How to write in a foreign language (even as a beginner)
Hi friends! In this video I talk about how I have been practicing writing as a beginner in Greek. Hope you find this helpful if writing is something you want to practice.
0:00 intro
1:13 tools
2:38 my writing process
4:09 what I write about
5:20 how I choose a topic
6:43 the importance of input
7:17 using dictionaries
8:43 repetition is good
9:59 setbacks and low energy days
11:26 consistency over perfectionism
12:49 the benefits of writing
💜 MY FAVORITE APPS AND WEBSITES:
Speakly (1-month free trial): www.speakly.me/share/-TQz4Rt2...
italki (get $5 after your first purchase of $20): www.italki.com/en/i/ref/FGedbb
LingQ: www.lingq.com/?referral=Botan...
✨ LINKS
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Twitter: / botanechka
💜 ABOUT ME:
Hi and welcome! I'm Tanya and the only thing I like more than learning languages is probably talking about learning languages (well, that and hoarding language books).
My native language is Russian and I'm currently in different stages of learning English, Spanish, Polish, Italian, Korean, and Japanese.
so many good ideas I'm going to recommend to my students! just a warning though, I've seen a lot of beginners write down vocab without noticing they had make mistakes in the spelling, make sure to quadruple check when you write down stuff that you will use as reference later!
Yes, I 100% agree with what you said about mistakes!
Yh that’s why I give it to a native to crosscheck before I start learning
Bruh I was reading my notes from my first Spanish class and I deadass had things like "hombre - hungry" written down. Most of them were probably just poor handwriting but still, I was studying those notes 😂
@@tbenavente I'm also a beginner learning Greek, and am having trouble finding learning programs, may ask what you use?
I love your sayings “you can not produce language unless u also consume it”. It simply feels so true but it takes time for me to realize that simple fact. I used to force myself to write output while didn’t provide input to my brain and I felt 😢.
something I did when i was learning russian was looking up + writing out baking recipes as it would force me to pay close attention to what I was writing and then when i'd actutally use it, I'd have to be able to read by own handwriting. it actually helped to make sure my writing was legible and accurate and made reading it much easier in the future.
OMG how is your Greek handwriting so much better than like 90% of the Greek population 😂 Impressive, well done!!
I was gifted a Hobonichi 5-year journal for Christmas back in 2021, so I've been using it every day for writing in Scottish Gaelic. It's been really great because I can see how far my skills have progressed since starting it. I focus mainly on journalling and on using words I already know, if I want to write about something and don't know the right word I'll use the English word but in a different colored pen so I can identify gaps in my vocabulary. Or if I need to write a non-Gaelic word on general I'll switch colors, which is funny to see an entry of Gaelic text written in fountain pen in Uncial script and suddently the words BURGER KING are right in the middle 😂
I like your honest approach to language advice, admitting flaws and problems the rest of us are struggling with too.
I learn best by writing things down, so I copy over EVERYTHING from my lesson. I feel that it helps me become more intuitive about sentence structure when I copy stuff down word for word than when I just glance at a sentence, figure out the meaning, and move on. I do change some of the sentences around as I go to better represent my interests, my family, where I live, etc.
This is so interesting! In my case, simply copying things from another source has never really worked, but once I started changing small things here and there to make it more relevant to me, like you mention, it's become a game changer.
That's what I did when I was learning French and a little bit less when I was learning English (I was learning only here and there by myself so that limited my writing opportunities). Anyway, what I wanted to say is that by copying everything and learning some rules, I became so good in writing French that everyone was calling me a "spelling monster". In addition to spelling, it also helps with just learning sentences to the point where they are natural and I completely stopped translating in my head. That was a very long time ago, I'm now completely fluent in French and in some areas I speak it better than my native Bulgarian, but one big part of getting there was copying text in French.
Wow, you can be really proud of yourself! I’m French and i know how my language can be difficult to learn or to master, even for native people. So i just wanted to congratulate you! Bravo 🎉
@@tbenaventeI am waiting for your reply
@@huskytailwhen you say copping, are you saying rewriting things that are already written in your target language? I think I’ll do that because if I create my own writings I’ll need someone to correct them. However, copying something will require only focus because I know it’s grammatically correct.
“My writing time is reserved just for that, for writing.” I like that approach. I feel like it takes the pressure off, the excess expectations of learning a language, while still being a useful way to absorb that language. Taking the pressure off helps to make it something you want to do every day, rather than a chore.
The idea to use a planner for "journaling" is inspired. I'm not much of a planner user but I always buy one because I think I should be using one (or it's pretty). I actually have one right now that I can use. Also having a small area to write in would really keep down the pressure to fill the whole page with writing.
You are easily my favorite language creator aside from Steve Kaufman. Your advice is always practical, your learning journey is relatable, and your content is so well-produced! I'm always inspired to get straight back to working on my languages after watching a new video of yours. Keep up the great work!
Thank you so much for your comment! It makes me really happy to know that other people find value in my content 💜
Thank you! My goal for this summer is to write a daily journal in Moroccan Arabic and in Spanish. Also, "not committing to any specific format for writing" is really helpful. It frees up the possibilities! Keep up the good work.
Asalaamu 3alikom khoya/khti! Tambien estoy estudiando español y l3arabiya dyal lmaghrib
You think at a higher level when you write, but also you can check your errors and review it wich helps in learning, that is having a purpose.
I love how this is applicable no matter the language you're learning. I'm a native English speaker studying Norwegian (on Duolingo because I'm poor and AuDHD brain spontaneously decided that a language only tangentially related to a special interest was more important than the three more relevant languages I've been meaning to learn and could actually use) and I've been wanting to branch out and find more ways to study, so this is incredibly helpful! Also a great use for all those fancy notebooks I've been holding onto but too overwhelmed to write in because I didn't know just what to put in yet. Another fun thing, I learned the word for recipe in Norwegian 'oppskrift' and have been looking at Norwegian cooking blogs or KZhead channels to get reading/listening practice in a very structured format on a topic I'm already familiar with. It's been very interesting, and I've picked up a lot of vocabulary (like løk for onion or sennep for mustard, etc), and made several recipes, as well as learned a little more about Norwegian culture and history! If you enjoy cooking, I highly recommend looking up recipes in the language you're learning, and reading the little blurbs in front too.
Omg, I always skip those blurbs when I read recipes in English, but with other languages this actually might work! I'm sure they are packed with useful vocabulary. Also, love how you mentioned having multiple notebooks -- I started my writing practice just because I bought yet another notebook and was like "well, I guess I have to write something in it now"
Yeah, I usually skip the blurbs if they seem like a story and don't offer any advice on techniques. But I realized when I saw one that it was a really good example of how just a normal person would talk, casual language from (most likely) a native speaker, rather than just the way that a textbook might use it which can be a little more stiff. As an aside, I really liked your video, and I got started on my own journal today! It was so nice that it popped up on my recommendations, because I've been wanting to try to find ways to output my own unique ideas while learning rather than just copying/translating what I hear or see, and this is a very achievable way to do so.
@@ninjabgwriter why do you want to learn Norwegian?
@@oh-noe The reason is super roundabout and a bit convoluted, so I hope it doesn't sound silly. I have a special interest (autism thing) in creative writing, and also a special interest in the video game series 'Portal', including a fan made mod of 'Portal 2' called 'Portal Stories: Mel' (free on Steam if you own Portal 2, and a ton of fun). One of the main characters, Virgil, has a Norwegian voice actor. Special interests collided and I ended up writing a fanfiction partially based off of another fanfiction I found (which is absolutely phenomenal) called 'Blue Sky'. Virgil is a robot, and has a similar role in the story of PS:M as another character in P2, Wheatley. In Blue Sky, Wheatley is given the backstory that he used to be human before his consciousness was transferred into a robot. I decided to go with a similar backstory for Virgil because he's the same kind of robot, and since his VA is from Norway, I decided to do the same for him since it gave me a good jumping off point to start fleshing out his backstory. It was kind of a whim to include some sections written in Norwegian, and I could have just used Google Translate (I definitely still have to use it for some words and to check my grammar and stuff, and it's mostly been dialog, but my dream goal is to one day be able to write an entire chapter completely in Norwegian by myself), but some of my friends had been telling me about how they were using Duolingo and mentioned it was free, so I decided I might as well give it a shot. I'd always been really intimidated by the thought of learning another language, especially because my school had a terrible French teacher who didn't actually know the language and just made us feel stupid if we didn't understand (because she didn't know how to teach us or answer our questions, she got fired and we never did end up learning French). Also because I'm hard of hearing, so it can be really difficult to differentiate between sounds, and I'm also dyslexic so reading isn't always super easy (but I really love reading and writing anyway). I feel like because it was free, and there was absolutely no pressure or anyone expecting me to learn, for some reason it was the perfect mixture of circumstances to make me willing to try. Honestly now I'm learning Norwegian partially for its own sake. It has a lot of sounds that aren't in English, and I find the phrasing super interesting. The order of words sounds a lot like some more archaic forms of English which can feel very poetic or attention grabbing to me, and it's really fun to speak and sing. Learning another language also had some unintended side effects as well that has been very positive for me. Firstly, it makes me feel like I'm smart enough to learn another language, and I'm going to give the other ones I want to learn a shot once I finish my Norwegian course. Secondly, it also is making me realize how hard I've worked to gain the skills to understand English, things like differentiating two words that sound the same to me by context clues in the rest of the sentence, or feeling the vibrations in my phone from the speakers to guess a word I missed, or using an edge to stay on the right line when reading, or how often I just use the length of a word and the first letter to guess which one it is, or mostly being able to tell that a sound is pronounced differently by where the vibrations are (the letters 'A' and 'Æ' both sound like 'ahh' to me, but I think the former's vibrations are closer to where my tongue starts to curve back down the throat, and the latter is closer to the uvula and tonsils, but I don't have anyone I can talk to who knows it so I'm not sure that's right, so don't quote me on that), and how language can actually be really exhausting. It made me realize that I'm working very hard to use language at all and like maybe I'm sort of cool for managing to do so despite all the stuff that makes it difficult and I should cut myself some slack sometimes. It's also very exciting every time I'm able to start using some of those coping skills for Norwegian. I was able to correctly guess a word by how the vibrations felt the other day when I had the volume turned down too low to hear clearly on a listening exercise where the word was hidden and I was supposed to match it to the correct English counterpart, and that was what made me realize that's a skill I have (I couldn't tell what a word was by just the vibration alone, but accompanied by a few of the sounds I can actually do fairly well). One feature I wish the Norwegian course had that apparently other courses have got is that the characters' mouths are animated. That would be incredibly useful for me, both for figuring out how to do the mouth shapes when pronouncing words, and some very rudimentary lip reading practice. Sadly, Duolingo doesn't pay as much attention to Norwegian because it's a smaller course than ones like French, Spanish, English, German, etc. In other courses they've got grammar tips and each character has a unique voice. There's a male and female voice in Norwegian, and though it's kind of funny to hear a bear, a grown man, and a little boy all sound like a neutral adult male AI voice, learning how to listen to as many different vocal qualities and accents as I can would also be incredibly useful because that can be challenging even in English. Accents sound so beautiful, and I really wish I was able to understand some of them better, but ones that run together can be really challenging like some from the southern regions of America for instance, especially if a lot of the sounds are more in the back of the throat. Last, it's taught me some things about how to have delayed rewards. Because of the way my brain works, I really like tasks that can be easily completed because they give an instant reward and then I don't have to worry about the obligation of doing them. And with ADHD, my brain doesn't give the feeling of reward as easily, and it can be very difficult to form habits or do things that have a very delayed reward rather than an immediate one because it has an impaired ability to release dopamine. But I've realized that I can't 'complete' Norwegian in a day, much less a few months. I'll probably always be learning more over my entire life, if I keep up with it. Feeling ok with that and learning how to set milestones to still feel that reward has helped a lot with Norwegian, but also encouraged me to diversify these skills to other areas. I know it's a rough and probably immacurate metric, but I looked up how many words children know by certain age milestones, and when I reach one, I write down how long it took me to get there. It makes me feel like I've 'completed' something and like "dude, look at me! I don't have the same neuroplasticity of a baby, and I still learned this many words in this short a time!" Right now I know almost as many words as a 3 year old according to the random study I decided to use, and I've been studying for a little less than 8 months! I'm super excited to hit that milestone (900-1000 words, I know a little over 750 right now). Duolingo isn't a perfect learning tool, and I really wish it taught me more about why I'm doing what I'm doing, more grammar, but all in all I'm actually pretty excited that I've been so successful so far. Anyway, this was a very long story, so I hope it wasn't too boring, but thank you very much for asking!
@@ninjabgwriteri thanks a lot for your answer. It was not for me, but I really appreciate all the elements in there, and I want to give my two pennies here. I think that one's intentions or reasons in learning a language, no matter what it is, should be convenient only to the learner. Either the initial sparkle which ignites our attention is weak or not, I'm always looking for the long-term achievement. Nowadays, I don't stick with only one motivation while I study languages, since as a human, and Tanya has doubled down in the video, I'm not interested being productive every single day. Anyway, your little story was interesting and I'm excited to see the future of this project of yours.
I'm currently learning German, and usually try to write something for my weekly italki lesson. Finding a topic is sometimes challenging - I've cycled through daily routines, my family, describing my home (each room separately, and then the exterior), films, books etc. Sometimes it is challenging. I find I over-rely on translation apps, but I'm really trying to wean myself from them, by at least writing a first draft without any digital assistance. Once I'm happy with what I have written, I review it with my italki teacher. The review of what i have written often spins off into a nice conversation for the remainder of the lesson. I do need to get more disciplined about this practice though, and the tips that you provide in this video will be very helpful. I can certainly see the benefit of daily journaling, like you are doing.
as a fellow greek learner it’s a pity there aren’t many good textbooks. there’s an amazing textbook by Alexey Grishin used in universities, with lots of grammar exercises, but i think it’s available only in russian. however, the best advice i got from it - it’s helpful to translate all the texts and dialogues from greek to your native language and then vice verse. that way you not only learn the vocabulary but also understand all the constructions and expressions you use. and my tutor taught me to try and alter as many texts as possible. for example, if there’s one dialogue about buying groceries in my textbook i rewrite it 2-3 times with different conversation starters, products and their weight or quantity. after your video i really want to try journaling in the languages i learn and especially in greek! i think it’s game changing :)
I'm learning Japanese so writing is a struggle since I need to look up almost every kanji in the dictionary every 2 seconds. But I love to write in French (my native language), so I really wish one day I can be able to journaling in Japanese without having to overthink about a spelling (or having to write everything in hiragana)
I am reading a book about how to just get to writing in general (in japanese), and the authors tips is to just write it how you think, even in hiragana cause there is no right or wrong. obviously kanji is helpful, but i think what helped me a tleast is just to write, even if everything in the beginning is in hiragana. i will focus on one or two words and learn how to write the kanji stroke order, but not perfectly and then to just write everything else in hiragana. this has helped me and i have been able to write more and more kanji because of this. maybe you could try something similar!
Maybe try typing ist out instead i think thats easier:)
It might help to use a 'draw kanji search' (you should be able to just Google that) if you can't find a kanji too, it's faster for sure
I'm also learning japanese❤❤❤❤❤
@@helenemaja0912Could you please tell me the name of that book?
thanks, this was pretty inspirational. I have been just dumbly copying things out, but I definitely want to generate my own Korean sentences and your video about that process has given me ideas and motivation, so thank you and keep up the good work!
Thank you! Your advice is so helpful! I have been struggling with writing and thinking about what to write. So, I have been scared to even try but focusing on a topic per week makes it way less overwhelming for me.
I love the idea of highlighting or saving things from content to write about!
Thanks a lot,i love learning languages and im currently learning 4 so this is really going to help me improve and im really excited to become fluent in each one 🇪🇬🇰🇷🇺🇸🇫🇷❤
One of the most helpful language learning videos I have seen recently! So many new ideas instead of the same old ones that get repeated often from different YTers.
Loving this channel for great resources and good ideas for language learning! :) Thank you for always sharing your resources!
I love your relaxed method! I'm currently focusing on getting more input but I'm saving this in my playlist for useful techniques.
heya I’m a student in high school, and this is amazing! every one of the points is spot on and you truly presented them in such a short and concise way!
This is a very informative and useful video! I've been struggling with writing and speaking Japanese despite learning it for 2 years. I can already read it pretty efficiently especially if I'm familiar with the vocabulary and grammar but producing the language is my stumbling block. After this video I've been inspired to start fresh and begin writing even if it's going to be about something mundane with the most simple grammar but that's what I need right now to get myself out of the slump. Thank you for the video!
This is so useful! Thank you so much for sharing❤
This was really helpfull! Thanks! I have always been one who needs to write to remember. I searched and found your vid because I need some method to stay with. I will start this tonight!
The traveling post-it note is a great idea, thank you 😊 I will also use the planner idea as well.
I'm learning greek aswell, and not very sure how to start/set up my journal, so this was helpful!
I love your channel! It's really clean and understandable. I don't often have the opportunity to exercise myself in my targets languages. Ps: I'm french
I’ve also been learning Greek so this has been very helpful, thank you!
Hi Tanya! just found your channel and you're giving so many good tips. You're very inspiring and I'll surely try out your ideas. Thank you!
Thank you for such a wonderful video! 😊 I'm going to try out your writing technique for my Greek studies. It's definitely time to incorporate some writing into my learning routine.
Thank you for your awesome videos, especially this one! There aren't too many youtubers focusing on Greek (which I love and I guess I will resume studying it). Your Greek handwriting is great! Same as you, I also believe that handwriting has a great role in language acquisition. I also value the classical methods (which actually suit me well) like copying texts, repetition of sentences and then replacing stuff till I memorize a specific structure, using textbooks 📚, pencils and dictionaries - hard format. I also appreciate the newer applications and online content, but after a while I find them tiresome so I would always prefer grabbing a book and a pen instead. Anyhow, keep up the good work! You've just got yourself a new subscriber 😊
I'm always amazed by how systematic many language learners are. For me, learning a language has to feel spontaneous. My organization goes as far as having 30 minutes a day to study the language. What I will do in these 30 minutes is a mystery even for me. In relation to writing, my journals are quite messy. I just write random thoughts according to the level I am and once a week or so I read it to make sure I understand what I wrote. Maybe it's not the most effective way, but since languages are a hobby and I'm not trying to get any certification, it's enough for me. Very nice video, thanks for sharing your method.
Dictation exercises are a really good way to practice writing. Great video!
Thanks for sharing! I think I will give writing a diary a try in my target language!
I love the idea of using an old diary. I really wanted to get started writing quickly but as I am such a beginner I didn't know where to start. Thanks for the advice :)
Oh, thank you for covering this theme. These are some real useful tips. I am a writer and i want to write in both of my target languages as well(english and japanese), but i am like you in the sense that i can read really well, but writing is troublesome. I am gonna be trying this
Such a good video! Lots of inspiration on how to use a journal successfully!
That's a very interesting and complete video @Tanya, full of really nice and easy to apply tips. I'll share it with my students, thanks a lot !
Thank you. I will try this out. I tried keeping a diary to improve my language skills and to force myself to think in the language. But I only kept it up for 4 entries. Using a post-it note to jot down good phrases, grammar, vocab that you want to reinforce through writing is such a good idea!
I just found your channel through this video. The video was amazing because for me personally I struggle to journal, so this is a good alternative. I will try to practice it for my Dutch and then later my Polish & Korean. You’ve just got another subscriber :) happy language learning! 😊
as a dutch person, this is the first time I see a foreigner learning it! :)
This is inspiring. Good luck with your language learning
This is a great idea and something I will start to incorporate into my language studies!
This video was so informative. Thank you.
I'm glad that the algorithm lead me to you. I'm very much like you when it comes to learning languages. I absorb languages mainly through media/contents (youtube, films, music, etc.). At some point I reach the point I can listen and read quite ok without having to reach for translator or dictionary, but hell, speaking and esp writing are really my biggest problems. In short, super excited while watching your video and I am urged dive in my languages learning immediately after this.
This video is gold thank you for putting this out there!
I am learning Arabic. I usually write a few times a week. I have wanted to put more effort into writing. Now, I usually just read a lesson with a native speaker who I meet with on zoom, and write about the topic of the book lesson we are going through. I have not put a lot of thought into how I could make my process better, but you certainly had a lot of great pointers I am looking forward to try.
I got very good ideas from this video. I really struggle when it comes to writing and I couldn't find a way to practice regularly. I'll try to implement these ideas into my learning process. Hopefully, I can make this work :D Thank you so much
ok this is VERY helpful for me. i've seen a lot of vids like these that gives out advices/tips i just couldn't replicate. but this vid was something that i could do. now i'm on my fourth day and i'm learning a lot! thank you
Glad it helped!
Hello! I love writing and I don't have problem witch it. I've started gratitude journal on English and I think that the writing is very important. I noticed that when I reading a lot my writing as better than before. My English is still far from perfect and many people tell me that I shouldn't learn language, because I don't any talent of it. But still I don't give up. I don't speak fluently but when I started recovering od myself I noticed that is better and more confident. I need to start write more on Spanish and your notebook was great! I really like to see how another people learn language and I do the same. You are my inspiration :) and I've learn from you so much.
this is so fitting since i also wanted to improve my writing in korean!! i used hellotalk for a year and there i would post short texts, but then i decided that i wanted to write longer paragraphs. that's why i made a notion database where log in my journal entries and then upload them to italki, langcorrect or journaly (when out of ideas of prompt ideas i use chat gpt and it works pretty well). if i notice i want to use a word i don't know, i look up and add it to a list of words to add to anki later (the reverso app for korean is still in beta, but it's super useful (apart from papago), to look words up without much distraction).
i needed this video so much omg i’m learning 2 languages right now (spanish for 4 years, korean for 8 months) and technically chinese but i’m just getting the basic knowledge before i actually start learning chinese. i can comprehend so much korean and spanish but i can never use it to the level i can comprehend, ci’ll definitely try these tips
I stumbled upon your channel by accident and saw that you offer very useful tips for those who study foreign languages.
Hello, thank you so much for this video ! I have been learning Dutch for over a year now and I feel a bit stuck and your video came at the right time : I'm now making a "writing idea jar" with ideas of things to write about and I'll be writing about a random topic related to my life and interests to write about at least 3 times a week, we'll see how it goes ;)
Having a basic understanding of Greek etymology will be very helpful not only with the spelling but with expanding your vocabulary.
Thank you for the clear ideas presented. Time for me to stop hiding behind reading and listening 😉
I don't do a lot of writing beyond copying out lessons, but I definitely want to work on it more. I'm studying Irish, which is primarily 18 letters I'm already accustomed to, so it's fairly straightforward. However, they have a lot of sneaky spellings and pronunciations for words depending on the grammar and it can still take me a while to parse things out. But I definitely have some older and unfinished planners, so this looks like a great idea to use them up!
very good tips. I am really lazy/scared when it comes to writing in my target languages… but I found this video inspiring, so I am going to keep trying.
So inspiring and useful as always. ❤
Glad you think so 💜
I really like your idea on using a planner to write in a different language. It's also a nice way for me to use the unused pages of a 17-month planner when I switch to a new planner due to the overlapping months. The idea of using example text on low energy days is nice too. I think this can be even more effective if you were to study and memorize the text and try to write it down without looking at the text. Repetition is important if you do this though.
such a great idea! thanks for sharing!
Thanks for watching!
Είναι απίστευτο ποσό ωραία γράμματα γράφεις στα ελληνικά ! Συγχαρητήρια για την πρόοδο !!! Χαιρετισμούς από Ελλάδα ❤❤😊😊
Ευχαριστώ, Αθηνά 💜
Very helpful. Loved this video!
This is very similar to how I've been practicing Spanish but with some tweaks. My current "lazy girl" method (I knew the biggest obstacle at first would be to just get in a habit of learning or practicing daily and not fizzle out after a month started with just 1 of these and added on the next thing after about a month of consistency. In total, currently, the whole routine takes about an hour a day and can be entirely done on my phone when I first wake up so there's no obstacles. (I used to be fluent in Spanish but lost it as an adult, and had a stroke at 25 that really messed up al languages I knew, so while not all was lost - keep in mind it's even hard for me to write in my native language now. Hard mode.) 1) ~15mins of new word flashcards. Currently I use the app lingvist since it advertised prioritizing most frequent words in the language; however, I'm able to recognize a lot of errors for latin american spanish even as someone relearning (and that native speaker friends have confirmed aren't right) so I wouldn't recommend this app for latin american spanish at the moment in the paid form. This can also be done manually though. For me this is about 50 flash cards a day and can be done first thing in the morning. Easy. 2) Practice 20mins on Busuu: this is the only app I actually HIGHLY recommend and recommend you pay for (it's only $30/y so not bad). It's structured more like a school language class and combines vocab, grammar, listening, following along with conversations, and finishes off each lesson with a segment where you respond to an open ended question either with a written paragraph or speaking ~1min. That last part is the best because native speakers are rewarded for correcting others' submissions and they have no idea what you learned in the lesson and will tell you if you did well or not or what you should fix or consider - since everyone's also learning another language there's a lot of people who understand what could be helpful that you wouldn't learn from an app or site (for example: my name is feminine in English and Hebrew, but in Spanish sounds like the male version of the name, so even if I say "my name is [...]" correctly with no accent, native speakers gave the [good] advice to maybe just say the feminine Spanish version of the name until I'm more fluent). 2...b?) in that speaking/writing part at the end chapters of Busuu lessons I try to write out what I want to say in English first on my notes app or notion (or go right to Spanish if I know what I want to say) and then use a dictionary or google translate or similar to double check my first draft. Once all seems good, I then read it a few times to get the flow and sound less robotic, and THEN I speak my answer into the app to submit. That way native speakers are correcting something that isn't half-assed. 3) if for some reason the lesson didn't have a speak/write section at the end, I write in a notion "journal" calendar like you do. It's open ended, and if I'm stuck that day I just keep it available on my phone to try to write/translate sentences I say that day and are things I'd actually say in real speech. 4) I have a segment on my to do for language larning marked as "extra" but really it just means "listen to a youtube video or two." Either a short clip from local news in Spanish without subtitles to see what I can pick up without much thought, or if I have more time I'll watch a Spanish lesson on youtube or watch an episode of a show in Spanish/with a lot of Spanish. I highly recommend watching cartoons in that language, even with subtitles! It'll usually be simpler speech but not be spoken as robotically clear as a newscaster.
I like how you used your planner to write every day of the week, I was looking at some different ways to create a language journal and this definitely inspired me 😍 I am studying Chinese though, and writing the characters are soo confusing, so I often type out what I want to write into Apple Notes, double check what I wrote into a translate app, then write by hand into a notebook. The process can get really fiddly though, but maybe keeping a glossary will help a bit with my writing!
加油!!
Hi! I first of all, I love your channel and your videos! i'm brazilian, and I taught myself english when I was 12, it's the only language I mastered other than portuguese, and because as I was younger I didn't mind going head first into any new experiences. The first books I read and sentences I wrote were a headache, and yet here am I. BUT somehow I'm forever stuck on A1 whenever I try to learn any new languages. Tried German, French, Korean, Spanish... I just get overwhelmed when It comes to reading, speaking and writing. but thanks to your videos, I'm slowly getting more confident and trying it out, thank you for the tips!!! Only yesterday I decided to start a writing practice for me and honestly this video couldn't be more perfectly timed hehe so thank you!!! 😄
I totally get the frustration! Sometimes I also wish I had the same level of obsession with a language that I had with English when I was younger, because back then I was down to do anything English-related, and with my other languages I've become super picky for some reason 😅 Best of luck with your writing practice!
I need to start writing more. I tried to start a journal in Korean, but only did one entry due to my lack of grammar knowledge that made my sentences so basic. However I've learned that I shouldn't feel like I'm insufficient. Small sentences can slowly become more complex with time as more vocabulary and grammar are learned. I'll definitely try the "topic of the week" idea! Sounds like it could be really interesting and help me with my studies.
Watching your channel makes me want to get back into Spanish and Russian. Thanks so much for your inspiration! 💕
Best of luck! 💜
I'm a Koine Greek learner, and I have to applaud you for learning Modern Greek, it seems so hard to me in comparison to any other languages I have studied, including Ancient Greek!
I really needed that video, I'm going back to study my secret language again and it's really important to me to practice writing, as well as speaking and reading, thank you for making this video, I really like yor channel, Good luck in your language studying ⭐
Best of luck to you too! ✨
Sachary is that YOU?
@@im_just_vidu yup hahahaha
@@sacharymateo1710 oh yeeee 🤭
I've been writing more in foreign languages recently and It turnes out a really fun and helpful thing. So thank you for sharing your experience it's motivating.
Glad it was helpful!
@@tbenaventeWhat workbook do you use for Greek? I’m also learning Greek and I’d love to have such a book for my studies.
@@So_-sk2wb I'm using two textbooks Communicate in Greek and Ελληνικά για σας A1, and both come with workbooks
@@tbenavente Okay, thank you ☺️
I love this channel!! ❤ I’ve been struggling with the “I” sound in greek too. 😂 This week I’m going to start my first diary. (I’ve never written one in my life) but there’s always a first time. and it will be in multiple languages hahaha. Thank you for this advice. Sorry for my English, and greetings from Colombia. 🇨🇴
Best of luck with starting the diary 💜
Thank you for your video 🤩🔥.
this video is very helpful, thank u
Writing and speaking are my favorite activities in a foreign language. It’s difficult because I’m still a beginner in Korean, but eventually I’ll get there!
Going to start journaling in Japanese because of you! Thank you so much!
Thank u so much for the tips, I was struggling with writing T-T
I like the video, it resulted very useful to apply in my languages learning!
Happy to be of help!
@Tanya Benavente, 08:23 min. mark. Your point on using limited writing time--BUT WRITING NEVERTHELESS!--is an excellent idea that I need to adopt. It seems to me that this would encourage students to expand their writing practice, as interest and mastery increases, very naturally over time. Great commitments sometimes need baby steps, at first. Cheers!
I used to do something a bit like this. I had an account on hellotalk which I only used for their social media style feature. I'd write up a little post on my account every day, practicing my skills and occasionally getting comments from native speakers. I admit it gets pretty difficult trying to come up with something worth reading every day, so I might try writing in my journal instead and then posting the exercises or questions that end up being more interesting.
thank you so much for this! im a beginner w/ chinese and have been wondering how i should go about writing practice (sentences, not just characters) at my level. :-)
Glad it was helpful!
I found the titel of the video interesting so I decided to watch. I admire your diligence (if that is the correct word) for doing all this and it’s great that you found a method that works for you. I’ve been learning languages most of my life and not by choice. I live in Flanders (the Dutch speaking part of Belgium) and French, English and German were mandatory for us. I’m dyslexic and although I realised now that I do like other languages I hated learning languages in school. So much even that I really looked around for a school where I could drop German. It was too much. One of the main things that I hated was writing things with a limited topic, using vocab that was in that specific chapter or learned before and trying to work with just the grammar that you have been taught. I would prefer struggling through new grammer and words to write something that I wanted instead of keeping to a set topic. Also working with my interests would help with remembering vocab and grammer. I had the same struggle recently when I was learning Japanese and I struggled a lot in class but somehow managed to write small texts and hold conversations with locals with a lot less effort. I guess this shows that although it’s a good method that it definitely wouldn’t work for everyone. I kinda just wanted to say this as most of the comments here say that this is an amazing method (which it is if it works for you) and I know that my younger self would feel very discouraged if it seemed to work for everyone else but me. 😓 Also quick side note. For the parts where you talk to the camera, I just wanted to say that you scared me a couple of times because you pretty much stare straight into the camera. It’s probably just me but I wanted to mention it. I’m not saying you should change but I always try to give some feedback where I can 😅
That’s pretty much my philosophy when it comes to language learning: there’s no universal best method, there’s only methods that suit a certain person. I myself might prefer different ways of doing things depending on the language I’m learning, my mood or my life circumstances. As for you other comment, I genuinely don’t know what to say - no one has mentioned it before and I also don’t really know where I should be looking if not at the camera 🤷🏻♀️
@@tbenavente that’s great that that is your philosophy in language learning and I do really like your video even if the method in it isn’t for me. But as I mentioned in my previous comment, I’m mainly saying this because people often turn to KZhead for answers (I certainly did) and can interpret this as the method to follow, especially with all the comments that affirm what you say so I wanted to tip that scale a bit and give my honest experience with the method. And (as mentioned) the reason why I felt the need to do that was that when I was younger and I would have found this video with all the comments that I read I would have thought that this was a method that would certainly work and end up being disappointed and feel defeated when it doesn’t work. I know I’m not the best at explaining things. 😅 Also the part about looking into the camera. I have 2 points to add there. 1) I’ve heard that looking slightly above or below the camera can work and 2) that really might just be something personal. I like videos like this where I can listen and I only look up when I hear something interesting and several times when I looked up I wasn’t expecting to see you staring at me. I kinda made me jump, nothing to serious. You can just ignore that if you want. 🤦🏻♀️😅
Inspiring!
Nice content and tips. Well, I am a Portuguese native speaker and I studied Spanish when I was a teenager. Nowadays I am learning English (and I wanna learning Latin as soon as possible). One thing that helps me a lot is studying more about English sounds, syllables, splitting and stressing syllables, , connected speech, morphology in general. My reading, speaking, listening and writing become faster in about two months. For me the hardest issue is those English vowel sounds.
Oh yeah, English vowels are hell 🥲
I’m currently teaching myself Italian, Dutch, and Hebrew. This will tactic will be helpful.
I try to write as much as I can in Afrikaans and it really helps me with the sentence structure :))
This might be a topic for a whole other video but you mentioned that without consuming a language it's harder to produce anything in it - which is very very true! English is my second language and it was so easy to learn it because I was learning it as a kid/teenager who was on the internet all the time and... if I wanted to do anything, I *had* to be constantly consuming English. But, for me, any other language is much harder to organically consume... Films and books are an exception, since it's quite easy to find foreign language films/books that I like. But on the other hand, I struggle to find things like podcasts or youtubers in languages that I'm learning that cover topics I'm interested in. I know they're out there, but because I don't quite know what to search for, I struggle to find them. And because a lot of the people who speak those languages choose to put out content in English because that way they reach a bigger audience. Any tips for how you find those things? Like I said, I know they're all out there, but I must be searching for the wrong thing! It would be super helpful to know how you go about finding them!
I haven't been consistent with it, but I kinda just write about whatever I feel like. Maybe talk about a movie or show I watched, maybe talking about some situation that happened or how I feel about something, or telling something I did. Maybe sharing something about culture/traditions (since I generally then post it online for corrections, I always assume I'm telling someone else new information). I've I was learning about a specific topic or maybe some specific grammar structure I might try to write something that would allow me to practice that - sometimes on purpose, sometimes, because the topic is just present in my mind. I do like the repurposing of old planner, but I think using one for all my TLs might have not been the best idea. It's helpful to just carry one if you're on the go, but since it seems I tend to focus in one for a certain period of time, it might have been best to keep separete ones and have it be more tidy and useful to find what I wrote before or make it consistent. I might have to rethink that in a new approach.
I love journaling, but I can't do it in my target languages, so I chose to copy short stories I already read and lyrics of songs I listen to everyday instead. It helps a ton with reading, spelling and memorizing words because of the constant repetition. But I am a writer, so the desire to create my own stories and poems is always there. Reading and writing poems is how I learned English actually, but I was really young and I don't remember the process. It was very organic, I guess, and I was very stubborn, lol. I hope I somehow can recreate that process with my other languages. I love your videos, btw 💖 I'm gonna try my hand at this 👀
this is something I do, but in a somewhat different application! I study opera/classical music so I spend a lot of time translating my repertoire, and since I love French opera and art song I get a lot of French practise in.. the only issue is that a lot of art song in any given language tends to deal with the same topics so it's a lot of reinforcement of the same words and ideas haha
One of the reasons I LOVE learning new languages is because I have new way to express myself in a journal
I learn English and I understand everything very well, but my writing/speaking skills sucks. I can't fully express myself and make so many mistakes. I hope these advices will help me to improve my writing skills. Thanks for video ❤️
You are inspiring me to work on Greek more. I have been trying to learn Greek since 1989. Some times I focus on it more and sometimes less. I picked up Spanish a couple of years ago and I focused on Greek in the first quarter and Spanish in this quarter. Now I want to switch back. How do you balance learning multiple languages?
Wait what? Channel in English? It is wonderful!!
Thank you so much
I was wondering how do you manage to study languages simultaneously? If you have a system or any tips, I would appreciate it. I maintain my languages by writing down lot on my journal, trying to read books and listening podcasts on those languages (English and German). I would say I’m fluent in English, but I need to work on my German and I’m semi-beginner in Hebrew
Complimenti!
Спасибо за видео. Я зимой активно учила английский, но теперь мотивация пропала и я ищу практики, которые помогут мне хотя бы поддерживать мой уровень как он есть. Думаю этот способ будет интересен.
i've been learning japanese for a few months but i'm really inconsistent (adhd lol). However, lately i've been trying to get back into it and a way i practice my writing is writing down any phrases i recognize from songs i like (in hiragana/katakana, idk many kanji yet)
Wow!! Good luck with your greek's, must be really difficult, Iam from greece and trying to learn swedish...it's really difficult already to me the swedish pronunciation etc. so, i cannot imagine how difficult seems the completely differnt alphabet of greeks letters 😅Very interesting video !! Have a beautiful week !
Alphabet is not even the worst part, grammar is 😅 Best of luck with Swedish! 💜
@@tbenavente Hahaha, grammar is the worst in every kind of language 😅 Thank you so much