subject: How To Learn A Second Language? [print this page] Everybody has the ability to learn a languageEverybody has the ability to learn a language. It requires passion, time, and effort.
If you cannot afford a class or a tutor to learn a language, buy a book. Make sure that it is a good book, especially with an audio CD, and look on the Internet for good recommendations. The problem with a book is that it does not teach well enough. A good thing about having a class or a tutor is that everything is explained in detail, and that is very significant for language learning. Make sure you have something like this to help you.
After struggling with a book for months now, I have come with a solution. Everybody learns different, but you should consider this idea. What I do is I read the whole first chapter, and I look for important phrases that I think I should remember, and I memorize them. I memorize them by using my phone, and write down the words in the "notes" section. So wherever I go, I will have my phone with me at all times. If I'm sitting down on a bus or if I am out of my house, I can just look at my phone for a quick second, and it saves me from bringing my large book everywhere. Next, go over what is left of the book; most of it will be grammar. It makes you look at it more when you are away from home, you will see yourself looking at the words more often and making things a lot easier. You just have to be sure that you completed everything you needed to memorize.
What can clutter your head is if you try memorizing first, you still have to then try to figure out the grammar. What can happen is you don't focus enough on memorization, you will focus more on grammar, but the grammar won't help when you don't understand what words you are learning. So you should learn the words first, and then learn grammar and the depth of the language for that chapter.
With time management, people say to study about 2 hours a week. That is wrong. You should learn about one to two hours a day. What you do is you have to spread your time out. Learn 30 minutes in the morning and then 30 in the afternoon. That way you won't clutter your head and you will learn slowly and gradually. It will be easier to memorize words.
When I'm learning words, I use the words in an everyday situation.
Pronunciation is very important; you need to make sure that you will understand it the correct way. I learned pronunciation fairly quickly. It was very, very hard at first, but I got the hang of it. It's the only way to learn it, keep practicing. Look on Google, there has to be something some pronunciation tutorials. Listen a lot to people speaking their language by watching a movie or on the radio. You can find radio online that will speak in the language you are studying. Try meeting friends online who speak in the language you are learning, there are lots of forums out there that you can learn from natives of that language. My point, you can find a lot of ways to learn pronunciation quickly and easily.
Something that also people think of pronunciation is that they need to know every sound of every letter the exact correct way. Keep learning and moving on with what you are doing. Make sure you have a basic understanding of how to say words. There will be some words that you won't know how to say, and that is fine. After reading lots of words, you will begin to understand how to say those harder words. You will know more about the letters and how they sound differently in different words. It all just comes after time.
Aunes Oversettelser AS has been in the business for 26 years, and we are specialized in technical translations. We are specializing in the Nordic languages, and can offer services into Swedish, Danish, Finnish, Norwegian and Icelandic. The premier translation agency for Norway and the Nordic region! Technical translation services for businesses in the Nordic countries and translation agencies world-wide.
