Agnieszka Murdoch: Back to Basics

Hello everyone and welcome back. It's uh been a little week. I'm here in Montreal, Canada to prepare for the North American Polyglot Symposium. And uh because of the travel and some unfortunate instance where I lost some of the recordings that I'd done, unfortunately, I wasn't able to get an episode out last week. But uh I'm back here and we're going to be taking you back to the basics with a very sort of, yeah, basic language learning episode. It's with Agnieszka from Five Minute Language and we're going to be talking about general language learning tips and tricks. So if you're new to language learning or you just want to reinforce the fundamentals and listen to Agnieszka's wisdom, then this episode is perfect for you. And I hope to see as many of you as possible in Montreal, of course, and if not, I hope you check out the recordings from the event. I'm sure it's going to be great. So I hope you're all doing well and enjoyed this week's episode with Agnieszka.

Hi Kris. Thank you very much for having me on the podcast. It's a it's a real pleasure to be here and talk to you.

It's a pleasure to have you. And uh before we get into all this five-minute language and language coaching, then why don't you give people an introduction on how you get into language learning and got to the point you are today?

Okay. Um so, I was born in Poland. Polish is my native language, and the the story of me learning languages is actually quite um, I don't know, you might think it's boring. I think it's quite interesting, uh because I guess I almost um stopped learning languages before I even started. So, uh when I was about 13 years old, um my parents sent me to English lessons. Um, and I didn't really quite understand why they were doing this. Um, obviously I was learning English at school and I was, um, you know, one of the first generations of students, uh, in Poland who had a chance to actually learn English. Um, because as as many of you will know, Poland used to be, um, a kind of, um, a a very different country, uh before 1989. Uh, before the fall of the Berlin Wall. Um, so before that time when my parents went to school, um, the only language you could learn was Russian. Uh, because of the the kind of the relationship between the Soviet Union and Poland, obviously. Um, so so my parents clearly saw that there was an an opportunity there, um, in learning languages when it became possible, uh, to learn languages other than Russian, because obviously Europe was changing and the world was changing and Poland became more open to the west and and the countries that spoke English and German and French and other languages.

Mhm.

Is it is it the same?

It's the same. Yeah.

Yeah. Um and yeah, so I did English and French, and I was not very good, um, at science. Uh, my family is is quite scientific. They've got quite scientific, uh, brains and ways of thinking and a a slightly different kind of, um, background than me, more kind of technical and and scientific. Uh, so I was I was a a bit of a an odd one out. Uh, uh, but, uh, languages were something that I was really interested in and and and good at. So, uh, I did that at school, and then I ended up going to England to do my university degree.

That's nice. I I I like the idea that you were resistant towards languages, uh, obviously, inadvertently so, but I remember my own childhood that anything in a school subject, even though I sort of secretly enjoyed it was still a school subject.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I think, uh, you know, when you start early, when you start at at the stage, I mean, obviously, I I seriously started learning when I was about 13, but before that, I I actually, when I was a child, I remember sort of playing with my, um, my brother, my younger brother, and pretending that I was speaking foreign languages. I don't know how old I was, maybe, I don't know, eight or 10. Uh, and, uh, and yeah, and I was pretending that I was speaking another language and he actually probably believed that I was speaking another language. Which was quite a funny thing. And then I would translate that language into Polish, um, to let him know what I'd just said. So I think I always had this kind of, uh, um, part of a kind of being a linguist was probably always part of me, but when I was 13, I was probably at the at the stage that you just mentioned, which was, you know, I'm too cool for this and I want to be doing other things.

Yeah, and if you start early then that becomes their new life. Uh, for instance, a lot of people ask me how I learned English, and the truth is I have no idea because I just did, you know, it's like I wasn't living in an English-speaking country, but starting English in grade two or something. Maybe even, maybe it was four. I I remember when I left school, they changed it to two, but but school seemed almost pointless because I was just playing video games or watching, you know, we don't have dubbing in Denmark, so if you just watch a lot of friends or whatever was on at the time, you just pick up English and it's just completely effortless. And it's just a part of my life from from back then. But if I had, if I had to choose at age, let say, around the early teens, then maybe I would've opted out due to it being too cool for school.

Yeah, yeah. Absolutely.

Yeah, they just speak out loud. They have no concept of shame. They have no inhibitions. Uh, they have no they they actually they don't have as much as of a filter as as adults do, because the adult brain realizes that you can't absorb everything. You there's no room for every single stimulus that you see or hear or, uh, is presented with. So the brain is doing a lot of filtering. And I think as a kid, you filter way less because everything is just like, ooh, look at that, look at that, look at that. But when you become an adult, you're like, oh, yeah, that's a bottle, that's a, you know, that's a bowl, that's a, whatever. So the brain just kind of ignores it.

Oh, I yeah. I I totally agree with you on that.

That's that's just not that that's like saying, uh, I can't I can't run because, uh, some guy can run a marathon in two hours. It's like, just because he's way better doesn't mean you don't get the benefits for doing it slower or yeah, I guess that's a pretty good metaphor. It's the same speed, uh, or time, you know, you might it if it takes me six hours to run a marathon, I don't know, probably take longer to be honest. But, you know, I I'd arrive at the same point, if you call that fluency or whatever, B1 or A C1, whatever you call it. Just because I'm slower, I'll still get there at some point. It's not impossible. Although, I do believe some people think that way, which is a little bit concerning.

Yeah.

Yeah. I think I think a lot of people do. And I think the other kind of, just going back to the kind of children versus adults, um, comparison, I think it's interesting that, you know, adults have very specific expectations of what they want to say and what they want to learn. Uh, and, you know, they want to learn a lot of vocabulary, they want to be able to say everything they, you know, they want to be able to translate word for word. Whereas children probably learn what's useful and what actually allows them to get by because, you know, communication for them, maybe, is more natural, uh, than for adults. And, you know, if something works, then it's works, whereas for an adult, often if it works, it's not enough because you have to be perfect.

Yeah. Which we can get into in in just a minute. I feel like that'll probably be part of one of the other topics that we'll get into, but yeah, I really I really enjoy talking about these kind of how we can make language learning more, I guess, accessible in a way, because you have to believe it before you can do it. And I really believe that what all the language learning bloggers, all the YouTubers and and even podcasters like myself, uh, we we're trying to in a way spreading a message that, yeah, you can do it and it's not that difficult actually, which I guess is a good segue into the five-minute language because, uh, that's a a new project of yours. Do you want to talk about it how you got started with it and your idea for it?

Yeah. Um, so Five Minute Language, maybe it's a bit of an unfortunate name. Maybe not. I don't actually believe that you can learn a language in in five minutes. Let's just put it out there. Um, so the the idea is that essentially, as an adult, um, as a busy person, or as a, you know, as a student even, you know, every everyone's got different commitments and I don't think any commitment, um, outside of learning languages should be an excuse, um, to not learn a language. Uh, and I think there are a lot of people out there who are interested in the idea of learning languages by themselves, but they don't quite know how to do it. Maybe they've had bad experiences in the past of going to language lessons or, you know, buying resources that they that they didn't really work for them. And so they might have this idea that, oh, you know, I can't really do this without any formal education.

Right.

There are a lot of things in there what you just said I wanted to, uh, talk a little bit about, but firstly the the name. You know, before we started this recording, I was I was thinking about the name and I said, hmm. On one hand, I really like it, but there are also, of course, parts of it I don't like because it might give false expectations as you just cleared up. But I really like the name because my philosophy is that five minutes a day in any language, as long as it's a focused form of studying, uh, probably usually using some kind of guide, some kind of, uh, book maybe that has some kind of, you know, structure. I mean, I don't think you learn a language for instance, by doing five minutes of flash cards a day because then you'll just kind of have, you'll have the you'll have the pieces of the puzzle, but you don't kind of see the whole picture. You don't see how to actually use the pieces. So if you use something like, let say, Colloquial Teach Yourself, one of these courses so to speak, five minutes a day, I'm pretty sure you can get very far in at least, let's say, similar languages to begin with, something like French for English speakers, Spanish for French speakers, Italian for Spanish speakers, whatever.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I think it it reminds me, have you ever heard of this, um, flossing metaphor? You know, some people say,

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. If you don't It's Seth, isn't it?

Is it?

I think he, well, he's the one I heard it from.

Probably, yeah. If you don't floss, just floss one tooth and then you will actually end up flossing.

Yeah, start with one tooth and some days some days you'll only do that one tooth and that's totally fine. But eventually you're just going to build up and you're just going to ride your own success to a full set of oh, I don't know how many teeth we have. That's a lacking, uh,

It depends. Depends on the person.

Oh, yeah, that's true. That's true. No, that's true. Around, uh, I don't know, some around some number that I don't know. But, uh, um, so I really I really like that concept. And that's also what I constantly constantly talk to people about when I introduce myself and people say, so what do you do and stuff like that. And I say, oh, well, I do this a day but then I I in my spare time I like to learn languages. And they're like, oh, do you? I really I always wanted to learn French. And I'm like, why don't you just do it? And they're like, well, and then they list off the all the excuses, you know, but the most common excuse I hear is I don't have time. And I find that such a blatant lie that I almost want to call people out on it because there is no way. I mean, unless you think that it requires five hours of serious study a day, or or that you don't believe you can do it yourself, that might also be a problem if people think they have to go to some night school or school in general. But anyway, everyone has time. If you if you feel like you don't have time to learn a language, it's not a time problem. It's a priority problem.

Yeah.

It's uh, it's it's just like, okay, if you watch any amount of TV in a week, you have to learn you have time to learn a language, you know, if you you can get up five minutes before, you can go to bed five minutes later, you can do it in your break, you can do it in your commute. I mean, there are it's just a lie basically. And it it kind of annoys me. But at the same time, I realize that I only think like this because I've been endlessly brainwashed by people like myself.

Yeah.

to to to think like that, you know. When I started the podcast two years ago, I'm sure I did believe that some people were just too busy to learn a language. Um, but now I I totally don't believe that. And, you know, you have to start with one. And I think a lot of people I meet, uh, who aren't into sort of polyglottism or whatever you want to call the the hobby itself. These people just want to learn one language. I want to learn French because I really liked France and my best friend's, uh, granddad is French or whatever. Uh, they have these very specific motivations for one language. I find it very rare to talk to people who are saying, oh, I really wish I knew German, French, Spanish, Italian, and Japanese, you know, those people are only at the Polyglot gathering and, you know, conferences and whatnot, but, um, those people will know already. So my interest is is actually more in in the people who say, oh, I really want to learn French. Uh, or whatever that, insert whatever language. And then questioning, why is that? Why are you not doing it? And it's always a motivational issue. And I think with your philosophy of the five-minute, let's say, a day or whatever, five minutes here, five minutes there, people could really open their eyes to these micro, uh, progress steps towards fluency.

It depends. Depends on the person.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. It's really interesting what you've said. I think, um, it is I think I partly agree it's a motivation question. Um, but I think also what you said about not knowing why they're not doing it. So I think if somebody says to me, I'd like to learn French and I just don't know I just don't think I can do it, then I would ask them, why do you why do you think you can't do it? And I think you need to kind of get to the bottom of of the issue, really. Um, as as with anything. Um, but yeah, not having time is definitely not an excuse. And, uh, you know, you you said watching TV. Yeah, if you watch TV then adopt the time that you spend doing that. You know, how many times do you check, um, Facebook every day? And that, um, it doesn't, you know, some people some people's counter argument to that could be that, oh, you know, I check it 15 times a day, but it only takes 15 seconds each time. But really what you're doing is you're you're using up your brain's capacity to do other stuff. So you're tired because your brain is constantly processing new information. Now, whenever you scroll down your Facebook feed, that's what your brain is doing. You may not realize that, but actually, uh, you know, your your brain is trying to identify and process information. And, you know, I'm sure you you've heard about the idea of decision fatigue as well.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Yeah. I check my emails all the time and it's not a good idea.

Yeah. And how many times does nothing there's nothing new?

You know, most of the time there's nothing new.

So, that's so that's that definitely a good point. And it also, what you said about Duolingo, it actually reminded me of something I read about Duolingo, um, the other day. I think they did some research into the optimum amount of time that you that they want users to spend on it. Um, I can't remember the exact number now, but they essentially said, don't binge on Duolingo because if you do that, you're going to burn out. So, I think it was something like maybe 30 minutes maximum. I I can't remember exactly. But that just shows that, you know, you don't actually need to be in a in a in a class for five five hours to to get better at a language. In fact, you're going to get worse because you're going to you're going to lose your attention, you're going to lose your motivation and you're just going to be burnt out.

Right.

Yeah, that's not bad.

Yeah, there's definitely a a negative there's a the what do you call it? The, uh, the gains in language ability are definitely going down the more time you spend in one session. Um, but you can spread out the sessions for sure. I mean, you can take a walk and and come back. Yeah. If you want to be really ambitious and and some people definitely can and are, you know, we're talking about motivational issues of just sitting down and doing something, whereas I know people who can sit down for eight hours and study without any problems. So it's funny that there that difference exists as well. It's not a universal universal problem.

Yeah.

So, there's a lot going on.

Yeah, but that's also brain energy, you know. If if you want to learn effectively, you need you need to consider how that how that's affecting you.

Yeah. It's tough and and it's it's funny and I I I talk about this a lot with, um, in terms of productivity because we want to do something, but it's like there's a disconnect between what we want to do and what we're actually doing. And does that mean that we don't want it enough or does that mean that we just don't know really how to productively do it? You you know what I mean? I mean, it's it's tough.

Yeah. It's tough. Yeah. Yeah, it's a it's an interesting one. Um, and I think a lot of the time it is not knowing what it is that actually separate separates us from from that goal. Um, and I think

You don't know the steps involved in becoming better at language X, for instance.

Yeah, and I think, you know, especially if you're if you're a language learner and you you've never learned another language, you don't actually know what it takes. I went for for my first 5K run last week. First time ever. Um, and I just didn't know what to aim for. I had no idea how long it takes to, uh, to run 5 kilometers. Um, I just didn't know whether it's going to take 45 minutes or 20 minutes, what's a good time, what's a bad time. And it did seem a bit overwhelming, to be honest, because they it was an organized run and they said three laps, and I just thought, how am I going to do that? So I think, you know, with language learning, you you you don't know what to expect. That's one thing.

But, of course, there's also lots and lots of traps and dangers there because for instance, I I the first blog I found was Benny Lewis's blog. And I found his blog when he was, I believe something like eight years or seven years into traveling the world learning languages. So by then, he'd already learned over 10 languages. And, you know, Benny's a it's not C1 language. He just learned language. He's just a, you know, communication, whatever.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. I think you're I think you're right. And I think the other so that's one danger, uh, comparing yourself. And I think at the same time, something that goes hand-in-hand with comparing yourself is not really fully appreciating, uh, what you've got to offer yourself. Um, and not really fully appreciating the things that you've already learned, the things that you already know. Um, and yeah, and I think when it comes to learning a language, it's a it's a very kind of, um, unique skill in that you can't really, I mean, at least that's my impression, that you can't really say, uh, you know, I've done it.

Right.

It's not always easy.

And he talks about it all the time, you know. He he was crap at languages when he started out, and, you know, look at him now. So, yeah, I think it's it's definitely I agree with you, it's definitely important to kind of remember that that there are different stages.

It's tough. Yeah.

It's tough. It's tough because when you for instance, if I asked you, how much German do you know? It's like, how can you answer that question? It's like, uh, some, uh, uh, quite a lot, quite a bit, you know. The point is that language is such a dynamic, uh, skill and ability. And by the way, you forget things all the time, too, in even in your native language. You forget words, you forget, uh, common idioms or whatever. And so there's also atrophy going on all the time. Yeah. So, so for me, it's incredibly difficult to say how much I know, but what I do know is that the things that I can do now that I couldn't do, let's say, for instance, Russian is an example I often give, because I'm not very good at Russian after, let's say, two years of sort of lazy and not very focused occasional huge breaks, uh, study. Uh, that's the preface I always use.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. I think it's it's interesting that you, um, you gave examples of things you can do rather than saying, uh, you know, I'm at this level A A1 or B1 or whatever. Um, and I think a lot of a lot of language learners tend to use the European framework, um, levels. Although, you know, that that's not as meaningful as being able to say, I can I can read the Russian alphabet, or I can do this and that.

Focus on practicality. I I think it's a great tip and don't focus on some arbitrary and useless, uh, um, levels designed by some academic somewhere. Because they the thing about those levels is that, yeah, it's a good it's good to compare with and I don't mind people using it to estimate their language skills, but from a personal point of view, it doesn't mean anything that I'm B1 in German or B2 or whatever. It doesn't mean anything. It's it's you might as well say that you're, you know, uh, you might as well insert any random word to explain your skills because those frameworks are so based on tests where you have to get, there are, I think there's what, three or four different elements to the test, a spoken, written, you know, there are different elements.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, yeah. But again, if English native speakers don't know all the English idioms or, you know, words, there's like, I don't know how many words there are in the English language. I see a lot of numbers getting thrown around, but if we say a quarter million, there's no way that anyone can know all of them. So essentially, you never, um, you never completely done with it as you mentioned before.

No, it's it's not always true. Um, I think I I I mean, I I I've lived outside of Poland for for a number of years now, but, um, and I work in English. I use English every day. So if you if you gave me an an a Polish speaker who's at at that level, I I bet they could, Um, they would maybe know some vocabulary that I'm not familiar with.

Right.

Who knows? Or they would be able to to use it better.

Yeah, they know the grammar, how it works in more detail, whereas you probably just know it instinctively.

Yeah, yeah. And I think the the kind of what you mentioned about some people kind of aiming for very, very high from the start. I think the danger of that is that you very easily get overwhelmed. Yeah. And you are not specific enough to actually be able to move forward. Because if I start to learn a new language, say I want to learn Russian. Uh, and this is my goal, to be fluent in Russian. But I haven't actually asked myself, you know, what does it mean? What's what's the what's the step in between? Um, and I think that's what you were talking about earlier, which is the kind of gap between, uh, you know, where we are and where we want to be. And we don't really know what's what's in between.

Right.

Yeah, they'll quit, give up.

Yeah, yeah. It's really tough, isn't it? Uh, our brains are really experts at, uh, uh, self-sabotage. Yeah, absolutely.

Burning out is a real thing, too. I remember last year, I did an experiment on how many Russian words I could learn in, I think it was like a month and a half, maybe two months. And I really went all in on Memrise and I did like 50, 70 words a day. It's just ridiculous. That's not bad. No, that's ridiculous basically. And I think I got up to about 1,000 words in a month. And then I just quit, and I was just like, this is not worth it. I mean, it was it was like hours a day. I think it was something like I had to do an hour and a half just to, uh, refresh. And then it would take, you know, another hour to add that day's words. And then and then, you know, you might say, well, okay, well, you you, you know, you burn out a little bit. You'll get back on it after a a break. I basically quit flash cards after that. I hadn't done flash cards in like, I just started I think about a week ago on Memrise again because it works so well for me. Actually, I retain words so well with Memrise and, well, I could I could have used Anki as well, but that's my favorite. I retain vocabulary so well with flash cards that it's a shame that I didn't use it, but, you know, I I burned out completely and it's taking me a year and a half.

That's not bad. Oh, wow.

to to get back to it. So, I mean, really, it's not just if you burn out, it's going to, you know, you can take a little week off and then you can get back to it. Probably you could, though, but just I I never I didn't feel like it. I was like, oh, not flash cards again. So, it's a it's a true word of warning.

Yeah, yeah. It's interesting. I I read this article the other day, uh, and it was talking about, uh, why motivation is not essential, uh, when you're, you know, whatever it is that you're trying to do. Um, and basically, uh, I think the the main point was that, um, we don't we don't stop doing something because we lose motivation. We stop doing something because we don't really know why we're doing it. So we don't really understand the real reason behind it.

Yeah. Yeah, and it's it's kind of annoying sometimes because some people might want to do something without having these great reasons, but you still might want to do it. It it's kind of like, um, I mean, I suppose you could always find good reasons for losing weight or getting fit. But unless you actually believe in it, then it doesn't really it doesn't really give you that extra motivation that we need sometimes. And I think what I'm beginning to understand also is that motivation is good, but at the end of the day, you also need to kind of just do it, you know, it's kind of the Nike, uh, slogan. I think if you said that you needed motivation to do anything, uh, then I don't think a lot would get done. Um, like work, for instance, people do work even though, well, I guess the the the money is motivation enough, but my point is just that, yeah, it's tougher, but I think sometimes you just have to do it, like, uh, even if you don't find it fun or interesting. If you if you want to do it, even though your motivation is not fully there. Just just do it, you know. Do I enjoy doing flash cards endlessly? Mm, no, not really. But they work. And and that's the point. And then some some person said to me recently. He said, well, you should only do things that you enjoy. Mm. I find that kind of, I mean, that's very ambitious, isn't it? Or is that just is that is that just me and my cynical world view where, you know, uh, things that are are worth doing will will always be hard or.

Yeah.

I don't I don't know. What do you think about that?

Um, I think it's a it's a good idea. Uh, just doing what you enjoy, but I think I I agree with you that, you know, sometimes to move things forward, you have to do the thing that you fear the most, and the thing that you actually don't want to do, uh, the most. Right. I think I I think I got it from some book. I can't remember where I got it from, but I think it's very true, and I think it's true with language learning, you know, when you come up come come up against an obstacle, it's often an obstacle that makes you feel uncomfortable in some way. Either because you don't understand a topic, or because you feel shy about speaking, um, and you know, if this is your blocker, then you need to get things done. And, you know, even if you're not motivated, uh, so I think there's a different between or not a difference, but I think there are two these are two sides of the same coin. Motivation and commitment. Um, and they're they're completely different things. As we said, motivation is something that is driving you forward. Whereas commitment is almost like a contract that you sign with yourself, uh, and you say, um, you know, I'm I'm I'm motivated to learn French, uh, but really what I'm doing is I'm I'm committing, I'm committing my time, you know, like we said, you know, I do five minutes, and you might end up doing an hour. But you need to commit to those five minutes to get to the hour. Um, so and I think when you really are serious about making that commitment, then the motivation comes after. Almost, um, you know, being able to see your progress, and enjoying the the the process of learning a language, being able to speak to people and and read and understand, and and yeah, and and it gives you, you know, real energy, and I think that's where the motivation comes from at least for me. But at the same time, I want to just acknowledge the point that you made about, um, learning something without necessarily having reasons. And I think that's also great. I I Yeah, I I wasn't trying to say that, you know, you have to necessarily have a reason, and I think,

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, and I think when I went to the

Some people do that. Some people say that if you don you don't have the proper motivation, you should find something else.

Yeah, yeah. But I think I'm thinking more about, um, you know, when people learn languages, and and you ask them why, and they just say, you know, just because, because I because I just like the language. You know, I don't have to give you a reason why I'm learning, um, Slovak or whatever, because I I just want to do it. So,

Right.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's true. It's quite funny that uh you you see that a lot in the community, like, why did you learn Moroccan Arabic? Well, I don't really have anything to do, you know, slow summer. Yeah. So I think that's cool, you know, just getting knowledge for the sake of knowledge. I think is is quite cool. Um, but um, I mean we could talk about motivation and and and these things all day, but I just wanted to move into uh a different topic. In the introduction, I said you were a language coach, and I just wanted to get sort of your words on what a language coach is and and what what does it mean?

Right.

Yeah.

Um, right, so I think, um, this is the kind of, um, it's a kind of phrase, I suppose, that I use to describe what I do, um, with all the kind of language work that I do. So, um, I would say that, you know, I mean coaching is not is not strictly that, but I think the blogging work I do and the webinars, um, I've recently started doing, and all the kind of the outreach work, I suppose, I do, um, is about coaching, really. That's how I see it. Um, I also do some coaching with, um, people sort of individually. Um, just advising them on on learning languages. Um,

Is that based on general learning or are you coaching with the language in mind?

No, so this is this is more general. Um, and I think coaching is basically about, um, helping somebody find the way through the learning process. I think that's essentially what it's about. So it's it's providing advice on how to how to overcome obstacles, how to structure your learning so that, you know, you're making progress, uh, how to set goals. So I think it's basically solving problems. And I think you can, um, for anyone who is struggling with making progress, uh, so I think you can do it in many different ways. And I think, you know, even blogging is a form of coaching in that respect because you're providing people with ideas, um, that they can use to solve their language problems. So I'm not thinking about specific language problems, um, like, you know, I don't know how to say this in in German. Um, but more kind of fundamental problems relating to the learning process.

Right. Well, I I agree. I think that producing any kind of content helpful to language learners would be a form of coaching, and I like that there are a lot of coaches out there who can, uh, share ideas and and try and and spread the the love of of and I guess the belief. Everything starts with the belief that you can actually do it, you know, if if you didn't believe that you could learn French on your own, then you'll never do it because that just becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, right?

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, hopefully, hopefully.

Yeah, I think that's a good that's a good description of that. Um, so yeah, it's a course, which is basically about how I learn languages, or how to learn languages effectively. Um, and it's focused on precisely that building habits, managing your time so that you can fit language learning around your schedule, setting goals, um, and then specific strategies for learning vocabulary, um, improving your reading, writing, speaking, um, so kind of some more kind of practical actionable tips there as well.

A little bit of everything.

Awesome. And I'll link that up, uh, actualfluency.com/LLP. Why not? That's easy to remember.

Oh, thank you. Thank you.

So people can, uh, can go directly.

Thank you.

And, um, what kind of challenges do you have when you want to create a course that helps people to learn every language in the world and and what kind of when you're going through it, you must it must have been tough to go back to remember how you used to struggle with it or, you know, how you used to think years ago, or did you have to rely on other people's experiences to the people who you were helping, you were coaching. Did you kind of include their problems and try to solve them? Or how did you actually go about creating it?

I think, um, the the important thing to recognize is that everyone is different, and there is no single right way to learn a language. And I think we we probably both agree on that. Um, so everyone is different, and obviously, everyone has different challenges. So, uh, when I was learning the languages that I, um, that I've attempted to learn in my life, you know, every time I I came up against a different obstacle. Um, the the most recent language I've been learning is Japanese, and that's a completely new new journey for me. Um, it's it's a very different it's it's probably my favorite language actually. And I think it's precisely because there are so many different problems. And I think that gives me a bit of inspiration in terms of, you know, what could be the problems that other learners might be encountering when learning this language.

Yeah.

Well, well, that's a that's almost a trick question, isn't it? Because I can't talk about the things that I don't know I know.

Oh, I see. Okay.

The problem is what you're talking about is a difference between active and passive, uh, memory. Or maybe even just between knowing something and not knowing something. But, so I, you know, if I wanted to, well, I've certainly had experiences where I where I've said, I used to know this word. Yeah. And now I don't. Um, like if you're testing a flash card or something, and it says whatever, tree. And I'm like, I I I swear I used to know how to how to say this.

Yeah.

Yeah, but I think I think it's it's a problem that, you know, we can we can attempt to address, uh, as part of the learning process. And I think, you know, one of the ways of of addressing it is really incorporating practice, uh, so you know, one in into learning, in so making passive learning into active learning by, you know, making sure that when you learn a word, you don't just learn a word. You learn a sentence, for example, and you know how to use it straight away. And then you say it. That's a good tip.

Yeah.

Exactly. And, um, what what a sentiment to to finish this, uh, this episode on, uh, I really, you know, I I probably said this before in previous episodes that to the listeners out there, that I really like to discuss kind of the basics of language learning because I think sometimes they get overlooked, and sometimes people say, well, do I need to, uh, do I need to wait 3.7 hours between renewing flash cards, or do I need to wait 4.2? And I'm like, just do the damn flash cards. Don't worry about it, you know. So, for me, it's really nice to bring it back to the basics and just, you know, kind of talk about these basic human fallacies, these basic, uh, psychological, um, flaws, basically, that we all have, and and and and build on them to fluency.

Yeah.

Uh, yeah. So, uh, if you'd like to read the blog, it's, uh, fiveminutelanguage.com. Uh, so it's digit five. Fiveminutelanguage.com. Uh, and you can also find me find me on Facebook, um, just by searching Five Minute Language. Um, it should come up. I'm on Twitter as well, but I don't want to kind of spread myself too thin. So, let's just stick to those two locations.

All right.

Uh, but yeah, thank you very much for having me on the podcast, Kris, and it's been really great talking to you.

Very welcome, very anytime. And it's good to, uh, see you in around the world as well and and whenever the opportunity comes up.

Yeah, hopefully, hopefully.

All right. Well, have a great evening and, uh, see you around.

Yeah, thank you very much. And you, too.

Cheers.

Cheers. Bye.

Thank you so much for listening to The Actual Fluency Podcast. If you want to come on to the podcast and share your language learning story, don't hesitate to apply on actualfluency.com/guest. See you in the next one.