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Test Unit 1 Reading

1. There are many factors that determine how difficult it is to learn a new language, including differences between the new language and one's first language, circumstances of learning, and individual abilities. 2. While Chinese's writing system and pronunciation make it very hard for speakers of languages using the Roman alphabet, Japanese speakers may find Chinese easier since Japanese also uses Chinese characters. 3. British diplomats reportedly find Hungarian the most difficult due to its complex grammatical system with 35 cases, even though its alphabet is similar to English, showing difficulty can vary between language and learner.

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Juani Gala
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46 views

Test Unit 1 Reading

1. There are many factors that determine how difficult it is to learn a new language, including differences between the new language and one's first language, circumstances of learning, and individual abilities. 2. While Chinese's writing system and pronunciation make it very hard for speakers of languages using the Roman alphabet, Japanese speakers may find Chinese easier since Japanese also uses Chinese characters. 3. British diplomats reportedly find Hungarian the most difficult due to its complex grammatical system with 35 cases, even though its alphabet is similar to English, showing difficulty can vary between language and learner.

Uploaded by

Juani Gala
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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READING COMPREHENSION

Read the text. Are the statements true (T) or false (F)?

1 The question of how hard a language is to learn is relevant to both first and second language
acquisition. ___
2 The only difficult aspect of learning Chinese for foreign learners is the writing system. _____
3 Portuguese is definitely easier than Chinese. _____
4 The circumstances in which you learn a language affect how well you learn it. _____
5 A Japanese speaker may find it easy to learn a language written in the Roman Alphabet. _____
6 The Hungarian alphabet causes problems for British speakers. _____
7 Hungarian is the hardest language in the world. _____
8 Hungarian has as many cases as Tabassaran. ____
9 Many British diplomats learn Tabassaran. _____
10 The writer thinks that learning new writing systems is easy. _____

The Hardest Language


People often ask which is the most difficult language to learn, and it is not easy to answer because
there are many factors to take into consideration. Firstly, in a first language the differences are
unimportant as people learn their mother tongue naturally, so the question of how hard a language is to
learn is only relevant when learning a second language.
A native speaker of Spanish, for example, will find Portuguese much easier to learn than a native
speaker of Chinese, for example, because Portuguese is very similar to Spanish, while Chinese is very
different, so first language can affect learning a second language. The greater the differences between
the second language and our first, the harder it will be for most people to learn. Many people answer
that Chinese is the hardest language to learn, possibly influenced by the thought of learning the
Chinese writing system, and the pronunciation of Chinese does appear to be very difficult for many
foreign learners. However, for Japanese speakers, who already use Chinese characters in their own
language, learning writing will be less difficult than for speakers of languages using the Roman
alphabet.
Some people seem to learn languages readily, while others find it very difficult. Teachers and the
circumstances in which the language is learned also play an important role, as well as each learner's
motivation for learning. If people learn a language because they need to use it professionally, they
often learn it faster than people studying a language that has no direct use in their day to day life.
Apparently, British diplomats and other embassy staff have found that the second hardest language is
Japanese, which will probably come as no surprise to many, but the language that they have found to
be the most problematic is Hungarian, which has 35 cases (forms of a nouns according to whether it is
subject, object, genitive, etc). This does not mean that Hungarian is the hardest language to learn for
everyone, but it causes British diplomatic personnel, who are generally used to learning languages, the
most difficulty. However, Tabassaran, a Caucasian language has 48 cases, so it might cause more
difficulty if British diplomats had to learn it.
Different cultures and individuals from those cultures will find different languages more difficult. In the
case of Hungarian for British learners, it is not a question of the writing system, which uses a similar
alphabet, but the grammatical complexity, though native speakers of related languages may find it
easier, while struggling with languages that the British find relatively easy.
No language is easy to learn well, though languages which are related to our first language are easier.
Learning a completely different writing system is a huge challenge, but that does not necessarily make
a language more difficult than another. In the end, it is impossible to say that there is one language that
is the most difficult language in the world.

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