1. Improving Participation in Adult Education
Grundtvig Learning Partnership
Nr. LLP-GRU-MP-2013-LT-00159
How to overcome psychological barriers
while learning foreign languages

2. PSYCHOLOGICAL BARRIERS I
Fear of disappointment / failing
Impatience towards learning
Lack of commitment
Fear to start
Fear of committal
Dislike of teacher / co-student
Lack of self-confidence
No belief in impact on career
Social anxieties
Bad learning experiences (own or of others)

3. PSYCHOLOGICAL BARRIERS II
Lack of support or encouragement
Fear of being "different"
Standing out in the community is depicted negatively
Peer pressure
Resistance to offers because they are mandatory to get social benefits
Resistance to offers because they don´t take into account personal experience
Lack of persistence
Lack of awareness of the meaning of learning

4. PSYCHOLOGICAL BARRIERS III
Lack of self-reflection
Lack of conviction to be master of his own destiny
Fear of change
Lack of ability to make choices
Lack of hope to be able to change one´s situation because of continuing or long-lasting discouragement
Fear of new technology
Fear that AE won´t have the wished for impact
Fear / risk that employer won´t give recognition to AE

5. Start effective language learning!
We offer guidelines and course “Start effective language learning!” to our learners.
The guidelines cover psychological barriers for studying foreign languages.
They can be applied to those studying other subjects.
They were developed based on the surveys in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia that were conducted among the language learners and the language teachers.

9. Psychological aspects. Main difficulties
Lack of belief in oneself, in one’s abilities, in success
Lack of proper motivation, clear and achievable goals
Negative way of thinking, negative emotions in the process of learning (boredom, tiredness, annoyance, etc.)
Negative attitude towards the studied language
Laziness, poor memory and attention
Fears (failure, talking, expressing one’s opinion, etc.)
Having had a bad experience
Frequent dissatisfaction with oneself, with the results, the teacher, etc.
Unwillingness to spend a lot of time learning
Lack of patience, insistence, creativity
Conflicts with the teacher
Lack of self-analysis

11. Principles of successful learning
In-depth treatment
Everyday learning
Real life practice
Following the teacher`s requirements
Importance of doing homework and other self-study
Importance of a good teacher
Knowing what you want
Taking the responsibility
Importance of getting regular feedback
Loving what you’re studying
Regular review
Working hard
Believing in yourself
Positive emotions
Being open-minded
Creating the learning environment

12. The solutions for overcoming barriers
Increasing the motivation
Showing the importance of the subject
Remote training, homework
No critics
Communication and interaction
Training program must be individualized according to the needs of the students
Training program must be individualized according to the personal learning difficulties
Regular improvements both for the teachers and for the students

13. Specific suggestions

14. Describe your experience connected with foreign language learning
Describe your experience connected with foreign language learning. Describe both positive and negative moments. Do your best to find more positive ones. Describe your achievements (even if you think they are not so important).
Close your eyes and dream a little. How would you like to study the language? What about your teacher? What about the learning materials? Write down your ideas.

15. Overcoming the psychological barriers.

16. Barrier: Low self-esteem, pessimism, negative beliefs, lack of self-confidence
Identify your beliefs (positive and negative) concerning learning. Write them down. You must replace every negative belief with a positive one.
You regularly have to convince yourself of the new positive ideas in order to absorb them completely. Auto-suggestion is a good way of changing way of thinking if it is often used.
Think of your achievements even if they don`t seem significant. Remember your new achievements and expect the further ones.
You should also read at least one book about positive thinking and practice the main ideas.

17. Barrier: Constant dissatisfaction
You must learn to praise yourself and feel grateful for any work you do and anything you achieve. Even if you fail to do a simple exercise, you should praise yourself for your time and efforts, anything done correctly, precious learning experience, etc.
Don`t wait until your teacher or someone else says something good about you and your work. Instead praise yourself!

18. Barrier: Laziness and passiveness
It is your choice. Every time you win or your laziness wins. Everyone has some will-power to overcome laziness.
If you tend to be lazy, you should often think about your goals. Think about achieving your final goal in detail and your desire to learn will become stronger.

19. Barrier: Fears
Identify your fears concerning learning. Think about the possible reasons. Understanding your fears and the reasons can help you a lot when solving this problem.
Imagine doing something without any fear, for example any successful communication, public speaking, etc. and believe in it.
In some cases you need to discuss your fears with the person you trust (your teacher, your psychologist, your friend, etc.).

20. Barrier: Lack of patience, too high expectations
Any learning takes a lot of time and patience.
In order to be able to speak any foreign language at a more or less good level (especially communicating with native speakers) you need to know a language at B2 level.
If your real language level is A1, you need a one-year intensive course (i.e. most of your time is devoted to language learning) or at least 2-3 years of studying as usual.

21. Barrier: Lack of self-discipline and being irresponsible
If you have a goal concerning learning, you should have all the responsibility for anything connected with achieving your goal.
You should have all the responsibility for attending classes, working hard, doing all of homework, etc.

22. Barrier: shyness and bad communicative skills
Shyness is mainly the tension of your body and mind. You must relax your body and mind to get rid of any tension. You can find a number of easy relaxation exercises which can help you a lot.
Shyness is also based on a low self-esteem. Build up your sense of self-esteem by regular thinking about your achievements and your goals.
And you must develop your communicative skills. Take up communication training or something like that. Be more active when studying and in everyday life.
Find a number of interesting people to practice communicating.

23. Barrier: Innate conservatism
You should consider anything new and any changes.
Don`t try to reject anything new immediately. Try it. It can be interesting and useful for you.  

24. Barrier: Lack of persistence
Pay your attention to a small child learning to do something, e.g. learning to walk. A small child falls down and stands up, falls down and stands up, falls down and stands up, etc. until one day he/she is able to walk.
Adults should do the same. After “falling” they should stand up and try again. So if you fail to do something in your learning, you should analyze the reasons, “learn this lesson” and move on.
Sometimes a huge success comes after a number of failures.

25. Barrier: Perfectionism
Don`t try to be perfect!
Take your mistakes lightly!
All the successful language learners have made a lot of mistakes so far and they still make them.

26. How do you feel?

27. How do you usually feel when studying (with the teacher and on your own)?
Do you often feel good or bad?
What emotions do you usually have?
Do you often feel bored, indifferent or interested?
Do you often feel irritated or satisfied?
Do you often feel tired or relaxed?
Do you often think of something else are do you concentrate properly on learning?
Do you study because you mainly want to or have to?
Do you like how you learn the language?

28. Knowing the real cause(-s) of your usual bad mood can help you to find appropriate ways out

29. You must learn how to put yourself in a good mood quickly.
You can use various simple methods e.g. some relaxation, thinking about something pleasant, doing what you like, listening to your favorite kind of music, chatting with interesting people, doing exercise, etc.
There are also other useful methods of controlling emotions which you can learn and practice.

30. If you have been ill, it is wise to avoid attending your language courses for a while.
If you want to and you can, revise what you have learnt, e.g. practicing listening.

31. If you have to work with the teacher or someone else you don`t like, you must change your attitude.
You must pay attention to something good about this person and ignore something bad about him/her.

32. If you have to attend really boring and tiring language courses, you must try to find something good and useful in this challenging situation.
You can learn to feel good even at the most boring lessons!

33. Fortunately, you can meet some teachers who can often put you in a good mood.
Even if you feel really bad before the lesson, you can feel much better during the lesson.
But very often you will have to be able to control your emotions and feel better, especially when doing any self-study.

34. The book for an effective language learning can be found on website:

35. Thank You