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For me learning a new language probably comes a little more natural, since I have been bilingual since I was five. In fact I was born in Albania but then I moved to Italy, and so this two languages have both been my mother tongues.
There are a lot of studies that show how knowing two or more languages since you are a kid, makes your brain more adapt to learn new ones. I believe that this is due to the fact that you are used from your childhood into thinking into more than one language and so this comes natural to you. When learning a new one, usually what slows down the process is that in order for you to speak, you first have to think what you want to say in our language, then translate in the language you want to speak and finally say it out loud. This, for me, comes a little bit faster, and I usually get used to think in a new language in a shorter period.
So, as I was saying, two years ago, I decided to start learning French.
I choose French, not because I particularly like the language, but because it is somehow similar to Italian, and so I figured out that it would have taken me a shorter amount of time to learn it compared to German for example.
This was the period where I was changing my job, I finished my contract in University as a Researcher and I was waiting for my contract in the new company to start. So I had almost 2 months of free time, and I decided to spend them wisely.
My strategy for learning a new language is simple:
- first I try to learn the basics of the grammatic;
- then I try to increase my vocabulary, by learning as much new words as possible;
- finally I try to expose myself to the new language as often as possible.
Every process of this list that I made has a peculiar "tool" associated with it.
Learn the grammar with Duolinguo
Duolingo is an amazing free app, that allows you to challenge yourself in different types of activities, like written translation, reading comprehension, speaking comprehension, and short story exercises.
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In the first month I use Duolingo intensively (remember that I was home from work an I had a lot of free time, so don't judge me 😅), with an average of almost 6 hours per day.
I don't know if you are familiar with Duolingo's measuring system, but 16034 XP are quite a huge amount, and I did almost 80% of that score in 1 month.
But of course you are free to use it as often you want, even half an hour every day can be really useful and you will see that in some months your grammar will improve considerably.
Increase your vocabulary with Anki
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Anki is a really interesting app, that through some flashcard which you can download, lets you learn new vocabulary with a very simple method.
Each flashcard contains a certain number of the most used word in the language that you want to learn. After having loaded the flashcard in the app, you start it an it shows you a certain word without any type of translation.
Under the word you have a button that says "Show Answer". When you think that you understood what the word/phrase means, you click on that.
It gives you the translation, and asks when you want to see that phrase again:
- If you didn't know what the phrase/word meant, you click Again, and it will reappear shortly (not immediately), so that you can retry;
- if it took you some time but you got the translation right, you click Good and the word/phrase will reappear in less than 10 min;
- If this was an easy translation, you click Easy, and it will reappear in some days.
This is a very effective method (at least for me) to improve the vocabulary and to memorize in a faster way a lot of new words.
Watch a lot of movies/TV Shows in the language you want to learn
This is by far the most effective method. Being continuously exposed to a new language is the most efficient and natural method to learn it.
Most of my cousins in Albania have learnt Italian, simply by watching on tv the Italian telefilms, which are broadcasted in original language with the subtitles. They have never been in Italy, but I can speak with them in Italian without any problem.
Of course this improves mostly your listening and comprehension skills, but not only, since if you start trying to speak more frequently that language you will notice that after a while it come really natural for you to formulate certain phrases since you have been listening to them so frequently.
The difficult part at the beginning is to get the "sampling frequency" of the language. When we speak naturally our own language, the most difficult part for someone that doesn't know it, is to get when a certain word finishes and the next one starts. If it is your mother tongue this comes natural since you are used to it, and your brain is capable on his own to divide the different words (although when we speak we aren't actually pausing between one word and the other).
So I started searching on Netflix all the series that were in French (as the original language or as a side language) and for three months I have only watched them.
I have watched entire series like Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul or Rick
and Morty in French and the end of this 4 months I have tried several times to speak to some French friends of mine, and I have seen in less than a week a great improvement on my speaking abilities.
Recently I have been for work in French (check my post about that trip if you have lost it --> France, a Hotel inside a Castle and the magic of Paris) and I had the counterproof that I am now able to understand and speak the language at a good level, which made me really happy 😊.
Conclusion
I believe that this method I used is really effective. Of course it took me such a little amount of time because first of all French is similar to Italian (I am trying the same strategy also with German and although I am improving fast enough, I am sure it will take me a lot more that 4 months) and also because I invested a really huge amount of hours at the beginning to learn the basics.
But with the right effort and a little bit of patience I believe that everyone can learn any language.
Nice strategy! 😄
Thanks 😊