How I learned a language and how you could do the same
About the article
In this article I present several tips and strategies to learn another language in a self-taught and efficient way, without beeing too boring. I also reflect on how language learning happens and how you can use this to your advantage for good learning. As I’m not an expert, not even close, everything I say is based only on my experience in five years learning English and on everything I learned in the process.
If you are learning or thinking about learning a language, read until the end, because this article is for you. If you don’t have the slightest idea how to get started, it can be of great help.
Language learning is like a puzzle
One day talking about language learning, about how I learned what I know about English and about important factors in learning any language, it came to my mind that the language learning process resembles the process of assembling a jigsaw puzzle. And it is using this analogy that I explain the path I took to learn English and which I think is an efficient and cool way to learn a new language.
Willingness and curiosity make learning much easier
First of all, the aspect that I see as the most important in learning not only languages, but any kind of learning is willpower.
Learning just out of obligation or something like that is much more difficult and boring than when we do it out of real desire and motivation. You procrastinate, you can’t wait for the time you set aside to study to end. It’s not impossible, but it will be a bigger hurdle.
When you have motivation, you’re able to dedicate yourself much more, be more focused and memorize things easier. One of the reasons is that we think more often of what we like and remember more of what crosses our mind more often.
Learning doesn’t have to be boring either, it can be as close to natural as possible. After all, children learn to speak their mother tongue naturally, without classes, just by experiencing that language.
There is also no magic formula for language learning. There are several methods, some better and some worse. The best thing to do is experiment and see what works best for you.
My general idea of learning is trying to experience the language in as many ways as possible, consuming content in that language. This makes learning more fun, helping you not to lose your motivation. By doing this we also learn the language as it is used in everyday life.
An exchange program is an example of experiencing a language, but it is not the only way. It would help a lot, but there are other, much cheaper options that you can do in the comfort of your own home.
Where does the puzzle come into this story?
Just like a jigsaw puzzle, you have to start with one piece first. After the first piece comes the second, third, and so on. The more pieces there are in the puzzle, the easier it is to find where to fit new pieces you have on hand.
The more parts added, the easier it is to understand the image being formed, that is, the general perspective. The more pieces, the easier it gets to find a pattern so you can fit new pieces together.
Likewise with language learning, in my opinion, the more things you learn, whether words, phrases, expressions or verbal structures, the easier it is to understand others by context. Also because you start to internalize the logic of how that language is built and start to understand things through your own intuition.
One difference between the two sides of this analogy is that language learning does not follow an exact same trajectory like a jigsaw puzzle that is added piece by piece. It’s always harder to get those first pieces in terms of learning, but then it gets easier as they help you learn more.
So in addition to your knowledge growing, I realize that the pace of growth also increases, until it starts to decrease as you start to learn most of what is most frequently used and the unknown things become less frequent.
Getting the first pieces
It’s common not to know how to start learning, there are always many options and we get carried away by procrastination. But either way, you have to pick some content to start getting your first pieces.
In order for learning from consuming content to be much more efficient, if you’re starting from scratch, it’s good to get initial knowledge in a more traditional way. Because simply seeing, reading or listening to the language without having the slightest idea of what’s there isn’t going to do much good. You need something to use as a starting point.
But even so, I recommend looking for cool content to consume from the beginning to get used to that language.
I think at this early stage a traditional learning site would be a good choice. I personally used it and I think Duolingo is a good example and gives you a good base to start with, even though it only contains the basics. But any cool content that gives you a good idea of how to assemble sentences into various tenses, a basic vocabulary of words and expressions will do.
This initial part is quite painful and maybe even discouraging, but hang in there, it won’t take long to get to the cool part of accelerated learning.
How long you will take at this stage will take a lot of your initial dedication. As I didn’t study that much, I spent about four months in this initial phase.
Using the first parts to get new parts
Now that you’ve learned the basics of the language, that is, the initial pieces, it’s time to venture into the language. Even if you’ve been exposed to the language since the beginning, this is when things start to get much more efficient when using the starting pieces to get new ones.
Find books, movies, series, podcasts and whatever in the language you are learning. The more the better. Try to find things you enjoy, because the more you enjoy the process the better.
But it is not simply consuming for the sake of consuming. Consuming the content is not the first objective, but just a way of learning, so consume it always paying attention to the language.
This is the most adaptable part of the process, not least because I don’t see it as a method, but rather as a strategy that everyone has to adapt in a way that they find most convenient and enjoyable. But I’m going to give ideas on how to learn this way the way it worked for me.
First, forget things dubbed when it’s in the language you’re learning. That habit is now behind us. Watch with subtitles first in your native language and, if you can, watch again with subtitles in The language you’re learning.
When you watch with subtitles, pay close attention to what is being said. Try to understand what is said in that language and try to associate it with the subtitles. It will be difficult at first, but then it gets better.
As you already got that base there at the beginning, you should be able to identify what you studied in what is being talked about. With that also you can understand other things by context.
Try to pay attention to the pronunciation of what you were able to identify and, if possible, pause the video, try to repeat and imitate until you see that you are getting closer. This is a good exercise to improve your pronunciation and with time you’ll get the hang of it, be patient.
I think it’s a very interesting idea to watch it again with subtitles in the language you’re learning after having watched it with subtitles in your language, because now you know what was said so it’s easier to associate with the subtitles. But what you can learn the most here is relating the written part to the spoken part by reading the subtitles while listening to the audio.
Already with readings, I recommend easier readings in the beginning, like children’s books or others with easier language. Don’t give in to the temptation of wanting to translate all the words you don’t know. Instead try to understand it from context and when something seems essential to understanding the story, look it up and write it down. When you see a word repeatedly and you’re not sure what it means, stop and write it down too. No need to exaggerate, let the story flow.
I don’t think it’s a very good idea to listen to podcasts in the beginning because there’s not much to use something else as a basis for comparison, like subtitles. Due to the lack of affinity with pronunciation in the beginning, the little vocabulary among other things, it would be very difficult to take advantage of podcasts at this stage. I think it would be more suitable when you are a little more advanced.
Something similar that I think is a great idea for those who are just beginning to learn is listening to audiobooks while reading the text. So you are learning to associate sounds with words and you can still use the same ideas as learning with texts.
Don’t let the parts fly away in the process
It’s very common to easily forget what we’ve learned, some more and others less, but everyone goes through that. When you learn the meaning of an expression, for example, it might make perfect sense when you see it again the next day, but a month from now you might not have the slightest idea what it means.
Everything you don’t use often, your brain throws away. The secret to all kinds of learning is repetition. But you can use these repetitions in the most efficient way possible with the use of Flashcards.
Flashcards are a type of study based on spaced repetition, which reinforces that memory when you are about to forget it, according to the forgetting curve theory.
In other words, it’s a two-sided card. On one side is the question and on the other the answer. Then you see the question and try to remember the answer. In our case, the most common is to put the phrase in your language on one side and in the language you’re learning on the other, but there are also other ways to do this.
Some people like to do this manually, but I find it impractical. I personally use and recommend Anki, which has versions for Android, IOS, Web, Windows and Linux.
A tip for using flashcards to memorize vocabulary is not to use isolated words because most words have different meanings depending on the sentence and the context. In addition, it is much easier to memorize a word within a sentence by association.
Other strategies for making flashcards would be to include images and other types of things that can help with memorization, but I’ve never personally tried it, but it might be worth researching more about it.
Other strategies
A great strategy to learn vocabulary is every time you say or think about something, like an expression or something else, try to translate it into another language. If you don’t have the slightest idea how to say that in the studied language, write it down, search it and add it to your flashcards.
About the pronunciation, I think it’s the hardest part of learning when you’re alone. In addition to imitating the audios, as I said, the ideal would be to have conversation partners. It could be that friend of yours who is also learning the language or even better if you know someone who speaks that language natively.
If you have some money to spend, a good use for it in your learning, in my opinion would be on conversation sites with native speakers. In addition to being able to train the spoken language, you can learn about several other things with those who actually speak that language. To learn English you could use a website like Cambly or any other service alike.
Other than that, the way I see to practice pronunciation in a “homemade” way would be to keep talking to yourself and trying to pronounce those phrases that you learned better and better. You can use audiobooks for this too, listening to how it is read and then reading the written version trying to imitate it.
For writing, in addition to the same possibilities to find people to talk to, be it your friends or even better native speakers, you can create things to write every day. You can create a diary or simply write about different subjects. Use your imagination.
Also practice the act of thinking in that language. Because the more you think about it, the easier it is for you to reason in that language and build sentences faster. It’s also very useful for you to find out what you don’t know in that language, write it down and learn it the same way using the Flashcards.
Another tip I have is whenever you have a doubt whether a sentence makes sense, try to search it in quotation marks on Google and it will show you how many times someone has written that exact sentence on the internet. Imagine that you have two options for phrases that you want to know which is the most correct, do this with both of them and if one has, for example, ten times more results than the other, the chance of it being the best way to say that it is much bigger.
It is also important to remember not to take things literally. It’s all about learning to associate one thing with another, that is, the meaning of the word or even finding an equivalent expression of your language in what you are learning and not about trying to form sentences by literally translating word for word. Trying to translate literally is more likely to hurt than help. Some idioms make no sense if try to see it in a literal way.
Thinking about the formation of sentences, I think it is also very important to memorize the verb tenses initially to learn how to assemble sentences in that language. A great thing is to make flashcards with lots of different tenses along with words and expressions you don’t know. By learning the verb tenses you will know how to put together all kinds of sentences, with only the vocabulary as a limiting factor.
Using several of these strategies above, more and more you cover everything you don’t know in that language until it becomes rare that you come across something that you simply don’t know how to translate in that language. At that time too, even if you encounter something like that, your vocabulary will be so wide that it won’t be difficult for you to get around the situation and explain what you mean in another way. Congratulations, you are now fluent.
That’s all folks
All you need to learn a language is curiosity, motivation and willpower. I hope these tips serve to encourage and help anyone who is learning or thinking about learning a new language. That said, how about taking advantage of these tips and setting aside 15 minutes a day to start taking the first steps in the language you’ve always wanted to learn?
