Hi. It's been some time since I have written about my language learning, though when I look through my posts the one on learning Thai was one of my most viewed. When I look to the title of my blog I see that it is Learning My Way Through Life and for the last 8 or 9 years I have been chipping away at acquiring a second language, in this case Thai. As my Mum was born in Germany I am also attempting to learn German by using Duolingo. This post is about my methods of learning these two very different languages and the very different methods that I am using to achieve the goal of being able to communicate with native speakers at some time in the future.
1. I think the first thing that is important for success is to have a good answer to the question why? Why am I learning the language? Take Thai. My wife is Thai. Her parents speak little English and her friends, when hanging out speak their native language. Yes many of them speak English well enough or even fluently in many cases but to be included in the conversation I need to be able to speak and understand Thai. I can't expect that as the only native English speaker at a table of 10 people that the other nine are going to speak English for my sake. So the reason for learning Thai is quite simple, be a greater part of my wife's life and also grow my understanding of Thai people's life and culture.
German is a little more tricky. Mum was born in Germany and moved to Australia when she was just 2 years old. No area of my life will be damaged if I fail to acquire German language skills. However, I would love to get a greater understanding of my German heritage and would love to be able to wander through the streets of Munich and chat over a beer or two with the locals and really get a feeling for that aspect of where I come from.
2. Method of learning. Where do we begin to learn a language and I guess, what am I willing to invest in the language acquisition? Early days learning was a scrambled affair, mixed between book learning and youtube clips. Some gave me a little bit of basic improvement but didn't really get me anywhere to the stated goal of good Thai language communication. My current method is to complete one lesson a day on the website thaipod101.com, add their vocabulary list to the flashcards tab and work my way through the flashcards each day. I have also set up a YouTube account called gerardthailearning via a gmail address. I then use Thai script only to search and watch videos. As a result when I log in to this account I get recommended videos in the Thai language. I like to watch cooking videos which I have found to be a particularly good tool as usually in a cooking video the cook or chef will run through the ingredients that will be used in the dish. This teaches me how to say many of the commonly used Thai foods. Another tool I use is sending text messages to my wife in Thai. In early days I used what we call Karaoke Thai or Romanised script but these days if I am not in too much of a hurry I use Thai script and jump onto the Thai English dictionary on my phone for extra support.
For my German learning I use Duolingo. I notice that there are plenty of critics of this method for learning a language. I find it easy to use and as a base for my learning I find it a very good place to start your learning experience. I am currently on a 183 day streak of learning at least one lesson a day. In fact my current method of learning is to complete one refresher lesson a day plus one new lesson each day as well. On the weekend I complete all outstanding refresher lessons and one new lesson. If no refresher lessons are required I will do 2 new lessons on the day. Do I believe that by just doing Duolingo each day that I will one day speak fluent German? No. But I do think that this method or most other good learning methods coupled with an outlet for using the language you have acquired can lead to conversational level of communication. And that brings me to my next and possibly most underrated component of the process.
3. Using your language skills. If you don't have an outlet for your language skills then you will lose them. Use it or lose it. Obviously if you have a friend or in my case a wife who speaks the language you can use the language when communicating day to day. Even that won't be achieved without making an effort. This is especially so if you have another language you can speak together. If that is the case you can easily forget to speak the target language or just get lazy and lapse back into you native language when it is too hard or you are too busy with life. Something I do like to do is practice my Thai language skills out at the local Thai restaurant by ordering our meals in Thai. When I first started doing this I was a little nervous of my skills but am now much better at the task. The big takeaway - don't be afraid to get it wrong. Obviously it is important to pick your timing with this kind of thing. If the restaurant is massively busy and you are starting out you need to be aware that the wait staff may not have the time to show your budding language skills much patience. If however it's a quiet midweek night then he or she may be more responsive. Also, if the waiter is looking at you and expecting English and they receive Thai or other language you have to cut them a little slack as you have probably completely caught them off guard. Restaurants are great places for this kind of communication but also try searching in your target language on facebook or instagram. Something as simple as searching ช้าง (Chaang) the Thai word for elephant or other object that came up in your last lesson can be a cool outlet to reinforce what you have learnt.
In this internet age it is so much easier to connect to people in your target language without even leaving home. I heard of a person who used Skype to chat in Russian. First they typed hello in Russian and then used the responses to their first conversation to connect to another Russian speaker and so on. I guess the tip is quite simple find an outlet. I live in an area of Sydney with a large Chinese population and if I decided to learn a Chinese language would have plenty of victims to test out my skills if I decided to learn. There are plenty of avenues available for this part of the learning process. You are only limited by your imagination.
Anyway, it's time to go. Happy Learning!!!
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