Struggling to learn a new language- Hear from the man who knows 20

Okay, so how did you come to speak 20 languages? It's a long story, and that's the thing about language learning. It's a long story. You don't learn them overnight, and it's basically being interested and having the opportunity to be exposed to the language. So I grew up in Montreal, English-speaking. I wasn't very interested in French, didn't do well, couldn't speak, let's put it that way. Then I got very motivated. I ended up going to France. I studied at the Institut de Politique in Paris, then I worked for the government. They sent me to Hong Kong to learn Mandarin Chinese, then we lived in Japan. And so once you discover how to learn and that you can learn, then it's a fun thing to do because you learn about other cultures. You meet people from different parts of the world. So it's a tremendous thing to do. Yeah, it opens a lot of doors, doesn't it? It opens a lot of doors, and it opens not doors only in terms of people and opportunities, and it had a big impact on my business career, but it opens doors to parts of the world that maybe are somewhat of a caricature or stereotype for you, and then you learn about them and the people and their history. It's just a great thing to do. Well, it is. And you said along the way, what did you learn about the best way to learn or to approach language learning? Okay. You know, it's very sort of relevant that we're now aware of AI and large language models where if you pump enough of information into the system, it'll start to predict and anticipate what's coming. Right? That's how AI works. That's how the brain learns languages. So it's input. So people think they have to learn some rules, learn a list of the most important words, and start speaking. And that's not how it works at all. You have to get the language into you. Gradually, things start happening in your brain, neurons connect, and at a point you are now in a position to start uttering the language and understanding more and more of it. But the focus is on input. And this is increasingly understood today. Okay. So someone is sitting here in Vancouver and planning a trip to Mexico, South America, Spain, or something. I really should learn some Spanish. Where's a good place to start? What do you make of the app, the Duolingo app and beyond? Okay. So the first thing is, if you're planning to go to Mexico, make sure you're going to go in a year from now, because you're not going to learn it in a month. That's point number one. The fact that you're thinking of going to Mexico is an important type of motivation. So now you've got a goal. But then you need to do a lot of listening. So in my case, I have an app, so I work with these, what we call mini stories on our app, and I listen to them. In the beginning, you have to listen often, lots of repetition. And don't worry about the rules, don't worry about what you forget, just bombard your brain. And eventually, you move away from so much repetition into more things of interest to you. But the fact that you're not where the language is spoken, it's not ideal, but most of my languages I have learned not where the language is spoken. Really? Oh yeah, including Ukrainian, by the way. Yes, well, I'm... Rozmobilyayo Ukrainskoy umovu. Oh my goodness. Well, you know, I've got my Duolingo app open here right now, because that's how I start off every morning at breakfast. I do a little... I'm on 850 days with Ukrainian now. So this is about sit and chat, you know, so let's just hear what it says. Come on. Oh, I didn't have the volume up, I thought I had it all ready for you and everything. Nope, it's not working. What do you mean? It says I didn't get it right. Duolingo is great to the extent that it's easy. Yeah. Okay, let's try this. It's fun? Vony ne luv lech kashu z myasom. They don't like porridge for breakfast or something like that. So if I could... What I would say right away there is, you needn't be in a hurry to speak. Okay. So you're trying to mimic what you hear. Yes. Okay. That's not necessary... It's not a bad thing to do, but it's not the best thing to do. What's better is if you are listening to a lot of things that are meaningful to you, and that, you know, it's like three minutes, five minutes, it's not like little phrases that they throw at you on Duolingo. You'll never get... I don't want to discourage you, but it's a good place to get started. But now I know how to say they don't have porridge for breakfast. That's extremely important. Extremely important. And some of the phrases on Duolingo are even more, you know, ridiculous. Like the dog doesn't like porridge for breakfast or something. So it's fine, but you need to do... You need to get into... The key is meaningful. There's a very famous professor from the States. He talks about compelling input, comprehensible and compelling input. Duolingo doesn't offer you compelling and comprehensible input. That's interesting. You know, I lived in Spain for a few years in my early twenties and became fluent in Spanish and loved the music and loved the language, but then went to France afterward to really dive into and work on my French. And I found it really difficult until a good friend of mine in Paris recorded a bunch of French songs for me. She said, you've got a musical ear and this is what you need. And that has served me so well. The music was my in to the French language. There has to be something. So I'm interested in history, for example, or music or cooking or whatever it might be. Things, you know, compelling, comprehensible input. And there's a whole sort of system to that. You start with easier material and gradually work your way up to more difficult material. And that's what we do with the web, the application that I developed. And that's all part of the package that I do with my platform on LingQ. But you have to, so you got to say the course. So everyone has to understand it's a long road. So going back to your person going to Mexico, the fact that that person is going to Mexico is good. That's a goal. That's a motivation. Now you have to put in a year because if you arrive in Mexico and all you've got is a few phrases, you will never be able to use those. You won't understand what people are saying back at you and people will switch to English. But if you can get to a sufficient level before getting to Mexico, then you'll actually be able to use it when you get to Mexico and your level in the language will, you know, improve significantly. Well, and Duolingo is so, is so gamified now too, you know, it's, it's really gamified. Yeah. I mean, just so you, you don't even really learn it. You're just wanting to get to the, to get some points, gather some points and move on and just say, okay, there, I finished another day. So Duolingo is good in the sense that there's two types of sort of motivation. There's the sort of extrinsic, like motivated to, oh, I maintain my streak or I, you know, whatever. I learned so many things or something, you achieved something. So that's a form of motivation, but it's short lived. If you can get into your music or you get in time, I happen to be interested in history, then you stay with things that are of interest to you. And being engaged with compelling, comprehensible input is a much longer term dopamine kick than just, you know, you know, I've done it so many days in a row kind of thing, which is good enough. I mean, you can do that, but that's not going to get you to fluency. Um, okay. 20, you're 20 languages in, are there any others that you'd like to still take on? Well, right now I'm in my Middle Eastern phase, so I'm doing Persian, Arabic, and Turkish. Are they all very similar? I mean, can you... They're not similar. They're three different language families, however, and Farsi, Persian is the easiest because it's an Indo-European language. You may know this, Persian and Arabic use the same writing system, essentially. Turkish uses the Latin alphabet, so to that extent it's easier, but it has other things that make it difficult. The interesting thing about those three languages is they've had a long history together. They've had a major influence on that part of the world, on other places in that part of the world. So for me, it's just fun. So beyond that, like we added Urdu to LingQ, I'm just, at this point, I'm intimidated by all the different, you know, Indian writing systems. I might go on to Urdu or Punjabi, which is very similar, you know? Oh, I just, I love the way your mind works, Steve. Really a pleasure to meet you. Thank you very much. Okay, thank you. Ja kujo. Hey. Yeah. You can say it in any language you'd like. Glasgow, good Glasgow. Yeah, yeah. Steve Kaufmann, or Lingo Steve, he's a YouTuber who talks about language learning. You can find him on YouTube. He's the co-founder of a language learning app called LingQ, L-I-N-G-Q, yes? Please add. Because of the events, because of the events in Ukraine, Ukrainian is free at LingQ, and any Ukrainian can study any language free at LingQ. Okay. So, there's a level of, a little bit of support. A little extra. Thank you very much for that. Do you have language as a New Year's resolution? Let us know about that. How has it been for you on the coast at cbc.ca?