Polyglottist

How to Form a Habit of Studying Languages?

Having been a language teacher for many years, I used to hear students of all different ages claim that they do not have the capacity to learn languages. Meanwhile, many of them could name people they personally knew for whom languages came easily and naturally. These students believed that they needed to have some “special talent” for languages, without which mastery of any language would be difficult, perhaps even impossible. Were these students right? Do you really need some innate ability for languages in order to learn them?

There are a lot of studies that have been conducted about these questions and yet there is no single answer for them. Some people definitely have excellent phonetic abilities and great awareness of grammar patterns. As a result, they likely have an easier and shorter path when it comes to studying languages. People with exceptional languages skills are chosen to work for government interpreting and translation services. Does this mean that other people cannot become fluent in non-native languages? Absolutely not. Learning a language is no different from following a diet, going to the gym, saving money, keeping one’s house clean, or thousands of other activities that require the formation of a strong, consistent habit in order to achieve a desired result. Therefore, the question of if one can learn and how one can learn a foreign language becomes a question of how to form a habit and remain consistent, rather than a test of one’s innate language learning ability.

Each of us has individual goals and desires. We articulate these goals and sincerely believe that one day we will start working toward these goals, but sometimes, often even years later, we come to the realization that we have yet to even start. The main issue most people face is a discouraging mismatch between expectations and reality. Unfortunately, any goal requires hard work and sacrifice in order to achieve it. Another part of this dilemma is not knowing how to start and how to actively improve, so often we attempt a brute force approach, running aimlessly towards a goal until the point of mastery. Here, I came up with a list of steps to take in order to form a habit of learning a foreign language. I hope these steps will be useful.

Decide what language you want to learn and create deadlines for yourself. Be as realistic as possible, do not overdo it.
Decide when you want to start (pick a specific month and day) and how much time you have per week/day to devote to language learning. The time frame can vary from 15 minutes per day to two hours. More than two hours per day is not realistic and will likely interfere with other responsibilities you have. It is much more important to study on a consistent basis than to study for many hours on some days, and then do nothing for other days.
If your day is flexible, you do not have to assign specific time window for language learning. If your schedule is demanding, chose a specific time to study that language and stick to it. This can allow you to set a routine, which, once established, will be quite easy to maintain.
There will be many days, especially at the beginning, when you will find various excuses of why not do it or skip it. Try to fight this tendency. If you end up skipping it, treat the next day like it never happened, don’t allow yourself to dwell on your past mistakes, but rather try to learn from them going forward. A minor disruption to your routine does not need to lead to abandonment of the project/goal all together. Forgive yourself for such minor weaknesses and mistakes and continue according to the plan afterwards.
According to research, it takes about two months to form a habit. If you win the initial internal battle with yourself and continue your language studies for at least 60 days, it will become much easier, if not completely automatic. It will be a part of your every day routine.
All of these tips and recommendations do not mean that in two months you will be able to master a language and then be able to discontinue your studies. Becoming fluent in a language takes a lot of time, and while basic conversational fluency may come relatively quickly, true fluency can take several years. However, if you form the habit of studying your language on a consistent basis (every day or almost every day), it will become a part of your life and you will no longer have to force yourself.
Good luck in the wonderful journey of battling yourself in order to achieve your goals of language fluency!

Olga Sylvia, PhD

Dear future Polyglottist Spanish students,

We will be offering beginner, low intermediate, intermediate, pre-advanced, and advanced Spanish classes for students who travel for pleasure or for work to Spanish speaking countries, who have family members who speak Spanish, and for everyone who wants to be proficient in the Spanish language. All of our classes will meet on Zoom. The registration for all Spanish classes will open soon!

MEET OUR ESL AND GERMAN INSTRUCTOR CAROLYN

Carolyn is a Ph.D. candidate in the German Department at UC Berkeley, where she is finishing up a dissertation on the development of German noun inflection. She began teaching at PLA (in the San Francisco Bay Area location) in early 2019.

Before moving to Berkeley in 2006, she spent two years in Freiburg (Breisgau), Germany, studying German and Scandinavian Linguistics and Literature at the Albert-Ludwigs-Universität and exploring the Black Forest. She has been teaching German continuously since 2008 at various institutions including UC Berkeley, the German School of Fremont, the Bay Area Kinderstube (BAKS+, an after-school full immersion program for heritage speakers of German), and, of course, PLA, and has worked with both children and adults at all levels of proficiency. She’s also taught English (both ESL/EFL and composition classes for native speakers) and has done a fair amount of proofreading and translating.

When she’s not teaching or working on her dissertation, she enjoys taking long walks in the Berkeley hills, singing, playing the piano, watching German detective series, and crocheting.

FACTS ABOUT POLYGLOTTIST

The word Polyglottist is a synonym of “polyglot” which describes someone who speaks multiple languages. The origins of this word are Greek: polyglōttos, from poly-(many) + glōtta (language). In accordance with our name, our school emphasizes the learning of multiple languages.

Our first location in San Francisco Bay Area, California opened its doors for students in January 2014. We have just opened our second location in The Hague, The Netherlands.

STATISTICS ABOUT OUR INSTRUCTORS

We currently have 25 instructors.

Three Polyglottist instructors hold PhDs, while another three are PhD candidates, sixteen of our instructors hold MA degrees, and three hold BA degrees.

All of our instructors hold degrees in languages they teach, linguistics, literature, history or pedagogy.

The average teaching experience of PLA instructors is ten years.

Our instructors come from 17 countries (Belarus, Brazil, China, Colombia, Eritrea, Germany, Italy, France, Japan, Mexico, Philippines, Russia, South Korea, Ukraine, Uruguay, Vietnam, and the US).

21 of our instructors are native speakers.

Eight PLA instructors are actively involved in academic research.

Learn more about our Italian classes which will be offered starting in November! We are currently finalizing the details about classes. Preview our schedule of Italian classes by clicking the link below.

https://www.polyglottist.nl/italian

Learn about our French program! We will be offering French classes for all levels, starting in November.

https://www.polyglottist.nl/french