Any fellow language learners here?

I studied French for a long time through formal education, and almost nothing stuck, really. Now I'm trying to learn Swedish. The strategy I've found that works the best is to put myself in situations where I have to learn it. For example, I set my phone to Swedish so I would be exposed to it more. That also set my Google Maps app to Swedish, so I got lost quite a bit for a while when I used that for directions. But after a couple of times, I no longer needed to glance down at the picture with arrows telling me where I needed to go; I could just understand it.

I also try to watch TV shows in Swedish and listen to music in Swedish. I'm particularly fond of Disney music for that, because it's familiar (it's pretty easy to get to listen to foreign language Disney music on YouTube). Oh, and since I'm a huge Harry Potter nerd and Pottermore offers the e-books, I'm slowly working on reading the series in Swedish, since I know what's going on but am learning new Swedish words (and sometimes pick up on grammar from that as well). I think I'm currently on chapter 4 of the first book though, so not sure how helpful that is lol.

Then I also try to look stuff up and use more traditional study methods as well. I have a Swedish-English dictionary, a translation app on my phone, and a couple of grammar books, and I research online to find out some of the rules. To get a better idea of how the sounds work, I also look up lessons that people have posted to YouTube so I can hear a native speaker speaking slowly enough for me to be able to pick up what they're saying, since they're specifically teaching it as a second language.

 

I'm learning Korean. Have you tried memrise? It's a great tool for learning new vocabulary words. It uses spaced repetition. I also use online sites for grammar and will try to make my own sentences at home as part of practice. I also talk to native speakers online and in real life to practice. Finally I listen to korean videos online to practice my korean and I also listen to songs since my listening skills are awful. So far I've been studying solo for about 7 months and I've definitely seen improvements but it's definitely a tough language to learn.

 

Only dead or constructed ones!

 

I started learning Japanese when I was about 14. Back then I had a textbook and a dictionary that I used to study by myself. I would learn the grammar and then I'd make my own sentences. I also did things like setting my iPod or whatever in Japanese, and listened to Japanese music, watched anime without subs, etc. I used a lot of online language exchange sites, apps, online tests, anything I could find to try to learn.

Before I came to Japan I was confident enough in my Japanese to put it on my resume, and agree to translate the ingredients on the Japanese candy at a former workplace. Once I got here though, I realized really quickly that it wasn't nearly as good as I thought it was. For the first 6 months I could barely order at a restaurant.

Emmersion and studying.

 

Yes, first of all English has been part of me for 13 years now, German for 2 1/2 and Russian for 1. As for German, many warned me that would be sooo difficult because I have to memorise the gender article (der/die/das) along with nouns but it's really not that difficult, and a lot of times there are signs of the nouns' gender. Most of the time if it's ge- something it's das, if it ends in -ung/-heit/-keit/-schaft it's always die... and if you see them in cases other than nominative, you can do some reverse engineering to get what it originally was.
Russian actually has some similarities to German, it also has the 3 genders but at least there's not too much to memorise because the last letter of the word specifies the gender. I'm still having a hard time with it because it doesn't stick as much due to the new alphabet and I can only have two classes a week as opposed to 6 German classes.
I hope I can study Dutch some day because it feels like a logical next step after German.

I tend to watch Let's play videos on youtube in the desired language, switch all my applications and everything to the same language and also finding native speakers to talk to.

 

I'm a language student, so learning languages is kind of my specialty.

I learned English and could say I'm perfectly bilingual now. I've been learning it since 3rd grade and I went farther than what the school thaught me. That's how I learned. Oh, and video games, too.

I'm an intermediate student in Spanish. I know quite a few verb tenses and for a french speaker, Spanish is really easy.

I also learn German with school, and it's really a cool language. After my two years of college, I should be able to speak well.

I learn Italian on my own, and I find it easier than Spanish. It looks more like French and it makes a lot of sense for a French speaker. If you know Spanish also, it gets even easier.

Edit: Oh, I forgot I did a course of mandarin Chinese! I love how they don't have grammar. It makes up for the difficulty of learning all the characters! It's not as hard as people think it is. It was the best grade I had last session.

 

hmmm I wanted to start learning Korean this year but it's February and I haven't even started learning hangul yet, lol. >.<

 

I took a six month Spanish course a few years ago. It was fun. Before that I tried Rosetta Stone but it was not helpful at all. Apps can be very useful as well.

 

I am learning Swedish, i am not actively learning in the sense that i spend hours everyday, but I sometimes just decide to learn some and it sticks with me that way, whereas if i force myself to learn it i just forget.

I use a cool website called Duolingo, along with doing the other common stuff such as listening to swedish etc. I also have an online friend who is swedish, so she helps me a lot too.

 

I love languages, but I never feel like I have time learning any. Whenever I feel I have time I'm gonna try learning German, Japanese, French, latin and--just for the hell of it--elvish.

 

I'm learning French, German, Toki Pona, Bulgarian Cyrillic and Kana. Planning on adding Japanese and Icelandic to that list at sole point in the near future.

I'm using Memrise for vocab, btw. I find it to be less boring than duolingo and random resources on the internet. I research grammar fun, so that comes a lot easier and I do that on the side.

 

I'm starting to relearn some of the Japanese I've learned, but I'm still on the basic stuff sadly >< I hope to be fluent in the language soon though and I may minor in it in college! I also am thinking about learning Korean!

Good luck with the Spanish, I'm sure you'll do great in it!

Right now, I'm using the Living Language software to learn - It comes with books, audio, apps, and an online course! I got it for my birthday!

 

I'm studying spanish currently and it's going rather slow mostly because of all the different verb forms the language has. I think there's like at least 25 conjugations per verb :lol: exhausting! The regular ones are a lil bit easier to memorize, however the irregular verbs are a pain. I wish to be fluent one day. Atm I can read and understand most texts. I have a hard time expressing myself however.

I can't believe some people are actually learning swedish I'm really curious why?

 

Hey, I'm learning Spanish too. I do find it a little difficult, but I have heard that Spanish is one of the easier ones to learn. I'm learning it so I can talk to people who live in South America. It's the main language everywhere there except Brazil and the Guyanas.
If I am able to, I would also like to learn Portuguese after Spanish, so I can go to Brazil and talk to people there. If I know English, Spanish, and Portuguese, I can talk to almost anybody in the Americas. The people above who are learning many languages give me hope that I can know these three.

 

I'm learning ASL. I'm currently on my second semester, which is all my school offers.

 

Back in school I studied French, Biblical Hebrew, Classical Latin, Hindi and Sanskrit. I was always much stronger at reading and writing then I was in speaking or hearing.

 

All in all, I've tried learning about 10 or so different languages in my lifetime starting at 13, but Japanese, Italian, Swedish, ASL, and Indonesian are my personal favorites to learn.

Duolingo is really addictive for me. I'm on a 70 day streak and almost finished with Italian and dabbling with Swedish. I can't wait until they come out with Japanese.

 

I'm learning French right now at school, though I guess I've been learning the language all my life, considering my parents come from a French speaking country. Sadly, I still have this awful accent when I speak (e.g. poor pronunciation of "ar" and "u"). As for strategies, I'm not sure how effective mine are. :lol: I try to learn through a lot of repetition, so basically exercises from textbooks, listening to the radio to improve comprehension, reading the news in French (kinda sometimes...), etc. (Not sure if the last two really count as "repetition", but yeah.)

 

I'm teaching myself French and Russian. Plan on going back to Spanish and Italian after that, and eventually German.