You Do Not Need To Be In The Native Country of A Language To Master The Language
Create Your Own Environment and Become Your Own Native Speaker
A list of techniques used in creating your own language environment
Make Yourself Think In The Language
Write a Daily Journal In The Language
Listen to Radio In The Language (Where Applicable)
Watch TV In The Language
Read Easy Books In The Language
Talk To Yourself In The Language
Practice Talking To Others In The Language
Listen To Music In The Language
Listen To and Repeat Children's Songs In The Language
Learn and Sing Songs In The Language
Buy Learning Books and Workbooks In The Language
Study The Language
Play Language Games
Test Yourself In The Language
Put Yourself In Situations Where You Need To Use The Language
Pretend to Already Speak The Language Fluently
Have Fun With The Language
Make Yourself Think In The Language
You have to teach your mind to think in the language that you want to learn. The more you force
yourself to think about things in the new language, the faster you will learn and
the more you will grow. Over time, your thoughts in the new language can become
like a reflex, much the same as how you have learned to quickly move your hand
away from fire so that it does not burn.
With consistent steps and little effort, you can start to teach your brain to
think not only in your native language, but also in the language of choice that
you are trying to learn and master.
Here are a few simple techniques to use:
Start off your day speaking in the language
Say things in the language out loud
Make yourself think of how to say a sentence in the language before using your native language, and say the sentence in the language to yourself
Practice counting, numbers and telling time always and any chance you get
End your day speaking, reading and/or writing in the language
Here are a few short examples of how to make this work (assuming your native language is English and you are learning Spanish)
Example 1
You wake up in the morning and are wondering what you can do today to progress in learning the Spanish language. Usually in the morning, you would say "Good Morning" to yourself to help start your day. Your native language is English. However, when attempting to learn the Spanish language, you should also learn that "Buenos Dias" means good morning in Spanish. Now, when you wake up in the morning, you can also say "Buenos Dias" to yourself before starting off. This is a very simple exercise, but helps teach your brain in tremendous ways.
Example 2
You are running around during the day and lose track of time. You get ready to run to the clock to see what time it is. When you get there, you notice it is 9:00pm (9 o'clock in English). This is yet another opportunity to practice your language learning. Assuming you are learning Spanish, when you see that it is 9:00pm on the clock, say the time also in Spanish as "Son las nueve (It's 9:00)" or "Son las nueve por la noche (It's 9:00 at night)".
Example 3
You are ready to leave your house, and are excited about practicing Spanish as much as you can. You get to your car, and know you need keys to open the car door. This is your opportunity to practice what you learned in Spanish, but realize that you do not know how to say "keys" in Spanish. At this point is where you need to improvise and practice what you know --OR-- go and grab a Spanish dictionary to find out how to say "key" or "keys". Your saying this time might be "Yo quiero encontrar mis keys para mi auto", which means "I want to find my keys for my car". After you learn that the word for "keys" is "llaves" in Spanish, you will then be able to say next time "Yo quiero encontrar mis llaves para mi auto".
Other simple phrases that you can practice with yourself and others:
What time is it ?
The time now is ....
Today is....
Write a Daily Journal In The Language
A journal is nothing more than a notebook or scratch pad that you can use to
write down your thoughts, ideas, feelings and other things. However, a journal is powerful and effective tool for anyone learning a language.
Here are sample things you can write in the journal:
Today's Date in the Language
Time of the Day in the Language
What you plan to do today
What you have already done today
New words that you learn that day
Writing inside your journal forces you to "think" in the language.
When writing in your journal, don't worry about making mistakes and in the case where there is a defined script with the language, you may want to start writing how it sounds and not the actual script.
For example, if you were learning the Gujarati language and writing in your Gujarati journal, there may be a point that you want to mention the color black, but you may only know the sound "kaalo" for black and not how it is written. So, just write in the journal the word "kaalo" as you think it sounds. Be creative. Later on in your road to learning the Gujarati language, you will eventually know how the color black is represented in the script of the Gujarati langauage (black is written કાલો in Gujarati) and how to write it.
This applies to all such languages. The important part with the journal is to start writing something that you know or are learning from the new language in the journal..... Again, this helps you to think in the language.
To practice writing a language with a character set / script that you don't know, you can pick out a simple reading, adverstisement, words, sayings, letters, or any representation of the language and start practicing. Evenutally, you will pick up the rules of how to "do things right" and you will refine what you practice. This is part of language learning and development. Take advantage of your language journal and start writing today.
Do not strive for nor expect perfection in the language at any time... You do not need to be perfect in languages to learn how to use them, speak them, write them, recognize them, master them. No one person in the world is perfect in any language. You do, however, have to be willing to think out of the box and use your own creativity to learn in the way which is best for you.
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