a language best. And as far as I can tell, this is to have a good handle on the grammar of the language, then learn a bunch of vocabulary, then practice it with a native speaker, then practice it in writing, and then devote a ton of time to listening and reading and watching. This is what we should tell people who want to learn a language. Not go live in the forest like Snow White and do absolutely nothing but surround yourself with the target language at all times.