How long does it take to reach C1 (advanced) in a language you're learning? 💭
🤔Someone asked this on Twitter today and it got me thinking. I wonder why questions like these are so common. It's good to have a broad understanding of how long it might take, but there are way too many factors at play, making it impossible to have a single answer to this question.
📚If you're fluent in Dutch and learning Afrikaans, it might take you a few months or years, depending on the time you put in to learn and practice, to become fluent. The two languages are that similar.
🤠But if you're a native French speaker learning Korean, for instance, the two languages are very different in terms of grammar, pronunciation, sentence structure and even writing system. It would require hours and hours more effort than the above example.
🗻In another instance, 2 native English speakers could both start learning Japanese. Person A spends hours weekly studying, getting speaking practice in, listening and getting immersion down, and works hard. They could reach N3 (intermediate) level in a year and a half if they put in a ton of effort and if Japanese is all they focus on. Person B might even live in Japan, but if they don't put in the work and just rely on some weekly classes and barely do their homework, they might never even reach N5 (beginner) despite living in Japan. 🤔
As you can see, it's really impossible to ask these questions and have a cookie-cutter answer for each person and each language. Let's rather put time in to be immersed in languages rather than get stressed about how long the process might take. What do you all think? 💖🥳
