<p>Here’s the situation: I’m planning on transferring to a design school in Germany. Most of the classes are taught in English, but it’s still very useful to know German.</p>
<p>I have access to the best language programs available (RosettaStone, Pimsleur, etc.)</p>
<p>For next semester (at my current school), I’m trying to take as many design courses as possible, but in order to take a German language class, I’d have to drop a design/art class. In addition, the language class is 50 minutes a day / 5 times a week, which could be good or bad. Good because it forces me to learn everyday, bad because my time might be better spent on design projects.</p>
<p>Any experience or recommendations? Is it worth the time to take a university language course, or should I just study on my own?</p>
<p>Do you think that if you commit to studying on your own you will actually do the work, even when it’s boring and there are other interesting and/or important things for you to do? Do you ever have a problem with procrastinating? With choosing to do fun things instead of the things you “should” do? With losing interest in things before you had expected to?</p>
<p>Are you in a position to supplement the practice the language programs will give you with actual human conversation with someone who is fluent in German? Do you have extra money to hire a German tutor? Do you know people from Germany or Austria who would like to get together with you regularly for German conversation?</p>
<p>Have you ever studied a language you haven’t been using since childhood? Were you successful in developing your skills to the point that you could engage in casual conversation with someone? Were you reliable about studying grammar? Do you enjoy studying English grammar?</p>
<p>I’ve found that most people (including me) are not as likely to actually discipline themselves to learn something that isn’t very enjoyable to them as they think they are. You may be an exception; I don’t know. But the odds are that you are not.</p>
<p>Since design clearly does interest you, it might make more sense to register for the German class but then browse the books and other materials being used in the design classes you’re not taking (either by going to the campus bookstore or by using the bookstore’s website to identify the books and looking them up on Amazon or something) to find something to read, or ask someone you know who is taking an interesting class to meet with you regularly to update you on what they’re doing, or in some other way supplement your education in design with out-of-class study. (I have never taken a course in design. I don’t know exactly what would be involved in doing this kind of study or how effective it would be. I do know it works very well for the sorts of things that interest me.)</p>
<p>Even though most of the people you encounter in Germany will probably speak some English, it is still hard to be in a position where you’re not able to understand most of what is being said around you. I think learning some German before you move to Germany would be a huge benefit to you. (Moreover, I would recommend that you continue to study the language in some way once you get there.) And I don’t think that you necessarily have to do that by taking a class. But I think you need to be completely honest with yourself about whether you need an outside force to motivate you to study. I don’t think most people are that honest with themselves – I think most people believe they will accomplish more than they actually will. And therefore I think that you should seriously consider the possibility that you are overestimating the amount that you will get done.</p>
<p>I also think that if you haven’t already been promised a spot in the other school, you need to consider that they are likely to think that some mastery of German is a plus. People who are living in a society but can’t speak the language well often feel isolated and homesick. They’re more likely to give up and go live with people who have a language in common with them. And therefore a school, even one that teaches in a language different from the one in use in the society around it, is probably better off betting on someone with some skills in the local language than on someone who doesn’t have any. There are a lot of ways to prove you have skills: a transcript isn’t the only way at all. But the first thing is to make choices that are likely to result in you developing those skills.</p>
<p>Thanks for the long reply. I think I’m pretty dedicated to learning, so I probably won’t take the course. However, I’m looking into auditing it, so maybe I can still show up but not lose the time to homework.</p>