Tag Archives: how to learn

April 3, 2012 · 12:10 pm

My System….so far…..(Part 1)

Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C. 20540 USA,

Since I started this blog, I have often spoke about my system.  I have written many posts about it and tweaked it over the few months.  Some have wondered, don’t you already know Thai?  Shouldn’t you already know how to learn a language?  Why don’t’ you do what you did then?  That’s fair enough question.

When I learned Thai, I was 19 years old, single and a missionary for my church.  My church had a book and a system that they used and I was living in Thailand as well.  I lived language learning.  This isn’t the same with Spanish.  Up until a few weeks ago, I was in a country that doesn’t have a large Spanish-speaking community.   I am(have) 30 years  with 4 kids and I work full-time.  The strategies that I used and the overall system can’t be applied in the same way that I learned Thai.

So a big part of this blog is helping me create the pattern and system for a busy working family person.  Once I created a useful pattern for learning a language, I could turn around and apply it to another.  If somehow this helps anyone else learn a language, all the better.  That said, I have acknowledged a long time ago that I blog mostly for myself(it’s not as selfish as that sounds)

Since not all of you have been with me since day one and because I like to finally consolidate my learning system in a new updated format, I decided to dedicate a post directly to how I am learning Spanish as well as any other future languages.  (For a summary of this you can click on my system page.)

Opposites attract

Languages are like some large four-faced monster.  Continue reading →

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February 28, 2012 · 4:08 pm

Falling flat on your face and getting right back up again.

In this business of language learning, you have to be humble.  You have to be ready to have someone laugh at you when you speak and tell you that your sentences makes no sense at all.  You also have to be ready for life to come in, kick your butt and turn all your well laid out plans inside out and upside down.  Why?  Because that is how life works!

I have talked about different things one can do to keep your attitude positive and upbeat while you go through this sticky mess called language learning.  I have mostly written them for myself so I have something to fall back on when I need it.  If they have benefited anyone else, then all the better.

This weekend I needed them and then some.  I usually do a Spanish Friday video every friday(I actually post it on saturday here) and then I do a Thai video every monday(posted on Tuesday).  Over the weekend I also try to fill up any available time with rebuilding my Thai level back to an advanced level of speaking.  The fluency is still there, but my vocabulary is just not at all what it used to be.

Then Life Happened…

This weekend, I did none of them.  I failed out right!  My airplane crashed and burned,  I fell flat on my face and I got a bloody nose doing it.  I don’t even get honorable mention, because I eventually just gave up and stopped trying to salvage the weekend.  I took 4 days off and did absolutely nothing about langue learning the whole time.

To be honest this is the first time this has happened to me!  I have set realistic expectations of only being accountable for 15 mins of language learning a day.   I am also very good at making the most out of those little free moments that you don’t plan, but just some how find.  Despite all that, nothing I could do this weekend would correct the course and my car drove right off the side of the mountain(ok, no more analogies).

When in doubt, reboot

One of my favorite TV shows is IT Crowd.  It was made in the UK and has never made it to the US (though NBC did make a pilot for an US version that eventually got scraped).  When ever someone calls the IT department they answer, “I.T. have you tried turning it off and on again?”  PC’s are great, but sometimes they get so messed up that you have to just shut it down and restart again.

That I what I ended up doing.  I ended up just shutting down, taking a step back, and rebooted a day later.  Sure I could have tried to get some studying in, but it wouldn’t have really solved the problem.   Sometimes, we just need to take a day off and then start over.  Yes our saved data may get lost, but at least we know where we are ended up and where to start over.  Ok sorry that was the last analogy

The moral of the story is that you need to stay humble and to make the most of the things, but sometimes you also need a reboot.

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February 20, 2012 · 12:41 pm

Will you get to the point?!?

Being here in New Zealand, I don’t get any opportunities to practice my Spanish or Thai with anyone in my day-to-day life.  I could probably find a very infrequent and irregular intercambio(language-exchange) over Skype during the wee hours of the morning when I no longer have any other obligations, but to me it’s just not worth it.

As I have said before, this is not an excuse on my part.  It’s a decision.  Based on my life style that I want to keep up, finding an intercambio is just so difficult, that I no longer try.  I have made peace with that fact.

I don’t want to belabor this pet peeve of mine, but one of the problems I have with so many language learning websites is that they are written by single expats living in the country where  they speak the language that they are trying to learn.  They are interesting to read and I have no doubt they help me and other, but I think they also reinforces the idea that they can’t learn a language if you are a married with children parent.

One of the things that I am hope to accomplish with this blog is to show everyone that you can still learn a language and make due, even if your life keeps your from using the “best” tools.  That is one of many reasons why I blog.  I am showing, at the very least to myself, that it can be done. Today I thought I would share an activity that use as the next best thing to an intercambio:

Talk to the wall.

In Thai I call this พูดกับกำแพง(puud gap gampaeng) and in Spanish I call it habla a la pared.  Continue reading →

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