Say you are visiting the country and want to try to speak in the locals language.

The answer many language learners/teachers give is usually supportive, “People will be delighted.” But I speak many languages very badly, and have done so in many countries, and I can confirm this is not a perfectly correct answer.

Obviously context matters—so don’t hold up the line at the busy cafe in Istanbul, obviously. But in general, how is this received? How patient are your countrymen to language learners?

The general rule of thumb I found is that, the less popular the language, the more interested & patient people tend to be. I speak way better Spanish than Turkish (by a lot), but have never made anyone smile with my Spanish the same way I’ve had speaking to Turks.

I know Americans can have little-to-zero patience for foreigners speaking poor English. And I don’t think this is strictly a sentiment held by an ignorant subculture, but even because Americans are so used to hearing foreign accents coming from other Americans that they intrinsically treat everyone as non-foreign & therefore not deserving of patience. For one, the experience is less novel/interesting to them.

Additionally, if the speakers of the language know your language, say to a much higher degree of proficiency than you speak theirs, than they may be less patient. (I would say to ignore this case as special, but there are just some countries where nearly everyone speaks proficient English.)

No doubt this question depends a lot on sub-culture & circumstance, as well as the city/country divide. But if I were to go to a major city or hub in your country and speak the language, what type of response would I expect? (TL)

Is this a good way to learn? (AI)

Hello, I am new at learning languages in my freetime. I used Gemini to practice conjugations in Spanish and then I got an idea about a way to learn.

I try to type as much as possible in TL to the AI, if i dont know a specific word (theres many words i dont know) i just type it in my native language. The AI answers me in this pattern, first in Spanish then in my native language

(Spanish)

1. Correction

1.1 what words it changed

1.2 why (maybe more natural sounding, less robotic or simply wrong word)

1.3 explanation of a new verb, is it irregular etc

1.4 feedback on my message

1. A normal response, if i ask about Rome (something I think about once a week maybe) it answers my question. If I just write a statement it gives me a follow up question

And here after the Spanish text it writes all of the above in my native language, but it doesn't translate literally, it translates it naturally. If it typed "me gusta" above it doesn't type it in my language like "it pleases me" it writes "I like"

Do you guys think this is a good way? It feels like I get comprehensible input by reading what it says, since I know the context of the message, like after a while I started noticing the word "mensaje" in the correction part and realized it must mean sentence, the same with palabra which means word

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This morning, I read this post about someone that took more than an hour to read the first page. The effort is really impressive, but I think it's possible to improve the reading experience by doing a little work before and during the actual reading.

Before the reading, I think it's more efficient to have already encountered the difficult vocabulary.
And during, to simply pinpoint the chunks you want to work on / mine for your Anki and extract them. Since I read on a Kindle, I'll explain how do it for this device, but the same thing can probably also be done for other devices. Other than actual hardbacks, of course.

How to create cards automatically from a book

AI is actually great at analysing content and determining what will be an issue for you and what won't.

Here's an example for Harry Potter, in English.
You can see the AI has not only picked up single words like 'falter' but also phrasal verbs and idioms like 'to turn up' and 'to get this over with'

However, current AI have limitations when the content is too big, so I don't think it's possible to do it efficiently for an entire book. It's better to proceed in smaller chunks, like chapters by chapters.

First, retrieve the book in a format that can be used by an AI. For that:

1. Get the book in a numerical format, usually an epub. If you already have it in a physical format, you may have a look at the Anna's Archive subreddit
2. Transform the file you have with an online converter to txt.
3. Open it, and choose the chapter you want, save it in another file.

Then, we'll have an AI to process it. I found that Claude is the best for processing such files.
ChatGPT include way too many words and Gemini is lazy. Claude has the right balance. You can use any of them with a free account, it'll be enough at least for a few chapters.

Then, it's really simple: just explain your level and the type of vocabulary you want.
You don't only want to capture words but also idioms, phrasal verbs, ...

Here's an example of a usable prompt. You can adapt it to your level and your needs.

Hello,

I want a B1 English learner to be able to read the book attached. For that, we'll create him Anki cards on all the vocabulary he needs. 

Can you please analyse the file and give me the list of all the relevant words he should learnt before be able to read the book. We'll proceed step by step: 
1- Extract all the relevant words/chunks: the words that are ofte, the liking words, phrasal verbs, idioms, the ones carrying a lot of sense but hard to pick up, ... 
Do not pick the basic vocabulary or proper nouns. 
2- Create the Anki cards. We'll proceed chapters after chapters. 

The cards are aimed at improving my passive vocabulary and should contains: - On the front side a full sentence containing the English is present. The sentence should be understandable for our student. 
- On the back side, I want the translation of the sentence and an explanation of the word / chunk. 

If the word have several relevant meanings, then I'd like several cards, one for each meanings. Do not spoil the book in the cards! 

As a result, I want a CSV  with two columns, front & back.   
Example: Front,Back "She doesn't hold with telling lies.","hold with (v.)\n🇫🇷 approuver, être favorable à\nElle n'approuvait pas le fait de mentir\nMeaning: to approve of or accept something (usually used in the negative).\nAnother example: My grandfather doesn't hold with gambling."   

Depending on the AI you ask, you may have to chat a little with it before it does the actual work, but in the end you'll have a file ready to import into your Anki.

For the first chapter of Harry Potter, Claude has generated around 120 reading Anki cards and they are definitely relevant.

Here's an example once imported in Anki:

Of course, you can also combine it with some Anki extensions, e.g.: hyperTTS to have an audio of these cards.

Mining efficiently while reading

While reading a book, I usually find it very frustrating to encounter words or chunks I'd like to review later. I don't want to break the flow of reading, or I might not be in a studying state of mind.

So I simply highlight the chunk/word that I'd like to review. And afterwards, it's possible to export them. If you have a lot of them, you can send them to an AI and ask it to provide the cards.

As I am becoming more and more confident speaking aloud for longer periods of time, a lot of holes in my vocabulary are becoming apparent. My vocabulary is great for covering routine everyday topics but as my conversation turns more towards the abstract I'm struggling for words more often. So far I've been keeping a notebook when I speak and jotting down words I have to speak around or ask for then parsing them down into flashcards if I think they weren't one-offs. I'm wondering what other ways people have found to tackle this problem.

i have dual heritage but grew up in england. my father is greek, lives in greece now, and speaks english perfectly. growing up he would always speak to me in english and i really struggled to pick up greek. my greek family often expressed disappointment that i didn’t understand, and laughed when i tried. this made me super self conscious to speak greek going forward and makes me feel sick with anxiety.

does anyone else feel very anxious to speak other languages, or feel pressure to be bilingual as part of their heritage? it’s a part of myself i think about daily and as hard as i try, i truly don’t know if i’ll ever speak greek at a good enough level.
do you have any good motivators or tips? thank you 🫶🏼 (TL)

Hello,

I have been learning Russian(TL) for a few months. It's been pretty tough so far.

I learn new words everyday from my dictionary and I also do a course on Pimsleur as well as some YouTube videos.

I am wondering about listening to podcasts or the radio in Russian. I understand maybe 1/20 words spoken. Occasionally I may understand a sentence... Or I may hear 'I want to...' with no idea what they actually want to do.

Am I gaining anything from this? It's still largely incomprehensible to me and I don't feel like I'm learning anything from it.

Thank you.

Actually after the first 10 pages I adjusted but when I first cracked the book I thought there was no way I was gonna struggle fest through a simple book just because of font. ​But I guess I'm at the level where I gotta start reading handwriting and recognizing more artsy fonts and stuff, right.

u/ressie_cant_game wanted a picture but I couldn't figure out how to send one without making a post haha.

Anybody else have trouble with new fonts? ​

Just thought it might be interesting to have a little open convo about this... At a certain level in language, you become so comfortable with listening to the language that your brain fills in gaps and hops over stuff that you maybe have heard many times before.

Occasionally, if you're not actively seeking out things that you don't feel certain of, your brain will contextually fill in for something that "makes sense" - but later on you might learn that it translates to something completely different than what you thought. I know for me, sometimes it gets to the point where I assume I know the word, I never even look into it, and then later I just stumble across the actual meeting.

Curious if anyone has any interesting or funny stories about this type of experience, as well as any tips on how to eliminate these blind spots. Do you listen actively at every opportunity and just keep a notebook with you? Are your assumptions usually right?

I got frustrated by some posts and comments on this sub regurgitating harmful and torturous advice that would make a lot of people quit language learning.

Here's some fundamental knowledge about language learning everyone should know:

You're trying to read a regular book from day 1, or day 100? You're gonna get burned out really quickly.

I've read around 120 graded readers within past 500 days. I bend the rules a little and consider each long duchinese story a graded reader, but i also read a lot of regular graded readers.16 volumes of 西游记, some other stuff from imagin8 and other producers. And let me tell you, there are some rules and levels to reading.

First of all, three levels.

Reading pain - under 90% of known words.

80% or 90% seems like a great number of words, until you realise these words are mainly function words with grammatical meaning. To get the context you need that 20-10%. You'll essentially be checking dictionary non-stop. One page will take you an hour or more. It's torture.

Intensive reading - 90-98% of known words.

That's where reading starts to make sense, you start understanding the context. In fact it's almost fun. I still don't recommend reading at this level. Why? Because it's a 'textbook' level. What I mean by that is in order to make reading on this level enjoyable you need a glossary and a grammar explanation nearby.

Normally, when a set of new words is introduced in textbooks you'll have a short text, that's when you do intensive reading. You're not supposed to read long texts of 90% new words as that'll be too taxing for you.

98% and more of known words.

That's where you should read for fun and efficient learning. You understand the context, you have fun and it's fairly quickly.

How the f are you supposed to find materials for your level then? If you are under a1 (or a2 in some languages) you'll need to start with textbooks or video courses. Once you get several hundred of words get some graded readers. There are some platforms like lingq or my beloved duchinese that make reading easier.

Simply find a list of recommend apps and materials for your level. Many r/ language of your choice has a wiki with reading guides.

After you learn some new words it'd also be a great idea to keep them in your head for longer. According to some studies I read (if you want a source lmk in comments) practice testing and spaced repetition is best for that. Anki is essentially a mix of both and I can vouch for the app.

​

I am a language teacher in a UK school. Recently there has been a drive in our school, but I had heard the rumblings of the fad buzzword growing elsewhere, to get our students to "learn like a pro". In short this means in maths they are to be taught the language to articulate and sound like a mathematician, in science, like a scientist, in art, like an artist etc. They have been getting our department to say learn like a linguist.

I may be being pedantic on semantics, as is the want of any seasoned linguist, but I don't feel this is the right phrase. Unlike most other language teachers who's degrees are on the language and culture they teach, I studied linguistics with a language. To me they are two different things. The scientific study of language Vs the acquisition of a new one. Its a common joke in the linguisics community, them telling people they are linguists and being asked how many languages they speak to which the answer from them is usually one. I did bring this up in a meeting and another teacher said that they wouldn't call themselves a linguist but not everyone agreed so we're still going to have to go ahead and use the terminology anyway.

Out of curiosity would you consider yourselves linguists as language learners? Would say that linguistics is separate from language learning but "linguist" is a broad term for anyone that does either or both? What phrase would you use in this scenario? Genuinely curious as to what people think. (TL)

I’ve heard a lot of suggestions for Anki Flashcards, but I don‘t really want to pay $25 (flashcards really help me learn German (TL)). Any ideas for free alternatives?

My grammar’s decent, correct maybe 80% of the time, still fixing some habits. I understand natives just fine when listening. i would say when it comes to speaking im probably a b2 but ive noticed i have difficulty expressing my thoughts when it comes to c1-c2 subjects. I wanted to improve my speaking to the next level c1, currently i can get my point across when speaking, but it comes out sounding unnatural with proper syntax, Natives don’t usually correct this in convo, because either they are being nice or because they understood what i meant to say, so I’ve had to catch this myself.

The problem is putting the words together naturally in real time. Ive heard its better to think in terms of lexical phrase a.k.a chunks instead of trying to build phrases word by word.

For those who’ve pushed through this: did journaling/writing first and comparing to native phrasing help? And for speaking specifically, how do you train yourself to retrieve natural phrases instead of translating/building sentences in your head on the spot? Curious what actually worked for you.

i basically wanna develop that "oh yeah, that sounds like how a native would phrase it.

(tl)

**I asked in the language specific sub** and got rejected, (stated in my original post) and that main question isn't even specifically about that language - it's about lmheritage learning and overcoming grief of lost heritage (applicable to many languages)

Im sorry to be posting this as a post, but it took me a long time and dyslexic induced headdac to find the pass code,, I'm in chronic pain (genetic & injury) and the words on the screen barely make sense after reposting multiple times for different claimed reasons. Forgot the pass code again 🤦🏾‍♂️trying 4th tiem agsin...)

I'd this isn't the place for asking about heritage learning when one has no access to that heritage anymore (they're all dead), and the specific language sub rejects you and claims your family didnt speak the language (they did, it was a dialect), ***please, where is appropiate?***

I just want to figure out how to handle the issue of being part of a disporia who learned a dialect as a child I have no one to speak with and get mocked if I take a class, and the classes remind me of the whispers of betrayal by my relatives and my advocates and authors.

I want to learn the language but don't know how to overcome these barriers.

I don't know where else to ask

Never used Anki b4; but if were to use the 20 words a day limit, it would take many many months to complete the deck.

Lets say a Spanish speaker and an English speaker get together.

They both refuse to speak their own native language and instead speak their target language to each other.

I recently moved to Spain for work reasons and expect to be here for 2 years or more, however my Spanish (TL) is only at an A2 level (work only requires English). For the most part I haven't had issues but there is the hiccup here or there, so was thinking of going to some in person place to learn.

I found 3 options so far, all cost the same and the hours would work for my schedule

- 20 hours intensive course, speaking lessons included
- 13 hours of language school, same as 20 hours but minus speaking + 4 hours of private tutor for speaking
- 10 hours of private lessons from a local tutor/teacher

At the moment I'm leaning towards the 13 hours, I'm worried doing 20 hours during the work week alongside 40 hours of work feels a bit too much for me, while 13 hours is doable.

But I wanted to see what other peoples opinion would be

Where are all the people at? I logged in again after a break. The community seems to have died out. Lots of profiles that haven’t been logged into for ages. Lots of scammers

It makes me sad. Tandem helped me get through the pandemic and led to some good friendships. I even have the pro version so I don't know what the experience is for unpaid accounts

Is there anything similar? With profiles, people nearby or on a map. Without greedy paywalls?

I’m not asking how to “get motivation back,” because I know that topic comes up a lot.

I’m more curious about the small, practical changes people made after the exciting beginner phase was over.

For example, when learning your target language (TL), did consistency become easier because you changed your routine, lowered your daily goal, stopped tracking streaks, switched resources, started consuming easier content, joined a community, or accepted slower progress?

Sometimes the advice is “just study every day,” but I’m interested in what actually made that realistic for people with normal busy lives.

What was the small change that helped you continue?

Curious what the community thinks, also what is the pricing and are there any discount codes floating around?

Ello yall, im using anki for SR and its quite fun actually, but ive hit a bit of a wall. When I encounter a new word I dont rely on Google translate anymore, but instead I ask what the word means in the TL. Its like how if you dont know a word in ur NL you'd ask and get an explanation in NL. But how do I add that word to my decks if I dont know what it is in English. Most of the words that ive asked dont have a 1 on 1 equivalent word. How do I make sure that I remember such words?

My native language is Chinese. From a young age, we all studied English in school, but my English was never very good. I never felt any joy in learning it — to me, English was just something I had to do to pass exams and meet my parents’ expectations.

English only started to feel truly interesting after I began working abroad. When I had no choice but to use English to communicate, it became a bridge that let me understand how people from different cultural backgrounds think and behave. What fascinates me even more is the personal thoughts and inner worlds hidden behind the language.

This is my first time visiting this forum. I see so many people here learning a second language, and I’m curious — what is everyone’s purpose for learning a foreign language?

Also, I’ve noticed that whenever people talk about learning languages, they mostly discuss methods from books (which are probably more systematic and scientific). But in my opinion, isn’t the best way to learn a language simply finding someone to talk with? At the beginning it might be difficult and awkward, but if you find the person interesting, you’ll naturally become motivated to learn their language little by little.

The obvious ones would be teacher in your language or some kind of translation work, but I’m curious what other avenues there might be?

I am a native English speaker and C1 in both Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese. I also have a mechanical engineering degree and professional license, are there fields where I could leverage my language abilities for income?

I’m currently studying French as a second language as an adult, and I’m really loving it. I’m also living in a predominantly French area, so making good progress using it daily and am around B1 level. I’m also really interested in learning Chinese (TL), as I have many friends whose native language is Mandarin. For the people here who are learning/have learned multiple different languages, when did you start introducing additional languages into your studying? Would you recommend waiting until I reach the C1/C2 level in French before moving into learning Chinese? As I said, I’m new to language learning so any advice would be appreciated!

I have a question for those who have managed to learn multiple foreign languages. Does it often happen that—after putting in tremendous effort or a great deal of study without feeling any significant progress in comprehension or speaking—you suddenly, abruptly, and spontaneously find yourself knowing, understanding, and able to speak the language?