PILAT

We just finished a two week training called "PILAT" which stands for "Program in Language Acquisition Techniques". It's hosted by Mission Training International in Palmer Lake, CO.

I had done language learning before in Central Asia and in N. Africa both briefly but intensely. I also had the traditional public school French education (and Chinese but forget that ever happened). None of the previous language learning (save maybe some recall of high school French) would be any help to us as we go forward. We will learn two languages for our future work so getting some serious training for that task was really critical.

I loved it. The biggest paradigm shift was from a 'teacher-driven' mentality to a 'learner-driven' mentality. They taught that language learning is like owning your own business. You own the bottom-line and it's your responsibility as the learner to make the business succeed. It's not the teacher's responsibility, it's not the sending organization's responsibility, it's MY responsibility. Coming from a Western public education we learned to be passive learners and the teacher would 'push' the information into our heads. This training taught me how to 'pull' the language into my head.

You concentrate on comprehension first. You don't try to speak it until you understand it and then just speak it for practice of comprehension. Later, you work vigorously on your pronunciation through phonetic drills, listening to a recording of yourself, and fine tuning your accent so it is pleasant to the native language speaker. We did all sorts of activities with basic pictures, role-plays, dialogue, total physical response, and others. We drilled each day some phonetic sounds to warm our mouths up and feel the different placement of each part of the mouth in order to make certain sounds.

One of the best parts was working with a language helper. Our small group was with a man from Nepal. He had never taught anyone in English his native Nepali language before, which was great. It gave us a real authentic idea of what it will be like when we find some gracious person in our future home to be our helper in the language. So, I learned some Nepali! Most of what I know is comprehension, so if you spoke basic Nepali to me I would probably understand it, but I don't have the speaking part of it down. It was cool to see how on the first day (we had three days with him) I was frustrated afterward because I wanted to speak it already, but by the second day it was getting easier to comprehend and see progress in our language learning. I even started hearing similarities in different parts of the language.

The gist is that you are in control of the language learning with the helper. You tell them what you want to learn. You come prepared with a language lesson and they just tell you the language. It's tough because most helpers will want to take control and go off on one particular verb or set of stories about the topic. It is my job as the learner to keep us focused in a 'tight world'-meaning we stay within tight boundaries so that the learning can take place better. If we stray into a 'broader world' the language will get to be too much.

So, for instance, we had the topic of transportation. We had a page of stick drawings representing a car, a bike, a bus, and a taxi. As the learner I point to each picture and the helper would say the name in his language. All I do is listen and work to comprehend what that word means. Then the helper says the word and I point demonstrating my comprehension. Then we use places like home, office, school, hospital and pair them together to create a sentence. The helper will then tell you what sentence you created-"You rode the bus home.", etc. Eventually, we are mimicking the sentences and on our way to comprehending the language! It was a lot of fun.

Our trainers are legends. If you heard their name (Dwight and Barbara Gradin) you wouldn't know them, but believe me, they are part of the hall of fame in heaven. They worked with a tribe in Vietnam when the war was going on! They also created PILAT and have been training in language acquisition since '75. Their story needs to be written down, but suffice to say they have a glorious testimony to God's awesome goodness. They are old; there's just no other way to say it. Probably close to 80 if not in their 80's. But they are the sharpest couple! They taught all two weeks and blew us away with their wisdom, wit, energy, and testimony. My dream is to be like them when we are their age. Never stopping, never finished telling the story of God.

We also made new friends during these two short weeks of training. One couple heading to our neighboring country! We have really enjoyed having fellowship with others like us for this window of time. It reminds us deeply that though we feel alone we are never alone. God is with us and so is this beautiful body of Christ, a cloud of witnesses, laboring alongside for the Kingdom of God.

In close, I recommend in the strongest of terms to anyone spending time in languae learning to take this training beforehand. It's two weeks that will save you years of hardship in language. I am so convinced that this has saved us a lot of frustration, stress, and depression when it comes to language learning. Take the time to do this. Seriously. They have programs all year long so there is probably one that will fit into your schedule. Language learning will still be hard, but we now have the tools to survive the storms that come.