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Press conference speech: "What for?" (boring)
https://www.learningtoknowrussian.com/2014/08/press-conference-speech-what-for-boring.html
A common question that people often ask me is «Why Russian?», «Why would you even start working on it?»
And that is true! Modern language learning industry is working in an excellent way... It is working in order to teach everyone the English language. One can spend a lot of time discussing the importance of the language in people's lives and in the world, but sometimes it seems that other languages are not in demand at all...
Overall, knowing Russian even in Russia is not always considered to be an asset! And some Australian, for example, who starts learning Russian really surprises!
The most unusual discovery for me personally was to learn that there are people who strive to learn Russian. And there are quite a few of them!
Of course, the main issue that people are interested in is, “Why... well, why do they need the Russian language?”
Thinking this way, one could just consider the Russian language as completely unnecessary, irrelevant and not needed. And any language other than English for that matter. By the way, that's what a lot of people think like. But maybe one should not always be so pragmatic, especially when it concerns the language. That is because the language is not only the tool, but also the key for understanding the culture and the mentality...
It is unexpected and unpleasant that those who would like to learn Russian don't have a lot available to them out of the latest achievements in the sphere of learning technologies. They have to use the methods from two centuries ago. Even the available products of suitable quality offer teaching «empty» and «pointless» Russian language. Nobody is interested in the answer to the question «Why does someone in the morning in Australia today need the Russian language?». That is why they are offering endless dialogues about the «Meeting in the airport» and other trifles.
I think that the question «What for?» is the main question. That is why I have never liked to call our product as «teaching the language». We do not want to teach anyone just for the sake of teaching. We need to solve worthy problems, for example, making a trip to a strange country safer, or study the language that a grandmother talked in, or read Dostoevsky in the original... Everyone has his own task. And this task can motivate both us and those who are using our products and services
When I started creating the company, I put the benchmark very high up. Developing a program of teaching the language based on a full-proof technology is not enough in my opinion. I am confident that our programs have to open up the way to understanding the culture and the mentality. Only then they are able to solve students' tasks and will not simply be another language aid on the shelf, on a disk, or in the head of the student.
I realize that this goal is a kind of a challenge. But we have taken up this challenge. We will live and work with it.
*********************************
Best regards,
Denis Ivanov, Learning To Know co-Founder
Join us: facebook.com/LearningToKnow
And that is true! Modern language learning industry is working in an excellent way... It is working in order to teach everyone the English language. One can spend a lot of time discussing the importance of the language in people's lives and in the world, but sometimes it seems that other languages are not in demand at all...
Overall, knowing Russian even in Russia is not always considered to be an asset! And some Australian, for example, who starts learning Russian really surprises!
The most unusual discovery for me personally was to learn that there are people who strive to learn Russian. And there are quite a few of them!
Of course, the main issue that people are interested in is, “Why... well, why do they need the Russian language?”
Thinking this way, one could just consider the Russian language as completely unnecessary, irrelevant and not needed. And any language other than English for that matter. By the way, that's what a lot of people think like. But maybe one should not always be so pragmatic, especially when it concerns the language. That is because the language is not only the tool, but also the key for understanding the culture and the mentality...
It is unexpected and unpleasant that those who would like to learn Russian don't have a lot available to them out of the latest achievements in the sphere of learning technologies. They have to use the methods from two centuries ago. Even the available products of suitable quality offer teaching «empty» and «pointless» Russian language. Nobody is interested in the answer to the question «Why does someone in the morning in Australia today need the Russian language?». That is why they are offering endless dialogues about the «Meeting in the airport» and other trifles.
I think that the question «What for?» is the main question. That is why I have never liked to call our product as «teaching the language». We do not want to teach anyone just for the sake of teaching. We need to solve worthy problems, for example, making a trip to a strange country safer, or study the language that a grandmother talked in, or read Dostoevsky in the original... Everyone has his own task. And this task can motivate both us and those who are using our products and services
When I started creating the company, I put the benchmark very high up. Developing a program of teaching the language based on a full-proof technology is not enough in my opinion. I am confident that our programs have to open up the way to understanding the culture and the mentality. Only then they are able to solve students' tasks and will not simply be another language aid on the shelf, on a disk, or in the head of the student.
I realize that this goal is a kind of a challenge. But we have taken up this challenge. We will live and work with it.
*********************************
Best regards,
Denis Ivanov, Learning To Know co-Founder
Join us: facebook.com/LearningToKnow
