What's the most effective method you've found for learning?

Cianos

Just wondering what aspect of peoples language learning they thought to be the most effective?

Would it be studying, reading and answering questions? Listening to audio books? Conversing with fellow speakers of the language etc etc?

Surely a combination of all would be beneficial but just wondering what aspect people found to make the most difference!

Jay Pentatonic

You're dead on about the combination of them all, no harm can ever come from that.

The best method for me is regularly listening to the radio. It helps me loads that there're no visual distractions, just the language to be heard.

and of course talking to real people in real conversations is always a huge help.

the trick is though, keeping up with it.

If you continuosly do a method that works for you again & again & again, you'll only get success

prideaspunch

Speaking with people is by far the fastest....writing down words you don't understand...and attaching mental images to words is also very helpful.

I would say the more variety you put into learning a language the better...but always have speaking with people as the main emphasis for study.

Aard

Other than living in a country where the language is spoken, this is what I (try to) do:

1. Flashcards -- yes I always though that they were dumb too, but that's only if they're in hard-format. I use a program called Anki, which is a relatively sophisticated way to learn vocab.
2. Read the news -- try to find a news site that suits your level, choose an article, and work through it. Add any new words to Anki.
3. Radio -- to get a feel for how the spoken language is used. Again, current affairs are the order of the day.
4. Talk to people -- no better way to learn than by throwing yourself in at the deep end. I often learn more from a two-minute conversation about the state of the bus service, than in a two-hour study session.

I've always found answering questions on a text to be tedious. It reminds me of school. Real-life language is usually quite different.

As Jay said above - keep it up! 30 minutes every day is preferable to several hours over the weekend. Even if you just read one small news article, and note the new words, it pays off over time. I think a lot of people have the idea that they're either never gonna get any good at the language, or that suddenly one day after years of study, they'll be fluent. If you give yourself a (vague) deadline, it will help. According to http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Language_Learning_Difficulty_for_English_Speakers most European languages would require about 800 hours of study before becoming any way fluent, which equals about an hour a day for two years. Motivation can be difficult, especially when progress is slow. If you can discipline yourself to do an hour in the evening no matter how you're feeling, you'll get there faster. In the end, I guess, it doesn't necessarily matter what you study, just that you study.


(I, too, am interested in other people's methods, so please post if you're reading this! )

travnett

http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/ check out this website, it has some good points on it for learning a language. Also check http://www.fluentin3months.com/ he is an Irish Polyglot and also has good points about vocab retention etc...

Aard

@travnet:
I've been on the Irish guy's site before, but I find it hard to find any information, and his videos are tedious to watch. Do you remember any of his vocab points off the top of your head?

dory

Aard wrote: »

@travnet:
I've been on the Irish guy's site before, but I find it hard to find any information, and his videos are tedious to watch. Do you remember any of his vocab points off the top of your head?

Mostly visualization and word association. Attach a big story to a word. Like if the word for station is monstair or something, imagine a monster coming into the station to remember that.


I think it's so hard to find information because he writes so often, so he has to write a lot of waffle around the good stuff to get up his readership. You have to dig deep to get past the, 'Stop thinking, speak' stuff.

dory

dory wrote: »

Mostly visualization and word association. Attach a big story to a word. Like if the word for station is monstair or something, imagine a monster coming into the station to remember that.


I think it's so hard to find information because he writes so often, so he has to write a lot of waffle around the good stuff to get up his readership. You have to dig deep to get past the, 'Stop thinking, speak' stuff.

Excuse me for going slightly off topic while I make my point. I've read a lot of his stuff recently and while he is certainly inspiring, I think a lot of what he writes is total rubbish. He has this really irritating arrogant attitude going, which really is arrogance rather than confidence. He seems really out of touch sometimes, making statements about how anyone can just go off and learn a language in the country it's spoken, that those who claim they are too shy to go up and speak to strangers (to practise languages) are deluded, things like that. He just constantly pushes this 'you can ONLY learn to speak a language by speaking with natives' thing, poo-pooing any ideas of using flashcards or vocab lists or podcasts.

What irks me is that he really isn't even that great at the languages he speaks, which is surprising since he has written many, many posts about how to lose your English accent, how to sound like a native, things like that. Yes, he does appear to be fairly fluent from the video blogs (although it's all scripted and practised) but his accent in French is horrendous. His Spanish is very good, but he still mispronounces many of the sounds and most certainly would never be mistaken for a native (which is a claim he makes on a regular basis). I know nobody is perfect, and it is impressive that he speaks so many languages, but if he can't manage to take his own advice, what makes him think it's so easy for his readers who don't have the ability to live abroad and interact with target languages speakers every day?

I also disagree about speaking with natives being the only way to learn. Of course it's brilliant, but Mr Polyglot doesn't seem to get that some people genuinely don't have the time or ability to do this. I've always being pretty enthusiastic about practising, and I still only manage about 3-5 hours a week of talking to natives. His idea that everyone can manage hours a day is just not realistic for most people. And I just don't agree that ONLY speaking is enough. I personally think that using your commuting time to listen to a Linguaphone CD or look at flash cards can be pretty effective. You could argue that it leads to people developing a passive knowledge of a language, but I think if you back it up with some interaction with human beings, it's fine. I've learned loads from watching either foreign movies with English subtitles or English movies with foreign subtitles. It's waaay more fun than learning lists of vocab (which does work for some people, but not for me), I think the fact there is an image on screen really helps with connecting words and phrases to concepts. Flashcard systems like Anki can be really good as well, especially for tricky words you seem to forget a lot, although I think you SHOULD NOT generally learn words in a list in a bilingual format, like apple = manzana. That only encourages you to think in English and translate and you will never be fluent doing that. I would only use vocab lists or flashcards for highly specialised or technical vocab.

I believe that there are different types of learners and therefore no one definite way to learn vocab. I learn well from listening and/or watching, for example I picked up 5 or 6 phrases of Romanian (which I don't speak at all) from eavesdropping on a conversation today. Some people just wouldn't be able to do that, they need to see the words written down. I find reading in foreign languages tedious and quite boring, so reading the paper doesn't work well for me but plenty of people swear by it. I think you should just try a mixture of things until you find something that works. I don't believe language learning should be a chore. I would certainly rather learn vocab from watching Sex and the City with Dutch subs than slog over books every night. If the method you choose is boring, you just won't do it.

Enkidu

Kallie Loose Sticker wrote: »

What irks me is that he really isn't even that great at the languages he speaks, which is surprising since he has written many, many posts about how to lose your English accent, how to sound like a native, things like that. Yes, he does appear to be fairly fluent from the video blogs (although it's all scripted and practised) but his accent in French is horrendous. His Spanish is very good, but he still mispronounces many of the sounds and most certainly would never be mistaken for a native (which is a claim he makes on a regular basis).

I must say I noticed this as well. In that video where he speaks eight different languages I noticed that about a few of them. His Irish in particular is completely off. Irish has two spoken consonants for each written consonant, he tends to only pronounce one of them. In some cases, r for example, neither of the two spoken versions sound like the English r (one sounds almost like a j), but he pronounces just like an English r.

As you said a lot of his suggestions won't work for everybody. I like to learn lots of grammar and get the phonetics right first, before trying to build my vocab. His "no grammar" approach wouldn't suit me it all.

However I do think he has useful suggestions about methods of learning you wouldn't think of yourself, such as loading textbooks on to Kindle in pdf format, e.t.c.

The other thing is that I don't think he assumes people have the time to just drop things and leave, more so that you can always utilise the time you have by doing stuff you might find embarrasing initially. For example you manage to speak to native speakers, a lot of people wouldn't do this because they find it embarrasing. I do agree with his general point that sometimes people just keep studying and studying and after years can't speak because they've never done anything active.

Also I should say two things:
1. He is definitely correct that anybody can learn a language and a lot of people are held back by a negative attitude.
2. I really do not think he is arrogant. As you said he ignores a lot of the realities of learning a language, but I think that's because he's a bit blind to some things in his enthusiasm. However there is nothing I would have taken directly as arrogance, it's not like he's saying "Only really clever people like me can learn a language".

Enkidu

Enkidu wrote: »

I must say I noticed this as well. In that video where he speaks eight different languages I noticed that about a few of them. His Irish in particular is completely off. Irish has two spoken consonants for each written consonant, he tends to only pronounce one of them. In some cases, r for example, neither of the two spoken versions sound like the English r (one sounds almost like a j), but he pronounces just like an English r.

All of them sound off to me, except Italian and that's because I can't speak it well enough to tell. I think he tries SO hard to sound 'native' that he ends up overdoing all the sounds and exaggerating features of the languages. His Brazilian accent just sounds like a foreigner trying to sound like a Brazilian. Now, obviously he speaks the languages fairly well and he does have a 'good' accent, but I just refuse to believe all these claims he makes, such as 'Argentineans think I'm Spanish'. No, they don't. No Spanish speaker would ever take him for a native Spanish speaker. He can't even pronounce 'Jose' correctly (he pronounces the S as a Z, like most English speakers). This is part of why I find him arrogant, I think he thinks his languages are far better than they really are and then uses himself as an example of how 'easy' it is. He presents an example of someone thinking he's native because he managed to pronounce three words without an accent and then says 'LOOK! See how easy it is to sound native! I only learned X for 3 months!' Guess what, I can sound 'native' for a few rehearsed sentences in Cantonese. Doesn't mean a thing.

As you said a lot of his suggestions won't work for everybody. I like to learn lots of grammar and get the phonetics right first, before trying to build my vocab. His "no grammar" approach wouldn't suit me it all.

Exactly. But he would shoot you down for suggesting that. He shoots anyone down who dares to suggest there might be other options, and often in a really rude way. I also find it more useful to learn a bit of grammar than to go up to someone sounding like a 4 year old.

However I do think he has useful suggestions about methods of learning you wouldn't think of yourself, such as loading textbooks on to Kindle in pdf format, e.t.c.

Indeed. A lot of his suggestions are really useful, that's why I read so much of the blog. I just don't agree with this 'one method for all' idea.

The other thing is that I don't think he assumes people have the time to just drop things and leave, more so that you can always utilise the time you have by doing stuff you might find embarrasing initially. For example you manage to speak to native speakers, a lot of people wouldn't do this because they find it embarrasing. I do agree with his general point that sometimes people just keep studying and studying and after years can't speak because they've never done anything active.

I also agree with his general point, but he has said several times that 'anyone' can live abroad and travel and that luck doesn't have anything to do with it. Well, that's utter bullsh*t. Some people are in piles of debt, have disabilities, have commitments at home (hospital, family members), there are plenty of reasons why it would be much more difficult for some people to do what he does. But he never acknowledges this. I find that he tends to over-congratulate himself without acknowledging that he has had a lot of good fortune as well. I also did not really appreciate his recent post which claimed that shy people are just deluded. Again, I totally see his point, that people should just get out there and speak, but he shows an alarming lack of compassion and empathy for people who really do have shyness/anxiety/depression issues. I don't see the benefit in such people forcing themselves to get out and speak when they would much prefer sitting in with a grammar book or watching films with subs. They're still going to learn a good bit, aren't they? I think he really does seem to assume that everyone in the world is like him and learns the way he does. I know plenty of people who became fluent in a language with very little real interaction with natives.

Also I should say two things:
1. He is definitely correct that anybody can learn a language and a lot of people are held back by a negative attitude.

I don't agree that anyone can learn to speak at an almost-native level, which he often seems to claim. He even tried to argue that it's physically possible for ANYONE to roll their R's, which is totally untrue. I do agree that a lot of people are held back by their attitude, yes.

2. I really do not think he is arrogant. As you said he ignores a lot of the realities of learning a language, but I think that's because he's a bit blind to some things in his enthusiasm. However there is nothing I would have taken directly as arrogance, it's not like he's saying "Only really clever people like me can learn a language".

I think he's arrogant because:

1) He overestimates his own ability.
2) He refuses to acknowledge other peoples' (real) issues with learning.
3) He thinks he knows better about EVERYTHING. Even medical issues and things like that. He is constantly telling people that conditions don't exist, it's all in their head. I find that incredibly arrogant and grating. Who does he think he is, like?
4) He seems to think his own experience is so much more valuable and valid than anyone else's. Just have a read of the comments pages. He is constantly telling perfectly reasonable and intelligent commentators that they're wrong because they don't agree with him.

I don't mean to totally slate the guy (although it seems I have ). I do think his blog is very interesting and a lot of his advice is good. I really do appreciate his enthusiasm and all that and find the whole thing inspiring. I just take everything he writes with a huge grain of salt. At the end of the day, it's impossible to become 'fluent' (in the way most of us understand the word) in a language in three months. I just don't buy it. What I think he is doing is a good impression of fluency. Mimicking the accent, mastering the basics, being able to have simple conversations. Because so much of a language comes from the culture, you just cannot get the hang of all the idioms, colloquial usage etc in such a short space of time. I'm not even convinced that someone could get a handle on the grammar in that space of time. While I do agree that speaking is one of the best ways to learn, I also think study is very important, especially for those who do not have an 'ear' for languages or who are more introverted. Speaking all the time is not for everyone, IMO.

Enkidu

Good post Kallie Loose Sticker!

Mimicking the accent, mastering the basics, being able to have simple conversations. Because so much of a language comes from the culture, you just cannot get the hang of all the idioms, colloquial usage etc in such a short space of time. I'm not even convinced that someone could get a handle on the grammar in that space of time.

I would agree with this. A lot of the difficulty of speaking a new language is having enough knowledge of its own literature, colloquialisms and cultural references to follow somebody talking naturally.

I must say, I tend to stay away from comments sections of websites, so I probably haven't seen some of the more forceful stuff you're talking about.

Aard

I would broadly agree with what was said above; he has some points, but an awful method of delivery.

I can only comment on his Irish and French accents. Neither are native-quality.

I do think, however, that his attitude towards speaking with natives is spot-on. When a French person understands perfectly what I've said, or, better yet, laughs at a joke I make, it gives me far more confidence in my language-skills than any number of hours studying alone. But of course, it's not so extreme; studying grammar should complement real-life practice.

dory

Kallie Loose Sticker wrote: »

At the end of the day, it's impossible to become 'fluent' (in the way most of us understand the word) in a language in three months. I just don't buy it. What I think he is doing is a good impression of fluency. Mimicking the accent, mastering the basics, being able to have simple conversations.

That's exactly what it is really. Think about it; he's been doing this since 2003. He currently speaks 8 languages (his Irish is very questionable). Take away English and Irish and you're left with 6. 6 in 7 years is not fluent in 3 months! He wrote about it before saying how long he'd been in each country; Spain 18 months, I think France was around 6-7 months, he did 6 years of German in school. I can't remember the others but from what I remember of his writing he has never gone from 0 - fluent in 3 months.

dory

dory wrote: »

That's exactly what it is really. Think about it; he's been doing this since 2003. He currently speaks 8 languages (his Irish is very questionable). Take away English and Irish and you're left with 6. 6 in 7 years is not fluent in 3 months! He wrote about it before saying how long he'd been in each country; Spain 18 months, I think France was around 6-7 months, he did 6 years of German in school. I can't remember the others but from what I remember of his writing he has never gone from 0 - fluent in 3 months.

I think he has done some projects such as Czech and Hungarian in 2-3 months but he's obviously not fluent in them, so I don't see the point he's trying to make. I think he might have learned Portuguese in a few months, but all the others, he studied in school and/or lived in the country for a considerable amount of time.

I just don't understand what he's trying to do. He claims he's not learning the languages for 'bragging rights' but that's exactly how it looks to me - learning how to 'seem' fluent. And what's the point in that, really? Who exactly is he trying to impress? Would the time spent pretending to master 8 languages not be better spent actually learning two or three?

Aard

@Kallie Loose Sticker:
I know exactly what he's trying to do: make money. His ebooks cost a pretty penny, and apparently he does consultancy as well. This would be fine, were he credible. He just doesn't compare to, say, Richard Simcott (search him on youtube!), somebody who clearly knows his stuff. This guy, however, just comes across as a chancer.

Enkidu

Aard wrote: »

@Kallie Loose Sticker:
I know exactly what he's trying to do: make money. His ebooks cost a pretty penny, and apparently he does consultancy as well. This would be fine, were he credible. He just doesn't compare to, say, Richard Simcott (search him on youtube!), somebody who clearly knows his stuff. This guy, however, just comes across as a chancer.

Holy ****! He's fantastic. He sounds very natural in every one of those sixteen languages.

Aard

Aard wrote: »

@Kallie Loose Sticker:
I know exactly what he's trying to do: make money. His ebooks cost a pretty penny, and apparently he does consultancy as well. This would be fine, were he credible. He just doesn't compare to, say, Richard Simcott (search him on youtube!), somebody who clearly knows his stuff. This guy, however, just comes across as a chancer.

You're right. He is a chancer. Whatever his motivation was for learning the languages in the first place (it doesn't really matter), it is obvious that he's now marketing himself as some sort of expert when all he does is rehash other peoples' ideas, point out obvious things (the consonants sound different in other languages? OH REALLY?) and drone on about having to speak the language. This whole 'language hacking' thing is basically, as I said earlier, removing all the 'boring' bit of learning and learning how to pretend you speak a language fluently. That's nothing new, it's just cutting corners. I don't care if I'd be right 70% of the time if I always formed my plurals a certain way. I'd be speaking badly the other 30% of the time. I suppose if you're only interested in being able to hold a conversation and don't mind making loads of mistakes, that's OK, but you don't need any language hacking guide to do that.

The whole 'fluent in three months' thing seems to be very misleading as well. I actually haven't seen any evidence yet that Benny himself went from nothing to fluent in any language. He made a big show of aiming to sit the C2 German after 3 months in Berlin, but he'd already done FIVE YEARS of German at school, and I never did see any posts about whether or not he passed it (although perhaps he did and I just didn't see it). Meh, fair play to him, I guess, if people want to buy his pricey e-books, but I'm not fond of the way he completely dismisses academic research, other peoples' opinions and common sense and reasoning. It does make him look like a total chancer and very unprofessional.

I will say that when you ignore the more patronising articles, his blog is good for motivating yourself. It is good to remind yourself to just get out there and speak - I went on a long weekend to Amsterdam and as I only speak very basic Dutch (never really got started properly), I normally would have just spoken English to everyone. However, having the 'just speak' thing etched into my brain, I decided to go for it and I realised I knew more Dutch than I realised - I was able to order coffee, lunch, tickets, basic stuff but it was a massive buzz that people understood me and replied to me in Dutch without batting an eyelid. If I'd waited until I'd learned more grammar, I might not have ever had the opportunity again. So for me, the blog is useful for that, reading about his adventures and being inspired to do similar things. The rest is pretty much a load of rubbish, IMO.

Sie

If you can get your hands on them for free or at a decent price, try the whole 45 hours of Pimsleur cd's (Comprehension packs I,II & III)... These are an easy, enjoyable and very very efective format of study. The trouble is if you buy new, the whole set could cost 600 Euro approx. But the whole world use these; they drive all the crap grammer into your subconcious as you learn vocab and challenge yourself to perfect your accent through speaking out loud, as you repeat learned sentences in a time limit. In a nutshell, your own private tutor; drilling you like a robot.

This is not enough simply on its own.. To back up, and learn the written language, try a book based course (everybody seems to suggest Teach Yourself). Just make sure you don't waste any cash on ridicouless holiday packs. Get the full long course. It will be a breeze after you make your way tru the Pimsleur audio packs. Teach Yourself and Berlitz courses are available for next to nothing on Amazon.uk.

By making your own flashcards you can obtain a very large vocablaury very quickly. Group 20 words/cards into thematic groups. This is probably the best place to start your study. I'd like to build up a 500 word database before looking into grammer. Knowing these words will help you put them and the grammer into context together. Revise often, especially in the first month and you will have these words for life.

I think these are the most effective methods, but classes and obviously visiting abroud and talking to natives are undenyably effective.

Don't bother trying to read Newspapers for a while as they will just dishearthen. Mostly written in the past tense. Instead buy the most basic books targeted especially for begginers. Or you could try a reader if you enjoy learning that way. Same applies to Tele and Radio.. You will need to be very advanced to make any sense of these.. If you play computer games set the language to your target language.. May be difficult to navigate at first but will all make sense after a while as you will have a fair idea of what's going on anyway. Every DVD you watch, do it with subtitles if they are avalable...

That's all I can think off the top of my head:cool:

Funglegunk

Sie wrote: »

If you can get your hands on them for free or at a decent price, try the whole 45 hours of Pimsleur cd's (Comprehension packs I,II & III)... These are an easy, enjoyable and very very efective format of study. The trouble is if you buy new, the whole set could cost 600 Euro approx. But the whole world use these; they drive all the crap grammer into your subconcious as you learn vocab and challenge yourself to perfect your accent through speaking out loud, as you repeat learned sentences in a time limit. In a nutshell, your own private tutor; drilling you like a robot.

This is not enough simply on its own.. To back up, and learn the written language, try a book based course (everybody seems to suggest Teach Yourself). Just make sure you don't waste any cash on ridicouless holiday packs. Get the full long course. It will be a breeze after you make your way tru the Pimsleur audio packs. Teach Yourself and Berlitz courses are available for next to nothing on Amazon.uk.

By making your own flashcards you can obtain a very large vocablaury very quickly. Group 20 words/cards into thematic groups. This is probably the best place to start your study. I'd like to build up a 500 word database before looking into grammer. Knowing these words will help you put them and the grammer into context together. Revise often, especially in the first month and you will have these words for life.

I think these are the most effective methods, but classes and obviously visiting abroud and talking to natives are undenyably effective.

Don't bother trying to read Newspapers for a while as they will just dishearthen. Mostly written in the past tense. Instead buy the most basic books targeted especially for begginers. Or you could try a reader if you enjoy learning that way. Same applies to Tele and Radio.. You will need to be very advanced to make any sense of these.. If you play computer games set the language to your target language.. May be difficult to navigate at first but will all make sense after a while as you will have a fair idea of what's going on anyway. Every DVD you watch, do it with subtitles if they are avalable...

That's all I can think off the top of my head:cool:

Thanks for that great post. (The computer game thing never occurred to me!)

I've been using the Rosetta Stone courses for Mandarin Chinese, and they are returning pretty good results so far. They use image rather than word association, with no English whatsoever, so the words and phrases do stick in your head without the need for much revision. The voice recognition, once you have set up your mic correctly (which I didn't at first, resulting in my shouting the Chinese phrase for 'These men are cooking' about 50,000 times), works great too. However, Rosetta Stone is in no way sufficient by itself for learning the language and should only be used as a supplemental (I also live in China and take lessons from a native speaker). It's also pretty damn expensive, ($499 on the website at the moment, and there is a sale on!).

Kevin.Hn

Read loudly, quickly, and clearly!

Sie

Funglegunk wrote: »

Thanks for that great post. (The computer game thing never occurred to me!)

I've been using the Rosetta Stone courses for Mandarin Chinese, and they are returning pretty good results so far. They use image rather than word association, with no English whatsoever, so the words and phrases do stick in your head without the need for much revision. The voice recognition, once you have set up your mic correctly (which I didn't at first, resulting in my shouting the Chinese phrase for 'These men are cooking' about 50,000 times), works great too. However, Rosetta Stone is in no way sufficient by itself for learning the language and should only be used as a supplemental (I also live in China and take lessons from a native speaker). It's also pretty damn expensive, ($499 on the website at the moment, and there is a sale on!).

Thanks m8.. Wow mandarin, well done on pursuing with such a tuff language, challenge of a lifetime.. I could never get near affording Rosetta Stone..

I know bottom line is, nothing really is sufficient by itself.. Yeah try the pimsleur thing if ya get a chance.. 700 euro to buy the 50 hours, but if ur lucky you can get it all for free at a good library.. Ha while listening to audio cd's, playing computer games is the difference between having fun while you learn, and sitting in an armchair (as they suggest on the website) repeating phrases to the wall and going crazy.....:cool:

Funglegunk

Sie wrote: »

Thanks m8.. Wow mandarin, well done on pursuing with such a tuff language, challenge of a lifetime.. I could never get near affording Rosetta Stone..

I know bottom line is, nothing really is sufficient by itself.. Yeah try the pimsleur thing if ya get a chance.. 700 euro to buy the 50 hours, but if ur lucky you can get it all for free at a good library.. Ha while listening to audio cd's, playing computer games is the difference between having fun while you learn, and sitting in an armchair (as they suggest on the website) repeating phrases to the wall and going crazy.....:cool:

It's actually not as tough as you would think, the basic grammar is more simple than European languages (though I hear once it gets more advanced, grammar rules that make no sense start to come into play). And I can't afford Rosetta Stone either, I was lucky in that the company paid for it!

Yeah I don't have the discipline to listen to 50 hours of audio while sitting in a chair either. It's better to have that stuff on in the background while you're cleaning your house or ironing your clothes, some mundane task like that.

Aard

OK, some more language-learning tips!


I've taken to reading forums in French, and it's really helping. Specifically, I read Skyscraper City. As it's a relatively technical subject, people tend to post cohesive sentences rather than text speak. Also, the people posting there would tend to have a good command of the language, and not make grammatical mistakes. I've already learned a lot of vocab, and somewhat surprisingly most of it is actually day-to-day kind of words and phrases.

I use a Firefox plugin called "Quick Translator", and it's honestly the most advanced, accurate translater I've ever used. Much better than Google Translate, and it seamlessly into the browser, cutting down on tab-changing copy-paste time. Of course, the trick is to limit the use of the translator, and only to use it when you really can't figure out the meaning, when you use it as a dictionary, or when there's an unusual turn of phrase being used.

Another thing about reading a forum, as opposed to a newspaper or a book (which I do too), is that the language used is the kind of language that's actually spoken. Newspapers and books are highly structured, which is fine if I want to write an article in French. But I don't really. I want to learn to speak it, and the time-delay nature of forums is much more suited to the learner than face-to-face. (Of course, and I'm probably contradicting myself here, face-to-face has its role too -- namely in building up confidence.)


Anyway, these are just some extra thoughts I had on learning. I guess the main thing is that different things work for different people, but the more options you have available the more likely you are to succeed!