A Scriptorium (which literally means “a place for writing”) is a room in medieval European monasteries devoted to the copying of manuscripts by monastic scribes.

I’d like to share with you a language-learning technique that is not something I would personally prefer to use but I do think that it will suit a lot of personalities out there–if you’re a grammar nerd, or really feel like you have to learn the formal grammar and syntax of a language to actually learn the language itself, then this is for you. I don’t take a side in this argument, I don’t think there should be an argument: it’s simply a matter of different personality types and what works best for you. The two extreme opposites here are people like me and Benny who hate any kind of formal classroom-like learning and just prefer to speak, speak, speak and sort of learn as we go, then there are people like Professor Arguelles (who speaks 13 different languages and is certainly no slouch), Randy, and  Iversen on HTLAL who much prefer to learn the formal grammar and syntax of a language so that they can really get a ‘feel’ for the structure of it and this allows them to effectively put everything together and truly understand the language, which is fine, too. Whatever works most effectively for you is what you should do.

The Scriptorium Method

What is the Scriptorium Method? This is something that Professor Arguelles developed and currently teaches to his students that forces  you to really focus on every last little detail of the language as you’re transcribing these sentences, you learn vocabulary and grammar all at the same time, and since it’s so focused you learn a great deal of it in a relatively short amount of time.  The key here is to really take your time and focus on what you are doing.  You will find that short sessions of about 15-30 minutes each are the most effective, as you simply cannot maintain the requisite level of focus for much longer than that.

The 3 basic steps that make up the essential Scriptorium method are:

1. Take a sentence and read it aloud.
2. Speak aloud again as you write it carefully.
3. Read the sentence aloud from what you have written.

What you are essentially doing is transcribing a text in the language in question, but you’re not just doing that, because as you go along you must look up and make sure you fully understand any and all grammar related to what you are writing and any and all vocabulary that you do not fully understand.  Do you see how you could easily spend 10 minutes on a single sentence?  The point is that you must FULLY understand EVERYTHING that you are writing, and you will do absolutely anything and everything necessary (up to and including contacting native speakers over the internet to help you, or a local one if you know one) to make sure that you do.  Now, if you were to do this and go through just, say, 10 pages of a normal (adult reading level) non-fiction book in the language that you’re learning, do you see just how much you would learn???  An enormous amount.  This isn’t my style, but that’s certainly not to say that it isn’t effective.

Demonstration Video

Here you can see Professor Arguelles doing a short demonstration of the Scriptorium method; he goes into further detail and answers questions about it in this thread on HTLAL:

 

A Quick Note Before We End: If you’re interested in learning Spanish, read this…

Edit (September 11th, 2012): I’ve got two posts that I’ve put up that I’m recommending everyone interested in learning Spanish go read if they haven’t already (if you have, ignore this, sorry): How to avoid wasting months learning Spanish the wrong way (basically this is my “how to get started right in learning Spanish” post for complete beginners) and The Telenovela Method where I cover how to use popular media like movies, music, and books to learn Spanish.  Additionally you can check out the front page for a more complete list of my best and most popular posts.

Cheers,

Andrew

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I put together a list of the internet’s Top 33 Free Spanish-learning resources, my favorite language exchanges and Spanish chat rooms, and more. I’ve spent a great deal of time putting together a 3-part series of articles for you on the internet’s best free resources for the Spanish-learner that you’ll get when you sign up for my newsletter–in addition to all of what you get below, I’ll be sure to send you any updates about cool new sites, resources, and learning tips and techniques that I come up with (I’m currently putting together a whole series that will teach you in great detail precisely how I go about learning a new language):

Part 1: A very long list of my favorite Top 33 free online Spanish-learning resources (tools, references, sites with free lessons, articles, blogs, forums, etc.) that’s far too long to include here, especially with all the other stuff I’ve got here that’s available just on this site alone, and I’d like to offer it to you (completely free, you don’t have to do anything other than sign up) right now.

Part 2: I explain what language exchanges are (essentially they allow you free access to an unlimited number of native speakers to practice your Spanish with), why they’re absolutely essential if you’re teaching yourself (I’m serious when I say this: it’s impossible to get fluent without them if you’re learning a foreign language on your own), how to use them, and which ones are the best.

Part 3: I cover chat rooms which are specifically devoted to connecting you with native Spanish speakers who want to learn English so you can chat with them in Spanish (and they’ll help and correct you) and then you do the same for them with their English (these are completely free to use, but rather hard to find, but I’ll tell you where the best ones are!). Sign up below!

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