A job interview, a move to an international team, a new role with English-speaking clients: tight deadlines make many people look for an intensive English course. The market offers everything, from ten-day immersions to courses with eight hours a day. It is worth understanding what really speeds up learning, and what only tires you out.
Concentrated study works
Here intuition is right. A language is learned much better through concentrated effort than in small doses spread over a long time. Robin Callan, the creator of the Callan Method, compared it to learning to type or play the piano: studying 40 hours over 8 weeks is better than the same 40 hours over 13 weeks, and often reduces the total number of hours needed. His rule: the more lessons per week, the fewer lessons in all. With short gaps between lessons, you forget less and spend less time recovering what you lost.
But there is a limit: tiredness
Tiredness is the great enemy of learning, whatever the method. Callan observed that if a student covers 15 pages in 2 hours of lessons a day, he won’t cover 30 pages in 4 hours: perhaps 20. Each extra hour yields less than the previous one, and the student starts to dislike the lessons. That is why he recommended, even for intensive courses, no more than about two hours of lessons a day, preferably with a few hours between them.
What about ten-day immersions?
Some immersions promise to take students to an intermediate level in ten days with eight hours of one-to-one lessons a day. Callan did the maths: that would mean learning and fixing a new word every minute and a half, for ten days. A few exceptional people might manage it; most can’t. In practice, such courses work as a brush-up for people who already studied the language for years at school. If you are considering one, ask for past results and whether it prepares for a recognised exam, such as Cambridge English.
The ideal length of a lesson
According to Callan’s observations, the average student concentrates well for about 40 minutes; after that attention starts to drop and the body wants to move. Up to about 50 minutes it still pays off. Longer lessons feel like better value, but usually teach less per minute.
The intensive format with Mr Q
The ideal frequency is one 50-minute lesson a day, Monday to Friday. If you are in a hurry, you can take two lessons a day; a student who does this without missing lessons can reach a good level in about a year. Fewer than three lessons a week, on the other hand, makes the course much longer. See the FAQ and the plans.
Hear it from Robin Callan
Robin Callan explains why a Callan Method lesson lasts no more than 50 minutes, and what happens to students’ attention after 40 minutes.
This article was inspired by Mr Q’s study of the handbooks written by Robin K. T. Callan and by the dozens of hours of conversation he had with Mr Robin Callan at his home, conversations that were recorded and that Mr Q considers a treasure trove of knowledge.