**구멍가게 is rarely used and has lowly/humble connotations so 작은 가게 is preferred usually
Grammar Highlights
~고 Connector
Basically indicates that 1 action occurs and then another
Adding 나서 after ~고 stresses doing one action after the previously mentioned action
Connects similar ideas
Connects adjectives
1st verb connected to ~고 is only conjugated if (1) when 1 action occurs after another with considerable time between the 2 actions and the 1st action leads to the 2nd action’s possibility; and (2) when connecting clauses with similar ideas happened in the past with no real indication of action order
Using 는/은 can compare 2 nouns in ~고 sentences
~고 싶다 is connected to verbs to mean “I want to…” – remember 싶다 conjugates as an adjective
~고 있다 denotes being in the process of getting into a state or position literally right now (i.e. 나는 앉고 있어 “I am literally in the process of bending my knees to sit down” vs. 나는 앉아 있어 “I am sitting”)
**구멍가게 is rarely used and has lowly/humble connotations so 작은 가게 is preferred usually
Grammar Highlights
~고 Connector
Basically indicates that 1 action occurs and then another
Adding 나서 after ~고 stresses doing one action after the previously mentioned action
Connects similar ideas
Connects adjectives
1st verb connected to ~고 is only conjugated if (1) when 1 action occurs after another with considerable time between the 2 actions and the 1st action leads to the 2nd action’s possibility; and (2) when connecting clauses with similar ideas happened in the past with no real indication of action order
Using 는/은 can compare 2 nouns in ~고 sentences
~고 싶다 is connected to verbs to mean “I want to…” – remember 싶다 conjugates as an adjective
~고 있다 denotes being in the process of getting into a state or position literally right now (i.e. 나는 앉고 있어 “I am literally in the process of bending my knees to sit down” vs. 나는 앉아 있어 “I am sitting”)
If you are self-studying Russian, congrats! It’s a gorgeous language of an interesting culture in which many great works were written!
FOR THE LANGUAGE:
the alphabet is not as scary as you think! do note, however, that russians typically write with the script (learn how to write ) and read in the print (here(song)). practice–write the entire alphabet out 5 times or more. here is the sandwich menu for McDonald’s in Russia–sound out the words; most of them are cognates. type in Russian with a phonetic keyboard here.
follow blogs like russiangrammar for any grammar advice you need!
buy the AMAZING 5000 Russian Words (2) book–it has 5000 words with conjugation/declensions AND stress, so you can pronounce them! Also has handy grammar charts and tips in back!
the best website resource i’ve seen by far is this. it has audio (!!!!!), vocab, lessons, and grammar tables. it’s great.
FOR THE CULTURE:
don’t skimp out on this! russian culture is interesting–it’s neither western nor eastern due to many centuries of what was essentially isolation.
here are traditions, so you don’t make a fool outta yourself! note on how to say good luck before a test – “ни пуха ни пера!”– it’s telling someone “neither down nor feathers” i. e., “I hope you fail.” the response is “ К чёрту!” which I believe means “Go to the Devil!” –basically the Russian version of “To Hell with that!”
Hi! I have a very short attention span, and I rarely find it in me to enjoy using only one resource to learn a language, so I often rely on immersion and actively using the language right from the beginning to learn languages. I’ve done this with pretty much all my languages, and it has worked out pretty well for me so far, especially with French! This is heavily inspired by this article on the medium, which changed my whole outlook on languages. I hope I can offer some helpful advice!
Starting off (A0 –> A2)
First of all, you’re going to have to set your goals in the language. What do you want to do in your target language? Do you want to be conversational or fully fluent? Do you want to focus on all the skills (reading, listening, writing, speaking), or only a couple? Which accent/dialect do you want to choose? Set your goals, and give yourself some habits to start sticking to.
In most cases, I would advice learning the alphabet and the pronunciation at first. For the alphabet, find a guide online and learn the stroke order. Keep on writing it over and over again. For languages like Mandarin Chinese or Japanese, where you have to memorise characters, try and memorise the most common characters. Also, find a pronunciation guide on YouTube or somewhere online, and immediately start working on it. Once you have a general idea of what the sounds are, start speaking and try to shadow natives (i.e. repeat what they say after them with the same intonation - you can do this with YouTube videos, or beginners exercises online). To practice both of these at the same time, you can try reading out loud, and maybe try dictating what you hear sometimes.
Start listening to the language a lot. Try and listen to YouTube videos and podcasts, and get used to the sound of the language. You might even want to watch a TV show or anime in your target language with English subtitles. I’d also recommend reading and listening at the same time, so if you have subtitles in your target language, then that could be great too. The more exposed you are to the natural use of your target language, the less unintelligible they will seem.
Memorise some basic vocabulary and phrases. There are loads of articles online that have basic vocabulary lists and phrases in different languages (there are even some on this website). Try memorising a few of them. In terms of what exactly you should learn vocab for, I would recommend learning vocab lists for these: numbers, subject pronouns, common greetings, the most common verbs (the first 100 should do) and their most common conjugations, days of the week, months, seasons, years, how to tell the time, how to talk about the weather, family, colours, house vocab, food, money and shopping phrases, common adjectives, common places, adverbs, parts of the body and medical vocabulary (I got all of this from this post). It’s a lot, but it will give you a strong foundation. You can then start learning vocabulary for your interests specifically. You can do this using multiple methods. First, you could use flashcards, like anki, memrise and Quizlet. You could also play around with apps like Duolingo or Lingodeer. Also, you could write them down, and keep testing yourself on them until you have them memorised (both target language to english, and english to target language). Make sure that you have audio, and that you know how the word/phrase sounds, and the pronunciation.
Start speaking with someone online. I recommend apps like Tandem and HiNative. Start trying to have conversations of basic topics straight away, and make sure you get corrections. Look up the words as you go.
Memorise a few basic grammar structures. This is especially important for languages like Korean or Japanese, which have extremely different grammar structures to English. Learn basic present, past and future tenses, along with basic articles and determiners, agreement, reflexive verbs, basic particles, negation and gender.
Immerse. I would recommend starting off with posts and videos that offer advice about things, since the language used in these tend to be simplistic, but topic specific. You can also use apps like LingQ. When practicing listening and reading, you can use the advice in these two posts (listening,reading). Don’t memorise every word you come across, and slowly try to ease yourself in.
Making the leap to the intermediate stage (A2 –> B1)
Vocabulary: I’ve already talked about methods of memorising vocabulary earlier, so I won’t talk about it again. As for what you should be memorising, I would suggest basing it on your interests and topical issues. When you immerse, and come across certain interesting words, then memorise them. You can also explore the tag for your target language on tumblr, and try and memorise some of the in depth vocabulary lists on here.
Grammar: I would suggest finding a specification, or list of grammar structures for the intermediate level, and learn all of them using articles and youtube videos. Then, try and use the rules regularly in your speaking and writing and receive corrections. Also, do practice questions.
Listening:I have gone in depth on how to practice listening in the post I mentioned earlier, so I won’t elaborate too much. Overall, I’d say that it is better to make sure that you are listening to the language a lot, and that what you are listening to is comprehensible input.
Reading: Find some learners exercises online, and keep doing them. You can also just generally try to read more, based on your interests. I would also suggest to apply the methods from the post I mentioned earlier.
Writing: Try and write a few sentences every now and then, and use your new grammar structures and vocabulary as much as possible. Make sure that you receive corrections. I have gone in depth on this subject in thispost.
Speaking:Find a speaking buddy online, and try and organise meetings, where you just try and practice speaking. Look up words you don’t know, and be brave: most people are kind, and won’t mind if you make mistakes, so keep trying to move forward.
Going from intermediate to conversational (B1 –> B2)
Vocabulary: Focus on your interests, and areas that will be useful to you. Make sure that you actually use the words that you are memorising while writing and speaking.
Grammar: I think the same advice as the beginner to intermediate stage is applicable here.
Listening: Listen to both intermediate podcasts and YouTube videos in the target language (innovative languages, iyagi, dreaming spanish, a piece of french, InnerFrench etc.), and also to native material (youtube videos, films, TV shows, vines, tiktoks etc.) that you find interesting. Use transcripts or subtitles (in the target language) to memorise new vocabulary, and then keep repeating the audio until you understand everything.
Reading: Read whatever you can get your hands on, as long as it is reasonably simple enough. I would recommend kids books, and also translations of books that you have already read in your target language.
Writing:Try starting a journal in your target language, and also try writing letters/e-mails to people, and maybe write some essays on topical issues. Once again, make sure that you get corrections.
Speaking:Continue having conversations with people in your target language. Let yourself make mistakes and be corrected, because that is the only way to improve. For your accent and pronunciation, shadow native material (I use Easy Languages for this).
This is as far as I have gotten in terms of my self-study journey, so I’m afraid I won’t be able to offer much more advice. When I eventually reach an advanced C1 level in a language, then I’ll definitely make a post about that. Thank you for reading this post! I hope it was useful to you!
Self-studying a language is an amazing way to learn, if you’re careful to avoid the pitfalls! Here are the steps I go through when making a study plan:
Step 01: Decide what you want to do and what you can offer (what language(s), how much time/money/energy/etc)
Step 02: Gather resources (decide what type you like best and then research and test)
Step 03: Make S.M.A.R.T goals (follow the guidelines and make good goals that will encourage you)
Step 04: Create your plan (using the 3 steps above and some prompting questions on the guide, form a schedule. Be organized, but stay loose and adaptable)
Step 05: Add some back-up or pressure (find an accountability or tandem partner, add the pressure of a scheduled exam, etc)
Check out the link for more Info on each step + tons of tips and links to resources and other guides!!
Good luck!!! Self-studying a language is not easy, but it’s so rewarding and fun!!!
You have probably seen this game before, Township. It’s one of those games where you have to build a farm and a city and you have to keep growing vegetables and making different items to keep growing.
Well, I’m going to share with you something that I have been doing recently to learn my target language, Korean. So I can study and play at the same time
You can download this game to your cellphone or your computer. Whatever you feel more comfortable with.
This is how it looks like. You have the settings to change the language. And you have a helicopter to send items to your citizens, and this is what we are going to work with.
1.Every person has a little dialogue. So choose a dialogue, and then take a screenshot. 2.Thenchange the language to Spanish. 3.Go to the same dialogue and take another screenshot.
4.Then you can cut the images so you only have the dialogue. 5.Paste the images on your favorite notes application. 6. Now you can take notes about vocabulary, phrases, grammar or anything else you don’t know.
You can compareboth dialogues and look how they translate the ideas and expressions. Of course it is not translated word by word, but the message and the feelings are the same.
Another thing I do is to memorizethe dialogue. This way my brain gets used to the words, and the expressions. If you don’t know how to pronounce a word you can go to Forvo.
If you have more questions about vocabulary and grammar that you couldn’t find in the dictionaries, you can ask in HiNative.
I also use Beelinguapp to do exactly the same thing. This is an app where you can find short stories in many languages.
It’s the bane of every language learner that wants to self study or study at home. If you are one of these self-learning warriors them you know what I mean. You have to create your own study schedule and plan your own curriculum and it can be a real P in the A. There are so many things to consider, such as your level, available time, your study style (which you can learn about here) and the goal of your learning. HOWEVER, despite all these variables, I am here to help you create your own customized language learning study planner that is both efficient and effective for YOU. So if you want to become a master study schedule maker, keep reading!
Calculate Your Hourly Study
Before you create your schedule begin by looking at your regular schedule (work or school) and determine how many hours per day you can study. Then calculate how many hours per week that makes. This will determine how much material you will be able to cover and how fast you will be able to get through it. The fewer hours of time you have available, the less content you will be able to learn over the span of a week. There is nothing wrong with this at all. Just have to say this clearly so that you don’t expect to be fluent in a few months if you only study an hour a day for five days. Don’t expect miracles people!
My Suggestions
If you work full time, I would suggest only studying about 30 minutes to one hour a day with review on weekends.
For people who have more time to study, you will be able to cover more content in the same week. However, make sure you aren’t adding too many hours so you don’t burn out. For those with more time, I suggest studying between 2-3 hours a day with review on weekends.
TLDR: Count hours because just like a regular language course, the amount of hours a week you study dictates how intense the course is and how much you will cover in a semester.
Determine How Many Days a Week You’d Like To Study
This part is ENTIRELY up to you! However, whatever you choose to do, make sure you leave at least one day of break to avoid burn out. I am currently doing 5 days a week of study with weekends off.
Choose Some Material
There is such a wealth of materials on the internet that I don’t recommend that you purchase ANY textbooks until you search the web to see if it is available online in pdf or something. That’s what I did. If you would like some free Japanese textbook pdfs, you can visit my post about free Japanese resources. I did find online a list of the best textbook by language:
TLDR: Do some research to find some material that will be best for you. DO NOT RELY ON APPS. THOSE ARE ONLY FOR DOWNTIME PRACTICE.
Create a Semester and a Syllabus (Get Creative)
The big cons of self-studying languages is the lack of organization. You have to do it alllll by yourself and it isn’t a basket a roses, believe me. So to make it easier for you, plan your studies in semesters like college courses. That way, you have more concrete and plannable goals. If you just float throughout the year as one continuous study blob, you’ll get bored, burnt out, and more likely to give up since your progress is not as easily trackable. But if you study by semester, you can set concrete goals for the semester and what you’d like to cover every day, week, and month. This way, you are easily able to track your progress. This is the best way to study, if you want to see real progress.
The other thing you need to do is create a syllabus, so once you’ve chosen your textbook and materials, go ahead and plan the WHOLE SEMESTER of what you will cover on what days, what days you will have tests, what days you will review, etc. This will require you to go through your textbook or online program in advanced to plan your studies. Try to plan each week by textbook chapters, program units, or specific subject you’d like to learn (celebrities, music, fashion, animals, etc) If you create a week where you are studying a specific subject, you can use movies, books, articles, youtube videos, or music to learn that subject!
For example:
Week 1: Korean From Zero Chapter 1 and 2/ Wani Kani 1
Day One: Blah blah
Day Two: Blah blah
Day Three: Blah blah
Day Four: Blah Blah
Day Five: Review Day!
Week 2: Korean From Zero Chapter 3 and 4/ Quiz
Day One: Blah blah
Day Two: Blah blah
Day Three: Blah blah
Day Four: Blah Blah
Day Five: Review Day!
Week 2: Desserts – Ms. Panda and Mr. Hedgehog Viki Tv Show
Day One: Blah blah
Day Two: Blah blah
Day Three: Blah blah
Day Four: Blah Blah
Day Five: Review Day!
Get creative! Your study schedule is whatever you want it to be!! Don’t forget to mark down the goals for the semester and what you’d like to be able to do by the end of the semester.
TLDR: Create your own semester-based plan to create concrete learning goals and trackable progress. Create a syllabus to write down your goals and your daily and weekly material to cover.
Figure Out Your Study Style
There are essentially two, which I talk about in an earlier post. The Systematic Style and the Intuitive Style. To find out which one you are, visit my post. Essentially, a Systematic learner would rather learn the concepts first, then practice them. An intuitive learner (such as myself) would prefer to be thrown in to an immersive environment and learn while immersed THEN learn the details of the concepts. This GREATLY effects how you need to approach your language study because you will need to develop specific language study skills. For example, if you are intuitive, you MUST have audio/video based lessons with explanations and you may not need a textbook at all.
is and implement this style into your study syllabus
HOW TO ORGANIZE AND PLAN MATERIAL
One of the biggest problems among self-taught language learners, is staying organized. You need to be having fun with your studies, but it needs to be organized. Take a journey with me into hypothetical land. Imagine that you wanted to use kpop lyrics to learn Korean. So to do it, you choose a song to start and then everyday you sing the song over and over and study more and more of the lyrics till EVENTUALLY you learn the whole song. Then you choose another and start again. This sounds normal doesn’t it? It’s shouldn’t be. It’s bad.
What you SHOULD do is determine exactly how long you want to take to learn the lyrics to the song. For this case, we’ll say five days (an entire work week). For each day, you need to determine how much of the song you want to cover. One verse? Two verses? Then you plan that the LAST day (the fifth) day of your studies, you review all the vocabulary words and grammar you’ve learned. On Saturday or Sunday, you test yourself on the material.
Voila!! You’ve just created an ENTIRE study plan for a week just around a single K-pop song!! Stick that in your syllabus and move it along!
TLDR: Organize. Organize. Organize.
Use Material You’re Interested In
Keep in mind that you DO NOT have to only use your textbook or language learning program. The internet is vast and so are the resources, so don’t limit yourself! If you would like to learn about fashion, sports, science, or whatever, then plan a week or two of study where you use online resources to do exactly that! You can use movies, shows, articles, music, or even books. Whatever you want in the subject that you want in order to make your language study as interesting and less brutalizing as possible. So it’s okay if you suddenly take a break from your textbook study to learn a kpop song or watch an anime. Do what you want!
TLDR: Mix in topics and subjects you’re interested in learning about into your language study to help keep you interested in your language study!
Conclusion
I hope this wasn’t totally overwhelming! I know it’s a lot, but if you want real language progress, you MUST be organized. It doesn’t matter if you want to know how to study Spanish, Japanese, Chinese, French, German or whatever. You can use these study tips to help you no matter what the language or what the level. Use these steps and you will become a master schedule maker in minutes! I hope this helps!! Good luck with your language study!!!
All Steps:
Calculate Your Hourly Study
Determine How Many Days a Week You’d Like To Study
Autodidact Tag (Revived Edition of the “I’m Studying” tag)
Autodidact (n.): a self-taught person; someone who lives an intellectual life without the necessity of a teacher, school, or tutor
(newer autodidacts are also welcome to do this tag!)
The Rules: [Part 1] share your recent studies (in class and/or independent) and specify the last topic/text you covered in the class. Make up your own course and topic names if you need. Remember books, podcasts, and documentaries apply (and are a good gateway into a subject too). There is no academic standard to uphold here. “Lowbrow” or informal topics are also very welcome! [Part 2] bold the topics in the list which you have studied and italicize those which you want to study and star (*) your favorite areas of study
Who I’m Tagging: everyone who sees this!
Part 1: Recent Studies
Care Ethics: Empathy, Morality, and Ethical Action
Elderly Wellness: Dementia, Diabetes, and Depression
Self-Development: Psycho-Cybernetics
Art History: Egon Schiele (for example)
History of Hip-Hop: The Pioneers
Philosophy of Aesthetics: Leo Tolstoy’s What Is Art
Engineering and Technology: Chemical, Civil, Educational, Electrical, Materials Science, Mechanical, Systems Science*
Medicine and Health: Alternative,Clinical Science, Research Medicine, Dentistry, Medical Specialty (eg. Dermatology, Podiatry, Surgery), Nursing,Nutrition*,Physical Fitness,Health Informatics,Medical Toxicology, Traditional Medicine, Therapy (Speech, Occupational, Physical, etc.), Public Health
hello !! ok so today i want to share some of the things i’ve learnt in my years of being a languages student, particularly regarding vocab & grammar. i personally lovelearning languages and there are many obvious benefits, communication being one of the fundamental ones.
tbh vocab and grammar are probably the backbones of any language - they play a huge part in developing your translation, reading, writing, speaking and listening skills.
pt i: vocab
have a list. the simple act of writing is one of the most effective ways to retain information tbh ! it’s good to keep a seperate section / notebook / document for this so everything’s in one place & i personally like to keep prescribed textbook words and words i look up during translations / exercises in seperate places as well, for the sake of organisation. also you can flick back through later and feel accomplished :-)
flashcards. write the word in your language on one side and the translation + relevant grammar info on the other side, and use that to test yourself. quizlet+anki are great online flashcard tools !
mnemonics.short [or long!!] phrases / acronyms /stories are super useful, especially with words with multiple meanings or words which look annoyingly similar.
word / pictorial association. ok word association is obviously easier in languages of the same family because so many words look / sound similar but pictures are great too, especially for more visual learners.
thisarticle contains some excellent tips for studying a language with a different alphabet
pt ii: grammar
make up chants / songs [hand gestures can help!!]
look for patterns.
take the french present tense -er verb endings: -e, -es, -e, -ons, -ez, -ent.
and the imperfect tense -er endings: -ais, -ais, -ait, -ions, -iez, -aient.
not too different right?? learn to spot these similarities + use them to your advantage !
repetition is key. sounds boring but repetition is one of the best ways to drill things into your brain; whether it’s verbally, mentally or just by writing out the entire table. i often repeat things over and over to myself whilst doing everyday activities like washing the dishes and it really helps.
learn the exceptions to the rule. because there are always exceptions. just learn them. i do recommend making summary notes or flashcards for harder concepts simply to gain a better understanding and also because you can look over them quickly & easily
also just !!! practice !!! often things make much more sense in context, so practice by doing exercises and translations
pt iii: general tips / links
read !!! reading exposes you to so much more culture + vocab and grammar in the way that it’s used in a day to day context
practice practice practice. whether it’s just going over vocab or scanning through a text or listening to music or writing a short passage, try to engage with your target language on a daily basis. trust me, it helps a lot.
find a partner !!! learning new things with friends is so much less daunting + you can study together and motivate each other and maybe even travel together one day
remember: learning a language is hard. adapting your brain to understand a whole new set of words and rules is hard. it’s supposed to be hard. but it’s ok to make mistakes. it’s ok. you got this. and in the end, it’s so rewarding - knowing another language is a skill you’ll have for life. good luck + i hope this was useful !
It’s the bane of every language learner that wants to self study or study at home. If you are one of these self-learning warriors them you know what I mean. You have to create your own study schedule and plan your own curriculum and it can be a real P in the A. There are so many things to consider, such as your level, available time, your study style (which you can learn about here) and the goal of your learning. HOWEVER, despite all these variables, I am here to help you create your own customized language learning study planner that is both efficient and effective for YOU. So if you want to become a master study schedule maker, keep reading!
Note to self: I am resuming my Japanese studying. I studied 3 semesters in college then did a year long study abroad in Japan. I came back and I’ve done nothing with it but waste it. I get asked so many times are “you fluent in Japanese?” or comments like “you went to Japan right so can’t you speak it.” Even in a dream I had someone ask me questions in Japanese and I couldn’t answer. I woke up and thought well this is a problem. So now I’m here trying to fix it. I want to study and do it as effective and efficient as possible. I spent the week researching efficient language learning and here is the plan I came up with…(see that lovely chart I made)
With that said…Its Japanese study time. Hardcore training will commence April 2014. Hope this all goes according to plan. In the mean time I’ll be gathering resources.
