
Ask HN: How did you really learn a foreign language? - zaidf
I took French for 3 semesters in high school. Yet I can barely say "hi" in it. Back then I took it just to fulfill the requirements.<p>I've decided to take Spanish101 next semester. Unlike when I was taking French, I genuinely want to learn Spanish and be able to communicate in it. I'd love to hear how you went about getting somewhat fluent in a foreign language.
======
idlewords
The most effective language tuition I've ever had consisted of daily one-on-
one lessons with a tutor who would make me talk and correct me on the fly. If
I made systematic errors, he would go over the point of grammar and we woudl
do some drills. Every night I had to write a one to three page essay, which he
would eviscerate the next day.

Having studied a number of languages, I've come to believe that being forced
to speak and write at the outer limit of your ability is the most effective
way to learn a foreign language (listening and reading will come effortlessly
as a side effect). However this is somewhat expensive, emotionally tiring
(adults aren't used to the experience of constant failure and correction), and
it can be hard to find someone who will really pounce on every mistake.

I've found intensive immersion programs with small classes to be a good
second-best, especially at the beginner level where progress is very rapid and
you have a chance to internalize proper phonetics and grammar.

A possibly useful image: you have about ten thousand wrong sentences you have
to get out of you before you are speaking the language well, so you need to
find someone who will help you get them out of your system as efficiently as
possible.

~~~
oPerrin
Can you tell us how you found this tutor? Did you interview multiple people?
And finally how much did this kind of tutoring cost?

~~~
trevelyan
We actually provide this for mandarin as part of my business
(<http://popupchinese.com>). And if you're looking for a data point, we charge
$25 for three 20 minute sessions a week. The workload ends up being about as
intense as taking a regular night course, except that it is one-on-one with a
teacher.

Textbooks and traditional classrooms are way back on the curve. They
prioritize the organizational problems of schools instead of the learning
needs of students.

------
TallGuyShort
A class can only take you so far. I took four years of Spanish when I was in
school, and then spent 2 months in an intensive Spanish course ( several hours
a day, every day ). I still felt very much the same as you do now. Then I went
to a place where I lived, worked, and socialized with native Spanish speakers
from several different countries - within 6 months, people I spoke to on the
phone thought I was born and raised in Colombia.

The best way is complete immersion with real Spanish speakers. It also
requires good social skills to connect with those people in a way that
actually changes the way you speak and think to sound more natural in that
language. People don't follow text-book rules in their own language.

~~~
mixmax
This is true - if you really want to learn a language you have to go to the
country and speak the language. I'm fluent in English because I lived in
London for three years, and spoke the language every day from dusk till dawn.

I also lived in Spain, but never became fluent in the language because I spoke
English to everyone. Immerse yourself in the language, speak to natives all
the time and you'll be fluent in 6 months.

~~~
garnet7
How do you get the natives you help you and correct you, rather than just
getting annoyed with you?

~~~
mixmax
Most people are actually really helpful if they sense that you're trying to
learn their language and make an effort.

But as everything else in life you have to be determined if you want to
succeed. Talk to the storeowner when you go shopping, find a coffee shop you
like become a regular and start chatting to people and become known as that
guy that's learning to speak Spanish, get a native girlfriend, get a job where
you have to speak the language, etc.

------
gruseom
I studied several languages. Here is my conclusion: books and classes are an
inefficient way to do it and don't give you the ability to speak and
understand the real language. The next time I want to learn a language, I will
go live where it is spoken. I'll still have a stack of books with me, but they
won't be my primary medium. If I need more bandwidth, I'll try to hire some
locals to teach me.

The coursework system of language instruction is broken, because it measures
your ability to pass a course, and this has little connection to really
knowing a language.

------
fogus
I cheated by marrying a Japanese woman and inviting her mother (who speaks no
English) to come and stay with us. You pick things up pretty quickly when
you're forced to.

~~~
aik
Cheating...smart...whatever you want to call it. Being forced into
speaking/learning as quickly as possible is by far the best approach I know. I
can't imagine anyone having the determination to be as consistently focused as
someone is when they have no option.

------
jgrahamc
I learnt French as follows: I did French at school until I was 16 when I did
French O-level. I wasn't very good, but I wasn't very bad.

I then forgot about French until I was in my early 20s. I met my wife. She's
French. I figured I'd better make an effort to speak French.

Having someone to talk to meant I could make all sorts of errors and get
corrected. But she was the wrong person to tell me about French grammar. I
tried taking classes in a local college but they were awful. Eventually I paid
a Swiss woman to teach me French grammar. Very quickly I realized that the
rules of French drilled into me at school were lurking in my head and that all
that rote learning was very, very useful. I took lessons for about 6 months
for two hours once a week.

Now I speak French fluently.

------
domodomo
Let me tell you about the best book in the world for learning language:

[http://www.amazon.com/Language-Acquisition-Made-Practical-
Le...](http://www.amazon.com/Language-Acquisition-Made-Practical-
Learners/dp/0916636003)

Language Acquisition Made Practical by Brewster & Brewster

It's from the 70s and way out of print. It's written by these two Christian
missionaries who went to many countries where no one could speak their
language, and they developed a framework for 'barefoot language learning'.
It's excellent way to design your own course. It boils down to find a language
partner, and then follow the methods in this book.

I became frustrated with the way a lot of language courses are structured.
They are so damn boring and suck the fun of discovery out of the language
learning process. From the reading I have done on language acquisition,
language classes should more closely mimic how children learn a language
naturally. LAMP gets you closer to this model.

Also, this book is an excellent tool: <http://www.lexicarry.com/>

There's nothing but a bunch of pictures in the book, describing different
nouns, verbs, and adjectives...all with NO English. You can use this with a
conversation partner to learn many many useful words in a more organic way
than memorizing a list of vocabulary with their english translation
counterparts.

Also, basically what everyone has said thus far. You need to live in the
culture, and more than anything, make friends who will speak the language with
you.

------
tokenadult
Listening to the radio is crucial, and there is a lot of Spanish on the radio
in most parts of the United States. Going to ethnic restaurants where the
language is spoken each time you eat out also helps. My bibliography on the
subject

<http://learninfreedom.org/languagebooks.html>

has some detailed suggestions. Read as much as you can in Spanish, and listen
to as much Spanish as you can at every opportunity, and you will improve in
Spanish.

I majored in Chinese in university, back when following my advice above was
hard for that language in my town, and then lived overseas in Taiwan, Hong
Kong, and China. Listening to the radio helped a LOT when I first arrived in
country.

------
Xichekolas
I took Spanish I in college, then I went to live in Spain for a semester. I
highly recommend this language school: <http://www.rondapiee.com/>

I learned so much in four months at that school that I was ahead of most
Junior spanish majors when I got back. (I was also highly motivated to learn
the language, and lived with a Spanish family. It's definitely possible to go
to any language school and not learn a lot if you don't make the effort.)

I went back there a couple years later and did another semester... but at this
point I have full command of the grammar, and just need to work on vocabulary.
For that, all you need is some spanish speakers to talk to.

------
icey
If you can find a way to swing it, being as immersed as possible is the best
way to go.

I don't know what part of the country you're in (or even if you're in the US),
but if you can find a way to start buying Spanish newspapers and watching
Spanish television, you'll be in much better shape than if you just tried
structured education.

~~~
yummyfajitas
The only problem with Spanish TV is that it is just as boring as American TV.
It has a bit more eye candy, but you can enjoy that without devoting any
effort to understanding spanish.

------
phicou
I learned an unfamiliar language while spending two years in the Peace Corps.
They have had many years to refine their language teaching materials. Still, I
only learned the basics after 2 months of very intensive training.

Once I knew the basics, I was able to learn a bit more from friends and
neighbors, especially children. Eventually I ended up dating and marrying a
local. Even though she spoke fluent English, we would try to use the local
language for anything not too detailed. This increased my vocabulary and
comprehension.

Once I was able to use and understand words, a book that described some of the
theory and formalities of the grammar really helped improve my ability to
express myself. I went from "cargo cult speaking" to actually knowing why I
was using the structures I used.

I still don't know as much as I'd like, and for more complicated statements, I
have to use English.

For your situation, I wouldn't expect to get too much out of a "101" course,
but if you really want to learn, you'll have many opportunities, especially
with Spanish. Try to talk to the staff at Mexican restaurants, and write down
any words or phrases you don't know, to look up later.

There is no substitute for hours speaking (and listening). That will give you
plenty of opportunities to learn new words, new idioms used by different
people, provide plenty of opportunities for people to politely correct you,
and most importantly, improve your confidence in your abilities.

------
Mankhool
I studied French in Grade 8, 9, 10, 11 and then had 2 more years of it in Uni.
None of that helped me become a French speaker. Some friends own a ruin of a
chateau in France and I spent a summer there working on it. That didn't seem
to be helping much - until I started speaking with the children of the locals
who worked on the chateau or lived nearby and visited everyday. It didn't take
long doing that to progress to a conversational ability level that I never
thought I would have.

------
dotpavan
"out in the wild" approach- I had native friends who were more than willing to
help me, by correcting my mistakes, and ofcourse making fun of it as well..
and referring to a book whose lines I would use in everyday activities, like
buying groceries, normal chitchat during commutes, etc..

also, this might sound weird, but I sometimes forced myself to "think" in the
language I was learning.. this was a good practice as it made me more
articulate by mapping words to mental images

------
nrr
I took seven semesters of German in high school and managed to skip everything
but one 300-level grammar course at university, but I appear more to be the
statistical anomaly than the rule. I'm fluent when discussing matters that are
mostly mathematics and physics, but I find myself tripping on several everyday
things.

I took a genuine interest in learning the language, and I made a point of
hanging out with German-speaking folks on IRC (in my case, mostly demosceners)
and the like in order to get an idea of how the colloquial language works.
Reading and writing formal and informal German both help tremendously as far
as extracurriculars go if full immersion is unattainable, but it's best to
supplement that with something like television shows (telenovelas are
particularly useful here) and music.

In addition to all of this, I had the goal in the back of my mind of earning a
PhD in mathematics someday. That said, at schools in the US, proficiency in
one of either French or German (sometimes also Russian and Latin) is often a
requirement as it is viewed as an important research skill with respect to
late classical and early contemporary literature.

I go with everyone else here, though, and maintain that full immersion is the
preferred way to fly.

------
biohacker42
Quality of education. You're far from the only American I've heard say: I took
x years of y and can't even say 'hi' in y.

I don't know what American schools do wrong, but Europeans have little trouble
teaching kids to have a working knowledge of foreign languages in the same
number of years.

The brute force approach would be to live in a place where the language you're
trying to learn is native. English is my 3rd language but I didn't get really
fluent in it until moving to the US.

~~~
rg
There's are other factors besides schools between American students and
European students. For many Americans, the reality of ever needing to speak
any language but English seems totally theoretical, whether for travel,
business, or profession. For many Europeans, needing to speak a non-native
language appears much more realistic. Further complicating this is that if
one's native language is English, then it DOES work almost all the time,
reinforcing the notion that foreign languages are merely decorative. By
contrast, if you were a Dutch computer scientist like Dijkstra, you would
understand very early that you could never hope to write professional papers
in Dutch. (Brits have the advantage of seeing that other languages really are
used, but share the disadvantage of already being fluent in what is nearly a
world language.)

------
dylanz
What if you're married to an English speaker already, and you can't leave the
country (tons of kids and a job)?

Immersion is obviously ideal, but not always practical. Then, you're left with
finding friends who speak the language, college courses, movies, etc.

Any other ideas?

~~~
pbhj
Persuade your partner to learn too? My then girlfriend (now wife) and I learnt
sign language together, which was fun and useful for 'talking' in the library.

------
pavel_lishin
I moved to America and went to elementary school.

Total immersion is the fastest and best way to learn a language. Arguably,
it's the only way you will ever be fluent.

If you want to learn Spanish but can't move to a Spanish speaking country, see
if you can find a local Spanish-speaking family to "foster" you - offer to pay
them rent to live with them for awhile, on the condition that they only speak
Spanish to/around you.

------
dgulledge
Your motivation to learn the language will be a strong factor in your success.
Wanting specifically to communicate in the language is a big plus.

Get as much contents as you can and use it. Since you are studying Spanish, if
you have access to a Spanish language cable network (or a broadcast TV or
radio station in some cities) use that. Start with something that is fairly
predictable, like the weather forecast. Get podcasts and listen to those. Rent
movies in Spanish (and turn off the English subtitles).

On the other side, find people to talk to. Ideally, you want native speakers.
You want to spend extended periods talking in Spanish. Force yourself to say
what you have to say in your new language, even badly, ungrammatically. You
will make mistakes.

Two blogs I like that emphasize exactly these two facets of language learning
are:

The Linguist on Language:
<http://thelinguist.blogs.com/how_to_learn_english_and/>

Fluent In 3 Months: <http://www.fluentin3months.com/>

------
soc
I'm about 8 months in on learning Japanese. I pretty much follow the method of
alljapaneseallthetime(.com). Learning grammer, kanji, and set sentences. An
SRS program like anki helps a lot with these. Then just immerse yourself (tv,
music, books, games). Couple of helpful sites out there too (smart.fm,
japanesepod101)

------
rsayers
I moved to Curacao. Picked up papiamentu (local creole language), Spanish, and
a little dutch (The official state langauge) pretty quick.

That is hardly practical for most people though. Take the classes, but
supplement that learning. Watch Spanish language films with and without
subtitles. Watch movies you already know very well dubbed in Spanish (I
learned lots from that).

Chat up people in Spanish speaking countries and attempt to speak Spanish as
much as possible. You might even find an English language student you can
assist at the same time.

If you go eat at a Mexican place, order in Spanish. Yes, you will butcher it
at first, yes you will feel silly. But you improve quickly by doing this.

Learning the way I did does have its drawbacks. While I can more or less
communicate effectively, I know almost know grammar rules. I can conjugate
correctly, but have no idea "why" something is correct.

------
pasbesoin
Lots of exposure. Hardly comprehensive, but a few tips:

Destiños. A UIUC/public television teaching show with a running story.

<http://www.learner.org/resources/series75.html>

Find music in the language, with lyrics, that you like. When learning German
and French, I listened to pop music that friends recommended. A lot of
language learning is not specifically semantic; train your ears (and brain) to
the sound of the language. Sung lyrics can also emphasize aspects of
pronunciation and colloquial use in a way other sources may not.

Find engaging activities that use the language. Much more motivating. And
allow yourself to be entertained by the process. Don't focus just on the end
goal of being fluent; enjoy the learning process and each moment of use.

------
wushupork
I learned "Kung Fu" mandarin when I trained with fresh off the boat
professional martial artists who didn't speak a lick of English. The only way
to communicate was for me to start learning mandarin.

That said, I believe there's no better way to learn a language than to live in
the country and not speak English.

I was a diplomat brat and at various points in my life I could speak Bahasa
Malay, Italian, and Hokien (does anyone even know what that is). However they
all fell into disuse when I moved. But the reason I became fluent was because
I was immersed in the people, all the kids, TV, everything.

I know many American teachers in Thailand who live in American neighborhoods
and eat where foreigners eat. As a result they never learn any Thai.

------
fuzzbang
I learned Thai by living with a Thai girl who spoke no English. Took about 6
months to become fluent. My suggestion is get a "long haired dictionary" and
you'll pick up the language in no time. :)

The best way to learn is to have no choice but to speak the language. Then
don't be afraid to fail. I learned Indonesian by speaking to taxi drivers and
any other locals I came in contact with. Same process I used with Javanese.

The trick is to start with a basic vocabulary and set of phrases. Then treat
the phrases as templates and swap words in and out. You'll be wrong a lot, but
the native speaker might phrase it correctly and repeat it back... just repeat
what they said and smile. Repeat this process until you're fluent. :)

------
hernan7
I guess learning a language works different for different people. Me, I took
English classes for several years, but what really got me over the hump was
reading Guitar Player magazine. Since I like playing the guitar, reading the
magazine was interesting to me. And it was written for native English
speakers, so no sugar-coating or "simplified" version there.

Curiously, once I was able to read Guitar Player in the bus without a
dictionary by my side, I also became able to understand spoken English. I
don't know why, really. I suppose I had gathered enough data from reading the
magazine to be able to extract meaning from context not only when reading, but
when listening to spoken English too.

------
alain94040
Spend your next one-month vacation in the country whose language you want to
learn. It's that simple.

In the meantime, read all the books you can so you don't start from zero when
you get there (although it will feel like you are starting from zero the first
few days).

------
buckwild
If you are able:

(1) Watch Spanish TV/Movies (2) Talk in Spanish to Spanish-speaking people
(use appropriately) (3) Learn the easy small words first (4) Immediately apply
and integrate what you learn with what you already know.

Note: The Spanish I learned in high school was enough for me to be able to
speak and understand it fluently (6 semesters). Also note that I can
understand several different languages fluently. This may have helped me learn
faster than most other people. I say understand because my American accent is
too thick to be able to speak in all of those languages with the proper
accent.

Best of Luck.

~~~
buckwild
If you play guitar:

try writing songs in whatever language you are learning. This helped me a lot
too.

------
sharpn
I'm learning Spanish at the moment, purely using Michel Thomas's course CDs,
and going to Spain for a week every few months. I guess going to Mexico as
often as possible would be the US equivalent (I'm in the UK). The CDs are
available free in libraries here, so you can rip them for free onto an mp3
player & listen to one per day repeatedly. I got by well in rural Spain for a
week without using English, but I'm far from 100% fluent yet. Other
suggestions here like podcasts, radio & TV etc. are also all good. Best of
luck!

------
JimmyL
Practice. Do some learning, and then practice again.

You're already at a disadvantage since you're not seven years old (five to
seven is the best age to learn a language, according to linguists), so you're
gonna need to make up some ground. Aside from picking a learning program to
pick up vocabulary, you need to practice, and do it in as many ways as you
can.

Some suggestions I/friends have used:

 _Mass Media_. Start buying a Spanish-language newspaper and reading articles
(specifically, articles that you don't know what they're about) with a
dictionary in hand. The first few you do will take an hour each for a two-line
article. But as you do this for longer times, you'll start to pick up words -
and (mainstream, well-regarded) newspapers are great because they've generally
got very clear writing. When you get confident, start trying to read the
letters or editorials. You should also dedicate an hour of the day to watching
news or a soap opera on Univision (doesn't matter if you don't understand it
at first - pay attention and you'll pick it up), and pick up a Spanish radio
station to start listening to.

 _Computers_. Set your OS's language to Spanish, and set Spanish as the
preferred language of your browser (so it will request es pages before en
ones). When you don't understand a web page, get out the dictionary and work
through it. Try and limit yourself to Spanish sites as much as possible, and
(most importantly) read all your online news in Spanish.

 _People_. If you can find some people to speak to in Spanish on a daily
basis, do this. To complement this, find a local cafe/restaurant that has
acceptable food and Spanish-speaking staff, and become a regular there.
Practice at home, and then go there an order in Spanish. Do this a lot (hence
the OK food). After you're feeling OK about this, go to this place at off-
hours, order something (in Spanish, of course) and try to make some small
talk. These people should be familiar with you by this point, and be amenable
to talking to a customer (since they don't have anything else to do). At
first, they'll likely respond to your broken Spanish in English - either
respond back only Spanish, or ask them to speak Spanish to you directly. They
see this as being nice and helpful; they're not trying to insult your skills,
and will likely accommodate you if you ask (and they recognize you).

------
p_h
I found this to be a pretty practical guide, written by a programmer:

<http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2004/12/29/15258/287>

------
weaksauce
Has anyone had any experience with the Rosetta Stone learning packages? I want
to learn Spanish but they seem pricey. It might be worth it if they are as
good as they attest it is.

~~~
silencio
This is just my personal experience with their Mandarin Chinese software
(disclosure: offered free through my college language lab, otherwise I never
would have touched it): I hated it. I understand the idea of immersion behind
the software, but I found it incredibly hard to grasp any real working
knowledge of grammar and cultural aspects/differences, it just feels a lot
more like a super expensive flashcard app with a few gimmicks. Plus the whole
immersion thing was supposed to avoid you "translating" into a language you
are comfortable with and then translating that into the new language...I
didn't find myself skipping that "bridge" with Rosetta Stone. I gave up on the
software after being bored out of my mind in a couple weeks before my Chinese
class started, and just went back to textbooks and resources like
chinesepod.com, where after a couple weeks of that I started to feel more
comfortable about doing the very thing Rosetta Stone seeks to skip, a lot in
part because Rosetta Stone was incredibly unhelpful with grammar and such.
Then the class started, and being able to converse with and get tips from
native speakers helped immensely.

On the other hand, I found Pimsleur and similar methods of learning languages
to be semi-helpful and possibly worth spending money on. No replacement for
memorizing things and total immersion via traveling/marrying someone/studying
abroad, but when you're stuck in traffic in the car, listening and practicing
speaking can do volumes to help.

In the end, I just got a flashcard app for my iPhone, stocked up on MP3s and
videos to watch and listen to, and I think that was more helpful than Rosetta
Stone ever could be. I'm not sure if there's any research or studies behind
language acquisition via Rosetta Stone, but when I'm an adult, I don't see the
benefit in learning a language as if I was a toddler again. I had learned
French in high school and learning Spanish afterwards was ridiculously easier
because I had already had "basics" like grammar down pretty well, as well as
an easier time learning vocabulary as there are many cognates. Not that I
remember much of either language anymore, but there are some times when taking
advantage of what an adult already knows is faster and more helpful than
learning like a baby.

~~~
furyg3
>On the other hand, I found Pimsleur and similar methods of learning languages
to be semi-helpful and possibly worth spending money on.

Arg. Sorry but I have to disagree. I used Pimsleur to get up and running
quickly with Dutch, and later realized that (other than for practicing basic
pronunciation) it's worthless. That was two/three years ago, and now that I'm
at a much higher level, I've gone back and listened to the phrases they wanted
me to learn.

Junk. Some phrases were severely antiquated, words were mis-translated so you
may be saying a phrase and you actually don't know what you're saying, etc.
The only thing it's good for is listen/read/repeat pronunciation, and that's
not so good when driving.

Rosetta Stone's a bit better since you're listening/reading/repeating, and
learning some real vocabulary, but you're spot on: it feels like it's for
kids. As far as language learning software goes, I only found one that was
worth anything, and it came with a Dutch textbook (CODE series... Dutch only).
It has movies/audio/text with quizzes afterward, vocabulary/grammar exercises,
and listen/repeat/playback feature.

Pro-tip for the OP: Languages are living things, you can't learn them by
yourself. _Any_ native speaker, no matter how unprofessional or unskilled at
language teaching, is much more help then some software tool. Your office
cleaning lady (who's probably better at Spanish then you'll ever be) earns
less than $10/hour. For the same price of Rosetta Stone Spanish 1-5 ($700) you
could have 70 hours of speaking time with a really interesting person.

I found a Berkeley exchange grad student who was teaching Dutch for $15/hour
on the side, learned a lot, and we ended up falling in love with each other.
Not saying that will happen for you, but it reinforces my 'find a native
speaker' method. :)

~~~
silencio
Well, they're fairly useless on their own, it's mostly using them in
conjunction with other methods of learning (i.e. a good textbook or two, a few
movies, podcasts, games, talking to native speakers) that makes them helpful
because you get a little practice where you might not otherwise.

Not sure if the quality of these language learning tools depend on the
language being taught and perhaps with individual learning preferences as
well. I thought Pimsleur for Mandarin was acceptable and similar to the texts
I was using, and since I had the most trouble listening and speaking Mandarin
(as opposed to reading/writing), it was helpful to me. But again, disclosure:
most of the language programs and resources I've tried were free through
school, which was immensely helpful in deciding what I liked and didn't like.
I'm not entirely sure I'd buy Pimsleur either ;)

------
omail
Marry a native speaker. Failing that get friends who are willing to converse
with you exclusively in that language. Since it's Spanish, that shouldn't be
very hard.

~~~
michael_dorfman
I'd change that to "Marry a native speaker who doesn't speak English." It's
too easy to revert to the common tongue.

~~~
trafficlight
You know they make catalogs for that sort of thing. I believe you can even
order through the mail.

------
saturdayplace
Immersion. I learned Hungarian living in Hungary. I had a two month crash
course beforehand.

Also, keep using it. Learned languages are like muscles, use them or they get
weaker. I've lost a gripload of vocabulary because I haven't been forcing
myself to use the language.

*edit - My username, 'saturdayplace' is a literal translation of a town in Hungary: Szombathely. Szombat = saturday, hely = place. I always thought that a saturdayplace would be a cool place.

------
malvim
I'm from Brazil, so Portuguese is my native language.

It's common here for middle-class young people to take English courses for
several years. I took one for six years, then one more year of a conversation
course. That, along with watching movies and TV (and reading and listening to
music, and...) took me far enough.

Then, a couple of years back, I went to California to live there for a whole
year and I must say that made a whole lot of difference.

------
alanthonyc
I took an introductory linguistics class earlier this year. One week was
focused on language acquisition, you may be interested in reading the
discussion (posted on my linguistics blog:
<http://linguistics.alanthony.com/2009/03/why-doesnt-it-work/>).

In summary: just taking a class won't help. You need to practice, practice and
practice.

------
peterbraden
Live there. Most people I've talked to suggest that a year is enough to become
fairly fluent. Also, you'll need to socialise when you're there - going to
another country and hanging out with ex-pats is a sure way to not learn
anything.

Although a grounding in the language from a course is good, until you are
racking your brains for the correct word while talking to someone, you're not
really training your brain usefully.

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gorbachev
I learned English by playing video games. Back in the day they didn't localize
the games or the manuals, so I had to read them in English.

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pavelludiq
When i was 6 years old, i watched a lot of cartoons and learned a few English
words. My parents were impressed and they sent me to English lessons. After
that i studied it in school, and its been 13 years now and I'm confident in my
knowledge, although i have horrible spelling(because i learned it by listening
and speaking mostly). Good thing spell checking exists :D

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msbmsb
Immersion and Usage.

Any opportunity to be surrounded by the language, and especially when you are
forced to use it, will greatly increase your fluency. Not being too concerned
about making mistakes and just speaking as much as you can is also important.
Immersion and free usage after a base of grammar/vocab study is what works for
me.

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bcelik
I kind of grew up with English, it started early on, and went on throughout
education. Still, a subsequent period of translating and reading creative
texts (literature, songwriters' lyrics) made the leap, making me really
comfortable "in" the language and its culture, and enjoy its beauties.

To get fluent in a new language, I'd recommend spending time together among
native speakers wherever you can meet them, ideally in the country of the
language. Coursebooks I think need to be assisted with some first-hand
immersion into the culture. and nothing can possibly beat having a native
girl-/boyfriend alongside the coursebook in making you a fluent speaker in a
way shorter time than you would imagine. that's how my German got fluent as it
is now.

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niv
I'm a native spanish speaker. To learn english I followed these basic steps:

1\. Learn basic grammar and vocabulary. 2\. Read. Read a lot. 3\. Listen to
movies and songs and pick up pronunciation. 4\. Keep on reading! 5\. Now you
know quite a bit!

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chaosprophet
Well if you really want to learn a new language, I suggest you start thinking
in that language. That's how I achieved my English fluency (and English _is_
indeed a foreign language to me).

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jacquesm
I've lived in Poland for a while and picked up some Polish, lived in Canada
(which did not exactly help my English).

German, French and English are taught in school here as well.

Very hard not to end up at least bi-lingual.

I have a very hard time studying languages from books but I find it incredibly
easy to pick them up while listening to them and being forced to communicate
with people that I do not have a shared language with.

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zandorg
I was in the top set for Maths and English, but in 5th (eg, 5th worst out of
6) set for French. I just couldn't be bothered to practise memorising the
words.

The wierd thing is that I can remember foreign _names_ with NO trouble. French
names, Japanese (Masayoshi Son), etc.

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dustineichler
I've been using <http://www.livemocha.com/>

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hypermatt
Yeah its pretty cool its peer reviewed learning, so you help other people and
it makes it easy to link up with penpals. I've been using it for 2 weeks now,
pretty cheap and good.

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jaytee_clone
Live in a native speaking country is still by far the most effective way of
learning a language.

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iterationx
I asked a guy who spoke 7 languages the same question, and he stressed reading
above any other exercise. Sure at first you won't understand very much and
you'll have to use a dictionary a lot, but its like a puzzle that gets easier.

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kuzux
I'm pretty sure it' too late for this advice but starating at a young age(in
my case, 7) surely helps

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bgnm2000
<http://www.langolab.com> is a good resource

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maw
I became good friends with a guy who worked in our company's Mexico City
office. A few years later, I decided to take the plunge and move to Mexico
City myself. It didn't hurt that the girls I chased (including the one I
eventually married) didn't speak much English.

I've now been here five years, and my Spanish isn't bad. It's important to
make an effort, though. I've met people from overseas who've put in little
effort—a real shame.

Moving to a different country isn't a realistic option for many people, and
you didn't say where you're located, but if you're in the States, chances are
there are plenty of Spanish speakers in your area. Why not talk to them?

As you meet Spanish-speakers qua Spanish-speakers, be sure to identify who'll
give you "correct" advice and who won't. It's important to be able to
understand and to be understood while communicating in various contexts. I've
learned lots of useful things about Spanish from pedants, people who play fast
and loose with the language, and everyone in between.

And there's plenty of well-edited Spanish language material freely available:
es.wikipedia.org is generally decent. (By the way, wikipedia can be an
excellent translation tool: when you're looking up some very specific term
whose precise translation won't be found in a dictionary, try searching for it
on en.wikipedia.org and see if there's a link to es.wikipedia.org) Some
newspapers with online presences include <http://www.eluniversal.com.mx>
(Mexico), <http://www.elpais.com> (Spain), and <http://www.lanacion.com>
(Argentina); there are, of course, many others. Chances are decent that there
are blogs that cover topics you're interested in, but be wary, as the quality
of editing can and does vary considerably. Incorrect spelling abounds!

As you improve, you'll be able to read books in Spanish. My first book was a
translation of one I'd read originally in English. I think this was a good
idea, because I didn't have to worry about vocabulary I didn't understand.
Reading Spanish-language authors in the original is even more satisfying. I'm
currently working through Bolaño's oeuvre. Borges and Sepúlveda are other
favorites, but I've really only just scratched the surface. (I've also read
some stuff translated from third languages, such as several books by
Murakami.)

As for references: The 501 Verbs series of books is useful (I have some minor
quarrels with the Spanish one, but there's nothing out and out wrong, and I do
recommend it). I like my Harper Collins Spanish/English dictionary; in
addition to a good range of vocabulary, it has one of the best grammar
references, in terms of both clarity and layout, that I've had the pleasure to
see. (A minor issue for some with Harper Collins is that it has a slight focus
on English as she is spoke in the UK and Spanish as it's spoken in Iberia;
unlikely to be a problem, but I'd be remiss if I didn't mention it.)
<http://www.wordreference.com> is an excellent resource. I also have a 5-way
pictorial dictionary which has proven handy at times.

Eventually you'll outgrow whatever Spanish/English dictionary you settle upon
and you'll want a more comprehensive, Spanish-only dictionary. The RAE's
(<http://www.rae.es>) dictionary is considered by many but not all to be the
most definitive. <http://www.rae2.es> is a more minimal interface to the RAE's
content.

So, stick with it and have fun. Learning a new language is very satisfying and
obviously very useful too.

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callosum
Language learning is one of my favourite subjects and one that I've been
reading up a lot on recently. Here's some more general strategies rather than
specific resources, from the notes I've been taking:

\- Try to get the same sort of input infants get - interactive, highly
repetitive and patterned. That's optimal for language learning.

\- Repeat at spaced intervals, and organise the material. You can organise by
looking for patterns in words, or by making up sentences containing a word,
etc. Personalise the words and make them yours. Having an affective reaction
to the word ("I like the sound of this word") can also help you remember.

\- For recalcitrant words, use mnemonic techniques. The best strategy is the
keyword technique, e.g. to remember the Spanish "caerse" (to fall (down)) you
could say "He fell down and _cursed_ ". Try to make it something you can
visualise.

\- Reading books you like and choose to read on your own accord is as good as
in-class vocabulary instruction (at least for L1 acquisition - there's been
less research on reading in L2 acquisition). But, you need to be able to read
at least 95% of the words to not get frustrated at having to look everything
up in the dictionary. Of course, if you're passionate about whatever you're
reading, you could know 10% and still plough through it.

\- Listen to music. A tune + words is much easier to learn than words alone.
From that, you can memorise and reuse sentence structures and new words. Also,
popular music tends to use more colloquial expressions, which helps to learn
informal language not covered by textbooks.

Personally, I've been learning Japanese recently and have learned more just
from a textbook, watching anime/drama and reading manga than in the equivalent
year of classroom Arabic I took - subjectively speaking. Some specific things
I've been doing that seem to have helped:

\- I've been using Anki for spaced repetition vocabulary practice. It's a
great piece of open-source software.

\- I tend to re-watch specific scenes that I enjoy after a few weeks. I've
usually learned something more to better understand what's being said in the
interim, which reinforces the usage of the sentence structures and vocabulary
used.

\- Similarly, I've been reading manga first in English and then in the
original. I more or less know from my previous reading and the visual context
what they said, so I can work out what each word should mean without looking
them up individually.

\- I've been writing diaries on lang-8.com and getting them corrected by
native speakers. It's a helpful, friendly community, probably quite like
LiveMocha but I've never tried the latter. It's focused on writing rather than
connecting for conversations on Skype.

\- I've been going for the local Japanese language meetup. It's not bad
especially when you get a Japanese person who actually will let you practise
your Japanese rather than always respond to you in English.

Bottom line, the fact that you're learning Spanish because you want to is your
biggest asset. It'll carry you through most of the difficulties of learning a
language. Try to expose yourself to material just a little bit beyond what you
already know, so you're learning something and not getting frustrated. Whether
you call it "flow" (Csikszentmihalyi) or "i+1" (Stephen Krashen) or just plain
common sense, it works.

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electronslave
I was raised in Austria, and German was our home language. More than full
immersion, it trained me to have an accent.

That said, the best (not really fastest, persay) way to learn language is
between the sheets. You learn SO much better when you're intimate and
motivated.

Which is how I learned French while living in Canada.

