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• Language Learning (Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 10 2017, @02:17PM

  by Phoenix666 (552) on Wednesday May 10 2017, @02:17PM (#507546) Journal

  Immersion in a foreign language while living in that culture is of course the best way to learn.

  If you don't have the opportunity to do that, there are two effective ways you can do in the comfort of your own home or when you're out and about.

  First, watch TV programs/movies in that language. It's an excellent way to get used to the cadence of the language and learn how to break up the stream of syllables into units of grammar and meaning. Once your vocabulary begins to pick up, you begin to acquire idiomatic expressions that are the bulk of how native speakers communicate. In this context, regular TV with commercials is very helpful, because the repetition of the commercials reinforces what you know and builds on it, and often you can crib because they're foreign brands whose catchphrases you already know in your own language.

  Second, get the Pimsleur language lessons. They are almost all audio w/ no written component, unlike Berlitz, so that you can do them while driving or at the gym or doing something else. Their technique is very effective at imparting competence quickly; in a lesson they give you a handful of vocab words and phrases in context, mix them up in as many ways as they can. The next lesson they repeat the previous words and phrases a couple times, then give you new material. You can easily get to survival competency in a week or two, and because of the way they teach it you retain that knowledge for a remarkably long time afterward (up to 18 months) if you stop there. I only did up to lesson 15 in Russian 10 years ago and can still pick out phrases in movies and speech.

  --
  Washington DC delenda est.

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