Learning a new language is incredibly rewarding. A new language will open doors when you travel, it will help you better understand a different culture, it can connect you with your roots or your friends and neighbors, it can set you apart on the job, and it is a wonderful way to keep your brain limber. But it’s not necessarily easy; learning anything presents challenges, and learning a new language brings its own set of challenges. Every language learner follows a unique path, but there are certain habits that every successful language learner adopts, and then adapts. Let’s take a look at five habits of successful language learners.
Language Learning Habit 1: Find your routine.
If you’ve ever gone to the gym or started an exercise regimen, you know what this is. You can’t set aside two or three or four hours one day a week and cram all of your good behavior into that one slot. Instead, you need to spread it out into shorter periods and and stick to that routine. Language learning is the same. You want contact hours with your language, and you want those contact hours to be spread out. Sit down with your calendar and figure out when you can carve away some time for your new language. If that’s an hour, great, but if it’s only fifteen minutes, that’s great, too. Set a calendar reminder, and use that time to review vocabulary, watch some videos, do some homework exercises, read an article, or – if you can – practice speaking. If you’re taking live online lessons with the Language Garage, you’ve automatically got that time once or twice a week, but for best results you’ll need to get some regular contact hours outside of your lessons.
Language Learning Habit 2: Be active.
In language learning, we talk about four skills: speaking, listening, reading, and writing. Two of these skills are passive – listening and reading. These are important, of course, but they’re only half of the picture. The active skills of speaking and writing are where the heavier lifting comes in. Language learners who make a habit of engaging actively in speaking and writing see much better results, because the active skills reinforce what you’ve learned in a powerful way. So, the next time you do something passive, for example watch a video or read a short article, add the active components of summarizing what you’ve seen or read by speaking about it (even to yourself!) or writing about it. Again, when you’re speaking with your instructor, you’re actively engaging. But if you only do that during your lessons, you’re missing out.
Language Learning Habit 3: Embrace mistakes.
No one likes making mistakes, but mistakes are definitely one of the five habits of successful language learners! When you’re used to being able to express yourself effortlessly when you speak or write in your native language, a new language can be very daunting because you’re in such an unfamiliar place. But this is an important part of the journey! See your mistakes not as errors but as opportunties to learn and improve. You will make mistakes – lots of them! – when you learn a new language. And no one will expect anything else. So embrace those mistakes, because they’re excellent teachers. If you learn to embrace mistakes, you’ll decrease your performance anxiety, and you’ll have a much better time.
Language Learning Habit 4: Go broad and find your bliss.
Some parts of language learning are universal; they’re things that we all need to learn, like basic vocabulary and grammar. But we’re all individuals with different interests. Get outside of the basic, universal parts of language and look for things that speak to your interests. Watch your favorite genre of movie, look up videos on YouTube about your hobby, read whatever section of an online newspaper that appeals to you the most, listen to your favorite kind of music, try to follow a recipe, hunt for memes… With the internet, all of this is at your fingertips, literally. Use this amazing tool to personalize your language exposure to whatever it is that makes you tick as an individual.
Language Learning Habit 5: Be realistic, one step at a time.
What’s your goal in learning a language? Do you want to be able to discuss Proust in a Parisian café or seemlessly navigate everyday life in Tokyo? Those are great goals, don’t shy away from them. But put them in perspective. Those are long term goals, and they’re only reachable after you set and achieve a whole bunch of more attainable goals. Set shorter term, smaller goals, for example daily or weekly. Maybe you want to successfully complete X number of minutes of exposure a day, or learn a certain number of new vocabulary items, or get a handle on some grammar point that’s challenging you. These goals are more realistic, and they’re tailored to your routine, so you’re much more likely to attain them. And nothing gives you that boost of confidence quite like attaining a goal you’ve set for yourself. The longer term goals will come eventually, especially if you focus on shorter term goals first.
It’s a marathon, not a sprint.
Learning a new language requires more than just memorizing new vocabulary and grammar. You need to do that, sure, but you also need to learn about yourself as a language learner. What’s your learning style? How comfortable are you making mistakes? What sort of schedule and routine is most realistic for you? What other interests do you have that you can piggy-back off of to help keep you engaged? How can you hack your own reward-system by presenting opportunities to achieve small, reasonable goals and feel good about yourself for having done so? All of this take time, and pacing. We hope that you can keep these five habits of successful language learners in mind, and most importantly, adapt them so they work best for you. Get comfortable for the ride, and enjoy the view as you move closer and closer to that long term language learning goal.
