Apps, Tips and Tricks for Learning a New Language (The Fun Way)

We all know that flash of motivation you get when you feel inspired to learn a new language. Maybe you've seen a social media post and admired how beautifully someone speaks, or seen a clip on TV and reminded yourself that you should get around to learning that new language you've been meaning to start. There are so many different programs and resources out there that teach languages, but often they can be filled with topics and information that isn't really interesting or relevant to you, or perhaps you just really don't enjoy the style of learning they provide. When I was in my first year of university, I made it my goal to learn a new language, but in my own way. I was traumatised by two-hour long middle school classes where we were drilled with grammar and vocabulary in seemingly the most tedious ways possible, while I sat there wondering why I ever took that subject. When I made that goal in my first year of university, I wanted to learn a language at my own pace, in my own way, with topics I was interested in, and to slowly build my way up from there. I have just finished my degree at the end of last year, and although I'm not yet fluent, I am confident in my skills and have moved on to advanced topics and studies, working my way up to fluency, and for the most part, I did this all for free and on my own. Sounds too good to be true? Here's how I did it.

1. Duolingo, Babbel, and Drops (Free Language Learning Apps)

I'm sure you've heard of the fabulous resource that is Duolingo. For those of you who might not have heard of it before, it's a free language learning program that is available as an app and also online. It's a great place to start as a beginner, and start building a foundation in an interactive and fun way. If you are learning a Romantic language (such as German, French, Italian, or Spanish) or a Slavic language (such as Russian, Czech, or Polish), it might be helpful to have some extra resources like a verb conjugation table in front of you while you're doing your exercises. As you're on a roll triumphing through topics on your way to get that gloriously satisfying completed Duolingo tree, it can be easy to skip over explanations of grammatical conjugations that can be hard to understand without having it in front of you. Sometimes you can miss grammar explanations entirely, leaving you wondering why your answer is wrong, and why all of a sudden one verb has changed to something completely different. A quick google search for ‘easy verb conjugation table’ or ‘masculine and feminine nouns’ in your chosen language can really help you with your Duolingo exercises, and make sense of the parts where there may not be a clear explanation as to why you have to change the verb or the adjective you’re working on. Or you can also search for more information on the Duolingo topic you're on if you need extra help. There are also forums in Duolingo where you can ask for clarification on an exercise and have your question answered by native speakers. You can also find some really informative YouTube videos that can help you with going over topics, but I’ll get into that later.

Babbel is another great, free app (with in-app purchases) that can help you with learning the basics. While Duolingo does a great job of training you on basic sentence structure and grammatical knowledge, sometimes the sentences taught aren’t really useful in everyday life. Babbel is a great way to learn some more colloquial terms, phrases, and conversation styles that are applicable to beginner learners, and includes topics which might be useful for your own lifestyle. Drops is another great app for free that you can use if you just want to learn some more vocab or some specialised words. It’s really fun and you can have the choice to skip over words you already know or keep ones that you haven’t heard of before, making your learning experience unique to you while still being fun. Sounds pretty good right?

2. HelloTalk and Tandem (Free Language Exchange Apps)

Once you’ve got the basics underway, it’s time to put your practice to use! These apps are an amazing way to practice speaking with people and to refine your language skills. They allow you to message, video chat, call or send voice memos with people who are native in the language you want to learn, and they are a great way to make some friends and practice your new language regularly. The great thing about these apps is that while you’re messaging, the other person can correct mistakes in your writing, so you know where you’re going wrong and why, or perhaps they might suggest a more natural way of expressing what you want to say in their language, and you can do the same for them if they want to learn English or another language that you can already speak. When I found these apps, I actually stopped my Duolingo training very early and took with me what basic knowledge I had to start a conversation, before using Google Translate the rest of the way. I made many, many mistakes (and a handful of really embarrassing ones), but the more I spoke to different people, the more I learned different ways to start a conversation, and slowly began to be able to talk about my interests and hobbies further and further without needing to translate the text beforehand. Eventually I was confident enough to speak to someone over the phone to practice my pronunciation (which you don’t have to do), and we spoke for about two hours. It was so fun and really lovely to meet someone from the other side of the world, and they were really interested to hear about why I wanted to learn their language. These apps are a fantastic resource because you can come back to them at any time during your progress, whether you are a complete beginner like I was and needed to translate everything to start learning how to talk about your own interests and passions, or whether you are an advanced speaker and you just want to ask someone for clarification on something, or you want to practice your writing, speaking, listening or comprehension skills. Another way that you can find a language partner is by going on Facebook and looking up learning groups that are focused on your chosen language, and finding someone to talk to through there. The Facebook Mentoring program is another new way you might be able to find someone to practice speaking to, although I haven’t used it to find a language partner, it’s a great cost-free feature that allows you to connect with different people from all over the world who have expertise in the topic you want help with. Either way, language partners are a great way to learn how to talk about things that interest you, and also to improve your conversational skills.

3. YouTube Videos/Netflix

If you feel like you are ready for the next level and want to start progressing in your comprehension, chances are there’s a trick which you are probably already using every day. YouTube. If you are already watching a sub-genre of YouTube regularly, like make-up tutorials or travel vlogs, or maybe you have a niche hobby that you like watching on YouTube - whatever it is that you already are watching on YouTube, try translating a common title of that sub-genre and searching for it along with English subtitles. This was a game-changer for me, because I started learning how people talk to each other naturally in the language that I chose, while still watching the style of videos I already enjoyed watching. YouTube videos are a fantastic resource to learn slang, to get used to the speed and accents of that given language, and to see footage of people’s local towns and cities. Although, *disclaimer* don’t be discouraged if at first you don’t understand anything they are saying, even with the English subtitles on. When I stumbled upon my first YouTube video in a different language with subtitles, I went from feeling like a Duolingo master to a complete beginner again, feeling as if I knew less than when I started. But fear not! Watching videos is a different way your brain is taking in information, and you’re not yet used to listening and watching language at the same time. Chances are the practice you’ve done so far is mostly written and listening in chunks, and you haven’t listened to a long conversation before. Little by little, these videos are going to help you get more of a feel for the language, refine your pronunciation, and the best part is, if you’ve found a video from a sub-genre you’re already watching, it’s something you’re already interested in! That is the key here, to find content that you are already passionate about or engaging in, and to try and find resources within that same genre in your new language. As I mentioned earlier, YouTube is also a great resource for finding tutorials on tricky things that you might have not quite got the hang of yet, simply search for the grammar topic such as ‘past tense Italian grammar’, and you will find lots of tutorials from people who are passionate about teaching languages and make it easy to understand these topics in bite-sized videos.

If YouTube isn’t really your thing or you aren’t already watching a lot of YouTube content, try looking up your favourite Netflix TV Show, or perhaps one you’re already watching, and see if they have the subtitles in the language you want to learn. This is another great way to start incorporating media from other languages into your everyday life that you are already consuming, and, on the topic of media, try looking up language pages on Instagram or whatever platform you use most often. There are lots of blogs that post daily words and phrases that are useful in everyday life with cute and aesthetic graphics, making it effortless to learn new content while you’re scrolling!

4. Start Thinking in Your New Language

If you’re like me and you almost always have an internal dialogue going on, try translating what you are thinking to yourself in your chosen language. Hey, it might sound a bit crazy, but no one’s listening! If you’re someone who rehearses conversations in their head (come on, I know I’m not the only one 😜) try translating it in your head and use a translator or dictionary to translate any parts that you don’t know how to say yet. Now, I’m no linguist or scientist, so I’m speaking purely from experience here, but this is really helpful for two reasons. When you start practicing producing new sentences rather than recalling information, it begins to sink into your subconscious mind, and it starts to feel like your brain is beginning to recognise you can express yourself in more than one way. After a while of doing this I actually started having dreams where bits of my new language would pop up, sometimes it would be incoherent, but my subconscious mind was starting to internalise the information I had learned. Or sometimes I would go to ask someone something, and I would almost start speaking in my chosen language without even realising it, it felt as though my brain was starting to actually make semi-permanent space for all of that information I had learned. But even with all of that aside, it’s still really important to start trying to think in a new language. That internalisation process makes your recall a lot faster for information that's still fairly new, and your brain starts to solidify words that you know really well. Another reason why this method is really helpful is that you start to become more fluent in conversation, and you get faster and more comfortable with speaking freely, without needing to try and remember how to say something. It starts to become automatic, and you get better at quickly rephrasing sentences to express what you want to say, even if you don’t quite have the vocabulary for the subject you’re talking about.

If you don’t think much in words or you don’t talk to yourself very often (I’m very skeptical of you 😉), try and think of a conversation you might have with your friend, or perhaps a story you were going to tell someone that happened earlier on in the week. You could try writing it down, and translating it by hand or with the notes on your phone, but it’s even better practice if you think of it first in English, and then try to translate as you go in your head, pulling out a dictionary or a translator as you go for words you don’t know. It’s a great exercise to practice thinking on the spot while having time to stop and look up things or research more before continuing, which usually you don’t have the luxury of doing in the midst of a conversation with someone.

5. Podcasts/Articles/Books/Music/The Possibilities Are Endless!

Podcasts are another great way to work on listening as an isolated skill when learning a language. Try looking up podcasts topics in your chosen language along with the translated word for ‘transcript’ and you might be able to find podcasts that have transcripts so that you can read along while you’re listening, or be able to go back and read any words that you haven’t heard of before and add them to your vocabulary. Once again, the key here is searching for things you are already interested in and are passionate about, but it doesn’t just have to be podcasts. Maybe you read a lot of articles, or you’re a bookworm and love looking up new fiction or non-fiction reads. The possibilities here are endless. There are loads of great podcasts on Spotify for all different topics, and you’re also able to find the top charts for songs that are popular in a given country. You’ll be able to find lots of new songs in their language, and that’s another great way to engage in learning a language while still having fun and learning new words. Another great trick is installing a translator extension on your web browser. When reading lyrics or articles in your chosen language, you can highlight the words and translate them instantly, and even save them so that you can look back over them later.

6. Language Tutor

Finally, if you are feeling pretty confident with all of your language skills but you want to focus on a particular topic that you're passionate about, and you can’t find much information on in it in your chosen language, or maybe there’s a grammar mistake that you keep making, but you can’t figure out why. A language tutor is a fantastic resource to patch those holes in your knowledge and gain fluency. Whether you choose to go to a class or get private tutoring, pick a setting which you feel is most comfortable for you, that will suit your level, your learning style, and your interests the most. Take your time to find a tutor or a class that is right for you. Don’t force yourself into an environment which doesn’t completely fit your goals and your style of learning, you might risk it backfiring and losing your interest in keeping up your language learning. Remember, it’s meant to be fun. When you are in an open and inquisitive state of mind, you will be able to learn so much faster and remember much more, and a great language tutor will be able to give you resources that suit your needs and passions, and help you to achieve your goals in the way that you want.

Being able to speak another language is a really exciting new skill to gain. I've always thought of it as kind of like going to the gym but for your brain, the great thing about it is that even though you are studying, you are seeing the results in your increased fluency and your increased confidence to express yourself in an entirely new way, and you come out the other side with a tangible and very useful skill. Languages are a fantastic hobby to start, and that’s just what they should be – hobbies. Language learning doesn’t need to be tedious or dull, in fact when you follow your intuition and explore things in a new language, you really enjoy learning how to talk about things that you love, and you get more than just a new way to express your feelings, emotions, thoughts, and passions. You learn about culture, about history, you make new friends from all over the world, and you open up doors of opportunity that you might not have had access to before you started. I hope this motivates you to start learning that language you’ve always wanted to learn, or perhaps to brush the cobwebs off one that you started but never finished, and remember above all, to go at your own pace, learn in your own way, and most importantly - to have fun. Happy learning!