Lemushroomman - Mushroom Man

a person standing on an artist's conk (type of toadstool mushroom) the text says todays vibe- standing on an artist's conk

a different person in all khaki with loafers with one foot behind and one forward to have stable footing on a mushroom, but in the process doing a common male modeling pose the text says serving conk

Learning by doing: my approach to self-studying languages

Hi! I have a very short attention span, and I have never really been able to make it through a course or textbook without giving up straight away, so I have never really been able to learn languages in the traditional way. I also very easily get bored with learners material, so I mostly stick to native material to consume my target language. Here is how I do it at the beginner level!

I usually start off with an app to learn the basics of the alphabet, vocabulary and grammar. Most of the times, I use Duolingo. I rarely get past the first few units before I jump into native material. Still, this is a good jumping off point.

When I start with native material, I usually use YouTube videos (with subtitles in the target language), and focus on spoken language, because spoken language is less overwhelming, and involves less complex language and grammar. At this point, I find that books are far too dense and complex for me to handle. Others might enjoy the challenge. My current favourites for this are LingoPie (for French, Spanish, German, Italian and Russian) and Viki (for Korean, Japanese and Mandarin Chinese).

I learn the most important words and phrases as I go. I do NOT look up every word, unless I can understand at least 70% of the language. For this, I will try and write the words and phrases down, and memorise them. I might use a flashcard app too (Anki is my fave, but Quizlet and Memrise are good too). For languages like Japanese and Chinese that have lots of characters to memorise, I will use an app (wanikani and chineasy are my faves). I always make sure that I know how to pronounce and understand each word or phrase.

I will start texting native speakers in my target language on apps like Tandem and HelloTalk. I look up words as I go, and will ocasionally try speaking.

I start shadowing (i.e. repeat after native speakers, imitating the intonation and pronunciation). I use Easy Languages for this.

After a while, I start reading. I’ll usually start with wikihow articles, or fluentu articles in my target language. I’ll write down new words, test myself on them until I get them correct, and then put them into anki to review.

After a while, I’ll formally study some grammar. I’ll usually use a textbook for this. However, I don’t necessarily do it in a traditional way. I go through the entire textbook and make a cheat sheet which condenses all the information in it to a few pages. I’ll review it regularly, and do LOTS of writing practice. For irregular verbs, I’ll just use flashcards, and write them down repeatedly.

Then, I’ll get a speaking buddy (I usually find one on discord) and speak with them a few times a week.

After a while of doing all of this, I start reading fanfiction (usually translations of my faves). It’s difficult, but I try to read intensively (i.e. look up every word).

At this point, I start journaling, and posting on the website journaly.

I’ll listen to podcasts like innovative languages, coffee break languages and language transfer. These are usually good for learning about grammar.

I start intensively reading serious content once I feel like I’m at a confident B1 level. I would suggest using proper newspapers (like le monde for French or BBC for English) and try studying one article daily. After a while, you can start reading a YA book (try something you’ve never read before in any language). Study it chapter by chapter fairly intensively, and then reread it again and again until you understand the story. After you’re finished with a chapter, put the new vocabulary into an app and review fairly regularly.

At the B1 level, listen using two sources: intermediate podcasts and native material. Intermediate podcasts are usually labelled as such, and are IN the target language, but about various topics, like culture or history (innovative languages have some, for french there is inner french, piece of french, news in slow french and RFI:Savoirs, for Spanish there is dreaming Spanish and news in slow spanish, and for Korean there is Iyagi). For native material, continue watching youtube videos about topics that interest you, and consider watching both the news and films/TV shows.

At this point you should be able to construct gramatically correct (mostly - if you still have problems then go through a grammar course, or work through a textbook) and fairly complex texts. I would suggest now learning some essay phrases and writing an essay. You’ll be terrible at first, BELIEVE me, but the more you practice the better you get. You could also start trying to write fanfiction (tip: use full phrases you have found in other books or fanfiction).

Continue doing what you are doing (reading intensively and widely, speaking with your buddy, listening, writing essays and short stories) and I think that after a while you will be able to say you are conversational in another language.

Thanks for reading this post! I hope it was useful! (Also haha ig my break from langblr is over lol).

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lemushroomman

10 months ago