To ask how you learn a language?

https://www.institut-francais.org.uk/french-courses/#/

Hi OP, have you had a look at the Institut Francais website? They offer online courses that are likely to be extremely useful.

I went to a French school as a child (not in France) but haven't used it regularly since my teens so it's really rusty. I have found watching French TV series with the subtitles on in French rather than English, incredibly helpful. I've also been trying to read French books and writing down new or remembered vocabulary. But I do really wish I had someone to speak it with! The best way to learn or polish a language is to use it.

I have a lot of bilingual colleagues and basically the only way they have learned is by living in another country to learn the language or picking it up from family members.

I have tried to learn Italian and French in the past, and failed miserably.

I should also add, it helps if you find a language you love. I utterly hated French at school, despite being decent at it. I quite enjoyed my Spanish evening class at Uni, but didn't really keep it up. I absolutely adore everything to do with German, yes even the complex parts of it, and feel as if it's a lifelong journey now. 🇩🇪

I learnt mostly by actual practice. Reading, watching movies, etc.

For the very basics, grammar, etc, you have to use a textbook, there's no other way. But as soon as that's out of the way, actually using the language is the best way to learn. You can start with comics and children's books. They're fairly simple. Look up words you don't understand. The first time you'll forget them. The second time too. And the third you'll remember them.

Move onwards to more complex stuff as you go.

I learnt english and spanish this way. My russian is a bit less good but I can manage daily.

Let's face it, I don't think there are many people like Katrina waves

You must really have a talent for languages!

I think it is hard as an adult especially if you're busy, realistically it takes a long time and a lot of effort if you just do an app or weekly lesson. Immersion is the best way, but sounds impractical if you have a life here. My Italian teacher did small zoom lessons which was fab, her advice was (if you're unable to be in the country) try to think in the language (e.g. walk around the supermarket and think "une peche" or write your list in French before you shop, before booking appointments or calling somewhere think "how would I do this in france" and say it aloud, walk around thinking about the weather, the scenery etc in the language) I found it a really good way of embedding learning when I couldn't go and talk to people from the country. The other thing is to learn some grammar terms, it's important in French and if (for example) you don't know what a verb is, or a pro noun, or a tense, it makes understanding what you're being taught tricky. You'll have to conjugate verbs - and if you don't know what that means first, it makes doing it hard to grasp. Having said all that, I'm still shit at Italian!

I’m fluently trilingual from childhood, and I’m passable in a couple more. The absolute best way to learn is through immersion. If that isn’t an option there’s nothing wrong with textbooks and/or programmes like Rosetta Stone, but supplement them with a tutor. If private lessons aren’t available locally, you can find a tutor online.

Also, watch movies and listen to music/podcasts/youtube in the language you want to learn. Learn to read books in it.

Lol! A friend of mine used to say the best place to learn a language is in bed. Certainly worked for my brother!

I hated French at school and didn't feel I'd learnt much at all, even though I took it to GCSE.

Then I lived in Italy for 3 years. I swear to this day I got the basics in Italian on one night with a group of Italians who didn't speak English and one who did at my shoulder ready to translate back and forth- and a load of red wine!

In reality though it took me 18 months to get fluent, during which time I spent a lot of time with non English speakers.

Knowing Italian made something "click", and improved my French, too! I think it's gaining the courage to hurl yourself into a foreign conversation willy nilly, hoping for the best. Watching DS1 on holiday, he might know a bit of French from school, but he's way too self conscious to attempt to use it.

We went on holiday to Germany this year and I got a fairly decent grounding in the basics from Duolingo. German has different challenges from French though- comprehension and pronunciation isn't so difficult, it's the grammar (and those insanely long portmanteau words!) I just called everything "das" and hoped for the best- on the rare occasions I was able to find non English speakers to practice on. I also rewatched Deutschland 83 (and 86, and 89).

This does actually sound good, though. I found Duolingo was very good at that - getting me to work out how I could build a sentence I wanted which would be understood.

It is much less good at helping me actually understand the response for this, I find it's incredibly helpful to learn some phrases like "Again please?" or "Please speak slowly" or "My [Italian] is not very good" or "Sorry, I don't understand" and then don't be afraid to clarify by repeating back to them what you think they said, and don't be afraid to rely on sign language! Practice and exposure is all you need to develop the receptive listening skills.

Often when native speakers speak to learners, they forget to slow down and simplify their language. Some people are better at this than others, but the other thing is that most people who have studied a language formally can understand much more than they can say. With Duolingo, I think it's often the opposite at first. So you can come out with a sentence which will be grammatically incorrect but basically communicate what you wanted to say, which if you'd learned by a traditional route would mean that you can understand probably about 10x more than you can say. So it gives people a false impression of where your understanding is.

Asking them to slow down/simplify or repeat things usually helps remind them you are a non native speaker which gives you more chance to catch what's being said.

Textbooks (esp beginner stage) are dull as dishwater and not very natural language. They are useful as an aid to classes but a bit crap on your own.

Duolingo got me to the state where I could have a basic conversation, and from then I started having as many conversations as I could in the language. Easy enough as I live in a country which speaks another language. In the UK, you'd be better off going to an evening class or conversation group.

Ask ChatGPT to pretend to be a flirty Parisian waiter who speaks no English, or whatever else sounds entertaining. Make it make itself useful!

That pretty much encapsulates learning a language when you’re a bit older. I’ve done Duolingo and an in person class for 3 years now. I also have an a level. I’m still shit, and not really improving but I keep on!

Join a class with your local council

Look at www.languageforfun.org for friendly group classes. If there are no classes near you, there are also plenty of group online classes (max 8-10 people with full interaction between learners and teacher)

You could join an online class or get a tutor, and complete KS3 and (later) GCSE workbooks alongside it (Pearson do good ones). If finances allow, you could do a course at a language school in the country where the language is spoken. I’ve been teaching languages for 21 years so feel free to message and ask anything.

Yes to this! I’ve learnt and taught languages and have always picked things up really quickly, but never understood how. You’ve really hit the nail on the head with your explanation, thank you! Especially the talking to yourself and making up dialogues part, if you know you are going to order a coffee/chat about your food/explain your opinion, then it’s definitely a confidence boost to have a few phrases memorised.

I also found learning the parts of language to give opinions (‘because it’s…’), connectives, more/less than, sometimes, never etc. also helps with fluency. Then it really is the case of swapping out nouns/verbs and repeating those sentence patterns.

A good translation app and a small pocket dictionary are also your best friends!

Well, you can't be bothered with duolingo so im not going to convince you otherwise.
Ill just say that I went to Italy for the first time this summer and I started duolingo Italian in February. By August I was able to use my new language skills in Italy and helped me a lot with buying things, asking for directions and even have very simple conversation with people.

This is known as "sleeping with a dictionary" and is a tried and proven method 😏

On a more practical front, immersion is a great way to learn and the internet is full of resources. As well as online language courses there are TV programmes, films, YouTube videos and computer games etc. to watch - which is one of the ways that Scandinavian and Dutch kids become amazingly good at English at a young age. Try listening to a foreign radio station or have it playing in the background - things like the news, sport and weather are all repetative and recognisable. If you know what the world headlines are on a given day, you'll pick up very quickly the gist of the same news report in German, Spanish or whatever.

Chatting to native (or near-native) speakers is a huge bonus - if you ask around you might be surprised at how many people actually speak another language, and all major towns and cities will have informal social groups of language speakers (e.g. foreign spouses, second generation immigrants, people who have lived abroad) if you can locate them.

People learn in different ways, so while Duolingo (and similar) courses work well for some people, for others this type of course has no value at all, and another approach such as immersion might work better.

Try to learn how most used verbs work in the language "to be/want/like/go/drink/eat/talk/have/buy etc...". Try to learn how to use "I/you/he/she/we" with said verbs in a past,present and future tense.
Learn "question" words such as "where,when,how,why,who...". Then,practice your vocabulary from a specific topic (work, home, places, hobbies, food, animals etc...".). With that under your belt, you will be able to communicate /understand basic conversations. Try to find a sympathetic native speaker to practice on, or find a tutor online if there's no evening class nearby. Have fun!

I used Duolingo to learn Italian. I thought i was doing really well and was pretty confident when we went to a small non English speaking town in southern Italy. I confidently asked a group of elderly women for directions -
“scusa, dov ‘è la piazza per favore?”

They understood and fired off a detailed set of instructions to reach the square. I smiled, nodded and said “grazie!”

as we drove away DH was so impressed and asked me what they said. “No idea” I replied “something about a church” 😂😂

moral of the story - Duolingo does NOT prepare you for actual conversation!

Oh that's really good going! It was a very blanket statement I know, it's borne from years of frustration of having had so many students say "I've been learning on Duolingo, I've worked through so many lessons" and then I find they can't put piece of grammar A together with any other vocab, or they've never been told how the sentences are made and so they're limited to these rote responses.

Duolingo is a good starting point to help build up your vocabulary and grammar knowledge and help your pronunciation. It's not good enough on its own, so maybe supplement that with evening classes, and also use some of the other resources suggested upthread. Netflix is a particularly good source for foreign language programmes as you can slow down the speed.

Duolingo doesn’t actually “teach” you anything. I’ve been enjoying Coffee Break French/German/Italian, though I can already do at least the basics of them all but it might suit if you don’t have much time to commit.

I did GCSE French and failed it.
As an adult I tried German at night school. It was full of people wanting to learn as part of their job.
I can not get my mind to get past direct word for word translation. It is ok for numbers and not much else. I am rubbish with grammar anyway so learning another lot in another language is too much for me.
I have made my peace with it.