What methods do you use when studying languages?

Language Learning
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Are you studying any languages? What techniques or methods do you use?

The techniques or methods don’t have to be “memory techniques”, but could also include things like “talking with people online”, “Pimsleur”, or whatever.

This is a follow up to: What language(s) are you studying?

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What language(s) are you studying?
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I am currently learning Japanese hence subscribing to this thread promptly :slight_smile:

  • Due to having an Audible membership I have access to Pimsleur Japanese, I listen to them while on my morning walk
  • I also have a Wanikani lifetime membership which I obtained on some black Friday sale and love to go through the mnemonics they provide for Kanjis
  • I have Minna-no-Nihongo paper books with me and work on my grammar and vocab using them
  • I subscribe to multiple channels on Youtube and Instagram for vocabulary and new content for Japanese
  • I watch Netflix Japanese serials and movies using the language extension to immerse more in the language
  • I got introduced to the AJATT method last year and also mining my own words from movies using Anki tool, also Tango vocab cards on Anki

I am a very slow learner and like my journey of studying a new language

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That’s interesting. I didn’t know Audible had Pimsleur recordings. It seems less expensive than the CDs.

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Are you studying any languages? What techniques or methods do you use?

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I merged your comment into this recent thread since they are on the same topic.

Are you studying any languages yourself? :slight_smile:

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I’ve been learning French for the last 4 years (after a 20 year gap since the end of school). I had forgotten a huge amount including how to decline present tense verbs, but it wasn’t completely from scratch.

  • I copied “My first 1,000 words in French” into Anki and used that for spaced repetition learning.
  • I went through the entire French course from the superb Kwiziq site from A1 to C1. Twice. Added lots of new vocab to Anki as I did this.
  • Also went to a great “language cafe” weekly. This is just a group of 3 or 4 people, plus one (paid) native speaker who can correct you or supply you with the vocab you’re looking for. This was great as an intermediate as the group was small and really useful to have the native speaker help you out. Copied vocab to Anki.
  • I started reading, starting out with a book that I had done at school when I was 18. Often felt like gnawing off my hand in frustration because of how often I was looking up vocab in my ridiculously large French dictionary.
  • Continued reading and found that I was improving rapidly. Discovered cool apps like WordReference which is much quicker to look up vocab.
  • Started listening to audiobooks and using YouTube.
  • Studied for the B2 level French exam about 18 months ago and found it very motivating.
  • I’m very happy with my current level which is getting to be a pretty solid C1. Definitely C1 for reading and listening because I’m doing that a lot now that I don’t have to look up so much vocab and I can listen to audiobooks in the car and understand most of it. I find that listening to French translations of books that I have already listened to in English is nice because I’m never stuck wondering what is happening if I don’t understand a sentence. Plus I think I pick up on vocab a bit more because I already understand the context. My speaking and writing lag a bit behind because I’m not practicing them as much, but I think that I could convert a lot of my passive vocabulary into active vocabulary pretty rapidly if I started working in France, which is my goal.
  • I really like the refold.la site and the general idea that learning 500 words from a novel doesn’t result in a noticeable increase in your level because the words are likely spread over a wide range of topic areas. However if you stuck to one “domain” (like technology, or nature, or whatever) and learned 500 words in that domain, then that would massively increase you level in that particular domain. If I were more disciplined I would work through domain after domain making sure that I start with the ones that are most useful and important to me. But I’m not disciplined. So I haven’t. I like reading dem novels. Michel Houellebecq rocks!
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