Great communication begins with connection, not perfection. "As We Speak" by Meyers and Nix

Title: Becoming Fluent: How Cognitive Science Can Help Adults Learn a Foreign Language

Authors: Richard Roberts and Roger Kreuz

Reviewer: Richard Sesek (educator, wantrepreneur)

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Topic/Intent of book: Contrary to popular belief, learning another language as an adult is not impossible. Further, there may be some advantages to being older. This book discusses the cognitive science and psychology behind learning, with specific emphasis on language acquisition.

I selected this book because: I am interested in learning other languages. I have generally struggled with other languages, but this book provides many tips and suggestions for how best to learn another language.

Recommendation: Yes. This book provides valuable insight regarding learning other languages. I think this book is interesting from a human factors standpoint and provides many suggestions for learning that extend beyond language acquisition.

Major lessons from this book: You do not have to start learning a foreign language as a child to be successful. Adults, in fact, have certain advantages over children (greater knowledge of idioms and expressions, richer context from their education/experience, and larger existing vocabularies).

This book provides descriptions of cognitive science principles and concepts that can both speed learning and improve the quality/retention of that learning. The book also illustrates many of the phenomena that can impede/discourage learning (e.g., confirmation bias, the planning fallacy, the fertilizer fallacy [more is always better], etc.).

Book Inspirations: This book provides great advice for learning in general and I plan to adopt many of the techniques discussed in the book when I study other languages, but also for my general research/studying. I plan to outline some of the heuristics and fallacies in the book and share them with students in my classes.