Studying a foreign language is not easy. It requires a lot of time, practice, and, depending on how you learn it, even money. Learning a whole new world and culture of communication is going to take more than just a few months, but it’s worth it. It makes you more competitive for jobs, and you have more opportunities to connect with different people.
At UT, we’ve been blessed with a foreign language requirement—fun but more work. For incoming freshmen, the jump from high school Spanish to a foreign language course can be daunting and difficult to navigate, but it doesn’t have to be! And this is coming from a habitual procrastinator. Through my relatively short but intensive two semesters studying Japanese, I’ve picked up on a lot of little tips that make learning a lot easier.
- Study every day.
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I know, this does not sound promising, but there’s a reason why languages count for six credit hours. You’re expected to study outside of class. Even just studying for 30 minutes to an hour each day will help the material stick. You could review your textbook, look over vocab flashcards, practice reading or writing—whatever! Repetition is key here. And if you absolutely don’t have time, don’t sweat it. Most courses offer daily homework, and doing that will still help. You might have to fit in some extra studying around exam time though.
Pro-Tip! When studying vocab or writing characters, it really helps if you can connect them to something you already know, like something in another language or the language you’re learning. For example, I remember that bag in Japanese is kaban because it sounds like the Korean word for bag, gabang.
- Don’t forget to practice reading and writing!
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Reading is one of the easiest ways to learn new words! Beyond that, you’ll cement alphabet characters in your mind, and you’ll familiarize yourself more with proper grammar, spelling, and sentence structure. Reading out loud also gives you a chance to practice speaking with better flow and pronunciation. When it comes to writing, it could be helpful to purchase a small whiteboard to carry around with you. This is especially helpful if you are learning complex characters (looking at you, kanji). You’ll save paper, it’s easy to erase and start over, and writing on a whiteboard is just more fun than using paper.
- Listen to native speakers.
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This really is the easiest way to familiarize yourself with a language, especially after you learn more about it. Watching TV shows in that language, listening to music*, watching YouTube videos—you could even just listen to the audio files offered through UT. Not only will this help you with pronunciation and grammar, but you’ll get to actually hear how people talk. In what situations do people say this? How do people talk casually, between friends or family? What about in formal situations? Is there any common slang? You may learn some of these things in class, but it’s hard to tell exactly what people are saying currently if you don’t actually listen to people speak.
*In songs, people tend to play with pronunciation, so be mindful when you’re listening!
- Record yourself speaking.
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This is a really easy way to notice any abnormalities in your talking. You can listen for awkward pauses, words you aren’t pronouncing correctly, or a part of grammar that you might keep forgetting to include (e.g., particles). Especially with awkward pauses, you can kind of figure out areas you might be struggling more with, like remembering adjectives or which sentence structure or conjugation you’re supposed to use. This not only helps you find areas you need to study more, but it also helps you fine tune your pronunciation and rhythm. It also helps to compare your audio recording to a native speaker’s!
- Make your own sentences.
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This kind of falls in line with practicing writing or speaking, but I think it’s worth making a separate bullet for. Whether it’s writing a short story or making up a random dialogue, practicing building sentences is vital. You can know all the words in the world and all the characters, but that’s not going to be much help if you can’t actually create a sentence.
All these tips tend to work together and help you improve in the same areas. Studying a foreign language genuinely doesn’t have to be that hard! It just requires time. And don’t be afraid to ask your teachers questions! You can do so during class if it’s relevant to the lecture, and you could also go to their office hours to talk about whatever else you want to know about that language or culture. Learning another language is fun and rewarding in a lot of ways, and I hope everyone can take something from their classes, even if they don’t find the actual language that interesting.