Why learn a language via one-to-one lessons?
Tuesday, 26th May 2009
Learning a language via one-to-one lessons involves just you and a tutor. There are no other students to distract you, as can sometimes be the case in language classes, and such lessons can be tailored to suit your needs, interests and abilities.
One-to-one lessons can be very intensive, so are great if you want to learn a lot in a short time. You can also choose are more relaxed approach, depending on how quickly you want to learn the language, and how much time you can devote to it.
Your tutor will have plenty of ideas about what to teach you and will be able to adjust the lessons to suit your level of language. If you have ideas about the kind of things you want to learn as well, the tutor should be able to incorporate them into the lessons, or even make them the basis of the lessons. In fact, such lessons will be more useful to you if you want focus on learning the things you really need or want to be able to talk about.
If you need to learn a language quickly, a week or two of intensive one-to-one lessons could get you to the stage where you can get by and have basic conversations. Or if you already have some knowledge of the language but are not very confident about speaking it, such lessons could help build your confidence and give you plenty of practice using the language.
Some organisations can arrange for you to have one-to-one lessons while living in a tutor’s home. This enables you to be completely immersed in the language, even when not having lessons, and to experience family life in another country. Your hosts might also arrange visits to local sights and introduce you to other local people, so this is a great way to get to know an area and a particular community.
Alternatively, if you are not in a great hurry to learn a language, but prefer the flexibility of one-to-one lessons, you could meet your tutor for an hour or two a week, and use the lessons as an opportunity to practise what you’ve learnt on your own, and to ask any questions you have about your studies. In order to receive the maximum benefit from such an arrangement, it’s a idea to study and practise using the language as often as you can between lessons.
More about individual and tailor-made programmes
Tags: english, spanish, french, german, italian, learning, language, tailor-made, intensive, one-to-one
Posted by Simon Ager under Attitudes to Language Learning, Types of Courses,
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