Am I a foreign language dummy?

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Go and live in Malta. You have a ready-made excuse then.

I took German for 3 years in high school. I'm not at all conversational. I remember a phrase or two. Ironically, I had the highest grade in the class.

I took Russian for 1 semester in college. Had one of the highest grades (aside from the people in the class who spoke Russian and took it for an easy A), but can now only remember one or two phrases.

I tried to teach myself Gaelic several years ago. Remember one or two phrases.

Like with most things, I don't have good memory recall of things that don't particularly interest me or that I'm not motivated to learn. I had a near 4.0 GPA when graduating from college, but all of the the things that I knew while in class or taking tests I no longer remember. Also, I have very slow memory recall, so even if I do remember a bit more German than I think, I'm unable to use it in conversation because it happens too fast.

I find learning languages tough, classes don't work for me.

Have you considered getting some one on one tuition? It needn't be a teacher, some patient person who speaks a little English for conversational lessons might do the job.

Jason

I have picked away at German with a language program but I haven't been very disciplined due to different life situations that make it hard for me to keep a routine. I think I could potentially do it.

I'm interested in using the language program plus other tools such as writing it onto notebook paper. I think the act of writing it instead of just reading it might help.

Also it would be helpful to have language content written in English, German, and Phonetically for German pronunciation as well as Video of a speaker.

Let's see...

Spanish in Junior High - barely passed
Two years of Latin in High School - About a C average most of the time
Took French in College - Failed the first time, got a C when I retook the class.

According to my parents, my first spoken language was Tagalog (We lived in the Philippines from the time I was 6 months to about 6 years old) Everybody tells me if I studied it, I would pick up Tagalog very quickly. I kind of doubt that. I've heard Tagalog spoken as an adult and it makes no sense to me. While I have learned to write reasonably well, I have never had a good understanding of grammar and the logic of language pretty much escapes me.

Like the OP, I have no musical ability. I own a wide variety of musical instruments, all of which I have never been able to learn. I can kind of plunk my way through a song on a piano, but I suspect this is because the notes are laid out in a linear sequence on the keyboard where I can see them.

Perhaps it is a minority of Aspies who have difficulty at things like language, music and math (I am very bad at all three) but clearly some do. Algebra is confusing to me, but I could get through geometry because I could visualize how it worked.

On the other hand, I am quite good at analyzing complex and chaotic things and distilling out the basic mechanisms that make a chaotic system work.

I have always thought that I could only learn a language by immersing myself in it, but my distaste for interacting with people would reduce the likelihood of me actually being called upon to use the foreign language.

Well... I'm tired and I'm really not coming to any intelligent point here, so I think I'll shut up now.

I guess I'm a foreign language dummy, too.

My theory is that when English is your native language, its almost pidgin-like simplicity spoils you and dumbs down the language centers in your brain. Later on, when you study some foreign language, you're overwhelmed with all the complexity. Only folks with a real knack for foreign languages can get very far. Many of us give up and never become proficient in the language (especially in output mode), even though we might get good grades in class.

A lot of folks disagree with this theory, but at least it's a great excuse for my lack of success in foreign languages, despite decent grades.

I believe in general, (atleast for me) unless i have a genuine interest in the subject (one of my primary interests) or if i even have a lingering doubt as to whether or not i am being forced to learn something, i am very resistant to learning anything related to the new subject.

languages are like that for me too, my english vocabulary is quite extensive, however whenever i would go to learn a different language (on my own) i never personally understood the benefits to doing so, therefore i couldn't learn it easily. additionally when i was thrown into a situation where i HAD to learn a different language (a college class), i failed because it felt like someone was trying to "make" me learn it. and for whatever reason, when i am forced to do something by someone else, my brain rebels and it makes learning nigh impossible.

I speak several languages and still screw up my spelling in all of them, I'm also not a native English speaker.

I think you essentially have two problems stopping you from learning here:

1) no to little motivation

Your wife will take care of things that you need her to and you know that. So, on a survival basis, you basically have it covered. What motivates most people who move to another country is that they need to learn it to survive there. When I first moved here my best friend moved with me, and as a result, I didn't utter any English for a year and a half because I didn't have sufficient motivation to start speaking. I was listening and soaking it up at school and at home, but I wasn't using it.

2) teaching methods

Most teaching methods in language learning center themselves around grammar. Sadly, learning grammar is really not going to be useful to an aspie. What makes kids so good at languages is two things, first they are visual thinkers at that age, their thought process is not yet language based and secondly, they are great at picking up and using patterns. Aspies are very similar to kids in those two ways, most of us are visual thinkers and most of us are also good with patterns.

Therefore you need to find a way to learn that is pattern based, not grammar based. Italian is similar to Spanish (there are heaps of patterns in spanish), therefore there must be basic patterns already present in the language that you can learn from.

Start with basic words / phrases you know you're going to use. Your wife should be able to help you. Build on it week by week. The point is not to memorise sentences, but to break stuff down at a really basic level so you can change a verb pattern or a noun pattern in the sentence and still be understood. You should be able to create your own sentences from the beginning without too much thought.

e.g. I want to see my wife.
The bolded indicates the subject, which you can replace with another subject (I have, I must, I need)
The underlined indicates the verb, which you can replace with another verb (to speak, to visit, to give)
The italics indicates the object or noun, which you can replace with another (my friend, her, them)
And the you have the option of extra basics you may need ( with, and, to, something)

Just keep finding patterns like the above, the more you use them, the more you will learn and you will naturally start to expand your patterns as you go out of necessity.