Language Learning: The LEGO Analogy
What Building with LEGOs Can Teach Us About Language Learning
As a child, I was a structural engineer in the world of LEGOs, constructing a vast ecosystem of bustling cities, intergalactic ships, and miscellaneous, abstract creations. They were easily one of my favorite toys growing up, much to the chagrin of my parents’ bank account. Over the course of a decade, my brother and I collected four 18-gallon bins chock-full of LEGOs, ranging in size, color, shape, and theme. We’d dump the bins out on the carpeted floor and play for hours on end, letting our imaginations roam freely, erecting imagined buildings and fabricating storylines for our miniature LEGO men to act out. LEGOs offered total creative freedom and exploration—despite the Godforsaken moments when your foot would land on a sharp, rigid plastic piece, leaving a painful series of circular impressions on your sole, typically accompanied by a raging stream of expletives. And it turns out, studying a foreign language offers many of the same parallels…and expletives.
The Basic Building Blocks
The frustrating truth about language is that it takes years, typically far more than you think, to develop the fluidity and freedom that you currently enjoy in your native tongue. When we speak, the words come to us with ease as our brain automatically produces, grammatically orders, and accurately conjugates each word into place. It’s simple. Natural. Fluid. Language, in this way, works a lot like LEGOs.
If you’ve never been exposed to LEGOs, everything is unfamiliar. A multi-colored, multi-shaped bin is placed before you, and you have no clue where to begin or what possibilities exist. The pieces are utterly foreign and intimidating. You’re told that they connect to construct magnificent structures, but you can’t fathom how any of it fits together just by staring at the edifice. Any attempt to piece together the jumbled pieces fails or leads to an unstable foundation. It’s an absolute mess.
So, what do you do? You begin with instruction manuals. Like LEGO sets, there are numerous language learning models, books, and applications scattered across the internet. They give you a base and help you get started. They walk you through each step and show you which pieces fit together and why. They familiarize you with sounds, symbols, and structures. By following the provided steps, it’s nearly impossible to get lost.
But in the same way that LEGO manuals keep you confined, so do many language books and apps. Repeating choreographed conversations and regurgitating words out of context can only get you so far. You’ve learned to replicate, but you’ve not yet learned how to create for yourself.
Unlocking the Freedom to Create
The only way to unlock fluidity and freedom in language is simply to play more. Like children, we need more exposure to creative play: less restrictive topics and rote drilling, and more open expression and space to roam. In fact, this advocacy for play is where the name LEGO comes from — the Danish phrase leg godt translates to "play well" in English.
Worksheets, grammar practice, and localized situational vocabulary serve an important function, but eventually, there comes a time to ditch the manuals and build spontaneously. No hand-holding, no step-by-step guides — none of it. Just dumping out the entire bin of LEGOs and building what you’re capable of. This looks like live, spontaneous conversation and a willingness to engage with unfamiliar topics. These challenges force your brain to think creatively, like an engineer, to solve problems and find methods of self-expression in real time, and it’s those experiences that will build your confidence over time.
Sure, certain objects will still appear foreign, and you’ll run into countless mistakes where buildings fall apart or pieces don’t fit together. Those structural failures are where you’ll learn the most. Becoming an architect of language requires that you build fearlessly, not letting mistakes in the blueprints or holes in your knowledge delay construction. You’ll likely learn during the building process, hire a contractor (or tutor, in the case of language), and gain far more experience than by confining yourself to tiny homes and manuals.
I’m not saying ditch the rules or never follow instructions. Fortunately, LEGOs will humble you real quick if you attempt to build haphazardly or disregard the appropriate fit of each piece. There is no evading grammar and structured learning; however, this must be accompanied by free play if you’re ever to reach a level of fluency and confidence in your target language.
Learn to Play
From what I can gather as a language learner, the secret (if anything is to be called such) to mastering a language lies in blending knowledge of structures with creative play. This will grant you the natural fluidity of expression that you experience in your native language, but guided by your understanding of the structural components and systems of your target language. You become a structural engineer of language rather than a robot stuck in the confines of Duolingo and rehearsed vocab.
Return to childhood and embrace free play. It’s intimidating, and you’re bound to make mistakes, but more play unlocks more freedom and confidence.
If languages were a simple set of rules and list of words, computers would have become proficient in speech recognition and creation 50 years ago (computer scientists tried). They realised that language was far more complex, nuanced, subjective, rhythmic and fluid than instructions and rules would ever accomplish (only getting us so far). Sometimes that which feels right is totally acceptable if it conveys meaning, exactly like play. Not formalised play like tennis or football, with its strict boundaries and points system, but play of imagination and experimentation, with exploration and expression at its heart. Exactly like Lego, with its colourful creations, strange solutions, interesting artefacts, and unusual combinations. Often these will only be understood by a few, the children creating the objects and structures, with further explanations needed to be understood by adults. Sometimes the constructions will fail completely and need to be totally reconstructed. Most importantly there is often no explicit direction or purpose other than the joy of creation itself. Much in the same way as we often talk or write just to express ourselves - for the joy of connection itself.
Great piece and the analogy is so right. We’re enjoying watching our young granddaughter play with words and twist them and see how they feel and sound to her. Kikidada. For quesadilla. One of our favorites.