hello ๐
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one of the best things about Duolingo is also one of its biggest drawbacks:
a lot of what it teaches us isn't relevant ๐ตโ๐ซ
you know what I'm on about...
those mental sentences that make about as much sense as a grayscale traffic light ๐ฆ
sure, they're funny (and, as always, I've got another cracker for you at the end of this email...)
but they don't really set us up for real-life interactions.
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this is something I'm working really hard on at the moment with my German ๐ฉ๐ช
I want to get as conversational as possible, as quickly as possible.
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sadly, learning the various ways of saying "the spider eats bread" just isn't going to cut it.
instead, I need to spend my time hunting down the most effective phrases, questions, answers and expressions
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Duolingo just isn't that useful for this.
which is why
I'm spending so much time on LingQโ
you've heard me rave about it before ๐คน
it's because there's genuinely nothing else quite like it in the language-learning space
rather than furnish you with the same old weakest-link-catering courses, it allows you to customize your approach to fit your own unique learning style ๐ช
Netflix, YouTube, books, podcasts, song lyrics... you name it
you can learn your language from pretty much ANY form of content you can think of.
hence why it features so heavily for me alongside Duolingo.
I can adapt it to fit my busy schedule,
helping me focus on the 20% of things that will produce the 80% of results
what does that look like for me? ๐ค
right now, it involves a hell of a lot of conversation analysis and flashcards
i.e. taking useful words and phrases from comprehensible YouTube videos, and automatically converting them to flashcards for hyper-efficient review ๐ช
if this sounds messy and complicated -- fear not
it's actually the easiest and most effective part of my daily routine ๐ฏ
it's even easier than Duolingo...
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all I do is go into LingQ and find a conversation-focussed lesson from the library...
i'll then hop into the video, watch it through, and follow the transcript...
then, if I come across words I don't know, or spot some phrases I like the look of, I'll simply highlight them and add them to my personal database...
each word and phrase I highlight comes with a translation and a score, which increases over time as I become more and more familiar.
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and that's all there is to it. ๐
then, the magic happens ๐ช
LingQ automatically turns those very same words and phrases into flashcards and adds them to my Spaced Repetition System (SRS)
(and if you weren't aware, studies show that SRS-fueled flashcards are among the quickest and most effective ways of committing words and phrases to memory)
this means they'll start appearing in my daily flashcard reviews -- all without me needing to make or design a single one ๐ฏ
this gives me that essential personalization that is lacking with premade flashcard decks, while cutting out all the faff of having to create them from scratch ๐
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as I review my words and phrases, my scores naturally go up, until eventually they get moved to my 'Known Words/Phrases' bucket
and, of course, the more useful words and phrases we can actively recall, the closer to fluency we are
just look at my growth since the start of the year ๐
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this isn't just some arbitrary statistic -- my German is absolutely surging right now ๐
i'm understanding more and more of the stuff I'm watching, reading and listening to
and i'm barely breaking a sweat ๐
it's so easy
and all from little more than just 60 minutes a day of Duolingo and LingQ
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so yeah
if you're hoping to achieve similar results in your target language
then this is a great combo ๐ช
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so if you haven't already, I'd highly recommend taking LingQ's free trial for spin
it really is a bloody good way to learn a language ๐
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and yet,
for all this talk about useful words and phrases,
there will always be a place in my life for some...
๐คช Weird Duolingo ๐คช
Washing the dishes takes an unexpected turn this week...
Cheers to Jonathan for this one:
Wringing out dishwater and conversations. What a mental world we live in. ๐งฝ
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Seen a weird-ass sentence? Let me know... and it could feature in a future newsletter!