What can I do in 1 month of language learning? (+ Top Tips)

I mean I know “it depends on the person” so I’m just gonna speak for myself. <br><br>I’ve learned 6 languages thus far and in my experience, in 1 month of language learning (let’s assume you put in an hour a day) you can probably memorize the basic grammar rules, 300-500 basic words, the common expressions, phrases, alphabet, and pronunciation, develop basic sentence structure, but more importantly, develop an acceptable accent.<br><br>This is very different depending on your native language and target language. For example, if you are Spanish and want to learn Portuguese, in a month, you could easily be able to learn a lot more of the language than if you were a Chinese speaker trying to learn Arabic.<br><br>If you are an absolute beginner, the first month is going to be very exciting. The first weeks you will feel like you are learning a lot and soon you will be able to understand a lot of things, then the progress will start to slow down as you go down the rabbit hole of the language of your choice. You might even feel like you have hit a wall of some sort.<br><br>Here are some tips to make the most out of this month (and your entire language learning journey). If you are a seasoned language learner, I would love to hear your tips as well!<br><br>Top Tips:<br><br> 1. **Set goals**. Language learning goals can be really vague. What do you really want to achieve? Do you want to get a new job? Do you want to make new friends? Do you want to travel? Are you learning a language because you love the culture of the country? In my case, I learned 5 languages because the country of my dreams (Canada) is a bilingual country. So I learned English and French at the same time. And in my process, I learned another 4 other languages in case I need them someday. If you want to learn a language, develop a “why” so you stay motivated. And I also recommend developing the goals in small chunks, like “I want to learn the basics of the language in 1 month”. It’s better than “I want to learn the language in 1 month” because it’s more specific and realistic.<br><br>2. **Speak soon**. Speaking is the best way to learn a language. I have met a lot of people that “have been studying Spanish for years” and still can’t say a word. What a shame. You must speak to make progress at some point. You can start by getting a language exchange partner, tutor, or even just speaking with yourself (many of us do it when we have nobody else to speak to).<br><br>3. **Practice consistently**. “Consistency beats intensity” they say. I couldn’t agree more. I learned Portuguese in 2 weeks just by spending 15 minutes a day. That’s 420 minutes of Portuguese, that’s 7 hours. You need to set a routine that you can keep doing every day, ideally at the same time. If you put in 4 hours a day but you don’t practice in the weekend, you are very likely to quit after a week or two.<br><br>4. **Time blocking**. You need to be very self-aware of how you spend your time. “We all have the same 24 hours a day”. If you practice during your free time, you might burn out. So I suggest blocking an hour or two of your day to practice the language. I recommend you to stick to that routine.<br><br>5. **Learn at 90%**. I always recommend learning at 90%. I don’t know the reason of this number, but I feel like if you “learn at 90%” you are going to stay in the “flow” zone and keep progressing. This means you are pushing yourself but not to the point of limiting yourself. For example, if you want to start a conversation with someone but don’t know a word that you want to say, don’t think about it so much and just go with another word that you know that can describe what you want to say. The opposite is also true. If you don’t know a word and you don’t learn it, you are just limiting yourself in your expression. I feel like at the end of the day, you need to find a balance between both.<br><br>6. **Practice active listening**. Sometimes, I meet language learners that just listen to their tutors or conversation partners and don’t really pay attention to what they are saying. This is just wasted time. You can watch movies and TV shows in the target language and practice active listening. When I listen to a podcast in Spanish, I try to learn new words or just pay attention to the expressions they use so I can use them in a conversation.<br><br>7. **Don’t get an accent, copy an accent**. If you want to learn a language, don’t develop an accent. You must copy the accent. And this is something that a lot of language learners don’t do. They just want to learn the basics of the language but they don’t really want to learn how to express themselves like a native speaker. I have met people that speak English fluently but still sound Russian or Chinese. That’s a shame. If you want to learn a language, you need to learn “how to” speak it. How does their mouth move? How do they breathe? What expression do they have when they speak? What words do they use? What idiomatic expressions do they use? And more.<br><br>8. **Use mnemonics**. If you don’t know what a mnemonic is, it’s when you use a word to remember another word. For example, my name is Santiago but my friends call me “Tiago”. The reason is that “tiago” sounds like “tea go”, so Santiago, “tea go”. I have used this technique a lot to learn idiomatic expressions in different languages. For example, there is an expression in Portuguese “Tomar o pulso da onda”, that means “to take the pulse of the wave”. How do you remember that? You can simply think about Tom (Thomas) and Ruper (from the movie Rupert). So Tom is taking the pulse of Rupert that is on a wave.<br><br>9. **Use flashcards**. Flashcards are a great way to memorize new words you don’t know. You can use apps like Duolingo or Anki.<br><br>10. **Don’t be afraid to make mistakes**. Making mistakes is part of the learning process. If you are afraid to make mistakes, you are afraid to learn.<br><br>11. **Immerse yourself in the language**. Immerse yourself in the language as much as possible. Listen to music in the target language, watch movies and TV shows in the language with no subtitles, go to a restaurant that speaks that language, try to get a job in that language.<br><br>12. **Learn the 20% of the language that will make 80% of the impact**. This is called the Pareto principle. I don’t know if this is true or not, but I feel like it is. For example, I can’t learn Portuguese fluently in a month, but I can learn the basics of the language, like the common expressions, words, phrases, etc. I can learn the alphabet, the punctuation, the common mistakes people make, the common expressions, phrases, words, idioms, etc. And that will make “80% of the impact”. If you want to learn a language, you need to learn the basics. I know some people that have been studying a language for years but still don’t know the basics.<br><br>I know that at the end of the day, there’s no formula to learn a language. If you are a seasoned language learner, I would love to hear your tips.<br><br>P.S. I know there’s a lot of controversy regarding the 30 days challenge for language learners in the community, so I would love to hear your thoughts.<br><br>Edit: I don’t think I ever said “learn a language in 1 month” but it was in the title. Let me fix that.<br><br>Edit: I also don’t think I ever said you would become fluent in a month. You might be able to develop fluency after 3 months, you never know. <br><br>I see that a lot of people in this community are very negative and they don’t like people that challenge their status quo. I don’t agree with that and I think we should have an open mind and challenge ourselves more.