The Nature Method for Learning Foreign Languages - What is it & Why isn't it Better Known?
Summary
TLDRThis video discusses the Direct or Natural Method of language learning, which relies solely on the target language from the outset, using pictures and vocabulary building through known words. Popular a century ago, the method has waned but is exemplified by 'Lingua Latina per se Illustrata'. The script delves into the history of pedagogy, mentioning scholars like W.H.D. Rouse, and explores books from the 19th and 20th centuries. It highlights the efforts of the ION Academy to revive this intuitive and engaging method, offering modernized versions and resources for learners interested in this immersive language acquisition approach.
Takeaways
- 📚 The Direct or Natural Method is an approach to language learning that relies solely on the target language from the first lesson, avoiding the use of the learner's native language.
- 🌟 The method uses well-planned manuals with simple sentences and vocabulary building through pictures and known words, popular from about 1890 to 1920.
- 🔍 'Lingua Latina per se Illustrate' by Hans Orberg is a well-known book that employs the Direct Method, featuring a continuous story of a Roman family with exercises and grammatical explanations in Latin.
- 📚 The Direct Method was championed by prominent scholars and linguists like W.H.D. Rouse, Otto Jespersen, and Wilhelm Vietor, as an alternative to the Grammar Translation Method.
- 🎓 James Henry Warman published books using the Natural Method for French, German, Spanish, and Latin around the 1890s, focusing on conversation and understanding through the target language.
- 📚 The Nature Language Institute published a series of language learning books in the 1950s using the Direct Method, with a focus on conversation and practical use of the language.
- 🔍 The Ion Academy is dedicated to reviving and updating the Direct Method, offering videos and republished books for various languages, including Latin, Czech, and Turkish.
- 🌐 The Direct Method emphasizes immediate use and understanding of the target language, which can be intuitive, user-friendly, and gratifying for learners.
- 📚 The original Nature Language Institute books from the 1950s included IPA italicized writing for non-English, non-French, and non-Russian languages, aiding in pronunciation.
- 🔍 The resurgence of interest in the Direct Method is attributed to the efforts of organizations like the Ion Academy, which aim to make this approach more accessible to modern language learners.
- 🚀 The script suggests a hope for a renaissance of the Direct Method in the 2020s, similar to its brief resurgence in the 1950s, and encourages exploration of this method for language learning.
Q & A
What is the Direct Method or Natural Method in language learning?
-The Direct Method or Natural Method in language learning is an approach that relies entirely on the target language from the very first lesson, with no use of the teaching language. It involves well-planned manuals that build vocabulary and simple sentences, often using pictures to aid understanding.
Why was the Direct Method popular in the late 19th century?
-The Direct Method was popular from about 1890 to 1920 due to its intuitive approach, which was championed by prominent scholars and linguists of the time, such as W.H.D. Rouse, Otto Jespersen, and Wilhelm Vietor, as an alternative to the Grammar Translation Method.
What is 'Lingua Latina per se Illustrate' and how is it related to the Direct Method?
-'Lingua Latina per se Illustrate' by Hans Orberg is a book that employs the Direct Method. It is well-known in the language learning community and uses a lot of pictures, continuous story, and exercises, all in Latin, to teach the language.
Why is 'Lingua Latina per se Illustrate' considered unique?
-While 'Lingua Latina per se Illustrate' is not as unique as some people think, it is considered unique because it is one of the few books that still employs the Direct Method, which was popular a century ago, and it is part of a series with companion volumes.
What is the significance of the Nature Language Institute in the context of the Direct Method?
-The Nature Language Institute published a series of books in the 1950s that used the Direct Method, including 'Latinas' by Orberg, which later became 'Lingua Latina per se Illustrate'. These books were part of a larger effort to promote the Direct Method for language learning.
What is the role of the Ion Academy in reviving the Direct Method?
-The Ion Academy is dedicated to reviving and promoting the Direct Method. They are uploading videos, chapter by chapter, on their YouTube channel and republishing old books in updated editions, making the method more accessible to modern learners.
How does the Direct Method differ from the Grammar Translation Method?
-The Direct Method focuses on conversation and immediate use of the target language, whereas the Grammar Translation Method, which was the standard at the time, focused on translating texts from and into the learner's native language, emphasizing grammar rules.
What are some of the criticisms of the Direct Method?
-While the Direct Method is praised for its intuitive and engaging approach, some criticisms include its dated content, especially for languages that have evolved significantly since the method's heyday, and its limited availability in modern language learning materials.
Can you provide examples of other language learning books that used the Direct Method during its heyday?
-Examples of other language learning books that used the Direct Method include works by James Henry Warman for French, German, Spanish, and Latin, as well as series by Payne and Mine Warring, and Appelton Jones.
How does the Direct Method utilize pictures in language learning?
-The Direct Method uses pictures to visually represent the vocabulary and concepts being taught, allowing learners to associate the target language directly with the images, which aids in comprehension and retention without the need for translation.
What is the current status of the Direct Method in language learning today?
-The Direct Method is not as widely known or used today as it once was. However, efforts by organizations like the Ion Academy are working to revive interest in this approach, making it more accessible through modernized materials and online resources.
Outlines
📚 The Direct Method in Language Learning
This paragraph introduces the 'Direct Method' or 'Natural Method' of language learning, which emphasizes the exclusive use of the target language from the very first lesson. The method relies on well-structured manuals that build vocabulary and simple sentences, utilizing pictures and definitions in the target language to aid understanding. The speaker mentions the historical popularity of this method from around 1890 to 1920 and its resurgence in the 1950s. The paragraph highlights 'Lingua Latina per se Illustrate' by Hans Orberg as a contemporary example of this method, noting its structured layout with pictures, continuous story, and exercises in Latin.
🎓 Historical Context of the Direct Method
The speaker delves into the history of the Direct Method, mentioning its promotion by prominent scholars and linguists such as W.H.D. Rouse, Otto Jespersen, and Wilhelm Vietor. It discusses the method's initial popularity in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and its subsequent decline. The paragraph also lists various Latin books from the period that employed the Direct Method, emphasizing that the Orberg series is not unique but part of a broader trend. The speaker notes the dated nature of these books for modern language learning but acknowledges their pedagogical interest.
🕵️♂️ Unraveling the Mystery of the Nature Method
This paragraph explores the enigma behind the decline of the Nature Method, despite its intuitive and user-friendly approach to language learning. The speaker mentions the Nature Language Institute, which published a series of language learning books in the 1950s, all adhering to the Direct Method. The books were reportedly used by half a million people, yet their impact and continuation remain a mystery. The speaker also touches upon the Linguaphone Institute, which continued to use the Direct Method in its language learning materials during the mid-20th century.
🌐 Revival of the Direct Method by the ION Academy
The final paragraph discusses the efforts of the ION (Ian) Academy to revive the Direct Method through their YouTube channel and website. The academy is dedicated to uploading videos and republishing books that follow the Direct Method, including languages like French, German, Spanish, Italian, Czech, and Turkish. The speaker expresses hope for a renaissance of this method in the 2020s and provides information on how interested individuals can access these resources. The paragraph concludes with the speaker's personal note about an upcoming road trip and the possibility of a temporary hiatus from video uploads.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Direct Method
💡Natural Method
💡Lingua Latina per se Illustrata
💡Pedagogy
💡Pattern Drills
💡W.H.D. Rouse
💡Otto Jespersen
💡Wilhelm Vietor
💡James Henry Warman
💡Ion Academy
💡Linguaphone Institute
Highlights
Introduction to the Direct Method or Natural Method for language learning, which relies entirely on the target language from the first lesson.
Use of well-didactically planned manuals to build simple sentences and vocabulary through the target language.
Description of vocabulary in terms of known words and use of pictures to aid learning.
Historical popularity of the Direct Method from 1890 to 1920 and its brief renaissance in the 1950s.
Mention of 'Lingua Latina per se Illustrate' by Hans Orberg as a well-known book employing the Direct Method.
Layout of 'Lingua Latina per se Illustrate' with pictures, text in Latin, and exercises in Latin.
The Direct Method's emphasis on conversation and its contrast with the Grammar Translation Method.
Historical figures like W.H.D. Rouse and Otto Jespersen who championed the Direct Method.
James Henry Warman's contribution to the Natural Method with books for French, German, Spanish, and Latin.
The dated nature of conversational language in old Direct Method books, especially for modern usage.
Listing of important Latin books from the early 20th century that used the Direct Method.
The role of Maximilian Berlitz in popularizing the Direct Method through the Berlitz School.
The Nature Language Institute's publication of language books using the Direct Method in the 1950s.
Mystery surrounding the disappearance of the Direct Method and its lack of presence in modern language learning.
Introduction of the Ion Academy's efforts to revive and update the Direct Method for modern learners.
Availability of updated Direct Method materials and the Ion Academy's dedication to polyglots.
The speaker's personal journey with language learning and upcoming plans including a road trip.
Transcripts
good evening
today i would like to talk to you about
an approach to language learning that is
variously known as the direct method or
the nature or natural method
what is direct or natural about this
method is that it relies entirely 100
upon the
target language from the very first
lesson everything is in the language you
are learning there's no
teaching language whatsoever
and so the way that that works is that
uh they are very well didactically
planned manuals that uh start building
simple sentences and build your
vocabulary that way uh the vocabulary is
then of new words described in terms of
words you already know and more than
anything else there's a lot of use of
pictures you're shown pictures to see
what
it is that you're learning
so um this is a method that um
was popular 100 years ago for about 30
years from about 1890 to about 1920 um
and kind of went out of the limelight
for a while maybe had a renaissance in
the 1950s and then has
pretty much kind of disappeared the same
way
it was very popular once the same way in
the 1960s
pattern drills were everywhere and now
you can't find any pattern drills it's
very hard to find any books that use the
direct or natural method today there's
only one
commonly known
and well loved a book that employs this
and that is this book that
pretty much anybody who knows latin or
anybody in the language in the community
has heard of lingua latina per se
illustrate by hans orberg
and the layout of this book as i just
showed you is you have a lot of
pictures
so
there's on the sides you have the text
it's entirely in latin here and on the
sides you have pictures and definitions
in terms of the words you have already
learned the text is nice and clear uh
and you have uh this is kind of a
continuous story for the most part of a
family a roman family
and there is some grammatical
explanation also only in latin and then
at the end of every chapter there are
three different types of sets of
exercises so this is well laid out and
in this form very nice and clear and one
would think that this would be kind of a
popular attractive idea that people
would like to say hey can we explore
learning a language in this fashion if
that works well that might be something
interesting and very gratifying to do
um
so as i said this book is the only one
that's sort of commonly popularly out
there today uh and because of that a lot
of people i don't know i think i just
want to start off by saying this book is
is not as unique in two senses as as
people think that it is uh first of all
this is uh part of oregberg's book is
part of an entire series i think many
people do know there's a follow-up book
to it and there are also it's really
essential there's about a dozen
companion companion volumes of books
exercises and vocabulary and things like
that most essential of which you get is
the teacher's manual so that you have
the answers to those uh three different
sets of exercises and then there's also
some
just dialogues and things to go with
this so this is not really a standalone
book because a lot of people seem to
think that it is
um but it's
uh as i said it is um
the only ex-implier of this method that
was very popular uh up to 100 years ago
uh for about 30 years until that so let
me start out by doing a little bit of
history history of pedagogy here
historical pedagogy so um this method uh
when it came about in say the 1880s or
maybe the 1890s was
a little bit after that too was uh
really championed by a number of very
prominent scholars and linguists w.h.d
rouse who is the sort of the main editor
of the loeb classical libraries in a
very polymath in many fields otto
jespersen wilhelm vietor all of these
well-known
philologists and linguists really put
their uh weight into this method of
learning as opposed to the grammar
translation method which was the most
popular standard method of learning at
that time
i think that the
first person that really came out with a
lot of these volumes was a guy named
james henry warman
lived for a very long time about 95
years but starting about 1890 he
published a number of books for french
german spanish and latin which he called
that point the natural method or also he
gave credit to pastelozi the
late 18th century uh
swiss um pedagog
so
his books are very much along the same
lines of these books they're entirely in
those languages they rely on a lot of
pictures um so
they're quite interesting to look at
[Music]
i'm going to now mention a whole bunch
as i said this this is
something that you can find
if you're interested in the history of
this easily google it put in direct
method natural method uh it was mainly
for french german spanish maybe some
italian for english so if you put that
you can come up with any interesting
number of volumes besides mormons from
that time period about 1880 1890
1900 1910
and i'm going to just list now a couple
of really important ones because as i
said many people tend to know about this
book for latin and think that this
orbit series is is unique and actually
it's not it's the last of a series of
this and uh so i'm going to list a
number of latin books in particular
because
uh however interesting and i am very
much in favor of older methods in
general these uh books for french german
spanish are
they are truly quite dated at this point
to look at the if you're the focus on
the natural method or the direct method
was on conversation and uh the
conversation that you learned in 1880
and 1890 is
rather different from the conversation
that you need in in 19 in 2022
[Music]
so uh latin though uh has not changed
and so there's a lot of books that
anybody who likes latin likes this
method ought to know about and uh i'm
going to say
this this method the direct method the
natural method so it had its heyday it's
it's birth
1890 1920 kind of went out of the
limelight but didn't disappear
then maybe about 1950s it had a brief
renaissance shall we say and then it
seems to have disappeared from the
picture but nowadays in 2022 and as i'll
tell a lot more about towards the end of
this video
there's at least one person one
organization that's making a very valid
effort to to bring it back and to make
it widely accessible and that's that's
pretty exciting i think anybody who's
interested in
my
channel my approach to learning
languages uh ought to be uh very very
interested in this
so uh the latin manuals that really came
out and almost like a 10-year time
period uh from about 1910 to about 1920
uh that are very similar
probably the grandparents or the parents
the direct
ancestors of orbits lingering latina
there were two volumes by a guy named
sun and shime uh of uh komentari de
uitame
1910 1909 and 1910
that are entirely in latin a modern
british school boy talking about his his
daily life and details
then there
were a pair of writers uh payne and mine
warring
who had a series of books called the
primus annos lingua latina and uh
secundemanos lingua latina and
1911 12 and 16
[Music]
and these were really uh under the
the aegis of this uh whd ralph guy the
the polymath editor of the loeb
classical library
and then there's also very very
interesting for anybody who's interested
in this a pair of appleton jones and i
think jones got killed in the first
world war uh and so then appleton
continued on his own so they have a
really really great series of books
called the puerto romanus and ponce
tyrone
and also the initial my first latin
course on the direct method and ludi
pesiki a set of plays that you can use
again all of these are about 1912
through 1919.
so there's a whole bunch of books that
precede
this one and use this method again many
of them uh because they are
really you know from a totally different
time and age are not so suitable towards
learning how to converse in in german or
latin or german or spanish or french
today
but are interesting to look at
pedagogically and could be revived and
updated perhaps but these latin ones are
still as good as they were back then
so
this method that
natural method the nature method direct
method that was
involved
in about 1890
1900 1910 1920
was i guess mostly popularized by
maximilian berlitz the i don't know the
father the grandfather of charles
burletz i don't know how many religious
there have been i think three or four
who have been
good linguists starting about 1875
through about now um so this became the
core of the religious method the blitz
school so it didn't drop out there and
as i said this might have uh
for some reason you're hard-pressed to
find books like these that i just
mentioned uh or for you know as i said
you could do a a search for direct
method natural method french spanish and
most of them are going to be published
in that time period
thanks to the internet archive that
wonders of digitization you can get
copies of these um most of these are
going to be published in that time
period
and you're hard-pressed to find
something in the 1930s 40s 50s but where
you will find them what occurred to me
after i started really digging into this
is that this is really the the core or
the essence
of the linguaphone institute books of
that period this is a set of
books that i've always championed the
linguaphone here's a similar thing it's
the linguaphone lesson and you have all
around the text entirely in the target
language in this volume see lingual
phone i guess diverges from that there's
a separate volume that has the
vocabulary and translation but if you
just have the main volume it's entirely
in the target language there's pictures
all around showing what you're learning
and it builds upon itself from the
language so uh you could use these
language volumes as a um as a form of
the direct message or the natural method
so langophone continued using this in
the 19
clear that pictures about 1940s vintage
30s 40s 50s 60s
but
getting back to this book
here and why i'm calling this video the
mystery of the the nature
method
is because this one that i was just
holding up by my faded paperback version
of it is is a
temporary one but the original copy of
this that i have is the same title
before it was called lingua latina per
se lustrata it was called latinas
and this
uh was published this is the first
edition of this this is published by the
nature institute the nature language
institute
this is
you see they're giving credit to a guy
named arthur m jensen being behind us
and each volume of this series
is uh listed all these uh eminent
professors who are behind it and at the
bottom here you can see that this
institute supposedly had
offices in in dozens of major cities
around the world and so this is called
originally this orberg's lingua latino
paseo de strata before it became
separated was published by this nature
institute and if you start digging into
this all these
nature language nature method institute
books almost all of them have copyrights
of 1954.
uh so they clearly were doing things
they got started before that this i
think the first one
uh was by this arthur m jensen at least
about 1942 maybe 1945 uh was uh
published the uh english by the
nature method uh and this institute back
in the 1950s mid-1950s published english
french german spanish i think russian
and danish because it's it's based in
denmark by this nature method and all of
them have the same look and feel of this
they've got the main text in the middle
lots of pictures pictures on the side
words defined on it and then again those
three different sets of
exercises uh at the end and commander
grammar also on the sides and a separate
grammar explanation so very uniform nice
looking set of books for a handful of
major languages plus danish where it was
based and in latin and other things like
this these were published in as i said
about 1954 a whole bunch of these and
that's the mystery to me is that if you
read the preface and the introduction to
these
they talk about having half a million
people studying by this method
after 1945 through about 1954
and it's very hard to uh find anything
about that and and know
where this went or what became of it uh
why it dropped out of the picture uh
just trends and vogues come and go and
language pedagogy we all know that
but this is so intuitive
and so user-friendly and so fun and nice
and gratifying to just start out using
the language immediately
and be able to understand the language
through the language that it's a
tragic enigma to me how and why this
might have disappeared
um so
uh there you have it it seems to have
been gone uh and before we skip up to
the future
let me say that there is a very similar
book
by william
g most called latin by the natural
method about the same time period 1957
that has nothing to do with this
and the dialogues themselves aren't
entirely in latin but there are
explanations in english that might be
diverging from this but in trying to
track down what became of these nature
method books
i'm not the only person who's curious
about that as a matter of fact there's
somebody out there who's much much more
interested and curious and devoted to
this uh than i am and this is the
founder of the ian academy a-y-a-n
academy the ion academy uh which has a
website here on uh it says a youtube
channel here where you can go and you
can find
all of these
french
german
spanish italian by the nature method
which they are
very very serious in dedicated fashion
um uploading videos for uh
chapter by chapter on here uh they are
expanding the series uh they're doing it
for czech and for turkish the the
founder i think of this behind it i
think he seems to be turk himself um
they are expanding these and once you go
onto their youtube channel you can click
onto their other website where if you
like they're also reprinting and
republishing
not just these and nice hardcover i
think even leather bound editions but
also
these old langophone books
so they're really behind this and
devoted to helping
people with polyitis get their hands on
this very very interesting fascinating
and exciting method that for some reason
has enigmatically
died out
so um if you're interested in these as i
said to my mind the original things by
warman and other people in the 18
80s and 90s although they're
pedagogically very sound for learning a
modern language particularly since the
focus of the direct method is on
conversation
they are a bit dated excitingly enough
these ion academy versions seem to be
updated or rewritten or done something
along those lines
if you're interested in these originals
again as i showed you for lingua latina
this is the basic outline
and this is kind of what it looks like
for latin and i think also for
italian and spanish and
czech and
uh turkish
but going back to this original edition
for english and french and russian
because it uses different english and
french because they're not phonetic and
russian because they are it uses a
different alphabet
there is uh ipa italicized writing
underneath the uh the mean language
thing so
if that's
important to you know that as well
but
again if you're interested in this
direct method nature method natural
method of learning languages
you can go to ion academy and listen
see what they have on their youtube
channel get the hard copies of these if
you'd like that uh from their website
you can go and google or do any other
kind of search for direct method natural
method and then
language of your choice
again i think you'll find it mainly for
french spanish german latin
some italian some other languages not
too many others
but it's really a fascinating approach
to
learning a language just again the idea
that you can start out and only use the
language uh to learn the language i
think is wonderful and it's it's
exciting
and just as i mentioned before pattern
drills have their role in place and it's
a shame they dropped out it's a shame
that this method is not better known
and just as it had a renaissance in the
1950s uh i'm wishing the ion academy
all good goodwill that perhaps it might
be able to have a renaissance now in the
2020s so i hope this was interesting and
useful to you and um
i may not talk to you
next week or the week after i am going
to have to uh
make a a long road trip to take my sons
to college i don't know where i'll be or
if i'll be able to film a video or
upload a video for the next week or two
but i will talk to you try to do so and
if not i will definitely talk to you
after a week or two so thank you very
much for listening and
good night
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