Language Learning at Home

How can you learn a language at home? By immersing yourself into that culture.

Here’s how:

What do you need?

Apps:

HelloTalk- This is a free app where you can talk to native speakers. It’s important to speak to natives because when we learn a language through teachers and books the words/phrases are accurate but, they are not always commonly said. If you speak to natives you’ll know which words are commonly said and which aren’t. Example: In English you don’t often hear someone say “I’m so so.” Instead they may simply say “eh I’m okay.”

WhatsApp- WhatsApp is a messenger app somewhat like Facebook Messenger or KIK where you can send messages or calls to family and friends. Since you’ll be talking to international people on HelloTalk or whatever language app you choose, you would need an app to keep in contact with your new language partners since you can’t text them from your regular messages. I guarentee you 97% of the native speakers on HelloTalk will have this app and eventually ask you for your number so they can speak to you on there. When adding them to your phone ask for their country number. For example the country number for the United States is +1 so if their phone number is from the United States you’ll put +1 then the rest of their number. I recommend adding them to your contacts first then messaging them on WhatsApp.

YouTube- You can find many lessons on this app. You can even find youtubers, vloggers, cooking recipes, gameplays, etc. Just as if you were watching it in your native language. I recommend making a new YouTube account and solely looking at videos with the language you’re trying to learn. That way you’ll get many video recommendations like music, lessons, vlogs, etc. regarding that specific language.

Duolingo- Theres many apps like duolingo. However this is the only app that I’ve tried in the past. It teaches you vocabulary, verbs, and sentences. It has many lessons that will help you learn your target language.

Dict. Apps- If you see a verb, phrase, or word you don’t understand you can find it on this app (slang words are not usually on dict. app and in some cases you may have to search through the internet to find the translation or word.) Try typing in your target language and dict or dictionary at the end at your Google Playstore or Apple store.

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When it comes to these languages:

English, French, Italian, German and Spanish.

You will have a slight advantage if you speak one of these languages already and you want to learn one of the other. Think of them like cousins. Cognates are words that looks like a similar word in another language.

Let’s take a look at the English word biology: it’ll be biologia in Italian, biología in Spanish, and biologie in French and German.

Some languages have the same sentence structure so once you learn one language if it has the same or similar sentence structure in another language all you would have to do is learn the vocabulary.

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Pick a region

If you’re learning Spanish for example you’ll need to pick a country and learn their style of speaking.

For example: Guapo in Mexico means “handsome” and Guapo in the Dominican Republic means “mad.”

There’s many countries to choose from Peru, Argentina, Ecuador, Costa Rica, Venezuela, Cuba, Colombia, etc. You do not have to pick only between Mexico and Spain. On the app HelloTalk you can choose a specific age range, country, and/or city. If you’re learning English you can choose between Australia, United States, England etc. It’s the same thing as being from another city. In the United States some people may say sneakers and some may say tennis shoes. What you say depends on where you are from.

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Immerse yourself:

Immerse yourself in the culture, music, television shows, articles, blogs, movies, apps, podcasts, children books to adult books, newspapers, and memes. On your social media follow things regarding that language or culture. Change your phone in that language. You already had your phone in your native language so you already know where certain things will be located. Keep a notebook and write notes down.

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What can I start with to help me learn a new language?

• Find your motivation. When starting out a new project at times you may feel like you’re going no where. But you are. You just have to be patient and persistent. Find your motivation and reasoning so if you feel like giving up you’ll keep going. Remember these two quotes: “Rome wasn’t built in a day.” And “The day you plant the seed is not the day you eat the fruit.”

• The first thing you need is to learn is vocabulary. You can not construct sentences without knowing any words! Start with basic things. You can start by looking around your room and the rooms of the house and finding those words. Then simple words and phrases like the weather, colors, family, food, greetings etc.

• After learning words you can learn verbs, how to conjugate them, the sentence structure, and basic grammar rules. You could learn verbs with words but it depends on how slow or fast you want to pick up the language. Even though you only know a little bit of words you can still download those apps and practice with natives. You can start with small talk like greetings, interests, emotional feelings, locations, you name it.

• Put something in the background so you can always be listening to the language you’re trying to learn. Talk to yourself aloud as if you’re in class. Make yourself your own teacher. Reread words and sentences over and over until you can pronounce it correctly, faster, and more clearly. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes and ask for help.
  

• Do not use google translater to translate the whole sentence. If you must use a translator it should be only to translate a word or perhaps a whole sentence. But understand why the sentence is the way it is so you can also learn. When making sentences do not use google translator. Try your hardest to form the sentence and send it to your language partner and they will help correct you. You can even ask why it’s structured that way and they can help you with that.

• You need to also practice by writing, voice memos, and phone conversations. Get a buddy or a few. Don’t be shy and don’t be ashamed. You’re trying to learn a language even if you don’t think you sound smart you are extremely smart by taking that extra step to learn a new language.
  

Good luck language learners 😉