Image courtesy of IM Nester

Like many other skills, learning a different language requires some knowledge, plenty of practice, and learning from your mistakes. If you do not have convenient access to a teacher, the internet is a useful place to learn.

It also helps if a friend or family member learns and practices with you. On the other hand, with available apps and online tools, you no longer need to have a learning companion.

Why Learn a Language?

Here are just a few of the many reasons for learning a new language:

• You will have a more enjoyable travelling experience if you know the language.
• Enhanced employment prospects.
• More social opportunities.
• More online resources become available to you.
• Understand other cultures better and acquire a deeper understanding of your own culture.
• Research shows that using the brain to recall and practice with different words and sentence structures can boost your brain health and may even delay the onset of dementia. You also develop many different skills including listening and speaking.
• Improve your communication skills.
• English is becoming a common communication language worldwide. If it is not your native language, learning English can help you communicate with others who have also learnt the language, for example, a Spanish speaker talking with a Chinese speaker in English.

Various Language Sites

Duolingo: Duolingo claims to be the world’s most popular language learning site with more than 200 million users. Learn a language in a game format. Enjoy free access, including mobile apps, or you can pay a subscription to remove ads and access downloadable lessons. I tried to learn Italian, but accidentally set the site to Italian instead of English. I had to clear my cookies and browsing history before being able to return to the English homepage. Once I sorted the problem out, I enjoyed the first exercises.

The Mimic Method: Idahosa Ness uses listening and mimicking to learn new languages. He explains that different languages use different sounds. Some sounds are common to various languages, others are unique to specific languages. A big part of learning how to communicate is to listen to those sounds so you can discern them and learn to pronounce them yourself, progressing to reading and writing the language later. You can access some basic information for free, or sign up and pay for a self-paced in-depth course. Barbara Oakley, creator of Learning How to Learn and Mindshift, is a fan of Idahosa’s teaching method. Barbara also enjoys several of the other sites mentioned in today’s blog.

Forvo: Forvo is a pronunciation dictionary, with millions of words shared to the site by thousands of native language speakers of more than 370 languages. Free access, donations welcome. You can join for free and add your own pronunciations of words in your native language to help others learn.

Some Paid Options

Free content may be fine for your needs, but to really get your teeth into a language, you may need to pay for lessons. Thanks to the internet, there are plenty of options.

Rosetta Stone: Another site that emphasises speaking, Rosetta Stone also offers a mobile app. Rosetta Stone uses a speech recognition tool to give instant feedback on your pronunciation via your own device. It also has online native tutors, downloadable audio lessons, and phrasebooks of common phrases. Payment is subscription-based, with access periods ranging from three months to two years.

Yabla: Only six languages are currently available here, but the language immersion style interactive videos have dual-language subtitles. There are also games to promote learning and test your knowledge. Try out a few sample videos and games before subscribing. Yabla can also be used in schools and universities.

FluentU: A range of languages, again taught by videos with interactive subtitles. Try free for 15 days, choose between a basic or a plus subscription. The plus plan also offers unlimited quizzes, flash cards, and spaced repetition reviews.

Italki: Choose a language, choose one of the more than 1000 teachers and select the lesson date and time, then connect for your personal lesson using Skype or other video chat software. Students purchase italki Credits which are stored in their Student Wallet. Credits are deducted from the Student Wallet when a lesson is requested. The italki Credits are transferred to the teacher’s Teacher Wallet after the lesson is completed.

Independent Websites

There are plenty of independent language teachers such as Benny Lewis The Irish Polyglot who can converse in 11 languages and has devised a system to develop confidence in conversational language in three months. Try his free seven-day email course.

Courses

Class Central lists 184 courses in the subject Foreign Language. Various languages are featured. Most of them are presented in English, so English speakers can learn other languages. There were also several learn Chinese courses.

One course is Conversational English Skills made by Tsinghua University in Beijing, China. It assumes students have already studied basic English and can understand the videos which are spoken mostly in English, with a smattering of Chinese. Slides, video transcripts, and captions are also predominantly in English. Among other topics, it discusses cultural issues, suitable conversations and how to manage if you cannot understand others. Aimed at travellers and students planning to study in an English-speaking country, it would be useful to people from many different parts of the world.

YouTube

Type Learn Language into YouTube’s Search box and you will have access to a seemingly never-ending list of videos. Some teach general language learning skills, others teach specific languages.

According to Quora, around two-fifths of the world’s languages use a rolled or trilled R sound. People who speak languages without this sound may have trouble perfecting it. Many English speakers have difficulty with rolling rs and YouTube videos teaching this technique abound.

A Final Thought

Thanks to the internet, it is now more convenient than ever before to learn a foreign language. As in learning a musical instrument, frequent practice helps you improve more quickly.

By Pat Bowden, published September 4, 2018.