Foreign Language Vocabulary Builder: Sticky-Notes

In order to make language-learning fun, and practical, you have to have to look forward to being surrounded by it on an everyday basis. I have found that sticky-notes have helped me not only build my vocabulary, but have also helped me to start learning words by which I am surrounded. Since I want to become an advanced learner of German, I have tried to immerse myself as much as possible with the language. One of my goals for this upcoming year is to become fluent. You may be asking yourself, “how, and can she really do this?”

One of the most powerful, and inexpensive tools that I have used to my advantage have surprisingly been sticky-notes. What I have already done is very simple. I have labeled different objects throughout my bedroom, and bathroom with their translations in German, along with their genders. For example, where I have my necklaces, I have labeled them “die Halsketten”, the drawer “die Schublade”, the toilet paper “das Toilettenpapier”, and the doorknob “die Türklinke.” I have had many objects labeled for about a year now, and have noticed an increase in my vocabulary. Most people, even the best polyglots, do not find it necessary to learn these kinds of words, but I think that it makes languages a more integral part of your life.

What do I mean by this? Every day when I wake up, I lay on my bed, and look around my bedroom. I then stare at objects that I know are labeled with sticky-notes, and test myself to see if I remember the words (if you are learning a language that has masculine, feminine, and or neuter words, it is important to always learn the words with their genders). It is practical, because I only had to label these objects once, and know that they will stay there, as long as no one else takes them down. By doing this, you learn vocabulary that native speakers use on an everyday basis.

If you are a college student like me, and live in a dorm room, and you want to try this, but your roommate does not want you to do so, do not worry. Simply label objects in your bedroom at home. This method can also be done with objects throughout the house (especially in your kitchen, and in your living-room).

This is also a great exercise for your brain. Whether you are ever going to have to actually say, or write the word “the doorknob” is unlikely, but what does matter is that you are pushing your brain to its limits trying to remember abstract, yet useful vocabulary that you would never learn in a textbook. Who knows? Someday, you may have the chance to impress a native speaker by effortlessly saying one of these words.

Being Afraid of Making Mistakes in Another Language

Ironically, I believe that what hinders, and discourages most people from continuing to make progress with a language is making the mistake of not making mistakes. By the end of this post, I hope to convince you that what has kept you from moving from one level of language learning to the next is the fact that you have been too scared of being wrong. Believe me, I used to be one of the shyest girls in my grade, and rarely voluntarily raised my hand to volunteer, or to ask questions. Many people often discourage others to raise their hands, or to ask questions unless they know the right answers. In school, I always wanted to be right, and wanted to impress my classmates by answering complex questions.

This is where I went wrong. I was always expecting perfection. I gave myself unrealistic, and high expectations. I would easily become frustrated, and would tell my parents that 10, or more years of French had been useless. If this situation sounds similar to yours, do not be worried. Luckily, I have learned that we cannot expect perfection, not even those of us who are OCD, or are perfectionists. If we expect to not make any mistakes when speaking, or dealing with aspects of our target language, we will automatically fail. Even though I am technically considered a native English speaker, English was my second language, and I rarely ever speak it at home, putting me at a disadvantage from most of my classmates. But even so, I have clarified grammar points, or how to spell words to people who are native English speakers. This shows that even native speakers can make mistakes. That is the beauty of being human: learning from our mistakes, and pushing ourselves to our limits.

Instead, what I encourage you to do is to try to speak every time that you get a chance to do so. If you have not already done so, and have studied a language for years, it is never too late to start doing so. What Benny Lewis (the famous polyglot that I have already mentioned) has said is that language is used to communicate and to share ideas with others. If you can write, and read in a language well, that is impressive, but if you cannot understand its native speakers, or speak it, then you have failed to do what a language is meant to do. Let’s compare languages to math (a subject that I was never good at). If you memorize an equation and know for what it is used, but you cannot apply it to real-world situations, then it is as if you did not know the equation. Language-learning requires you to step out of your comfort zone, and to learn from your mistakes.

Being a native Spanish speaker, there have been many times in which my friends have wanted to practice their Spanish with me. In my opinion, those who have done so successfully are not the ones who had perfect grammar, or who used complicated vocabulary to try to impress me. Instead, those who made grammar or vocabulary mistakes, or who translated words literally from English to Spanish are the ones who were brave. Why? The reason is simple. They were willing to say what they knew, and spoke to me in a natural way. Native speakers also pause, and sometimes have to think about what they want to say the way that they want to say it, but that is part of communication. What matters is that you are trying, that you are willing to learn from your mistakes, and then correct them. Being fearless is what separates bad language-learners from exceptional ones.

Before ending this post, I will share a small anecdote to hopefully inspire you to start speaking your target language as often as possible, even with native speakers. I started taking German I as a sophomore in high-school, and had hopes to someday reach the AP level. At the time, I was trying to do this on a whim, and forgot about this goal for a long time. When I went to a language immersion camp for a month-long high-school credit program, I was attempting to learn enough German in order to skip German II, and move on to Honors German III as a junior. At first, the task was daunting. I was placed into the third level out of six after only taking German for a school-year, and having little to no writing or speaking practice.

There were several people in my group who had taken German for 2 years, a girl who had taken it for 4 years, and a boy who had gone to the camp for 3 years. I was definitely the underdog in the group, but pushed myself out of comfort zone every day. I asked my teacher clarification questions, and used the little vocabulary, and grammar that I knew. By the end of the session, I had only spoken in German from breakfast through dinner time for 10 days (a language pledge that you could choose to do), something that I would have never imagined of accomplishing. How did I manage to learn so much in such a short amount of time? I was fearless. I was brave, and made many mistakes. I conjugated verbs incorrectly, and blanked on words, but could not freely express myself, and used what I knew.

I had girls in my cabin who had had years of practice with the language, which only pushed me to keep on learning more. The first day of camp, I could barely formulate a sentence. One of my friends claims that she could not understand what I was trying to say that day. However, by the end of the camp, I could easily communicate with girls who had gone to the camp for 10 years. This shows that speaking is the most important aspect of a language. Do not worry, and take a few deep breaths. Speaking is not as scary as it seems. Native speakers are not trying to look down upon you. Instead, we want to encourage you to keep on striving to reach your language-learning goals.

Switching Your Phone to Another Language

To start off this blog, I want to write posts about easy ways that you can start incorporating languages into your everyday life. I know how busy we can get, and how little free time we have, so I want to write about realistic changes that you can start making today. Since we live in a technology-oriented society, most of us have smartphones, or own our own laptops. The easiest, and fastest way to start thinking in a language is by changing your phone, and or your laptop to your target language.

There are many reasons why this change is very beneficial. The first is that it allows you to start thinking in your target language. When you wake up and check the weather app, or simply check your phone for updates, you will automatically start reading the words in your target language. It will take a little getting used to at first, and you may have to translate a few words into your native language, but it will not be as hard as you may think. Most of you have probably owned your devices for enough time to be familiarized with where all of your applications are, and where everything is located on your devices. This means that you would do everything that you had been doing prior to changing your language setting, but simply in another language.

No matter if you are a beginner, an intermediate learner, or an advanced learner, you will expand your knowledge of your target language. Your Facebook, your Instagram, your emails, and even YouTube will automatically switch into your target language if you change your language settings, but do not panic. If you ever run into a situation in which you do not know what you are reading, simply copy and paste the words onto Google Translate, or look up any unfamiliar words (I do not recommend being reliant on Google Translate, because it is very rarely a hundred percent accurate, but it can make your transition a little easier, especially at the beginning).

Another reason why this technique is helpful is because it is free, and takes no extra effort. Eventually, you will become so used to reading everything in your target language that you will no longer have to translate everything. This allows for a complete immersion experience, which is a great way to make a lot of progress in a short amount of time. A lot of people tend to overlook the benefits of doing this, but I promise that it will help you strengthen your skills. I have had my phone in German for a few months now, and have learned a lot of words by simply making inferences on their meanings. I have also looked up any unfamiliar words, which has helped me expand my vocabulary.

Bonus: If you want to have an even more immersion experience, you can organize your device by creating folders that contain applications of a particular topic (for example: current events, social media, or music). Instead of labeling each folder in English, look up the translations of those words. This way, every time that you use your device, you will only be reading, and pronouncing these words in your target language. In no time, you will be able to say words like “network failure”, or “delete” without even thinking about it.

Below, you can see what my phone currently looks like in German.

I hope that this post was helpful! If you have any suggestions on posts that you would like me to write, feel free to comment down below. 

5 Reasons Why You Can Learn Any Language

•  1. Most of the best language-learners are teenagers, and adults.

This means that if you are a teenager, or an adult, you will have an equal playing field. The theory that you can only learn a language well if you are a child has already been disproven by some of the most famous polyglots around the world. Although it can give you an advantage early on, you do not have to have any prior experience, or be bilingual in order to do this well. In fact, as Benny Lewis (a well-known polyglot) has said, adults have the advantage of knowing how they learn best. Teenagers, and adults have had years of learning, and have had many different experiences. Children, on the other hand, have had very few years of learning, less experiences, do not understand grammar rules, and are not as focused on the mechanisms that build up a language. Therefore, teenagers, and adults are more likely to distinguish patterns, and can compare their mother tongues to other languages that they speak, in order to learn information quickly.

• ·     2. Once you find the learning-style that bests suit you, and your needs, you will be unstoppable.

As you all know, everyone has preferred ways of studying, or to go about retaining new information. The same pertains to language-learning. There is no wrong way of doing so. Some people like to study flash-cards with words in their native tongue on one side, and the words in their target language on the other. Some people like doing traditional grammar exercises, while some like to be completely immersed as much as possible. Every language learner retains information differently, but is ultimately capable of achieving mastery, or fluency in a language.

• ·   3. No matter how different a language is from another; most languages have similarities.

It may seem hard to believe at first, but I have experienced this first-hand. Before starting to learn Russian, I thought that it would be impossible to retain vocabulary, but as time has passed, I have realized that Spanish and Russian share some words that are identical, but that are pronounced differently. 

                                           For example,

Atmosphere = atmósfera, атмосфера

Music = música, Музыка

Opera = ópera, опера

System = sistema, система

This especially holds true if you are learning a language that belongs to the same language family group. Even more so than in the previous example, it will be more likely that these languages share similar grammatical structures, vocabulary, and, oftentimes, expressions. Let's take German, and English as an example:

Bed = Bett

Fish = Fisch

House = Haus 
Warm = warm

As mentioned in the comparison of Spanish and Russian words, the German and English languages also share words that are similar, or identical, but that are pronounced differently. This can make language-learning more enjoyable.

• 4. There are many free applications, resources, websites, and videos that are just as good, or that are even better than paid ones.

I have found that some of the best resources that I have used to maintain 7 languages have been free of cost. Many of them have complete courses, links, and tips on how to learn what is essential in each level of language-learning: beginner, intermediate, and advanced. A common myth is that you have to spend a lot of money on textbooks, workbooks, courses, audios, or CDs in order to become fluent in a language. Although it would be a good idea to own at least one of these, it is not necessary. We have information right at our fingertips with a simple click of a button, and a search on Google, or on YouTube. The best part about all of this is that you can spend less than an hour a day using free resources, and achieve satisfying results, as long as you are consistent with your learning.

• 5. You do not have to have a “good” memory in order to learn a language.         

I added this bullet-point, because I cannot stress it enough. I have personally struggled with learning vocabulary, and memorizing information all of my life. I would often find myself spending countless hours trying to cram information into my brain, and not retaining most of it. Luckily, there are several simple solutions to this problem. Spaced-repetition, which is a method in which you review information in intervals, allows your brain to remember words, and concepts in the short-term, as well as in the long-term (stay tuned for a blog post on what I do in order to learn vocabulary, and expressions). You can also learn how to be confident in what you are saying, or learning from the very beginning, and get much better results.

Although there are more reasons why anyone can learn a new language this year, I decided to write about the 5 that I think are the most important, and that are rarely mentioned. If you thought that you could not learn a language before reading this post, I hope that you thought about that a little differently. Have you started learning a new language recently? If so, which obstacles have you faced?

Introduction

Hi, everyone. I wanted to write a post introducing myself, as well as state some of my goals for this blog. For many years, I was thinking of writing a blog, but always ended up putting it off. With the start of a new year, and a new mindset, I decided to create a blog, so that I could inspire other people to learn languages. Although there are already many talented language-learners around the world, I wanted to share my own unique experiences about language-learning, wanted to give others advice, and wanted to create a community in which others could share their own stories.

If you have found my blog, and have failed to successfully learn a language, want to improve a language, or want to learn a new one this year, then you have come to the right place. Despite being a freshman college student who has very little free-time, I have managed to study 7 languages, and can comfortably speak, read, write, and understand 5 languages (in order of when I started studying them: Spanish, English, French, German, Italian, Russian, and Portuguese).

I know what many of you are probably thinking: “You must be a genius!”. One of the main reasons why I decided to create this blog was, so that I could try to convince you that this were not the case. As many other famous polyglots have stated, there is no such thing as a language gene. I was not born smarter, or more capable of learning languages than anyone else. I simply found very effective ways to make languages a part of my identity. Multilingualism, or, more specifically, being a hyperpolyglot (someone who speaks 6 or more languages fluently) is a way of life that I have only recently started to embrace.

Having Colombian parents has not only given me the gift of bilingualism, but also the appreciation for languages. Oftentimes, many people think that English is the main language of the world, and, that if you speak it well, you can travel anywhere, and meet anyone around the world. Having already traveled to 37 countries, and to 39 states, I can confidently say that this is not always the case. For example, when we went to St. Petersburg in Russia last summer, there were very few people who could speak English, despite the fact that it is one of the largest cities in Russia. Luckily, I could read Cyrillic, could understand a decent amount of words, and we had a tour-guide, so we managed to get by. But as many of you know, this is not the case for everyone.

I hope that by reading my posts, you will learn why languages are so crucial in an ever-changing, competitive world. The world is only getting smaller, so there will continue to be a huge demand for bilingual, trilingual, polyglot, and hyperpolyglot individuals. Do you want to learn how you can set yourself apart in your personal, and in your professional life? Do you want to get advice from an individual who has a lot of language-learning experience? Do you want to find out how I have managed to keep so many languages straight? If you answered yes to any of these questions, then feel free to come along for the ride.