How to Learn Any Language in 3 Months 218 Comments
The Okano Isao judo textbook I used to learn Japanese grammar.
Post reading time: 15 minutes.
Language learning need not be complicated.
Principles of cognitive neuroscience and time management can be applied to attain conversational fluency (here defined as 95%+ comprehension and 100% expressive abilities) in 1-3 months. Some background on my language obsession, from an earlier post on learning outside of classes:
From the academic environments of Princeton University (Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Italian) and the Middlebury Language Schools (Japanese), to the disappointing results observed as a curriculum designer at Berlitz International (Japanese, English), I have sought for more than 10 years to answer a simple question: why do most language classes simply not work?
The ideal system — and progression — is based on three elements in this order…
1. Effectiveness (Priority)
2. Adherence (Interest)
3. Efficiency (Process)
Effectiveness, adherence, and efficiency refer to the “what”, “why”, and “how” of learning a target language, respectively. In simple terms, you first decide what to learn, based on usage frequency (priority); you then filter materials based on your likelihood of continued study and review, or adherence (interest); lastly, you determine how to learn the material most efficiently (process).
Let’s cover each in turn. This post will focus on vocabulary and subject matter. For learning grammar, I suggest you read this short article. For “reactivating” forgotten languages — like high school Spanish — this sequence will do the trick.
Effectiveness: If you select the wrong material, it does not matter how you study or if you study – practical fluency is impossible without the proper tools (material). Teachers are subordinate to materials, just as cooks are subordinate to recipes.
Adherence: Review, and multiple exposures to the same material, will always present an element of monotony, which must be countered by an interest in the material. Even if you select the most effective material and efficient method, if you don’t adhere with repeated study, effectiveness and efficiency mean nothing. In other words: can you persist with the material and method you’ve chosen? If not, less effective materials or methods will still be better. The best approach means nothing if you don’t use it.
By analogy, if sprinting uphill with bowling balls in each hand were the most effective way to lose body fat, how long would the average person adhere to such a program?
If you have no interest in politics, will you adhere to a language course that focuses on this material? Ask yourself: Can I study this material every day and adhere until I reach my fluency goals? If you have any doubt, change your selection. Oftentimes, it is best to select content that matches your interests in your native language. Do not read about something that you would not read about in English, if English is your native language (e.g. don’t read Asahi Shimbun if you don’t read newspapers in English). Use the target language as a vehicle for learning more about a subject, skill, or cultural area of interest.
Do not use material incongruent with your interests as a vehicle for learning a language – it will not work.
Efficiency: It matters little if you have the best material and adherence if time-to-fluency is 20 years. The ROI won’t compel you. Ask yourself: Will this method allow me to reach accurate recognition and recall with the fewest number of exposures, within the shortest period of time? If the answer is no, your method must be refined or replaced.
An Example of Effectiveness (80/20) in Practice
Pareto’s Principle of 80/20 dictates that 80% of the results in any endeavor come from 20% of the input, material, or effort.
We can adapt this principle and prioritize material based on its recorded likelihood and frequency of usage. To understand 95% of a language and become conversational fluent may require 3 months of applied learning; to reach the 98% threshold could require 10 years. There is a point of diminishing returns where, for most people, it makes more sense to acquire more languages (or other skills) vs. add a 1% improvement per 5 years.
To see exactly how I deconstruct the grammar of new languages, I suggest you read “How to Learn (But Not Master) Any Language in 1 Hour”. Now, on to the meat and potatoes of communication: words.
If you were an student of English (though the list can be adapted to most languages), the following words would deliver the greatest ROI per hour invested for the initial 1-3 weeks of study:
The 100 Most Common Written Words in English
1. the
2. of
3. and
4. a
5. to
6. in
7. is
8. you
9. that
10. it
11. he
12. was
13. for
14. on
15. are
16. as
17. with
18. his
19. they
20. I
21. at
22. be
23. this
24. have
25. from
26. or
27. one
28. had
29. by
30. word
31. but
32. not
33. what
34. all
35. were
36. we
37. when
38. your
39. can
40. said
41. there
42. use
43. an
44. each
45. which
46. she
47. do
48. how
49. their
50. if
51. will
52. up
53. other
54. about
55. out
56. many
57. then
58. them
59. these
60. so
61. some
62. her
63. would
64. make
65. like
66. him
67. into
68. time
69. has
70. look
71. two
72. more
73. write
74. go
75. see
76. number
77. no
78. way
79. could
80. people
81. my
82. than
83. first
84. water
85. been
86. call
87. who
88. oil
89. its
90. now
91. find
92. long
93. down
94. day
95. did
96. get
97. come
98. made
99. may
100. part
The first 25 of the above words make up about 1/3 of all printed material in English. The first 100 comprise 1/2 of all written material, and the first 300 make up about 65% percent of all written material in English. Articles and tense conjugations that can often be omitted in some languages or learned for recognition (understanding) but not recall (production).
Most frequency lists are erroneously presented as the “most common words” in English, with no distinction made between written and spoken vocabulary. The 100 most common words as used in speech are considerably different, and this distinction applies to any target language.
The 100 Most Common Spoken Words in English
1. a, an
2. after
3. again
4. all
5. almost
6. also
7. always
8. and
9. because
10. before
11. big
12. but
13. (I) can
14. (I) come
15. either/or
16. (I) find
17. first
18. for
19. friend
20. from
21. (I) go
22. good
23. goodbye
24. happy
25. (I) have
26. he
27. hello
28. here
29. how
30. I
31. (I) am
32. if
33. in
34. (I) know
35. last
36. (I) like
37. little
38. (I) love
39. (I) make
40. many
41. one
42. more
43. most
44. much
45. my
46. new
47. no
48. not
49. now
50. of
51. often
52. on
53. one
54. only
55. or
56. other
57. our
58. out
59. over
60. people
61. place
62. please
63. same
64. (I) see
65. she
66. so
67. some
68. sometimes
69. still
70. such
71. (I) tell
72. thank you
73. that
74. the
75. their
76. them
77. then
78. there is
79. they
80. thing
81. (I) think
82. this
83. time
84. to
85. under
86. up
87. us
88. (I) use
89. very
90. we
91. what
92. when
93. where
94. which
95. who
96. why
97. with
98. yes
99. you
100. your
Individual word frequency will vary between languages (especially pronouns, articles, and possessives), but differences are generally related to frequency rank, rather than complete omission or replacement with a different term. The above two lists are surprisingly applicable to most popular languages.
Content and vocabulary selection beyond the most common 300-500 words should be dictated by subject matter interest. The most pertinent questions will be “What will you spend your time doing with this language?”
If necessary, the most closely related rephrasing would be “What do I currently spend my time doing?” It bears repeating: do not read about something that you would not read about in your native language. Use the target language as a vehicle for learning more about a subject, skill, or cultural area of interest. Poor material never produces good language.
Feed your language ability foods you like, or you will quit your “diet” and cease study long before you achieve any measurable level of proficiency.
As a personal example, I used martial arts instructional manuals to compete effectively in judo while a student in Japan. My primary goal was to learn throws and apply them in tournaments. To avoid pain and embarrassment, I had tremendous motivation to learn the captions of the step-by-step diagrams in each instructional manual. Language development was a far secondary priority.
One might assume the crossover of material to other subjects would be minimal, but the grammar is, in fact, identical. The vocabulary may be highly specialized, but I eclipsed the grammatical ability of 4 and 5-year students of Japanese within 2 months of studying and applying sports-specific instruction manuals.
The specialization of my vocabulary didn’t present a single problem in communication, it is important to note, as I was spending 80% of my free time training with people who also used judo-speak and other vocabulary unique to sports training and athletic development.
Once the framework of grammar has been transferred to long-term memory, acquiring vocabulary is a simple process of proper spaced repetition, which will be the subject of a dedicated future post.
In the meantime, don’t let languages scare you off. It’s a checklist and a process of finding material you enjoy with a good frequency ROI.
Ganbare!
###
Odds and Ends: Giveaway and USC Video
I’ll be giving away some very cool stuff this week on Twitter (electronics, my favorite bags, etc.). Just click here and follow me to see the goodies.
The Cisco-sponsored video about my house by the USC team is in the final 24 hours of competition and needs a few more views to win. Unfortunately, none of the embed views counted last time due to bad code. Please click here and wait a few seconds to help these kids get their big break!
Posted on January 20th, 2009
- Subscribe and get the latest
- Save this page
- Stumble It
- Email to a Friend
- Print it
- Leave a comment
Did you like this article?
Related Posts
-
Most Popular
The Not-To-Do List: 9 Habits to Stop Now
The Art of Letting Bad Things Happen (and Weapons of Mass Distraction)
How to Travel the World with 10 Pounds or Less (Plus: How to Negotiate Convertibles and Luxury Treehouses)
How to Do The Impossible: Create a Paperless Life, Never Check Voicemail Again, Never Return Another Phone Call…
-
Topics
- 4-Hour Case Studies (27)
- Automation (5)
- Dance (3)
- E-mail Detox (19)
- Entrepreneurship (1)
- Filling the Void (64)
- Gadgets (11)
- Geoarbitrage (8)
- Interviews (22)
- Investing (9)
- Language (12)
- Low-Information Diet (39)
- Marketing (21)
- Mental Performance (13)
- Mini-retirements (21)
- Nonsense (5)
- Outsourcing Life (14)
- Physical Performance (25)
- Practical Philosophy (1)
- Presentations (1)
- Protecting Time (11)
- Random (7)
- Remote Offices (7)
- Rockstar Living in… (5)
- The 4-Hour Body (11)
- The Book – 4HWW (38)
- Travel (44)
- Uncategorized (19)
-
Tim on Twitter...
The most common words in the English language (and most others, too): http://su.pr/AhcGHL 17 hrs ago -
Tim's Photos and More
Comment Rules: Remember what Fonzie was like? Cool. That's how we're gonna be -- cool. Critical is fine, but if you're rude, we'll delete your stuff. Please do not put your URL in the comment text and please use your PERSONAL name or initials and not your business name, as the latter comes off like spam. Have fun and thanks for adding to the conversation! (Thanks to Brian Oberkirch for the inspiration)
218 Responses to “How to Learn Any Language in 3 Months”
January 20th, 2009
2:38 pm
Excellent post, I especially enjoyed the idea of breaking a language down by word frequency for maximum retention, something I’d like to practice with Japanese.
I really enjoy your blog; I check it on an almost daily basis and would consider you a sort of “tech” big brother. I appreciate your genuine insight and tips on a variety of topics and would like to offer you a, “hats off” from Arkansas.
Regards,
Nick
January 20th, 2009
2:44 pm
Hi Tim,
Great article – but I especially like the reading time at the top. That way I knew I’d have time to start and to finish the post.
Thanks,
Bman
January 20th, 2009
2:47 pm
I was very excited to see a new language post pop up in my reader. Unfortunately I was a little disappointed after reading it. It looks like you simply repurposed material from your previous posts and from the 4HWW site.
Overall it is great material – especially for those who have not yet seen it but selfishly I was hoping for more.
Just my take, thanks.
January 20th, 2009
4:59 pm
@Anne,
Thanks for the comment. I made some edits to this piece and cleaned it up. Not to worry — there will be more coming :)
All the best,
Tim
January 20th, 2009
2:49 pm
Okay, how did you determine the reading time for the post? What about dead language like Biblical Greek or Hebrew? :)
January 20th, 2009
2:52 pm
One of my goals in 2009 is to learn Spanish. I can’t wait to put these “hacks” to good use!
Cheers,
Adam
January 20th, 2009
2:56 pm
Tim, glad you linked to the digital crib video. Enjoyed it, rated it, commented on it.
By the way, “Post Reading Time” is something I have been stressing for others to do for so long. First I noticed it on your blog, but want to congratulate you for using it.
Cheers!
James Bressi
January 20th, 2009
2:56 pm
Brilliant. I was actually logging on to the site as I know you have written about language learning in the past, and here’s some fresh stuff. I always struggled with languages at school, but I think it was the teaching/learning methods and relevance. Planning to live in Spain & Argentina for a few months with Spanish lessons in 2009/10.
January 20th, 2009
3:01 pm
Sound advice. It’s striking that courses which promise “fluency” disappointingly turn out to offer conversational fluency only rather than reading ability. The latter being much more demanding in terms of vocabulary. As someone more interesting in having a reading knowledge of a language than making chit-chat I’m very interested in study techniques for memorizing large vocab lists. I’ve had some success using Linkword Languages off-the-peg mnemonics product in Russian, the only problem with it, however, is the limited vocabulary size. Moreover, coming up with your own mnemonics for 10,000+ words is a chore that would tax even the most creative person. I plan on experimenting with spaced learning (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaced_learning) in the future, but I wondered if anyone else has useful memorization tips such as semantic grouping or the like?
January 20th, 2009
3:04 pm
Thanks for a great post! I took two years of Arabic during my time at the Air Force Academy and have been wanting to “reactivate” the language and gain more proficiency without wasting time on ineffective methods.
You stated once that you don’t care for Rosetta Stone and I was wondering why? I have never used the software, but it is available to me for free through my organization and I was planning on trying it – wanting to know your reasons before I pursue this route.
Appreciate your personal experiments in living, much more insightful than listening to some critic sitting on the sidelines spouting off theories.
January 20th, 2009
3:06 pm
I love this. Thank you. I am a Japanese speaker but to be honest, it’s not perfect and a little childish – in fact, it’s been referred to as “Mardi’s Japanese” in Japan. Oh dear… Will definitely take on your points. In fact, I have just printed it out! Thanks again Tim.
January 20th, 2009
3:12 pm
Really Nice Post !! My native language is spanish Im from Puerto Rico . If any one speak spanish or know speak it I recomended to read “Aprenda un Idioma en 7 Dias ” from spanish author Ramon Campayo. Campayo also have some other books as ” Desarrolle una mente Prodigiosa ” . One of my goals for last trimestre of 2009 is begin to use a knew language, maybe italian or french.Ahh i finally bought a Ferriss’s Book arrive this week. Yeahh !!
January 20th, 2009
3:17 pm
Hey Tim,
I’m a web developer, and recently released an online language-learning application which applies the principles you mention in this post. The app takes advantage of the spacing effect to make practice as efficient as possible.
It also has a ton of Mandarin Chinese content (more of which will be added soon), ordered by level of the HSK exam (a tiered, standard test of Mandarin fluency), and ordered within each level by frequency of occurrence within the written Chinese language. You can also add and share your own content all you want.
The app is completely free and even has an iPhone interface so you can practice on the train or wherever else. You can check it out [by clicking on his name. Sorry, Joey -- comment rules are such.]
January 20th, 2009
3:28 pm
Perfect timing. I just started a French-German-Italian (30 min of each) conversation group in NYC and we have our second meeting tonight. I’m going to print this out and bring it!!!
January 20th, 2009
3:33 pm
An attractive teacher will definitely help with Item 2. Not politically correct, but too bad.
January 20th, 2009
3:33 pm
Miguel,
When I determine my average reading time I divide my post length by 250. I have seen under many sources that the average reading speed is anywhere between 200-250. Someone correct me if I am wrong.
As far as a dead language. I have been studying Greek and Latin because of my interest in Medicine. I find I apply the rule that Tim gave in finding literature of interest. This usually consists of medical textbooks but at the same time, I do enjoy greek mythology and have dabbled in similar texts in Greek. I really don’t speak either well but I find it improves my knowledge of medicine.
Great post Tim, I always enjoy a good post on learning a new skill.
Cheers,
Jeremiah (Digital Trainer)
January 20th, 2009
3:53 pm
Hey Tim,
Thanks for your reply and advice.
I was just about to ask you to share your strategy for learning languages, and here it is… unbelievable. It will take quite a time to review it and tell you a proper thanks for that…
To tell you the truth, my friends and your russian fans said that your book is like a Bible for Entrepreneurs for the people in their 20-30s. And more over, always moving forward and learning more – that’s what makes your lifestyle unique and fabulous. To get rich – and apparantly get fat, bored and lazy, or a different way of living with daily automated income and doing what you are REALLY want to do, without worrying about paying a rent for next month, – that’s what most people didn’t know about at all…
Do you consider to make a family in your life? How do you think it will change your life? I am 31 myself, live with my girlfriend, and I am always thinking which bachelor things I want to keep no matter what influences marriage and kids can bring on me, and very interesting if you thought of that and have any answers for yourself…
Thanks for what you are doing,
sincerely,
Vadim.
January 20th, 2009
3:56 pm
Great stuff Tim. It’s amazing how “unscientifically” most people approach language learning. When you think about how long you need to invest to become fluent in a language it makes complete sense to focus a lot on the *how* upfront.
We’ve been working a lot at eduFire one trying to make the language learning process a lot more convenient. I think the notion of traditional classroom learning is on its way out and quickly being replaced by a number of great alternatives. Online language exchange sites like Friends Abroad and iTalki, self-paced sites like Live Mocha and Mango Languages and online tutoring and group classes at places like eduFire and Myngle are definitely the wave of the future.
I’m looking forward to a world in which learning languages becomes much more accessible. It does wonders for pulling together societies and increasing economic opportunities. Let’s hope that all these new tools and methodologies make that a reality.
January 20th, 2009
4:03 pm
After dating my Australian born taiwanese girlfriend (now fiance) for four years, i’ve picked up only a few words of Chinese (Mandarin) even though I spent alot of time around the language with her and her parents.
I’ve consistently had problems breaking through the comprehension barrier and am afraid to “practice” as much as I would like because of personal fear. This post really speaks to me! I can see now that it’s not really my attitude toward the language (which is generally quite positive, barring the frustration!), but the materials. Thanks for the wake up call Tim.
Love your work, can’t wait for your next book. ;)
January 20th, 2009
4:10 pm
Tim,
I have now established two of your posts into my everyday life. I loved what you had posted about Leo Babauta and decided to make 2009 my year for small but life-altering incremental changes. I’ve written down the 30-day challenges I’d like to accomplish during the year, and March will be when I start learning a different language. I will attempt Mandarin or Hindi.
Thank you for your posts and your continued inspiration. May 2009 be as awesome for you as I know it will be for me.
January 20th, 2009
4:16 pm
I like the ideas, especially the word list. This will come in handy. I have never thought of reading things that actually interest me instead of merely reading. I thought it didn’t matter what I read as long as I was reading, but interest plays a big part of it. Perhaps I should try to learn Japanese so that I can read manga. I know I wouldn’t mind that.
Thanks for the ideas.
January 20th, 2009
4:25 pm
I love the most common words approach. It definately works. It’s especially helpful for travelers who are going to a country for the short-term and need to understand the locals or get around. This paired with a decent phrasebook make the trip more enjoyable.
January 20th, 2009
4:33 pm
http://www.iknow.co.jp
I stumbled upon this site 3 months ago when I saw a video from Tofugu mentioning it. I’m already having decent broken conversations in Japanese over Skype and hopefully I’ll be pretty able to talk pretty smoothly in 2 more months. Best of all, it’s free!
January 20th, 2009
4:38 pm
Tim, great stuff as always. You need your own language books/cd’s/videos etc. Let travel or tech be the subject matter for adherence and put out your own word lists, and materials.
January 20th, 2009
4:43 pm
What would you suggest to someone trying to learn (and use) multiple languages over a short period of time? I’m preparing for a trip through 11 different countries over 11 months with about a month in each place. There will be about 7 different languages (besides English) to wrestle with. I have 7 months to prepare before I leave.
Any tips? Or any resources you’d suggest for dealing with this kind of multiple language acquisition?
Your articles are the best resources I’ve found for learning languages. Thank you.
January 20th, 2009
4:44 pm
Can anyone recommend some effective Russian materials? I’ve just arrived in east ukraine for work on my startup and a “mini-retirement” but the russian course books available here are very awkward. if you can help – spasiba!
January 20th, 2009
4:45 pm
Great stuff Tim! One of my goals this year is learning Korean so I can meet my girlfriend’s family properly. I’m going to give your techniques a shot. I’ll let you know how it turns out!
January 20th, 2009
4:46 pm
Hey Tim,
Great words. Kim and I used your last language post (as well as your Pimsleur recommendation) to practice our language skills on our mini retirement (and last dreamline goal of 2009) in Rio for the New Years celebrations. It works- even in Portuguese :) Look forward to implementing this one in France for our next mini-retirement.
Best and Happy New Year
Rob and Kim
January 20th, 2009
4:52 pm
Hi Tim,
I have a question specifically about Japanese study.
Should I bother with Kanji, if so, to what degree?
I’ve passed the JPLT Level 3 test, and I can read perhaps 400 Kanji, since it was an equal part of my Japanese curriculum at uni.
The next natural step is to work toward the nikyuu, but I’m a little unsure about it as it involves studying a lot of kanji on my own, which I might not have the patience for.
It would be nice to be able to read and write, but a bigger priority is to be able to converse fluently, especially in business situations.
Given your 80/20 principal, wouldn’t it be wiser to drop kanji study altogether? On the one hand I realise kanji would help me understand even the spoken the language, on the other, learning kanji I find far more tedious and it would take a longer time to master – but is it essential do you think?
January 20th, 2009
4:55 pm
@H Roark,
I recommend kanji. It’s very difficult to accumulate a large vocab in Japanese with a visual kanji image to associate for “jukugo” and other combinations due to the few phonemes of the language and massive number of homophones.
So, in short: yes, I would recommend learning to read kanji.
Good luck!
Tim
January 20th, 2009
4:57 pm
Why are the “The 100 Most Common Spoken Words in English” in alphabetical order? What’s #1? What’s #20?
January 20th, 2009
5:23 pm
@huh,
The simple answer is: that’s the only way I could find them!
Tim
January 20th, 2009
5:01 pm
Thanks for this post! I especially like the word list idea and will use it in developing my ESL lessons.
January 20th, 2009
5:01 pm
“one” is at number 41 and 53 in the list of most common spoken words.
January 20th, 2009
5:19 pm
The Vis-ed approach is great for certain languages– the Hebrew ones are terrific since each card gives gives adjective, noun, adverb, and verb variants for a particular root. The Korean ones, however, are full of archaic, obscure, and otherwise infrequently-used vocabulary–and the phonetic transliterations into Latin letters does not match the actual pronunciation of the word.
I did French in junior high and high school, majored in Russian in college, did an intensive Hebrew language program in Israel for seven months, and have lived in Korea for almost five years. At some point or another, I have had conversational fluency in each (having gotten rather rusty in each since then).
Korean is BY FAR the hardest of them all: it has all the nuance of Chinese pronunciation combined with the sentence structure of Japanese. That’s why I’m studying it– if I can get over that hump, I can do anything. If anyone wants tips on studying Korean, drop me a line.
January 20th, 2009
5:35 pm
Good article. See also the site I mentioned for more research on this suject.
January 20th, 2009
5:48 pm
The incredible level of quality of this blog continues to amaze me!!
January 20th, 2009
6:09 pm
I live in Taiwan and when I got here my first priority was learning how to read and say food and drink items. I spoke to another guy who learned how to give directions to taxi drivers as his first priority.
Second to that, as I teach yoga I learned more chinese from yoga books written in chinese (that had been translated from english and I translated back to english to figure out the terminology that I needed).
I also study tai ji and that was another source of language learning matierial.
One other thing that helped me is that I am interested in chinese calligraphy and so learning to write the characters also helped me to recognize them easier.
January 20th, 2009
6:18 pm
Hi Tim!
Quick Question:
Im Trying to be a spanish speaking rep this june. now i have the complete set both Michel Thomas and Pimsleur (w/c u ‘voted’ on the comment in the other article).
1. Now which should I start first? MT –> Pims or the other way around?
2. Any ’supplemental’ things / materials / doings? eg. movies to watch things to tweak, forums to join, in a 80/20 fashion?
Hoping for your response thanks
Racann
Manila, Philippines
January 20th, 2009
6:29 pm
Hey Tim, Great blog. Good to hear that you enjoyed Nikko. I live in Utsunomiya, about 45 minutes from Nikko. There are many cool places to see and things to do around here.
If you’re still in Japan, let’s hook up and I’ll show you the local sites.
January 20th, 2009
6:56 pm
I think you forgot the word “FUCK”.
###
I didn’t, but the frequency folks seem to have forgotten :)
-Tim
January 20th, 2009
7:09 pm
Thank you! I love this! And I really need it for my traveling!
Thanks again!
ps. Any updates on your show? More episodes hopefully?!?!
January 20th, 2009
7:34 pm
Where can we find information about the 100 most common written and spoken words in languages other than English, say Spanish or German?
Thanks so much!
January 20th, 2009
8:29 pm
Great! I’ve been waiting for more on this subject for quite a while. I used your previous posts in years past to help me tackle some of the european languages while living in Berlin. I can’t wait for more.
January 20th, 2009
8:37 pm
Hi Tim,
This is definitely useful for people who are considering taking up a 2nd language. Learning a new language can be grueling and somehow you just make it look so easy. Kudos to you.
Cheers
Vincent
Personal Development Blogger
January 20th, 2009
10:56 pm
Tim,
What are your feelings on interactive language learning programs? The Rosetta Stone set for example. I had a friend recommend it for spanish, but I’m not sure if I should spend the money on it based on what you cover. Let me know if you can! Thanks
January 20th, 2009
11:19 pm
Very interesting stuff. I learned Spanish in about 3 months but it has taken me more than 5 months to get anywhere with mandarin. The only significant difference that I can see in the experience was the fact that when I learned Spanish I was deeply interested in the content and immersed myself in it. As I’ve been learning mandarin I’ve dealt with topics that hold no interest. Time to change my tactics.
On a side note, my boss recently tasked me with a program to teach several hundred native mandarin speakers English so that we can do business in China in English. Any recommendations? I’ve got a plan but am always open for ways to improve it.
January 20th, 2009
11:44 pm
Wow, your method is awesome.
I’m starting learning italian with your guide.
In a while will give you a feedback how it worked to me.
Cheers,
Robert
January 20th, 2009
11:52 pm
Relevancy of the material is vital to adherence. As English speakers in Germany my kids don’t learn the same words and phrases that are important to me. They want to understand the rules of the neighbourhood games and one of their first words was “spiel” which is play in English.
January 21st, 2009
12:56 am
I wish i could find a list of the most common SPOKEN words in japanese…
I’ve found some older written lists, and sites like iknow seem to use the same lists… but they seem to be based on writing… and to be a bit out of date.
They often feature words like “typewriter”, and also seem to be based mostly on newspaper articles, as political and finance terms seem to come up way too often…
I wonder if there is some software to analyse a website and make a list of words by frequency??
January 21st, 2009
1:34 am
Hi All!
Thanks for the great comments and contributions. A few things:
1) There is a great resource about word frequency lists here: http://www.lextutor.ca/research/ Thanks, Rene!
2) I do not recommend Rosetta Stone or similar “we’ll teach you to think in a language instead of just speak it” and “we’ll teach you to learn like a child does” systems.
Most cognitive neuroscientists who do semantic/phonetic mapping will agree the former is impossible, and learning languages like a child is slower than learning like an adult. If you read the research of Hakuta or look at anecdotal evidence like mine, adults can learn much, much faster than children by using their native language for associations.
Using “learn like a child” is a great excuse for a company to produce materials with the same images for every language and minimal tweaking of translation, which = lower cost of production. It’s designed to be simple to produce en masse, not for best results.
Here’s the thing, though: any system you stick with is better than a fantastic system you don’t stick with. If you absolutely love Rosetta Stone and enjoy the CDs, you will eventually learn the language. For me, and many I suspect, “eventually” isn’t good enough. I’m happy to do some hard work to get really good really quickly.
Just my two cents!
Pura vida,
Tim
January 21st, 2009
1:43 am
@H Roark and anyone else learning Japanese.
If you’re serious about learning Japanese for business purposes or mastery, unfortunately you’d also better be serious about learning Kanji. I bit the bullet and learned all 1945 of the Joyo Kanji and then some when I was studying for 1kyu, and it was absolutely worth it.
Kanji really start to pay dividends when you move on to more advanced vocabulary. The more words you learn, the more you start to get amassed in a sea of homonyms. And before you know it, the language just dissolves into a blurb of same-soundiness in your head. Since Kanji retain actual meaning, it becomes much easier to distinguish which word it is.
Another great benefit of learning Kanji is that you can often accurately guess what words you’ve never heard before mean, or spot read new words in print.
That said, there is an 80/20 way to go about learning Kanji. The standard rote method of memorizing each character individually stroke for stroke is not it. I highly recommend the “Remembering the Kanji” series by James Heisig for a systematic approach to learning to read and write kanji that takes advantage of common radicals.
January 21st, 2009
1:57 am
Ah, finally the commentary on Rosetta Stone I was looking for. That makes sense. Thanks!
Are there any systems or products that you do recommend for Spanish?
January 21st, 2009
2:05 am
@Tim
Funny, in my own language learning I was always frustrated that I was force fed English transliteration as a method of learning grammar and new words. I often found it easier to just think in terms of the native grammar. In my own mind I conceive of language as a serious of modular blocks that connect to each other to create meaning.
Once you figure out something like Japanese uses SOV word order, it seems like a gigantic step backwards and a whole lot of extra work to start with an English sentence as reference and transliterate it into Japanese. That said, for learning new or advanced grammatical structures, using English as a reference can be helpful, but I feel should be discarded as quickly as possible once you’ve properly learned to use the new grammar. It’s also useful sometimes when you just can’t quite figure out how to say what you want to say.
In my purely anecdotal experience, what I’ve consistently observed over and over again in native Japanese and Korean speakers learning English (and those speakers learning each other’s languages for that matter), is that the biggest barrier to sounding natural is failure to properly learn and internalize grammar. Starting from very basic word order, not even advanced grammar. What these speakers wind up saying is clearly just a word-for-word transliteration of the sentence in their native language that doesn’t quite survive translation.
I love language learning so much I could go on about it ALL DAY.. maybe even all week.. but I’ll stop here.
January 21st, 2009
2:54 am
Thanks for all your posts on language learning, they are proving very encouraging for my situation: I’m Icelandic and my Japanese fiancée will move here in the summer and start studying Icelandic.
She is a bit worried (and so am I) because the sentence structure is vastly different from Japanese, there are 4 (dreaded) noun cases, and nouns can be masculine/feminine/neuter which affects the adjectives. I’m hoping we will be able to use the techniques you have described to help her reach fluency quickly, but secretly I worry considerably about the blasted grammar. Do you have any suggestions for our particular case?
January 21st, 2009
3:00 am
Speaking of spaced repetition, are you aware of SRS programs like Supermemo, Mnemosyne, Anki?
January 21st, 2009
4:16 am
One of the things I do when I learn a language, is doing research about the country in which it’s spoken, or the people who speak it if they happen not to have a country. It’s amazing how small details can help me connect bits of linguistic rules.
Also, I always try to do languages exchange with people speaking the language I learn, and learning the language I speak. However, that’s not always easy.
Nice video, Tim. Off-topic though, are you losing hair??
Sorry, couldn’t help it! :)
January 21st, 2009
4:18 am
Hi Tim,
Thanks for your post. Can you recommend any specifc programs or materials for Japanese, from which we can find one we love?
I’m using Pimsleur and for the first time ever, learning fairly effortlessly and easily.
However… I’m always open to even better ways if you have them.
Thanks so much,
Michael
January 21st, 2009
4:19 am
Hi there Tim,
my nname is Kei
I am enjoying your articles here in Tokyo
and I often see that you are visiting Japan…
If you have sometime next time,
why dont you stop over to my restaurant in Tokyo
would be honored to serve you,
offcourse if you like Turkish food!
Please do contact me if you are to come to the restaurant.
Thanks for the vibe always
regards
Kei
January 21st, 2009
4:33 am
Great Post Tim,
You keep on impressing me; I love your style of accomplishing anything with a more time efficient system; you seem to be able to accomplish anything; I am so impressed and have been using your principles in my lifes mission of giving anyone and everyone a simple proven system to not only get the best body of their adult life; but lifestyle and life;
So that they can be fully engaged and reach their true potential in all the major areas of their life with the most time efficient, results orientated program on the planet.
I love to do the same as you; please keep the vision of the better school systems; I would love to see a post on that topic to start to round up your team that may be able to help you.
Having two young daughters of my home; and mentoring hundreds of kids in the Chicagoland area; and seeing what is going on throuogh out the country with people going $100,000 in debt for a degree then trying to go out and get a “JOB”, is heart breaking;
Lets do it; I can’t wait to see your next post / publication on fitness / fatloss.
Keep up the great work; You have won me over as a fan, Tim.
Darin L. Steen (the Chicago Kid)
January 21st, 2009
7:02 am
Great post.
Quick question to anyone reading:
Do you know of any Dictionary series like English – German, with a 2000 word limit?
From what I gather from this, 2000 words is the most effective number of vocabulary to learn http://www.lextutor.ca/research/ for a given language, assuming that a dictionary limits itself to the most frequently used words.
I am quite good at what other people would consider boring repetitions, so my most effective method would be learning 2000 words and grammar to ‘master’ a language.
January 21st, 2009
7:32 am
Joey,
You ROCK!!! your flashcards are awesome, I was using cumbersome paper flashcards before.
I’ll be studying them from now on as user nate_ch
Thanks again Tim for sparking up more inspiration!
Nate
January 21st, 2009
7:36 am
Wow. This is really useful information. Thanks
January 21st, 2009
7:43 am
For those studying Mandarin Chinese:
Chinese word frequency list (ie most frequently used Chinese characters):
http://readmandarin.com/research.htm
January 21st, 2009
11:52 am
Excellent points about why learners should choose the subject matter.
I’ve found that instant translation tools, like Loqu8 iCE (Chinese-English) work very well. By picking a subject matter, I browse websites and documents that are improtant to me. Unliked “canned” language programs, this immersion method lets me focus on learning what’s important to me. Personal motivation goes a long way towards adherence and efficiency.
January 21st, 2009
1:04 pm
Hey Tim,
Great content. It is important to remember that learning a language when you are a adult should not take years of theorical studies.
I’m currently learning German in Berlin after leaving Paris. I’ve taken a 3 months course and my objective is simple : being fluent in everyday life.
To reach this goal i have to learn numbers, common verbs and words and some rules.
Quite simple in fact but challenging anyway :)
It makes me smile because all the people who studied German for 8 or 10 years at school say that they can’t say anything in German.
It’s like comparing orange and apple. Time in school isn’t time you choose to spend.
Pura Vida !
January 21st, 2009
2:02 pm
I speak 9 languages fluently and since Tim’s first post on language learning have learned another, Russian, well enough to understand political discussions on the radio, and to read and listen to literature.
I totally agree with many of the points in this post of Tim’s.
Efficiency: The greater the efficiency, the greater the intensity of the learning experience. Massive listening, reading and word review is the most efficient way to learn. Classes, grammar explanations, Rosetta Stone, and even having conversations before you have much of the language, is not efficient.
The classroom is a low intensity language learning environment.
Effectiveness: Which I understood to mean focusing on important things first. To me this applies mostly to making sure that the content you are learning from is interesting and meaningful. I would not worry too much about prioritizing words and structures to learn. The brain will figure that out, and shelve the odd low priority word that pops up. The point is that if you want fluency you need a lot of words, a lot, and you need a lot of input.
Adherency: Absolutely important. It is best to stay with interesting content and you will learn, because you will be motivated to continue listening and reading. You cannot learn from boring content. I agree wholeheartedly with Tim. Content that is artificially built around “easy words” is only useful at the very beginning, and soon loses interest for the learner.
This article of Tim’s is very useful. If his previous one about mastering a language in one hour served more to attract the attention of people to the opportunities of learning languages, this article offers more concrete advice for the long haul.
I would caution people about the 3 months. I am a good language learner. I have been studying Russian for over 2 years, and I have a ways to go yet. But it does not matter, I enjoy the process. That is the most important thing.
January 21st, 2009
2:14 pm
Thanks Tim. I always enjoy reading your stuff. A quick note for other readers.
Take Tim’s top 100 lists and copy and paste them into google’s translator,
( http://translate.google.com/translate_t# ) to quickly get the foreign language word equivalents. Gives you a nice study list to practice.
Cheers.
January 21st, 2009
2:39 pm
Hi All,
Here is a great suggestion from fellow blog reader, Tatoosh:
“A quick note for other readers.
Take Tim’s top 100 lists and copy and paste them into google’s translator,
( http://translate.google.com/translate_t# ) to quickly get the foreign language word equivalents. Gives you a nice study list to practice.”
Thanks, Tatoosh! Great idea.
Tim
Cheers.
January 21st, 2009
2:19 pm
I challenge any reader to summarize Tim’s 3-4 language posts. Now that you were able to pick Tim’s brain on language hacking, what practical advice would you give to your friends?
Could it be something simple as “study a language not in class but as you apply it”?
Tim, your writing style seems great for getting applause, but it clutters your message. Listen to yourself – quote:
“Principles of cognitive neuroscience and time management can be applied to attain [...]“.
###
Fair enough, F. The first version of this was written about two years ago, long before I adopted a more comfortable tone. The next will be more conversational.
Tim
January 21st, 2009
2:20 pm
[continuation]
In all fairness, does that even sound remotely understandable?
January 21st, 2009
4:01 pm
[...] by Timothy Ferriss’s work on language learning I have a few months to get myself in verbal [...]
January 21st, 2009
6:04 pm
Great post. I’m going to try your suggestions to see if they’ll actually work! :-)
January 21st, 2009
7:06 pm
[...] How to Learn Any Language in 3 Months (tags: tips lifehacks travel Tutorial reference linguistics research lifehack) [...]
January 21st, 2009
9:15 pm
I totally agree that learning the Japanese language without learning kanji alongside your vocab will hamstring you later in your studies. It is also a cultural thing. Many Japanese will give the explanation for homonyms as they have different kanji, which makes perfect sense to a Japanese, but is frustrating to NJ who can’t write.
Here again, Tim is right on. Learning the basics of kanji, the radicals, and the reasons for them will go a long way than rote memorization methods of the 70s.
January 22nd, 2009
12:56 am
BTW, Leeds University has produced large frequency lists, running to many thousands of words, of several major languages based on a variety of corpora. See http://corpus.leeds.ac.uk/list.html .
January 22nd, 2009
1:04 am
Hi All,
Another very good lead for frequency lists from Ewan:
“BTW, Leeds University has produced large frequency lists, running to many thousands of words, of several major languages based on a variety of corpora. See http://corpus.leeds.ac.uk/list.html ”
Thanks, Ewan!
Tim
January 22nd, 2009
9:24 am
This is great! Thanks everybody!!
Still would like to know Tim what you recommend then as the best materials for learning Spanish (I had been told Rosetta Stone as well). Or would you just say get the word list and learn some basic grammar and practice? Wanna get that materials thing right and then go for it. I want to get to proficiency at the ability to teach in Spanish.
January 22nd, 2009
12:24 pm
Yet another knowledge-boosting post. Thanks Tim!
Sorry to ask what a totally unrelated question, but something has been bothering me for a long time and I was wondering if you might be able to help.
I recently quit my job at a fairly secure financial firm (yes, I did just put the words secure and financial together) because I realized that it was not meant for me. I now have my own website that presents eco-innovations and tips on how to recycle stuff creatively. It is my dream to be able to live off of my writing and I love talking to people about it…with strangers. My problem is that I’ve been finding it very hard to communicate these ideas with the friends I have grown up with and love very much. Maybe it is an inevitable part of growing up, but my interests just aren’t the same as the other 26 year old girls and guys in my group. I feel at times that when I’m trying to discuss what makes me happy (green practices, social media or what I think will be a revolution in advertising and the way that we relate to one another), people take it as preachy or uninteresting. Some people have told me to find new friends, but I feel the issue is within myself, and that I can somehow make the change I want to see happen. Any thoughts?
January 22nd, 2009
3:31 pm
Fantastic article. I’d like to add two things:
First, this advice applies to every skill, not just language. You cannot overestimate the importance of “Priority, Interest, and Process.” I’ll be bookmarking this article as inspiration for any new skill I want to acquire.
Second, as someone who speaks four languages (with varying degrees of fluency) I’ll say that the best, and in my opinion the only, way to learn a new language is move to a country where you will be forced to learn. It took me four years of high school to learn Spanish because I was in the US. It took me two months to become just as fluent in Italian when I was living it Italy. And I didn’t even take a language class when I was there. (And I would have never learned Hungarian if I hadn’t lived in Budapest!)
When living in a foreign country you will have the Priority (otherwise you won’t be able to buy lunch). And finding the Interest will be easier because you can easily seek out your Italian-speaking judo schools or whatever.
January 22nd, 2009
5:12 pm
@Ewan Sinclair: mnemosyne is an option for spaced recall. I personally have used vistor’s cards (essentially blank business cards) in a more manual system. Something I picked up from Goethe Institut tips was colour-coding gender on the cards (blue = masc, red = fem, green = neut; black for verbs, etc). This worked well for knocking gender into my subconscience – I found I started to visualise the nouns as different colours when writing. When I was playing around with ancient greek I extended this to using colour with tense for memorising the basic forms of verbs.
A second tip that seemed to push me over a bit of a plateau in my learning German (which is mainly for reading novels – travel doesn’t really interest me that much) was switching all the music I listened to to music in German – there are some great bands like Rosenstolz, Klee, Juli and Wir sind Helden – and so creating something a bit closer to an immersion environment. In three years of studying mainly on my own I have gone from basically scratch to having just read my second German novel (Treffen sic zwei by Iris Hanika).
Many thanks for the word lists (and the commenters who pointed out where to get them).
January 22nd, 2009
6:32 pm
all language learners i recommand you check out http://ichi2.net/anki/ its free
January 22nd, 2009
8:27 pm
Tim,
Glad to see you considered my comment! Even though I think you got it, allow me to clarify. See this as constructive criticism from a reader who is really interested in what you write and eager to apply it – but who finds that an overabundance of 1. buzzwords and 2. abstract statements isn’t helpful and often even hinders proper understanding just when you got to an extremely interesting part. Think of a soccer game broadcast on TV; just as someone is about to score, electricity falls out. That’s exactly the issue I repeatedly have had when reading your blogs or listening to one of your interviews. Still, they’re worth it! :-)
Keep up the good work!
Frederik
January 22nd, 2009
10:37 pm
Hey Frederik, (aka “F”)
Tim’s opening statement in this blog makes sense, maybe it’s complicated to you and I get that. We all have various learning styles, it happens.
Let me make it simple for you,
A + B = C
Principles of cognitive neuroscience (applies to understanding memory and language use) + time management (application of Tim’s techniques) = conversational fluency within 1-3 months.
The rest of Tim’s post explains how this can be achieved by the application of certain techniques.
Also, to answer your question, I would tell my friends to apply effectiveness, adherence, and efficiency to create a realistic learning model for a new language. I would also advise them to incorporate the 80/20 principle (apply 20 percent of activities which lead to 80 percent results). The trick is to find success with a set of proven fundamental models to get the most out of our creativity. And that is exactly what Tim has demonstrated. Great job Tim!
January 22nd, 2009
11:43 pm
Hi Tim,
I have always struggled with foreign languages but this post give me a renewed motivation to finally give it another stab.
As ever your posts are excellent and a cut above the rest.
Cheers
Andy
January 23rd, 2009
2:47 am
[...] Tim Ferriss ci spiega come imparare qualsiasi lingua in tre mesi. [...]
January 23rd, 2009
8:12 am
Tim,
Something that might interest you:
A couple of college kids talk themselves into a conference and ask Branson to fly them to DC, they went to DC with Branson on his private jet a few hours later.
(it’s in Dutch though)
http://www.vkbanen.nl/actueel/nieuws/737170/Altijd-handig-om-nummer-van-een-man-als-Branson-te-hebben.html
Cheers,
Jeroen
January 23rd, 2009
9:42 am
Great posts and insights as always Tim.
January 23rd, 2009
9:59 am
[...] Learn Any Language in Three Months – Great words from the octolingual Tim Ferriss about learning any language. It’s definitely worth the read for anyone who wants to learn another language. [...]
January 23rd, 2009
10:13 am
Great article with great comments.
Some additional resources: I found the 2000 most frequent words (in the correct order :)) from the Brown Corpus googling for brown corpus wfk2. Some other word lists (movie and TV scripts, the British National Corpus, Project Gutenberg, etc) for English and other languages can be found in or reached from Wictionary’s “Frequency lists” article (linked to my name.)
These lists are also good for testing purposes. I remember how surprised I was when I could only find one or two unknown words in the first 5000 most frequent English words :)
January 23rd, 2009
11:32 am
Hey Tim,
So glad you did another post about learning languages.
The fact that you spoke Japanese on your pilot (and made absolutely NO reference to your own linguistic abilities) was deeply cool.
Well played.
More on language learning! Write another book or something . . . .
January 23rd, 2009
11:56 am
hey all
first of all thanks for great posts.
One idea came to me while reading this post and its comments: what if we collect 600-700 hundred most frequent words and combine learning them by rosetta stone method? I used to learn 20-30 words a day using Rosetta, and those 600 will be devoured easily…
Second, last year I’ve spoken with Lingua Center Professor in Moscow, and he said that 70% of word usage is 658 words (I guess russian words, I didn’t ask). With those properly learned words and basic grammar one can do everything in different country but teach…
Third, I’ve compared my lists of 600 hundred words in English and Spanish – they were very close, but different. Using method how to define most frequent words, it will be useful to have it for every language…
Thanks All and Tim,
Vadim
January 23rd, 2009
3:33 pm
http://wordcount.org/main.php
“WordCount data currently comes from the British National Corpus®, a 100 million word collection of samples of written and spoken language from a wide range of sources, designed to represent an accurate cross-section of current English usage.”
January 23rd, 2009
7:31 pm
http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/ – great site on learning japanese and languages in general
January 23rd, 2009
7:44 pm
Hey Tim,
I’m having a problem with the effectiveness step— deciding what I want to learn. I’ve been studying Mandarin for a while now, and I’m still working on my conversational fluency. I have also recently started learning Japanese. I’ve learned the Hiragana, and a little vocab.
I’m at the point where I want to become fully conversationally fluent in Chinese, so I want to learn the Chinese characters I know a couple hundred, but I’m nowhere near literacy. I know that Heisig’s books are very effective and I have the choice now to learn traditional hanzi or simplified.
I currently use simplified characters when chatting with friends, because I hang out with mostly Chinese Mainlanders, but I know that Kanji and traditional hanzi are written just about the same. I eventually want to master conversational fluency in Japanese as well, so I’m wondering whether I should purchase the book “Remembering the Simplified Hanzi” or “Remembering the Traditional Hanzi”. I plan to move to Mainland China (probably for a year) at the end of this year, so simplified hanzi seem to be most immediately practical for me, but I’ve heard arguments for both.
What’s your take on the issue? Thanks a lot!
Nathan
January 24th, 2009
2:12 am
Outstanding! I use similar methods in teaching at North Carolina Central University. One of my courses is Statistics and I use many non-traditional techniques to inspire and capture my students attention (this led me to author a non-traditional Stat book to aid in student learning and comprehension). I have found however, that collaboration is the greatest teaching method. Similar to your judo experiences, I dare to say that the collaboration between you and your Japanese colleagues greatly aided in your level of interest, intensity to learn, motivation, will to compete, and coherence of the material. If you add this factor (one of interpersonal interaction and collaboration to your 3 initial components) I believe that you will find that your instructional methodology is even more effective.
Great Article! (I love the one on “getting back up” post as well and plan to share it with all of my grad and undergrad students)
Please continue doing what you do. Take care and be blessed!
With Greatest Respect and Warmest Regards.
James
January 24th, 2009
6:16 am
Thanks Kerry, I’ll definitely try those out. Also Routledge publish frequency order dictionaries in a couple of languages, and I think they’re expanding their list this year.
January 24th, 2009
8:25 am
“Word List Expert” is a excellent software for make lists! Works in all alphabetical language. Count frequency of word in any given text. the list can be widelly configurated and export result list for Excel, clipboard or text file.
January 26th, 2009
4:48 pm
@Fabio,
Very cool recommendation. To repeat — software for creating word frequency lists:
“Word List Expert” is a excellent software for make lists! Works in all alphabetical language. Count frequency of word in any given text. the list can be widelly configurated and export result list for Excel, clipboard or text file.”
Tim
January 24th, 2009
8:34 am
?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
January 24th, 2009
8:39 am
What I wrote in kanji that your site didn’t like very much:
chotto senmontekina nihongo wo shaberaretemo, nihongo ga wakaru wake deha nai dato omoimasu. sono jyoukyou kara sukoshidemo hanaretara, chittomo yakuni tachimasen. hontouni nihongo wo naraitakattara, ganbattekudasai.
January 24th, 2009
9:51 am
I listened to one of your videos. You discussed Public School System and requested contacts. I am highly interested in what you would plan. I work in schools as a speech-language pathologist. I love reform and change… So I am interested learning more about your ideas. blessings.
January 24th, 2009
10:39 am
Nathan,
I’ve had similar problems in the past so i hope you don’t mind my 2 cents. If you will be spending all of your time in mainland i’d stick with simplified. Master simplified and learning traditional and kanji will be so much easier. The more characters you learn the easier it is to learn additional characters. The tricky problem with learning Chinese and Japanese is making sure you correctly pronounce the character using the right language. You might find yourself reading a Japanese text and every time you see a character you pronounce the Mandarin instead of Japanese. This can make reading very interesting!
Good luck
January 24th, 2009
11:29 am
Thanks for another language post. I am learning German my vocabulary needs to be expanded.
Will start with the 1000 most common German words from
http://german.about.com/library/blwfreq01.htm
January 24th, 2009
11:40 pm
@ branden
Kak dala!
A friend of mine gave me a book called “DERMO! The Real Russian Tolstoy Never Used” (ISBNs 0452277450 & 978-0452277458) I would give you the link but I think Tim frowns on that. You’ll find it on Amazon with the LOOK INSIDE! feature..and maybe some places in Ukraine.
The book will not make you fluent in Russian, it contains LOTS of nasty words, but also contains lots of handy phrases that real people use in Russia, not just text book stuff, it certainly is not “Russian for entrepreneurs”!
It has Cyrillic and Latin spellings of words. It may help you out with some simple stuff quickly.
January 25th, 2009
1:44 am
Great article Tim,
There has been a few mentions in the comments about the language teacher Michel Thomas. I seem to remember from some of your previous articles that you also recommended him as a good resource for language learning. Is that still the case or do you solely prefer this new method now?
January 25th, 2009
2:20 am
Great post, although it sounds like some rote memorization which is not as fun as some other ways.
Just throwing this out there, I’m planning a mini-retirement to South America (exact destination still undecided) for Jan ‘10. Is anybody else in the same ballpark? Please email me if you are, it’s edwardkbartlett at gmail.
January 25th, 2009
4:16 am
Great advice… missing.
To summarise.
1) Use a good course
2) Use material you’re interested in
3) Use a good course
Sadly no practical advice on choosing a good course.
Plus of course number 2 is only a half-answer. It can sometimes be incredibly frustrating being interested in something but not quite understanding it.
January 25th, 2009
9:21 am
As someone who had to learn a foreign language (Spanish) to survive in my occupation overseas, I wished I would have had this post 10 years ago. I eventually became fluent but not without wasting hundreds of dollars on programs, tapes, worthless “instant” programs, etc. I eventually stumbled onto my own “system” very similar to Tim’s.
Lessons learned from my personal experience:
–learning like a child is much too slow. It’s easier to associate new foreign words with my existing English vocabulary. This also provides a future benefit: You will be able to translate between the two languages faster and more accurately. My wife is fluent in both languages and grew up speaking both of them in the home. She never had to sit down and learn that “galleta”=”cookie” or “cama”=”bed”, she just knew them independently. As a result, she is a slower translator than I (although she speaks each language with native fluency and Spanish better than I).
–Don’t spend a dime on tapes/CD’s unless there is absolutely no one around that speaks your target language. They are only good for getting the accent right, not for LEARNING the language. A dictionary (or word lists–to include a list of verbs), and a good phrasebook to start, is all you need. Determine common phrases that you can plug in other verbs and nouns into to communicate different ideas. I believe this is similar to what Tim explains in his Judo vocab example.
–Don’t learn ABOUT the language, learn THE language. I think this is the biggest problem with current language programs out there. And the reason someone can take 2 years of high school Spanish, get A’s in it, and not be able to successfully conduct a simple business transaction in the target language. Is it REALLY important to know indicative, demonstrative, past participle, and other grammatical terms as they relate to the target language? If you think they are, ask yourself why a fluent, English native-speaker, who reads, speaks and writes intelligently will get so many questions wrong on a typical English grammar test. Learn THE language, not ABOUT the language.
–Most important key to learning a language that overrides all of the tapes, books, classes, etc…….You have to be willing to TRY. Just speak. You WILL make mistakes. But the faster you make them, the faster you learn. Thinking you’ve learned it in your head but never trying to communicate won’t work. Leave those inhibitions at home.
Tim, muchisimas gracias por todo! Estamos muy agradecidos!
January 25th, 2009
11:15 pm
My obsession for the past 12 years has been becoming fluent in a multitude of languages, and it really is hard finding good insight on this topic. I find that most people are turned off to the idea of language learning based on past experiences during high school or college language classes.
Your post hit this topic perfectly.
January 26th, 2009
12:20 am
It’s cliche to say where there’s a will there’s a way, but I’m a fan of the compelling why … and as you put it, the compelling ROI.
I’m also a fan of expert techniques that get exponential results. I value time.
When it comes to any sort of knowledge work, I’ve seen the right techniques produce ridiculous results many orders of magnitude greater over lesser techniques. That’s why I’m always on the prowl for patterns and practices for skilled living.
January 26th, 2009
3:25 am
[...] not the ends in themselves. If you think 1,500 words are enough, you might be interested to read this article by Tim Ferris. (At least he has improved on his previous 1 hour estimate of the time necessary to learn a new [...]
January 26th, 2009
12:19 pm
Tim,
Your take on language learning really hits home for me. In High School I struggled like mad to just squeeze out a passing grade in French. Although I’m not currently looking to rekindle my French, your take makes a lot of sense as to why I couldn’t grasp it.
January 26th, 2009
3:46 pm
[...] and I are both a big fan of Tim Ferriss and his blog and check out what he’s writing at from time to time. He has fascinating views on language [...]
January 26th, 2009
5:21 pm
From an article linked to by my name, which verifies my experience of the effect of having pop music, in the language I am learning, constantly playing in the background:
Read the whole article.
January 26th, 2009
10:47 pm
Tim, My husband and I were inspired by 4HWW – enough to finally start taking some action. As a matter of fact, we just recently launched our blog which will chronicle our journey as we redesign our lifestyle. We’ve been exploring some possible ways to earn a living “on our own terms” so we can quit our 40-hr-week jobs. One of the ideas we’ve tossed around is providing multi-language translation services. We have a relative who is doing this with good success. The information in your post is great stuff! I especially like the suggestion of reading material in an interesting subject matter to learn the language. Seems so obvious now! I once learned American Sign Language to communicate with a co-worker. But, once I quit working with him I quickly forgot most of what I had learned. What’s a good way to increase retention if you don’t use the language(s) on a regular basis? Thanks again.
January 26th, 2009
10:55 pm
Hi Tim,
I made the decision to take a sabbatical and used your recommendations as a source to explore my options. I will head towards Central America and will pick up volunteer work along the way. Let me know when the opportunity strikes to volunteer with you or contribute in some way to build a school overseas.
January 26th, 2009
11:00 pm
This concept will work well in my music class. Musicians must be able to sight read well on the band stand. They rarely get the chance to see the music before the gig. Therefore if I concentrate on teaching my students the most common used rhythms in music, I’ve produced some fantastic sight readers who can cover 90% of the gigs available.
Similarly to language, there is a point at which one can study obscure rhythms that will rarely be seen on a page of music.
January 26th, 2009
11:20 pm
I’m a little confused on your method here. Let’s say I’m learning Chinese. I’ve got my Chinese newspapers out. How do I pick up grammatical structures from these direct sources? It seems like you need some kind of textbook intermediary to learn the grammar before you could read anything.
January 27th, 2009
12:34 am
How do you get so many people to comment on your blog? Nice work!
Matt Bamberg
January 27th, 2009
1:59 am
Hi Tim,
Thanks for another very interesting post!
I’m wondering, though, specifically about becoming conversationally fluent in Japanese. I’ve been studying the language for three years, both in small classroom settings and with a private tutor, but I’m still not even close to the 95% comprehension rate you cite as possible in three months.
I’ve read all your language posts, and I understand the 80/20 rule, but there are just so many types of grammatical structures and vocabularies in Japanese. For example, even after I’ve mastered the plain form, Japanese people often instead communicate in keigo, which is completely different, so how could I hope for a 95% comprehension rate of all conversation in only three months?
Am I missing something? Because even if I learn the 100 most common words, 95% comprehension still seems like a daunting goal. I don’t doubt you, because you seem to know a lot about this stuff, but do you have any specific tips or advice for understanding spoken Japanese?
January 27th, 2009
3:36 am
Question.
@Tim
Comment avoir cette méthode en français?
Mreci
Viviane
January 27th, 2009
12:23 pm
Hi!
This all very cool, but a ran into a guy who has a method for learning languages in 1 day – and I mean really to learn.
The stuff his got going is amazing and I’ll learn about it when get on his course.. If it’s a success I’ll be talking russian in by valentines =)
January 27th, 2009
12:44 pm
Dear Tim,
I am indebted to you for giving me the tools to dramatically increase productivity, reduce stress and increase free time. A German mother and years on Wall Street led me to view productivity in the number of hours worked – 80+ hours a week used to make me feel good. Overstimulating myself with information was another big lesson for me (major OCD).
I have spent the last 15 years learning how to invest from several proven macro investors. No surprise, but the guys on Wall Street are no more enlightened, and in fact very often underperform the average Main Street investor.
Interestingly enough, the principles you have developed have very relevant applications in successful investing:
Focus on Macro Asset Classes: this is absolutely critical. 2-3 years ago, it was strikingly obvious that the credit markets were out of control. Yet, how come very few took the time to stand back and assess the massive bubble that was being creating. The next much larger bubble is the shortage in liquid transport fuels (oil, which provides 95% of our transport fuel is in major decline – read any industry report). Yet, even some of the smartest investors have no clue about this – perception vs. reality – investors like to delude themselves.
Low Information Diet: 95% of the news on the financial news channels is nonsense and most often the promoter is conflicted. Read only the truly independent sources from those who have made money over decades (and not someone was up 150% last year due to probability). Dr. Marc Faber, Jim Rogers, Warren Buffet (though I think this cycle he has become the system – very hard to outperform when you manage that much money) are some of the best.
Work 4 Hours: this is key. On Wall Street, you are kept on major emotional roller coasters and fast money is exciting. Unfortunately, this is not the way to make money – the vast majority of traders don’t last very long. Again, you have to select the right major macro trend and then sit for 3 to 5 years. The volatility will be intense, but the upside is much greater than the whole “diversification” theory that Wall Street markets. Look how 99% of investors faired in this downturn (granted, this is an extreme example).
These and a few more principles really do work. It has taken years of testing various strategies from some of the best investment renegades to truly learn how to invest money. If you are ever in Singapore, you have a place to stay – happy to share whatever I can about financial enlightment.
Best,
Ron
January 27th, 2009
4:03 pm
[...] a language, check out Tim Ferriss’s blog post (author of The 4-Hour Workweek), “How to Learn Any Language in 3 Months.” It might be the key to unlock your inner polyglot. Tuesday, January 27th, 2009 [...]
January 27th, 2009
4:49 pm
Automating the translation of the “100 Most Common Words”
=================================================
Great article yet again!
Inspired I made a small script to automate the translation of the 2 lists in Tim’s post into Pinyin (Chinese romanized script), which I blogged about yesterday.
Thinking today about the generic case for any language I checked out the Babelfish site and figured out an automated translation was doable. With a copy-n-paste of the list of words Tim stated into a file called, for example, “100-most-common-words-spoken”, and then running the following oneliner a Linux system, it automatically grabs the words for whatever language you want. Just change “lang=fr” to “lang=xx” where xx is the two country letter code of choice. Here I chose xx=fr (France) and a snippet of the output of this oneliner as it scrolled by is shown here:
[kiat@kiat-t61-uk pinyin]$ for word in $(cat 100-most-common-words-spoken | awk ‘{print $2}’); do export lang=fr ; echo -n “${word} = ” ; elinks -dump -force-html -dump-width 1600 -no-numbering -no-references “BABELFISH/translate_txt?ei=UTF-8&doit=done&fr=bf-res&intl=1&tt=urltext&lp=en_${lang}&btnTrTxt=Translate&trtext=${word}” | sed -n ‘1,/Search the web with this text/p’ | tail -n 2 | head -1 ; done
a = a
after = ensuite
again = encore
all = tous
almost = presque
also = aussi
always = toujours
and = et
because = parce que
before = avant
big = grand
but = mais
Because of the comment rules here I had to change the Babelfish website name in the oneliner to BABELFISH, which is not hard to find and replace with the real one.
Cheers,
Kiat
January 27th, 2009
6:22 pm
@Kiat,
That is fantastic! Thanks so much!
Tim
January 27th, 2009
4:56 pm
Oops! a simpler method is given above in Tim’s response by just pasting the list into the Google translate site or maybe even Babelfish. From there it’s easy to put that into a doc. No need for all this command line stuff. Can I get my post back? ;-)
January 28th, 2009
7:11 am
Hi Tim,
I like the idea of deconstructing know-how to it’s smallest bits & parts and to leave away all the non-essential stuff in order to get a maximum in a minimum of time. As you mentioned in your article “Pavel: 80/20 Powerlifting and How to Add 110+ Pounds to Your Lifts” this principle can be applied not only to languages but to any skills you want to acquire. I ask myself, if there are, so to say, global deconstruction rules to melt down certain skills to it essentials. Would be a nice topic for an article; something like “The 10 Rules of Deconstructing any Skills”
Regards from Munich (Germany),
Alex
January 28th, 2009
11:44 am
Great post Tim!
After studying French in HS and college, never became fluent until lived in France for a semester in school, ah Paris. I remember reading Le Canard Enchaine as great help in learning topical French as well as some slang, since was satirical. Going to see if online.
I also remembered that learning a few current slang terms helped tremendously in conversation and reduced the foreign accent and “tourist” stigma. Never learned slang in school, wasn’t until in country that picked up some.
A great ice breaker I learned was, “Je parle francais comme un vache espagnol.” This self depricating response to questions of whether I spoke French always resulted in a laugh, and opened the door for locals to work w/me on my French.
Seems like internet would be place to find topical articles/material in other languages.
Wonder if you have an suggested sites in various languages.
Bob
January 29th, 2009
7:15 am
[...] There must be another method to learn. I go to the newsstand to buy some magazines, taking some of Tim Ferriss’s language-learning advice. One of the titles is Psicología Positiva, an autoayuda (self-help) publication. One of the [...]
January 29th, 2009
8:40 pm
Hi Tim,
Thanks for the wonderful post on Language learning, however with the 80/20 principle you mentioned I’ve been trying to find out how to learn the violin. I’ve searched high and low to understand what is it that I need to focus to learn the violin, do you have any insights/tips on this.
Warm Regards
Jayanth
PS. I do go to Violin classes.
January 29th, 2009
11:12 pm
????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
?????????????????????????????????????????????1000????????????????????????????????????????????
January 29th, 2009
11:15 pm
Looks like the comment I wrote in Japanese has been garbled by encoding, so I put it up here as well just in case:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Mithridates/comment
It’s all positive though. I use pretty much the same techniques to use languages myself.
January 30th, 2009
9:47 am
Hey Tim,
Do you know about Supercool School? Essentially they provide Virtual Classrooms, making school Web 2.0. Everyone with a microphone and webcam can be a teacher, and everyone with an internet connection can join in and learn. On any topic they like, free.
This might the revolution of education that we need. A woman from Germany already taught a woman from South Africa. And an L.A.-born entrepreneur living in Shanghai taught on how to enter the Chinese market.
Check it out!
January 31st, 2009
4:51 pm
Damn… Now that’s one useful post! I’ve never heard it broken down with such simplicity before. I had 4 years of Spanish in high school and still have a decent vocabulary. My girlfriend is Colombian so I’m getting the practice in now.
Does anyone know if Rosetta Stone for learning languages is the real deal or just a bunch of hype? I wonder if it expands on the principles laid-out here…
February 1st, 2009
6:04 am
Tim, your post rekindled my long forgotten desire to learn the German language. Thanks to you!
February 1st, 2009
6:51 am
Fewer commenters than I expected brought up the suggestion of learning the language through the lyrics of songs. I think it’s a tactic worth stressing.
It seems like without even realizing it, I have memorized enough song lyrics to fill several phone books worth of pages, and I’m sure most of the readers have too. For example, if I say “I been to Phoenix, all the way to Tacoma, Philadelphia, Atlanta, L.A.”, I’m sure 99% of you can recite the next several lines.
There’s an Israeli/Spanish singer named David Broza, who has some fantastic stuff (very listenable), and with a good clear voice. Once I ran some lyrics through the Google translator, they “locked” into place since they finally had meaning attached to them. Really, within a few minutes I was memorizing the song (”Hoy No”).
What does this “rote” memorization do? Well, it gets you familiar with pronunciation, syllable stresses, sentence structure, and most of all, it certainly keeps you motivated.
February 2nd, 2009
6:35 am
hey tim,
have you ever tried learning a language in the combination with music? there used to be cassettes in germany called “superlearning” in the 80’s. I tried to learn some italian with them back then and was surprised that I was still able to converse with my girlfriend (now my wife) about 15 years later although I never actually spoke or further deepend my italian knowledge during those years.
the idea is that the music relaxes and opens up some parts of the brain usually not used in our daily routines and you learn by imprinting the language into the subconcuious. sounds very esoteric and the music they used was, too. (lot’t of slow classical chamber music)
there’s also a german label (Orkaan Music) that has a series of german-italian audiobooks out where you learn the language in combi with the music.
they also apply the 20/80 principle by only teaching the essentials you need to get through the holiday (ordering food, buying tickets, going to the market etc…) no grammar, no books needed…
maybe this is interesting to try?!
greetz and rock on!
February 2nd, 2009
8:32 pm
just wondering if anyone is familiar with
http://www.thebeautifulaim.com
a young man is trying to build himself into a worldclass soccer/football player using advanced training/movement/psychological methods.
Paul
February 2nd, 2009
8:44 pm
Tim –
Regarding education: Start with http://www.childrenofthecode.org. Sets a good foundation for where we have come from and you can read interviews of some of the true leaders and innovators in education, child development and literacy. A whole bunch of great videos as well.
Dr. David Rose of Harvard suggests that the future is in the margin – that what we do to teach kids with learning differences (we refuse to call them disabilities, since many dyslexics prove to be geniuses once they are extracted from the oppression of the system) today is, in many ways, how we will teach all children in the future.
I am fascinated with the broad notion of how we can equip everyone to reach their full potential. Its not just education. Your parents were a huge part of why you learned what you learned and how you applied it.
I’ll be interested to see where this next passion takes you and hope that I can be a part of it.
Joe
February 3rd, 2009
9:40 pm
Tim & All
Anyone familiar with a mac program that has proven worth while with regard to language learning? I took note of the “Super Memory” but wonder if other goods like this are out there. Thanks in advance for sharing- tons of good leads, shares and suggestions here. :)
-Mig
February 8th, 2009
9:20 am
Yo did it again Tim! Great insightful post.
I happen to have a site which may be useful to your audience.
I run a website called Leximo, and its a Multilingual User Collaborated Dictionary.
You can find information on Leximo’s vision by reading the Leximo Dictionary Manifesto.
February 10th, 2009
1:09 am
Hi Tim
thank you for the article.
I have translated it in Italian for your Italian fans
http://www.italiansinfuga.com/2009/01/23/come-imparare-linglese-o-qualsiasi-lingua-in-tre-mesi-secondo-tim-ferriss/
February 11th, 2009
2:03 pm
Hi Tim
thanx very much for this approach to language learning.
For years now I always had the same feeling, that the way of teaching ( thinking in a foreign language or learn it like a child) does not work for my “engineer” approach to new things.
Is there any material available (books, audio books) where language (esp. Spanish) is presented in this way ?
Greetings
Alex
February 12th, 2009
5:27 am
Hi Tim,
I have translated it to Spanish:
http://translations.babelic.com/como-aprender-un-idioma-en-3-meses/
February 12th, 2009
2:52 pm
Anyone who wants to learn languages…or anything.. I suggest checking out iKnow! – http://www.iknow.co.jp. It’s a website that’s popular in Japan but has 180 different possible language combinations. iKnow! has an algorithm that remembers how fast you learn and forget so it can teach you whatever you want to learn as fast as possible. Very personalized and fun.
February 13th, 2009
7:15 am
Hi Tim,
Thanks very much for this great post on language learning!
February 16th, 2009
12:45 pm
You narrowed it down to the essential! Great post! After learning a couple of languages and having always a hard time doing so, I’m currently learning Spanish in Costa Rica. I learnt the 100 most common words in the plane and when I arrived I could already ask for the most necessary things. Now, after two weeks of intensive Spanish class I can have a more or less fluent conversation and expanded the list to the 1000 most common words.
The frequency list was a great help. For the grammar it is more or less the same. For the start it’s enough to just learn the grammar that you will need most frequently.
Pura Vida!
February 16th, 2009
1:37 pm
[...] addition, Tim Ferris’ article on learning a language made a good point that stuck with me: if the method you use to learn a language is boring, you [...]
February 17th, 2009
8:30 pm
Good info, Tim. As a 25+ year speaker/writer of Japanese, I wholly agree: Forget the textbooks that present “lessons” on random (and dull) topics, and instead delve into topics that interest you. Create your own learning materials and system, from whatever texts/audio/people/etc. address your interest. After all, as you point out, the goal should not be “the language” itself, but should always be *doing something using the language*. So, learners, jump in and start doing stuff!
Another tip: Music is perhaps the best memory aid of all. The memory lays down lyrics like no other text. Even now, I can think, “I know the word I’m looking for was in that one college textbook we studied…”, but is there any chance of my recalling the generic lesson paragraph that contained the word, even though we read it a hundred times for test prep? Of course not. But when I think, “I know the word I’m looking for comes up in that one song… let me find it…”, can I hum to myself and dredge up the word? Yep, works like a charm! The mind has a magical ability to store lyrics.
Best of luck to everyone here learning Japanese or any other language. (For the interested, on my site I write about the *few* things that are hard about learning Japanese, and the *many* things that are easy. Take heart and master it!)
February 17th, 2009
11:25 pm
I was always searching for a site like yours to learn spanish, you have made it possible for me thanks.
February 21st, 2009
6:47 am
[...] Just have to put our thinking caps on! Check out this post on language learning from Tim How to Learn Any Language in 3 Months I’m in Buenos Aires right now, and am trying to use this method to learn faster. 3 months is [...]
February 22nd, 2009
12:21 pm
Like Nick, I also plan on learning the most frequently used words in Japanese. I think I’ll buy a dictionary or something. Your language posts are very thought-provoking.
By the by, do you know any stores or sites that carry that textbook?
February 26th, 2009
5:07 pm
Thanks Tim. Great Post.
I pasted these words into my word processor and hit translate to get started on the basics of translation to any language
Here are the lists in comma form so everyone else can do the same (easier on the eyes than long lists). Or you can use the program suggested by Kiat Huang.
Written:
The, of, and, to, in, is, you, that, it, he, was, for, on, are, as, with, his, they, I, at, be, this, have, from, or, one, had, by, word, but, not, what, all, were, we, when, your, can, said, there, use, an, each, which, she, do, how, their, if, will, up, other, about, out, many, then, them, these, so, some, her, would, make, like, him, into, time, has, look, two, more, write, go, see, number, no, way, could, people, my, than, first, water, been, call, who, oil, its, now, find, long, down, day, did, get, come, made, may, part
Spoken:
a, an, after, again all, almost, also, always, and, because, before, big, but, I can, I come, either/or, I find, first, for, friend, from, I go, good, goodbye, happy, I have, he, hello, here, how, I, I am, if, in, I know, last, I like, little, I love, I make, many, one, more, most, much, my, new, no, not, now, of, often, on, one, only, or, other, our, out, over, people, place, please, same, I see, she, so, some, sometimes, still, such, I tell, thank you, that, the, their, them, then, there is, they, thing, I think, this, time, to, under, up, us, I use, very, we, what, when, where, which, who, why, with, yes, you, your
March 2nd, 2009
6:57 am
[...] Tim Ferris – How to Learn Any Language in 3 Months Der “Produktivitätsguru No 1″ über Effektivität und Interesse beim Sprachen lernen und Sprachen wiederauffrischen. [...]
March 4th, 2009
7:39 am
Great tips everyone!
To improve my French reading I have been following some blogs on topics I’m interested in. I also read entries on the French version of wikipedia– since I have to read French for history it’s a great way to brush up on very specific topics — but in small doses!
If you are a studying a less commonly taught language, I recommend you look for language exchange partners— just google “free language exchange” or similar, there are several great sites. You will find people eager to speak with you and they can provide you with websites, online radio stations, you name it for practicing your target language. I have found this to be effective with my Mongolian studies.
Good luck with your studies everyone!
March 4th, 2009
8:51 am
[...] (If you’re now somehow inspired to learn Slovene, you can start here and here! And an interesting post on learning a language in 3 months.) [...]
March 6th, 2009
5:01 am
Aprender un idioma en 3 meses… ¿con elearning?…
Al menos eso es lo que propone Tim Ferris, al que ya mencioné ayer. Ferris ha publicado recientemente en España “La semana laboral de 4 horas”, un best seller a mitad de camino entre la auto-ayuda, el management light y los libros de cóm…
March 8th, 2009
3:08 pm
[...] stumbled across this article while reading through Tim Ferriss’ blog. Ferriss is the author of “The 4-Hour [...]
March 14th, 2009
3:06 pm
[...] dass er egal welche Sprache in nur drei Monaten lernen kann. Und gibt aber sein Geheimnis preis. Hier seine Tipps. Viel [...]
March 17th, 2009
10:25 pm
I had trubbs with French especially the female male verbs + conjugates – very confusing. I can’t even begin to imagine Japanese Chinese + Korean which seem to use symbols?? 69SWW = 69 Second Work Week!!
It’s all Greek to me Tim but the word Ouchykins sprang to mind with yer Judo Text book! ;))
March 18th, 2009
1:56 am
@Billy Warhol: True, you need to learn Chinese characters to read Chinese, Japanese, or (to some degree) Korean… but for those languages, you *don’t* need to deal with a lot of other hassles, including the one you mention (noun genders). You might be surprised by how many things are *easy* in Japanese (to pick one language):
http://www.homejapan.com/2008/02/whats_easy_about_learning_japanese
March 19th, 2009
12:56 pm
Tim,
I think you made a mistake in the “100 most common words” list. Surely “Dude” and “Like” must be high on the list! ;-)
March 20th, 2009
4:15 pm
I stumbled across your site at around midnight and it’s now 8 in the morning! Thanks to amazon.co.jp your book will arrive on my doorstep later today.
Your posts on language have given me the inspiration to finally take up a 2nd foreign language. I found your advice on finding material that interests you spot-on. My Japanese reading skills and most of my vocab initially came from reading manga and martial arts magazines. A friend of mine learned to read playing Final Fantasy in Japanese. The best thing is that it doesn’t feel like study at all.
March 23rd, 2009
7:50 pm
Tim and other readers,
I just stumbled across this:
202,059 words, 130,080 pronunciations, 209 languages
http://forvo.com/
-Hosh
March 25th, 2009
1:21 pm
A recent Scientific American web article supports your method claiming that people need a minimum number of vocabulary words to create more complex (and natural) verbal expressions. http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=babies-talk-language-development
March 31st, 2009
11:49 am
Is there a tool that will give me the romanized translation of the word list?
Thanks,
David
April 1st, 2009
10:00 pm
You ever try to tackle Russian? I am going to give it a go . . .
April 6th, 2009
1:34 pm
Quick comment: the intersection of top 100 written and spoken words is smaller than it seems at first. There are 44 words in the second list that are not in the first — and so if you add the first list with my list below, you’ll have the union of the two sets, without the repetitions:
after
again
almost
also
always
because
before
big
either/or
friend
good
goodbye
happy
hello
here
am
know
last
little
love
most
much
new
often
only
our
over
place
please
same
sometimes
still
such
tell
thank you
there is
thing
think
under
us
very
where
why
yes
April 14th, 2009
8:31 am
With the http://ichi2.net/anki software, does anyone recommend or like a specific vocabulary deck? Thanks,
-Mig
April 14th, 2009
1:15 pm
First off, I love the book. I found a language learning software that adheres to your method if you are learning Spanish to travel to a Spanish speaking country. They even have different dialects.. Click on the link to watch the demo of their product.
Thanks.
April 17th, 2009
11:46 am
I think the 100 common spoken written words is a great idea. I have been trying to do this for modern Greek, as I have had endless attempts at grasping this language. I was wondering if anyone else was making these crib sheets or whatever you wish to call them for other languages, maybe someone can make a database?? Anyways great blog!!! keep them coming.
April 18th, 2009
11:57 pm
I have been trying to learn Spanish for 3 years. I have used Rosetta Stone and taken private classes and done a variety of other things, including spending about 3 months in Spanish speaking countries.
I just came across your concept of language learning. How does one determine a list of the most commonly used word, spoken and written, in a language. After that has been mastered, what are the next steps.
I like you basic idea but do you explain it in more detail somewhere? Not sure how to proceed further to improve my Spanish.
April 21st, 2009
5:32 pm
Hi Tim,
You didn't elaborate much on your technique to learn the Joyo kanji on your TED presentation where you talked about swimming.
How did you manage to master 1945 kanji in just 6 months? Can you share a bit of wisdom I could use?
Cheers
April 21st, 2009
6:13 pm
That's why when I read for pleasure it's only in the language I'm learning (Spanish). I love it… especially when I get into a story so much that I don't even realize I'm reading in a different language. Love that!
April 22nd, 2009
12:36 am
Hi Pedrorica,
I highly suggest learning the 192 or so “radicals” that comprise kanji first. Then, get kanji cards and also read manga comic books, most of which will have “furigana” subscript on the characters to indicate pronunciation, which then allows you to look up vocab and characters on an electronic dictionary.
Good luck!
Tim
April 22nd, 2009
3:35 am
Thanks for your quick reply! Much appreciated!
April 28th, 2009
7:57 am
Interesting article. Now I’d know what to prioritize if I try to review and relearn my supposed first language but didn’t get to learn it well.
May 3rd, 2009
5:39 pm
[...] of a start so that I can study on my own and make progress – which is what I intend to do using Tm Ferriss‘ approach. He advocates a thoughtful, yet common sense approach: read/consume information [...]
May 12th, 2009
1:17 pm
I don’t think it’s true that cooks are subordinate to recipes. Not real cooks!
May 12th, 2009
2:14 pm
[...] Khatzumoto and Tim Ferriss (author of 4-Hour Workweek), I’m going to start by concentrating on building my Korean [...]
May 15th, 2009
4:32 pm
Thanks alot, you helped a bunch with my latin class.
May 27th, 2009
7:57 am
Great post! Identifying the core words in a language is really key, and is the basis for the Pimsleur method as well. I think you have a talent for measuring your own progress…a lot of students find it hard to gauge their own effectiveness, and thus rely on a teacher or tutor to push them along. Motivation is essential too!
May 30th, 2009
9:08 pm
I think the most efficient way to learn a foreign language is by the method of “shock therapy”. It’s based on my personal experience. My family immigrated from Soviet Union to Israel when I was 15. I had a year and a half to learn two languages – English and Hebrew – to the level high enough to pass high school exams. Otherwise, I would’ve been pretty much left behind in this life.
I had no choice but studying like 15 hours a day. That was a powerful motivator and worked like a charm.
June 1st, 2009
1:39 am
Evgeni, I agree with “shock therapy” too. When I went to Japan, I went to a language school, but the teachers couldn’t (wouldn’t?) speak English; I didn’t get a bilingual crutch there. Also, I bought an English/Japanese dictionary to help out, the sort of tool any language student should get – and wisely, I got one intended for Japanese speakers, not English speakers. So that forced me to learn reading quickly too.
I’d advise any learner to do the same, if possible: Throw yourself into some “sink or swim” situation, and don’t make things too easy for yourself. DO have fun learning, though – seek out all kinds of social situations and media sources to keep the variety flowing.
June 5th, 2009
7:59 am
I’t been a LONG time since I posted on your forums Tim. I’ve been very busy following the advice of one of your former teachers (Andrew Krauss) striving for inventing and licensing success. I found invent right from this site.
I first found your site via a search about langage teaching and learning, because I’m an ESL teacher in Japan.
Now I come back for my own learning purposes, to get more serious about learning Japanese. To that end I found this forum again looking for the top 500 spoken Japanese words to make my primary vocabulary study list.
Now that I see Tim’s comments about using Google translator I have a another question. Tim, do the top 500 most common spoken words in a language hold across languages as the top100 do?
Does anyone here have the top 500 spoken Japanese words in Romanji (Japanese words written with the English alphabet) and Japanese. I’d really appreciate finding such a list.
Thanks,
Tim
June 11th, 2009
2:18 pm
Ok, first of all I really enjoy your blog especially this particular article. I just have one question, how can you tailor learning a language using your method to a situation where the language your learning is dead or in a severe linguistic recession (!) and there is an absence of modern commentary on issues outside of language rights i.e. Irish!
P.s. pictures of you with the hurley… very good!
June 23rd, 2009
2:33 pm
BAITARU JUDO…Love the Japanese…Vital Judo desu ne?
June 26th, 2009
3:12 am
Hi Tim,
I just went to Alexanderplatz in Berlin to try and memorize the irregular German verbs by placing them in various locations, and it failed spectacularly. I decided that I needed something linear, so I returned to Friedrichshain and walked down Warschauer Str, only to find that after committing fifteen verbs and their various forms to memory, I couldn’t recall them.
Do you have any suggestions for memorizing verb vocabulary?
Thanks,
Will McNeice.
PS I saw the comment by the bread woman on Twitter. While I question with her enthusiastic use of language, I have to admit that I’m on her side. Bread is one of the most delicious foods in the world (especially here in Germany). Why would you want to cut it out just to lose a little weight? In fact, I just ate two Schrippen with peanut butter, and it made my morning!
June 28th, 2009
8:26 pm
Tim,
This is the best and only good article I have ever read about language acquisition. I have spent the last 18 years studying about 14 languages. Much in the same way you did. I break them down and see how they tick. Not great in most of them, but can get by.
Please contact me. We are kindred spirits in language learning. I won’t bore you. Take a look at my website. I am just launching a foreign language software that is 100% unique in every way. It’s called PeanutButter.
You can download a free trial version for mac. I look forward to hearing from you.
By the way. My first foreign language and best is Russian. I know why you keep avoiding it.
Dale
July 19th, 2009
9:47 am
Tim and/or anyone else who may be able to help,
Is their currently an “Argentina Spanish” version available of the 4HWW?
It’s my understanding that Argentina Spanish can vary much from other dialects of Spanish so I want to make sure I’m getting the “right” Spanish version of the 4HWW if possible to be a main part of my Spanish learning material for my mini-retirement to Buenos Aires next month…
Thanks in advance,
Adam Sherwood
Cincinnati, OH
July 29th, 2009
8:56 pm
Hi Adam,
There should be a Latin Spanish version through Editorial Planeta. Probably not Argentine, but you never know :)
Tim
July 19th, 2009
2:28 pm
This site has great choices and has helped me and my wife to learn any language either fluently or just enough for when we travel.
July 23rd, 2009
9:07 am
Hi,Tim.
I should say that your blog and bestseller are useful for English learning. It is interesting to read, therefore it is easy to learn language. My compliments.
My English isn’t good enough. However, I am seriously thinking about second language. So, a couple of questions, I am intersted in your opinion.
1. How do you think, what language is the most prosective, I mean the number of native speakers and its usage around the world?
2. Is it really hard to learn two (or even more) language at the same time? Especially, if you are not efficient in the first?
July 29th, 2009
8:40 pm
Hi Ilya,
Thanks very much for the kind words! To answer your question, I believe 1) English is the most useful language for speaking worldwide, and 2) it is almost impossible to learn two languages at the same time simultaneously. If you are reviewing one language while learning another, that is absolutely possible.
Good luck!
Tim
July 28th, 2009
12:29 am
Hey Tim i have a question, i’m planning to learn a new language, i’m from MExico so my native language is Spanish.
I have read about you and the rules that you propose to learn, also have learned some techniques to improve my memory
do you think that a software like “tell me more” (not following the course) just using the vocabulary and the spoken word tool, can be handy to avoid the search over and over again and just click the word, learn it with the techniques i already know and then get more into rules and sfuff after i already get the vocabulary and basics of the language?
i want to learn french and since spanish and french share the same grammar structure, and stuff ithink i would be a lot easier for me
Well have a nice day! hope you can answer and keep on the quality work you are doing here
July 28th, 2009
11:16 am
Looks like I’m late to the party.
Hire a viritual assistant who speaks the language you want to learn. Have him/her only communicate in that language. Just with emails at first, then spoken.
August 4th, 2009
10:18 pm
I want to strongly agree with the suggestion to read intellectually relevant and stimulating material in the language you’re trying to learn. I have had good success reading newspapers (leftist) in Mexico City and then later in Rome and Barcelona, and because I was interested in what’s happening locally and in the world, I could begin to follow the news narratives quite well. When I didn’t know vocabulary I circled it and then later did or didn’t come back to it. I have one additional comment. I do think it’s going to be possible for me to learn TWO languages at the same time this fall because one’s going to be ASL – American Sign Language. So there! :)
August 16th, 2009
8:50 am
Since i learning Spanish i make a quick search for the most common words in this language.
Here is what i found, a list from a scientific study conducted by Mark Davies. Hope this help.
http://www.vistawide.com/spanish/top_100_spanish_words.htm
August 16th, 2009
4:32 pm
Hi,
I’m looking at learning Norwegian, German, Icelandic and Hindi (not all at the same time!)
If anyone has any experience learning these languages with Tim’s methods, or has deconstructed them, please get in touch as it would be useful to hear your insights and ideas.
Many thanks,
Ash
August 22nd, 2009
9:36 pm
I am not sure if this has been asked or not but how would I go about improve my English vocabulary in an efficient way? English is my first language. I’m currently reading The Snowball and I am just looking up every word I do not understand but it seems to tiresome and 3/4 of the time I look up the same word 3 times and still can’t remember the meaning.
August 23rd, 2009
3:31 pm
[...] (Besides it makes poking fun at English so much more exciting!) Two great places to start: 200 Words and Flash [...]
September 1st, 2009
1:54 am
Thanks Tim, i really liked ur blog.
I agree that travelling to other countries will bcom easier wid ur blog
n help lots of people to learn other languages
Great tips for everyone :)
“Thanks for sharing!”
September 1st, 2009
3:31 am
Thanks Tim, great Thoughts!!
I agree that this blog will help to learn other languages faster n make travelling easier.
I am very much intrested in gaining knowledge of a language and so it will help me to recognize them easier.
It will also help alot of people :)
“Thanks for sharing!
September 10th, 2009
4:12 am
hello, everyone
Tim it seems that you have been studying chinese, according to that what would you recommend as a good (best?) material to learn chinese (mandarin) ?
I’m starting from nearly nothing (just speaking a little japanese), will take classes at the univeristy here in shanghai and as soon as I get a basic level I will add a private teacher to the mix.
thanks for the post,
September 19th, 2009
6:21 pm
Tim, I love the principles that you outline. After 10 or so years of academic language learning, and about 1.5 years of REAL language learning I can truly say you are spot on with those principles. Make language learning a RATIONAL process! I saw all the language learning websites that were thrown up here, and I don’t want to seem like I’m advertising just another site…but checkout lingq.com. I’ve spent along time learning what to do and what not to do, and this site is a real help as far as giving free resources. I suggest finding the podcasts, these have very organic and natural conversations in the languages that you want to learn. Once again, thanks Tim for demystifying the obvious and giving us all a little road that leads back to common sense and logic.
-Paul
September 23rd, 2009
1:39 pm
[...] How to Learn Any Language in 3 Months focuses on efficiency and the Pareto principle in true Ferrissean style. This is good advice for [...]
September 25th, 2009
12:07 am
I am doing a review of Rosetta Stone for my language learning site and remembered your comments about them above:
“Using ‘learn like a child’ is a great excuse for a company to produce materials with the same images for every language and minimal tweaking of translation, which = lower cost of production. It’s designed to be simple to produce en masse, not for best results.” I remember you said that same thing about text books that are printed exclusively in the target language (e.g. Berlitz.) Like you, I have also worked for Berltiz, and was equally frustrated by their monolingual, ineffectual materials.
Rosetta Stone and Berlitz are good examples of a well-funded, well-marketed, but altogether mediocre products. Like many of the most profitable companies, they have taken a weakness (i.e. not wanting to pay for language specific images, translations, etc.) and turned them into product features: “No translation! No memorization!” On the surface, this looks good, but when you dig down into the products, you realize just how limited they are.
My conclusion: Instead of wasting hundreds of dollars on CD-Roms that require sitting at a computer, why not just download any of the 100,000+ podcasts on a topic that floats your boat.
Interest = More time with the language = Fluency
September 27th, 2009
11:30 pm
Tim,
Thanks for the post, but I do have some questions about the effectiveness and efficiency portion. Adherence is easy, because one can say, “This is great stuff. I think I’ll stick with it.” However, effectiveness is not. As an example, since you are a tango buff, to a person who has never danced and seen tango before, it would be difficult to determine which crosstown tango schools are more effective. How would he/she know which is better? Or, more importantly, better for him/her?
I think the same thing can be said of efficiency. How does one measure progress when learning a language on one’s own?
I guess my main concern is that in the 1 to 3 month time frame, it seems that determining which materials and processes are the most efficient and effective would eat into that time – especially if finding the perfect materials and methods turns out to be a trial-and-error process.
Any thoughts or ideas? Or better yet, recommendations?
Thanks,
Marc
October 5th, 2009
12:38 am
Amazingly insightful. Breaking bigger jobs down in to bullet points makes a lot of sense – I’ve seen this used for speed reading courses, so it looks like you’re right on the money. Maybe in 90 days I’ll be posting comments in Italian!
October 18th, 2009
4:40 pm
Tim,
Old post, but I decided to revisit today.
I’ve recently begun working with a refugee family from Syria.
They have very little English and this has given me some ideas on helping them learn English.
As they are new to Canada it seems we need to focus on ensuring they get the most bang for their buck as fast as possible to a least get some semblance of comprehension.
Thanks
October 19th, 2009
10:12 am
Great post. Very valuable since it is taking me a while to learn Spanish, and I’m living in Madrid!
Thanks again
Lara
October 21st, 2009
11:00 am
Great post! Keep up the good work.
October 21st, 2009
3:27 pm
Tim,
I am in Geneva right now, where I have been on a mini-retirement for the last 2 months. I have used your methods and those of a few others in accelerated learning to develop my French extremely quickly. I can understand and express myself 9 out of 10 times. It works. Thank you.
BUT!!! despite really working on it, I am struggling to improve my pronunciation. I can always get my message across, but its not the way I want to speak the language. Do you or anyone else out there have any methods to train pronunciation???
October 25th, 2009
9:02 am
Hi Tim,
I watched your random video with Kevin Rose…love the show by the way! You mentioned some language resources that you use. Do you know a really good resource that teaches Canadian French (Quebecois)? Thanks.
November 8th, 2009
9:41 am
Great read. Especially in the beginning you have to focus on the main material. Another tip i can give is to “group” words togheter when learning vocab and make a mental projection or link between them.
This is a technique used by the ancient greeks who were memorising speeches. E.g. make a mental walk through your house and memorise the translation of each object you see in your “mental walk”.
November 12th, 2009
8:13 am
Hi!!!
I have been in Beijing for 2 weeks know and I am studying Mandarin – I am a Colombian guy(spanish) who speaks no more than xie xie and ni hao. I know you speka mandarin and i was wondering if you have any special sugestion about mandarin -i know you speak it very well-, not just speaking but also writting.
Thanks,
Juan
Leave a Comment or a Question
Comment Rules: Remember what Fonzie was like? Cool. That's how we're gonna be -- cool. Critical is fine, but if you're rude, we'll delete your stuff. Please do not put your URL in the comment text and please use your PERSONAL name or initials and not your business name, as the latter comes off like spam. Have fun and thanks for adding to the conversation! (Thanks to Brian Oberkirch for the inspiration)