I learned 3 languages using 3 different methods. Here’s what actually worked.

I am a native English speaker, but I have also learned German, Portuguese, and Polish. I have learned each of these languages using a different method. So in today's video, I'm going to walk you through each of these different learning methods I have used, and at the end, I'm going to share with you what actually did and did not work. Essentially, which process, which method worked out the best, how I learned a language the fastest, and if I were to learn another language now, exactly what I would do. So let's get started. The first foreign language that I learned was German, and this one really jump-started my passion and interest in learning languages, and this method had a lot more to do with the traditional school-taught method. I started off using a lot of textbooks, grammar charts, all of those sorts of traditional methods of learning a language, memorizing vocabulary, taking in lots of input, a mix of reading, writing, listening, and speaking. So I mean, quite a variety, but in general, I would say that it was much more of a textbook traditional school-focused method of learning a language. Now as I progressed learning the language, I also had some immersive experiences actually being in Germany and speaking German, and this really sped up the process of learning the language, but honestly, after learning more languages, I think that if I had done things differently, the immersion could have been more helpful. I felt like at that point, I knew some basics, but most of those had to do with grammar, and so actually getting words out to speak was really hard, especially that first time actually being in Germany, speaking German. Now I knew basic words, but I could not understand as much as I thought I was going to be able to. At that point, I had already studied almost two years, and I had studied the language really hard, and so I thought that my language skills were much higher than they were. And when I was there, I also had a much higher expectation of what I could understand and the output I could create. But knowing what I know now, I was actually at quite a basic level, and I think that if I would have focused more on just common words and actual real-life scenarios rather than just random word lists and random grammar charts, that immersion could have been so much more helpful than it actually was. Sometimes we spend hours and hours, even years, focusing on the language and studying things, but we are diving deep into the wrong sorts of things. And so then when you go to actually use the language, the tools that you have built aren't actually that useful. And so then when I started to learn the next language, I really took the experience that I had with learning German into that language learning experience. Now, in the end, I think it took me four years from starting to learn the language to passing a C1 exam for German. So all in all, that was four years. About eight months of that time was actually in Germany. So I did have quite a bit of that in an immersive environment. But from zero to a C1, that was a four year experience. One main pro from going all about this language learning journey was that I tried so many different things. I was so inexperienced with language learning that I actually truly experimented listening to this, listening to that, writing, reading, I mean, everything. I tried so many different learning materials. And I think that that broadened my understanding for actually language learning. Maybe all in all, it wasn't that helpful for German, but it was helpful in terms of understanding what does and does not work. And that's also different for every single person. Now, one con I found in this language learning journey was that I tried so many different things that I was never in a super consistent routine. Every day I was just doing something. And of course, that's better than nothing. But the routine happened to be pretty inconsistent. And looking back now, if I had a more focused, consistent routine, I think I could have reached that C1 level much faster. Now, the next language I learned was Polish, and this one I went about completely differently. This was a much more immersion focused language. Now, the reason I started to learn Polish was because I went to Poland to study, and so I wanted to be able to communicate in Poland. And so before leaving the country, I did not take any classes. I mean, I could have done more, but really, I've just looked up some common basic words, some basic phrases like how to introduce yourself, just the quote unquote survival language skills, just so that I could barely communicate when I got there. I think I also started to do an A1 workbook at this time just to learn some skills. But really, my knowledge was bare minimum, very, very basic. Now, when I arrived, the city I was in, most people were not speaking English. And I actually thought for some reason that maybe I could get by speaking German, but that was not the case. So I actually had to use that basic Polish I learned. And every day using even just these basic words, I was able to improve just a tiny bit every day. And that really set a foundation for language learning. I think actually one really important thing I did before arriving was I made sure that I knew how to read and write. So when I would see words written, how to actually pronounce them and vice versa, especially since Polish is such a different language, that was really essential. Some languages, it's pretty straightforward. Like Spanish, you just have to learn a couple different pairs and how to say it. But with Polish, the pronunciation is completely different. So I made sure before I left that I could pronounce words that I saw and that if I heard a word, I could write it down. That was one of the most important things. And actually that took a really long time. And so making sure I could do that before arrival made it so that when I encountered new words, when I heard words, I could write them down. I could look them up. I actually had the base, at least just the very basic tools to learning more in the language. Now, here is where the process really changes, because I began studying every single day while living there, spending a couple hours every day. But I did it so differently. I did the very opposite of a traditional textbook school method. I had a workbook that was actually a quite different format and very unique, but the way it functions is every lesson, it gives you a very short explanation of what you're learning, and then it gives you sentences in Polish and you translate it. And then the next page, it gives you sentences in English and you translate it to Polish. And so all you're doing is trying to use that one key skill that you've learned in the language, both directions. And this is probably the best workbook I have ever used. Now, it is fast paced learning that way. If you have a really dissonant time learning languages and it just doesn't click in your brain, it might be hard. But generally, I found that to be just so fast paced. You learn the skill really quickly and then you just jump into actually practicing it in real life sentences, real life scenarios. And that is so much more helpful than just writing out charts. I mean, doing a word search or multiple choice, matching things together. I mean, these workbooks sometimes are just ridiculous. But this one was so focused and really time efficient, too. So every day I would spend an hour doing that. And then I had a notebook where I would write down all my new words from that one chapter. And then I would also review my words from the day before. So any new words from the day before, write down the new ones. That was my bare minimum. And then if I wanted to do anything on top of that, I would just look up some random vocabulary lists on Quizlet or on the Internet and just practice them. Something like furniture or kitchen appliances or vacation terms. Right. So just random, completely random vocabulary lists. But then I was actually practicing my language skills every day in the city. Now, if you're listening to this method, you're probably thinking to yourself, what about grammar? And that is the key difference here. I did zero grammar. Now, I learned some very basic things in my workbook that were in the chapters. And then from that, I learned enough to know that Polish grammar is extremely difficult, extremely confusing and very vast. So then I went on to just get a big picture of the grammar. So this is how verbs work. This is how nouns work. I looked at it. I checked it and I make sure I understand it. But I did not spend hours memorizing endings. I was aware of how everything functioned. And then I basically was like, I'm going to learn the words and I'm going to practice and I'm just going to be in the city practicing. And eventually I'm going to hear the grammar. And it's actually amazing how that works, because slowly I would notice in different situations, oh, here you say this ending. And slowly my grammar just has gotten better and better and better. And so, of course, my Polish is not even close to perfect. It's a really hard language. My German is much better, much more precise because I focused on that more. But I can communicate very effectively in Polish, quite a fluid level, just because I can get across, because I can say the words and generally I can use the grammar to make them sound correct. And of course, this method actually requires a lot of immersion because you're kind of doing the basics and then just throwing yourself out there and saying, I'm going to start learning and just practice, and hopefully that carries the rest of the journey. And it does, but it is quite a different method. So I would call this the immersion method. All in all, what I learned in this journey of learning Polish is that context is key. When you learn words and phrases and even grammar completely out of context, you aren't actually able to use them and you actually then aren't able to communicate. And no matter how much you study, you aren't able to be fluent. Another thing I learned is that grammar will fill in the gaps over time. Of course, you need to know a broad understanding, but actually hearing and speaking the language, grammar will naturally fill in. And also people don't really care. I have never had the experience where someone understands you perfectly and they just answer you and correct your grammar. That doesn't happen unless it's a good friend of yours and you ask them to correct your grammar. People don't care if you make grammar mistakes. They just want to understand you. You just want to understand them. You want to be able to communicate effectively. And that is the goal. They don't care if your ending is wrong. Another thing I learned is that words are essential. You can communicate, you can sound and be fluent with just words because then once again, you can actually have a conversation where you understand each other. Another thing I learned is that pronunciation is essential. When you are learning a language, you know a bunch of words, but you're saying them incorrectly. No one understands you. And if you hear and see words that you don't know, but you can't write them down in your dictionary because you don't understand the true rules of pronunciation, you also can't learn the new word. So pronunciation early on is honestly so. Essential. And I wish people talked about this more because they tend to skip over it as if it may come naturally. And it does not. It's something you have to learn and it has to be focused on early on. And the last thing I really took away in this language learning journey is that you have to create, you have to produce the language. You cannot just have input, input, input, input. Of course, input is important. We need input to learn the language and to really develop the ear for the language. But you will not learn a language if you do not produce the language. So now after having learned German and Polish, I wanted to learn another language. And so I took everything that I learned in those two journeys and I started learning Portuguese. And honestly, this was kind of a test. I tried to do a method that nobody teaches, that I had not used. And I thought after these two languages that if I would do it this way, maybe I would become fluid really quickly. So what I did was I started with learning the 10,000 most common words. Initially, I just started with the first 1,000 most common words. I looked up a list of top 1,000 most common words in Portuguese. I printed that out. I put them on flashcards and I learned 100 a day. So then in 10 days, I had the most common 1,000 words. And of course, this first 1,000 words was a massive sprint just trying to get familiar with the language. Every time I encountered a new word in my flashcard, I would look it up on Google Translate and press the play button to make sure that I was pronouncing it right as I was practicing. So I started with just those first 1,000 most common words and then the first 10,000 most common words. After I got those first 1,000 most common words, I started doing a daily tutor class. So I met online with a tutor and we would just talk in the language. I mean, we weren't even doing lessons. We would literally just speak in Portuguese. And I did not know any grammar at this stage. Literally, I had 1,000 words and I was starting to learn more. I was working on my 10,000 list. And then every day in class, I was learning more. But that is all I knew. No grammar, nothing else, just words. And then I would just sit there every morning with a teacher and speak for an hour. And it was the most effective method I have ever used. It was honestly incredible to see how even with just that you can communicate. And then every day I was learning more words. I was getting more exposed to the language, improving my pronunciation more. And every day I could communicate more and our conversations could get a little bit more and more in depth. Now, after I started doing that, then I decided to add in a workbook. So I got just an A1 workbook and just started to do one chapter a day. I think then I dialed it back to 50 vocab words a day instead of 100 with my flashcards and then my hour long class. So I was spending about two and a half hours a day learning the language. So it was quite a lot. But I kind of had this really good groove of getting tons of words, actually speaking, having conversation in my class. And then my workbook was slowly introducing grammar and context. But it was super slow. And at that point, I already had enough of a basis of just words, just interacting with the language that the workbook really was helping building out my grammar and my overall language skills, I would say. Now, immersion came next. I think I did this for two or three months. And then I actually went to Portugal and I was there for six weeks doing language classes and practicing speaking the language out in the city and in my classes. And at the end of that, I passed a B1 exam. So I think it was four and a half months total from zero to the end of that program. And I passed a B1, but four and a half months for passing a B1 is very, very fast. And I honestly think that this method of learning a language is extremely effective. Once again, I had all the basics. I had tons of words I could actually communicate without even using any grammar. And then I slowly started to add in grammar. I used immersion to add that context, to train my ear, to hear the grammar and really learn almost more like kids do, where you just have some basics and then slowly based on interactions and context and just input and output, you start to improve. And that was really an effective process and method I went through to learn the language. Now, all in all, with learning Portuguese, what I learned is that words have to come first. But really, when I learned Portuguese, it was a test to try and see if I just learned words first, if I could do it. And it totally, totally worked. So I truly learned the importance of vocabulary and how focusing on that in conjunction with pronunciation right off the bat will really help you excel in your language learning journey. The next thing I learned was the importance of understanding and then speaking. Of course, you understand first. And so this cycle goes words, understand, input, slowly speak words, understand, input, slowly start speaking, start speaking better. And all you have to do is just get started in that loop and just keep going and you will become fluent and learn the language. The other thing I learned here is that it is important to briefly review all the grammar, understand how things work, understand how verb conjugations work, how nouns function, how articles function. Right. You need to know all of that, but you can get a very general understanding without actually diving in and really memorizing each chart. Just review everything quickly, have it in the back of your mind. You know how things function. And then after that, just start paying attention when you're listening and speaking and start to hear the endings and you'll slowly start putting them on correctly. And lastly, in this journey, focusing early on pronunciation made it so much easier to fast track that language learning process. I just already had that done right off the bat. So then as I was taking in words and trying to express myself, I was just ready to go and I was understandable and I could understand. So my key takeaway here is that the third method of learning Portuguese was the fastest and it was all a vocab first method. So if I were to learn a language now, a new language, I would do the exact same thing. Honestly, I would learn the first 10,000 most common words, focus on pronunciation right off the bat and focus on that every day. I would focus on input and constant immersion. So really using context to understand. And I would build a consistent routine of actually talking to someone so that I'm using all those words I've learned using context in taking real context and words to actually build my language learning skills. Remember, the goal here is actually fluency. Passing exams are great, but if you want to reach fluency, if you want to be understandable and understand others and actually be able to communicate, this is the right starting place and this is actually going to help you do it. Now, if you want to turn out my pronunciation guide for learning English as a foreign language, it's linked below and that can really help you jumpstart your language learning journey. But thank you so much for watching. If you have any questions about language learning, leave them in the comments below. I answer every comment and I will catch you in the next video. Thanks so much for watching. Bye.