(taken from my log) I must recommend the book Language Master Key. This guy advocates a listening-heavy approach and I think he's spot on with that idea. He fills in a gap missing in most "how to learn language" books, because he has allot to say about this area, where most everyone else says to just do it. I really feel his advice has allot of experience behind it, while explaining in a simple way. There are a few ideas that I might try out in the future. One is listening to what someone says in L2 and translating it into L1. And the other way around. He likes the theories of Krashen, but he's not a slave to it, and it quick to point out when it contradicts his own experience. For vocab (and grammar) he uses a notebook, as well as flashcards so that he can easily mix up the order of the words. The way he sets it up is attractive but I'm hard pressed to move away from Goldlist for my part. Best I can sort out, he recommends studying in 3 week spurts. I guess it's because during this you will have fast progress and your motivation will go up, but after three weeks you really can't keep it up any more. I recognize some bits from his blog. Including how-long-does-it-take-to-become-fluent. I found this interesting because it has an estimated time for learning a language to B2. Cebuano would be right along the lines of Tagalog, at Category III language, and according to this 10 hours a week would take about 3 years. I think if I did any more than that in a week I would probably pass out.
I read it when it was free. Very good stuff! I think that Ron is the real deal when it comes to language learning. He has experience learning languages to very high levels - including a stint in the US military learning Arabic full-time. I really like his blog as well: http://www.languagesurfer.com
