Moving to a country where they speak the language you are trying to learn kinda helps.
I've lived in the US for 15 years. At first I wouldn't even be able to even tell words apart, so listening to a lot of people and trying to make the sounds they were making was my first challenge. Then I knew like 200 words so my conversations were a bit limited so memorizing words was the next goal. And then I would get into more interesting conversations and people would use rare words which everybody seem to know what they meant. And for that you can only read a lot ^_^
Then you can get fancy and try to reduce your foreign accent for extra points.
But being exposed to the language is a must, hence living in a country where it is spoken helps. My french is kinda awful (I've never lived in france) but I can order food at restaurants which is nice.
Ask HN: To those who became fluent in a second language, what did you do?
51–60 of 207 posts
Re: Ask HN: To those who became fluent in a second language, what did you do?
#52The key is to get feedback. And normally, that means trying to make the sounds while you're young, because people tend not to correct adults when they make a slightly wrong sound.
Hang around kids and you'll notice people correcting their sounds repeatedly. Teachers will show them how to move their tongues, describing just what to do to make a th-sound or g-sound and so on. Go to an adult class and you rarely get that, apart from fixing really coarse issues.
If you're lucky, the easiest way to learn is just to grow up in a dual language zone. I grew up with four languages around me, so I know those sounds. To make it useful, though, you need instruction. You're unlikely to grow up in a place where specialist terms like "magnetism" or "accrual" are used in multiple languages. Also having some classes will clear up the minor niggles with any given language.
Re: Ask HN: To those who became fluent in a second language, what did you do?
#53I'm french, and I speak fluently english thanks to video games and community forums. But I also started learning norwegian and I'm doing pretty well, talking woth norwegian friends
Re: Ask HN: To those who became fluent in a second language, what did you do?
#54I'm fluent in German, English. I'm living in Japan and am almost fluent in Japanese and quarter fluent in Korean. I also recently started Hungarian and Spanish. The most important part in my opinion is to live in a country that speaks the language you want to learn. You have to immerse yourself as much as possible with the culture and language. Also very important that you aren't afraid to try to use what you learned…
Strongly agree that wordlists are useless (beyond the first few hundred that you are going to see constantly anyway) and making connections is key to retaining vocabulary. Another tip is to pull vocabulary lists from reading material, and then to review them you just re-read that text until it becomes easy.
I think wordlists and learning tons of vocabulary through deliberate study are generally underrated. However, I do agree that once you've got a good foundation, pulling words from texts is a great idea.
I think the ideal thing to do is to get a list of words from a text before you read it, then prime yourself on them, and then really solidify them by reading the text. I think it makes the text a lot more enjoyable.
I actually just put together a prototype of a tool for doing this and wanted to polish it more before posting it, but I'd love any feedback / ideas from people who are into language learning here: https://langtools.curtis.io/
You can test it out with a guest account: guest@example.com, password "guest". Or just sign up, I don't validate your email or anything.
It's pretty rough but I think the basic idea of uploading a text, and seeing which lemmas are unknown to you so that you can pre-learn them is a good one.
btw here's some german if you want something to paste into it: http://lpaste.net/267332
Re: Ask HN: To those who became fluent in a second language, what did you do?
#55>How long did it take you?
Depends on the language and were you're coming from but to get C2 proficiency it takes anywhere from 900 to 4400 hours of immersion according to various sources.
In my experience that's quite accurate.
Re: Ask HN: To those who became fluent in a second language, what did you do?
#56I think the guy from fluentforever has the general pattern down correctly:
1) learn phonetics and pronunciation
2) learn a base of of the most common words (he has a list of 625 words, I think wikipedias "simple english" word requirements would be another good source). Do this with anki.
3) start studying grammar
4) move onto native materials (while continuing with anki)
I also think that most people massively underrate vocabulary study. With consistency, at only 15 words a day you could deeply learn ~5400 words a year with anki. I think it would be pretty easy to do more if you were dedicated, but 15 is pretty sustainable. The rate you tend to be taught vocabulary in college level courses is crazy low.
[0]: http://fourhourworkweek.com/2014/07/16/how-to-learn-any-lang... I swear this guy isn't the type of charlatan you'd expect to be associated with Ferris.
I hope this doesn't feel too spammy but I'd love if people had any feedback on the basic idea behind the tool I posted here: https://news.ycombinator.com/reply?id=12717657
Re: Ask HN: To those who became fluent in a second language, what did you do?
#57Everyone I know who has advanced skills in a foreign language spent one or more years in their target country where they had to speak the language daily, combined with a structured language course or class. Otherwise it is extremely difficult to get the necessary amount of daily exposure to new and novel situations where the language you want to study is used. You can try by watching a lot of foreign TV series and mo…
Native in Kirundi, I've learnt English, and French at school and by watching movies in those languages. No need to go in a foreign country. And now I work for a NGO, using them in my professional life.
The key is not only to read, understand, practice but also not to fear to make mistakes and get corrected. That's my experience. I've lived in Tanzania for 4 years, when I was young but with a fear of speaking Swahili the wrong way. Now I can understand and read Swahili, but responding back is so painfull. I'm waiting someone who can correct me while I speak it.
Re: Ask HN: To those who became fluent in a second language, what did you do?
#58I'm not fluent yet but after using duolingo for a few years (with varying degrees of commitment) I've had a tremendous improvement on my german after switching to lingq in the last few months. It allows you to import texts and you can very quickly look up the meaning of the word. While you do this it creates a database of words you've seen/ learned in context. It also automatically creates flashcards of those you've been exposed to and progressively moves them to a known state. What's cool is that you get a real sense of progress and where you're at. You can attach audio to texts as well and it also keeps tracks of words you've listened to. Anyway that's kept me much more motivated!. But still the gist of it is, read stuff you like in target language, children's books, newstories and hear the same content read out loud. Tv shows with subtitles in the target language are also great.
Re: Ask HN: To those who became fluent in a second language, what did you do?
#59Live in another country, and in an environment where English wasn't an option 80%+ of the time. But when there (here) structured learning in the form of a few books to round-off vocabulary/grammar and a few lessons mainly to track progress and give feedback helped hugely in going from basic to intermediary. Pleco dictionary and flashcards for 1-2 hours per day also very useful.
This is the only method that has worked for me. There is no substitute for talking to native speakers every day.
also, class + studying while immersed. it's helpful to do both. and watching tv or listening to the radio ..
.. so essentially i'm saying "do everything you can think of, especially living in an immersive environment" b/c that's what i did for a couple years .. and i'm still not exactly fluent.
of course the experience of living in a different social mileu is awesome for reasons connected but not equivalent to language fluency, like broadening cultural perspectives.
Re: Ask HN: To those who became fluent in a second language, what did you do?
#60I am fluent in English, French, Arabic and Spanish, the first is my native tongue and what helped with the following two was the fact I started learning them as a child. As for Spanish, it was mostly motivation to keep using it. Learn to think in that language.