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1. grammar, vocabulary, immersion. the three pillars of language learning. in the beginning, choose one trusty resource for each. taking korean as an example, i use the amazing “howtostudykorean” website for grammar, the corresponding memrise course for vocabulary and my favorite k-dramas and podcasts (like talk to me in korean) to immerse myself in the language. there are so many blog posts with resources out there on *all* the languages.

2. collect your resources in a spreadsheet, and indicate exactly how often you want to use them in a week. the more concrete your goals are, the more likely you are to actually do them. writing down the exact time for self-study in your time table/calendar is even better!

3. once you’re gradually building up your language skills, think about getting in touch with natives, through sites like hellotalk. actually using the language is the best way forward, so even if you’re insecure, just try it out! in my experience, natives will be happy to help. language-tandem, where your language partner is studying your native language, is also a very cool method.

4. find like-minded people who also self-study languages! it’s great to have a network to motivate each other, share struggles or tips.

Mieux vaut prévenir que guérir

“It’s better to prevent than heal.” This means that it’s better to stop something bad from happening than to fix the damage that it caused. I like this one because of the way that it puts things into perspective. If you can stop something bad, the less people will get hurt,

Petit a petit, l’oiseau fait son nid

“Little by little, the bird makes it’s nest.” This is similar to slowly but surely. The bird is taking it’s time and each little stick it puts into the nest is that much closer to finishing it. I like this one because it tells how good things take time.

Qui n’avance pas, recule

“Who does not move forward, recedes.” Life will go on around us, and you must move with it, or else you are moving back. I like this one because you must move forward, even if it’s hard, or else you’ll be living in the past.

Il n’y a pas plus sourd que celui qui ne veut pas entendre

1 You want to be able to know where our language came from (like greek and latin)

2 You want to read at the dark and braille can do that for you

3 Sign language -> you can: 1 talk at noisy places, 2 to talk to people at your own city who doesn’t speak your language

4 Because the grammar is so different from the others (indonesian_with_its_amazing_verbs entered the chat room)

5 Because your crush studies or speaks that language

6 You like crime fictions (so you should consider study nordic languages, there is a Glass Key Award given annually to a crime novel by an author from the Nordic countries, ponder it)

7 You love food and want to try new recipes (maybe italian, japanese, russian, thai or from some Africa’s country?)

8 You want to master some topic

9 You love so much some specific content in a foreign language that you need to understand what the creator really meant to say, so you have to learn the original language to catch the nuances of everything

As we’re in the middle of summer and a lot of us have time to read, I thought it would be great to list all the great french books I know and I’ve read if you want to practice french or read french books!! (or just if you don’t have books to read now) note : the list is faaar from being complete !

POETRY

Apollinaire - Alcools, Calligrammes André Breton & Philippe Soupault - The Magnetic Fields Charles Baudelaire - The Flowers of Evil (Les Fleurs du Mal), Paris Spleen (Le Spleen de Paris) Paul Éluard - Capitale de la Douleur, Les Mains Libres Paul Verlaine - Poèmes Saturniens, Romances Sans Paroles Arthur Rimbaud - Illuminations Victor Hugo - The Contemplations Stéphane Mallarmé - Poésies Comte de Lautréamont - The Lay of Maldoror Louise Labé - Poésies Pierre de Ronsard - Les Odes Marceline Desbordes-Valmore - Elegies et romances Alphonse de Lamartine - The Meditations

NOVELS

Albert Camus - The Stranger, The Plague, The First Man Jean-Paul Sartre - Nausea, The Words Annie Ernaux - The Years, The Possession, Shame, Happening, A Woman’s Story Stendhal - The Red and the Black Victor Hugo - The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, Les Misérables Madame de La Fayette - La Princesse de Clèves Madeleine de Scudéry - Clélie Honoré de Balzac - The Unknown Masterpiece, Old Goriot Gustave Flaubert - Madame Bovary, Sentimental Education George Sand - Story of my Life Alfred de Musset - The Confession of a Child from the Century Laurent Binet - HHhH, The Seventh Function of Language Jean Teulé - The Suicide Shop, Eat Him if You Like, Monsieur Montespan, Charly 9 Voltaire - Zadig, Candide Chrétien de Troyes - Yvain, The Knight of the Lion + Lancelot, The Knight of the Cart Marguerite Duras - The Ravishing of Lol V. Stein Marguerite Yourcenar - Memoirs of Hadrian Antoine de Saint-Exupéry - Night Flight, The Little Prince, The Wisdom of the Sands Jean de la Fontaine - The Fables Émile Zola - The Beast Within Marcel Proust - In Search of Lost Time André Gide - The Counterfeiters, The Immoralist, The Vatican Cellars, The Pastoral Symphony François-René de Chateaubriand - René, Atala, Memoirs from Beyond the Grave Aragon - Aurélien Jean-Jacques Rousseau - Reveries of a Solitary Walker

PLAYS

I’ve summarized professor  Alexander Arguelles’ video, because I think this is crucial for language learning. 

There is no magic trick that will help you become fluent in 1 month, but there are very effective approaches to learning a new language and if you combine them, you will surely become fluent.

If you’re learning a new language, the most important thing you need to consider is – what type of language learner are you? 

1. If you:

have a more deductive approach, which means that you’re better at listening to and observing the language first and learning through that, rather than starting with plain grammar points from a textbook

have a fair degree of intuition

like to observe a phenomenon

feel somewhat comfortable with ambiguity for a while, until things become clear

are someone who can feel comfortable being corrected when they realize they were wrong, rather than getting confused and frustrated because they went down an initial path that turned out not to be correct (so you actually learn from being corrected and you don’t get confused by it)

then, these manuals are best suited for you: the Assimil Language Series, the Linguaphone Series, the Cortina Methods.

2. If you:

have a desire to have things explained to you beforehand in a nice and clear way

have a logical and analytical mind (which is usually the product of education in general)

have a need for a systematic approach (basically if you’re most comfortable with a book which is going to introduce the grammar according to an agreed set of methods or an organized plan)

then, you should try out some of these manuals: the Hugo Series, the Made Simple Series, the Teach Yourself Series, the Buske Series. 

3. PAY ATTENTION TO PATTERNS!!!

the most important part are the patterns of a language

no matter what type of language learner you are, I think it’s really clever to incorporate this method into you learning. 

a language is actually made up of patterns which constantly repeat themselves and that is THE KEY TO FLUENCY

repeating the patterns over and over again, until they become natural, until you no longer have to conjugate the verbs in your head before speaking

when you become really good with patterns, your sentences will come out naturally, and patterns are what will get you to fluency

I’ve provided the links, where you will find a review of the books, so that you can have an idea of what they look like. You can find most of these on amazon.

Lockdown is extended for at least one more month