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English language in 16 hours. Polyglot

In 2012, the first season of the reality show was released on the Culture channel - Polyglot - English in 16 hours. The ambitious goal is stated right away in the title of the program.

8 participants with different levels knowledge: from elementary to zero.

16 lessons with an experienced teacher, during which you had to:

compile a basic dictionary;
master the basics of grammar;
and ultimately speaking.

The purpose of the program “Polyglot - English in 16 hours”

– to help students enjoy their classes and make it clear that achieving tangible progress in learning a foreign language is not a fairy tale, but a reality.

Not to be intimidated by deliberate complexity, but to open up new spaces: so as not to suffer over the next exercise or stack of words, but to live the language, take the most desired, necessary for:

communication with foreigners: in in social networks, on forums, while traveling abroad;
viewing films and TV series in the original;
access to information sources.

In 16 hours it is possible:

A person who has a more or less decent command of his native language is, by definition, capable of speaking another language. At least for basic level. The only limiting factor can be a lack of motivation. Dmitry Petrov

Dmitry Petrov

- the person who took on the task:

Linguist and part-time polyglot. IN varying degrees familiar with more than 30 languages.
Simultaneous interpreter. Works with major European languages: English, French, Italian, Spanish and German. And, not so revered by the masses, Czech, Greek and Hindi.
Lecturer at Moscow State Linguistic University.
Author of the book “The Magic of Words”.

But Petrov’s main merit is not in his titles, but in the methodology voiced in the program “Polyglot - English in 16 hours.”

Many simply do not need to delve very deeply into all the richness of the language. They want faster, more practical results. Actually, for this reason I tried to formulate the basic principles of the methodology.

Its essence boils down to the following: there are a number of basic algorithms, a certain matrix, a “multiplication table” of the language, which must be brought to automation as quickly as possible. Dmitry Petrov

Personally, I identified two main advantages of Petrov’s lessons, which are 100% consistent with the main theses of the program itself:

increased motivation;
presenting the basics in a concise, concise form.

Let's consider these points in more detail.

Polyglot - English in 16 hours - reality!

Many people need language for travel, study or work. But how many people actually acquire the skills?

Most people perceive any foreign language as a sealed secret. Something so complex that only a select few, gifted from birth (with excellent memory, a special way of thinking), can master it.

Memories of school hardships do not help progress either. Memories:

about the mess in the head after classes;
about the thick fog that obscures the vision when trying to cope with homework.

So is it possible to overcome disbelief and change the perception of English as a kind of Holy Grail that everyone has heard about, but few have seen?

Polyglot comes to the rescue, promising the impossible - to teach a language in 16 hours? It turns out that it’s time to pack your bags and prepare for the tour according to the scheme - Suitcase → Moscow → London, New York, Sydney?

No!

This is impossible, despite the promises of pseudo-linguists, neither in a week nor in 3 months. In such a short period of time, the only thing you can really master is the alphabet.

And Dmitry notes that he did not intend to teach everything in less than a day (two full working days):

Nobody ever set out to teach a language in 16 hours. The point is to overcome the psychological barrier, help students experience the comfort of learning a language and understand that it is real. Dmitry Petrov

It helps a lot when a person with many years of experience in studying and teaching languages (he knows more than one) assures that you are able to understand, master and speak a foreign language. This is why the cherished 16 hours are needed - to open your eyes.

And before we move on to the second point, firmly remember one simple but important idea - Each of us has already mastered one language.

In my case, it is Russian.

An integrated (volumetric) approach to studying

What does this mean?

Let's formulate the question differently: How do they teach at school, and what is Dmitry Petrov's approach?

School program

Familiar to most and looks something like this:

first we teach Present Simple and a long list of nouns;
in the next lesson Future Simple and a little irregular verbs;
a week later - Past Simple and try to read;
at the end - a test on Simple tenses.

And so in a circle: Simple → Continuous → Perfect → Perfect Continuous, flavoring the times with interrogative and negative variations, stacks of words and reading texts, most of the meaning of which remains a mystery.

And the problem is not only the complexity of the subject or the incorrectness of the methods.

Speed of material absorption

Each person has an individual speed of mastering the material. This applies not only to English: to all disciplines. Students gather in one class:

able to get ahead of the curriculum;
coping with the load;
who are hopelessly behind and, ultimately (years later), simply “give up” on the subject.

This situation in education was revealed at the panel Sal Khan, offering to teach not for the sake of passing tests, but for gaining knowledge and developing skills.

English subtitles are available in the video.

Sal Khan. “Learn for improvement, not for passing tests.”

English difference

What's special? That:

half of any textbook is written in an unknown language?
Parents who studied German at school are not able to help with the analysis of the next rule?
Despite the deep penetration of the English language into our lives, a learning culture has not been formed in Russia (in comparison, for example, with the Scandinavian countries)?
our fellow citizens do not have the opportunity to travel around the world (to places where knowledge is required foreign languages)?
Is society inert and we need to be patient?

Who knows. Perhaps a little bit of everything.

But what does Polyglot offer as an answer to the silent question?

What does the course “Polyglot – English in 16 hours” include?

First, let's look at the time tables:

Times Present

One table contains the basis of all Simple time. For comparison, in the tutorial that I used, this time is scattered across three chapters 6, 11 and 12.

Negative and interrogative form– the same story – chapters 8 and 9.

So you either have to invent your own general table of times, or go through the entire textbook every time.

Continuous tenses

A similar scheme applies to extended (long) time.

Certainly, English Times cannot be reduced to two tablets. There is the universally hated Perfect, the terrible Perfect Continuous, and then the completely incomprehensible one. But:

Firstly, these two tables present most used tenses.

Secondly, these times are the basis that will take the weight of other knowledge.

Course vocabulary

The next thing you should pay attention to is vocabulary.

The average English speaker is able to actively use 20,000 words. 8,000-9,000 is required for free communication and reading non-specialized literature in the original.

90% of human speech consists of 300-350 words, regardless of a person’s age, his level of education and the language he speaks. Dmitry Petrov

Below I will leave lists of words that were used in the course “Polyglot - English in 16 hours”. Total 300 lexical units:

I did not include some expressions that were mentioned in the lessons. They were not given as frequency or importance, but simply came up in conversation or were part of the topic. For example: surrealist (surrealist), whim (whim), cuisine (kitchen: about cooking).

Nouns, adjectives, adverbs

Pronouns

Time indication

Traveler's Concise Dictionary

This selection can be compared with two others:

The main difference between Dmitry Petrov’s program and the school course

– minimum (basic) volumes grammar and vocabulary are given immediately, in the first hours of class. And the main work is carried out in bringing their use to automatism (the level of freedom of proficiency in the native language).

Your speech will not become refined and varied. The sentences will be of the same type and bland in sound. But there will be:

ease and fluency of pronunciation;
ability to convey a message.

Believe me, understanding what is written in a book or newspaper, heard in a film or video on YouTube is much easier than starting to write and speak yourself.

Perhaps that is why the program participants immediately begin to construct proposals.

Use of acquired knowledge

How long does it take before a student can (should) speak English?

According to Dmitry Petrov, less than an hour. Without putting it aside, in the very first lesson, students (even those who have never studied the language) begin to construct simple sentences. Just subject + predicate:

I'm open.
I will open.
I opened.

An elementary thing, but like the first step on the surface of the Moon, it is a huge leap for that part of humanity that wants to master the English language.

Practice colloquial speech not only develops the most difficult skill, but adds confidence from the first steps. You realize that you are able to speak. And this is a huge plus for motivation - the only critical parameter for the development of any skills.

In conclusion

I advise you to immediately start practicing the grammatical structures and words you are learning:

Do this every day. Find an hour, half an hour, ten minutes, but don’t stop making progress. As the author of the course advises, find a couple of free minutes several times a day:

lunch break;
travel by bus;
going to the store.

The minutes that make up the hours on which your success or failure depends.

There are always exceptions

But don't be afraid to say what's for you school years were not in vain. That after graduation they could easily go to Britain and talk to a passerby without tension or a shadow of doubt. I believe that such people exist and for them the program “Polyglot - English in 16 hours” is a long-ago step.

But from personal experience studying at a Russian school and looking around right now, I also understand that you are an exception. Most people (in terms of foreign languages) are still wandering in the dark.

Everyone can dispel this darkness. You just need to start stepping in the right direction - the one that Dmitry Petrov has already suggested with his “Polyglot”.

The intellectual reality show of the Kultura TV channel is an intensive course in learning English. The teacher is a real polyglot, who speaks more than 30 languages. This is teacher Dmitry Petrov - psycholinguist, simultaneous interpreter, teacher, author of the book “The Magic of the Word”. There are 8 people in the group of students.

Participants: actors Vladimir Epifantsev, Anna Litkens, Daria Ekamasova, Alexandra Rebenok, Anastasia Vvedenskaya; jeweler-designer Mikhail Milyutin; art critic Alisa Gorlova; writer, screenwriter and presenter of the "Cinema Magic" program Oleg Shishkin.

Here's what Petrov himself says about this interactive course:

“To master the English language perfectly, even a lifetime is not enough. To learn to speak professionally, you also need to spend a lot of time, effort and energy. But in order to simply learn to understand people, to be understood, and most importantly to get rid of the fear that many people have that inhibits any desire and opportunity to express themselves in language, this requires no more than a few days.

What I offer you, I have experienced myself and enough large quantities of people. I am a professional translator, linguist, I do professional translation in a number of languages, and I teach it to others. And, gradually, a certain approach and mechanism was developed. It must be said that there is such a progression - each subsequent language requires less effort and time.

A week is enough for any language. What is language? – Language is a new look at the world, the surrounding reality. It's the ability to switch, to make a click. And just like in a receiver, we change one program to another, tune in to a different wave.

What is required on your part is motivation (the desire to travel, something related to the profession, learning and communication, it could be friendship or love)"

At each lesson, what has been learned is consolidated and new grammatical and lexical material is introduced. By the end, students have mastered basic grammatical patterns and can use them fluently in their speech.

Dmitry Petrov's method is not to start a language, but to penetrate it, to feel comfortable in a new language environment.

Click on the image to view the lesson

Lesson #1

Participants in the show begin a course of 16 lessons. Everyone's goal is to learn to speak English. To master a language perfectly, even a lifetime is not enough. But it only takes a few days to simply learn to understand people and to be understood, Dmitry Petrov is sure.

Lesson #2

The verb in every language is the stem. The list of verbs that every person constantly uses does not exceed 50-60 words. There are, of course, thousands of others, but they are used in only 10% of speech. We can talk about the present, the future, the past. We can affirm, deny, or ask something. The result is a table of 9 cells: tic-tac-toe.

Lesson #3

Most of us know a huge number of English words. Consciously or on a subconscious level. English words hover everywhere. But they can be compared to a scattering of beads, which themselves are scattered, but the systems are not. The lack of a system prevents them from being used effectively, so one of the basic principles of our system is to create a thread, a rod, where all these beads can be strung.

Lesson #4

List of the most important verbs most often used in English speech, Dmitry Petrov suggests working it out using a basic scheme and bringing it to automaticity. This is the first step that needs to be taken in order to reach the level of fluent, relaxed language proficiency during the course.

Lesson #5

Do you think it is possible to learn 50,000 words in a minute? Each of you can make a bet with those who do not know what is possible. The situation is simple. In English, Russian and a number of other languages there are a large number of words with the same ending. So, in the Russian language, about 50 thousand words end in -tsia or -siya. In English, most of these words have the same root and end in -tion or -sion. According to statistics, there are several tens of thousands of such words.

Lesson #6

Dmitry Petrov's students, using the structures and tables obtained in previous classes, begin to communicate in the language. With mistakes, with long pauses, but progress is noticeable. The main thing is to relax and remove the psychological barrier.

Lesson #7

Dmitry Petrov's method is not to cram the language, but to penetrate it in order to feel comfortable in the new language environment. Probably for this reason, the show participants decided to master professional vocabulary. Six of them are media persons - actors, directors, TV presenters.

Lesson #8

Dmitry Petrov and the show participants analyze the system of prepositions. First, students make sentences about the position of objects in space. Petrov then explains that some prepositions are added to verbs, and so-called phrasal verbs arise.

Lesson #9

One must speak without hesitation, with pleasure, figuratively, Dmitry Petrov believes. If you pay attention exclusively to grammatical structures and the number of words learned, then success is hardly possible. And if the language is perceived not as a textbook or dictionary, but as something living, changeable, filled with vivid images, these barriers disappear. This is exactly the approach Petrov follows when working with students in the studio.

Lesson #10

In the tenth lesson, project participants continue free and creative communication on topics that interest them. Of course, they don’t do everything accurately and correctly, but Dmitry Petrov is in no hurry to correct the grammatical mistakes of his students: he wants them to learn to enjoy speaking English, and they can always polish their speech. The main thing is to have something to polish.

Lesson #11

At the 11th lesson, the group conducts a kind of revision of the acquired knowledge - repeats the grammatical patterns studied in the first lessons. Daria Ekamasova talks about how she went on an internship. At the end of the lesson, students continue to develop their communication skills.

Lesson #12

Dmitry Petrov tells what principle is best to form the basis of a language and explains with what mechanisms to gain the necessary vocabulary. Students describe the image they associate with learning English and eagerly wait for the teacher to reveal to them all 30 “magic” verbs with which they can talk about everything.

An intellectual reality show on the TV channel “Culture”, an intensive educational video course “Polyglot” consists of 16 lessons - English lessons, the goal of which is to learn to speak English. The developer of this unique system, as well as the teacher during all classes, is Dmitry Petrov, a well-known Russian linguist, translator, polyglot, who speaks thirty languages.

Polyglot. English in 16 hours.

The classes are attended by eight students (who are media persons - TV presenters, directors, actors) who practically do not know English, except at the level of first-graders high school. But by the end of the course, they will already be able to communicate in English using complex and correct expressions.

Here's what Petrov himself says about this interactive course:

To master the English language perfectly, even a lifetime is not enough. To learn to speak professionally, you also need to spend a lot of time, effort and energy. But in order to simply learn to understand people, to be understood, and most importantly to get rid of the fear that many people have that inhibits any desire and opportunity to express themselves in language, this requires no more than a few days. What I offer you, I have experienced on myself and on quite a large number of people. I am a professional translator, linguist, I do professional translation in a number of languages, and I teach it to others. And, gradually, a certain approach and mechanism was developed. It must be said that there is such a progression - each subsequent language requires less effort and time. A week is enough for any language. What is language? – Language is a new look at the world, the surrounding reality. It's the ability to switch, to make a click. And just like in a receiver, we change one program to another, tune in to a different wave. What is required on your part is motivation (the desire to travel, something related to the profession, learning and communication, it could be friendship or love)

Watch all Polyglot lessons. Learn English in 16 hours for free on the Fascinating English website:

It’s probably now difficult to find a person who is interested in the topic of learning foreign languages and has not at least briefly heard about the sensational “Polyglot” program. literally blew up the TV and Internet space several years ago.

In this article we will try to figure out whether this technique proposed by Dmitry Petrov is effective and what pitfalls it hides.

First of all, let's start with the fact that the purpose of this article is not to belittle or insult the wonderful teacher and researcher (and we sincerely believe so) Dmitry Petrov, or, God forbid, to try to shine at the expense of his authority.

Let's immediately agree on our position - Dmitry Petrov is a truly talented linguist who has made a certain breakthrough in the field of teaching English grammar (primarily English, although issues dedicated to other languages are already available) and has managed to help many people get off the ground in learning a foreign language

For those who, for some reason, are not familiar with the Polyglot program, we recommend that you briefly familiarize yourself with it at this link.

So what do we then want to say with such a slogan as “Dmitry Petrov’s system does not work!”

First, let's look at the Polyglot course's approach to learning grammar. In a nutshell, as a show experiment they took 6-8 people with almost zero or very weak level of English proficiency and, over the course of several episodes, the structure of sentence construction in English was explained to the participants in a schematic, extremely adequate and down-to-earth form, a system for changing endings in verbs depending on tense, etc.

What was the success of this TV show? After all, almost every good teacher practices similar approaches to one degree or another. The secret of popularity was precisely in its apparent simplicity, quick presentation and assimilation of information. The participants, in whom we recognized ourselves, literally grasped on the fly grammatical structures that had seemed unusually complex since school.

The system itself, in general, is brilliant in its simplicity. Indeed, everything is laid out on the shelves, understandable, intelligible, convenient and recommended for familiarization to any person who has started learning English from scratch.

However, what pitfalls does this approach hide? Often, when talking on the phone or conducting an interview with another potential student at our school, we are faced with the following questions: “What do you think of Dmitry Petrov’s methodology?”, “Does your school offer training in the Polyglot program?”, “Petrov teaches English in 16 hours, do you have the same accelerated courses”, etc. Perhaps some of our readers will find such questions strange, but at our school we hear them all the time.

Frankly speaking, such questions always baffle our team. And that's why. At its core, Dmitry Petrov’s system is a schematic, maximally simplified format (by the way, this does not mean that it is bad) for presenting basic information on the structure of the English language for a beginner. And everything wouldn’t be bad, it would seem, what’s wrong with conveying information to a beginner more clearly and legibly? But here one problem comes up - the slogan of the "Polyglot" program is "English in 16 hours."

Perhaps it is this slogan, and not the filling, that primarily fuels the audience’s interest in this format of training. Well, you must agree, if you need to get from point A to point B and the distance between them is 1000 km, then what format of travel will you choose - a bicycle, a car, a reserved seat on Russian Railways or an airplane? I think that if we're talking about about making the most efficient use of your time, then you will take a plane and cover this distance in just over an hour.

The same situation occurs with the perception of the format of the Polyglot program. A person who has decided to study English and is studying the situation at the suggestion of different schools, private teachers or tutors looks - here the “Elementary” course is offered to me to take 4-5 months. And with Dmitry Petrov it is done in 16 hours. This results in a certain logical inconsistency. It seems like, why take 5 months to do something that can be done in 16 hours of work, roughly speaking 1 week?

This leads to the search for some kind of “magic pills” for not knowing English, which you can drink over the course of a week and become a “Polyglot”. Alas, the reality is that the competent and healthy message of schematically understanding the seemingly complex grammar of English times has turned into a distorted understanding of the original idea.

The "Polyglot" program with the slogan "English in 16 hours" gave hope for quick and painless results, the achievement of which, let's be honest, requires at least 1-2 years of concentrated work.

Such a slogan stands on par with phrases like “Pump up your bicep for summer”, “Pugacheva’s secret diet. -30 kg in 1 week”, “Getting rid of hypertension with the help of our miracle powder”, etc.

And this is not the direct fault of Dmitry Petrov (although from a marketing point of view it is obvious that the program was created precisely with the aim of attracting as many audiences as possible through such a slogan). Here lies the mental trap of our mind, which wants to get everything quickly, painlessly and with minimal investment.

Here I would like to go into more detail and note 2 key points that people who decide to learn English in 16 hours are unaware of:

1. Any grammatical structure, be it a change in verb forms, a scheme for constructing sentences, a scheme of statements/negations, requires development and implementation in the format of mechanical memory at the level of automaticity.

Dmitry actually talks about this in the very first issue. However, this information is usually not perceived consciously. What is the use of the fact that you have figured out how to construct a sentence in a diagram. Will you be able to speak more or less freely now? Well, with the right degree of intelligence and quick thinking, you can. Only very slowly, with a notebook and with “ekanyas” and “akanyas”.

You must understand that any scheme, even if it is presented as clearly as possible, requires systematic repetition in speech, practice in dialogues, reading aloud, memorizing some fragments and listening. This is what all the remaining months of training are spent on. Elementary level, in addition to the proposed 16 hours. Such skills cannot be consolidated in a day or two. this takes several weeks, and the final formation of the skill takes about 3-4 months. And we're just talking about the basic level! What is 16 o'clock?

Most people don't think about this. thinking of language as a skill, like riding a bike or playing solitaire. It’s like you took it, learned it and that’s it - you won’t forget it.

If you are also tempted by the desire to learn English in 16 hours, then understand that there are things that will not happen ahead of time, even if you crash into a cake. A woman cannot give birth healthy child earlier than 8-9 months. It's the same here.

By the way, the same 16 hours of study in the “Polyglot” format with a lesson duration of 1 hour and 2 times a week gives a minimum of 2 months of classes. So 16 hours here should first of all be understood as a publicity stunt.

2. Vocabulary.

Many people also don’t think about the fact that language is not only about grammar, but also about an insane amount of information in terms of memory load and volume of information.

Let's even assume that in 16 hours you have perfectly mastered the basic grammar of 4-6 basic English tenses and can even construct sentences in your speech relatively freely (although practice shows that 9 out of 10 people are not capable of this in such a period of time).

What words will you use? :) Beginner, basic set words with which you can communicate on main topics and understand the answers - this is at least 500-1000 words.

I repeat, 500-1000 words. To imagine the volume of such information, try learning 30 words a day for a week. At the end, after 7 days, all other things being equal, if you are not doing only this, you will most likely have a mess in your head.

It takes most people from 3-6 months to a year to develop such a volume of vocabulary (depending on the level of diligence and perseverance of the student). Therefore, again, no “English in 16 hours” will save you from having to learn this basic vocabulary.

And if we are talking about confident command of English at least intermediate level, then this is already 1500-3000 words. This level is achieved in 1-2 years.

To summarize the main essence of the idea, I did not want to say that Dmitry Petrov’s system is bad, ineffective, or complete quackery. The problem is its perception by many people who are looking for freebies in the format of putting on a bracelet and being healed, drinking magic powder and building muscles.

We must understand that learning English, no matter how much we would like the opposite, is a long and systematic process that takes different people from 1 to 5 years permanent job. And even having reached a certain level of language, it is required to keep it alive active form and constant practice.

And the Polyglot format systems are just excellent and modern help on this path, designed to facilitate the process of language acquisition and remove certain psychological complexes about learning English, which many have had since the days of poor-quality language education at school.

But this system cannot serve as a panacea and the only source of education. If you really seriously want to learn English, then it’s better to start by finding a good, proven school or find a teacher and start learning. Yes, it may not be so fun and easy. Or maybe the process will go smoothly for you. No one knows. But one thing is certain - there are no magic pills and only you, with your diligence and perseverance, can achieve the goals that you have set for yourself.

POLYGLOT
(video material)

English language in 16 hours online with Dmitry Petrov





All languages

"Polyglot. English course"– the first season of an intellectual reality show on TV channel "Russia - Culture" broadcast from January 16 to February 9, 2012. Dmitry Petrov's program, broadcast on one of the country's main television channels, teaches all viewers and participants to quickly master the language, which can be used immediately after the first lesson.
Dmitry Petrov- an expert in more than 30 languages of the world, an excellent psycholinguist, simultaneous translator, and methodologist for quickly introducing language into students’ heads. His book “The Magic of the Word” has long broken circulation records for educational books. His technique really gives excellent results in short time. Comfortable learning a new language for Dmitry Petrov is the main priority in the presentation of material. He teaches common expressions and words, and then reinforces them complex revolutions speech of a foreign language.
There are 8 students in the group. All students either do not know the language they are studying at all, or, at best, they have vague memories of school curriculum. Already in the first lesson they begin to communicate in the language. With mistakes, with long pauses, with tension, but progress is noticeable immediately. Anyone can watch lessons and learn - both a child who goes to primary school and a pensioner sitting at home.
Your main task for yourself Dmitry Petrov considers not only machine learning, but also memorization for many years.
The program consists of 16 episodes, each episode lasts about 45 minutes - that’s quite long time for the lesson, so it is necessary to pay very close attention to every minute of this precious and intelligent show. TV viewers notice progress literally from the second or third program. Each subsequent lesson consolidates the material covered and gradually moves on to new grammatical and lexical material.
Program “Polyglot. Learn English in 16 hours!" very useful in our difficult time when foreign language lessons are quite expensive for ordinary person, and not everyone is able to study independently correctly.
Dmitry Petrov about the success of his students: “During intensive course, which I offer, I try to create in students a fireproof stock of knowledge, which, at a maximum, can serve as a good basis for continuing their studies, and at a minimum will ensure that the language will never again be perceived as foreign, will cause positive emotions and, if you return to it even after some time, you won’t have to start learning it again from scratch. But, of course, to use it effectively, additional regular training will be required.”
Watch and learn at home and for free.