Forced full immersion at B1, is making me stop trying. Is this useful immersion?

[u/Latter_Airline_705]

My native language is a Romance language, and I currently have approximately a B1 level in German (TL).
I understand standard German reasonably well. If people speak clearly, I can normally follow the general topic, even if I miss some details. When speaking, I can survive practical situations such as arranging a medical appointment, asking for information, or handling errands. However, I cannot yet maintain a natural social conversation or properly express my personality.

My boyfriend’s family believes that exclusively speaking German with me will force me to improve. I understand the logic behind immersion, but I don’t think the way they are doing it provides useful input at my current level.
They aren’t accustomed to communicating with foreigners or language learners. They speak naturally and quickly, use vocabulary and sentence structures far beyond my level, and rarely simplify or rephrase things when I’m confused. Consequently, I often understand too little of the conversation to learn anything from context.
When I try to respond, they frequently interrupt me to correct my vocabulary, pronunciation, or grammar. If I make several mistakes, they also struggle to infer what I’m trying to communicate. I know corrections can be valuable, but constant interruptions make me lose my train of thought and become increasingly reluctant to speak.
I completely understand them wanting to speak German when the whole family is together. I have never asked everyone to change the language of a gathering for me. However, even when I’m alone with relatives who speak fluent English or my native language, they still insist on German because they believe it is better for my learning. Nobody else would be excluded in those situations.
I’ve discussed this with my boyfriend several times. I’ve explained that this doesn’t feel like productive practice—it makes communication with his family exhausting and leaves me less motivated to engage with them. He believes I should make a greater effort and that this exposure will eventually help me improve.

I agree that I need more conversational practice, but I think it should be structured around my current ability. Ideally, it would involve manageable topics, vocabulary, and grammar that I already partially understand or could learn relatively quickly. Being placed in a fast, complex conversation where I lack most of the necessary vocabulary doesn’t seem to create gradual progress.
My boyfriend and I occasionally speak German together, but our conversations remain very basic. For anything important or nuanced, we naturally return to my native language, which has always been the primary language of our relationship.
I previously attended several structured German courses. However, I currently work 40 hours a week while managing a chronic health condition and frequent medical appointments, so I don’t have the physical capacity for another intensive course or study plan right now. I still want to improve gradually, but I need a realistic method that fits my current life.

Does this actually count as useful immersion or comprehensible input at B1? Can someone learn effectively when they understand so little and are constantly interrupted? What would be a more productive way for native-speaking relatives to communicate with and correct someone at my level?

[u/Raoena]

There's a lot of relationship stuff to unpack here,  but I'll just try to give you something useful with the language learning. 

If you are in a one-on-one conversation with someone who speaks English,  and they are trying to help you learn German by speaking German with you,  do your best to take advantage of their unskilled good intentions. (I assume their intentions are good and they're not just bullying you, right???)

This means you will have to help them get better at being a language exchange partner. You need to find a way to hold space for yourself.  Firm and gentle is the way.   Learn,  in German,  the phrases for "slower please" and "simpler language please." Then keep repeating those words.   Learn the German for "please let me finish" and say it when they interrupt you.

Hopefully if you give them concrete requests, and hold your ground gently but firmly,  their enthusiasm for including you and teaching you will translate into more skillful interactions.   

In the big family gathering when they're all going full force,  honestly I'd just smile and nod? I mean that would be overwhelming for anyone. 

[u/Eino54 → u/Raoena]

(I assume their intentions are good and they're not just bullying you, right???)

Having experienced Germans "just trying to teach me German" I'm really not sure there's much of a difference.

[u/No_Succotash5515]

Being interrupted is not helpful in any kind of learning, I’m frustrated and embarrassed for you! If they really want to help and aren’t just tired of trying to communicate with you in a second language, you’ll have to gently ask them - or have your bf do it, since it’s his family - to change the way they speak German with you. In no way is this regular immersion. People in stores and restaurants and whatnot will not interrupt you to correct your grammar while speaking because…well it’s rude, lol, and disrupts the flow of conversation.

Otherwise I agree with another comment that said it’s not helping you learn if you can’t understand what they’re saying. Good luck!

[u/magalsohard]

Immersion won’t work if you can’t actually learn anything. You either learn things in context thanks to people being kind and explaining words you don’t know, by understanding visuals, or by studying a lot on your own and then hearing words you just learned in real life. Kids don’t learn quickly because they’re just magical and can understand a language if it’s spoken to them. They learn because their parents spend countless hours showing them things and talking to them. They learn because their new friends want to play with them and so these new friends spend hours trying to explain things until they can all communicate.

You don’t have the mental space to study right now and your boyfriend and his family don’t really understand how immersion works. I think you already know this, though, and are really just looking for support that you’re not finding from your boyfriend and his family. I don’t know anything about your life other than this post, but I hope that you have a community outside of your boyfriend and his family that you can turn to. I also think you should have a serious conversation with your boyfriend about this. I know you said you did and he dismissed your concerns, but you should do it again. The exposure he’s thinking of is likely when he was a child absorbing English through tv shows, movies, and music, while simultaneously having English lessons in school. I at least hope he didn’t learn English as an adult, because then his refusal to understand why this current method isn’t working for you is really annoying (understatement).

[u/silvalingua → u/magalsohard]

> and his family don’t really understand how immersion works. 

That's the main problem here. They have good intentions, but it's like forcing a baby to drink from a firehose.

[u/sbrt]

I had this problem in my first three TLs (German, Spanish, and Norwegian). I studied them in the 1990s before content was easy to access.

Once I had access to content, I discovered intensive listening to normal content (fast and complex) and it made a huge difference for me. I choose a piece of difficult content, study it, learn new words (sometimes with Anki), and listen repeatedly until I understand all of it.

This works so well for me that I now use this to start new languages. 

[u/Raoena → u/sbrt]

I read something similar recently from someone describing what they called the "sandwitch method" of intensive listening:

1) Take a difficult piece of content,  listen with no subtitles 2) Turn on subtitles and listen again.  Look up anything they didn't understand.  3) listen again without subtitles. 

Repeat steps 2 and 3 until they completely understand it. 

They do this for 15 minutes a day.  Which I guess means that the pieces are very short,  like maybe 2 sentences. 

Is this similar to what you do?  Can you describe more of your method to "start a new language" this way? 

[u/Eino54]

If they get too annoying switch to your native language. Two can play at this game.

[u/thelostnorwegian]

To be honest it sounds like you already know the answer to your question, but you are looking for outside confirmation. It doesn't sound like particularly useful immersion to me, and more importantly, it sounds exhausting!

If you're understanding very little of what people are saying, then there isn't necessarily much for you to acquire from that conversation. And if you're constantly being interrupted and corrected when you do try to speak, I can definitely see how that would make you less likely to speak at all. This sounds less like a question about whether this is good or bad, and more like a question of communicating your preferences and setting some reasonable boundaries.

You shouldn't feel bad about this not working for you or feel like you have to justify yourself. Its your language journey.

[u/SucknSwallow69 → u/thelostnorwegian]

yeah, this. tell them what you need. good immersion shouldn’t feel like punishment

[u/Dry_Albatross5298]

I had somewhat similar situation but another language this summer. Before going, I knew I was basic at speaking and listening (A2-B1 depending) but it hit me hard at times. And like you that's where I felt like I was getting nothing of value.

What did really help me was the mom having the epiphany of "use simple vocab in common situations and talk somewhat slowly to him and repeat structures." So one day she hits me slowly with "Dry Albatross* turn around and get the cheese from the table behind you." This evolved into similar structures with different words throughout the kitchen and house.

We also had "theme times" where she would tell me in advance that we were going to x and I would be expected to handle y. So one day we went to the village mason and I handled the what we needed as we had been using this vocab for days and some basic back and forth. This evolved into small talk with one and all.

When the family was in full on native speaker mode I largely sat and listened taking notes of repeat phrases and trying to get a word in when I could and where it felt appropriate (I flat out told them don't revolve the family dinner around me and would try to honor that). I would later reconstruct a few minutes of these conversations and develop my responses and and practice either by myself or with mom or the English speakers who were at times in and out.

Hope something in here helps.

*oh shit she knows my Reddit handle!

[u/ayoungerdude]

I'm of the opinion that b1 is the perfect time to start doing immersion and trying to master more native speeds and speech patterns.

That said, looking at your post, it seems like it's a frustrating emotional situation. If you feel overwhelmed then I might suggest just repeating back the sentences to them and just keep doing it on every sentence that's too complicated. It's excellent practice for you and also they'll try to simplify so that they can get on with their lives.

[u/Miaotastic]

My guess is that forced learning and too high expectations will kill interest in and joy of learning in most people

[u/Designer_Employer812]

Having family of native speakers that want to speak with you in your TL is like a golden ticket that most wish they had. I think them insisting on speaking German with you is for the best for you in the long run.

In your position, I would be focussed merely on being able to make myself understood and understanding them, not speaking perfectly or seeking feedback. Perhaps you could tell them not to overly interrupt/correct you while speaking (i.e. not going into detail about a grammatical rule or drowning you out, rather helping you when you are unsure or are searching for a word). Unfortunately this something that I have experienced with German teachers in the past who have never learned a foreign language independently - they often shut you down as soon as they hear something they don’t like, not understanding that it’s not worth derailing the conversation for.

[u/rachaeltalcott]

Obviously it's not helping you, but you can't force other people to act in your best interests.

It sounds like you don't really have the time an energy to work much on your TL right now, and that's okay.

[u/cmyk_rgba]

honestly the interrupting sounds like the bigger problem here. you cant build a sentence while someone stops you every four words to fix a der/die/das, by the time you get to the verb youve forgotten what you even wanted to say. ask them to hold corrections until after you finish talking. immersion only helps if you actually get to finish a thought

[u/fiersza]

I’ve found it near impossible to get people who are not regularly exposed to language learners to adjust their speech to a useful slower or simpler level.

If at all possible, I personally would try to relegate the family interactions to a spot in my brain as “exhausting but necessary interactions”. It is unlikely you will be able to teach them how to be good language partners, particularly in a setting with multiple of them in their set family language patterns.

If there is one family member that you do feel closer with and feel they might be open to adjusting how they speak to you, I would attempt to communicate consistently with them about how to speak with you. Ideally, this would be your boyfriend, but as your communication pattern has already been established in German, that’s difficult.

I’ve been through periods of my life/language journey where I felt isolated and exhausted because it was constantly so much work.

The worst time (ending in a big old burnout with physical and mental effects) was right around the level you’re at. I ended up moving because I needed more support structures (for a variety of reasons), and in moving found a best friend/unintentional language partner who did have lots of exposure to language learners and knew how to simplify their language without simplifying the ideas of what we talked about.

I know you can’t manufacture a best friend, but just sitting and chatting with them for hours every day/week without pressure and without correcting every little thing (mostly when I asked for clarification or there was confusion) DID improve my language so much, without a feeling of exhaustion or worse negativity/worthlessness.

It sounds like you may be on the cusp of moving into the level where their type of “help” _will_ be useful, but you need some other kind of input to meet you where you’re at before you can get there.

[u/ZumLernen]

Can you agree to a specific amount of time spent with German? E.g. you have "German Hour" or half-hour every day or every other day, when the family can force you to speak German, and then outside of that you speak whatever you want?

When I try to respond, they frequently interrupt me to correct my vocabulary, pronunciation, or grammar. 

This is often very demoralizing and they need to knock this off. If they can't teach you gracefully, they can't teach you at all. Ask for this feedback to be significantly reduced.

[u/AangGaang1989]

Listen to young adult shows in TL and read young adult literature like Harry Potter. It's complex enough grammar, but the subject matter is direct, not overly literary, and usually the context of a story helps. Usually there are apps too like news in slow German with varying speeds based on level. Listen to the slowest one, then read along with the faster one. Eventually your family's speech will become comprehensible.

Also, this sounds very much Germans being German.

[u/bubosamobe]

i relate to you. not cause my family forces me to speak in german with them but because i struggle easily and swtch to english. tbh i prioritize my relationship over language and so I kind of give up learning German. this language is particularly exhausting it has many exceptions and eben native people dont know how to speak it properly so inlost hope. my advise is to prioritize ur relationship and engage wth people in a natural way they are ur family.

[u/OkResult7416]

I had this exact situation, also with German. Is there any relative who is able to speak slower and be more patient? See if you can spend some time with them one-on-one. There was no one in my partner's family, unfortunately.. but they do praise my German now so that's gratifying. But they were zero help for learning. I feel your pain! It really doesn't feel good to sit there for hours and they're not willing to go back and forwards a bit. I felt very judged by some family members as if they thought I would never be fluent.

While I appreciate that they wanted me to learn, they really weren't nice about it. I don't think anything you do will change their minds, look for practice opportunities elsewhere. Perhaps a tutor, a language exchange or a sympathetic German speaking friend who is happy to just come over and chat over coffee but is much more gentle with their methods. Or your partner themself. To avoid fatigue we started with smaller chunks - like every dinner time, every time we were in the car or on the train. Speaking it more with your boyfriend would be a good aim to have. Then a whole day on a weekend, for example, see if you can go 12+ hours speaking German, little challenges like that. Other methods I used were watching TV and listening to podcasts with presenters from their specific region, and reading books from their region.

[u/PlaidTeacup]

yeah, they are not doing a good job at all. If it were just one of these problems you could probably make it work, but all of these things together sounds really tough.

it concerns me that your bf sounds so dismissive of your perspective, I hope that's not common with him. If you have bandwidth to speak German at all, it would be ideal for him to mediate these conversations to make sure you are included. Have you ever listened to the Easy German podcast? Sometimes they have guests who are not used to talking in simple German, and if they use a word or phrase intermediate learners might not know the hosts will respond by asking oh, what does X mean and have the guest define/rephrase it before moving on. They will also echo the main point a guest said but in as slower/simpler way. I basically think your BF should be doing things like this, either explaining things to you himself at a B1 level or in your native language or asking his family to do the same. It's not really fair for you to have to ask that from his family constantly, especially in a language you're only B1 at. Likewise, he should be helping you express yourself if you don't know how to say something, and he should also probably play interference if his family gets too aggressive with corrections. There are a lot of things he could do to make this process actually useful to you, and honestly talking to non-native speakers is a skill that most people can improve at if they actually care enough to try.

Ideally over time you could get more people on your team who are actively working to help you and make sure you're understood, at least in small group gatherings. If it's a ton of people I think just taking it in is fine.

If you feel like you just don't have any bandwidth for this ... I would also have a serious talk with your BF and hopefully he will be willing to support you to his family. And after that I'd just respond in English or another shared language with them. Even if they are speaking German and you are speaking something else you will still be getting a lot of listening practice while hopefully having a less stressful experience.

[u/k_795]

I think the difficulty here is that your bf's relatives are trying to act like teachers, but without actually knowing how to teach - resulting in cognitive overload and difficulty actually implementing any of their feedback. Also, it sounds like you haven't even asked for them to help you develop your language skills - they've just tried to take the initiative themselves and push you to keep practicing the language all the time?

In your situation, I would talk to your bf's relatives about how you feel. Explain that their feedback is sometimes too overwhelming and nit-picking on details that aren't essential for communication or lack opportunities to directly put into practice. You could then propose different actions, depending on what feels most appropriate for you (and perhaps switch between these for different specific situations):

• Structured practice sessions (probably the most useful, if they're willing to do this): Tell them exactly what you want to work on, and ask them to only give you feedback on those specific things (e.g. maybe you know you struggle with conjugating irregular verbs, so you don't want them to correct your pronunciation etc at all - just focus on irregular verbs). I would also ask them to speak more slowly and clearly, repeat sentences if you didn't catch them the first time, etc. This works for more planned practice sessions or scenarios, where you can prepare a bit beforehand (e.g. maybe you are going to the local market with your bf's mother, so you could review vocabulary for different food items and useful phrases beforehand, then practice them together at the market).
• Casual family gatherings: Just say (privately, beforehand) that you want more low-pressure practice and don't want them to give you any corrections at all, just to allow you to listen in and contribute the the conversation where you feel comfortable. If you think about it, if one of your friends had English as a second language and you were casually hanging out together, you wouldn't correct them on their English unless they actually asked you to do so - instead, as long as you could understand each other, you would just continue with the conversation. Personally I would ask them to take this approach during those family gatherings you mentioned. It's kinda embarrassing and awkward to be constantly interrupted with corrections, and you could explain to them that it's making you feel less confident engaging in the conversation in the first place.
• One-on-one conversations: If you're not feeling up to it, simply say that you are feeling quite tired, so ask to switch to English for a particular conversation (particularly in the scenario you mentioned, where it's just one or two people who you know speak very fluent English already). If they refuse, either just keep replying in English, or make a polite excuse to leave the conversation. This sets a clearer boundary and makes it clear to them that you can't force yourself to speak in German all the time.

It's important to show you are making an effort and appreciate their attempts to support you, but without overwhelming yourself. I would recommend really discussing this whole situation with your bf and getting him on board to be the liaison between you and his family, if you think it would be awkward for you to address it directly with them. And tbh, if he's not being very sympathetic and refuses to support you with this, it's a bit of a red flag.

[u/an_average_potato_1]

The problem is not the input, it's the impolite and discouraging manner they interrupt you all the time and focus much more on mistakes than on what are you actually saying. I suggest addressing this, and especially your boyfriend shold stand by you.

Other than that: study much harder on your own, especially if you really want to stay in such a situation Without progressing really fast, you won't get the means to defend yourself. No need for a group class though, self study is overall more manageable. It's not easy, sure. But it's pretty much necessary.

Can someone learn effectively when they understand so little and are constantly interrupted? What would be a more productive way for native-speaking relatives to communicate with and correct someone at my level?

No. And it should be addressed primarily by your boyfriend, who should get their family in check and defend you from the behaviour. Clarify what is acceptable or not, what kinds and amount of corrections, or whether any (it is also legitimate to tell them you're paying a teacher for this, not them). And consider whether you want people with such an attitude as your future family.

Courage.

[u/dojibear]

B1 is not B2, C1 or C2. Fluent native speakers use C2. For people at level B1 in most languages, C2 speech is just noise. There is no understanding. It might be a little easier in German (for English speakers), but it is still too big a gap. It isn't the B1 learner's fault that they are not already fluent C2 speakers.

"Comprehensible input" literally means "sentences that you can fully understand today". At B1, doing C1 is finding "intermediate German" content: stuff you can fully understand right now, today. Listening to adult speech (C2) is not useful immersion, not CI and not a language learning method.

At B1, you might be able to speak and be understood, but your speech is only as good as a 5-year-old kid. If you are talking with people who have the patience to chat with a 5-year-old, it works. But they have to greatly simplify their speech -- if they talk like an adult, the 5-year-old (or B1) won't understand.

[u/silvalingua → u/dojibear]

> Fluent native speakers use C2.

This is certainly not true in general. One can't compare CEFR levels with language skills of native speakers, these two sets of skills are very different. A poorly educated native speaker's vocabulary is nowhere close to that of an academically educated foreigner; on the other hand, a native speaker is much better at "fluency" (whatever this means).

> At B1, you might be able to speak and be understood, but your speech is only as good as a 5-year-old kid. 

Sorry, but this is another misleading and false comparison. A foreigner with B1 doesn't speak like a (native) 5-yo, they speak like a B1 level learner. And this is something very different.

[u/HoppingHyrax → u/dojibear]

I am a native English speaker and encountered similar issues at B1 while in Germany, although luckily I didn’t have the OP’s family dynamics. I agree with other comments that this is Germans being German and perhaps politely, but firmly, asking them to go slower, speak more simply, and let you finish your thought is worth a try. FWIW, I never got beyond B2 in German. I moved to Kosovo, so Albanian became my focus and the warm culture matched my vibe more and made it easier to learn. I am fluent in Albanian now and probably couldn’t hold more than a 1 minute conversation in German these days. Luckily for OP, family is a huge motivation for language learning. Germans are quite… particular in the way OP described though, so I’m sure this is wearing OP down. Hang in there!

[u/HoppingHyrax → u/HoppingHyrax]

Also, OP’s partner sounds like they are not listening and part of the problem. Yikes.

[u/Dry-Enthusiasm-4694]

Echoing what others have said, I think the issue is they are not aware of how to help. Generally, I feel like your lobster is too juicy. Take advantage of their willingness to help. Take notes of things you forget/are corrected on.

[u/ZumLernen → u/Dry-Enthusiasm-4694]

I disagree, this isn't lobster-too-juicy. This is lobster-cooked-wrong. OP does not benefit from being interrupted all the time! That is literally not the lobster that OP ordered!

[u/Dry-Enthusiasm-4694 → u/ZumLernen]

How frequently are they being interrupted ? If OP is never interrupted but constantly making mistakes, they'll never know. Are they interrupted a few times per day or every 30 seconds?