English is Toughest European Language to Learn.

[Marteno]

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn1233

it's also interesting to note that, according to the article, dislexics are at a particular disadvantage when learning English due to the language's illogical spelling.

That being the case, would it be approapriate for dislexics to be allowed to learn English using an alternate phonetic script, or would it be preferable to force them to learn the current one and let them sink or swim with literacy?

In addition, this script could also be used to teach non-native speakers in Quebec, thus increasing their successrate in learning English as well and, perhaps, reduce some of the anglo-phobia.

After all, to be fair, if French Canadians and dislexics need to learn the monstrosity we call English spelling, I think it's understandable that some will be turned off.

What are your thoughts on this?

[chlorine]

Too bad, english is a language of commerce and those who don't adapt and learn it will be left in the dust. If dyslexics have to learn it differently well whatever I don't really care.

No sympathy from here.

[SovietCanuckistan]

I personally think that any language with considerable conjugations like French, Spanish or Italian is more difficult to learn. It seems like a waste of time to conjugate a verb or have masculine/feminine nouns. It is not intuitive and only makes learning harder.

[Marteno]

I personally think that any language with considerable conjugations like French, Spanish or Italian is more difficult to learn. It seems like a waste of time to conjugate a verb or have masculine/feminine nouns. It is not intuitive and only makes learning harder.

Actually, despite the verb conjugation, English is still harder than French due to irregular verbs. i forget the exact figure, but English has over 280 irregular verbs; French has over 80.

So even if English conjugation is harder than French, the student is still left memorizing each verb in English, whereas for the most part, once he knows the rule in French, he can apply it though and through. Although I'll acknowledge French verb conjugation and gender are headaches too.

As for the article referring todislexia, however, the main reason for English being difficult for dislexics had nothing to do with the grammar, but rather with non-phonetic spelling.

[Kate Shaw]

As my dyslexic Daddy says, "If B U R D doesn't spell "bird" then what the hell does it spell?" He thinks Noah Webster was a terrorist.

[DA_Champion]

From what I understand which language is harder depends on what you know first. Going from french to english is one of the easier transitions, and going from english to french one of the harder ones.

My own personal guess is that developing an simple grasp of english would be very easy, and mastering it, very difficult. I recall working at zellers one time, the coworker training me, total separatist, said one of his reasons was that English was too simple a language.