How to Learn a Foreign Language

By Samantha Asher

Before starting to learn a foreign language, you need to know what you are getting into. You can't expect to be fluent in Spanish after a few months of watching the Spanish channel. If you study for 20 minutes a day, you will not be able to carry on a long, strenuous conversation with ease after even a year. There's nothing wrong with taking it slow. Twenty minutes a day may be all you can and are willing to put into it, and that's fine. You just need to understand that it might take a little bit longer to build your fluency.

If you are looking to learn a quick small amount of conversational Spanish, French, or other language, a few months of concentrated study may get you there. If you want to be fluent in the language, several years will get you speaking, and a lifetime of learning will keep you building and keep you fluent.

Next, you need your supplies. The basics you will need to get started aren't expensive. You will need a dictionary, phrasebook, textbook with grammar, newspaper or book in your language, and note-cards and/or a notebook. If you want to learn further and don't mind the expense, you can get workbooks, software programs, and listening programs. Rosetta Stone and Pimsleur are great programs, but I would still recommend using other resources for grammar, vocabulary, and reading comprehension. Their premise is that you didn't learn English through textbooks and that you should learn your second language the same way you did your first. But I look at it this way, sure you didn't use a textbook to learn your first words, but later on you went to school and used textbooks and other materials to learn how to read and to hone your English.

Now you can finally get into studying. Believe it or not, there's not much else to it besides following the directions. Follow your textbook from cover to cover, but instead of just 'getting through it' like you may have done in grade school, master every part of it. Make sure you know every grammar point and every vocabulary word inside and out. Do all the exercises and make sure you understand them all completely and practice yourself as well. Listen to your audio programs again and again until you have mastered them. Read and translate all your material, memorize the words you don't know, and figure out the grammar you don't know in each sentence and master that.

In order to get everything you can out of all your learning aids, you need to really take advantage of what they have to offer you. If you really master the material in one beginner's textbook, you could probably know more of your language than a student who simply breezes through two or three books.

Continue on when you finish each book by moving on to a more advanced text. Continue speaking and writing in your language. Read and translate material in your language every day. Watch movies in your language and instead of just listening to them, comprehend them. Even when you feel you are fluent, keep spending at least a little time each day reading, writing, speaking, and listening so that you don’t lose any of what you've learned.

Do you want to know more about learning a second language? Go to LearningaSecondLanguage.info for more information on language learning.