I’ve just started my A2.1 course and once again, I found myself overwhelmed. I sense a pattern here –feeling exactly like I used to during my first classes in A1: flooded with information from left, right and centre, anxious that I might not be able to keep up, but really keen to get good. Fast.

I’m what you could call a lazy perfectionist when it comes to learning new languages. Until I get them right, I don’t bother practicing them outside of my own mind (i.e by speaking to people, writing), probably because of the fear of embarrassing myself. I’ve done exactly the same with French or Spanish many years ago.

So with this in mind I started my German-learning journey a couple of months ago by speaking a cheeky amount of English in class (against DeutschAkademie’s rules…), hiding under the pretext that I simply understand new concepts better in this language. While this might be true, I am aware that it is also detrimental to my evolution, and that sitting in my English comfort zone will not push my limits enough.

But the thing is, in this new course my lazy perfectionism does not work anymore! People actually speak in German exclusively, be it by asking questions directly in German, or explaining new words to using synonyms. During my first class there were tons of question marks around my head: how do people know so much already? Am I in the wrong level? How do I ask this thing in German? How do I explain this thing to my colleague, without using ANY words in English?

Then it hit me… THAT’s what the learning strategy of this school is really about: throw you into the deep end and almost force you to find your way up. It’s painful, it’s hard and it’s uncomfortable. But I can totally see the logic behind it and it’s growing on me. After all, without this system my inner nerd would not have seen the light of day again!

Sintia