I used to think that I was pretty good at learning languages because it seemed easy enough to pick up words here and there on my travels or remember Farsi that my dad taught me. However, it turned into a totally different ballgame when I moved to Italy. Something about needing to learn the language raised the stakes and the pressure and the next thing I knew I couldn’t construct a sentence in Italian correctly if my life depended on it. But I think it was more than just being self-conscious and feeling pressure (although neither of those things helped), instead, I think my learning method sucked. I learned Italian entirely from textbooks. I learned to conjugate the shit out of verbs and make sure that the adjectives agreed with the verbs. The problem is that speaking was some kind of impossible puzzle I felt like I had to put together all while trying to have a conversion. I’m way too much of an overthinker for that. Someone would be talking with me about cooking and the entire time I’d be thinking, “Is ‘blender’ male or female?” Since I’ve learned much easier methods that have helped my Italian come much further with less effort.
Get A Workbook
Learn the rules with a workbook instead of a microwave-sized textbook: You have to learn the rules otherwise your Italian (or Spanish, French, Chinese, Farsi, etc) will only progress so far. However, you really don’t need to learn the entire language via a gigantic book. Get a workbook, learn how to conjugate verbs, how the adjectives and nouns work, and all of that and put it aside.
Audio Works Like Magic
Once you know the rules more or less, get some kind of audio tool like Pimsleur and listen to it while you’re drinking coffee in your robe in the morning, showering, or lounging around the house. Hearing and repeating language is how children learn their mother tongue and it absolutely works. Listen, repeat, and you’ll be prattling away in no time saying helpful things like, “I love blue parakeets,” in your language of choice.
Rosetta stone or DuoLingo
Rosetta Stone costs a few hundred bucks but DuoLingo is a free app you can use on your smartphone. Either one will work just fine and they’re super great for marrying your workbook knowledge with what you’ve learned from your audio lessons. It’s also a great way to really increase your vocabulary in almost every area you can think of from school, sports, cooking, and just day-to-day life.
Get Cozy and Rent Some Movies
After all of this, you’ll find yourself at about an intermediate level and the best way to go from intermediate to advanced is by watching movies in the language you want to learn with English subtitles. Try to watch one or two movies per week and you’ll be surprised by how quickly you won’t need the subtitles.
Find a Language Friend
Skype with a practice partner. You can probably find someone on Meetup or in a Facebook group (just be careful, there are murderers and weirdos out there). You can have an advanced understanding of a language but be really terrible at speaking it if you don’t practice. A lot of speaking a language well is muscle memory, which is where accents come from. If you don’t practice talking regularly your skills won’t really progress and you’ll perpetually sound like a toddler. There’s nothing more irritating than being able to understand everything that someone says but not have the speaking skills to respond intelligently. Imagine being out and about while traveling and an attractive person says, “You’re so hot! I’d love to take you out for a drink!” And you respond with, “Me likey alcohol! WEEE.” Nobody wants that.
Have any other tips and tricks for learning a new language? Put it in the comments below. We’d love to hear your ideas or experiences!
