| Pages in topic: [1 2] > | Learning one's fourth, fifth, sixth... language Thread poster: Anton Konashenok
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It's almost a truism that the more languages you already know, the easier it is to learn a new one. However, as your linguistic intuition grows, it also becomes increasingly more difficult to find a study program that is sufficiently fast-paced, detailed and specialist-oriented. Let's use this topic to collect recommendations for such programs (face-to-face or online) or study aids in all languages! Personally, I'll be especially grateful for Japanese and Hebrew.
| | | | Recep Kurt 
Türkiye
Local time: 17:05
Member (2011)
English to Turkish
+ ...
| Rosetta Stone | Mar 22, 2023 |
I find Rosetta Stone to be a very practical program as a first step to any language. Tried Spanish and was impressed bu how many words I learned in 30 minutes... They have a nice way of getting you to remember words. Read somewhere long time ago that the Department of State (US) used it to train their diplomats before sending them abroad.
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Anton Konashenok wrote:
It's almost a truism that the more languages you already know, the easier it is to learn a new one. However, as your linguistic intuition grows, it also becomes increasingly more difficult to find a study program that is sufficiently fast-paced, detailed and specialist-oriented. Let's use this topic to collect recommendations for such programs (face-to-face or online) or study aids in all languages! Personally, I'll be especially grateful for Japanese and Hebrew.
I've been using Memrise for a while to idly learn Korean vocabulary. Since I'm using user-created courses, not the official ones, the quality varies, but I find that what I learn tends to stick in the long term.
I would have recommended it even more highly a year or so ago, but now it's not that great. In the past they allowed you to add photos, grammar notes and sample sentences to help with memorization. With all those aids deleted, memorizing tons of dry vocabulary with no context is... not fun.
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AJATT
Comprehensible input
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| Language learning | Mar 24, 2023 |
I like Duolingo personally if I'm learning a language from scratch, though it sounds like it might not be fast-paced enough for you. I've just been on there doing a French lesson.
Memrise is also good for vocab learning.
Television/radio from the country in question helps to push yourself further.
If you are serious, paying for lessons would be the way to go to progress quickly I would think. There are also websites where you can get matched up with a nativ... See more I like Duolingo personally if I'm learning a language from scratch, though it sounds like it might not be fast-paced enough for you. I've just been on there doing a French lesson.
Memrise is also good for vocab learning.
Television/radio from the country in question helps to push yourself further.
If you are serious, paying for lessons would be the way to go to progress quickly I would think. There are also websites where you can get matched up with a native speaker for conversation practice.
None of these is really 'a program'. I think as an experienced language learner I'd be mixing and matching from all over the place to put together what I need. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Rosemary Soroos
Ireland
Local time: 15:05
Member (2023)
German to English
+ ...
| Depends on your goals | Mar 24, 2023 |
I've been using Duolingo on and off for years, but one year ago today I started learning Ukrainian on it and stuck with it consistently, and yesterday I finished the basic course. I don't know how well I could have a conversation (probably not well at all!) but I have certainly learned quite a lot of vocabulary, and have a fairly good foundation to go on with. At some stages I wanted to look for more grammar explanations, because I learned to recognise case endings and tenses instinctively (like... See more I've been using Duolingo on and off for years, but one year ago today I started learning Ukrainian on it and stuck with it consistently, and yesterday I finished the basic course. I don't know how well I could have a conversation (probably not well at all!) but I have certainly learned quite a lot of vocabulary, and have a fairly good foundation to go on with. At some stages I wanted to look for more grammar explanations, because I learned to recognise case endings and tenses instinctively (like natural language learning!) but didn't learn the rules. I've looked up a couple of things during the year, but it's mostly been Duolingo. Now I'm ready to go look for more resources.
For me, it was just an idle pastime and curiosity. I spent 10-20 mins most days, very little serious study, and I'm honestly quite surprised by how much I've learned. Duolingo is not going to be a good resource if you're motivated to learn faster or more deeply, or have a more defined goal, but I discovered it worked for me as an introduction to a new language and it has piqued my curiosity for more.
Now I need to choose another new language to try for a year! Maybe Japanese.
[Edited at 2023-03-24 08:56 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | Baran Keki
Türkiye
Local time: 17:05
Member
English to Turkish
| Seriously wondering | Mar 25, 2023 |
How can one 'learn' a language while working a job as unpredictable as freelance translation?
I just can't comprehend it. I tried learning German, even attended evening classes in person before Covid, but got thrown off course by a translation project every time I seemed to have made some progress. I gave up eventually. Perhaps I wasn't determined as much or didn't have the aptitude, but I can safely say that my enthusiasm was killed every time I landed a project that required my full atte... See more How can one 'learn' a language while working a job as unpredictable as freelance translation?
I just can't comprehend it. I tried learning German, even attended evening classes in person before Covid, but got thrown off course by a translation project every time I seemed to have made some progress. I gave up eventually. Perhaps I wasn't determined as much or didn't have the aptitude, but I can safely say that my enthusiasm was killed every time I landed a project that required my full attention.
That said, more power to those wanting to learn their umpteenth language in their sleep (I heard that there was such a 'technique') or in between translation projects.. ▲ Collapse
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Baran Keki wrote:
How can one 'learn' a language while working a job as unpredictable as freelance translation?
I just can't comprehend it. I tried learning German, even attended evening classes in person before Covid, but got thrown off course by a translation project every time I seemed to have made some progress. I gave up eventually. Perhaps I wasn't determined as much or didn't have the aptitude, but I can safely say that my enthusiasm was killed every time I landed a project that required my full attention.
That said, more power to those wanting to learn their umpteenth language in their sleep (I heard that there was such a 'technique') or in between translation projects..
I find it difficult too. I'm trying to brush up my French at the moment because I'm going on holiday to France but normally keeping my working languages up to date is my main priority. I don't do much non-work language learning.
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Baran Keki
Türkiye
Local time: 17:05
Member
English to Turkish
| Thanks Rachel! | Mar 25, 2023 |
Rachel Waddington wrote:
I find it difficult too. I'm trying to brush up my French at the moment because I'm going on holiday to France but normally keeping my working languages up to date is my main priority. I don't do much non-work language learning.
It's nice to be on the same page with you  Though, being a native English speaker, why would you feel the need to learn the language of the country you're planning to visit for a holiday? Aren't the folk over there relishing the prospect of practicing the Lingua Franca with a native speaker such as yourself? I'll bet the condescending Frenchies not deigning to answer to you when you asked them something in English is a thing of the past...
| | | | | Even five minutes a day would be helpful | Mar 26, 2023 |
Baran Keki wrote:
How can one 'learn' a language while working a job as unpredictable as freelance translation?
I just can't comprehend it. I tried learning German, even attended evening classes in person before Covid, but got thrown off course by a translation project every time I seemed to have made some progress. I gave up eventually. Perhaps I wasn't determined as much or didn't have the aptitude, but I can safely say that my enthusiasm was killed every time I landed a project that required my full attention.
That said, more power to those wanting to learn their umpteenth language in their sleep (I heard that there was such a 'technique') or in between translation projects..
I understand your concern and the solution to your question is even five minutes a day practicing or learning a new language would be better than doing nothing. Of course, if you can invest an hour, or maybe much more in learning a new language would be better. It's the same as being a professional musician or a professional athlete, where you touch the instrument(s) you play even for a few minutes in order to keep your touch or doing some minimal exercise to keep your body in shape even when you don't have the time to dedicate a certain amount of time.
I used to study a variety of languages decades ago where for fun, and the most effective, efficient and reliable way of learning a new language was to do exercises in a grammar book, such as "Teach Yourself" series or "hugo's XXX IN THREE MONTHS", where these books start from learning the number of alphabets and how they are pronounced to a reading and translating a paragraph or two with all the answers to the exercises in the back. By this way, you learn through actually writing the target language and this helps you very much in how the spellings and the grammars work.
[Edited at 2023-03-26 07:46 GMT]
| | | | Daniel Frisano
Italy
Local time: 16:05
Member (2008)
English to Italian
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| None of the above | Mar 30, 2023 |
1) A quick pass in Assimil or such, just to get the gist of the language.
2) Flashcards and/or listen & repeat, ca. 500 to 1000 sentences per day.
3) Occasionally study the grammar.
Tried and tested with Czech and Norwegian from scratch. Both took several hundreds hours to reach a reasonably fluent conversational level.
Personally I find that all pre-scheduled courses or popular website/apps (Rosetta, Duolingo, etc.) are mostly snake oil.
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IMO the more languages you learn, the less well you will speak the others and write your own.
It's all about specialisation, see.
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Anton Konashenok
Czech Republic
Local time: 16:05
French to English
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TOPIC STARTER | Ice Scream, really? | Mar 30, 2023 |
Ice Scream wrote:
IMO the more languages you learn, the less well you will speak the others and write your own.
It's all about specialisation, see.
Hmm... I know 19 languages: 2 native, 7 professional and 10 for my personal needs. According to your logic, I must be somewhere in the bottom 1% of the world population in terms of my speaking and writing aptitude. If really so, pray tell, what am I doing here on ProZ.com?
| | | | Lieven Malaise
Belgium
Local time: 16:05
Member (2020)
French to Dutch
+ ...
| Good question. | Mar 31, 2023 |
Anton Konashenok wrote:
If really so, pray tell, what am I doing here on ProZ.com?
I think it's an excellent question what somebody who is able to learn to master 19 languages is doing in an apocalyptic hell hole as Proz. 🙂
[Edited at 2023-03-31 06:40 GMT]
| | | | | Valid point though | Mar 31, 2023 |
Anton Konashenok wrote: Ice Scream wrote:
IMO the more languages you learn, the less well you will speak the others and write your own.
It's all about specialisation, see. Hmm... I know 19 languages: 2 native, 7 professional and 10 for my personal needs. According to your logic, I must be somewhere in the bottom 1% of the world population in terms of my speaking and writing aptitude. If really so, pray tell, what am I doing here on ProZ.com?
There are exceptions, but for most of us it's a choice between learning a new language, working on an existing language, building specialist knowledge, figuring out business skills, honing writing skills, etc., etc.
Adding a new language is the least useful of these because no matter how many languages you have you can still only do the same amount of work.
So sticking to one or two working languages IS a form of specialism.
Some people have an amazing capacity for learning and that's great. But most of us have to plan our learning needs carefully to avoid getting distracted by things that don't really help.
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