I tell stories about language learning through the numbers, one word at a time.
After learning 10,000 German words, I'm here to bring language learning tips inspired by data.
For language learning apps, I've used Anki for years to build flashcards and familiarity with German and Hebrew along with other topics. I've gone through the "learn German for beginners" process, well past the A1 or A2 level and hope to share how to get through B1 or B2 to native speaker levels of fluency. I've read books, watched movies, listened to podcasts and binged shows in my target languages. Let data-driven insights help you build a study plan.
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I've actually done this before with Spanish and Japanese and got different results. Albeit I've gone well over 100 days and more into several years, here's what happened. I used to watch A LOT of anime, Japanese dramas, and play video games in Japanese. It helped me get used to hearing words and phrases, but I never became fluent, and I didn't understand proper grammar. On the other hand, I've read Spanish a lot. For some friends who struggled with English, I'd ask them to text me in Spanish. As long as it was written, I could understand most of what's said. However, I couldn't speak it or listen to it because I'm not used to hearing Spanish at the pace of a native speaker. This continued for a long time (well over two years for both). I didn't really interact with the two languages, but rather I was more like a spectator. Eventually, I took classes to learn Spanish. Being in a setting that encourages interaction accelerated my learning. I could apply what I knew previously with ease. After about three months, I was able to hold conversations with native speakers. All of this being said, I'd like to bring up one more detail. I don't have any friends who know English as their native language. They all learned English through media: TV, video games, KZread, Twitch etc. Interacting in communities with English is how they learned. Only one friend took classes, formal or not. So it can be done. Someone can definitely learn a language by watching media as long as you're also interacting with others who speak the language.
Can you do one about Anime? It's a common thought that Anime Japanese is not real Japanese, but as someone who watches a lot of anime and actually learned the language to an advanced level I have the thought that it is almost the same, but I'm curious how close it is.
Ok, tell me the truth how many languages do you have a copy of Harry Potter in?
The knowledge of a word is not the same as the ability to translate it into your native language.
I think anything can help if makes you keep watching, it's the consistency the most important thing and is so much more easy continue if you really like and want watch
This video hits close to home. 3 years ago, when I started learning English seriously in order to start college, I was stuck for a while in the beginner stage. I tried learning advanced stuff but couldn't for the life of me to learn anything useful. Then, one day, I saw my younger siblings watching the arabic version of phineas and ferb. At that moment, I got the idea: What if I watch the original English version. At the time, I thought of it as last ditch effort to learn english that I would have to slog through or I would end up joining an arabic university, which I wasn't looking for. But after starting the show, I was impressed, it was actually fun and I enjoyed watching it a lot. After finishing phineas and ferb, I watched spongebob and a few other shows. This step was really important in my language learning journey as it transferred me from learning English as a subject to understanding it mentally without thinking about grammar and other stuff. A few months after that, I took the IELTS exam, and I got 6.5, which I was very proud of. So, yes, I think learning English from cartoons is a really good method if you're open minded about it and enjoy your journey while doing it.
Interesting video. I just wanted to comment on what you said at the end about picking in advance tomorrow's input. From personal experience it's super helpful as you avoid all the distractions of scrolling in platforms like KZread and you cut straight to the videos you want to watch. A separate watchlist dedicated to one target language helps even more towards that direction👌
Ive had access to eurpean kids tv channels growing up in the middle east (the power of cable) so i watched SpongeBob in different languages, and it definitely helped me learn a lot of foreign words all thanks to the dialogue's pacing and colorful visuals. it definitely made me interested in learning more languages and now that I'm studying japanese I'm still using SpongeBob and it's japanese dub to learn more words and phrases haha!
Where was your data about slower speech, or pauses, or the increased comprehensibility provided by visual gags? You provide basically one piece of data, that isn't all that much on its own given that you learn from kids' and adults' media at the same rate, and then extrapolate everything else out of that.
I like this idea. I just need to find a show that I like.
So you're telling me I now have an excuse to watch all the SpongeBob episodes that were ever made?
Where do ypu find kids shows dubbed in your target language but wkth English subs.
WOW thank you!
i want to learn korean. if i find where to watch/stream spongebob in korean, i’d be happy to be a real life test subject for this.
www.youtube.com/@NickKorea See you back here in 100 days 😛
@@OneWordataTime1 i’d love to, but it seems there’s no official captions in korean or english so i can compare languages & make note of new words. i could certainly try just by audio alone, but that might slow the process a lot 😅
@@wrainb0 I just tested out the Language Reactor chrome extension for Spongebob on KZread and was able to have Korean + English (including Korean transliteration if that's helpful!). No pressure to actually do the challenge but there should be a way for you to immerse in a way that's helpful!
As an anglophone who learnt Spanish and now at level C1 starting from 2016, my best advice is to watch your favourite shows/film in the language you want to learn (since you know what it's about you're just hearing a new way to describe those concepts) and DEFINITELY watch children shows (Peppa pig, SpongeBob, bluey, ect) it helps SO much.
אהבתי, תודה!
This is a very nice video (unlike the Sponge Bob one)! You actually did the experiment and it was interesting to follow. Congrats on the success🎉 I'd like to note that you made your input comprehensible by: 1) Studying words 2) Having English subtitles Simply watching Sponge Bob in Polish most likely wouldn't work. I watched Easy German and it also helped me
Hi One Word at a Time, I have really enjoyed watching your videos and found them very insightful. For this video essay, I was wondering how long the steep hill would persist if you looked at learned words (greater than twenty exposures) rather than new words alone. Do you have any insight on this? Also, did you use a morphological analyzer or consider all forms of the word as different words completely? I can't wait to see your next video.
for those finnish learners like me wizard or a wizard in finnish is velho! its my favorite word lol
Finnish harry potter is guality one, it has a lot of funny words
Should i turn on subtitles when watching to keep learning ?,,,,,,,,,,
As someone who learning a language with not to much resources, thank you for these videos. You are helping me think of creative ways to achieve results!
It's definitely a valid strategy. I was able to learn Japanese and speak at an N5 level after 3 years of watching just anime (albeit a lot of it). That was in 2020. Now I've made a lot of Japanese friends and can comfortably have day-to-day conversations. I would say formal teaching I took later on contributed maybe 15% to my overall ability. I can barely read or write though, which has caused a lot of awkwardness in restaurants when I ask for an English menu.
I grew up in the States and in China 50/50 (in that order.) Catching up to the local language when I moved to Mainland China after middle school in the boondocks of the Midwest was a real struggle bus. Long story short, I actually went ham on watching shows like SpongeBob dubbed in Mandarin (and other native shows) to pick up my proficiency. Worked out pretty well. Would love to reach out and offer anecdotal feedback on the video topic. Bless. Incidentally, the Mandarin dub of SpongeBob was of a Taiwanese variant. Certain words like 乐色桶 vs 垃圾桶 kinda gave away to my classmates just exactly where I was getting my extracurricular education lol.
One of the most underrated language learning channels out there. You deserve 1 million subs instead of those “KZread polyglots”.
I do wonder if there's a measurable difference between watching a show you've never seen before vs. one you've seen a thousand times. It seems to me like the latter would make picking up new words easier, since your foreknowledge of what the characters are talking about should help you establish the context of those new words very quickly.
IF YOU ARE TRYING TO *RELEARN* A LANGUAUGE: Set all your netflix and amazon shows to that language, its crazy how fast this works.
I don't know about kids.. bt I do know that adults can learn fluency by watching movies in the desired foreign language and they will catch own . Especially movies with subtitles too to help them understand better mostly for beginners... I recommend Immersive translate to generate the subtitles for you
I exposed my 3 year old daughter to Sophia the First and was shocked by how much I was learning.
When I was a kid we only had German tv (I am Dutch). Over the years my brothers and I learnt German by only watching tv and we would have full blown German conversation with one another, but my parents didn't believe us. Until 1 day a couple who knew German visited and we had very long conversation. The couple were amazed at our German speaking skills and couldn't believe we learnt all that from tv. Unfortunately we switched cable and didn't use any German so it all faded away.
For point 1, about building intuition. You say, if more than 3 seconds per card, hit Again. 1) using base review settings, this would quickly put you into "ease hell". Basically, when you hit Again, Anki gives the card a demerit. As a card accumulates demerits, Anki shows it at a higher frequency. If you only use Good to pass and if you don't use FSRS, then demerits are essentially permanent. As you hit Again over and over after 3 seconds, you accumulate enough permanent demerits on the card that you'll see it much more often than necessary, increasing your review time with no additional benefit. The basic maxim is that Agains are expensive and should be used as sparingly as possible 2) if you want to do the method anyhow, you can go to review settings, "automatically reveal answer", set for 3 seconds, set auto timeout answer to Again. Love your channel, have been binging you for the last hour. Each time you say a good point, I think "there's no way he can top this", then you say another good point 30 seconds later. Thanks
Could you share your Anki deck? I'm having a hard time finding a good one for Polish.
I'd love it if your experiments could be carried out by a team of researchers with proper randomizations and controls. Alas, there are only so many language learners as analytic and method-loyal as you (and I, for that matter).
muslim or jew?
Jew
I've learnt English watching cartoon network. I'm Romanian
"A feel for the music of the Polish language." That's a really nice way to say "szczść" xD
i learned my second language mostly ONLY BY SPONGE BOB. (my first and second language are slavic so they are similar). So, it helped me go to school and study in my second language till age of 6