TIMESTAMPS: 01:35 - Language learning advice vs. language-specific information 03:06 - Language learning is a skill (which most natives don't have) 06:19 - Why there’s so much bad advice 08:10 - Even professional teachers often don’t understand language acquisition 12:12 - Rebuttal: “But top sports coaches often were never top athletes” 13:44 - Most natives are bad at articulating how their language works 15:29 - Natives will often give you false information 19:46 - How to properly utilize feedback from natives 22:16 - Conclusion Sorry if the audio seems out of sync at times…… While editing, it’s hard to know when the audio’s out of sync and when my computer’s simply lagging.

It's more like asking a person born rich how to get rich.

Damn. This makes so much sense to me. It's abundantly clear to me why I'm not really qualified to "teach" English acquisition. I've been using various apps like HelloTalk or Busuu and correcting a learner's English. But virtually 80%+ of the time, I find myself looking up English grammar rules because I have no idea why some things sound strange or weird. (Now Google shows me English language learning ads 😂) And I end up second-guessing myself on what is the proper grammar of the sentence. I'm pretty sure I gave out some B.S. answers more than once. Thanks for pointing this out!

Yeah my Japanese friends can’t really explain things, they’re just like “I kinda just know this...”

Couldn't agree more. As a native Japanese speaker I can articulate every fine difference in use as to when to use は and が as minutely and precisely as an average native English speaker can explain the adjective order in English or which of a(n)/the/ø one should use in a particular sentence. The answer is always "Yes" or "It just works."

You have a lot of Japanese books!

This first point is so true. As an iTalki teacher, I had one student who booked about 80% of my lessons. She was Chinese and her English was good (better than my best foreign language at the time) and she sometimes asked me stuff and I had to say "Your English is better than my Swedish, so you actually know more about this than I do." - and then there was the fact that Swedish is very near to English, versus English for her (being a long way from Chinese obviously). Another thing to watch out for is what I call "hyper correction" which is when the native speaker feels that if one is being strict about their language, then it should be pronounced or should be written in a certain way that is in fact wrong. One example is in Swedish, when R and S occur together (which they do all the time), then 90% of Swedes will pronounce it "shh" and this is considered correct, and is written in text books, but I came across a teacher who tried to insist that I should say "rrr" and "sss" as separate sounds, which sounds freakin' crazy unless you are Finno-Swedish. An equivalent in English would be those people who think that "who" doesn't exist and it must always be "whom", when they actually have no idea how to use "whom" correctly.

My native language is italian. A friend asked me when to use “l’imperfetto” and when to use “il passato prossimo” (both are past tenses) I was like... uuuhhhmmm i don’t know... But then she showed me her worksheets and i could of course solve it without problems... and she got angry because i told her idk but could use it the right way... 😬

Tbh, I also don’t remember how I learned the second language. Other than consuming content for 1000s of hours, it’s hard to evaluate what of what I did made how much of a difference, and it was a long time ago. That is to say that even if someone was successful at learning a language, they probably also won’t be correct about a lot of stuff. For example I can tell if something sounds wrong in english (my second language), but often I can’t explain exactly why.

Asking a native for language advice is kind of like asking a tall person how to be tall.

I've always said the same thing. Natives are good for pointing out what sounds right or wrong to them and what a native typically says or what they call something, but not language specific learning techniques. Ask a native Spanish-speaker how to form the imperfect subjunctive and they most likely won't even know what that is, although they use it naturally. I learned about how English worked (my native language) after studying other languages. Language learning (self study) is all about creating a continuous language learning environment and becoming obsessed with the language. You have to want to become part of the culture and community of those who speak the language. People don't realize all of the hours and experiences that native speakers have in their language. They have private tutors for years (mom, dad and siblings constantly talking around them and to them) and are sent to school for seven hours a day for 12 years (at least in the U.S.) where they hear and use the language in every class. They have to read, write, listen, speak and take tests constantly. Even in classes like P.E. and Math, they're learning and using the language. Adults don't invest that time in a foreign language. They also rarely completely stop speaking their native language. Adults also already have way more general knowledge than children so we obviously can learn some things much more quickly. The proof is always in the pudding. Listen to language learners who have reached high levels of fluency in the language. Each person's path is unique, but there are certain things we all had to do in order to learn, develop and master a foreign language.

This video is spot on. A hard pill to swallow for heavily viewed KZfaq language “teachers”.

There are definitely occasions where I'll ask my Japanese teacher (who is, in my opinion, extremely fluent in English, even accent and pronunciation wise) why something is the way it is in Japanese, and if he genuinely doesn't know the answer he'll say that he doesn't know why, which I appreciate way more than him telling me some made up thing on the spot.

I'm hesitant to throw all language teaching etiquette under the bus but certainly in my experience there are a lot of misconceptions as you say. I unwittingly achieved an effectively native level of fluency in two languages growing up (in addition to my native language) and I can with confirm the common factor was definitely mass immersion (absolutely focus on immersion guys!). Strangely enough no teacher ever seemed to be aware of this. I can only imagine what they were telling their other students.

I want to drive something home from your video: being attentive to how native speakers speak is really the key to all of this. An immersive approach to learning will do no more for you than many other approaches to learning if you don't pay attention. You may be able to get to the point where you have good comprehension but if you are not thinking about and paying attention to how natives speak and write and how you speak and write in comparison, you are just going to get stuck.

I'm trying to imagine a traditional language teacher watching this video and going crazy about your ideas, which doesn't make any sense to their previous experience. I don't know why they think that shit they teach at school is supposed to work. That doesn't make sense!

Indeed. I'd also like to add that knowing a language and teaching it are completely different sets of skills. To teach a language effectively, you don't only need an intuitive understanding of how it works, but the ability to spot differences between it and your students' native tongue in order to draw conclusions about the reasons behind the mistakes they make. Because a lot of the beginner and intermediate level mistakes learners of foreign languages make can be explained by examining the structure of their native tongues. My native tongue is Arabic. The syntax is almost opposite to that of Japanese to the extent that you can sometimes translate back and forth between the two by simply starting from the end and working your way back up. This means that although I've had a broad understanding of Japanese grammar for the longest time, I struggled with spontaneous speech because the longer the sentence was the harder it became for me to forsee how its structure is ought to be because that's simply not the way my brain was trained to work. This also meant that in order for me to truly have a great command of the language, I didn't only need to study grammar points and memorize vocabulary lists, but change the very lense through which I see the world. Right now I'm still stuck at the phase where I have to either form the complete thought inside my head before expressing it, or talking in bits and bytes while going back to make amendments as I speak. However, ever since I've became aware of what was really holding me back, progress became regular.

Personally I’ve found it a big help to talk to my teacher. He speaks Korean, Japanese and English, and is also learning Spanish. Sometimes it’s hard for him to explain things but I do find him a massive help.

Just got done with my first iTalki lessons today, go to KZfaq, and then I see that thumbnail lmao I'll definitely keep this in mind going forward, though. Really good vid

It's funny how "iTalki" is crossed out in the thumbnail and I have an iTalki lesson in one hour... lol

I agree 100% what you said, teachers try to give advice about learning foreign languages but they didn't even master one, and if they know more than one language, it's just in a basic level. So they don't have the experience and the struggle of learning foreign languages.

17:26 Fun fact: The Japanese name for 'pitch accent' is 高低アクセント, which literally means 'high-low accent'.

Great tips. I'm a native English speaker and a language enthusiast myself. Learners of English ask me all kinds of questions about English which I often have no idea how to answer!!

This is an amazing video. I've been studying several languages, and have a lingusitics degree, and I've noticed many times that native speaker answer without knowledge of language learning or the grammar of their language, or out of agenda (how things SHOULD be said according to the academy vs how people actually speak). Thank you for this clarifying, enlightening video

Great video, man 👍 I’ve studied languages for years and while language exchange with native speakers has been one of the most useful tools ever in developing my fluency after learning the basics, I can definitely confirm that *most* native speakers do not actually understand the details of their own language and, well, basically everything you said in the video had some truth to it! In fact, I have learned so much about my own native language from talking to so many foreigners, being asked questions I’d never thought about and thinking a lot and/or looking up answers, watching English-teaching videos in order to pass on good ones to friends learning it, etc. We just speak our own language. We don’t intimately “get” it. I don’t find much like this out there. I think a lot of teachers tend to be too optimistic thinking that warnings of negative aspects of learning will demotivate people. I think you gave valuable, honest advice. 👍

This video is so meaningful for me considering I also have just finished my first year in univeristy taking "language" classes and assuming that a native speaker is the most "trustworthy" or "valuable" source to learn from. Thank you so much! This is such a mindset switch for me, but it makes so much sense and also gives me a lot of relief.

I just found your KZfaq channel few days ago and after watching one single video, immediately, knew I had to be subscribed! What and AWESOME work you're doing, Matt. I'm a English learner and after 6 months really focused on English I'm feeling lost. I'm full of motivation, however, lack of guidance sort of discourage me and pushes me out of road, feeling like I don't know where to going. Matt, I'll appreciate if you give me some guide I can follow or in which order I should watch your videos and then I'll try to figure out how to apply everything onto English. Thank you for everything you are giving to this community.

Matt I have a specific but in my opinion "hot" question which most of us would find interesting. Me and a lot of MIA viewers are at least almost fluent in English. For me understanding is a no-brainer, even if I watch science, politics or law stuff I almost never have problems. Now the thing: My accent sucks terribly... I am not happy at all with the way I pronounce words, vocab choice, etc... I think this developed at school and work, where I was/am regularly forced to output in Englisch. I mean everyone can understand me but as you said: "being understood and sounding native are different things". Really hope you could make a VOD regarding this topic, since I think a lot of people would benefit from that.

Wait, there's a language youtuber who is not endorsed by Italki?

This was really interesting! I wasn’t sure what kind of things you were going to say to back up your statement because I’ve heard this same statement but not with any reasons behind it. I really agree with you. Sometimes I think learning from someone who learned the languages really well is better at the beginning and learning from a native is better later on. Depending on their own experience with language learning.

From my experience, the best tutors are the ones willing to say when they aren't sure or will look it up. I have a tutor who does just that. I also know he's a language learner who is still trying to master English himself. So I think having a teacher like that helps in that he understands the struggle of language learning. I personally do the same thing for my Japanese friend who is trying to learn English. I learned long ago I know English but don't usually understand why I say things the way I do. So anytime I am asked a question, I always look up the grammatical reason why and then try to re-explain it to her in a simpler way.

I'm so glad I came across your videos early on in my journey of learning Japanese! Before that I was sooooo lost I was all over the place どうもありがとう

im not even learning japanese but youre content is some of the best ive found on youtube, keep up the great work!

Dude how are you not at atleast 500k subs

"Japanese is flat." How many times have I heard this from Japanese teachers? Hahaha

Your comment about seeking language advice from native speakers is very inspiring. I think most language learners, including me, tend to believe that native speakers are 'authority' in the language they are good at and there is no way that we can challenge them because we can never be a native like they are. I have been asked questions about my native language and I could not explain well enough because there are so many things come so natural to me and I have never thought of why I spoke or use certain words in certain ways until I met a person asking me to tell him/her why. Since I could not give him/her a satisfactory answer, I kind of 'more understanding' when some teacher told me 'Well, native tend to speak it in this way, no reason' but in fact there is a reason, he just doesn't know.

I think it’s funny how much effort we put into sounding native in Japanese when I’ve never heard a Japanese person speak without a noticeable accent.

That anecdote about the native japanese college teacher was really eye opening!

My mom is a teacher. She has to teach english and swedish. She can have basic conversations in english but she is not as fluent as I am. I tried talking with her about good ways to learn languages but she doesn't listen... she has the traditional teacher approach with little word tests and extensive grammar reading. I beliebe that with that approach you can get on a basic conversation level but you won't ever get fluent that way and it takes a lot more time and energy. I'm now learning german and really so far the best thing I have done in order to learn has been playing minecraft with a 9 years old german girl. And also reading a book. Though with the book my mom always teases me like: "how come you say you are not good in german, yet you read a book?"

thank you for this!! also loving the new setup!!

That's something I learned hard way while learning German from natives. They have their obsolete ways of teaching and no thought about how foreigners think

I remember when I visited my host family in France, I was asked about how to pronounce "cicada." There are lots of cicadas in France and not any in the state of WA. I never actually heard the word, but I've read it before. So I told him it was pronounced "Ky-cada," but he had the correct pronunciation, "Si-cada." Now there's someone who thinks that "cicada" is pronounced differently than it is, perhaps even correcting his fellow French friends because a native speaker told him it was pronounced a different way.

I have a best friend from Spain that moved to Norway for 4 years ago and I teach her Norwegian and she teaches me Spanish, it helps us both❤️ I learnt English from when I was 6 till 18 so of course I can already speak it, but my friend knows it was hard learning Norwegian and I know it was hard learning Spanish, and now we are both helping each other and speak relatively well, of course she speaks better Norwegian than I speak Spanish because we live in Norway but I can keep a conversation without problems❤️

Good video, again... :) I think you are right about the sports coach analogy. True there are some great sports coaches (martial arts instructors, etc.) that may not be the most talented athletes. However there are other key differences: (1) coaching methodology tends to follow what has produced results in the past and (2) even coaches who are not the most talented athletes have 'made the journey'. They know what it's like to train themselves. A professional ice hockey coach, for example, probably hasn't taken a class at university telling him 'this is how players get better' and then walks into his job never having played hockey before or never having experienced training himself.

It's incredible that I have come to this conclusion a while ago. I tend to spend most of my time thinking things over and over, and it was one of those things that made question native speakers abilities to understand what learning a new language actually feels like.

Omg Thank you!!! I had to learn the hard way with Chinese. Now, I see why we don't actually learn a language in school because we only learn from a textbook. I'm not fluent yet but I am at an intermediate level. I truly started learning Chinese at 21 so age does not matter.

Excellent analysis. I'm glad you mentioned that it's not just the average native speaker who is the problem, but also so-called "professionals" who are monolingual and have no real knowledge about how we acquire languages.

I took a Japanese class at my university a few years ago taught by a Japanese woman and she had some frustrating policies about learning Japanese. My Japanese level was much higher than the class so I was always wanting to use the more advanced grammar and vocabulary that I knew but she would scold me for veering outside of the confines of the material we were studying. She told students not to learn Japanese from material outside of class because it would corrupt our knowledge. Somehow it doesnt occur to people how many hundreds of years it would take to become fluent sticking the couple hundred words or so we would learn in a semester

Really informative and thought-out video. Subscribed just because of these kinds of videos, and hoping as well as looking forward to more! Thanks

Excellent video bro. You've confirmed a lot of what I've learnt during my journey of learning a second language as an adult.

Thanx man, I did think about it before, but here you just made the whole idea clear 👍

I’ve only ever studied with native speakers who are certified tutors. Most know their language really well and are actually trained to teach. They also have unmatched intuitive knowledge of their language. Sometimes it’s more important to sound natural rather than correct.

Matt is a skilled guy..He has been teaching many people how to tackle language learning for years..and he has been doing it intelligently and honestly

This Video is very useful for every language learners. I found new information here. Thank you

Amazing video! I love how MIA and AJATT has opened my eyes to so many things wrong with education

Man, this is the second video I saw of your channel. I love your tips! I remember a lot of tips from my english teacher which were really bad, even though she learnt the language. It's probably a "chain" of bad advices that started from their teacher, or even before, idk. Anyway, I'm starting to learn french and your videos are really helpful. I know my English is not good enough, but I've never really enjoyed to learn it, although it's useful (and your videos are an actual proof of it).

Agreed. As a native English speaker, I've had so many "good questions" from L2 learners of English. It's made me more observant of English and why I say what I say the way I say it for sure. Also, I've had many questions about other languages that couldn't quite be answered with ease if at all. Most of my foreign language acquisition has been self-taught, and it has only gotten better by having native speakers around me to strengthen my skills.

This is brilliant! I was trying to explain this point and could come up with a brilliant explanation like this! Amazing 😉

This is so true, I used to teach English in Taiwan and certain questions I couldn’t answer and had to ask the Taiwanese teacher why the grammar was the way it is, she knew cause she had learned it as an adult, I didn’t cause it’s my native language. I think there’s a similar problem with getting advice from someone who’s learned a language very easily, because they are talented they could have leaned in any way and still have been successful. I’ve just uploaded a video talking about this also, and how I learned Chinese as a deaf person.

Great video, well explained and accurate! Well done!!!

Interesting point and I've got to admit it makes sense. In my experience as a non native English teacher naitives are invaluable in helping students overcome their speaking barrier. There's some kind of magic to them :))) For me that's probably the main reason why it's worth hiring a native English speaker trained in ELT.

I like the new setting. Your set up is looking much more professional as well.

You're amazing. Bless your heart. When I learn my first language, i'll make sure to find a way to thank you.

I totally agree on the unconcious part. I had a lot of times where my teacher couldn't quite explain something with words, so he resorted to using different usage examples to explain. And I mean, even I having learn English as a second language find myself only knowing some things by instinct, so it isn't that rare. That's why studying words and such in context is so important.

Bro this was really insightful. Every language learner must watch this video. Subbed

Love the new format!

I tried native speakers twice and then went "Alright, let's try a different approach". Now my tutor is an Ukranian. No regrets.

Hundred percent on the mark! You could not have made it clearer! Fantastic job!

Matt, Great analogy. Never look at that way. Thank you for pointing that out. Your videos are top notch.

My [Vietnamese] wife asks me questions about English. I can for sure tell her the answer, often answer why, sometimes I can even track the gut feeling to a rule, but often enough I don't why it is the way it is. Also as a music teacher I can relate to the music analogy. I feel like you can really only teach what you had trouble learning (maybe that's an exaggeration). The problems I had to battle and struggle and fight to overcome I already know the best and quickest way to help my students as I was very deliberate in that process. Something that came easy, it's a matter of looking and seeing what I'm doing and then teaching that. They're definitely different processes.

Absolutely on point. Teaching is a skill. I had a guitar teacher earlier in life and a French teacher later in life and I didn’t gel with them and (incorrectly) concluded that I was just incapable of learning either of the things they were masters of. When I realized that they were “native“ to their areas of expertise but not “native” to teaching, I ceased believing I was “dumb.”

Hype for the new place! It’s looking awesome

Hi, Matt-san I've just started to be a tutor on italki and I thought 'oh no am I not supporting students at all ?' when I found this video though Dôgen-san's channel this morning. But, I'm so relieved, I am okay enough to be a tutor 😊 according to this( I mean, my skill is to be sharpen of course! ) Thank you for making this video :))

Finally, someone who knows what he's talking about.

This reminds me of when I was teaching English for Berlitz in Japan. Students mostly followed a curriculum and when they hit the halfway point or completed a book, we had to take five minutes to recommend ways to self study for that student based on their individual needs. As a language nerd who had studied languages for almost 20 years on and off but more on, I was totally up for it. But apparently most teachers felt totally unqualified and had no idea what to say. But they’re told that’s not an option they have to just make something up and sound authoritative. A perfect example of when you shouldn’t listen to the native speaker. I’m sure it happens all the time in other language programs too.

It's really a great class. Thank you so much!

I've been learning Spanish for about 20 years and my GF is a native speaker of both English and Spanish. I can explain Spanish grammar far better than she can because I had to learn it. She is infinitely better than me at speaking and listening to the language and is pretty much 100% fluent. She just doesn't know WHY things are the way they are. So yes, your video is right.

Jfc I’m so glad someone said this lmaoo. All I had to do was think about native English speakers and how many of them don’t even know English that well. 😂 unless they also learned a different language or a linguist I realized they rarely think about their language or why they say what they do. A lot of esoteric grammar is also just intuitive if they’re a native speaker, you can’t expect them to explain a lot of stuff that makes sense. The flat thing has also really annoyed me, because I grew up speaking Vietnamese so i can hear pitches in speech VERY easily. I never heard Japanese as flat in tone. Very even but not flat. I think what they *mean* is that they don’t usually stress syllables. Either they don’t recognize there is a difference between the pitch/strength or they dont realize that pitch is a part of the definition of evenness to English speakers.

I always thought this! Thanks for the reassurance

The BEST use of Native speakers (from places like iTalki) is for conversation practice. To learn the language itself, apart from conversation (which is like over 50%), you should learn from people who have learned multiple languages AND it's their native language. So if you want to learn Japanese, take lessons from a Japanese native speaker who also has learned English and/or Spanish and/or whatever language.

Great video! I'm both a native and non-native speaker teacher. I teach English, which is my second language, and Portuguese, which is my native language. And I can say that I can teach both languages very well. I also hold a B.A in Tesol and a M.S in Linguistics, and it is exactly this that makes me a good teacher. It is the knowledge of what a language consists of and how to teach it that makes me stand out. In addition, tbh sometimes I find it harder to teach Portuguese because words that are quite mundane for me might have never been heard by my students. And sometimes Im unaware of that, so I use vocabulary in my lessons that is inappropriate for their level.On top of all that, there is the obvious fact that your students, by definition, will never be native speakers of the language they are learning, so why is it so important that they learn it from a native speaker? Overall, the quality of a teacher is measured by how good he is at several criteria: methodology, proficiency, knowledge of grammar, etc. Of course you cant be a non-native teacher of English, e.g, with intermediate English skills. But if you are a highly proficient teacher who knows how to teach the language, you will do a great job! Trust me

I can definitely attest to this. I teach English as a foreign language, which I started really learning when I was 15, and I feel quite confident in my teaching abilities. On the other hand, I've had the experience of teaching my own native language, Portuguese, to foreigners, and I basically sucked. (Take into account that I have a college degree in both languages.)

I like it very much that you are claryfing terms beforehand (s.am not a native speaker)

100% true. People almost react like it's blasphemy to say this. But it's simply true. Also, not only on italki and HelloTalk and so on, but that's also one of the reason why most Japanese classes you can take freaking suck. The teacher is generally a random Japanese person (mostly a woman) who absolutely doesn't have any deeper understanding of her native tongue. (Which is in itself totally fine, I also couldn't teach German, my native language - but don't become a 'teacher' then)

I really like your insights. Thanks so much!

I learned ぼく as being high to low and I forced myself to say it that way, but recently I've had a strange feeling that something was off about that pronunciation. The more I got better at the language the more my intuition would tell me I sounded like an anime character or something by pronouncing it that way. Your explanation perfectly cleared up all my suspicions. I will pronounce it low to high from now on :)

agreed. we live our whole lives being immersed in our native language. we just can't help but learn simply through experience. language learning is a skill and requires specific info that lets lets you learn faster and more explicitly.

Omg. “The big red dog” example threw me back to my 5th grade English class. It’s pretty useful when describing a noun using a number of adjectives, but I still get confused with the order 😅.

This has nothing to do with foreign language learning, but I'm excited to find that old version of 古文研究法 (Kobun Kenkyuhou) by Dr. Jin-ichi Konishi right behind you ! You sure must be a conoisseur of great books😊 I was terrible at classical Japanese when I was in high school but somehow decided to keep all the books by Dr. Konishi. I'm so glad I did. Now, in my fifties, I am re-learning Classical Japanese grammar from (almost) ground zero and have slowly come to appreciate our cultural heritage in its original text. Language learning can be a great hobby; it costs very little if you choose your tools wisely. And the joy it gives us will be tremendous!

I'd actually go even further and look for a native speaker who's already managed to learn a third or fourth foreign language in their adult life. L2 is often acquired through years of exposure that begins in childhood. Consequently, millions of non-native English speakers have absolutely no idea how to learn a foreign language because they learned it from practice while being forced to attend a class at school, playing games, watching Hollywood movies and interacting online. Sure, their results may vary greatly because of talent, intelligence or dedication but still their learning path may remain unknown. I learned the most about acquiring foreign languages when I decided to learn Italian (my 4th foreign language) at home without classes because I was completely on my own and had to self motivate and find ways to move forward. Made lots of errors on the way and wasted tens of hours but learned a lot about the process and applied it to the next foreign language with ease. Great content Matt!

Key point here: 0:45 He's specifically saying the native speakers that *have not* mastered a second language. I can confirm this because the advice that has helped me a lot is from native speakers that have mastered a 2nd or 3rd language, so they know all the struggles and the process of learning a new language.

That's a very good point and it applies to bilinguals as well. growing up as a bilingual, when I moved to Europe I didn't learn the language for 5 years! Thankfully, now I'm able to speak 4 languages. Acquired language is different than native learned language(s).

Never tought about it but you have a point. Even tho I taught Swedish for a short period I could probably not teach swedish very well or english even tho it is not my native language I learned it young.

I relate to your uni/college story. I did Spanish at uni (just for one semester, I wanted a language elective and it was the only one they offered). I love languages and spent easily 6hrs a day either directly learning or immersing. I also speak French which helped. I am dyslexic and I was entitled to extra support but my teacher literally accused me of not being dyslexic because I was (not surprisingly) doing better than everyone else in my class (except for a girl whose mother was Equadorian), who were probably only doing Spanish for the 2hrs a week that we had class. She had no conception of the work that I put in and the fact that this was not my first additional language, just acted like my 2x diagnoses (I had to get another one when moving countries) were not true and refused to allow me extra time on assessment, completely ignoring all the times I would randomly mix up words and letters- not forgetting M/F but literally just forgetting letters or putting them in the wrong place, and would never be able to finish extended written response in the given time. Her English was terrible which made it harder to explain tbh. Other students said it was hard to communicate with her as well. Glad I only had one semester with her.

大賛成です！（英訳をあとで書きます）I will write my opinion both in Japanese and English. 「外国語を習得していないネイティヴ」は，無意識に母語を話しています。 学習法や，なぜそう言うのかなど，分析的な解答は得られません。 ですが状況に応じた自然な表現など，ネイティヴだから分かることもあります。 知りたい内容に応じて，アドバイスを求める相手を選ぶことが必要だと思います。 「ぼく(僕)」には自分を指す場合と，小さな男の子を指す場合があります。 頭高アクセントの僕は，小さな男の子を表すと思います。 たとえば小学１先生ぐらいの男の子は，自分のことを頭高アクセントで僕と言います。 その子に対して「僕，いくつ？」と聞くような場合も，頭高アクセントです。 年齢が高くなるにつれて平板，もしくは尾高になるのではないでしょうか。 I totally agree with you, Matt! Native speakers who haven't mastered a foreign language speak their own language only unconsciously. They can't give you analytical answers to questions such as "How can I learn Japanese?" or "Why do you use the expression?". But they can tell whether what you say sounds natural to them. So you need to think who you are going to ask according to what you want to know. I think "Boku" has two different meanings. One is to refer to a young boy and the other to refer to yourself (male). If you say "Boku" in the atamadaka accent, you are talking about a small boy. A first grade boy would call himself "Boku" in the atamadaka accent. You would call him "Boku" in the atamadake accent when you ask him, "How old are you?" I think as a boy grows up, he calls himself "Boku" in the odaka (tail-pitched) accent.

Great video! I think you're right on all counts. I can't help but wince, though, when you keep saying "if I would have". I know this is an American alternative to "if I had" but it still jars on me!

I didn't know about the adjective order rule. Cool. Calling it a sentence makes an alarm go off for me though - although I know we do use incomplete "sentences" all the time in real life, except formally. I agree with your points.

Hey Matt! Thanks so much for the advice. Nobody has said it but those stack of books behind you are beautiful. ALSO, I wanted to find out if you also studied most of Keigo when you learned Japanese?

Very sound reasoning in my opinion, man. Couldn't have said it better myself.

very informative and well done video!