Learning a new language

[Namednoname]

I'm sure this is something a lot of people have at least thought about or maybe even done. And I thought it'd be good to create a topic for people to speak about this and share some tips or their own experiences and successes/failures. 

 

At the moment I'm thinking of learning to speak Thai, so when I go to Thailand next april, I'll be able to understand and hopefully speak some basic Thai. A website which has peaked my interest when I was looking around is http://www.fluentin3months.com/. This guy basically sets himself a challenge to become conversational in a language in 3 months. And at the moment he is learning his 12th language, so he's doing something right!

 

He says he does this by actively trying to have conversation in the language he is learning. And he focuses on this, rather then studying grammar and understanding the mechanics of the language. He focuses on being able to efficiently communicate first, then when he is starting to get progress, he begins to look at grammar, but only when he is starting to understand the language. Which does make sense to me.

 

Anyway, some food for thought! I'm going to test this out and see whether I have any progress in a month or two. I just need to decide whether I really want to learn Thai, or whether to start learning Portuguese, which I really want to learn as my two best friends are from Portugal. And it'd be pretty neat to be able to converse in Portuguese. 

 

So, what experiences have you guys had with trying to learn a new language?

[Skye.]

Well I learned 3 new languages (German, Spanish and English) in addition to my mother one and I don't think you can be fluent after 3 months unless you spend 8 hours/day practicing it. Of course, you'd be able to do some basic things like ordering in a restaurant, asking for directions, tell the time and other things that are helpful for vacations but that's about it. And of course, you will need to maintain it after you're back! I took spanish classes last year and forgot almost everything I learned beause I'm not practicing it.

 

For the website, the guy's strategy is what I think is the best and I think it deserves a try. Knowing the mechanicals of a language is not useful if you don't know how to have a conversation. I learned english with music, television and books much more than at school. In fact, I got the basis in elementary school and went by myself afterwards.

[Raikas]

Nothing beat immersion, but if you can't have that then lots of conversations are a good second choice, I'd think.

 

I don't think you can be fluent after 3 months unless you spend 8 hours/day practicing it.

 

I think it's possible if your target language is one that's a fairly close relative to one that you speak already (or if you're under the age of 8), but otherwise I think that's using a pretty loose definition of fluency.

 

That said, even a very basic level of a language is useful, so that's not saying anything against a 3-month project!

[CalvinHobbes]

I'm going to Taiwan in April (just booked it) so I was planning on trying to learn some Mandarin before going. I might give this a shot! I haven't read through the whole website yet, but I have no idea where to start even.

[huSTLer]

Thai is a tough language to learn, especially if it's the first language you choose to learn and you only give yourself 4 months. Luckily, with Thai, the grammar is really simple (like other Asian languages). 

 

Here's how I would attack the language:

Look for sources where you can listen to the language, and try and imitate the sounds you hear. If you can find a Pimsleur or Michel Thomas tape, I like those best. Also, try to find a source on the internet where you can watch the news in Thai.

Learn the 1000 most frequently used words first. Use mnemonics if you can. Mnemonics make things easier to remember, but work a lot better when there are more familiar sounds in a language. Mnemonics let you memorize a lot more than the recommended 20 words per day.

Walk around talking like a Thai cave man. The grammar is simple, and you'll be putting sentences together easily after a while of watching the news.

Get a phrasebook, and memorize a few interesting phrases. This will also help with grammar.

There are communities online where you can chat with people in your target language in exchange for chatting with them in their's (English). Sign up and start having conversations.

 

I hope this was helpful, and good luck!

[Namednoname]

Well I learned 3 new languages (German, Spanish and English) in addition to my mother one and I don't think you can be fluent after 3 months unless you spend 8 hours/day practicing it. Of course, you'd be able to do some basic things like ordering in a restaurant, asking for directions, tell the time and other things that are helpful for vacations but that's about it. And of course, you will need to maintain it after you're back! I took spanish classes last year and forgot almost everything I learned beause I'm not practicing it.

 

For the website, the guy's strategy is what I think is the best and I think it deserves a try. Knowing the mechanicals of a language is not useful if you don't know how to have a conversation. I learned english with music, television and books much more than at school. In fact, I got the basis in elementary school and went by myself afterwards.

 

I decided to start with Portuguese cause it's a hell of a lot more convenient to learn due to having my Portuguese friends. And I know I won't get fluent in 3 months

I'm hopefully heading to Brazil in 2014 for a few months, so my aim is to be fluent enough to hold conversations pretty comfortably by the time I leave. So I have roughly 1 year and 3 or 4 months to learn it

And I'm planning on watching some Films and listening to music in Portuguese when I'm a bit further a long. 

 

 

Thai is a tough language to learn, especially if it's the first language you choose to learn and you only give yourself 4 months. Luckily, with Thai, the grammar is really simple (like other Asian languages). 

 

Here's how I would attack the language:

Look for sources where you can listen to the language, and try and imitate the sounds you hear. If you can find a Pimsleur or Michel Thomas tape, I like those best. Also, try to find a source on the internet where you can watch the news in Thai.

Learn the 1000 most frequently used words first. Use mnemonics if you can. Mnemonics make things easier to remember, but work a lot better when there are more familiar sounds in a language. Mnemonics let you memorize a lot more than the recommended 20 words per day.

Walk around talking like a Thai cave man. The grammar is simple, and you'll be putting sentences together easily after a while of watching the news.

Get a phrasebook, and memorize a few interesting phrases. This will also help with grammar.

There are communities online where you can chat with people in your target language in exchange for chatting with them in their's (English). Sign up and start having conversations.

 

I hope this was helpful, and good luck!

 

I've decided against Thai now after researching it a bit. Like you said it looks like it'll be a tough language and I don't think 4 months will be anywhere near enough to get to the stage I would like. So I'm going to learn Portuguese instead and one day I'll hopefully come back to Thai. But I'll definitely incorporate some of your idea's for learning Portuguese.

 

And luckily, my bro had Rosetta Stone on his computer with Portuguese on it (I didn't even know he had Rosetta Stone lol) And today I spent 2 and a half hours learning on it and It seems alright. I'm remembering the meaning of the words pretty easily, but when they speak it, sometimes I don't understand what they're saying. But, I'm happy with this for now. I'm gonna keep doing this when I have time (Which I usually have a lot of) And practice on my friends. When I know more, I'll start listening to some music,watch some films and read some books in Portuguese (I have a lot of time to learn this ). Also I'm going to check out Pimsleur and Michel Thomas.

 

Ah well, It's quite exciting I actually find it pretty fun learning which I didn't really expect.

[Namednoname]

I just downloaded 1 lesson of the Pimsleur Portuguese thing.. At the end when they combined all what they were teaching into a conversation at the end and I understood what they were saying, it blew my mind a bit lol. Definitely going to look into Pimsleur properly as well lol.

[huSTLer]

Yeah, the method is pretty astounding! The tapes (I guess they're CDs or mp3s now) are quite expensive, but if you're really lucky you can find them at your local library.

 

In my opinion, Rosetta Stone is not ideal. It's not that it doesn't teach you the language, it's just very very VERY slow. There are much more efficient and effective language learning resources, Pimsleur being one. Although, it is a fun way to learn.

 

Don't wait long to get some music, movies. I'd say, if you go with Pimsleur, you should be able to start listening and picking out words in music and movies within a couple weeks of consistent practice (30-45 mins/day). The goal isn't to understand everything, so don't beat yourself up and stop, it's just to train your ear to pick out and separate words so that it doesn't sound like everyone's talking so fast!

 

If you get a book or two, try and find an elementary school reader. These are books with short stories aimed for kids. This will help you identify new vocab words to study. Also, find an online newspaper from Portugal or Brazil and try and read one article every week. Highlight the words you don't understand and add them to your vocab list. This will make you feel awesome because you're reading what adult Portuguese speakers read!

 

I like to use the free flashcard software Anki to practice vocab. Study English to Portuguese AND Portuguese to English. I also like to use Flickr and Google to find pictures and get rid of English altogether. It's easiest to remember if you can think of a mnemonic. For example, the Portuguese word for bed is cama. Imagine your significant other asking you to *come* to *bed* (but kind of in an Italian accent). The more ridiculous the image the better. Concentrate on the image for a good 10 seconds. Now you'll never forget! Well, you might, but you'll remember it better than rote memorization.

 

As you might be able to tell, I'm a bit obsessed with language acquisition.

[Namednoname]

Yeah, the method is pretty astounding! The tapes (I guess they're CDs or mp3s now) are quite expensive, but if you're really lucky you can find them at your local library.

 

In my opinion, Rosetta Stone is not ideal. It's not that it doesn't teach you the language, it's just very very VERY slow. There are much more efficient and effective language learning resources, Pimsleur being one. Although, it is a fun way to learn.

 

Don't wait long to get some music, movies. I'd say, if you go with Pimsleur, you should be able to start listening and picking out words in music and movies within a couple weeks of consistent practice (30-45 mins/day). The goal isn't to understand everything, so don't beat yourself up and stop, it's just to train your ear to pick out and separate words so that it doesn't sound like everyone's talking so fast!

 

If you get a book or two, try and find an elementary school reader. These are books with short stories aimed for kids. This will help you identify new vocab words to study. Also, find an online newspaper from Portugal or Brazil and try and read one article every week. Highlight the words you don't understand and add them to your vocab list. This will make you feel awesome because you're reading what adult Portuguese speakers read!

 

I like to use the free flashcard software Anki to practice vocab. Study English to Portuguese AND Portuguese to English. I also like to use Flickr and Google to find pictures and get rid of English altogether. It's easiest to remember if you can think of a mnemonic. For example, the Portuguese word for bed is cama. Imagine your significant other asking you to *come* to *bed* (but kind of in an Italian accent). The more ridiculous the image the better. Concentrate on the image for a good 10 seconds. Now you'll never forget! Well, you might, but you'll remember it better than rote memorization.

 

As you might be able to tell, I'm a bit obsessed with language acquisition.

 

Yeah I'm going to try and hunt down some Pimsleur CD's / MP3's at some libraries near me as buying them is pretty expensive. And I was thinking of buying The Alchemist in Portuguese as it's one of my favorite books, and my english version has ironically been nicked by my Portuguese friend lol. Also the language used in it was pretty simple so I reckon it would be a nice start, and I'd at least be interested in what I'm reading

 

And I might try and listen to some Portuguese songs while I'm working today, as for most of the night I'm working on my own listening to music anyway.

[Fonzico]

Have any of you heard of Duolingo? It's a pretty amazing concept.. basically they teach you a language (right now they just have Spanish, French, German and English, with Portuguese and Italian in beta currently ) for FREE, and in exchange, you help to translate webpages from the language you are learning into your native language.

 

As an online-only project, it obviously has some serious limits as far as true fluency (which I think people can agree generally requires non-structured conversations with real people) but it does have sound clips so you can learn to understand the spoken language (and there is a feature to use a mic that will evaluate your own speaking skills, but I've never used it, so I can't really comment.) as well as the writing/reading aspect.

 

I'm learning Spanish right now (I took a couple semesters of Spanish about 4 years ago, but forgot most, but it still gave me a considerable head start) and it's genuinely fun - there's a leveling system, as well as timed bonus rounds.

 

Anyways, you can't beat the price! Check it out here

[Ihadris]

Japanese, Swedish and Gaelic here. I can second Hustlers recommendation for Anki, in fact I can't recommend it enough. It's gotten me through my degree. 

 

More than anything else I think it's important to know -how- you learn. As an example, a friend and I couldn't study together because he learnt through conversation & memorizing example sentences where as I have a need to pick everything apart to understand how it relates to everything else. As a basic example: His flash cards were things like "I went to the supermarket" but mine would be "Subject v-past particle location". Once I understood that I just couldn't learn the way he did I progressed much much quicker. 

 

In terms of resources, Babbel.com have free vocabulary smart-phone apps for most European languages and their paid service lets you concentrate on the aspect that you want to focus on. The grammar was there in its own section for those that wanted it, as was the basic vocabulary, conversation practice, idioms etc. 

[Namednoname]

I just downloaded anki onto my phone, how do I use it, just write down sentences I want to learn/remember and review it occassionaly?

[huSTLer]

I've never used it on my phone, but you just make flashcards for whatever you want to learn. I usually put target word on one side and translation on the other, and maybe a little extra info for things like irregular verbs and stuff. You can also import images and sound files (think native pronunciation).

[tazboyvt]

Great goal!

 

I went to Beijing, Shanghai and Jiujiajiao this past summer.  I was determined to learn some Mandarin before going.  I used Tim Ferriss's approach to language learning - essentially an 80-20 approach, and found that I learned a ton.  I still have it, too, and have been able to learn more upon returning.

 

I was able to visit a chicken farm at the Great Wall, learn a few drinking games at bars, wander with impunity, and exercise with old ladies and old men at the Temple of Heaven with my rudimentary, yet effective, language skills.  I know there are some videos of me speaking with locals from other people in my group.  I just have to find some.

 

Basically, I have become a fan and thrilled with the language.  It has simple power and glory in the way it constructs meaning.  I love, too, the three looks I get in succession when I start to speak.  First, there is the surprise of "did that white devil just speak civilized?" and then the , "OMGods, he DID?!" and the joy that follows on their faces.  I see it often and absolutely love it.

[Namednoname]

<blockquote class='ipsBlockquote'data-author="tazboyvt" data-cid="378462" data-time="1357787575"><p>

Great goal!<br />

<br />

I went to Beijing, Shanghai and Jiujiajiao this past summer. I was determined to learn some Mandarin before going. I used Tim Ferriss's approach to language learning - essentially an 80-20 approach, and found that I learned a ton. I still have it, too, and have been able to learn more upon returning.<br />

<br />

I was able to visit a chicken farm at the Great Wall, learn a few drinking games at bars, wander with impunity, and exercise with old ladies and old men at the Temple of Heaven with my rudimentary, yet effective, language skills. I know there are some videos of me speaking with locals from other people in my group. I just have to find some.<br />

<br />

Basically, I have become a fan and thrilled with the language. It has simple power and glory in the way it constructs meaning. I love, too, the three looks I get in succession when I start to speak. First, there is the surprise of "did that white devil just speak civilized?" and then the , "OMGods, he DID?!" and the joy that follows on their faces. I see it often and absolutely love it.</p></blockquote>

lol that's awesome! And mandarin is definitely one of the languages I'd like to learn in the future.