Had you known me throughout my high school days then you would not need to be told just how much I hated learning a second language. At the time it seemed like a great idea and I even scored my first ever trip abroad to Indonesia to practice my skills. After 6 years of study however it was clear that I had not grasped Indonesian at all and my final exam proved that beyond a doubt. I’d even go as far as to say I despised learning a language and couldn’t for the life of me imagine trying again.
What’s changed for me to be considering it again? my passion for travel of course. When I was in Saudi Arabia I ended up using Arabic language translations but my passion for travel is urging me to learn new languages. I believe language has a link to understanding the country I visit better and to show my respect for the people I speak to when ordering food or asking for directions. Time and time again I have felt lost by not being able to speak to someone while abroad and the tipping point came while I was in Spain recently.
Previously I’d stopped a few days in each major city and moved on before encountering much of a problem due to the high tourist route I followed. After a good 2-3 weeks of exploring Andalucia where Spanish really was the dominate language I became aware of how much I do struggle with languages. The whole time I felt awkward and rude when interacting with the people around me for not knowing enough while a visitor to their homeland.
The realisation that I needed to, no… wanted to learn was sitting in a little bar down in San Ambrosio with Abbey from achickwithbaggage.com and constantly having to use her as a translator. I could tell these people around me had amazing stories by the amount of times she would laugh and smile but I couldn’t join the conversation, I couldn’t even thank them properly for the beer that had just been bought for me by this spanish stranger.
The rest of my trip followed a similar pattern. Others would speak for me or I’d struggle through in broken english always with the thought in the back of my head that this just can’t go on. Not if I want to call the world my office and not if I wanted to be taken seriously while doing so.
Now back in London I have to follow through on what I felt in Spain. It’s easy to say yes I’ll learn a second language no problem and once you leave the country the desire slips away. I’ve made goals, I’ve told people these great stories about how I’m going to learn Spanish so I have to follow through. Which is why I’m also telling you this, it’s easier to not do something when you don’t tell anyone. Sure I can still skip out on my goal but I’ll lose face, to you and to myself so there is no going back. I will learn Spanish.
The goal at this stage is to return to that bar down in San Ambrosio at the end of the year and instead of using Abbey as a translator for my conversations with the owner, Miguel. I want to be able to understand enough of what he says to have a go at responding myself. It’s going to be a difficult as I’m living in London and working horrible hours, but I fell in love with Spain while there and I need to prove to myself that I can be more than a passing tourist.
To get me started I want to know your tips. How did you learn a second language? Was it via classes, audio guides, living abroad or was it meeting up with a friend who could teach you. Once I get started I’ll keep you all updated on my progress and hopefully by the end of the year I will have something to show for it.
Photo Credits: tunguska and el_monstrito.
If you haven’t checked out Benny Lewis (@irishpolyglot) and his Fluent in 3 months site, I highly recommend it. He is very inspirational and has awesome tips for learning a language.
Cheers Jeremy. I’ve not looked at his site for awhile but did see he has a tips newsletter and looks like an ebook as well so might look into it.
So funny you just posted this because only yesterday I started listening to a Linguaphone Spanish course in my car! I learnt French and German at school but obviously even they are rusty now and I’d like to pick them up again, but for my trip next year I definitely want a basic grasp of Spanish.
Julia I had the option of French and Indonesian at school and for some reason went with the later. A basic grasp of Spanish will be fine with me, just being able to look at the words and know how to say them even. At the moment all sorts of horrible happens when I try.
I decided to study Spanish for a similar reason, and started off with group classes. I found this to be reeeeeally slow, as the teacher never has enough time to properly attend to each person in the class, plus the class moves at the pace of the slowest learner. So I gave up after only getting the basics. Then when I decided to go travelling to south america, I realised I needed to have another go, and this time went for a private teacher. You can find them on Gumtree for £10 an hour often, which is good value for private lessons. Even cheaper would be language swaps, although with that you’d have to help them with english as well as them helping you with spanish. It made a huge difference and really helped me when I was in Mexico.
Even better though was when I got to Guatemala and had two weeks of intensive lessons, 5 hours a day, one to one – it’s also the cheapest way to learn fast (not much more than $100 per week including accommodation, which is way cheaper than something similar would cost in London.
Thanks for the insight into the different forms of study you have done Geoff. I see the point about classes and think that would drive me crazy so a private tutor might be the way to go, especially if I can find out for only a tenna a session.
I think I’d take up classes in Spain if I make it there because it’s best to learn the language where you are going to have to use it every day. For now though London is home so need to make do with what’s available.
Good on you- It’s not easy.
As a former teacher in a bilingual area, I was always amazed at how easy it was for kids to pick up a second language- and how hard it was for adults. I worked on my Spanish for 2 years, and at the end of my time there, I could understand about 50% of what was said and could speak in small choppy sentences. I wish I’d not lost almost all of it in the past 10 years.
Good Luck!
Good on ya! I’ve been trying to keep up with my Italian studies. There’s this little old Italian lady who lives down the street from me and I want to be able to say something to her one day. There’s lots of free language podcasts on iTunes that you can listen to on your iPod on the bus, train, etc.
Rosetta Stone for the PC is excellent.
YAY!! I’m so happy for you. I remember when you were still in Australia and slightly taken aback when I recommended getting a Spanish tutor. How far you’ve come. 🙂
haha Abby. I remember that now, I have changed a great deal to now be considering it myself. Ah the lure of travel.
Good for you and congrats!
It’s not going to be easy, but it’s sure going to enjoy both the process and the feeling of being able to express yourself in a new language.
Un abrazo desde Barcelona 🙂
I moved to Germany 3 years ago: my knowledge of the language extended to knowing how to order a beer (and I mean that literally). I was lucky enough to have a private tutor with my contract but I took a slightly different approach. While you can learn the rules and the grammar, it is also vocabulary that you need. I would ask her to take me through all the words and phrases I would need in certain situations e.g. hairdresser, restaurant, bar etc. You can then use this basic knowledge in expanded situations. So my advice would be to find yourself a tandem partner (of sorts) who can speak Spanish with you.
One other word of advice you will find that native speakers will potentially switch to English as soon as they find out you are a native English speaker – don’t fall into that trap. Practice speaking as much as you can – it can actually be hilarious when you get it wrong (but I found I didn’t make the same mistake again). Good luck and happy travels.
Jae one of my first real phrases in Spanish was how to order a beer 🙂 I’m currently hung up on how to pronounce a word. In english I can look at a word and for the most part say it correctly. In spanish I look at the word and go ummm how do you even say that let alone work out what it means.
I like the idea of a partner to practice with and think it will be a route I take once I get going.
Learning Spanish may be one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. I took classes when I started my trip in Ecuador for a month. I should have kept taking classes along the way when I started traveling because I feel like I should be much closer to fluent after 8 months in Latin America. I can read most of what I see. I can understand people decently. Talking is the hardest part. You have to practice constantly.
Good luck!
Argh Stephanie don’t tell me that. If you are surrounded by people and find it hard little old me in London will never make it.
Good luck! I love having that ability to communicate with someone in a foreign language, and I’m lucky to have picked up Spanish pretty easily (and French back in school, although it’s now extremely rusty). I’m thinking of learning Portuguese and starting with some podcasts or something independent like that since I already have the Spanish base, but if you’re a total beginner I think a tutor or class would be worth it at least at first to get the basics down.
I learned Thai by living in a rural village for two years. Crazy how quickly you pick up words when it’s your only hope for communicating.
My advice is to read. I learned a lot of survival and casual language through conversation, but I learned a lot of the technical and grammatical words through reading.
Magazines are great because there are pictures and they are often written the way people speak.
Good luck on your language learning journey!
Kelsi I like the idea of reading but first I need to learn how to say the words or I’ll just be speaking garbage haha
I find it’s tough to practice new languages as an English speaker, every time i try everyone always wants to practice their English with me it seems. My best advice is to try and find locals who don’t speak your language and suffer through it.
Hey man- You are doing something I decided to do late last year (learn Spanish). I have made some notes along the way as to what wastes time and what doesn’t. A few things come to mind:
1. Clicking pictures for vocab building is a large waste of time. And boring. Don’t spend too much time on vocab in the early stages, except suvival & social phrases.
2. Practice pronunciation intensely early. The Pimsleur program is good for developing a good accent if you can listen and mimick sounds. Learning to speak Spanish not sounding like a Gringo is very important!
3. After you are in late beginner stage, find your favorite movie or TV series and turn on Spanish audio and/or subtitles. Watch it over and over and over again.
4. Once at an intermediate level, change your email, facebook, phone and other electronics interfaces to Spanish. (Doing it earlier than intermediate frustrated me because it slowed me down so much.)
5. Go on Couchsurfing to find a Spanish-English exchange meetup or partner. Find Spanish restaurants and cafes to go to in your area.
6. Travel to a Spanish speaking country and make a vow not to speak ANY English whatsoever.
I wish you the best on this project, man!
Awesome tips Ryan and yes the pronunciation is my biggest hurdle from what I have seen so far. I can look at a sign and say it but if I’m saying it wrong then who cares that I know what it means. Nobody else around me will have a clue what I’m asking them.
Switching my phone, facebook and the like to spanish sounds scary but I guess as I do those tasks everyday it’s an easy way to pickup the words as you know what a button does already.
Really appreciate the info mate.
I 100% agree with these tips. It’s so easy at the beginning to focus on vocab vocab vocab because it’s easy to find online and easy to do alone. This is SOOOO not the route you should take. Focus instead on learning and really understanding basic conversational phrases, learning basic verb conjugation and pronunciation.
In addition to all these great tips, I’d highly recommend downloading free podcasts in Spanish (anything you can get your hands on) or music. Ricky Martin (yes… Ricky Martin) has a pretty clear easy to understand accent and is a good place to start. Also, a lot of artists (especially pop artists) release albums in Spanish as well as English, so download those as you already know the English versions of the songs (see Beyonce – Si yo fuera un chico AKA If I was a boy)
oh, yes, i have to agree, the accent point can be hugely important – my Spanish teacher pushed me really hard on pronunciation, picking me up on what I felt at the time were only really minor differences (we once spent 10 minutes just saying the word ‘paella’ to each other repeatedly until i got it right) – but after travelling in south america for six months i realised it made a huge difference sometimes, i’d hear other gringos pronouncing words wrongly and not being understood, which they obviously found hugely frustrating as they were making a real effort, especially as they often couldn’t hear the mistakes they were making
Awesome that you want to learn a second language. Since you’re not feeling like you can do an immersion in another country right now, I’d suggest the Pimseuler language series. You can get it at your local library. I just listen to it on my way to and from work and it’s amazing how much it helps. You may also be able to find a Spanish meetup through Meetup.com so that you can practice with others who are learning.
Good luck to you!
Yes Peggy I’d love to just set myself up in Spain where I am surrounded by the language but at present London is home so I just can’t go down the full immersion route at this stage (I wish I could).
I do have some of the Pimseuler audio for spanish so might start listening to that instead of my music to and from work to help. Nice idea about the meetup.com stuff as well.
Totally know how you feel mate. I remember after my first few trips to France all I wanted to do was learn French. It’s such a good feeling delivering something in another language and watching the native completely understand you. I recommend you have a chat to Benny from fluentin3months.com, he’ll be able to sort you out.
Cheers Justin I’ll have to checkout Benny’s stuff as it has been suggested to me by another person as well. You did a course here in London as well didn’t you?
Yeah I did a course with TNT. It was helpful, but was only 5-6 weeks. I then started one with Alliance Francaise but going each week proved difficult to manage with social life stuff.
I recommend getting yourself the LP phrasebook to start with because it has heaps of common phrases in it to learn. Then (echoing others) set your Facebook, Gmail, etc to Spanish. Much interesting fun ensues. 😀
Awesome I have a phrase book for Europe (that I’ve never used) but need to get started on how to pronounce the words first. Might look at the TNT course to pickup some basics and then move onto more serious stuff after that.
I like the way you changed the language on your phone to French too Justin. Little things like these help establishing a new language in your subconsciousness. Listening to music and finding out the meaning of the lyrics helps too.
I love this, Chris!! Between your post and Megan’s (@megan_rtw), I think you’re going to motivate me to get my goal of re-learning Spanish started sooner rather than later. I studied it for years in school but was heaps better at grammar than speaking. Now that I’ve been out of school for years and haven’t used it, it’s all but lost. I think I’d want to do a language immersion experience to jump into it and have to learn quickly 🙂 We’ll practice a few words when I see you (hopefully) in a couple of weeks!
Chris, I recommend intensive classes and a homestay if you are serious 🙂 You’ll learn the most the fastest that way. I’ve studies so many languages over the years but never learned as much as I did when I studies Russian and lived with a family at the same time. Good luck!
Brooke I wish that was an option because I 100% agree with you. Alas I’m in London until I can at least sort out a better money situation so have to make the most of what I have. After that however I’ll be straight into some classes abroad in Spain.
Even better though was when I got to Guatemala and had two weeks of intensive lessons, 5 hours a day, one to one – it’s also the cheapest way to learn fast (not much more than $100 per week including accommodation, which is way cheaper than something similar would cost in London.
I think a very good way to learn a language is to just speak it and not be shy about it, and have someone with you who can teach you.
Sometimes I have clients who want to learn a little bit Thai. Some people are very educated, some are not – but the ones who speak more learn faster than the ones who speak less, even if they are less educated. Think about a child – a child learns a language naturally, because it babbles all the time. If it knows just two words (let’s say: red and green), it will go through the city and shout “red” whenever it sees something that is red and “green” whenever it sees something that is green.
And as an adult, you can learn actually a lot faster than a kid if you learn this way – it is just that you are more conscious about the learning process and thus you feel more slow. But if you can get over that, you can learn to speak basic conversational Thai pretty quickly, even while you are on a sightseeing trip for just a couple of days. However, most people are a bit too inhibited for that, but with a bit of motivation from themselves and a bit of cheerleadering 😉 from a native language speaker they can learn some useful phrases.
Good luck mate. I was inspired to learn after spending 3 months in South America where English just isn’t spoken.
A valuable resource, for your commute through London, are the “Coffee Break Spanish” podcasts that you can download for free from iTunes.
I did learn most of my German using the Pimsleur program and completing it with a Teach Yourself series book. I liked that I could dive in the book and whenever I would get mentally tired, I’d go out for a walk and start a n audioclass. I’d always feel ready to study again after that 20 minutes “break”.
Then of course, you gotta go out and hitchhike too, it makes wonders. In Turkey I did a 10 lessons Pimsleur course, then maybe 3 lessons in a book, got myself a dictionary and went hitchhiking. It really got me speaking !
I just blogged abotu this myself! My Spanish is basically nonexistent, despite taking it for years in school. I always had a hard time with it. But there are so many people I can’t really talk to! I’m working on improving my Spanish because of this, too. I love the idea of going back to that place later!
I’m using Rosetta Stone and I really love it so far. Everyone says immersion, immersion, immersion though. If you’ve living in London you can always find a spanish language group! This is where you get together with a group of people, everyone is trying to learn spanish (or there are also exhange groups where they are tryign to learn english and you are trying to learn spanish) and you speak spanish together. You can find these online pretty easily. I’ve been in smaller cities where they’ve had big groups, so London should be pretty easy.
Good luck!
I’m curious what you say about Rosetta Stone in a couple of months. I’ve really given Rosetta Stone a good shot, and I’ve talked with others too. At first, I loved it too and practiced at least 1hour per day for about 3 months. The thing about Rosetta Stone is – you are learning how to get forward with the program, your mind connects the right pictures with the right phrases – but it doesn’t transfer into real life. Despite what they claim and how the theory goes. I was really a big fan of the idea behind it – but the thing is, I found that when you are in a real life situation or having a conversation, all the knowledge you pick up from Rosetta Stone isn’t easily accessible. What’s great about Rosetta Stone is the FEELING that you’re making progress, because it has that “video element game” to it: the instant feedback, telling you how many you got right. Unfortunately, that progress has more to do with how you handle the program rather than how well you speak the language. Personally, I think Pimsleur is a much better way to get started learning a language, and then add immersion to it.
Hola! I’ve been doing the Spanish Rosetta Stone for just over a month now and I am amazed by what I am learning and remembering. I’ve been listening to the companion sessions on the train and I can actually follow along. Also they now offer online services including free sessions with native speakers which is very helpful. I understand that it isn’t the best way to learn, but as there isn’t a huge Spanish speaking population in Melbourne I feel that I’m learning more than I would in a language course. And interestingly enough I do think in Spanish occasionally – I was at a restaurant this morning and one of my first thoughts was “La mujer come huevos y pan” Its not perfect and I’m not yet at the point where I can have a complete conversation, but I’m getting there…
Good Luck!
I learned by living abroad in China. That is the only way to learn a new language. Not only do you learn the words, sentences and grammar, but you by default pick up the body language which is in many ways the way we communicate
I took a three month course on Spanish down at Spanish Cat here in Sydney last year and really did fall in love with the language. Good luck with the lessons!
It is tough being a thick Aussie at times. I remember being in my year 8 French Class at Dalby State High School and commenting on numerous occasions how it was pointless to learn French as I will never use it in later life. Then of course I grow older and now I live in a French speaking country. If Mrs Handley is out there; I just want to say I am sorry. You were right, I should have paid more attention in class.
hahahaha Matt I know that feeling oh so much and while indonesian wouldn’t be much use to me in Europe I really wish I’d learnt the language instead of pretending to.
I learned German mostly on the Chicago El, reading “Teach Yourself German” on the way to work. (I later took a few evening classes, but the book provided the bulk of my training.)
I’ve also studied Italian at the Istituto Venezia in Venice, Italy, spending four hours a day in classes for two or three months at a time. That’s a great way to learn a language, but it does require staying in one place for a while and spending a fair amount of money. I suspect that it also works best if (1) you’re single or, better yet, living with a local who doesn’t speak English, and (2) you’re a sociable type who spends a lot of time joining conversations in bars.
Mate! Happy you’ve written this to keep yourself accountable. Remember my wise words in Madrid? Find Spaniards via Couchsurfing that live in London and meet up with them 2-3x week. It needs to be pretty frequent in order to excel at another language. Actually initially I would suggest taking a beginner course to get the basics before you start conversing. Anywho, make that dream a reality so that when I’m in Madrid I can pop down and visit the south. 🙂
Chris, best of luck, sir. Can’t wait to see the results in December! Another good piece of advice is to invest some time in talking to people at http://www.italki.com – it requires that you put in a substantial amount of effort, as you actually have to log in, set up a profile and find people to talk to, but I promise, after you have your first couple of conversations, everything gets easier. My advice is to start with someone who speaks almost no English, that way you’ll be forced to use whatever Spanish you do know.
Oh and having a second tab open with google translate at the ready is always helpful 🙂
Awesome! I took some Spanish classes about 18 months ago (10 weeks, run by our local council for something silly like £30) and LOVED it. I reckon the best way is total immersion (amazing how fast you learn when you have to!) but failing that I agree with one of the previous commenters – get the pronunciation right AT THE START! I can’t really speak German or French but I have a fair idea of what the various diphtongs and consonants are meant to sound like, so I can read a para passably, even if I have only a vague idea of the meaning. This help, even when doing something simple like asking directions: “donde esta Calle Velazquez”? Also, listen to native speakers a lot – to pick up the rhythm of the language. Think how confusing it is when non English speakers emphasise the wrong part of a sentence, then think what might be doing in (or to!) a foreign language 🙂
holaaa, my name is Daniela, Im spanish but I’ve been living in the uk sice 2000. After reading about ur experience in Spain I couldn’t help but think about my experience when I first came to live to the uk. I came on my own, didn’t speak the language and didn’t know anybody, also with very little money. Looking back I really don’t know how I did it but Im glad I went throughou it all cause it has made me so much stornger as a person. I found a share house with 4 guys 2 English, 1 Canadian and 1 Scottish and although the firs 6 months were reallu hard with their help I survived, there is nothing better than finding urself alone in a foreing country to learn the language quickiy. It help me a lot to listen, it’s soooo improtant that u train ur ears to all the diferent accents, also inSpain we have soo many diferent ones. Listening to the radio hepled me a lot and after that watching tv with subtitles was probably the best way for me to lear not just how to speak the language but also how to write it “hoepfully im doing a god job 😉 “. It was probably after ayear living here that I started to feel more and more confident and I use to threw myself to diferent situations like I will stop people to ask for direccion even though I didn’t needed them but just to listen, or I will go to London and spend all day chatting with everyone and anyone on the street that were selling anything just so I could practice. Well I wish u all the best in learning this beatiful language. Mucha suerte!!!!
WOW Daniela if that’s not enough of a advocation for living abroad in the country you want to learn the langauge of I don’t know what is.
I’ve really struggled to find time here in London to study Spainish and think the only way I’m really going to learn is if I move to Spain and attend classes and interact with the locals. After all it’s a good excuse to go back and I’m just looking for an excuse to be honeset 🙂
Thank you for the comment it’s really given me a lot to think about.
Hi there, I just though this link could help you. About 5 years ago my boyfriend decided to come to England, it hasn’t been that easy for him to learn English purely cause living toguether we can’t help but speak Spanish. I found a group in Reading call LASS, we meet once a week and it doesn’t matter your level of spanish, the main objective is to meet people who shares the same interest in spanish and south american coulture and to speank spanish. it has help him a lot and we’ve met loads of really nice people
This is the link for the Reading group but I know there are groups in London too
http://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/69279671176/
Muchas suerte
Daniela
Love your articles, though sometimes it feels as though your bright orange links are burning me like the hot aussie sun.
Keep up the great work mate.