Since learning French, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese and Korean, I get asked a lot about what\u2019s the best way to learn a language. In this article, I\u2019d like to share what I think works, what I think doesn\u2019t and what I think doesn\u2019t matter to learn a new language from zero to a conversational ability.<\/p>\n
Before I start though, here\u2019s three caveats:<\/p>\n
That being said, here\u2019s what I would do if I wanted to learn a new language and waste as little time as possible.<\/p>\n
The best strategy, in my mind is simple:<\/p>\n
A mistake many people make in viewing this strategy is not realizing the importance of \u201cDay One\u201d and \u201cOnly speaking in the language\u201d. Many people think if they wait a few months to start speaking or speak 50% of the time in the language the process will be comparably effective. Those are not the same, and they are not nearly as effective.<\/p>\n
The reasons for why departure from the strictness of these rules isn\u2019t effective are subtle and hard to realize if you haven\u2019t tried this before. The purpose of starting from the day you arrive is that this is the optimal time for designing your environment. If you wait even a few weeks, you\u2019ll have already established an English-speaking environment which will make later immersion much more difficult. This is what happened to me when I went to France.<\/p>\n
The reason for only speaking in the language is that if you have a ratio (say you aim to speak half the time) you\u2019ll find half of your speaking situations much harder than the other half. This creates a natural momentum which pulls you towards speaking less and less of the language you\u2019re trying to use. The end result is that aiming for 50\/50 usually ends up being only 5-10% in the language. (Note: This effect is mitigated somewhat if you have specific languages for specific people or situations, but 100% immersion is still best.)<\/p>\n
Unfortunately, this is not a realistic strategy for most people. Most people can\u2019t afford to travel for extended periods of time. When they do, they often have jobs or other responsibilities that prevent staying 100% immersed.<\/p>\n
But just because it\u2019s not possible for everyone, doesn\u2019t mean it won\u2019t work. If you have this option when learning a language, do this. It sounds really hard, but it gets easier fast and you\u2019ll learn the language very quickly. Don’t use a second-best strategy if you have the option to use the best.<\/p>\n
So let\u2019s consider some alternative scenarios where you can’t do the best strategy: full immersion from Day 1.<\/p>\n
In this situation, you can\u2019t travel to learn the language. But that doesn\u2019t mean you can\u2019t have partial<\/em> immersion. Here, my suggestion would be to start by picking a friend or partner who also wants to learn the language and have an agreement with them: we have to talk at least once per day, and whenever we do talk it\u2019s always in the target language.<\/p>\n Depending on who your partner is, this could actually add up to quite a bit of immersion. It\u2019s not actually very important that the person be a native speaker or already fluent to practice. Actually, in some cases it\u2019s better if they aren\u2019t. Simply use a dictionary or Google translate whenever you get stuck with words or phrases.<\/p>\n You will need to supplement this with some time speaking with an advanced or native speaker of the language to make sure you\u2019re not learning mistakes. But I think having as little as 10% of your time in this way would still allow you to progress quite quickly.<\/p>\n Note: This situation is the same as one where you can travel, but for some reason can’t do 100% immersion. Pick people or settings where you have to speak in the language you’re trying to learn. The broader a net you cast and the sharper and more clear the situational rules are the better. None of this beats the best strategy, but it can be a useful approximation where the best strategy isn’t possible.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Say you want to learn an obscure language, or you can\u2019t find someone who is willing to commit to only speaking that language with you. Here, the option is pretty simple: hire a tutor. Go onto iTalki.com<\/a> and find someone who will teach you the language. You can get community tutors there for fairly cheap.<\/p>\n If that\u2019s too expensive, you can also opt for language exchanges with people who want to learn your language. In that case though, you need to be really strict about what time is in each language, or an intermediate speaker might push you to speak a lot more of the language they\u2019re trying to learn.<\/p>\n For tutors, I also recommend explaining to them your immersive approach, in English (or whatever language you speak well) before you start. Many tutors have a different teaching philosophy and may be resistant if they\u2019d rather you do grammar drills or more traditional exercises. Sometimes it takes a couple teachers to find one that will work with you well, so don\u2019t give up.<\/p>\n This isn\u2019t a problem either. In many cases you do the same as Situation #1 or #2, you just end up studying less.<\/p>\n The important part if you only have a few hours per week is to commit to the time in advance. With 100% immersion, practice is unavoidable. With only a small amount of your week devoted to speaking, you\u2019ll need a lot more effort to push yourself every time to practice.<\/p>\n This is a tricky question for two reasons:<\/p>\n This preparation is assuming you\u2019re using the best strategy<\/em> of 100% immersion. If you\u2019re not traveling to the country and going 100% from Day 1, then the issue of prior preparation isn\u2019t important. You can start with just an hour or two of preparation and use Google Translate in the first conversation if you like.<\/p>\n What kind of preparation should you do to start speaking a language? This is actually, in my mind, a lot less important than people think. There\u2019s lots of ways you can get a general understanding of the basic words and phrases in a language. Some might be somewhat more effective than others, but fretting over which one to use is silly.<\/p>\n If I was planning on learning a new language from scratch and I wanted to do some preparation before traveling to the country to do 100% immersion, I would probably do about 50% conversation practice through something like iTalki.com, and about 50% of some kind of beginner learning resource like Pimsleur<\/a>, Duolingo<\/a>, Teach Yourself<\/a>, Rosetta Stone<\/a>, etc.<\/p>\n The key to remember is that the non-speaking parts of learning are to supplement<\/em> conversation practice, not to replace it. If your goal is to avoid using the language directly in real conversations, you\u2019ve already picked the losing strategy.<\/p>\n This is also easier than it looks. The simplest option is just to open up Google translate, type whatever you want to say in English (or another language) and translate to the language you want to speak and try saying it to the other person.<\/p>\n If they understand you and say something back which you don\u2019t understand, ask them to write it down (a hand gesture of writing with a pen is pretty universally understood for this) and then pop it back into Google Translate and see the result.<\/p>\n Your conversation doesn\u2019t need to be fancy, fast-paced, or even make sense. Sometimes when I\u2019m learning a new language I\u2019ll list off a bunch of almost identical sentences to train up a certain grammatical pattern: \u201cI like to swim.\u201d \u201cI like to run.\u201d \u201cI like to eat.\u201d \u201cI like to travel.\u201d \u201cI like to paint.\u201d \u201cDo you like to swim?\u201d \u201cDo you like to run?\u201d and so on…<\/p>\n As you get to the level where you\u2019ve memorized some basic phrasal patterns for saying \u201cI want\u201d \u201cYou want\u201d \u201cWhere is?\u201d etc. you can stop translating whole sentences and instead translate specific words. So you\u2019ll look up the word for \u201cchicken\u201d instead of the whole sentence, \u201cDo you like to eat chicken?\u201d<\/p>\n This isn\u2019t actually hard to do at all. The difficulty people have isn\u2019t a mental one, but a social one. Doing these baby-talk sentences feels very awkward and there can be an intense embarrassment as you go from fully fluent adult to barely comprehensible toddler in your linguistic abilities.<\/p>\n The best thing you can do to get through this is to find a tutor or partner who (a) is either in the same boat as you, so therefore you don\u2019t feel weird because their ability is also terrible or (b) understands what you\u2019re trying to do and is supportive of it. If you have a tutor or partner who isn’t supportive, ditch them immediately and find another. Some tutors don’t understand this method of language learning. The problem is with them, not you.<\/p>\n When learning a language I don\u2019t spend 100% of my time speaking. However, because the speaking part is the part most people avoid, I have to reemphasize: my strategy doesn\u2019t work if you eliminate the speaking in the language part. Don\u2019t skip over the parts you think are too hard and do the stuff you think is easy, because without the speaking all the other stuff doesn\u2019t work.<\/p>\n However, assuming you actually have followed my advice and are spending at least 50% of your learning time in conversations, the next step of where to invest your time is up to you. I usually focus on aspects of the language that I can\u2019t focus on enough while juggling the mental difficulties of a conversation but are nonetheless important. This may be different for different languages.<\/p>\n In Spanish, for instance, I found the conjugation system a little overwhelming. It was too hard to juggle saying what I meant and also making sure I was remembering the dozens of different forms a verb could take to indicate exactly what I wanted. To fix this, I bought grammar exercise books and worked through conjugation exercises until I had memorized all the major forms regular verbs take (and the most common irregular ones). Then, when I would speak, I could more quickly remember the form I needed.<\/p>\n In Chinese, in contrast, grammar wasn\u2019t a huge issue. Instead I was plagued by pronunciation and vocabulary issues. Pronunciation, especially tones, were brutally hard in the beginning and it was difficult to juggle that with trying to speak. So I would do pronunciation drills to work on my tones. Vocabulary was also difficult because it shares few cognates with English. I felt that learning the characters would be an important mnemonic aid to learn new vocabulary, so I invested my non-speaking time doing a Anki decks<\/a> which taught these.<\/p>\n These activities were helpful, but they\u2019re a supplement, not a replacement to speaking.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve tried almost every method for learning a language. Immersive practice is by far the most effective. And, yeah, it is scary and hard and you might not think you\u2019re ready to do it. But, if you give it a shot you\u2019ll often find yourself speaking much faster than you realize.<\/p>\nSituation #2: You Can\u2019t Find a Partner<\/h3>\n
Situation #3: You Only Have a Few Hours Per Week<\/h3>\n
How Much Preparation Should I Do Before Speaking?<\/h2>\n
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What Kind of Preparation Should I Do?<\/h2>\n
How Do I Stick to Speaking the Language With Zero Ability?<\/h2>\n
Should I Do Anything Other Than Just Speaking?<\/h2>\n
I Don\u2019t Want to Speak Yet, Is There Anything Else I Can Do?<\/h2>\n