The Russian language is one of the main Slavic languages that are spoken in plenty of European and Asian countries, but some people argue about the origin of the old Russian language and whether it is the old Slavic or both of them are different languages.

The old Slavic language, the origin of the recent Russian language, is created during the first centuries AD with the beginning of Christianity by two monks, Cyril and Methodius>

It actually stayed as the written language for a long time and was used to write religious and formal text, the old Slavonic language descended from the old Bulgarian dialects and was spoken in Eastern Europe and some parts of Central Asia.

On the other hand, the old Russian language was formed in the twelfth and fifteenth centuries and gathered the Eastern Slavs, it was used in Russia and some of its surroundings, and it’s considered the origin of the modern three Slavic languages: Ukrainian, Russian, and Belarusian.

As a result, the old Russian language is greatly different from the recent Russian language, in pronunciation, Grammar, and even some of the vocabulary, so if you’d like to know more about the old Russian language you will have to search for older eras references.

And now, since we mentioned the origin of this language you might find it different not just from one language, it doesn’t look like any of the HinduEuropean origin languages nor the Semantic one, so you are probably not familiar with it, let’s mention some of the challenges.

What are the main difficulties for Russian learners?

For Russian learners, as we mentioned earlier there are no similarities between the languages and especially for a language as old as Russian, like:

• Alphabet

The Russian alphabet uses the Cyrillic typing system or the old Slavic typing, which is not related to any non-Slavic language in how it’s written and pronounced.

• Conjugation

The conjugation in Russian is very unique, for the verbs it has a rule for each case and it differs from the other one, for the nouns and the adjectives as well which have their own rhythms and sounds, accents, and endings.

• Grammar rules

The Russian language is known for its large number of grammatical structures and usages, they are not as strict or stable as the other languages, as they’re usually changed according to the case, and the speaker’s intentions or even sometimes the dialect.

The challenges in the Russian language for other languages

Recently plenty of people are willing to learn the Russian language from different lingual backgrounds, and learning the Russian language was never an easy task, like any language, with its rich heritage or varied culture, let’s take a look at some of the challenges:

• Unfamiliarity 

• The Russian language uses the old Cyrillic way of writing which was used initially in the old eras which makes it unfamiliar in how it is written for the other languages.
• The letters in the Russian language can have different ways of pronouncing the sounds, and in some conditions, there are some letters that aren’t pronounced or silent but you need to be mindful of their position.
• There are some sounds in Russian that don’t have an equal sound or letter in plenty of others and use different sounds to identify the unfamiliar sounds to them.

• Doesn’t have a high global context

• • You may find yourself exposed to the English language a lot so you must be familiar with its sounds and letters even if you didn’t study it, whether in your studies or when you working.
  • On the other hand, Russian can be a bit closed or confined by some specific fields or communities, which means that the probability of you meeting a native Russian or listening to Russian conversations randomly is pretty weak.

• The nuanced sounds

These are the sounds that are similar between the Russian language and the other languages, but written in a different way, and even pronounced not the same for the same sound, which makes the learners uncomfortable in the beginning.

• The compound words

Despite that the Russian language doesn’t have a wide variety of vocabularies and plenty of compound or borrowed words, these words could have combined roots that won’t be easy to understand for a beginner.

• The communication and culture

The Russian language is very affected by its culture so you probably will find phrases that can have cultural links which can make it harder for non-native speakers to understand.

Russian language courses

 So as probably you don’t have a Slavic origin language background or you are a complete beginner in learning the language, you will need: 

• Practising regularly 

Practising the language is a fundamental step to mastering it, so make sure to practice the language very well and constantly, especially the points that differ Russian from your native language.

• Exercise

Training yourself and exercising is also a crucial point like solving exams and testing yourself all the time, evaluating yourself constantly.

• Focusing on the different lingual aspects

The language we are speaking is very rich in culture and heritage and is highly affected by it, so put some time to study the cultural aspect of it in order to understand its context.

• Covering the four skills  

We can’t say that we are learning a language if we’re not covering the four skills fairly, so organise your time to focus on how you can develop each one of them.

• Asking for help from an expert

Sometimes it is harder than you think, and that’s normal, so don’t feel shy to ask for help from an expert whether through taking a course in the language or to simply ask someone with previous experience to guide you and give you the best advice.

We considered here in Elmadrassa.com to provide you with all of these points:

• Giving you the perfect mentorship by qualified mentors to guide you through the process as smoothly as possible.
•  Full guidance and following up in case you needed to ask any questions or have any difficulty.
• Building a suitable program for you and covering the four skills.
• The environment is encouraging and helpful to motivate you to focus and be merely comfortable.