vocabulary for learning a new language
I’m currently learning Mandarin (Chinese) at school and self-taught for Spanish. At first, I found that teaching myself a language is very tricky because I struggled and didn’t know where to start. Here are 30 topics that you can get start to learn a new language. Hope this can help!
1. Basic vowels, diphthongs, and consonants (different languages have different ways to pronounce them)
2. Greeting phrases (hello, how are you, what’s your name, how old are you)
3. Polite phrases (thank you, nice to meet you, i’m sorry, you’re welcome, excuse me, please)
4. Basic people (girl, boy, child, adult, he, she, I, me, you)
5. Number (1-1000, 1 million, phone number, house number)
6. Time (morning, afternoon, evening, night, o'clock, weekdays, months, years)
7. Basic verbs (drink, eat, speak, say, work, study)
8. Family (grandparents, parents, siblings, form sentence to introduce members in the family, where do you live)
9. Sentence structure (learn how to form one independent sentence)
10. Negative sentence structure (i’m not, i don’t have, i don’t know)
11. Question phrases (what, when, where, why, who, how, do you…)
12. Meals (breakfast, lunch, dinner, snack, brunch)
13. Food (vegetable, meat, fruits, noodles, rice, dessert, fast food, adjective related to food like delicious, sour, sweet, bitter, spicy)
14. Drinks (tea, milk, coke, juice, smoothie, soda)
15. Colors (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet, brown, grey, black, white)
16. Emotions (happy, angry, sad, bored)
17. Transportations (bicycle, walk, bus, car, motorcycle, subway, train)
18. Clothing (accessories, shirts, t shirts, pants, jeans, shorts, dresses)
19. Directions (around, left, right, front, back, north, south, east, west)
20. Basic animal (dog, cat, cow, chicken, bear, fish)
21. Traveling (countries’ names, hotels, culture, customs, traditions)
22. Weather (sunny, rainy, snow, temperature, hot, cold, cool)
23. Seasons (spring, summer, fall, winter)
24. State of being (i’m sick, i’m uncomfortable, i’m hungry, i’m thirsty)
25. Hobbies (drawing, singing, dancing, reading, writing, watching movies, listening to music, playing musical instrument)
26. Sports (swimming, soccer, volleyball, basketball, hockey, badminton, tennis, baseball, softball)
27. School (subjects like art, science, literature, math, classes, courses, when school starts/ends, classroom, exam, tests, book, pens, calculator, notebook)
28. More verbs (wake up, go to sleep, go to school, cook, play sports, buy)
29. Technology (phones, laptop, social media, app, benefits, disadvantage, internet, TV, chat, video call, call)
30. Occupations (doctor, nurse, architect, businessman, accountant, chef)
31. Past tense (i did…, i was…, i traveled…., yesterday, last week, last year)
32. Future tense (i will, i am going to, tomorrow, next week, next year)
33. Complex sentence structure (if…,then…; besides…, also…;however..,.;but)
34. Locations (school, building, office, cinema, shop, shopping center, library)
35. Body parts (eye, nose, mouth, ear, head, hair, arm, hand, leg, foot, teeth)
36. Description (tall, short, long, thin, fat, skin/hair/eye color, adjective like funny, intelligent, beautiful, handsome)
37. Environment (earth, environment, trees, trash, turn off light/electricity, plastic bags, pollution, recycle, climate change)
38. Cooking (add, stir, boil, grill, fry, chop, mix, bake)
39. Festivals (new year holiday, Christmas holiday, easter, halloween)
40. Preposition (above, below, under, next to, in front, at the back, opposite)
