08/11/2020
3 Mindsets That Fire Up Your Motivation to Learn a Language
1) âMistakes get me closer to the promised land.â
If laughter is good for you, being able to laugh at your mistakes is even better.
People who successfully learn and master a language have made thousands of mistakes. Theyâve made so many, theyâve lost count. Well, really, they donât count them at all!
Used the wrong vocabulary? Wrong verb conjugation? No problem, learn the correct one and then move on. Violated a dozen grammar rules in a single sentence? No big deal! Made a fool out of yourself in front of a native speaker? Just got yourself a newfound friend.
People who fail make very few mistakes. Itâs because they donât even try. Theyâre afraid of committing the slightest of errors, so they tiptoe around language practice. They make mountains out of molehills and quit after a series of totally common mistakesâŠmistakes that even native speakers make.
They often end up with Motivation Killer #2. They come to the conclusion that theyâre just bad at languages. So they quit and never make it to the promised land, not knowing that each little mistake, each little screw up was actually a step in the right direction.
The thing is, errors are part of language learning territory. Theyâre right smack in the middle of the whole thing, an inherent part of the process. Benny Lewis, the polyglot behind Fluent in 3 Months, even advises people to make as many mistakes as possible. More mistakes is better in the long run.
So donât think that you need perfect grammar and pronunciation before trying out your first sentence. Nope, thatâs putting the cart before the horse. Youâll get nowhere. Do this instead: Speak your first sentence, make all the mistakes you can make along the way and then slowly w**d them out over time. Thatâs how you get to native-like pronunciation and fluency, not the other way around.
Think of kids learning their mother tongues. Maybe you have children of your own or a young nephew or niece. Listen to them speak. Notice how many times they butcher their own language? They donât even pronounce words right. Mistakes are so much an integral part of language learning that we can even predict the type and timing of errors that children make.
But kids never make a fuss over it, do they? They say, âWaits for me!â and go on with their day. And the adults who interact with them just laugh off the innocent gaffe, or sometimes correct them and then move on. Everybody understands that the child is still learning.
Adults are quite a different breed. Every mistake becomes a blunder and signals the end of the world: âI should have gotten 10 out of 10 on this vocabulary test. Whatâs wrong with me?!â
If youâre to bulletproof your language learning motivation and never lose steam in the process, youâll have to realize that every blemish in your record, every mispronunciation, every little vocabulary word you canât seem to recall, every mistake on the âchapter quiz,â every correction you get from a native speaker and every sentence you canât decipher are all a trail of crumbs that you follow on the road to learning.
Do this: Whenever you commit a mistake, write it on a small piece of paper. For example:
Did a quiz online. Thought the plural for âchildâ was âchilds.â Itâs actually âchildren.â Ha!
Fold up that piece of paper and put it in a bowl. Every once in a while, draw from that bowl and read whatâs written. Be reminded of the correction to your mistake and learn the material. If youâre still not confident, toss the paper back into the bowl to be revisited another day. Otherwise, throw it away. Replenish the bowl as often as possible.
Thatâs just one way of learning from mistakes.
You actually have software and apps that do this for you automatically. Theyâre called SRS (Spaced Repetition Software). Say you want to stock up on vocabulary by doing flashcards. Spaced repetition apps like Anki and SuperMemo can do this for you so you donât have to create an actual deck where you write the word in the target language on one side and its translation on the other. These apps are electronic decks that you can practice on.
And they take it a step further. Say you made a mistake and gave the wrong translation. Boo hoo! No big deal. The apps have an algorithm that tells them to show that particular card more frequently so you can have more practice with it and eventually learn it.
See? No big whoop every time you make a mistake. The app is actually encouraging you to try again. Itâs as if the app is telling you: âMade a mistake? Try again. Made another one? No worries, I got it covered. Try again. As long as it takes, pal. I have all day.â
Mistakes are not the enemy. If you get that mindset in your head, no misstep, error or mistake can ever extinguish that fire of motivation.
2) âMan, this is fun!â
How motivated do you think you would be if your view of language learning were that itâs a chore, a burden and a bore?
You look at a long list of Greek vocabulary words or a thick Russian book, and youâll soon be opting for a walk-in root canal instead. Many will come to the conclusion that language learning is a drudgery, a dead serious challenge that only the disciplined and the inherently, mysteriously motivated can hurdle. But oftentimes itâs not even really the materialâs fault that we get bored and lose motivation. We do this to ourselves, demotivate ourselves out of the running. We think, âThis thing isnât making it fun for me,â expecting language learning to somehow make itself fun.
For language learning to be fun, you have to be an active participant, not a passive observer of the proceedings. In short, make it fun!
Some of the things you can do to achieve this include:
Aim for variety and novelty. Variety is the spice of life. So mix it up by using multimedia. Watch movies, listen to songs, partner up with a native speaker or dive into audiobooks.
Aim for brevity. Speaking from experience, anything thatâs long tends to become synonymous with âhardâ and âtedious.â Break up your study into short bits and stop just before you get tired and lose motivation for the next day. Leave things with you wanting more and youâll find yourself excited to do it again tomorrow. Many make the mistake of squeezing out every ounce of motivation for the day, so it demotivates them to do it again the next day.
Pair language learning with your favorite activity. For example, letâs say youâre into archery. Why donât you place different vocabulary words on the target, draw from a bowl containing the same words and try to hit the word you picked? The idea is, donât just wait for the material to be fun. Do something about it.
Donât take any of it too seriously. Being serious kills all the fun. Pressuring yourself will deflate you. I donât mean that you donât work at it, I donât mean that you donât learn from your mistakes, I donât mean that you should be content with your present language chops. I mean donât let todayâs mistakes stop you from trying and making tomorrowâs mistakes. Itâs not the end of the world, so letâs not act like it is. Weâre just learning a language. People do it every day. So relax! Shoot some arrows.
Check out some language resources for kids. These are learning tools whose language games make you think âWhere have these things been all my life!â The activities are interactive, wildly colorful, user-friendly and guaranteed to make language learning a hoot.
Muzzy BBC is one such great resource that makes use of animated video courses. Itâs meant to teach 600+ words in your target language covering a variety of basic topics. So if youâre struggling to get started with your language and still havenât learned the basics, consider that if a course like this is designed to keep kids from getting bored, it might just be the ticket for your own motivation.
Continuing with the BBCâs great language resources, go over to BBC Languages and consume the wonderful array of audio, video, tests and activities they have for Spanish, Italian, French, German, Chinese, Greek and Portuguese language learners.
Donât just study up on the language. Put down the language textbook for a minute and dive into the culture. Youâll learn almost as much French by learning about French food and cooking techniques, for example. So widen your horizon and look to the culture. It will make the language come alive and give you more reason to love your target language. YouTube contains tons of native speaker produced content that will give you hours of engaging language lessons in the form of fun vlogs.
Find a friend to help motivate you. Find someone funny, whose energy can be infectious. This person doesnât even have to be a language learner themselves, just somebody who can crack you up and give you a hard time when youâre taking yourself too seriously. Let them quiz you on the thing youâre learning. Make it into a bet. And then when you lose, get them that ice cream.
3) âEvery day is training day.â
Consistency is the name of the game. Itâs true for the milkman, the mailman and it should be true for our motivation to learn any language.
But weâre only human, and there are days when energy is at a low and we just donât feel like doing it. There are days when weâd rather watch a marathon of âFriendsâ than hit the books. There are moments when we canât smile at the progress weâve made. The different ways to make the process fun that weâve just talked about will help. Theyâll turn the whole journey into one big adventure. But how do we bulletproof motivation on those days when itâs the hardest?
How?
By making language learning an essential part of you.
Letâs learn from the milkman who greeted your grandmother with a âgood morningâ every day, and the mailman who faithfully delivered your familyâs mail for years. Do you think they didnât have mornings when theyâd rather stay at home and have somebody else knock on doors and flash those everlasting smiles? Sure they did!
But why do they go out when everybody else stays in? Why do they brave the snow and rain? Why do they report for duty when they donât feel like it, dealing with guard dogs, sneaky sprinklers and rowdy neighborhood kids?
In some cases, itâs a simple matter of having a job, of course, but for at least the more dedicated among them, the answer is âbecause itâs what I do, gosh darnit.â Heâs the milkman, and everybodyâs counting on him to bring in fresh milk every day. Heâs the postman, and heâs delivering mail to the right homes at the right time. Itâs who they are. Itâs a part of their being, and thatâs why bad weather, a bad mood or a bad day canât stop them.
Studying a language is very much the same. Successful language learners donât leave language learning to chance or their mood that day. Because they could be not in the mood that day and for several days after that. Instead, they try to practice the language day in and day out, especially when itâs hardest.
This mindset, in a way, takes the burden off answering the question, âWhatâs my motivation to learn this thing today?â It turns language learning into a normal and daily routine, making it a part of your day, a fiber of your being, a definition of what you are.
âAm I gonna study today or not?â That question becomes irrelevant, because the answer will always be âyes.â Thereâs no guessing to be had.
Cracking a language textbook, watching language learning videos, honing your craft with language learning websites is what you do. Itâs not something out of the ordinary, itâs what you do. âIâm a language learner, gosh darnit! Thatâs what I do!â
Carve out a time each day for when you study your language. You can make it as short as five minutes, though itâs better if you go over. Reserve that time for language study alone. Same time each day. Same exact time. Very important. For example, think â9 pm to 9:05, itâs go time.â Donât say âIâll get to those five minutes, depending on my day.â No, youâll never get to those five minutes that way. Carve out that daily five minutes first, and the rest follows.
One cool way to achieve this is through the app Habitica. Itâs a to-do list app that allows you to create habits by game-ifying them. So youâre not only learning the language, youâre also playing an RPG-style game. You create a character and each time you accomplish a daily task, you get rewarded by perks like unlocking armor, buying a pet or opening up new quests. Fail to do a daily task, and soon the monsters will be out to get you!
But, of course, there are still times when you just canât get out of bed and get into those books. For you to be able to recover and still do it day in and day out, you need to know that youâre not slugging it alone.
A great way to deal with these ups and downs and keep on track is with polyglot Olly Richardâs courses. He offers something for many different languages, and everything is designed to help you figure out your own favorite way to learn, schedule your study time and maintain your motivation. He also really likes to keep you accountable by giving you âhomeworkâ at the end of each module. Some of it even involves emailing Olly directlyâwho better to keep you honest than someone whoâs learned seven foreign languages himself?
Source: https://www.fluentu.com/blog/motivation-to-learn-a-language/
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