What's the best way to learn another language?

[D.U.F.F.]

1 hour ago, mariopepper said:

Constant improving your skills and knowledges. Try to write in the language you wanna learn to

你認為寫這篇文章有助於我學習說話

[Vejnemojnen]

Resurrecting this thread instead of starting my own : )

 

I have found Busuu to be very handy. Especially the "conversation" page with the pictures and videos. You write or speak about what you see, and natives will give you feedback&correction. First I downloaded the Android app from torrent, tested it for 3 weeks. I found it great, so purchased a year of Premium Plus membership for 40 euros. Well worth it so far.

 

The grammar pages are a bit rudimentary (at least now...), but easy to grasp. I've been using it to improve my German, and so far, I am surprised, how useful it is. I would need to find a way to practice speaking& arguing, presenting opinions though. Any better recommendations? Would be nice, if it's either low cost or even free. : )

 

Is there a thread on these boards which is in German? 

 

And one negative remark about Busuu: they do not offer neither Norwegian nor Swedish as an option. As far as I am aware of, they do not plan to add these languages later.  I am just simply not interested in romance languages (Castellano, Italian, Portuguese, French..). In fact, the only neo-latin languages I find interesting, are Romanian and Aromanian. Sorry, we humans are not created equal.. : )

[LAwLz]

Not sure if it's been said already but there is pretty much only one efficient way to learn a language:

1) Grammar has to be learned through reading about it or a teacher. There is just to way around it.

2) Vocabulary is best learned through spaced repetition. It's the system used by Memrise, Anki, Duolingo, etc.

3) Listening to the language being used. Either by watching content in the language, living a country where the language is spoken, or talk to another person using the language.

 

So when you want to learn a language you need to:

1) Find a teacher or good books which can teach you grammar.

2) Find out which words to learn and in what order, and then repeat them a little every day using some spaced repetition system.

3) Find some way to use the language. Either by watching, listening or speaking to the language in some context.

[Vejnemojnen]

@LAwLz

Well said. The grammar part is unfortunately true. But a good coursebook can do wonders. Or "open eyes, open ears", whenever you listen or read anything, pay attention to grammar, like cases, conjugations, prepositions or tenses. That way, it will be engraved easier to your circuitry. 

 

This reminds me, that I'll have to recap and study more grammar. Which is not something, what I do gladly...

[Lii]

Forget duolingo and other similar applications, they are bad

 

For pronunciations use Google traslante, it works just fine for that; Also Google is always a great source, you can get videos with subtitles, that help to understanding listening, on pronunciation (and etx), also they give pretty usefull information 

 

The pain in the ass I would say it's mostly due to grammar (and with some language, the writing system..), for that you should learn it,  though I found,  out, that If your goal, is to understand/talk a language, usually it's a lack of vocabulary, that doesn't permit you to communicate, though having a nice grammar is always nice 

 

Also if you wanna train yourself to talk it, there are seveal ways, you can chat/talk with random people on the net (there was also a reddit section about this..), or catching up some tourists/students on your local university, or trying to talk with vocal assistance, always if they get what you are saying