Everyone wants to learn a second foreign language, or maybe a third or more in better cases; For various purposes such as study, communication, travel, work and perhaps just out of love for the same language.
However, many fail in the matter, because they followed the famous wrong path and followed the old method of learning languages, which is: a classroom, a teacher, books, dictionaries, and countless references.
Psychologist Chris Londsale.
He runs a company in China, and because of his work, he was forced to learn Chinese with its two dialects, mandarin and cantonese K, and he is also the author of the book (The Third Ear) in which he deals with human attitudes towards learning languages, and the customs of those who were able to master more than one language known as polyglots ..
After spending a lifetime researching learning methods and theories, he was able to identify five rules and seven ways in which anyone can learn any language in six months, explaining this in his TEDxLingnanUniversity talk.
The five basic rules for learning any language
1) Pay attention to the language content that interests you:
Why do you want to learn a second language? Is it for an academic / academic purpose?
For example, do you want to learn English because you are learning to manage business? ... then learn Business English.
Do you want to learn Spanish to be able to communicate with your Spanish friend? So learn conversational Spanish
Do you want to learn German to be able to read scientific and medical research papers written in German? Then you need to learn medical / scientifical German.
And so on..
2) Use the new language as a new communication tool ; There is no need for your study of the language to be confined to the classroom in the antique academic image.
You have to put yourself in situations that force you to use this language and communicate with others, even if only to a small extent.
3) Focus on the message : when you understand the message to be conveyed to you, you will be unconsciously acquiring the language.
When you learn a new language, instead of focusing on words, try to absorb the message they are trying to convey to you through their gestures, body language, and facial expressions, focus on the meaning.
4) Language is a psychological training, not the acquisition of knowledge
We have “filters” in our minds that recognize sounds familiar to us, and deny sounds that are foreign to us.
So, if you don't hear it, you won't be able to learn it.. that's a rule!
Therefore, you have to constantly listen to the sounds of the language you are learning to train your brain to receive new sounds.
In addition, you have 43 muscles in your face, which you have to organize to use to produce sounds that others can understand.
5) Take care of your psychological state
If you are upset and sad, or stressed and tense, then most likely you will not be able to learn anything other than if you are happy and calm, then you will achieve and learn more effectively.
So try to be in a stable psychological state while you teach, but if you are disoriented, you will learn with difficulty.
Be tolerant of yourself, at first you will understand very little of what people say, but that's okay everything will get better and it's only a start.
Seven steps to learn any language quickly and effectively
Based on these five rules established by Mr. Chris, there are seven steps that you must follow in order to quickly and effectively learn any language .. They are:
1) Listen a lot
They call it “brain soaking”. At first, you will not understand most of what you hear, but that's okay. It tells the different sounds, repeated words and their pattern.
Listen to short conversational clips, to parts from movies and series, to songs and documentaries, to children's spoken stories and songs.
2) Acquire the language interactively
Focus on understanding the meaning and message through facial expressions, body movements and gestures, rather than on the meaning of each word.
3) Start mixing!
If you have ten verbs, ten words, ten pronouns and adjectives, then you can form 1000 different sentences. Language is a creative work. You can say whatever you want in multiple forms.
It is okay to form funny sentences that do not seem logical or of a comic character.
Some fun won't hurt, just make sure the sentence structure is correct.
4) Pay attention to what's important
In every language there is a content that is most used, in English one thousand words represent 85% of the language, and three thousand make up 98% of it.
The rest are not equally popular.
5) Get a language father!
When you begin to learn any language, your itinerary will be as follows:
In the first week: Always ask, “What is this? “How do you say such-and-such? "Can you bring that back slowly?" , " What does this mean? “.
* In the second and third week: You will be able to use some pronouns and adjectives such as "I - you - these - he and she - hot - cold - tall - beautiful - stupid .."
* In the fourth week: You will be able to use conjugation letters such as “and - or - but - so…” And by that, you can make complete sentences of correct meaning.
That linguistic father will treat you like his child who starts to learn to speak, will understand what you say when no one else understands you, he will create a safe environment for you to practice language with confidence, and the rules of language parenting are:
He will strive to understand what you are trying to say.
He will not correct you.
They will emphasize understanding by using correct words and correct phrases.
They will use words you already know while paying attention to body language and facial expressions.
6) Mimic the sound
Imitate the facial expressions and movements that you see on the faces of the people who are speaking so that you are able to pronounce the words correctly.
7) Make mental pictures
Some people, while learning the language, create an endless long list of words that should be memorized next to the corresponding meaning in their native language, and return to it from time to time in the hope of fixing them in their heads, this method is not effective at all.
Everything on your mind is an image. When you think of fire, you feel the heat and you smell the smoke and you see the flames.
All you have to do is think about the mental image you have regarding fire, then put its contrast in the language you are learning and it will remain in your mind.
And Memrise is one of the most popular sites in this regard:
Now all you have to do is specify the language you want and do the right thing!
