Some time ago I figured out one thing: my language journal doesn’t fit me. How did I know? I didn’t use it. It didn’t attract me. I had a not so cheap grid note book with high quality paper, but I rarely took it out of my board. Which, of course, is a mistake, especially if we are talkinh about language learning. How can the journal help you, If you don’t use it? So I bought a new one. That one where you can add or remove pages. And it’s absolutely amazing. I use it every day and my languages are improving. But not only languages, but also my drawing abilities. Sure, in my country we say a hundert people hundert tastes. Use whatever suits to you and how it suits to you. But here are few basic tips how to learn languageswith a journal.
Basic tools
A notebook
As I said before, I prefer that kind of notebook where you can add or remove pages, move them etc. It’s very practical, since you can add whatever you want and whenever you want. I use One notebook for two languages, and again, it’s great to be able to add pages. But anything what works for you is great, I love dotted notebooks as well.
Pens, rulers, scissors, stickers, tapes, highlighters
Good news! It’s totally up to you. Try to find out, what fits to you best. I love colors and I’ve noticed that for my brain it’s easier to remember things if they are colorful, so I use lots of colours. But in case you are about to use markers, I recomend to find some which doesn’t bleed trough the paper.
How to journal?
The biggest question is, what to put in your language journal. This is up to you as well of course, but I can suggest few things.
Grammar
In my journal, I have some basic rules or rules I can’t remember. It’s easier to look them up whenever I need to check them, no need to browse through textbooks.
Vocabulary
How about all those amazing vocabulary lists you liked on tumblr? Or how about an illustrated vocabulary? It’s my way how to study basic vocabulary, usually substantives since they are easy to draw. By this way I can connect two of my passions - languages and doodling. And my visual-oriented brain exhilarated.
Diary
Writing a diary is one of the best methods how to learn and practice your target language. Even if you just wrote about your everyday things, your vocabulary increases and and moreover the words are connected with your life, hobbies, work etc so they are easier to remember.
What if I don’t have anything to write about?
No problem! There are plenty of prompts and writing challenges on the internet, just search pinterest a bit and you will wind ideas for many months.
Keep track!
When speaking about challenges, it’s quite handy to make some kind of tracker so use don’t get lost how your challenge is going.
There are no limmits of what you can and can not include in your language journal. Postcards from holidays in country where your target language is spoken? Lists written in your tg? Favourite quotes in your tg? How about a whole page dedicated to motivation quotes?
Include a page with your both long term and short term goals, dates of exams, brain dump about what do you want to learn next. There are thousends of possibilities.
Want to share your language journal? Use hashtag #mylanguagejournal so I can see it!