When I was young and wanted to know how to get a girl’s attention, people always told me “just be yourself”. I remember how frustrated I was with this line! I used to complain, “obviously ‘being myself’ doesn’t work, because I am myself and it’s not working!” Later on, though, Eventually, I realized I was so focused on getting a girl’s attention that I had become “the guy who wants attention from girls”, and once I stopped trying so hard and started just doing the things that I liked — when I stopped trying to be something for other people, and started just being myself — I ended up getting all the attention from girls I could ever want.

So often, the best advice is also the most frustrating. What you’re hearing sounds wrong because it’s so different from the way you think. Sometimes the you can’t learn something new unless you first un-learn something you already know… or think you know. Sometimes you have to change your beliefs in order to move forward.

One common theme that I repeat a lot on this blog, and indeed in all of my advice to language learners is that the best way to learn a language is to “just use it”. I say it a lot, and I know it to be true because I’ve used this in my own efforts to learn languages. When I’ve used a language, I’ve done well learning it. When I haven’t used it, I’ve had very poor results.

But when I give this advice, I often get arguments in response. When you tell someone the best way to learn is to use the language, you’re usually meet immediately with a response such as “How the hell can I use a language I haven’t learned yet?”, or, “You have to learn it to use it, but you’re saying I have to use it to learn it… that’s circular logic!”

Indeed, on the surface, those look like very logical arguments. But they’re still arguments. The first thing to remember is that any time you’re arguing, you’re not learning. Arguments are, by their very nature, the forceful rejection of an idea rather than welcoming it. (I can’t wait to see how many “arguments” I end up with in the comments section after this!)

When I say “use the language”, I mean it! There will always be time for you to study a book, or to write practice sentences, but those are activities with no personal investment. But if you print the directions to your next doctor appointment in another language, you have a very real investment in using the language, because if you don’t use it, you won’t make it to the doctor’s office!

When you decide to USE the language, your deficiencies become immediately apparent. If you’re making a grocery list, you won’t have any doubts about which words you need to learn. If you change your language settings on Google, there will be no question about which words you need to understand in order to continue using the web site.

This blog is littered with posts with advice for how to use a language in order to learn it. I’ve linked to a few of them in this post. It’s the best advice I know for learning foreign languages… but you might just have to change the way you think.

It’s only May, but already this year I’ve received several free copies of foreign language-related products, and the only thing asked in return is that I review the products on my web site — and I will give each of them an honest, fair review. But as I see more and more new language learning products, I’m constantly reminded of one of my biggest complaints: everyone is competing in the easy space.

When you look at the offerings of all makers of language learning products, they all start to look the same. Everyone is offering materials for people who want to learn Spanish, French, Italian, and German. Those who have been around a bit longer will probably have added Portuguese and Chinese. Maybe Arabic. Maybe Russian. Maybe. And after those, the field starts to get very narrow.

In spite of large numbers of people who speak Korean, Polish, Japanese, Greek, and Turkish, it is very difficult to find materials to help the new speaker learn those languages. And finding materials for Ukrainian, Catalan, Macedonian, Swahili, Kazakh, Norwegian, or anything else can start to seem nearly impossible — particularly for anyone who is not currently living in one of those places.

The root of this problem is obvious, of course. If we follow the popular saying, and “follow the money”, it is clear that the languages getting the most attention are those with the largest potential consumer base. The motive is clear: These companies are not making these products because they want to help you learn, they’re doing it to make a profit.

Before I continue, let me be clear: I have nothing against people earning a profit in return for providing a good service. But I do question the quality of that service when its primary motivation is profit.

Yes, it is entirely possible that some of these products may have risen out of someone’s passion for the Spanish language. But I have my doubts about how far that passion continues once they make the switch to offering French. Especially when Portuguese is always so late to the game. And if a product was born out of a passion for German, why aren’t Dutch and Afrikaans the next products to follow?

With all the big players fighting over the same four popular European languages, there is still a lot of room left for someone who is passionate about Czech to be the first big player with a product in that space. The same goes for Amharic, or Bulgarian, or Tibetan. And with so many Indian people around the world speaking only English, I’m sure there is a huge market for first-generation immigrants who want to learn Hindi.

All of these opportunities are being missed. Even Rosetta Stone, who have the most recognizable name in language learning, usually only offer their entry-level product, and for only a handful of these peripheral languages. Meanwhile they offer as many as five lesson levels for popular languages like Spanish.

My point is this: The motives are clear. These companies (or at least most of them) are not making these products because of their passion for helping you learn; they are making their products because they want your money. And that is the fundamental reason why bloggers like me spend so much time recommending alternative ways to learn.

Don’t waste your money on products that don’t have your best interests at heart. If you’re going to spend your money, spend it wisely. Find companies and people who are passionate about helping you. Use products that are designed with your best interests in mind. In fact, you might be surprised: some of the best products cost very little, and many are free!

It is my firm belief that one of the main reasons why so many people do not learn foreign languages, or why so many people fail at learning foreign languages, is that they simply do not know how to do it. This is the worst kind of problem, because it is a problem whose existence is invisible.

It’s easy to find solutions to problems when you know they exist, but when you don’t know you have a problem your chance of finding an answer is very small. Not knowing how to learn foreign languages, people turn to classrooms, tutors, software, books, or other products which are really only designed to teach the workings of a language, but not to teach how to learn it, or to use it.

So how do you learn a foreign language? That’s the real question then, isn’t it? If most people don’t know how to learn a foreign language, what is it that they don’t know? If you happen to be one of those people, what can I tell you that will help to change that? The answer is a lot of the same things I’ve been saying all along.

Create urgency

The first thing that you have to do is create urgency. Take away the path of least resistance. If you spend all of your time happily functioning in your native language it will take you forever to learn anything in a new one.

As a programmer, when I want to learn a new programming language, I could spend weeks studying it but very little would make sense and I would just get bored. Instead, if I want to learn a new language, I start a brand new project and use that language. Sure, it’s difficult… and slow… but with a real, tangible set of needs in front of me, I learn a lot quickly! The same applies for learning a spoken language.

If you’re anything like me, you probably use Facebook regularly. You might also use Twitter. Maybe you’re the type of person who likes to watch YouTube videos or look for look at funny pictures. Doing those things in a new language doesn’t require much effort on your part, because you already know how to do them. You don’t need instructions or translations.

I am learning more Greek from following Greek people on Twitter than anything I am learning from any book. Sure, I still have to go to Google Translate and look up a lot of words I don’t know, but I’m seeing these words in real-life usage rather than in the sterile, constructed sentences of a lesson book.

Use the language

We’re not all travel bloggers, permanently moving to a new country where we can then learn our new language through immersion, and it’s not often that a change of residence can coincide with our language learning plans, but there are still plenty of things we can do to force ourselves to use a new language while we learn.

Two years ago, while I was learning Italian, I wrote about subscribing to blogs in foreign languages about things that interest you. I’m no longer focused on learning Italian, but I still read the Italian travel blogs I mentioned every day. I can’t say the same about any lesson book I’ve ever read! I enjoy reading about travel, so doing it in another language is easy… and fun! In fact, I just recently found some Greek blogs to start reading.

You probably have a smartphone — maybe an iPhone or an Android. You use it every day, and you know where your apps are and what the icons look like. You don’t really need that to be in your native language, do you? Switch it! Sure, there will be some things that confuse you from time to time, but you’ll also learn a lot of new vocabulary out of necessity, just from using the language. And you can do the same with Google, Facebook, even your whole computer. Why not?

If you’ve spent any time in the language learning community online, you’ve heard about this phrase “comprehensible input” — target-language input which can be understood. What better way to get comprehensible input than to steal it away from your native language!

I’m fond of saying it: You are what you do. The way to learn a new language is clear: use it.

Instead of a long post today about things I do when I learn, today I’m going to change it up a bit and ask for input from my readers.

When you first decide to learn a new language, what are the things you need to know? What strategies do you use? What tricks do you have for getting started?

Answer in the comment section below.

In my last post I pointed out a number of false friends that make life more difficult for the new learner of Modern Greek. But everything isn’t bleak… there are also some not-so-false friends that can be used to your advantage. Today, I’ll look at some of the ways that Greek words can be found in the roots of English words.

Note: I have not done any investigation to prove actual etymology, and I am not asserting that these words are directly historically related, though it seems almost obvious that most of them are. I apologize, but I have to say that in order to prevent the unnecessary comments from self-appointed “language police”, who will almost certainly litter the comment section with arguments about actual linguistic history.

Anyway, I present these word connections in this way because such mnemonic (μνημονικό) devices do help the learner. They’ve definitely helped me!

So then, let’s take a look at some vocabulary that is immediately meaningful to the beginning learner of Modern Greek. Many of the English words to which I correlate the Greek will have scientific or medical meanings, which is a good indication that they are, in fact, using Greek roots.

άνθρωπος – pronounced “anthropos”, which sounds like the beginning of “anthropology”, the study of man, which makes sense because the word means “man”!

γυναίκα – pronounced “gineca”, it obviously reminds me of the word “gynecology” which deals with women’s health. The Greek word means “woman”.

παιδί – pronounced “pedi”, it’s the start of “pediatrician” which is a medical field dealing with children. The word means “child”.

θεός – pronounced “theos”, it reminds me of the word “theology”, the study of gods. And as you probably guessed, the word means “god”.

χρώμα – pronounced “chroma”, it calls to mind the term “chromatic”, which deals with colors. The word means “color”.

αριθμός – pronounced “arithmos”, it reminds me of the word “arithmetic”, the theory of numbers. Not surprisingly, this word means “number”.

λέξη – pronounced “lexi”, you can probably already see that in any lexicon, this word means “word”.

κρέας – pronounced “kreas”, it reminds me of the beginning of the word “creatine”, a chemical that helps to build muscle. Muscle is meat, and that’s what this word means: “meat”.

πατέρας – pronounced “pateras”, it’s a fairly obvious cognate for “father”, but it also helps to remember that it sounds like the beginning of the word “paternal”.

μητέρα – pronounced “mitera”, like the previous example it’s an easy cognate for “mother, but it also sounds like the beginning of the word “maternal”, which adds a little more meaning and perhaps makes it easier to remember.

One likes to think that with so much influence on the English language, there should be a wealth of cognates in Greek which would make it easier for a native English-speaker to learn — and there are — but there are also a lot of “false friends”… words that sound like cognates, but are not.

When I started learning Greek this year, one of the biggest challenges I had to overcome was dealing with false friends. Right from the start, several of the most commonly used words in the Greek language are false friends!

ναι – perhaps the most difficult false friend with Greek, this one still causes me trouble. The word means “yes”, but it is pronounced “nay” which means no in English, and sounds like a word of negation in many other languages as well.

μια – another words that’s been particularly troublesome. This word is pronounced “mia”, which would sound like a first-person possessive (my) in a large number of Indo-European languages, but in Greek it is a feminine indefinite article (a/an).

με – anyone with any experience in a Romance language would take this word as an accusative personal pronoun (me), and it does indeed have that function. However, most of the time that it’s used, its meaning is “with”. (με ζάχαρη = with sugar).

τι – this sounds like it could be a second-person pronoun (you) in almost any Indo-European language. Unfortunately, that’s not even close. This word means “what?”.

και – speaking of the word “what”, that’s exactly what I want to think when I hear this word. Pronounced “kay”, it sounds exactly like the Spanish qué or the Italian che, but it actually means “and”!

η – and the word “and” is what my mind thinks when I hear this word, which sounds like the Spanish “y” or the Russian “и”, but is actually the feminine definite article (the).

ή – to make things even more difficult, adding a stress to the same word changes its meaning to “or”!

ο – And “or” is what I want to think when I see this word, but it’s actually the masculine definite article (the).

Those are all very common words, ready to trip up the new learner from day 1. At this point, I’ve managed to successfully separate them in my mind from their “false friend” meanings. (Though I must admit that I still have trouble with ναι!)

But there are also several more landmines waiting for the Greek learner. Here are a few that I have discovered so far…

ιδιωτικός – sounds like the English word idiotic, which likely originates from this Greek word, but definitely has a completely different meaning today. Ιδιωτικός means “private”.

κόσμος – sounds like “cosmos”, which in English and Russian refers to outer space, but in Greek this word means “world”.

λιμάνι – pronounced “limáni”, it sounds like it would mean “lemon”, but it actually mean “port”.

ερώτηση – saving the best for last, this word is pronounced “erótisi”, I’m sure you can imagine why I thought it meant something other than “question”.

I’m sure I’ll discover many more along the way, but as you can see, that’s already a lot for the new learner to overcome!

Of course it’s not all difficulties. In my next post, I’ll talk about some of the cognates and other slightly less obvious shortcuts that I’ve been able to use to my advantage so far.

If you asked me to choose the one language-learning activity that I think provides the greatest increase in knowledge and ability, for the smallest investment of energy, I would always say the same thing: learning to read.

For those of you who don’t know Aaron Posehn, check out his new language blog, “For the Love of Languages”. He recently wrote a piece entitled The Advantages of Knowing How to Read Foreign Languages, making several points that I agree with, and also pointing out a few great tips that I had never thought of before.

This works with any phonetic writing system, with the exception of a handful of Asian languages that are character-based and have no alphabet. The advantage is obvious when you consider languages like Russian, or Hindi, which use completely different alphabets, but it’s also useful for languages using Latin-based alphabets.

The most obvious and immediate advantage is, of course, that once you learn to read the language you can start to recognize names and places, as well as the wealth of cognates present in almost every language. For example, learning to read the Lithuanian writing system allows me to recognize that Ĉikaga is the name of my city (Chicago), or žurnalas means “magazine” (journal). Similarly, learning the Macedonian writing system makes it possible for me to recognize that word Фудбал means I’m probably reading about soccer (football), and the word Скопје is a reference to the capital city (Skopje).

Being able to perform such simple tasks in another language may sound small, but it enables you to read basic signage, find directions, and (with some creativity) even make some assumptions about things you see in headlines, or tweets, or whatever else you see in that language.

Also, most notably, it empowers you to learn basic vocabulary. Once you know how to read, you can learn basic words (for example, from your phrasebook) and you’ll be able to find things like restrooms, exits, airports, etc.

One really exciting idea which I hadn’t previously thought of, though, is a trick Aaron mentioned in his post. After being able to read the alphabet, and not much more than just that, he was able to use the words printed next to pictures in order to purchase the exact breakfast meal he wanted while in a restaurant in Pusan, Korea.

What other tricks have you discovered from only learning only to read a language? Leave a comment below! And don’t forget to go check out Aaron’s blog!

It’s been a while since I updated here. Rest assured, that’s not because I’ve given up. There’s a good reason for the recent silence — I’ve moved!

I’ve hinted in recent posts that I wanted to find an apartment near my office, and thus near Greektown. Who could have imagined I’d find the perfect place? Not only is it only a 1-block walk from the heart of Chicago’s “Greektown”, but it’s also in the building directly adjacent to my office!

My commute to work is less than fifty steps (I never even cross a single street!), and that means a savings of more than one-and-one-half hour each day just getting to and from work… which means more time I can spend doing the things that I enjoy, including learning Greek, and practicing with the people in my new neighborhood!

Not only is the location perfect for everything that’s going on in my life, but this apartment is also the nicest place I’ve ever lived. The space is large and beautiful, everything is brand new, and the people in my building are extremely friendly. For the first time in my life, I can’t think of a single complaint about the place where I live.

In spite of the fact that I have very few possessions, many details of the move ate up a lot of my time recently. But that’s all done and I’m all settled in now, so it’s back to my studies and back to regular updates here.

Stay tuned!

Yesterday morning, I woke to an email from David Mansaray, asking me “Is learning a language difficult?” Part of my response was quoted in his latest blog post, but I found the topic very interesting, and it inspired me to give a lot of thought to how we use the word “difficult” in relation to language learning, and other things.

It’s not learning a language that’s hard. Actually, taken at face value, “learning” is easy, and “language” is easy. Then again, exercising is easy too. So is saving money and paying bills. But in a world full of diet pills, spray-on tans, cosmetic surgeries, lottery tickets, and game shows, it’s hard to deny that the hard part of any big task is having the consistency, the perseverance, the patience to see it through. Learning the language is the easy part; the hard part is doing all the work, day after day. This is why foreign language skill remains such an effective signal about people — there’s no shortcut for doing the work.

Once we accept that learning is the easy part, it becomes obvious that difficulty isn’t the issue. The actual challenge is intent, which is at the core of persistence. If you pay attention each year on January 1, you see endless examples of easy tasks people want to accomplish: lose weight, quit smoking, start exercising, and often, learn a foreign language, etc.

Is quitting smoking difficult? No! Your default state is not smoking! What could involve less effort than staying in your default state? It requires more effort to acquire cigarettes, light them, smoke them, etc.

Is exercising difficult? No. Just stand up and start doing it. Certain exercises may, in fact, be difficult, but the act of exercising is as simple as anything else.

Is losing excess weight difficult? No. Just stop eating so much of the things that fatten. Once again, your default state wins here. We are all, by default, not eating. It requires more work to gain weight than it does to lose it!

And, as we already discussed above, learning a language isn’t difficult either. If you’re reading this, you’ve already learned at least one language successfully!

None of these things is difficult, and calling them difficult doesn’t affect your confidence, or trick yourself into thinking it can’t be done. The truth is, calling things difficult is an excuse. It’s a fore-drawn conclusion. It’s a way to justify to all your peers when you fail to do the simple task you claimed you wanted to accomplish.

But your peers know this game already. They play it too. When someone tells us something is difficult, we already understand that they’re really telling us they lack the persistence to do it. So lets not fool ourselves into thinking that it’s different when we it… “Others are making excuses, but I really mean it.” No. You don’t.

When your desire to eat jelly donuts is stronger than your desire to lose weight… when your desire to have than next cigarette is stronger than your desire to quit… when your desire to have a bigger television is stronger than your desire to grow your savings… and when your desire to watch tv, go to the bar with friends, play video games, etc. is stronger than your desire to learn a foreign language… then the intent is clear: you will not do it. And then you’ll justify that poor self-control and lack of persistence by proclaiming “it’s too hard.” But make no mistake: it’s not hard. It’s an excuse.

In previous posts, I’ve already described the process I used for my first month of Greek study, which has been mostly about getting comfortable reading and writing in the new alphabet, learning pronunciation rules, and learning some basic phrases.

I’ve already impressed my Greek coworker twice this month with the amount I’ve learned in a short time. And last week, I even had a very brief conversation — basically, an exchange of small-talk — with the man behind the counter at a bakery in Greek Town.

I’m off to a good start already! Without a doubt, having people with whom to speak is a huge key to success in learning a foreign language.

Now that my first month is done, the time for relaxation is over. For the next month or two, I’m going to charge through all the materials I can find, and do it as fast as possible.

Brute-Force Fluency
Based on my results last year with a short Polish experiment, I’m going to give this method a serious chance. Starting with Colloquial Greek I’m going to read through as much material as possible, as fast as possible.

The idea is not to memorize every detail. It’s not even to “study” or to successfully learn everything I see. Rather, I just want to understand each concept as I see it. If something doesn’t make sense, I’ll slow down, re-read it, etc. But as long as I’m understanding what I see, I’m going to keep going.

After going through the entire Colloquial Polish book in just 9 days, I found that in spite of not remembering every word I read, the grammar made sense, the conjugations made sense, even the constructions of words and prefixes made sense. I didn’t get fluent, but I did learn in 9 days what might have taken several months otherwise.

Using this method, I was able to speak and understand Polish at a very basic level in just over a week. Could I get similar results in another language? Could I get even better results by repeating the process a few times with additional books?

We’ll find out. The experiment begins now. If it works, it will change everything about how I approach language learning in the future.