Lessons
Class Introduction
18:18 2The Science of Memory
17:34 3Spaced Repetition
38:45 4Tools of Language Learning
11:30 5The Basics of Anki
29:22 6Analog Methods
17:37 7How to Hear & Form New Sounds
23:03Train Your Mouth
28:11 9Student Questions
22:49 10How to Learn a New Spelling System
39:48 11Typing in your Target Language
20:54 12Learning Simple Vocabulary
31:07 13Designing Your Flashcards
29:07 14Demo: Learning Simple Words
27:18 15Japanese & Chinese Flashcards
11:34 16Breaking Down Grammar
25:39 17Abstract Vocabulary
22:22 18Flashcard Review
19:14 19Demo: Grammar & Abstract Vocabulary
43:54 20Lang-8 & Assimil Books
23:37 21Making Language Work For Your Life
31:21 22Mobile Language Learning
25:45 23Study Habits Review
08:21 24Time to Play: Custom Vocabulary
31:11 25Flashcards for Abstract Words
42:13 26Listening & Reading Comprehension
52:54 27Time to Play: TV & Film
17:11 28Time to Play: Speaking Fluently
40:42 29Method Review
29:32 30The Science of Friendship
39:14 31Why Do We Do This?
08:39Lesson Info
Typing in your Target Language
The next thing I wanted to discuss was typing and I think we probably will have time for my macros for chrome if there's a desire but let's talk about typing um learning how to type in your target language seems like a weird waste of time, you know I want to speak this thing and then I start telling you will know if you want to speak this thing then you should learn how to write it because you won't have these broken words and that's all well and good, but do I really need to learn how to type in japanese? Well, yeah uh, but on the yeah, but is that there are really, really easy ways of doing this one of the fun things you know when I was learning russian the reason I say yeah instantly is because we're using a computerized method you know, how are you going to get the text that you're trying to learn into your computer? But you have to type it somehow, but generally there are ways for especially for english speakers to get content into into anything into your computer at a really rapi...
d clip you don't need to go learning some crazy keyboard leo in russian, for instance, there is uh a keyboard layout that basically corresponds to the keyboard layout that you're used to any time you hit you want us sound and russian which looks like a sea in russian you type the s button and you will get any time you want any any of these sounds in russian the sound and you type the k button you will get the russian kay you want an l u put the l button and you'll get the russian l it's like a wonderful keyboard they're usually solutions like this for almost every language on dso that is out there for generally when you're talking about a language that has some crazy alphabet at least crazy is a non england non roman alphabet there is usually some sort of input method that you can use that means that you can still touch type in that language as long as you get your settings right um so we're going to talk about them a bit, but the first thing I want to talk about is what about the languages that don't have some crazy alphabet? You know, how do you type in french? How do you get all those accents? Um we're going to do a basically a little demo in on the mac terms of how that works normally, um sorry, james is like, uh we're not covering lennox at all um but yes, we're going we're going to cover basically how to do them the mac because I'm on a mac and I can show you that four windows I would suggest you going to this girl is also in the course syllabus tiny orioleslast fancy keyboard which will direct you to a site that shows you how to access the international keyboard on a pc um which is very similar sort of designed to what the mac thing does but let's talk about max for a second because run amok in winter so let's open up a text that it just so I could have something to write on I'm going to make it big hello? Great. So, um in french I have a number of things that are normally sort of relatively normal a b c d e f g um I won't have everything um but I will also have things like this you know, things like that I have a sea city I have a number of symbols that I need to learn how to produce on dso for european languages. Basically, what you need to learn is how to wise get that character on top of a letter this sort of slanting thing on one direction. How did we get that character on top of a letter? How do we get that one on top of a letter? Sorry not on top of a u but on top of anything and how do I get uh usually you need this one the little character let's make these really big and take the space is often between basically you're looking for these four symbols how do you get the slanty line in this direction of slanty line in that direction two dots are little hat so slanty line for mac slanty line is holding down the option button and hitting me every time you had option e you're holding on both of those things you will get this sort of yellow thing this yellow thing will suck in whatever value stick in front of it so if I want to have slanty line then that creates that uh if I want a slanty line eh I just do option e okay I want options you I want option eo I can do this is lol day basically this will do that uh similar sort of thing if I want to produce this then I'm going to do option till the thing on the top left right above the tab key to the left of one I'm holding that option I'm holding hitting that little thing that actually looks just like the slanty line I want and then I get the same thing basic interesting option plant eating that's it um in terms of the two dots now for german that kind of thing uh that is a you problem out I'm hitting option you I get my two dots and I can go uh kind of um and then for the carrot on doing is option I so if you do option I so this is basically I'm using e here I am using the little till the thing here I'm using you here and amusing I here and that is producing all of my uh oops they're hard to keep track of anyway this kind of thing um the only other one that you may need is the sea city um that is option c you produce those the other one you might need a little twit early thing on top of the end then you in spanish that is option in and then you can put that on top of whatever you want uh and you confined instructions for this online that you khun basically you see uh typing in french and it will teach you how to do that you know on a mac if you search for this and google you will find an article telling you how to do that but basically all units and low is that if you hold down option and one of these buttons basically eat the little till the thing you I you will get the cymbals you need so that um but what about I think that's what we're covering we have one more thing about learning how to say really really hard words to say um but what about something like like mandarin or japanese what do you do there? I wanted to show a demo of of japanese because I love it because the the max solution for that is really nice the pc solution is very very similar I don't know it'll in exclusion I just I'm not going to give you lennox answers today I'm really sorry but I want to have if if folks in the chat rooms have those answers and one to supply them I'm happy to start dumping them out of my website um one thing to note actually is um I think I was going here I have discussion about typing in each language individually uh when necessary on my web site on the language resource is like so if you need to type in french if you need to type in japanese I either have an article there already or I intend to put one there and if you have one and one is not there send it to me and I'll stick it on the website I mean I'm intending to make this a pretty comprehensive list of resource is um but if you are just sort of you don't know what to do you don't want to learn you don't want to learn how to do it natively on your computer there is a wonderful website called type of dot com I believe type of that order yes type of that order also in the syllabus uh that will let you choose where you want to type and you say okay, well I want to type in german and it will give you a german keyboard that will give you things like, uh, pull you and we'll give you keyboard shortcuts who will say, ok, if I hit control a every time I hit control, eh, I will get that control o control you control. S and so now I'm getting my est cet assisting that jake was asking me about, um so this is a kind of handy thing. This is also handy for learning. I mean, you can actually type in the international phonetic alphabet this's my my favorite source of typing for that s so if I need, you know, to type in which I rarely do, then this is actually a way of typing directly in the typing, and I just kind of so anyway, I like type of work. I just do recommend that you learn how to type natively on your computer and not rely on these sorts of websites if you can, but we were going to spend a moment learning how max handle japanese because it's really neat, and I like it. I found out about it today. So, um, in os nine os nine, ten point nine nine uh, we'll get there, uh, go to the apple menu, click on system preferences and go in os ten point nine two keyboard and it always ten point eight or earlier to language and region but I'm in a west end points I'm gonna go to keep her here I'm going to find a few options keyboard text shortcuts I'm ignoring all of these what I'm looking for his import sources an import import sources I'm gonna find my us keep work this is the court and keep order if you have another keyboard to using tomorrow it'll be there whatever and I'm going to add a couple of new ones I'm gonna be demo in japanese and uh basically japanese the three alphabets of japanese because that's going to overlap with chinese too so I'm gonna click plus I'm going to search for japanese and I'm going to add the coto eddie keyboard wonderful awesome coto eddie keyboard I found out about today okay and I'm also going to add a traditional chinese someone search for chinese I'm going to go to a traditional because japanese basically uses the traditional chinese alphabet in terms of their third alphabet and I'm going to select trackpad handwriting just the coolest thing in the world yes yes I see raise eyebrows doesn't do that yes it does and I want to get at okay um and so I've added these three keyboards what you'll notice is that in the top right if this is checked if show input input menu in many bars checked in the top right you will find an american flag and you will find a few other keyboards keyboards that you couldn't search through and so if we go back into text at it just to have some stuff to type you know right now I'm in my normal keyboard abc but now it will switch and I will switch to the first of japanese is three alphabets got just a fanatic alphabet every two letters ka ki ki koo koo I'm saying wrong sorry uh is one simple and so if I want uh let's say I want to say he'd are gonna then I'm gonna write a tch I that is the japanese he I want our hey that is that I want g ain, which is god and it already knows that already is predicting that I'm probably going to right heat I gotta and it can it's predicting what the end of this word is but I'm gonna write it anyway and a shot also love this think, uh if I want to switch to the other japanese alphabet um then I can switch to kata kata and you'll notice there are keyboard shortcuts there's like control shift k this sort of thing you'll get used to those if you're if you're learning japanese, but if I want to write copy khanna in kappa kana which is the alphabet they used for foreign words loan words then I can write k k k hoping that spelled right I don't actually know japanese yet um and another thing which um I think this will lead me to you I believe this is going to be the, uh, japanese forward for dog I remember the word for dog correctly this is underlined if I had space twice it's going to spit out the symbols the traditional chinese symbols that congee for dog and it will give me dictionary definitions unfortunately his dictionary definitions are in uh well none of these actually probably will be in japanese on our japanese I can see that they're japanese characters they will give you dictionary options in terms of what is each of these things mean I mean this is it's like it's this all built into the operating system which is really neat I'm the last thing that I wanted to do actually I'm going to do in you again um you said space twice to get this and I'm going to select this this failure just like this guy which isn't correct any work and then I'm gonna try this trackpad handwriting thing because it's really neat welcome to track bed hand ready basically hit control shift space bar to turn it on and off it will tell you that to turn top trackpad handwriting off because you will want to turn it off because it will take over your computer you press control shift space bar and suddenly I have this thing on my screen and let's say I wanted to write something I want to right I think this is the number six you will see on my trackpad directly on my computer track pad I wonder if we could get like video of my trackpad or like of that of everything the sea do we have the light the light so is the light lights I get no camera this is head um I'm going to start drawing with my finger yes hello I'm gonna start drawing with the finger I will draw a line down and it will I will do it I will dry line down I will draw a line across I will draw a line down and I will draw another line down and it it's following my finger and I can select aiken just tap on the track pad I can tap any of these eight buttons basically the top left of the track bed will delete what I did and so I just tapping once on the top left of my trackpad. So I'll do that one again and on the top right I see the character I was attempting to make and so I could just press that button and poof I've just written in country they're really need input methods so I just like that so I don't know how useful that is going to be for everyone that's going to be only really useful for those wait control shift space um it's only really gonna be useful for those of you who are learning these languages but for those of you who are and are using max like neat tools to play with toys so that um but um but um I think we're ready for playing around with long complicated sounds we already did this demo we already talked about typing in european languages and we're ready for one last little bonus thing which is how do you deal with ridiculous words how do you deal with this question that we had in the last segment of well how do you do with check when you have a language where you can have one word that is four continents in a row that has no valves I mean polish is going to be slightly less damaging than check check is going to hurt your tongue when I was in moscow the any way I could find my way around was I was at the troops the underground station that have no vowels so I knew you would take me to you exactly what I meant it's great yes I mean I think it's like how do you deal with these things like you can pronounce every like this is the word of a dragon and the words drawing means to five flinch which is appropriate for this word er and so you have no problem with many of these sounds there's a boat great well I could handle though this is from english theirs is great we have we have done we have a rule which is new okay, so that's going to potentially cause problems but then you haven't all good who? Easy, easy it's fine these air all easy sounds there's one of them is potentially tricky for some of you this rolled our but aside from that it's fine and I say okay, we'll fight I know how to pronounce each of these words each of these sounds in isolation okay, so now just say repeat after eavesdropping now and people are like thie end how do you build up words like this? And so, uh this is sort of an old singer trick that I've adapted for language learning where you start at the end and you go to the beginning you can't right now perhaps saves drawing but you can probably say new and so let's start there and so everyone here why not start with this and just go new? I think I now go good what about good knew about good new you okay so can handle good knew what about full oh oh you oh, you organize all of you here's the new one that's pretty good yeah spanish speaking it's not fair, okay organ okay, pretty good, okay, no okay this is back cheney uh the idea back chaining is that you get better and better and better at getting to the end of your word so you always know where you're going you can use this in individual little chunks for for things like check in polish and russian where you have these horrible constant clusters and you're like I don't do this to me um you can also use this in bigger chunks for things like like I have this example of my website that's I think linked in the in the syllabus ah for me learning how to pronounce the word speed limit in german which is her excuse finished kites becomes which is ridiculous you know you have these ridiculously long words and so you could do this in chunks you don't actually have to do like individual phone named by phoning sound by sound you can just do okay if I need to learn how excruciating kites between sunk then I can you know end with this is let's see if I could ride this thing out oh, I'm writing in the country this's hearst fish in this kites big kind silk kindness is one german word thank you german on dso give good examples and so you can just start out and just be like okay what about soon like in state soon try it okay, what about a song about lorenzo grandson about book? What about it's. Because I was pretty good. Okay, what about kites? Big pencil. Okay, give me a dish. Fish kite's been canceled. This's cool. I've never actually done this sort of work before. Vintage kites. Because this's cool. Okay, how about shaving dish? Kites becomes gish windisch kites. But thiss one's gonna be tricky? Finish it's become so finish has become so it's spinning it's getting quiet. Alright. Finish kites begun. So teeny you build up from there? Actually, this first part, this first part is one is the sort of thing that you really would do. Were it one by one? Because this first thing is really kind of rough. There's hurst, hurst, that's. Just hard. So you have to do t pushed pushed extradition she's convincing this sort of thing. This part is where you kind of you do it in chunks like soon wasn't so hard. Clint wasn't so hard. But then you may well do sound by sound by sound. Um, this is the kind of thing this is how you practice this stuff, even when it gets as ridiculous as german.
Class Materials
Ratings and Reviews
Nephele Tempest
I really enjoyed this course. Gabe has a terrific, easy teaching style that's entertaining and absorbing to the point where I'm conscious of having gone through the course a little too fast. I am looking forward to going back through it a little more slowly to catch any tidbits I missed, but even without that I feel I have so many new tools to apply to language learning and I can't wait to get started. I really appreciate that he also went over how to tackle a language you've already learned in the past but have not retained to the level you'd like, as well as how to start a brand new language from scratch. I hope to do both with much greater success than my previous attempts.
user-278c98
Worth every penny. Despite the title, you'll learn far more than how to become fluent in a language -- you'll learn how to learn anything you want! Gabe is a great presentational speaker, articulate and captivating. The foundation of the course is about how to set a concrete and measurable goal, learn effectively, and set yourself up for success. This course addresses forming new habits within the constraints of your current life, making progress when you don't feel motivated, and how to recover from setbacks like getting off-track or when you just don't grasp a concept--these topics are often missing from other learning courses so students flounder as soon as they stray from the formula. Building on all these fundamentals, Gabe then offers specific techniques and tools for language learning. Excellent course!
a Creativelive Student
I really wasn't expecting to learn a whole lot of new things with this course but I feel like I have come away with so much more then just how to learn a language. The science on how our mind and memory work was really interesting and also very applicable to other parts of my life. Along with this course, I purchased Gabriel's pronunciation trainer which I also highly recommend. I never thought about the pronunciation of a language as a separate part and I feel like learning this first is already greatly improving my understanding of my goal language. I have tried to learn another language many times only to either give up from frustration or get bored with the program I'm using. This course and Gabriel's method of learning a language have me so excited that this time will be the time I succeed. I can't wait to start using the word list once that is available and to start creating my own. Thank you so much for such a great course.