Languages without textbooks
Because I disagree with ONLY using language textbooks…
Do I have to emphasize on the “only” more?
Disclaimer: this post applies mainly to outside of a classroom setting [even then I disagree but that’s a whole different matter]. Also It doesn’t mean I won’t use a textbook from time to time, or that I look down on people who use textbooks. As a matter of fact I’m jealous because my attention span isn’t high enough for textual learning. This does NOT mean you shouldn’t use textbooks. For a beginner, it is important that you use one. But, it’s better not to only use that. I learned a slavic language, as well as English, with only these methods, they kinda work yo. But I’m a mere language peasant so don’t think I’m some next level thing cause I’m not!
I’m not a fan of textbooks because I feel like they’re on this repetitive paradoxal cycle that ends you into a slump as soon as you start to feel like you’ve achieved something. I tried completing over six books and it always ends up like this. They usually teach you vocabulary that doesn’t correlate well, and they don’t provide enough explanations on the grammatical nuances. Also, most of them don’t even tackle the spoken language and slang, which I find annoying. I want to text man. I want to be able to be as rude in Romanian as I am rude in English. Why don’t you give me that?
It’s dry, and I want to cry just by looking at the amount of Smith and Tanaka’s in Japanese textbooks. If I see one more スミスorシュミット from ドイツ with a generic company name I will scream.
Ok apart from crappy 2 min paint skills, behold the methods.
Reading thematic/reference books
Pick up a book on X subject (for my case in Japanese), like an encyclopedia about animals.
Start by breaking your book in sections. I use the page method, meaning I’d read a page at least twice before going to the next page. Breaking your reading material in smaller/digestible sections won’t exasperate you, or demotivate you. Think about it. What is a smarter goal? Reading the whole book by Tuesday vs Reading 10 pages by Tuesday ? Go for a smaller portion, especially if you have other commitments.
Don’t start by searching up words. Read the section you started with first. Read it once. Read it out loud preferably (optional but it helps). Then skim it for words, starting from the most recurrent words, to the least recurrent. If your book is based on one subject, don’t waste too much time on kanji if you’re doing it with jp. They might repeat a lot later on anyways. When you’re done with that, read again with your unknown vocab in mind. Don’t feel bad for not knowing everything right off the bat.
The best thing I could suggest to do is to do a quick summary of what you read, in target language. Use the words you learned from the text, as well as your previous knowledge. Don’t go up searching new words, that’s a tedious process I don’t suggest, unless you have the time and motivation.
When you finish your book, look for documentaries and videos on the subject you just read. Seriously youtube is full of those, and with the proper keywords, you can find everything. If you have trouble with finding something, I could help you.
You don’t need to be a certain level to read a reference/thematic book (this applies especially for non romanized languages), but for Japanese I do suggest using a book which has furigana if you’re like me and don’t know the enemy properly— I mean kanji, not the enemy, my bad. Seriously, we don’t need to be advanced or achieved a specific JLPT level, or be fluent. But that doesn’t matter, as long as you’re reading something you find interesting.
Learning thematically from videos:
This is particularly useful for those who want to have some variety in their learning, or who want to have a break from said studying but still learn something. What I’d do is pick up a particular subject that you like and search it up in youtube (alternatively I recommend afreeca for Korean learners but that’s not gonna get you school subjects or niconico for Japanese learners).
Find said subject in your target language, try to put good keywords to get relevant results. Don’t be like me and get imperialist propaganda while searching for politics lmao.
Find a channel that posts video of said thing that you like.
Open up a notebook or a note program, whatever is more efficient for you.
Title this document/notebook the subject you want to learn from.
Have different sections in it. What I do is: spoken language (what the person said with a translation of it, this is particularly useful for everyday expressions or slang), written (written things in the video if there are, especially if you’re looking at a lecture), and a mini glossary (for words you encountered through listening and are interesting.). For the words I suggest you search them up at the end of the video.
After finishing the video, search up the words. Now, take a pretty notebook, or open up a new document titled with your subject. Write a small summary of what you watched with the words you learned/wrote in the glossary if it was a lecture video, or write a diary-style entry about what you watched. Did you watch a beauty video? Write what you think about that beauty cream presented. “She said it was 25,000W. Ugh. So expensive. I’m not paying that much for it. I prefer this foundation cream. blabla” (just a random example lol). Basically write or type something.
What to do with the spoken language part? The expressions that you heard? This applies especially if you watched a vlog, a gameplay or a random video. Check those expressions, check if you’re alone in the room and say them out loud. I promise you they will get repeated in other videos (especially the hello, this is x, thank you for watching, etc), so they are not useless. A lot of the time in japanese videos, for instance, I hear a lot of polite expressions in the beginning and end which are super useful, noticed this with romanian as well.
WATCH WHATEVER YOU WANT: you like planning agendas videos? Beauty guru? Anime? Drama? Gameplays? Lectures about history? Eating shows? Seriously watch whatever please don’t be scared.
Learn from a language exchange, yas:
I’m using Hellotalk for this. Especially since it has a correction feature which means native speakers can correct you and provide notes for you. But if you want to chat with native speakers without studying the language directly, this is what I do. I just chat with the person and throw in whatever I think is right. If it’s wrong, then I cry— I mean I gladly accept the correction and learn from it. Usually when I receive a correction from the user I immediately reuse this correction in another message so it sticks in ^^!
a) write a badly written message to a language buddy
b) get correction of your message
c) optional: cry because you made an obvious mistake
d) review the correction, send a message with that correction :D
Do you like to write?:
What do you mean no? Shh, I’m sure you said yes. Nanowrimo in november, a word document all year long. Also, tumblr’s prompts. Start a little story (no matter your level), write a fanfic if you want, a novel, whatever. Doesn’t have to get read by other people, but if you want, put it on lang-8. Just write as much as you can but whenever you feel annoyed from searching up words, stop. Write when you want and when you have inspiration. I’m doing this for jp so I can attest it’s good practice :D Alternatively, making small dialogues and monologues is also a good think. Pretend this is drama class. I highly recommend this. Boost your ego!
Pretend to be a native speaker:
Yes, you read this right. Pretend to be a native speaker. No I don’t mean to pretend to be someone you’re not. I mean to immerse yourself completely. I’m talking about changing 90% of your daily things to the language. Which means:
phone settings
computer settings (please be careful here though)
website language (again be careful dont send random relationship requests like me).
training to think in the language. Next time you stab your toe on the table, curse in your target language. Say how much it hurts and how much you hate your table, in the language.
Twitter: tweets in your language. It can be a private twitter. My twitter is for Korean and its private and I dump in all random thoughts that are very embarrassing and most of them are about my crushes so yeah I mean double benefit! You practice writing with the new grammatical structure you encountered and then you can ramble to yourself about pretty/handsome people YAS
Buy the Fluency pill it’s $99.99 on Ebay…. Okay but I wish there was a fluency pill….
THIS ONE IS WEIRD BUT I HIGHLY RECOMMEND. This is really where you pretend to be a native speaker but you’re not. Go to x website that has the option to write comments or chat with other people from that country. We foreigners to the language love to spread the word about how we’re, well, a foreigner to them and that we’re studying that language STOP! just write everything EXCEPT THAT. I remember when I was studying this particular eastern european language, I went to a site and chatted and never said anything about being Canadian. Nobody asked, I just went along and the conversation didn’t stop or change. Honestly, we don’t write PERFECTLY in English, we use slang and write in broken phrases. SO WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE? ^O^ !!!!
Are you still alive from this long post?
*Splashes water on you* Wake up yo. Okay. You’re amazing and I love you for that. You deserve great things! Anyways last tip is… Use a textbook as long as you don’t make it your main focus. This also goes for the thematic books. We need variety!! Don’t you feel tired of only studying? What you learn…it should be used somehow… this is why I don’t like only textbooks. I was the one who studied spanish from textbooks only for years and it got me nowhere because I never used it. Use the language. That’s the golden tip seriously. BUT! Use it accordingly to your preferred study method and IF that is textbooks, don’t feel like I’m looking low at it. (I’m one of those who drools at textbook shelves and would watch a 20 min video of you making a tour of your shelf so believe me lmao).
Anyways sorry for this disgustingly long post I’ll tag this omg.
This is such good advice
Link to HelloTalk App.
