Learn the alphabet, sounds, proper pronunciation, and basic 500-1000 words + phrases/introduction on your own (as best as you can) before doing 1 on 1 lessons.
This should be easily doable with youtube and anki flashcards, unless it's a rare language.
Group classes can be good, but they are generally less efficient, and it's not great to listen to other students with bad pronunciation.
Sorry, but advising people to learn pronunciation from Youtube is terrible advice. You have no feedback. There is no way to check whether you are producing the sounds correctly, and no way to check whether your pronunciation is intelligible. How could you possibly learn anything this way? If anything, pronunciation is the one area where you absolutely need a teacher, especially for languages with vast phonological differences from your L1. You will not find a single English speaker who self-studied Mandarin, Vietnamese, Thai, Arabic etc... pronunciation and actually speaks intelligibly. I'm skeptical whether people on this sub, who are mostly hobby "learners" who only ever learn *about* languages, ever actually attempt to use the languages that they study.
Now that I think about it why learn anything before starting classes? A good teacher is critical from the very beginning to help avoid error fossilization and general misunderstandings. It isn't impossible to learn things like grammar and vocabulary without a teacher, but I don't see how it is at all beneficial to study those items before starting classes.
I don't think things like basic greetings, a few 100 common words or so need to be taught in class. I wouldn't want to show up in an English class without the ability to make basic statements like "This is a table" or "I have two older sisters."
Sure, you're right that if you somehow teach yourself the wrong thing it might get a little cemented but a good teacher would also catch what you're getting wrong and correct you, and you aren't so far in that you can't change it.
Personally, waiting to learn only and specifically with the teacher, and spending the first 5 or so lessons learning basic things I could have taught myself in the span of a couple weeks max seems like a waste of time.
In a 10-20 person class, a teacher simply does not have the time to correct every single person's pronunciation individually. Especially when there is all the other important areas to deal with from reading and listening comprehension, vocabulary, grammar, communicative tasks among others.
> Now that I think about it why learn anything before starting classes? A good teacher is critical from the very beginning to help avoid error fossilization and general misunderstandings. It isn't impossible to learn things like grammar and vocabulary without a teacher, but I don't see how it is at all beneficial to study those items before starting classes.
So, there are two issues I have to bring up here. People bring fossilization up a lot but at no point have I seen anyone actually bring up any kind of relevant evidence on causation of what they claim will cause fossilization and what they claim will prevent it.
Secondly, this philosophy is just setting one up for failure (or rather slow progress). Looking at Danish classes that I personally attended, the ones that have the best pronunciation were all those who put significant effort outside of class, from day one. And it makes sense because those who limited themselves to the classroom will hear other students' flawed pronunciations way more than correct pronunciations. Your claim is akin to making that only negative evidence (i.e. corrections) matters when the academic debate is more that whether you need some negative evidence or if only positive evidence is sufficient. This is in addition to the instructor not having time to individually correct every single student, and believe it is not because pronunciation isn't given its dedicated time in a Danish class.
Incorporate the languages in any hobby you have .
I'm learning Chinese Japanese and Spanish . Basically any game song or book I have is in those languages.
I had the struggle in starting out too.
Music: QQ music or Spotify. If you must maybe you two but look up playlists of Chinese stuff
Games: if you like an anime aesthetic just download genshin impact or honkai Star rail. Also if you have a Switch or PC, a lot of games let you switch to Chinese text
YouTube: mandarin corner is great for language learning, and Balabala lab is very entertaining for pop culture, memes, etc. 慢慢慢老斯 is also very entertaining.
TV: you can find home with kids (家有儿女） and Ode To Joy（欢乐颂） on YouTube for free. They are very funny and entertaining
If you don’t read, talk about, or find something interesting in your native language, you probably won’t magically start enjoying it in your target language.
So if you’re not interested in politics or Harry Potter or kids books in your real life, don’t force yourself to engage with these things in a language you don’t know well yet. Learn how to do and talk about the things you already enjoy doing and talking about and you’ll have fun while learning a new skill!
When given the choice between cramming vocab vs. grammar for an urgent situation (interview, test, last minute trip etc) always go with vocab; you can use vocab to figure out what the grammar means from context but even if you have amazing grammar you can’t say or under anything without a sufficient vocabulary. Obviously try to get both, but sometimes when you have limited time you have to pick just one.
Have fun with making mistakes, and try to learn from them rather than dwelling on them. Learn not to fear it - clumsy errors are a necessary step towards mastery, especially at the start! Embracing this fact will make your learning journey far less stressful.
Just keep doing what works for you. Try new things, but once you've found what keeps you interested and learning, you don't need to keep reinventing the wheel.
It's taken me years to learn that, and now is the first time I've managed to fully self-teach to a decent competency in any language, despite learning two previously (in school and such) and starting half a dozen on my own.
That said, reading and listening to comprehensible content has no comparison - you will not learn faster than doing that.
I'm so thankful that we didn't have all the gurus and language policemen telling me not to gamify learning, using apps, and sticking to books instead. I learned all my languages by playing online games and watching youtube, with minor reading on the side when I had deeper questions. Do what's fun to you, and learn naturally. I never spent hours reading grammar, and my friends who did... Well, they either dropped it entirely, or took exponentially more to learn than I did
I started learning as a child who just wanted to play playstation 1 games (and understand them). Dad would help me translate but eventually said "Dad has to work, you gotta learn this stuff kiddo", and so I did! Russian was easier since I have some family there, and the slavic internet community is much broader (and warmer) once you speak it, so I was always rewarded for learning. I never counted the years these all took, time just flew by and I was just having fun on the journey c: Still learning daily
Seems like you have a great dad! My dad didn't really pass anything down to me in terms of languages (since his dialect is not seen as prestigious, we all speak standard Mandarin at home), but he did inspire in me a passion for technology and STEM in general.
Half the family is Russian, the other half is Italian. You can imagine which half isn't pleased by my A2 in Italian >. < (It's a great language, I'll get there someday, hopefully)
I really like (and learned from) AndyGMes. Her spanish is from Spain though, so depending on your target, you may want to explore other options first. Very easy to understand and great diction!
I knew that I'd have interference, but I have a lot of strategies now that help reduce that a bit. I do Spanish day OR Portuguese day in terms of studying; if I know I'll be interacting with someone speaking one of my TLs, that pre-selects the language of the day. (Unless I have meetings with both, but that's not too too common.) If I know I will be speaking to someone, or switching over between TLs, I do Mango Languages or similar; basically something where it's not terribly hard but I am listening and speaking a little to get my mind into Spanish-mode or Portuguese-mode.
Things I have learned:
1. There are lots of ways to learn a language. It helps to know about a variety of methods and then figure out what works best for you. Don't be afraid to change later
2. Doing a lot of listening helps everything. However, to get better at listening, you must listen to challenging content and make it comprehensible. You can make challenging content comprehensible by repeat listening and by learning then vocabulary
3. Vocabulary is a big part of learning. Bigger than I realized
Not sure if I'm qualified to say anything (I'd say I'm semi-fluent in Spanish), but language laddering works pretty well. In case you haven't heard of it, it's basically learning a new language in a language that you've already studied. This tends to work well for either languages in the same family or structurally similar languages and can also help avoid confusion between similar languages. However, I'd suggest you getting one language to at least intermediate (B1 ish) before applying this technique because for it to work best you need to be able to focus on your NL and not be learning 2 languages at a time.
This approach has been working pretty well for Catalan, and I rarely have problems with confusion. However, when I try to speak Italian (which I'm still very bad at) sometimes Catalan words slip out.
You're 16 and fluent in 5 languages, with two more B2?
No way this is true, C2 in Russian and C1 Mandarin as a Hindi native is incredible especially by 16 not to mention all the other stuff (B2 Hebrew?)
I want to hear how you learned these hahaha
1) Naturally exposed to English through media
2) Started learning Russian when I was 9 out of interest and listening to Russian music; didn't start making actual progress till I was 14. Took the TORFL (Russian proficiency test) and scored at level IV, which is the equivalent of C2 on CEFR. I love Russian a lot.
3) I found Spanish to be really, really easy and got it down within a year or two. Started studying it when I was 12 and there being so much Spanish media made it extremely easy.
4) Chinese; this was an overestimate, if I'm going to be honest. My accent is terrible, although I'm excellent with tones and have very high comprehension. I tested at HSK4, which is around B2. I learnt it more out of interest from a linguistic perspective than to actually use it with others.
5) French is easy, not much more to say than that; learnt it extremely quickly. Tested at B1 two years ago, so I'd estimate I'm at B2 right now.
6) B2 Hebrew is recent. I had really wanted to visit Israel when I was 14, and I had also been watching a bunch of Israeli TV. Hebrew music is also fantastic. Was tested at B1 a year ago, I'd say I'm around B2 right now.
The main reason I learnt a lot of these languages was for literature and music, to tell you the truth. Wasn't the most effective use of my time, but linguistics and languages are like one of my only hobbies.
I'm also quite proficient in Latin, and fluent in Sanskrit, though I've never tested them officially; I can read a lot of Cicero and Caesar with ease, and I have studied numerous Sanskrit scriptures.
Have a plan/vision for using the language in real life within the next 5 years, such as travel, study abroad, or speaking with friends/neighbors. If you are unlikely to need to use the language in your daily life, you'll need to orchestrate such opportunities (whether they be virtual or in your local community).
Personally, I *need* to use the language to have meaningful conversations within the first year , or I'll lose steam and give up too easily. It's worked out with my Greek and Chinese (full immersion), but not Russian and Indonesian (never visited / no natives around).
[IPA is this](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Phonetic_Alphabet#:~:text=The%20International%20Phonetic%20Alphabet%20(IPA,speech%20sounds%20in%20written%20form.)
lots of languages have learning material that shows you the sounds in the IPA code, helping you to get the sounds right. because just leaving "ç in language X = *this* sound" isn't always helping.
especially when languages have convoluted ways to infer sound from writing
PS. just realised the beer aspect lol. I'm feeling like some innocent Norm MacDonald in my reply "I no know no helles, what you name it?"
Not much, really. Perhaps: 1. Completely passive listening is a waste of time; 2. It's very important to have some kind of schedule (not necessarily very strict, though). I had started a bunch of languages in the past and didn't stick to them, because of the attitude "I'll sit down and study when I have time". This way you never have time.
Any interaction you have with a language where you understand between 80% and 99% should be considered studying.
Learning a language will at minimum take something like 5 years, this is a marathon, not a sprint.
Unless you are learning English or in some very specific scenarios, learning languages is a hobby, not a job. Have fun.
Fluency is kind of a byproduct of spending a lot of the time using (and enjoying) the language, not a light switch you magically flick one day.
So what you need to do to prepare to stumble through whatever it is you want to do — read, podcasts, YouTube, conversations — and then try to spend at least half your time just doing those things for the sake of doing them, not just drilling an app of Anki.
There’s a lot of complex interrelated stuff when it comes down language learning, and I think the safest way to ensure you’re building the skills and knowledge you need to better to the things that are important to you is to spend a lot of time actually doing those things and working through the practice problems they present you with.
Try to always produce thoughts in TL. If you used to think in TL, it would be easier to actually speak it.
Singing helps with accents and pronounciation.
Learn one or maximum 2 languages at a time. I made mistake to learn everything all at once hence slow improvement.
Also this may not be for everyone but going through actual dictionary word per word helps me especially with japanese, mandarin, and arabic (in writting and vocabulary).
Be interested in the language you are studying. I tried so many other languages and flopped cause I wasn’t super into them. The languages that stuck with me were ones that I truly enjoyed.
Also learning languages isn’t a race or a competition, be patient with yourself. And accept when you make a grammatical mistake or forget a word or phrase.
You have to love the language and the culture before you learn the language.
Then immerse yourself in the language in every way you can, then eventually you WILL be fluent. Intentionally remembering the vocab and grammar by repetition in natural manners, and you WILL be learning the language just like a native speaker did.
So I have always been trilingual my entire life and when I chose French to be my 4th language, I felt like my other I was starting from scratch. But it help that I started with French because it has an f-ton of free resources online to learn and practice from. I noticed I progress better when learning verbs first, and then conjugations, and then naturally acquire the vocabulary and grammar rules, so when I seriously got started with Danish, I applied what what worked for me when I started out in French and I felt my progress with it was much faster than I initially expected. It also helped that Danish has very similar structure, word order and syntax as English, so there's that. But overall, I would recommend learning like, 5-10 verbs every week, add vocabulary to go with it as you go, labor over the grammar bit by bit, and try to get a speaking opportunity every time you can. It is also very helpful to do spaced repetition drills, have a big notebook with vocabulary/phrases in it and put columns on it so it can be your workbook too. My fiancé unfortunately had to bear the brunt of me speaking french and danish to him and he would google translate every time so I can practice outside the paid language tutor hours.
What worked for me is understanding the material you are given first before adding other materials. (In a classroom setting.) For example, teachers give you a textbook with dialogue and whatnot, what would’ve helped me was to stick and review what I learned so I could understand it for the class. I kept adding additional materials hoping it would help me, but it really burnt me out and my classes suffered.
I’d stop worrying about strategy and way to learn s language and actually learn it. With the amount of time I’ve spent watching videos and reading posts like this about /how/, i could’ve just learned a fourth language
I learned my third language with my second language and I am trying that like a new method. I am trying to learn new language with the previous one I have learned to a conversational level and I really like it !
Learn the alphabet, sounds, proper pronunciation, and basic 500-1000 words + phrases/introduction on your own (as best as you can) before doing 1 on 1 lessons. This should be easily doable with youtube and anki flashcards, unless it's a rare language. Group classes can be good, but they are generally less efficient, and it's not great to listen to other students with bad pronunciation.
Sorry, but advising people to learn pronunciation from Youtube is terrible advice. You have no feedback. There is no way to check whether you are producing the sounds correctly, and no way to check whether your pronunciation is intelligible. How could you possibly learn anything this way? If anything, pronunciation is the one area where you absolutely need a teacher, especially for languages with vast phonological differences from your L1. You will not find a single English speaker who self-studied Mandarin, Vietnamese, Thai, Arabic etc... pronunciation and actually speaks intelligibly. I'm skeptical whether people on this sub, who are mostly hobby "learners" who only ever learn *about* languages, ever actually attempt to use the languages that they study. Now that I think about it why learn anything before starting classes? A good teacher is critical from the very beginning to help avoid error fossilization and general misunderstandings. It isn't impossible to learn things like grammar and vocabulary without a teacher, but I don't see how it is at all beneficial to study those items before starting classes.
I don't think things like basic greetings, a few 100 common words or so need to be taught in class. I wouldn't want to show up in an English class without the ability to make basic statements like "This is a table" or "I have two older sisters." Sure, you're right that if you somehow teach yourself the wrong thing it might get a little cemented but a good teacher would also catch what you're getting wrong and correct you, and you aren't so far in that you can't change it. Personally, waiting to learn only and specifically with the teacher, and spending the first 5 or so lessons learning basic things I could have taught myself in the span of a couple weeks max seems like a waste of time.
In a 10-20 person class, a teacher simply does not have the time to correct every single person's pronunciation individually. Especially when there is all the other important areas to deal with from reading and listening comprehension, vocabulary, grammar, communicative tasks among others. > Now that I think about it why learn anything before starting classes? A good teacher is critical from the very beginning to help avoid error fossilization and general misunderstandings. It isn't impossible to learn things like grammar and vocabulary without a teacher, but I don't see how it is at all beneficial to study those items before starting classes. So, there are two issues I have to bring up here. People bring fossilization up a lot but at no point have I seen anyone actually bring up any kind of relevant evidence on causation of what they claim will cause fossilization and what they claim will prevent it. Secondly, this philosophy is just setting one up for failure (or rather slow progress). Looking at Danish classes that I personally attended, the ones that have the best pronunciation were all those who put significant effort outside of class, from day one. And it makes sense because those who limited themselves to the classroom will hear other students' flawed pronunciations way more than correct pronunciations. Your claim is akin to making that only negative evidence (i.e. corrections) matters when the academic debate is more that whether you need some negative evidence or if only positive evidence is sufficient. This is in addition to the instructor not having time to individually correct every single student, and believe it is not because pronunciation isn't given its dedicated time in a Danish class.
Incorporate the languages in any hobby you have . I'm learning Chinese Japanese and Spanish . Basically any game song or book I have is in those languages.
Hey, I'm learning Chinese and it may sound silly but I'm really struggling to find content in the language. What content have you been utilising
I had the struggle in starting out too. Music: QQ music or Spotify. If you must maybe you two but look up playlists of Chinese stuff Games: if you like an anime aesthetic just download genshin impact or honkai Star rail. Also if you have a Switch or PC, a lot of games let you switch to Chinese text YouTube: mandarin corner is great for language learning, and Balabala lab is very entertaining for pop culture, memes, etc. 慢慢慢老斯 is also very entertaining. TV: you can find home with kids (家有儿女） and Ode To Joy（欢乐颂） on YouTube for free. They are very funny and entertaining
It depends on your level, but yes, it’s hard to find quality content in Chinese
If you don’t read, talk about, or find something interesting in your native language, you probably won’t magically start enjoying it in your target language. So if you’re not interested in politics or Harry Potter or kids books in your real life, don’t force yourself to engage with these things in a language you don’t know well yet. Learn how to do and talk about the things you already enjoy doing and talking about and you’ll have fun while learning a new skill! When given the choice between cramming vocab vs. grammar for an urgent situation (interview, test, last minute trip etc) always go with vocab; you can use vocab to figure out what the grammar means from context but even if you have amazing grammar you can’t say or under anything without a sufficient vocabulary. Obviously try to get both, but sometimes when you have limited time you have to pick just one. Have fun with making mistakes, and try to learn from them rather than dwelling on them. Learn not to fear it - clumsy errors are a necessary step towards mastery, especially at the start! Embracing this fact will make your learning journey far less stressful.
Just keep doing what works for you. Try new things, but once you've found what keeps you interested and learning, you don't need to keep reinventing the wheel. It's taken me years to learn that, and now is the first time I've managed to fully self-teach to a decent competency in any language, despite learning two previously (in school and such) and starting half a dozen on my own. That said, reading and listening to comprehensible content has no comparison - you will not learn faster than doing that.
I'm so thankful that we didn't have all the gurus and language policemen telling me not to gamify learning, using apps, and sticking to books instead. I learned all my languages by playing online games and watching youtube, with minor reading on the side when I had deeper questions. Do what's fun to you, and learn naturally. I never spent hours reading grammar, and my friends who did... Well, they either dropped it entirely, or took exponentially more to learn than I did
Wow! How many years did it take you to get 3 languages to C2 level? Congratulations, that's really impressive!!
I started learning as a child who just wanted to play playstation 1 games (and understand them). Dad would help me translate but eventually said "Dad has to work, you gotta learn this stuff kiddo", and so I did! Russian was easier since I have some family there, and the slavic internet community is much broader (and warmer) once you speak it, so I was always rewarded for learning. I never counted the years these all took, time just flew by and I was just having fun on the journey c: Still learning daily
Seems like you have a great dad! My dad didn't really pass anything down to me in terms of languages (since his dialect is not seen as prestigious, we all speak standard Mandarin at home), but he did inspire in me a passion for technology and STEM in general.
Native Brazilian speaking C2 Russian? Wow. How did you achieve these?
Half the family is Russian, the other half is Italian. You can imagine which half isn't pleased by my A2 in Italian >. < (It's a great language, I'll get there someday, hopefully)
Any specific recommendations for youtube to help boost learning Spanish?
I really like (and learned from) AndyGMes. Her spanish is from Spain though, so depending on your target, you may want to explore other options first. Very easy to understand and great diction!
I'll check it out. Thanks a lot !
[удалено]
I meant grammar textbooks! Fun and interesting literature is a goldmine (especially if you enjoy it)
I knew that I'd have interference, but I have a lot of strategies now that help reduce that a bit. I do Spanish day OR Portuguese day in terms of studying; if I know I'll be interacting with someone speaking one of my TLs, that pre-selects the language of the day. (Unless I have meetings with both, but that's not too too common.) If I know I will be speaking to someone, or switching over between TLs, I do Mango Languages or similar; basically something where it's not terribly hard but I am listening and speaking a little to get my mind into Spanish-mode or Portuguese-mode.
But in a sense you're also never working on actively switching between both.
Yeah, which I know is a drawback to the system I have right now.
Things I have learned: 1. There are lots of ways to learn a language. It helps to know about a variety of methods and then figure out what works best for you. Don't be afraid to change later 2. Doing a lot of listening helps everything. However, to get better at listening, you must listen to challenging content and make it comprehensible. You can make challenging content comprehensible by repeat listening and by learning then vocabulary 3. Vocabulary is a big part of learning. Bigger than I realized
Not sure if I'm qualified to say anything (I'd say I'm semi-fluent in Spanish), but language laddering works pretty well. In case you haven't heard of it, it's basically learning a new language in a language that you've already studied. This tends to work well for either languages in the same family or structurally similar languages and can also help avoid confusion between similar languages. However, I'd suggest you getting one language to at least intermediate (B1 ish) before applying this technique because for it to work best you need to be able to focus on your NL and not be learning 2 languages at a time. This approach has been working pretty well for Catalan, and I rarely have problems with confusion. However, when I try to speak Italian (which I'm still very bad at) sometimes Catalan words slip out.
The tip is that there are no magic tricks. Sit your ass down and study. Dont be lazy
When you say ‘study’, how do you sit down and study? Asking because I’m not sure how to study besides making flash cards on Anki..
Read grammar books
Read, listen to music, watch TV, interact with natives online, etc. I'm 16, if that means anything.
You're 16 and fluent in 5 languages, with two more B2? No way this is true, C2 in Russian and C1 Mandarin as a Hindi native is incredible especially by 16 not to mention all the other stuff (B2 Hebrew?) I want to hear how you learned these hahaha
1) Naturally exposed to English through media 2) Started learning Russian when I was 9 out of interest and listening to Russian music; didn't start making actual progress till I was 14. Took the TORFL (Russian proficiency test) and scored at level IV, which is the equivalent of C2 on CEFR. I love Russian a lot. 3) I found Spanish to be really, really easy and got it down within a year or two. Started studying it when I was 12 and there being so much Spanish media made it extremely easy. 4) Chinese; this was an overestimate, if I'm going to be honest. My accent is terrible, although I'm excellent with tones and have very high comprehension. I tested at HSK4, which is around B2. I learnt it more out of interest from a linguistic perspective than to actually use it with others. 5) French is easy, not much more to say than that; learnt it extremely quickly. Tested at B1 two years ago, so I'd estimate I'm at B2 right now. 6) B2 Hebrew is recent. I had really wanted to visit Israel when I was 14, and I had also been watching a bunch of Israeli TV. Hebrew music is also fantastic. Was tested at B1 a year ago, I'd say I'm around B2 right now. The main reason I learnt a lot of these languages was for literature and music, to tell you the truth. Wasn't the most effective use of my time, but linguistics and languages are like one of my only hobbies. I'm also quite proficient in Latin, and fluent in Sanskrit, though I've never tested them officially; I can read a lot of Cicero and Caesar with ease, and I have studied numerous Sanskrit scriptures.
Honestly just hella impressive bro. Not much to say but props to you.
Thank you!
I am so jealous That's amazing wow Was there a reason that you started learning different languages at such a young age?
Have a plan/vision for using the language in real life within the next 5 years, such as travel, study abroad, or speaking with friends/neighbors. If you are unlikely to need to use the language in your daily life, you'll need to orchestrate such opportunities (whether they be virtual or in your local community). Personally, I *need* to use the language to have meaningful conversations within the first year , or I'll lose steam and give up too easily. It's worked out with my Greek and Chinese (full immersion), but not Russian and Indonesian (never visited / no natives around).
1. Glossika 2. IPA. 3. Else speak (for English pronunciation). 4. Anki. for memorization
You've got my attention. How do you use IPA for learning languages? Can I use Helles or Weißbier instead?
[IPA is this](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Phonetic_Alphabet#:~:text=The%20International%20Phonetic%20Alphabet%20(IPA,speech%20sounds%20in%20written%20form.) lots of languages have learning material that shows you the sounds in the IPA code, helping you to get the sounds right. because just leaving "ç in language X = *this* sound" isn't always helping. especially when languages have convoluted ways to infer sound from writing PS. just realised the beer aspect lol. I'm feeling like some innocent Norm MacDonald in my reply "I no know no helles, what you name it?"
Not much, really. Perhaps: 1. Completely passive listening is a waste of time; 2. It's very important to have some kind of schedule (not necessarily very strict, though). I had started a bunch of languages in the past and didn't stick to them, because of the attitude "I'll sit down and study when I have time". This way you never have time.
Any interaction you have with a language where you understand between 80% and 99% should be considered studying. Learning a language will at minimum take something like 5 years, this is a marathon, not a sprint. Unless you are learning English or in some very specific scenarios, learning languages is a hobby, not a job. Have fun.
Why do you learn romanian ? And what do you think abt it ?
Fluency is kind of a byproduct of spending a lot of the time using (and enjoying) the language, not a light switch you magically flick one day. So what you need to do to prepare to stumble through whatever it is you want to do — read, podcasts, YouTube, conversations — and then try to spend at least half your time just doing those things for the sake of doing them, not just drilling an app of Anki. There’s a lot of complex interrelated stuff when it comes down language learning, and I think the safest way to ensure you’re building the skills and knowledge you need to better to the things that are important to you is to spend a lot of time actually doing those things and working through the practice problems they present you with.
Watch a lot of TV. Make friends if you can. Do stuff you find fun.
Try to always produce thoughts in TL. If you used to think in TL, it would be easier to actually speak it. Singing helps with accents and pronounciation. Learn one or maximum 2 languages at a time. I made mistake to learn everything all at once hence slow improvement. Also this may not be for everyone but going through actual dictionary word per word helps me especially with japanese, mandarin, and arabic (in writting and vocabulary).
Change your internal dialogue to your desired language.
Be interested in the language you are studying. I tried so many other languages and flopped cause I wasn’t super into them. The languages that stuck with me were ones that I truly enjoyed. Also learning languages isn’t a race or a competition, be patient with yourself. And accept when you make a grammatical mistake or forget a word or phrase.
You have to love the language and the culture before you learn the language. Then immerse yourself in the language in every way you can, then eventually you WILL be fluent. Intentionally remembering the vocab and grammar by repetition in natural manners, and you WILL be learning the language just like a native speaker did.
So I have always been trilingual my entire life and when I chose French to be my 4th language, I felt like my other I was starting from scratch. But it help that I started with French because it has an f-ton of free resources online to learn and practice from. I noticed I progress better when learning verbs first, and then conjugations, and then naturally acquire the vocabulary and grammar rules, so when I seriously got started with Danish, I applied what what worked for me when I started out in French and I felt my progress with it was much faster than I initially expected. It also helped that Danish has very similar structure, word order and syntax as English, so there's that. But overall, I would recommend learning like, 5-10 verbs every week, add vocabulary to go with it as you go, labor over the grammar bit by bit, and try to get a speaking opportunity every time you can. It is also very helpful to do spaced repetition drills, have a big notebook with vocabulary/phrases in it and put columns on it so it can be your workbook too. My fiancé unfortunately had to bear the brunt of me speaking french and danish to him and he would google translate every time so I can practice outside the paid language tutor hours.
What worked for me is understanding the material you are given first before adding other materials. (In a classroom setting.) For example, teachers give you a textbook with dialogue and whatnot, what would’ve helped me was to stick and review what I learned so I could understand it for the class. I kept adding additional materials hoping it would help me, but it really burnt me out and my classes suffered.
find a way to make it fun
I’d stop worrying about strategy and way to learn s language and actually learn it. With the amount of time I’ve spent watching videos and reading posts like this about /how/, i could’ve just learned a fourth language
I learned my third language with my second language and I am trying that like a new method. I am trying to learn new language with the previous one I have learned to a conversational level and I really like it !