How I Learned a Language Four Times Faster

Let’s not beat about the bush. I hated Spanish in school. The only reason why I took the subject was because I was told I had to. If you got an “A” you were great. If you got a “C” you passed. I was the only person in my school who got an “F,” which pretty much summed up my attitude to learning foreign languages.

Forty years later, things have changed. After living here in Barcelona for 28 years, my Spanish is reasonably fluent, which is not remarkable, given the circumstances. Sadly, what is remarkable is that this is exactly what I had been doing with the other language in Barcelona: Catalan.

For the most part, I’d created a Catalan-free world. Even in restaurants, I was able to ignore the Catalan on the menu and solely focus on the Spanish (or English, if it was an option). I’m embarrassed to say it, but I was completely incapable of having any sort of meaningful conversation beyond “Bon dia.”

But here’s the thing, all of that changed when I was given a challenge by my publisher.

“How quickly could you learn a language if you did a little every day?” she asked over a coffee on Rambla Catalunya.

“I’ve no idea,” I replied.

“OK. Then why not find out and write a book about it?”And thus my book, “Learning a Language: How I managed it. How you can too,” came to pass.

At first, I was a total disaster. It’s easy to say to yourself, “I’ll learn a little every day,” but what exactly do you learn? And how? After a few weeks of irregular verbs and grammar, my inner voice started talking: “This is pointless. You’re wasting your time. It can’t be done.”

But, of course, it can be done. Millions of people successfully learn a new language. Some learn more than one. So I started to do some research on what the experts do. I looked at their websites. I listened to their TED talks. I read their books.

What I learned was that acquiring new language skills is not a question of talent or time. It’s a question of technique. I can say this with hand on heart because I — the person with the wrong attitude for languages, who failed Spanish at school and took 20+ years to learn it in Barcelona — successfully learned to converse in Catalan in under half a year. To be precise I went from “false beginner” (unable to hold basic conversations) to passing my intermediate B1 exam in five months, the equivalent of two years’ worth of studying for most.

You’re probably asking yourself “So what are these techniques? Come on, spit them out!” With the space available there’s no way I can go into depth with all of them. But these are the techniques that have served me the most.

MAKE MISTAKES

I have a friend who we’ll call Pat. She’s been living in Barcelona for five years and although she’s tried to learn Spanish, she can’t speak a word. The reason is she’s terrified of looking stupid, of getting it wrong and embarrassing herself.

This, ironically, is possibly the biggest mistake she could make. Everyone trying to speak a new language makes mistakes, lots of them. In fact, according to polyglot Benny Lewis, you should expect to be making 100+ mistakes a day.

Making mistakes is part of the process and shows you’re trying. And trying is what counts. The only thing Pat has learned is to keep her mouth shut in social situations. And the more she does it, the harder it becomes to change. So try to adopt a playful attitude towards learning your new language. And when you get it wrong, don’t feel bad.

LANGUAGE EXCHANGE PARTNER

If you want to learn how to swim, you don’t read books about it. You jump in and have a go at it. Language is just the same. You meet up for a coffee (or Skype) and practice speaking a real language with a real person. It’ll be excruciatingly uncomfortable to start. After a few more times, you wonder what all the fuss was about.

During my five months of study, I had four language partners, one of whom I still meet up with two years later. Don’t worry about your level being too low. So long as their level of English is good enough to communicate, you can start trying and converse.

It gives you so many advantages: You can control the speed and direction of the conversation, you get to speak for half the time and they’re (usually) totally free, which is brilliant. And you just might make a good friend, too.

PHRASES AND EXPRESSIONS

For learning fast, nothing beats learning whole phrases and expressions. For example, thanks to the lyrics of the song “Lady Marmalade,” most of the planet already knows how to say voulez-vous coucher avec moi, ce soir? without having any idea of the grammar (or practical implications) involved at all.

During your language exchange, pay attention to useful phrases. “Have you heard about …?” “Could you tell me what’s the difference between…?” and “I’ll send you a WhatsApp when I find out” all involve complicated grammar, which basic language classes stay well away from. But there’s no reason at all why you couldn’t learn them as useful expressions, even if you’re a beginner. My eight-year-olds haven’t a clue about conditionals, imperatives and subjunctives, but that doesn’t stop them from running about and using them.

REVISE BRIEFLY AND OFTEN

How many spare minutes do you have during a normal day? Could you find a minute before you get up? How about one during breakfast? Or on the metro? You get the idea, don’t you? I bet you could easily find a dozen separate minutes throughout your day. And with each one you could go over your new phrases and expressions. How? Get a revision app such as AnkiApp, which is simple and effective.

Similar to making flashcards, you put in all the useful expressions you want to learn along with their translations. Then in each revision session, the app challenges you to remember ten of them, or more if you prefer. You grade your ability to recall each one on a scale: easy, good, difficult or fail. In your next session, the app remembers what you’re struggling with and tests you on the trickier ones more than the easier ones.

Flipping through ten expressions takes a trivial amount of time, so you can do it often. And the more you do it, the more you’ll realize learning one or two phrases a day is easy. In fact, three or four isn’t asking too much either.

If you combine these four techniques and stick to them for a few weeks, you’ll impress yourself (as well as your friends and family) with how quickly you can learn to converse in your new language. And if I can do it, you certainly can, too. It’s just a question of applying yourself in the most effective way and discovering for yourself that it’s possible to learn a language quickly as an adult, regardless of the grades you got as a kid.