I can attest that going to another country doesn't mean you will learn that language. My oldest son went to China for a year to teach English. He did not come back speaking Chinese. It's likely that I will end up speaking more than he does. At least for now. However, the 2 takeaways for _me_ in learning a new language are to learn pronunciation first, then whatever else (vocabulary) you feel necessary. Multiple languages won't begin to work or be understandable for you until you know at least one second language fluently. Once you do new languages become progressively easier.
I'm glad that I'm real life language learning is not a competition. I learnt languages only in school or college (foreign languages degree). Every time it seemed like a competition. Either I couldn't have the proper pace to take all my exams in time or I got people jealous of my speed of understanding. It was bad at all times.
Yeah the irrational passion to learn languages. I say this to language teachers sometimes and they don't get it. They think everyone needs a good logical reason to learn a language such as for their job or to talk to their girlfriend/wife. Quite frankly I will put my money on the irrational person to excel over the rational person.
@@storylearning music indeed is an example. im very much interested in learning a little bit of korean, japanese and thai for singing only for now. not everyone has the same reasons to learn a language❤️you’re right! also, love the video! very different from every video ive seen!
I resonate a lot with this. Many people ask why I’m so dedicated to learning different languages. I truly could never tell them the exact reason, there’s just something so compelling about understanding how they function.
I used to watch 小马's videos when I was first starting out in Chinese, and they were a great source of motivation! But the main thing that I have come to understand is that everyone has their own definition of fluency. For some, it is the ability to have simple conversations with people, or it is the ability to appreciate a text in the original language, or it is to culturally understand the people of that language. All you need to do is find your 'why' of language learning and stick to the essence of that 'why.' There is a lot of comments here that 小马 is starting to overstate his work, but I feel that if there is one thing that he sells, it is that language learning should be fearless and open-hearted. And that is such an important lesson that we can learn from him. He has clearly found his definition of fluency and has been faithful to it.
@@storylearning can u make a video about some of the LL apps like babbel and online offers like italki and give your own opinion on what could give people a headstart without having the chance to travel or talk to natives. I speak German English Spanish Romanian and Portuguese and was going for French next. Any tips?
In my experience it has helped alot to use a little time, like 10-15 minutes on Anki a day, but using the rest of the time for immersing. It makes learning new vocabulary really effective.
@@mutton_man Watching, reading and listening. When you're new to the language you should find someone who make content for learners, so someone who speaks clearly and relatively slow. When you're watching something you should turn on subtitles (most beginner creators add subtitles). It will take a very long time to understand native speech like a native, but don't worry, you get better with time. I know it's hard sometimes, but you should try to not worry too much when you don't understand something when watching and listening although I do it regularly when reading. This is not a problem when you use a reader.
@@TheRockstarFreak9 I bought a mandarin course on udemy. I've completed hsk 1&2 and I've started hsk 3. I struggle when mandarin speakers speak quickly I have to pause the video after each sentence to work out what they are saying. I tried watching a kids programme, pepa pig, in mandarin. They speak so quick I can't understand most of it. I struggle to translate quick enough in my head. Is there a program that you watched to help you as a beginner? Also do read in traditional mandarin or Pinyin?
@@mutton_man Yeah, it takes a looong time to develop a fluid understanding of speech. I would either learn words with pinyin first and characters after, or look at pinyin and the character at the same time. I have been using lingq, which in my opinion works great as you see the pinyin on top of the character. You also hear how the words are pronounced when you press on them. So what I would do is that I would go through the transcription of something relatively easy and translate each and every word. Slowly work your way to the next episode when you feel you want to listen to something new. You should also listen to the audiofile on top while reading. In lingq there is a course called ministories, which are great because there is lots of repetition. When you're doing chores or working out or something you should try to listen as much as possible. Listen on repeat to the point where you're at in the course. If you do this you will see progress, but be patient. Again, don't worry when you're listening and don't understand. This is completely normal. When it comes to the speed I don't think you should worry too much about that either as long as you're repeating what you listen to and look at the transcript. If you use lingq I actually don't think you need anki either, unless you really want to. When you get a little more intermediate you can follow the advice I gave earlier, and just expose yourself to a lot of intermediate content without too much repetition (Although you should still do some). Hope this helps, and good luck!
I studied Chinese in High School for 3 hours a day, Monday through Thursday. It was good, but what really helped me become fluent was complete immersion. I had a friend who had moved here from China who stayed with my family for about 6 months, & at the time she didn't know very much English. So I was translating between her & my family, & of course conversating with her each day. When I eventually moved to China, I was set. I was even dreaming in Chinese when I lived there! :) Immersion is where it's at.
Great vid. The whole comprehensible input route has been the best way to go for me. I took 4 years of portuguese in high school and it wasn't very practical. I've been learning french for 4 months with comprehensible input and I've learned and understand more french than I do in portuguese. Your French short stories book has been a big help.
Love your video. I am a Peruvian living in the US fully fluent in English. I also speak french and portuguese. I also play de violin every week and .... I am a doctor. The key to do all I do is by taking advantage of every single minute of the day. I literally go to bed every night with my brain hurting... but happy!
"It's by stuff like you do in your course .." well, glad to hear Xiaoma say that. Olly Richards' courses are the most sensible thing out there. "Guided" comprehensible input to get over the beginner hump. Great stuff!
First of all, I have nothing negative to say about Ari, his Chinese is good from what I hear from his videos and I'll take that at face value. I just find the approach interesting, I took much the same approach of trying to speak Chinese as much as possible and not dedicating as much time to memorising vocabulary, reading etc. And the approach did work well for me, by the time I came out of university I had a very good level of spoken Chinese, I went back to live in China and could navigate around freely, do everything I needed to do using the language and I was able to make basic conversation upon meeting Chinese people. That's where it stopped however and I've been stuck at this upper intermediate B2 level for years now, making small progress here and there but I would find myself having the same conversations over and over again, and I don't mean just "Where are you from and why do you speak Chinese etc." I found that I wasn't able to have interesting conversations and therefore make meaningful friendships in Chinese (made plenty of Chinese friends, but most speak very good English) I'm now going back to flashcards, doing lots of reading, watching plenty of RUclips in Chinese (with Chinese subtitles), most importantly in things I'm interested in such as politics with channels like 攝徒日記Fun Tv and 斯坦説中文 (Polish guy with fantastic Mandarin by the way) and listening to Taiwanese indie and rock bands like 草東沒有派對 and I'm finding my level is improving rapidly. Anywho the purpose of this rant isn't to discourage anyone from Xiaoma's approach I think it's a good way to become conversationally fluent in the language, I'm just putting this out there for anyone who finds themselves in the same position as me, you might have to change your methods once you reach a certain plateau!
I also have a similar history as yours, been stuck at upper intermediate level for years and realized that casual conversations is not going to help me improve further.. What I do now is try to watch more TV shows, even drama, also pay attention to how Chinese people speak and try to replicate, not just the usual Foreigner speaking Chinese trying to get around..
Let's be honest even in the native language a lot of people don't have 'high level conversation'. In my native language I only talk about foods, weather, and someone's ugly clothes. In the internet I can find higher level information if I want to, but most people just go to Facebook and tiktok and most of the contents are not high level at all.
I vaguely remember coming across this video where the person in the video was talking about how she managed to keep Korean vocabulary in her head and practice her speaking. She tried to think out loud as much as she could. She lived in South Korea and sometimes when she was at a cafe or in a shop or whatever, occasionally she would have someone come over to her to help find the right word for something or help with her pronunciation
"how babies learn is not by vocab lists" well, true, but then babies have about 10 years or even 12 of 100% full immersion all day until you can really have a meaninful conversation with them! It's not efficient.
Well babies also don't have the mental capability to learn languages as fast as a fully grown adult with the same recourses. Only because it takes them 10 years with full immersion doesn't mean immersion isn't the best way to learn how to speak a language.
@@coin5207 Except that immersion isn't the best way to learn languages. Just think about how many Americans have difficulties with separating their, there, they're, theirs, and there's. How many write "should of". Think about misheard song lyrics. Think about all these people on social media being mocked for having misunderstood some idioms. Lasanya, Philly Menyong, synonym toast...
@@Flyingsearat They aren't. They have the highest neuroplasticity but don't have the mental capacity to understand more than simple grammar or words. And they don't have any previous language to draw on for understanding linguistic concepts or pronounciation. An adult who is fully focused on language learning can be fluent in 6 months, depending on the language. Have you ever met a baby that is fluent in anything?
Learning Chinese is a very rewarding experience! I urge everyone to give it a try, or at least take a look at some videos to learn more about the language! Fluency is a fairly subjective term, and I think that if you're reading this and are putting in the right amount of work, you could easily speak Chinese much better than Xiaomanyc.
well, Chinese isn't for everyone. I need some kind of motivation or something that interests me to learn a language, currently im leaning Japanese because I gained interest from there culture and Anime so I decided I want to live in Japan for at least a few years. That gave me motivation to learn Japanese. Can I ask you why you're interested in Chinese?
@@ammar8406 Great question! I guess at first it was simply to learn a completely different language and learn about a different culture. After learning it for a while and going to China many times, I fell in love with the country and the language. I eventually did a master's degree in Teaching Chinese as a foreign language so that I could teach others about it and eventually started a RUclips Channel to do some videos online to help more people learn and learn about Chinese/Mandarin.
@@SimpleChineseRUclips Oh, do your currently live in China or do you plans to move to China? Also what's your level in Chinese ( beginner, intermediate, advanced or fluent? )
@@ammar8406 I've been living in China for almost 10 years and have completed the HSK6 test about 5 years ago. I can confidently say I have reached fluency and often "trick" people on the phone haha
I love that you pointed out that you can live in a country and not learn the language (especially if you’re a native English speaker since so much of the world is catered to that, imo). I’ve seen a couple of language learners talk about “wasted time” in Korea cause they thought “oh, I’ll just go there for a year or two and be good at it”😂 They said you STILL have to make the effort and put yourself out there to try and get better, since there’s so much English there (especially if you’re at an international school or a company that doesn’t make you have to learn the language).
I would say that it really depends on the level you're at. Like xiaoma can get around in China and more or less express himself fluently and say everything he thinks. So he might be anywhere between B2 - C1/C2 (Common European Reference levels). But as someone who is reading law in her second language (after a few years of learning it), it's different when you're a perfectionist who deals with extremely complicated subject matter that lots of natives have trouble with. Especially one that relies on subtle nuances in language. So I'd say a lot of the negative comments here are from people who are trying to achieve a higher level at which, in my opinion, you really need both memorisation and immersion (the latter should come super naturally if you're at a C1 level). But that doesn't mean that anyone starting out in a language shouldn't focus on immersion. They absolutely should because it's all about familiarising yourself with the culture, the sounds, and the way people think, before you can get into the nitty gritty details of something like the difference between a tragedy and a travesty.
Excellent point. As others said, it's about how you define fluency. Xiaomanyc seems to take the perspective that fluency is being able to comfortably live life immersed in his target language. If someone defines fluency as being able to understand the level of nuance required for legal debate, then very few people ever achieve fluency in their native language.
When those that get frustrated about not understanding or knowing grammar in a foreign language, do you know or understand all the vocabulary, grammar, or even completely understand everything in your native language? Don’t be frustrated.
@J G This often skews conversations on fluency. I know I'm a beginner, but I've had Japanese people over state my ability to me. Polite (Asian) cultures will do this to express that they are somewhat impressed / appreciative. This is expected and the correct response invariably seems to be telling them that they're wrong.
@@UmamiPapi Nihongo jouzu! Yeah, they will tell you how good your language is sheerly out of surprise. Even if all you said was "hello" or "excuse me" if you said it somewhat competently with the correct pitch accent it is so surprising to them. Even if my overall proficiency isn't that strong, I have always enjoyed languages in general and put a huge emphasis on correct pronunciation above all 😅 this sometimes gives people the impression I am more fluent than I actually am.
One other thought that I wanted to add is that you’re not just learning a language, it’s important to learn the culture and the customs and the many nuances of the people that you want to be able to communicate with. It is scary at first but it becomes really fun because you basically become one of them. it’s impossible to describe that kind of connection that you make when you fully embrace another culture and language fully. But it is incredibly rewarding
Great video. I've been watching Chinese Dramas for two years. I decided to learn the language this year. I have recruited my children to learn speaking Chinese so it can reinforce my learning too.
Immersion is helpful with a basis of pronunciation and basic sentences / grammar. You need something to build on. Babies start from 0, but also take many years to get to a decent level in their native tongue.
My advice, get away from your English there. There is no way someone spends 3 years in a country and isn't able to order a coffee, absolutely no way. Once more, force yourself, and get away from your English, as much as possible. You will see the difference.
I saw the video you did on how Mormon missionaries learn the language so well and so quickly. I myself did that a few years ago and I was fortunate enough to go to the Philippines. The Philippines is highly underrated! Anyway, the way he described his approach to learning in this video was very similar to my approach to learning the language. It was more than just living in another country but what I was doing all day every day was talking to people and you know trying to help them and teach them about God. But at the root of it it was trying to connect with people and share some thing that would apply to them specifically. because I was trying to connect with people all day every day and I had a lot of those every day experiences and I was excited and driven as well. But you learn very quickly that people are pretty repetitive in the kinds of conversations they have. It was a actually pretty easy to pick up and learn all the typical questions and phrases. I asked a lot of questions! I would always try and ask about phrases or specific words that were unfamiliar to me. If there wasn’t time in a situation I would just write it down the way it sounded to me and ask somebody about it later. It was an incredible two years of my life! I definitely need to go back to the Philippines again and I just love Filipinos now!
Thanks for sharing and for definitely for the reminder re:going to the country some people are so dumb with this they think you’ll automatically just learn it ‘from the streets’
The mindset is spot-on. Even as a native Chinese myself, anecdotally I would say that learning writing Chinese has a very steep diminish of return; The strokes are hard to memorize, practices took years even for us since age 7 all the way up to age 18, and the worst aspect would be that you tended to forget how to write them in your later life even if you were Chinese, 30% the characters I learned now I couldn't write them down at all. By the advancement of modern Pinyin system, there's probably little point for a mastery of writing Chinese .... unless lest you were into calligraphy or something....
A million thanks to you for this brilliant video !!! 👌❤👍Great job !!! 👍I totally agree with everything you said. Your approach to analysis of his methods is great. It seems to me I've searched for this information for so long. I've understood from the video some things I did correctly but I didn't do them for fluency a lot. I love your channel and your way of teaching. Keep it up !!! ❤👍👏 Could you please make a video with Anna? Tell about her strategy how she became fluent in English. She has her RUclips channel "English Fluency Journey". She is Ukranian but she speaks English fluently and clearly. She has achieved this great result for a year or two years. I don't remember exactly. Thank you in advance.😊
Very interesting, his "get ready for the conversations I'm likely to have" is pretty much how I learned Japanese (that, and noting all the new words and phrases that came up in those conversations). Similarly I was just interested in conversation so didn't put much into learning to read, though in the last few years I have paid attention to that and now can read novels , newspapers etc with only occasional dictionary use and /or confusion. That said, I've noticed a significant jump in my speaking ability from reading more, so I kind of regret taking that approach (no harm done tho, I got there in the end) and would recommend learners get stuck into reading earlier, say once they have crossed the first hump of being able to converse easily. I'm similarly ambivalent about anki, I'm finding it useful as a beginner in uchinaguchi, but abandoned it before I'd really nailed reading in Japanese as it's just such a chore (and as such, not effective) - my conclusion is that, as he says, the natural repetition of input is far better because real content is far more engaging. Anyway great video, very interesting perspective on getting to conversational fluency.
So did you start learning to speak before anything? Just purely from immersion and remembering things? I’ve been learning Japanese lately, only a few days but I’m really confused on what direction to even go. I have read and tried to immerse as much as possible but I don’t feel like I’m learning much. How did you begin when you were learning?
@@rainbowsixnews9373 I recommennd immersion, probably for several months before you start trying to speak (tho there's no harm in trying earlier) soon you'll start to pick out words, look them up in a dictionary, that'll start your vocabulary building, Using a textbook audio as immersion can be a good start as it'll have the meaning in the textbook and the audio will be pretty accessible and "basic". Um, incidentally I do a bilingual Japanese/English podcast, also on youtube, search "tensaimon" and you'll find it, you might find it useful as it's bilingual. Good luck!!
I believe the key words came at the very end of the video, you must have an "Irrational passion" in order to not only achieve fluency in a language but also to be the best at anything. Most people aren't irrational like those who smash the ceilings to reach their goals, the supreme misfortune is to believe that they are "just exceptional" albeit some are, but not the majority.
@@liqritrs8391 Fluent he was after the immersion program where he had a sociable level. That is usually when you speak fluently but can't yet express more specific thoughs and emotions very well. He now is thou on a C2 level most likely so that usually takes a lot more and is for many not even the goal. B2 to C1 is already a really great level that will give you a great freadom in a language when talking but also consuming content
Personally, from my experience, immersion is the fastest way to learn a language. I was 7 and came from the Philippines to New Zealand basically not knowing any English apart from yes, no or thank you. I had so much opportunity to take in so much input in school, that it took like under a year to become conversationally fluent.
Funny, that... "I spend hours with Anki memorizing words" - "you don't need to memorize words, you learn words naturally". So... how did he learn the vocabulary? He had a list of sentences and memorized them. *rolling eyes* There's no f-ing difference there. Also, we don't know how far he would have come if he didn't spend any time with Anki. We don't know how much memorizing words helped him further on. It was the same thing with the guy learning Japanese. He, too, spend time with Anki, and now says he shouldn't have. How would he know? I learned the English, Swedish, and German verb conjugation through memorizing lists, and right now I have a better grip of that than some native speakers. I have learned all my vocabulary - this, here, that I'm using right here, right now - English is my second language, and my first is Finnish, and I'm 50+, so not so much being surrounded by English when I was growing up. I would say there's nothing wrong with my English and vocabulary attained through rote memorizing. So, please, stop disparaging flashcards and rote memorizing. And I hate the "natural, like children" learning "method". We aren't children. It takes some 5 years for kids to learn languages, children cannot attack language learning with determination, they can't focus on learning what they need, they will have to accept to learn what they are being taught with no possibility, ability, or even knowledge to influence the subject matter. This is why kids make mistakes like "the cat eated lots of mouses". They also don't understand that languages have things like that, so it can be difficult to accept that it's not eated, it's ate. It's not mouses, it's mice. But it's not hice, it's houses. Or that it's many goats, but not many sheeps. Frankly, that's just something people have to memorize.
The issue with this guy is he's exaggerated and distorted the time involved. I used to follow him before he became famous. He's always been into click bait and he's too comfortable stretching the truth, for my taste. His story has changed over the years. He's not exactly the most straight forward or honest guy out there.
I know people referred to him, but when I saw his clickbait videos, like how he became fluent in Spanish in 20 days, was just mindboggling. In the video he also claimed, he can speak fluently about many subjects, despite the video being heavily edited. It is obviously bullshit, but there are people who actually believe it.
@@alanguages there are numerous videos of him speaking very fluent Spanish at length unedited. His skills are impressive for the short period of time (during the pandemic) that he’s been studying. His recent video in the Mayan village is excellent and very entertaining. He’s talented for sure. Can you match him on all the languages he attempts? I doubt it.
@@robgrant7683 Do you actually and honestly believe Xiaoma became fluent in Spanish in ONLY 20 days? I am sure I can match him in Spanish, since I lived in Central America. Edit: If you are unaware, some native Indonesian speakers have stated Xiaoma's Indonesian is awful.
@@alanguages it doesn’t matter. He can communicate with people in a natural setting which is his goal. To use language to break down the barriers between people. His recent video in the Mayan village is a perfect example. It doesn’t matter whether you rate it as “fluent” because clearly he is communicating just fine with everyone he speaks with. You seem to be completely missing the point of what he’s trying to do. Yes, some of the video titles are a bit of clickbait, but who cares. If you watch the videos he’s very clear on his goals and is obviously meeting his objectives. I find it very entertaining and so do the people he’s conversing with, and that’s all that matters.
@@robgrant7683 A BIT of clickbait. No the titles like fluent Spanish in 20 DAYS is utter bullshit. Edit: By the way you stated his Spanish is VERY fluent. I take it for you to judge you are implying yourself to be fluent in Spanish. I am asking if that is what you are in fact stating? Also you avoided my question, by all of a sudden saying it doesn't matter. I will ask again. Do you actually and honestly believe Xiaoma became fluent in Spanish in ONLY 20 days? You apparently missed the point of my post, and it is not me rating whether I think Xiaoma is fluent or not. My point is that Xiaoma did NOT become fluent in Spanish in 20 DAYS.
I've thought about the topic of early speaking a lot and did a lot of research on the topic. From hearing about how others learned to speak at a high level, and from my own experience, speaking early is just not crucial in acquisition. In my experience learning Japanese, I didn't really find trying to speak early helped me understand Japanese any faster. It was just more stressful because I didn't know enough words of grammar to be easily understood. I just didn't really speak Japanese to other people for about 3 years of learning except to some Japanese exchange students a few times at my university. I just focused on immersion and writing for my output practice for 3 years. My speaking ability had to be practiced separately from my ability to understand the language as the listening and pronunciation are separate from the ability to comprehend meaning. Speaking is the hardest skill and forcing beginners to do the hard stuff first is just frustrating and causes people to quit learning. I would say that unless someone is already living in the country where the target language is spoken, focusing on reading, writing, and listening will make speaking much easier later as they'll already have a foundation of vocabulary and grammar to build spoken sentences with. From there, the learner can focus most of their attention to accent and cadence instead of trying to remember words or grammar. Ari really likes speaking because it's active recall, but I'd argue that writing (or typing these days) is just as active and is much less stressful for learners as they have longer to think about what they want to say without awkward pauses. Plus they can look things up if they are completely stuck. It's a good training for learning to speak as the learner learns to write more quickly. They will naturally increase the words per minute they can think in, which is very useful for being able to speak at a natural rhythm. Once I started speaking regularly, I had to fix some problems, but it didn't take long to to fix them as I could isolate the problems in my mind and focus on fixing them. I definitely think speaking is an important skill to do well eventually, but like any skill that's built on the foundation of other skills, jumping in too early will just be overwhelming and confusing. It's like saying you have to play basketball in the NBA from the beginning to learn basketball. In physical tasks we wouldn't expect beginners to do the hardest stuff first, and it's no different for language learners. Take the time to learn the basics and work up from there to be able to do the hard stuff well.
Alright......XiaoMa is speaking like HSK4 Chinese, which is impressive and could be called fluent but barely. Many Polyglots like him swear by their immersion methods "oh just read books and talk to people and listen to radio etc etc." but that only works if you already have a decent chunk of vocab. Comprehensible input is a term for a good reason. I can believe that they made extremely rapid progress using these immersion methods AFTER going through the slog of memorizing vocab in school or via anki. You NEED that foundation, you cant just start watching a historical drama in Chinese with 0 language background and magically understand the words from context unless youre a savant. You familiar with the bottle neck and break through? 瓶颈然后突破， you can be accumulating a massive amount of quantitative progress and vocabulary and grammar etc etc. without any noticeable qualitative shift in your level....that is the bottle neck and youre building up until you finally reach that tipping point where you break through. If you study a language full time for 3 years while living in the country for 2 years you will learn it no question. no secret method there.
@@LibertyMapper Maybe he is HSK6 but i've never seen a video of his where he is speaking at that level. He doesnt speak like other HSK5/6 people that I know. He is certainly far short of his "NEAR NATIVE" claim..
@@josephjoebrown11 To be fair HSK isn’t really a good nor fair way to truly know someone’s Chinese ability. It’s a corrupt and flawed test that doesn’t really test your Chinese comprehension. I’ve taken the tests. Anyone could learn to pass those test and still have shitty mandarin. I do agree with you that he’s not fluent. His consonants, vowels and tone pairs need work.
Also I disagree with saying that reading books talking to people or listening to the radio is only for people who have a foundation in the language. When I started mandarin I learned mandarin through kids books, dramas, textbooks and just speaking to people. I would take what I learned an use it with a native speaker, then if they wanted to correct me to make me sound more fluent, then so be it. You would also be surprised what listening to a podcast or watching a movie in that language a few times can do. The brain is a powerful organ, it will figure things out. Living in the country definitely helps , however it’s not the end all or be all. I know people who can’t even speak mandarin and live in China right now.
I disagree! Partly about Xiaoma level, I agree he speaks pretty basic, though I'm quite sure he could pass HSK5-6 if he sits down some months to prepare. Met enough people who passed HSK6 yet couldn't speak better. However I kickstarted my learning by just warching 8 hours of Chinese Drama a day for 2-3 months with english subs, then went to China for 4 weeks alone trying to only hook up with Chinese. Didn't learn Chinese before (or only a tiny bit - like HSK1-2 level which is 300 words many years before then forgetting it again). Instantly after I was fluent in simple things, and quite a few Chinese told me my Chinese is better than that of people who studied Chinese for 3-4 years at Uni full time course. I've never learned a foundation. Been going to Taiwan around a year overall since (with China closed due to Covid, and living quality higher in Taiwan for me), yet I learned faster while being abroad and watching tons of youtube/youku/bililbili or listening through virtually any chinesepod lessen produced at least once than while actually being in Taiwan. Yeah I cannot read or write at all - and now 5 years in try to learn it by trying to read the subs in Chinese. Not sure this is gonna work - but I hate actual classic learning - no fun. I kinda guess - start with immersion 3-4 months (but not in country but anywhere) then learning those vocabs would be fastest. But there are many ways to learn. And yeah for me it's just part time, besides running my own company. But I try to always listen to Chinese when doing sports to not get out of touch. I can now understand most youtubers in Chinese, get most content from Chiese talk shows, yet I am stuck at that B2-C1 level way too long. Already 1 year into learning my Chinese was better than some Chinese I met who had passed B2 in English and we mostly spoke Chinese. Yet i am very far away from C2 and don't seem to get much closer. So yeah either it's that I spend too little time learning Chinese - or it's that for C2 you will actually need that foundation. Quite often Taiwanese friends are amazed at what I understand, then at other times cannot believe I don't understand something simple. That's missing a foundation - some topics I just skipped as I had no structure at all.
4:16 Languages close to your native tongue, you can just learn some main words and basic grammar and start speaking. Watch how fast he learned Spanish (being so similar to English and already have learned a language). For some languages like Japanese, I'd argue it is better to drill vocab and learn grammar more up front. Reading Japanese or Chinese without drilling is almost impossible, and the grammar of Japanese or Korean is a lot harder to think in when you come from a Germanic language like English or Spanish
First of all I want to say that I personally enjoy your and Xiaoma videos, so, not a hater. Just want to clarify some misunderstood stuff about anki. "Talking and reading is a natural SRS". Yep, it is, and with that you will take a much longer time to reach a high level. 5k words are 98% of what is said/writen so if you want to be more than intermediate in a language you better have a more efficient way of learning vocabulary. Putting it in another way, any method that has you learning vocabulary at any pace will eventually lead to a approximately a b2 level.People that talk about immersing as the holy grail "always" go to the extreme and say objectively wrong stuff like "anki is overvalued", if anything, immersing, as an efficient tool is overvalued. What I mean is that the ratio learning/minute in immersion is so low and yet, people praise it like is magic.
I take your point, but I think what your analysis is missing is that language learning is not simply a question of amassing vocabulary. Yes, you need to get to those 5000 words, but it would be better to go slightly slower, less efficient in your words, but do so through an input or context-based method that teaches you all the other things you need to know about the language.
@@storylearning language learning, of course involves more things that just learning vocabulary, BUT the single most important factor on determining the level of understanding is how many words you know, there is no way around it. You say that there is value on input learning because it teaches you others things you need to know. But what are they that anki cannot teach you more efficiently? Let's remember the 2 key factors in learning: spaced repetition and forceful recall. The first one you cannot control during immersion, things just appear. And secondly, forceful recall, which in reading happens but in listening things just happen too fast for you to have time to recall the not-so-consolidated stuff like words/grammar. One things GREAT about immersion is about consolidating what you already know. So, is immersion efficient in some context? Yes, when you already know lots of stuff but in not enough contexts(how easy you remember stuff will depend on how many contexts of a certain words/grammar structure you know) Hopefully I could explain myself better but I think I did not do it in a efficient manner my guy, sorry haha
My deep interest in learning languages has to do with wanting to communicate with those who speak the language. And I am one of those whose passion to learn Spanish was initially motivated by wanting to speak (flirt ?) with a man from Peru. Turned out he was married to an American woman who was already fluent in Spanish (and presumably flirting too 😁, as they had two adorable children). 🤣
He boats about discussions but never about how many books he read in chinese. I think this would be a better milestone to claim fluency. Also his story is about over a decade, but not sure when fluency was reached. His attitude is definitly a model of self discipline but not sure about the language learning method it-self.
I worked with someone who took French in school and they went to France; she said what she learnt in school was completely useless. That's the problem here in the UK when it comes to teaching languages in schools, they teach just textbook French/Spanish instead of making it more immersive, natural and fun.
This is the first Olly video that i am struggling to agree with. I guess this really depends on why you want to learn a language. Being able to speak but not write well is not an option for me. He says that memorizing vocabulary lists using anki is overrated. Yet he admits to memorizing phrases to prepare for conversations. That's not really fluency. I personally use anki to drill actual phrases that I encounter while talking to natives so that I can memorize them. I don't use it to study individual words out of context. So the problem is not Anki. The key is how it's being used. Lastly, I think that the impact of living in the native speaking country was minimized in this video to make a point. I have been to the country of my target language multiple times and the benefit, especially regarding speaking, can't be matched.
I think these are all interesting points! Just goes to show that there's no "one way" to do it, and the best we can hope for is learn from others and find our own path.
@jazzyeric21, I noticed that also, about how Olly downplayed immersion. Compare a person who studied intensely for three years on their own, never immersed, against someone who went for immersion for two years after one year of intense study, then the comparison will be a noticeable gap between their levels, when talking. On top of that Xiaoma is presumably married to a Chinese woman that gives him the practice of daily speech, for who knows how long.
Before doing full immersion in Italian I learned 1.500 most common words in context using Duolingo and after that in six months I was speaking fluently Italian, so learning vocabulary in a proper way it’s indeed effective
let me say something that year of learning people are talking about is just different,people on the outside dnt know what it is. if you study in English in china it’s a little harder to learn chinese.that one year of chinese is very intense to the extent that it’s impossible to to finish one year without having to speak conversational chinese even if you dnt want to. Classes are from 8am to 5pm most times and every/most people that do the language in class not online can all speak chinese even the laziest. The point is dnt base your journey based on someone who said they did a year of chinese in china what they do in that one year can take you way longer if you do it on your own. That one year of chinese consists of you being in class and prohibited from using any other language apart from chinese from about the 4th week, many of your classmates come from different countries and some can’t speak English at all so the only way of communication is chinese you cannot compare that to studying a whole day by yourself. Not to mention activities in the school, if you dnt do well you have extra classes .And another thing I would say is passing the HSK exam is not complete an evaluation of how good your chinese is .the exams are way easier than real life apart from HSK 6 maybe 5 at times. Learning chinese online and using HSK is like learning English from a British teacher and then later on you have to speak to an Irish with a deep accent when you can have a fluent conversation with them you know your level is high.
Some parallels with my own studies, for sure, though I had no formal education at all. I moved there when I was eighteen years old to study martial arts and also didn't focus on characters for the first several years. Likewise, I used a targeted approach to teach myself, but it was words, rather than sentences because Chinese grammar is almost non-existent. After about three years I became more or less fluent and have continued to improve since then. Being married to a Chinese woman helps, but this didn't happen until later. Try arguing in Chinese and still getting the tones right! Speaking of tones, I spent a lot of time on my pronunciation and tones and it has paid off. It's what really separates people that speak some Chinese and those that excel.
I learnt my first English word in the age of 12, now I am 29, I would say I am fluent in but I just starting adopt my American accent. And I learnt French for 2 years and still I can't do routine dialogue. Am I so not talented at language learning?
Memorizing vocabulary is not fun but it is absolutely necessary when learning a language. Babies learning their first language and adults learning a second language is comparing apples to oranges.
I started learning kanji because I had a desire to write symbols so in average I learned 100 kanji per month. I slowly practiced writing each kanji at least 400 times or about 8 Kanji per day but I had to stop at about 1500 Kanji because I developed tendonitis. I read Wikipedia in Japanese and although I know the kanji of a word sometimes I still don’t know their meaning. For example the word population and entrance have the same kanji but swapped and a different meaning even though the kanji the makes up the word is mouth and person. Anyways I speak zero Japanese and actually can understand Traditional Chinese subtitles better than Japanese because Im a little afraid of Katakana and Hirangana because I don’t know what it means unlike Kanji which I know what it means.
It took me 3 years to get to HSk5... i doubt its humanly possible to learn chinese in 1 year... not to mention learning is one thing.. then you need at least 2000 hours of conversations to practice tones.. After 5 years i still consider myself a B2 at most... If you want to learn a language fluently in 6months -1 year... try norwegian or french..
if you only study for HSK exam, I met someone who made it from 0-HSK6 in 10 months. Then he immediately started writing his PHD thesis in Chinese (a Russian, so not east Asian). But yeah it took him another 6 months of conversation to actually be somewhat fluent - just learning vocab for passing HSK6 doesn't make you talk at all. Also possible to do it the other way round - first immerse and learn to talk, then put down those 6-8 months 10 hours a day to pass HSK6.
i lived twice a half year in Germany i can speak basic but i wasn't surrounded with foreigners so most of the time i used my language or englsih as it was easier to use and i knew just a little more than german. Since than my english not real good but improved a lot and i wish i will reach an C1 level in my life.. And ofc learn other languages as well. :D
Comprehensible input is the secret plain n simple language learning ppl. How can an input be comprehensible?? Simple you have to know what they are saying. If it’s a movie watch it in English once or twice then watch it in the language you’re learning or even a show. Comprehensible input guys get it in your head already. Just keep listening to input you understand and your brain will pick it up no matter the language. Japanese Mandarin it doesn’t matter
@@zakky4175 it could be English dub or just subtitles in English. You just have to know what’s being said first Then turn off the English sub/dub and listen to it again in Korean. You won’t notice at first but your brain will eat it up. Watch tones of Korean shows like that. Then after you get good enough you can start reading or listen to an audiobook. It has to be fun. For example I’m in my first week of learning French and I watched lupin in English first now I’m watching it again in French. I’m telling you it works
@@Trillvil1 Thanks for the reply. 1. should I rewatch it again without subtitles if i don't understand. how many times? 2. should i read online stuff in korean? what if i don't understand what it says should i use a translation? 3. should i memories variety shows/movie sentences until i memories it fully then go to next sentence?
I am a Chinese person who is currently learning English. I am hoping to find a native English speaker or someone who is fluent in English and also learning Mandarin. This way, we can learn from each other and help each other check grammar issues.
Videos like this are cute. But we're not all going to other countries for 1-2 years to get a grasp on the language. One of the best tools I was taught was to put sticky notes around the house with the language - wall, fridge, door, picture, soap, bureau, etc.
I think the top tip is to actually have a goal or enjoy it . I’m British and before studying Chinese , i tried Spanish which should’ve been extremely easy as grandmother moved to the uk and only spoke Spanish and is also regarded as one of the easiest languages to learn as a native English speaker but it was the most hardest, most boring thing ever .
I am a native in Spanish and it might be actually boring for you because culturally it's not very different to English and most of deep Hispanic things are available in English already... In Chinese, however you enter into another dimension@@introvertdude99
I've tried all that. I've spent over a year studying basic vocabulary and I live in China, so yes I have to speak some Chinese to people. I've been stuck at HSK 2 level for years. The truth is that learning a radically different second language comes down to talent. I know talented expats who've never studied in their life and speak fluent Mandarin (maybe not writing) and people who've studied hard and are stuck. I'm afraid talent is the dominant variable in language learning.
I fear you might be succumbing to confirmation bias. In my experience it comes down to hard work and persistence, whether you’re talented or not. Of course it is possible to work hard and get nowhere, but that’s when method becomes an important variable.
@@storylearning I used the methods mentioned to be effective in the video. I could study more but I don't have time for formal lessons as I work a lot. Perhaps I have it but I would probably need an intensive program. Perhaps when I get back to America I can take classes. Learning in China isn't working.
HE LEARN CHINESE FAST, IT IS BECAUSE 1. CHINESE GRAMMAR IS SO EASY 2. CHINESE CHARACTERS ARE CAME FROM SIMPLE PICTURE, THEY ARE DESIGNED LOGICALLY AND YOU JUST KNOW ABOUT 500 COMMON CHINESE CHARACTERS 3. CHINESE VOCABULARY ARE MAINLY BASE ON ABOUT 500 CHINESE CHARACTERS. AFTER YOU KNOW THIS 500 COMMON CHINESE CHARACTERS, THAN YOU CAN HANDLE 90% OF CHINESE VOCABULARY 4. CHINESE VOCABULARY ARE MAINLY BASE ON THE CHINESE LANGUAGE THEMSELF, NOT OTHERS LANGUAGE. INSTEAD, THE ENGLISH VOCABULARY HAVE SO MANY WORDS ARE CAME FROM ANCIENT GREEK AND LATIN
@@liqritrs8391 xiaoma Chinese is very good, but I think laoma Chris or xingyue are better, they are in that level where if they speak to a Chinese person in the phone they might not realize they are foreigners.
Interesting to see how Ari's recommended learning method places a large amount of importance on output while MattvsJapan - certainly when he was younger at least - strongly advocates against it. It's good to get opinions from different people who have achieved huge success learning language(s) so you don't hold treat any single person's opinion as scripture.
Honestly, this mindset can be seen from the result. I speak mandarin pretty well, understand japanese quite a lot, and grew up listening to both languages. Grammar-wise, I might not be able to nitpick matt’s japanese as I can with Ari’s grammar, but i can definitely hear their pronunciation level. As matt values input very much and spent such a long time processing those input, he’s focusing more on mirroring the natives. Mirroring their grammar, word choices, pronunciation, mannerism, cultures, basically everything. Resulting in a close to perfect japanese pronunciation and mannerism. Unless he made a mistake in grammar or vocabs no one can hear the difference between his japanese and a native’s japanese. Whereas Ari focuses more on output, so as we can see, he makes progress from cant say anything to daily conversation level fluency really quickly. But, his chinese pronunciation and mannerism is very off. He has that very heavy english accent in his chinese and a very american mannerism. Just from listening to him speak a few sentences, I know he’s a foreigner. Obviously, both method works, but in my opinion, output focus works well if you’re just aiming for daily conversation fluency and if you have a “i don’t care if i sound bad as long as the other party gets it I’m good” mindset. But if you want to go closer to native level fluency, input based learning is very important. It’s simply because from conversational fluent to close to native there just aint that many books to study from and way too many little aspects books don’t usually cover. The best is just to analyze it yourself from a native’s speech.
Yes but this dude mentioned before that he did a lot of immersion. He said he had head phones in constantly with an mp3 on loop. If i remember right he also listed to tv in Chinese like news and stuff. So it's likely his immersion combined with anki. Were responsible for the majority of his progress. That's probably were most of his and ability came from. Also him going out and speaking gives him even more input listening practice. When natives respond to what he says. Sure you need to practice speaking. But immersion was a huge part of his time spent with the language. He also said he listened to sentences over and over to practice the accent. So his approach was the same as matts in those ways. Only real difference was the speaking practice early on.
I've watching both for a long time while studying Japanese. I've thought about this topic a lot, and I've found that I generally agree with Matt on this topic. From hearing about how others learned, and from my experience, speaking is just not crucial in acquisition. In my experience learning Japanese, I didn't really find trying to speak early helped me understand Japanese any faster. It was just more stressful because I didn't know enough words of grammar to be easily understood. I just didn't really speak Japanese to other people for about 3 years of learning except to some Japanese exchange students a few times at my university. My speaking ability had to be practiced separately from my ability to understand the language as the listening and pronunciation are separate from the ability to comprehend meaning. Speaking is the hardest skill and forcing beginners to do the hard stuff first is just frustrating and causes people to quit learning. I would say that unless someone is already living in the country where the target language is spoken, focusing on reading, writing, and listening will make speaking much easier later as they'll already have a foundation of vocabulary and grammar knowledge to build spoken sentences with. From there, the learner can focus most of their attention to accent, pitch, and cadence instead of trying to remember words or grammar. Ari really likes speaking because it's active recall, but I'd argue that writing (or typing these days) is just as active and is much less stressful for learners as they have longer to think about what they want to say without awkward pauses. Plus they can look things up if they are completely stuck. It's a good training for learning to speak as the learner learns to write more quickly. They will naturally increase the words per minute they can think in, which is very useful for being able to speak at a natural rhythm. Once I started speaking, I had to fix some problems, but it didn't take long to to fix them as I could isolate the problems in my mind and focus on fixing them. I definitely think speaking is an important skill to do well eventually, but like any skill that's built on the foundation of other skills, jumping in too early will just be overwhelming and confusing. It's like saying you have to play basketball in the NBA from the beginning to learn basketball. Take the time to learn the basics and work up from there to be able to do the hard stuff well.
I hate that the only language I'm determined to learn is super hard. Japanese is hard to think in since the different grammar structure, and kanji throws a wrench into reading. Chinese, Spanish, or any other Germanic languages seem so easy to learn, but I'm already 2.5 years into Japanese
I hear you, I studied Japanese for a year before I quit it. It was around 2002, and there were not a lot of materials available to a poor student at the time. I wish you luck! It is hard, but so beautiful.
@@KAIZENURAMESHI I disagree. Anime and manga are popular, but there are tons of movies, music, and books that are never translated. Anyone with enough curiosity can be rewarded with unique experiences whether they visit or not.
One question I do have for you, Olly Richards, is any advice you might have on picking my third language to really dive into. So I’m bilingual and I love learning my second language when I was a missionary. Currently I’m very interested in Several languages and I’ve been working on a handful simultaneously and I enjoy it but I know I would learn one of them much more quickly if I picked one to start with. I know some polyglots like Lindy spends time in several languages but I feel like she focused on one at a time in the initial phases. anyway any advice on prioritizing a particular one so I can learn it more rapidly wills be great. I just know that I want to be polyglot like Lindy and yourself and in 10 years I want to be comfortable and conversational in like eight languages or 10.
Olly, I see the points you're trying to make and I agree they are very valid and match lots of theories out there...but when he mentions that still nowadays he cannot read a book in Chinese as he does in English, and that he does not see the benefit of it, how can he (and you) consider him fluent? Fluency is not just about speaking an "scripted" form of the language. With scripted I mean he has learned parts of the language very well, maybe not so well others but he knows how to get by very well by now. However, he's far from fluent if he cannot read a book or a newspaper in Chinese and understand it yet. A language is a tool to communicate, speaking is key and we should start first listening, then mimicking sounds, then speaking but it does not stop there, it is simply not just about speaking. If one wants to get fluent reading is key to get us there sooner and with a solid knowledge under our belt. Based on what he says he's not fluent yet. He can be pretty good at conversational speaking by now, no doubt.
Well I think this just comes down to your definition of fluent. Why should it not be just about speaking? Who decides? I'm not a fan of dogma, and by any objective standard he is highly fluent in Chinese. (Whether or not he reads a lot.)
I think what your trying to say is he isn’t as advanced enough to read a newspaper. There are different levels of fluency. So because he can’t read a newspaper or a book to me that just means he isn’t fluent to that level yet but is fluent enough to converse daily with Chinese people.
Fluency is not about the skill. I'm not judging him either. A native that does not how to read nor write can be fluent in his language but that person knows a number of words and expressions that Ari (XiaomaNY) probably does not know if he cannot read a book un Chinese and understand it. I have agreed he's probably very good at conversational speaking but I still think he's not fluent in Chinese based on his own description on what he can/cannot do yet.
Marie, I agree one can put levels on almost everything (eg. basic fluency, intermediate fluency, advanced fluency) but fluency is an end state, i.e. it's like being alive or not. You're fluent or you're not, and this clear cut approach is done on purpose, and curiously it is only because there are so many different ways to get to fluency that it is done this way. Think about this in the following way, no native knows all the words and meanings in their language. This is so as each speciality uses same words with different meanings or level of detail, and also words that are not used elsewhere. If we would consider levels no one would be considered really fluent, ever. There is also a distinction between fluency and proficiency but that's for another time I guess.
Sorry, I couldnt really take anyhting away from this video. How should you go about speaking when you don't live in the country? Meeting a Tandem partner 2 times a week is not enough. When I was in South Korea i met with korean friends about twice a week and I also spoke in class. But after 2 years of Studying my speaking ability was still not anywhere near fluency. Maybe we need some concrete numbers? Is speaking 3 hours a week even enough to see progress or should you speak every day for 1 hour? And what about Matt vs Japan who became fluent in Speaking only by reading and listening. I feel like theres not a single person out there you can give a somewhat satisfying answer to these questions.
It’s all a question of degree. You don’t have to do exactly what Xiaoma did, but can learn from his experience. To answer your question directly: If you want to become a fluent speaker then *at some point* you need to spend an extensive amount of time speaking. To put some numbers on it, I’d say this means speaking for few hours a day for a year or more. This is obviously hard to do, and requires significant lifestyle engineering. I’ve done this in a few languages and I did it by creating total inversion environments around me. But remember that you don’t have to do this right now. It can wait. Btw, your comment about MvJ is not accurate - he spent years immersed with a japanese community at college, with extensive daily speaking practice. It doesn’t matter what your primary learning method is, sooner or later you need to spend a LOT of time speaking.
This was so helpful in my Chinese journey. If you have any tips to help a 12 year old on his journey of learning Chinese that would be so helpful. Thank you ahead of time. Hopefully lol
Looking at the methods of how people achieved what they did is prone to 'selection bias'. What happened to the people who followed the same method and failed?
Probably the majority would fail. It's not possible to present every side in a videos like this, nor is there any one path to truth in language learning, so my goal is to present interesting case studies.
Yeah I went through the same exact path as him but with Spanish (immersion, anki, etc) although yeah obviously writing wasn't an issue. I'm learning Chinese now and I've run across him at xiaomanyc and honestly... I find his videos to be pretty clickbaity/cringey.
too many people talking about how to aquire a new language. It is very easy but it takes time. You have to play with the language like babies do. Dont do anything a baby does not do. Don´t do grammar, not srs, dont try to memorize. Frequent words you need will appear, try not to use dictionary. Tons of listening hours at an apropiate level. Dont try movies or news at the begining. Learning basic things like colors is boring but you need it so be ready for a boring begginer phase. Modulate your input level. Do not try to speak. It will become natural with in a 8-12 months. Be patient.
I recommend learning some vocab before immersion. Kids can play together despite not knowing each other's languages. Try that with an adult and see how fast they ignore you.
I started to learn Mandarin 2017, several months after Trump was inaugurated. I got Hsk-3 in October 2019. I've never been to China. Just learned weekly every Saturday on a course until 2019, and from RUclips channels... Long time ago I learned German for about 4 years, and been to Munich to learn German at EF. I can still speak German now, though not as fluently as English....
@@carlx8409 What video....??? Chinese....??? There are many of them in RUclips. You can browse and pick it up... Chinese zero to hero by John Long is one of the good ones....
5 years studying every day? 10 minutes per day? Because if you do that , 10 minutes per day in 1 year = 3250 minutes, or 60 hours, or less than 3 days. (Without sleeping) 😆
@@Felhek 5 years at least an hour each day. If you think otherwise you Definately haven't studied chinese and if you had you're a beginner or low level. 尤其是成語，古代電視劇的詞彙，等等。
doesnt take 5 years to learn Chinese. Learning full time in an immersion environment you'd learn darn quick. Chinese is a crazy difficult language but it is still only a language.
@@edmerced1522 conversational. HSK4ish. That took like 1-2 years of very casual studying. 成语 isnt some extra secret hard part of the language, it is super built in. You can be HSK0 and know renshan renhai.
If one cannot read and write and understand the language, it means that he is not good at it. Speaking itself is not enough. Reading and writing is what takes time. What’s the point of learning a language without reading and writing? You cannot do much with it!
Here are the 8 secrets polyglots use to learn languages fast: ruclips.net/video/PE_eolTGTTA/видео.html
I can attest that going to another country doesn't mean you will learn that language. My oldest son went to China for a year to teach English. He did not come back speaking Chinese. It's likely that I will end up speaking more than he does. At least for now. However, the 2 takeaways for _me_ in learning a new language are to learn pronunciation first, then whatever else (vocabulary) you feel necessary. Multiple languages won't begin to work or be understandable for you until you know at least one second language fluently. Once you do new languages become progressively easier.
I love that all these people collaborate on language learning. It's not a competition.
I'm glad that I'm real life language learning is not a competition. I learnt languages only in school or college (foreign languages degree). Every time it seemed like a competition. Either I couldn't have the proper pace to take all my exams in time or I got people jealous of my speed of understanding. It was bad at all times.
Yeah the irrational passion to learn languages. I say this to language teachers sometimes and they don't get it. They think everyone needs a good logical reason to learn a language such as for their job or to talk to their girlfriend/wife. Quite frankly I will put my money on the irrational person to excel over the rational person.
Every time. Goes for everything in life. Music is a prime example.
@@storylearning music indeed is an example. im very much interested in learning a little bit of korean, japanese and thai for singing only for now. not everyone has the same reasons to learn a language❤️you’re right! also, love the video! very different from every video ive seen!
@@storylearning Go to Taiwan
Irrational? Or rather, sontaneity, affective/emotionality, individual
concrete examples (later generalized as
.rules).
I resonate a lot with this. Many people ask why I’m so dedicated to learning different languages. I truly could never tell them the exact reason, there’s just something so compelling about understanding how they function.
I used to watch 小马's videos when I was first starting out in Chinese, and they were a great source of motivation! But the main thing that I have come to understand is that everyone has their own definition of fluency. For some, it is the ability to have simple conversations with people, or it is the ability to appreciate a text in the original language, or it is to culturally understand the people of that language. All you need to do is find your 'why' of language learning and stick to the essence of that 'why.' There is a lot of comments here that 小马 is starting to overstate his work, but I feel that if there is one thing that he sells, it is that language learning should be fearless and open-hearted. And that is such an important lesson that we can learn from him. He has clearly found his definition of fluency and has been faithful to it.
Great video, thanks for including this awesome person in your video.
Glad you enjoyed it. Any other “method breakdowns” you’d like to see?
DAVE??? WHAT???
@@storylearning can u make a video about some of the LL apps like babbel and online offers like italki and give your own opinion on what could give people a headstart without having the chance to travel or talk to natives. I speak German English Spanish Romanian and Portuguese and was going for French next. Any tips?
In my experience it has helped alot to use a little time, like 10-15 minutes on Anki a day, but using the rest of the time for immersing. It makes learning new vocabulary really effective.
Hey, yes that’s exactly how I like to do it.
How do you immerse yourself?
@@mutton_man Watching, reading and listening. When you're new to the language you should find someone who make content for learners, so someone who speaks clearly and relatively slow. When you're watching something you should turn on subtitles (most beginner creators add subtitles). It will take a very long time to understand native speech like a native, but don't worry, you get better with time. I know it's hard sometimes, but you should try to not worry too much when you don't understand something when watching and listening although I do it regularly when reading. This is not a problem when you use a reader.
@@TheRockstarFreak9 I bought a mandarin course on udemy. I've completed hsk 1&2 and I've started hsk 3. I struggle when mandarin speakers speak quickly I have to pause the video after each sentence to work out what they are saying. I tried watching a kids programme, pepa pig, in mandarin. They speak so quick I can't understand most of it. I struggle to translate quick enough in my head. Is there a program that you watched to help you as a beginner?
Also do read in traditional mandarin or Pinyin?
@@mutton_man Yeah, it takes a looong time to develop a fluid understanding of speech. I would either learn words with pinyin first and characters after, or look at pinyin and the character at the same time. I have been using lingq, which in my opinion works great as you see the pinyin on top of the character. You also hear how the words are pronounced when you press on them.
So what I would do is that I would go through the transcription of something relatively easy and translate each and every word. Slowly work your way to the next episode when you feel you want to listen to something new. You should also listen to the audiofile on top while reading. In lingq there is a course called ministories, which are great because there is lots of repetition. When you're doing chores or working out or something you should try to listen as much as possible. Listen on repeat to the point where you're at in the course. If you do this you will see progress, but be patient. Again, don't worry when you're listening and don't understand. This is completely normal.
When it comes to the speed I don't think you should worry too much about that either as long as you're repeating what you listen to and look at the transcript. If you use lingq I actually don't think you need anki either, unless you really want to.
When you get a little more intermediate you can follow the advice I gave earlier, and just expose yourself to a lot of intermediate content without too much repetition (Although you should still do some).
Hope this helps, and good luck!
I studied Chinese in High School for 3 hours a day, Monday through Thursday. It was good, but what really helped me become fluent was complete immersion. I had a friend who had moved here from China who stayed with my family for about 6 months, & at the time she didn't know very much English. So I was translating between her & my family, & of course conversating with her each day. When I eventually moved to China, I was set. I was even dreaming in Chinese when I lived there! :) Immersion is where it's at.
Leaning Chinese is such a useful skill and its super rewarding. it would give you a special experience. I encourage everyone have a try.🧡
I tried for 3 days then i give UP
Great vid. The whole comprehensible input route has been the best way to go for me. I took 4 years of portuguese in high school and it wasn't very practical. I've been learning french for 4 months with comprehensible input and I've learned and understand more french than I do in portuguese. Your French short stories book has been a big help.
Love your video. I am a Peruvian living in the US fully fluent in English. I also speak french and portuguese. I also play de violin every week and .... I am a doctor. The key to do all I do is by taking advantage of every single minute of the day. I literally go to bed every night with my brain hurting... but happy!
Thanks for sharing!
"It's by stuff like you do in your course .." well, glad to hear Xiaoma say that. Olly Richards' courses are the most sensible thing out there. "Guided" comprehensible input to get over the beginner hump. Great stuff!
Thanks Perry.
First of all, I have nothing negative to say about Ari, his Chinese is good from what I hear from his videos and I'll take that at face value. I just find the approach interesting, I took much the same approach of trying to speak Chinese as much as possible and not dedicating as much time to memorising vocabulary, reading etc. And the approach did work well for me, by the time I came out of university I had a very good level of spoken Chinese, I went back to live in China and could navigate around freely, do everything I needed to do using the language and I was able to make basic conversation upon meeting Chinese people.
That's where it stopped however and I've been stuck at this upper intermediate B2 level for years now, making small progress here and there but I would find myself having the same conversations over and over again, and I don't mean just "Where are you from and why do you speak Chinese etc." I found that I wasn't able to have interesting conversations and therefore make meaningful friendships in Chinese (made plenty of Chinese friends, but most speak very good English) I'm now going back to flashcards, doing lots of reading, watching plenty of RUclips in Chinese (with Chinese subtitles), most importantly in things I'm interested in such as politics with channels like 攝徒日記Fun Tv and 斯坦説中文 (Polish guy with fantastic Mandarin by the way) and listening to Taiwanese indie and rock bands like 草東沒有派對 and I'm finding my level is improving rapidly.
Anywho the purpose of this rant isn't to discourage anyone from Xiaoma's approach I think it's a good way to become conversationally fluent in the language, I'm just putting this out there for anyone who finds themselves in the same position as me, you might have to change your methods once you reach a certain plateau!
I also have a similar history as yours, been stuck at upper intermediate level for years and realized that casual conversations is not going to help me improve further..
What I do now is try to watch more TV shows, even drama, also pay attention to how Chinese people speak and try to replicate, not just the usual Foreigner speaking Chinese trying to get around..
Thanks for sharing! Hope your expirience will be helpful for me. Sorry for my english grammar.
@@dr-ej8vs your grammar was actually fine here.
Let's be honest even in the native language a lot of people don't have 'high level conversation'. In my native language I only talk about foods, weather, and someone's ugly clothes. In the internet I can find higher level information if I want to, but most people just go to Facebook and tiktok and most of the contents are not high level at all.
I vaguely remember coming across this video where the person in the video was talking about how she managed to keep Korean vocabulary in her head and practice her speaking. She tried to think out loud as much as she could. She lived in South Korea and sometimes when she was at a cafe or in a shop or whatever, occasionally she would have someone come over to her to help find the right word for something or help with her pronunciation
"how babies learn is not by vocab lists"
well, true, but then babies have about 10 years or even 12 of 100% full immersion all day until you can really have a meaninful conversation with them!
It's not efficient.
Well babies also don't have the mental capability to learn languages as fast as a fully grown adult with the same recourses. Only because it takes them 10 years with full immersion doesn't mean immersion isn't the best way to learn how to speak a language.
@@coin5207 Except that immersion isn't the best way to learn languages. Just think about how many Americans have difficulties with separating their, there, they're, theirs, and there's. How many write "should of". Think about misheard song lyrics. Think about all these people on social media being mocked for having misunderstood some idioms. Lasanya, Philly Menyong, synonym toast...
@@Ketutar then again I never said it was a foolproof, perfect way I said it was the best way
@@coin5207It’s the opposite actually , babies are better at learning languages than adults
@@Flyingsearat They aren't. They have the highest neuroplasticity but don't have the mental capacity to understand more than simple grammar or words. And they don't have any previous language to draw on for understanding linguistic concepts or pronounciation.
An adult who is fully focused on language learning can be fluent in 6 months, depending on the language. Have you ever met a baby that is fluent in anything?
Learning Chinese is a very rewarding experience! I urge everyone to give it a try, or at least take a look at some videos to learn more about the language! Fluency is a fairly subjective term, and I think that if you're reading this and are putting in the right amount of work, you could easily speak Chinese much better than Xiaomanyc.
well, Chinese isn't for everyone. I need some kind of motivation or something that interests me to learn a language, currently im leaning Japanese because I gained interest from there culture and Anime so I decided I want to live in Japan for at least a few years. That gave me motivation to learn Japanese.
Can I ask you why you're interested in Chinese?
@@ammar8406 Great question! I guess at first it was simply to learn a completely different language and learn about a different culture. After learning it for a while and going to China many times, I fell in love with the country and the language. I eventually did a master's degree in Teaching Chinese as a foreign language so that I could teach others about it and eventually started a RUclips Channel to do some videos online to help more people learn and learn about Chinese/Mandarin.
@@SimpleChineseRUclips Oh, do your currently live in China or do you plans to move to China?
Also what's your level in Chinese ( beginner, intermediate, advanced or fluent? )
@@ammar8406 I've been living in China for almost 10 years and have completed the HSK6 test about 5 years ago. I can confidently say I have reached fluency and often "trick" people on the phone haha
@@SimpleChineseRUclips That’s amazing, congrats on learning Chinese Fluently! I hope you have a good time in China! Have a great day :) !
I love that you pointed out that you can live in a country and not learn the language (especially if you’re a native English speaker since so much of the world is catered to that, imo). I’ve seen a couple of language learners talk about “wasted time” in Korea cause they thought “oh, I’ll just go there for a year or two and be good at it”😂 They said you STILL have to make the effort and put yourself out there to try and get better, since there’s so much English there (especially if you’re at an international school or a company that doesn’t make you have to learn the language).
Truly fantastic video. Thinking of Mandarin as my next language. Currently majoring in Spanish
And he did it in just 24 hours!
Hahahahah ❤️
I would say that it really depends on the level you're at. Like xiaoma can get around in China and more or less express himself fluently and say everything he thinks. So he might be anywhere between B2 - C1/C2 (Common European Reference levels). But as someone who is reading law in her second language (after a few years of learning it), it's different when you're a perfectionist who deals with extremely complicated subject matter that lots of natives have trouble with. Especially one that relies on subtle nuances in language. So I'd say a lot of the negative comments here are from people who are trying to achieve a higher level at which, in my opinion, you really need both memorisation and immersion (the latter should come super naturally if you're at a C1 level). But that doesn't mean that anyone starting out in a language shouldn't focus on immersion. They absolutely should because it's all about familiarising yourself with the culture, the sounds, and the way people think, before you can get into the nitty gritty details of something like the difference between a tragedy and a travesty.
Excellent point. As others said, it's about how you define fluency. Xiaomanyc seems to take the perspective that fluency is being able to comfortably live life immersed in his target language. If someone defines fluency as being able to understand the level of nuance required for legal debate, then very few people ever achieve fluency in their native language.
Leaning Chinese is such a useful skill and its super rewarding. it would give you a special experience. I encourage everyone have a try.
ive been learning japanese for a little over a month now and reading and listening is definitely working for me.
Great! Keep it up!
Ok. good. how about Turkic languages?
@@erturtemirbaev5207 no
@@MegaLoveDoctor i see. How many languages do you speak?
@@MegaLoveDoctor where are you from?
Irrational passion for languages. That's what it is that I have. Thank you and duly informative video!
When those that get frustrated about not understanding or knowing grammar in a foreign language, do you know or understand all the vocabulary, grammar, or even completely understand everything in your native language? Don’t be frustrated.
This is true, my native language is Tagalog but I do not know all the vocabulary and grammar structure.
I love this! PLEASE DO MORE!!
Ok then! :)
Some Chinese native speakers I've read on Reddit claim that he is not fluent, he is at an intermediate level.
@J G This often skews conversations on fluency. I know I'm a beginner, but I've had Japanese people over state my ability to me. Polite (Asian) cultures will do this to express that they are somewhat impressed / appreciative. This is expected and the correct response invariably seems to be telling them that they're wrong.
@@UmamiPapi Nihongo jouzu! Yeah, they will tell you how good your language is sheerly out of surprise. Even if all you said was "hello" or "excuse me" if you said it somewhat competently with the correct pitch accent it is so surprising to them. Even if my overall proficiency isn't that strong, I have always enjoyed languages in general and put a huge emphasis on correct pronunciation above all 😅 this sometimes gives people the impression I am more fluent than I actually am.
@@thomasrad5202 Same.
One other thought that I wanted to add is that you’re not just learning a language, it’s important to learn the culture and the customs and the many nuances of the people that you want to be able to communicate with. It is scary at first but it becomes really fun because you basically become one of them. it’s impossible to describe that kind of connection that you make when you fully embrace another culture and language fully. But it is incredibly rewarding
Great video. I've been watching Chinese Dramas for two years. I decided to learn the language this year. I have recruited my children to learn speaking Chinese so it can reinforce my learning too.
But if you don’t memorise then immersion doesn’t do anything. I’ve been in Taiwan for three years and can barely order a coffee or say silly phrases
It’s quite common to live in a country without actually being immersed at all.
Immersion is helpful with a basis of pronunciation and basic sentences / grammar. You need something to build on. Babies start from 0, but also take many years to get to a decent level in their native tongue.
My advice, get away from your English there.
There is no way someone spends 3 years in a country and isn't able to order a coffee, absolutely no way. Once more, force yourself, and get away from your English, as much as possible. You will see the difference.
I saw the video you did on how Mormon missionaries learn the language so well and so quickly. I myself did that a few years ago and I was fortunate enough to go to the Philippines. The Philippines is highly underrated! Anyway, the way he described his approach to learning in this video was very similar to my approach to learning the language. It was more than just living in another country but what I was doing all day every day was talking to people and you know trying to help them and teach them about God. But at the root of it it was trying to connect with people and share some thing that would apply to them specifically. because I was trying to connect with people all day every day and I had a lot of those every day experiences and I was excited and driven as well. But you learn very quickly that people are pretty repetitive in the kinds of conversations they have. It was a actually pretty easy to pick up and learn all the typical questions and phrases. I asked a lot of questions! I would always try and ask about phrases or specific words that were unfamiliar to me. If there wasn’t time in a situation I would just write it down the way it sounded to me and ask somebody about it later. It was an incredible two years of my life! I definitely need to go back to the Philippines again and I just love Filipinos now!
Thanks for sharing and for definitely for the reminder re:going to the country some people are so dumb with this they think you’ll automatically just learn it ‘from the streets’
Made that mistake already! :)
The mindset is spot-on. Even as a native Chinese myself, anecdotally I would say that learning writing Chinese has a very steep diminish of return; The strokes are hard to memorize, practices took years even for us since age 7 all the way up to age 18, and the worst aspect would be that you tended to forget how to write them in your later life even if you were Chinese, 30% the characters I learned now I couldn't write them down at all. By the advancement of modern Pinyin system, there's probably little point for a mastery of writing Chinese .... unless lest you were into calligraphy or something....
then how about hanzi characters that use for job? do that need in job
A million thanks to you for this brilliant video !!! 👌❤👍Great job !!! 👍I totally agree with everything you said. Your approach to analysis of his methods is great. It seems to me I've searched for this information for so long. I've understood from the video some things I did correctly but I didn't do them for fluency a lot. I love your channel and your way of teaching. Keep it up !!! ❤👍👏
Could you please make a video with Anna? Tell about her strategy how she became fluent in English.
She has her RUclips channel "English Fluency Journey". She is Ukranian but she speaks English fluently and clearly. She has achieved this great result for a year or two years. I don't remember exactly. Thank you in advance.😊
Thanks, I’m so glad you liked it
Я тоже!
Very interesting, his "get ready for the conversations I'm likely to have" is pretty much how I learned Japanese (that, and noting all the new words and phrases that came up in those conversations). Similarly I was just interested in conversation so didn't put much into learning to read, though in the last few years I have paid attention to that and now can read novels , newspapers etc with only occasional dictionary use and /or confusion. That said, I've noticed a significant jump in my speaking ability from reading more, so I kind of regret taking that approach (no harm done tho, I got there in the end) and would recommend learners get stuck into reading earlier, say once they have crossed the first hump of being able to converse easily. I'm similarly ambivalent about anki, I'm finding it useful as a beginner in uchinaguchi, but abandoned it before I'd really nailed reading in Japanese as it's just such a chore (and as such, not effective) - my conclusion is that, as he says, the natural repetition of input is far better because real content is far more engaging. Anyway great video, very interesting perspective on getting to conversational fluency.
Thanks Simon. That's what I was trying to do, present a new perspective. I think I'll do more, given how many people seem to be riled up by this 😬
So did you start learning to speak before anything? Just purely from immersion and remembering things? I’ve been learning Japanese lately, only a few days but I’m really confused on what direction to even go. I have read and tried to immerse as much as possible but I don’t feel like I’m learning much. How did you begin when you were learning?
@@rainbowsixnews9373 I recommennd immersion, probably for several months before you start trying to speak (tho there's no harm in trying earlier) soon you'll start to pick out words, look them up in a dictionary, that'll start your vocabulary building, Using a textbook audio as immersion can be a good start as it'll have the meaning in the textbook and the audio will be pretty accessible and "basic". Um, incidentally I do a bilingual Japanese/English podcast, also on youtube, search "tensaimon" and you'll find it, you might find it useful as it's bilingual. Good luck!!
I believe the key words came at the very end of the video, you must have an "Irrational passion" in order to not only achieve fluency in a language but also to be the best at anything. Most people aren't irrational like those who smash the ceilings to reach their goals, the supreme misfortune is to believe that they are "just exceptional" albeit some are, but not the majority.
So by "one year" you mean "three years"?
If not more... 👏
And by fluent, he means intermediate
@@liqritrs8391 Fluent he was after the immersion program where he had a sociable level. That is usually when you speak fluently but can't yet express more specific thoughs and emotions very well. He now is thou on a C2 level most likely so that usually takes a lot more and is for many not even the goal. B2 to C1 is already a really great level that will give you a great freadom in a language when talking but also consuming content
Such a good way of breaking all these guys advice down! Awesome work mate
Personally, from my experience, immersion is the fastest way to learn a language. I was 7 and came from the Philippines to New Zealand basically not knowing any English apart from yes, no or thank you. I had so much opportunity to take in so much input in school, that it took like under a year to become conversationally fluent.
Funny, that... "I spend hours with Anki memorizing words" - "you don't need to memorize words, you learn words naturally". So... how did he learn the vocabulary? He had a list of sentences and memorized them. *rolling eyes*
There's no f-ing difference there.
Also, we don't know how far he would have come if he didn't spend any time with Anki. We don't know how much memorizing words helped him further on. It was the same thing with the guy learning Japanese. He, too, spend time with Anki, and now says he shouldn't have. How would he know?
I learned the English, Swedish, and German verb conjugation through memorizing lists, and right now I have a better grip of that than some native speakers.
I have learned all my vocabulary - this, here, that I'm using right here, right now - English is my second language, and my first is Finnish, and I'm 50+, so not so much being surrounded by English when I was growing up. I would say there's nothing wrong with my English and vocabulary attained through rote memorizing.
So, please, stop disparaging flashcards and rote memorizing.
And I hate the "natural, like children" learning "method". We aren't children. It takes some 5 years for kids to learn languages, children cannot attack language learning with determination, they can't focus on learning what they need, they will have to accept to learn what they are being taught with no possibility, ability, or even knowledge to influence the subject matter. This is why kids make mistakes like "the cat eated lots of mouses". They also don't understand that languages have things like that, so it can be difficult to accept that it's not eated, it's ate. It's not mouses, it's mice. But it's not hice, it's houses. Or that it's many goats, but not many sheeps. Frankly, that's just something people have to memorize.
I love this! I was thinking the same thing as I listen to the video. So you think I should start using flash cards? I’m learning Spanish now.
Interesting take. I'm curious, but how long have you been learning English for? You're written English is A LOT better than many native speakers.
@@eobardthawne7126 I think you should, but only if you are comfortable with it.
@@7Soldier_of_God7 If you are talking to me, I started learning English on 3rd grade, when I was 9.
The issue with this guy is he's exaggerated and distorted the time involved.
I used to follow him before he became famous. He's always been into click bait and he's too comfortable stretching the truth, for my taste.
His story has changed over the years. He's not exactly the most straight forward or honest guy out there.
I know people referred to him, but when I saw his clickbait videos, like how he became fluent in Spanish in 20 days, was just mindboggling. In the video he also claimed, he can speak fluently about many subjects, despite the video being heavily edited. It is obviously bullshit, but there are people who actually believe it.
@@alanguages there are numerous videos of him speaking very fluent Spanish at length unedited. His skills are impressive for the short period of time (during the pandemic) that he’s been studying. His recent video in the Mayan village is excellent and very entertaining. He’s talented for sure. Can you match him on all the languages he attempts? I doubt it.
@@robgrant7683 Do you actually and honestly believe Xiaoma became fluent in Spanish in ONLY 20 days?
I am sure I can match him in Spanish, since I lived in Central America.
Edit: If you are unaware, some native Indonesian speakers have stated Xiaoma's Indonesian is awful.
@@alanguages it doesn’t matter. He can communicate with people in a natural setting which is his goal. To use language to break down the barriers between people. His recent video in the Mayan village is a perfect example. It doesn’t matter whether you rate it as “fluent” because clearly he is communicating just fine with everyone he speaks with. You seem to be completely missing the point of what he’s trying to do. Yes, some of the video titles are a bit of clickbait, but who cares. If you watch the videos he’s very clear on his goals and is obviously
meeting his objectives. I find it very entertaining and so do the people he’s conversing with, and that’s all that matters.
@@robgrant7683 A BIT of clickbait. No the titles like fluent Spanish in 20 DAYS is utter bullshit.
Edit: By the way you stated his Spanish is VERY fluent. I take it for you to judge you are implying yourself to be fluent in Spanish. I am asking if that is what you are in fact stating?
Also you avoided my question, by all of a sudden saying it doesn't matter. I will ask again.
Do you actually and honestly believe Xiaoma became fluent in Spanish in ONLY 20 days?
You apparently missed the point of my post, and it is not me rating whether I think Xiaoma is fluent or not. My point is that Xiaoma did NOT become fluent in Spanish in 20 DAYS.
"Most people who live in a country" is a bit of a stretch, that is where the most fluent learners come from, relative to any other contrasted group.
I've thought about the topic of early speaking a lot and did a lot of research on the topic. From hearing about how others learned to speak at a high level, and from my own experience, speaking early is just not crucial in acquisition.
In my experience learning Japanese, I didn't really find trying to speak early helped me understand Japanese any faster. It was just more stressful because I didn't know enough words of grammar to be easily understood. I just didn't really speak Japanese to other people for about 3 years of learning except to some Japanese exchange students a few times at my university. I just focused on immersion and writing for my output practice for 3 years.
My speaking ability had to be practiced separately from my ability to understand the language as the listening and pronunciation are separate from the ability to comprehend meaning. Speaking is the hardest skill and forcing beginners to do the hard stuff first is just frustrating and causes people to quit learning.
I would say that unless someone is already living in the country where the target language is spoken, focusing on reading, writing, and listening will make speaking much easier later as they'll already have a foundation of vocabulary and grammar to build spoken sentences with. From there, the learner can focus most of their attention to accent and cadence instead of trying to remember words or grammar.
Ari really likes speaking because it's active recall, but I'd argue that writing (or typing these days) is just as active and is much less stressful for learners as they have longer to think about what they want to say without awkward pauses. Plus they can look things up if they are completely stuck. It's a good training for learning to speak as the learner learns to write more quickly. They will naturally increase the words per minute they can think in, which is very useful for being able to speak at a natural rhythm.
Once I started speaking regularly, I had to fix some problems, but it didn't take long to to fix them as I could isolate the problems in my mind and focus on fixing them. I definitely think speaking is an important skill to do well eventually, but like any skill that's built on the foundation of other skills, jumping in too early will just be overwhelming and confusing. It's like saying you have to play basketball in the NBA from the beginning to learn basketball. In physical tasks we wouldn't expect beginners to do the hardest stuff first, and it's no different for language learners. Take the time to learn the basics and work up from there to be able to do the hard stuff well.
Thank For The Sharing, Olly
Alright......XiaoMa is speaking like HSK4 Chinese, which is impressive and could be called fluent but barely. Many Polyglots like him swear by their immersion methods "oh just read books and talk to people and listen to radio etc etc." but that only works if you already have a decent chunk of vocab. Comprehensible input is a term for a good reason. I can believe that they made extremely rapid progress using these immersion methods AFTER going through the slog of memorizing vocab in school or via anki. You NEED that foundation, you cant just start watching a historical drama in Chinese with 0 language background and magically understand the words from context unless youre a savant.
You familiar with the bottle neck and break through? 瓶颈然后突破， you can be accumulating a massive amount of quantitative progress and vocabulary and grammar etc etc. without any noticeable qualitative shift in your level....that is the bottle neck and youre building up until you finally reach that tipping point where you break through.
If you study a language full time for 3 years while living in the country for 2 years you will learn it no question. no secret method there.
Wtf he is easily HSK6 by now.
@@LibertyMapper Maybe he is HSK6 but i've never seen a video of his where he is speaking at that level. He doesnt speak like other HSK5/6 people that I know. He is certainly far short of his "NEAR NATIVE" claim..
@@josephjoebrown11 To be fair HSK isn’t really a good nor fair way to truly know someone’s Chinese ability. It’s a corrupt and flawed test that doesn’t really test your Chinese comprehension. I’ve taken the tests. Anyone could learn to pass those test and still have shitty mandarin. I do agree with you that he’s not fluent. His consonants, vowels and tone pairs need work.
Also I disagree with saying that reading books talking to people or listening to the radio is only for people who have a foundation in the language. When I started mandarin I learned mandarin through kids books, dramas, textbooks and just speaking to people. I would take what I learned an use it with a native speaker, then if they wanted to correct me to make me sound more fluent, then so be it. You would also be surprised what listening to a podcast or watching a movie in that language a few times can do. The brain is a powerful organ, it will figure things out. Living in the country definitely helps , however it’s not the end all or be all. I know people who can’t even speak mandarin and live in China right now.
I disagree! Partly about Xiaoma level, I agree he speaks pretty basic, though I'm quite sure he could pass HSK5-6 if he sits down some months to prepare. Met enough people who passed HSK6 yet couldn't speak better. However I kickstarted my learning by just warching 8 hours of Chinese Drama a day for 2-3 months with english subs, then went to China for 4 weeks alone trying to only hook up with Chinese. Didn't learn Chinese before (or only a tiny bit - like HSK1-2 level which is 300 words many years before then forgetting it again). Instantly after I was fluent in simple things, and quite a few Chinese told me my Chinese is better than that of people who studied Chinese for 3-4 years at Uni full time course. I've never learned a foundation.
Been going to Taiwan around a year overall since (with China closed due to Covid, and living quality higher in Taiwan for me), yet I learned faster while being abroad and watching tons of youtube/youku/bililbili or listening through virtually any chinesepod lessen produced at least once than while actually being in Taiwan. Yeah I cannot read or write at all - and now 5 years in try to learn it by trying to read the subs in Chinese. Not sure this is gonna work - but I hate actual classic learning - no fun. I kinda guess - start with immersion 3-4 months (but not in country but anywhere) then learning those vocabs would be fastest. But there are many ways to learn. And yeah for me it's just part time, besides running my own company. But I try to always listen to Chinese when doing sports to not get out of touch. I can now understand most youtubers in Chinese, get most content from Chiese talk shows, yet I am stuck at that B2-C1 level way too long. Already 1 year into learning my Chinese was better than some Chinese I met who had passed B2 in English and we mostly spoke Chinese. Yet i am very far away from C2 and don't seem to get much closer. So yeah either it's that I spend too little time learning Chinese - or it's that for C2 you will actually need that foundation. Quite often Taiwanese friends are amazed at what I understand, then at other times cannot believe I don't understand something simple. That's missing a foundation - some topics I just skipped as I had no structure at all.
Memorization sets the sail and immersion is the wind to take you fluidity.
4:16 Languages close to your native tongue, you can just learn some main words and basic grammar and start speaking. Watch how fast he learned Spanish (being so similar to English and already have learned a language). For some languages like Japanese, I'd argue it is better to drill vocab and learn grammar more up front. Reading Japanese or Chinese without drilling is almost impossible, and the grammar of Japanese or Korean is a lot harder to think in when you come from a Germanic language like English or Spanish
Spanish is nowhere close to English. German is closer to English than Spanish.
@@TheSublimeLifestyle neither german(although is same family)...french I would say is more similar(only in vocab)
Excellent video Olly much obliged
First of all I want to say that I personally enjoy your and Xiaoma videos, so, not a hater. Just want to clarify some misunderstood stuff about anki.
"Talking and reading is a natural SRS". Yep, it is, and with that you will take a much longer time to reach a high level. 5k words are 98% of what is said/writen so if you want to be more than intermediate in a language you better have a more efficient way of learning vocabulary. Putting it in another way, any method that has you learning vocabulary at any pace will eventually lead to a approximately a b2 level.People that talk about immersing as the holy grail "always" go to the extreme and say objectively wrong stuff like "anki is overvalued", if anything, immersing, as an efficient tool is overvalued. What I mean is that the ratio learning/minute in immersion is so low and yet, people praise it like is magic.
I take your point, but I think what your analysis is missing is that language learning is not simply a question of amassing vocabulary. Yes, you need to get to those 5000 words, but it would be better to go slightly slower, less efficient in your words, but do so through an input or context-based method that teaches you all the other things you need to know about the language.
@@storylearning language learning, of course involves more things that just learning vocabulary, BUT the single most important factor on determining the level of understanding is how many words you know, there is no way around it.
You say that there is value on input learning because it teaches you others things you need to know. But what are they that anki cannot teach you more efficiently? Let's remember the 2 key factors in learning: spaced repetition and forceful recall. The first one you cannot control during immersion, things just appear. And secondly, forceful recall, which in reading happens but in listening things just happen too fast for you to have time to recall the not-so-consolidated stuff like words/grammar.
One things GREAT about immersion is about consolidating what you already know. So, is immersion efficient in some context? Yes, when you already know lots of stuff but in not enough contexts(how easy you remember stuff will depend on how many contexts of a certain words/grammar structure you know)
Hopefully I could explain myself better but I think I did not do it in a efficient manner my guy, sorry haha
My deep interest in learning languages has to do with wanting to communicate with those who speak the language. And I am one of those whose passion to learn Spanish was initially motivated by wanting to speak (flirt ?) with a man from Peru. Turned out he was married to an American woman who was already fluent in Spanish (and presumably flirting too 😁, as they had two adorable children). 🤣
Thanks for the good advise
He boats about discussions but never about how many books he read in chinese. I think this would be a better milestone to claim fluency.
Also his story is about over a decade, but not sure when fluency was reached.
His attitude is definitly a model of self discipline but not sure about the language learning method it-self.
I worked with someone who took French in school and they went to France; she said what she learnt in school was completely useless. That's the problem here in the UK when it comes to teaching languages in schools, they teach just textbook French/Spanish instead of making it more immersive, natural and fun.
You gotta do one of Matthew Youlden, he speaks almost all of his languages accent free. Especially his german is very good
Awesome Video!
This is the first Olly video that i am struggling to agree with. I guess this really depends on why you want to learn a language. Being able to speak but not write well is not an option for me. He says that memorizing vocabulary lists using anki is overrated. Yet he admits to memorizing phrases to prepare for conversations. That's not really fluency. I personally use anki to drill actual phrases that I encounter while talking to natives so that I can memorize them. I don't use it to study individual words out of context. So the problem is not Anki. The key is how it's being used. Lastly, I think that the impact of living in the native speaking country was minimized in this video to make a point. I have been to the country of my target language multiple times and the benefit, especially regarding speaking, can't be matched.
I think these are all interesting points! Just goes to show that there's no "one way" to do it, and the best we can hope for is learn from others and find our own path.
@jazzyeric21,
I noticed that also, about how Olly downplayed immersion.
Compare a person who studied intensely for three years on their own, never immersed, against someone who went for immersion for two years after one year of intense study, then the comparison will be a noticeable gap between their levels, when talking.
On top of that Xiaoma is presumably married to a Chinese woman that gives him the practice of daily speech, for who knows how long.
I didn't agree with this vid at all. Parroting is not fluency.
Before doing full immersion in Italian I learned 1.500 most common words in context using Duolingo and after that in six months I was speaking fluently Italian, so learning vocabulary in a proper way it’s indeed effective
SPEAK SPEAK SPEAK !!!!! VERY important.
looking at that thumbnail I though he changed the method from vocabulary flashcards to going out to Chinese restaurants, VERY OFTEN
So proud of AbroadInChina
let me say something that year of learning people are talking about is just different,people on the outside dnt know what it is. if you study in English in china it’s a little harder to learn chinese.that one year of chinese is very intense to the extent that it’s impossible to to finish one year without having to speak conversational chinese even if you dnt want to. Classes are from 8am to 5pm most times and every/most people that do the language in class not online can all speak chinese even the laziest. The point is dnt base your journey based on someone who said they did a year of chinese in china what they do in that one year can take you way longer if you do it on your own. That one year of chinese consists of you being in class and prohibited from using any other language apart from chinese from about the 4th week, many of your classmates come from different countries and some can’t speak English at all so the only way of communication is chinese you cannot compare that to studying a whole day by yourself. Not to mention activities in the school, if you dnt do well you have extra classes .And another thing I would say is passing the HSK exam is not complete an evaluation of how good your chinese is .the exams are way easier than real life apart from HSK 6 maybe 5 at times. Learning chinese online and using HSK is like learning English from a British teacher and then later on you have to speak to an Irish with a deep accent when you can have a fluent conversation with them you know your level is high.
I like the moment in Ari’s videos when the other person realizes he is speaking Chinese. They are usually sweetly surprised.
Some parallels with my own studies, for sure, though I had no formal education at all. I moved there when I was eighteen years old to study martial arts and also didn't focus on characters for the first several years. Likewise, I used a targeted approach to teach myself, but it was words, rather than sentences because Chinese grammar is almost non-existent. After about three years I became more or less fluent and have continued to improve since then. Being married to a Chinese woman helps, but this didn't happen until later. Try arguing in Chinese and still getting the tones right! Speaking of tones, I spent a lot of time on my pronunciation and tones and it has paid off. It's what really separates people that speak some Chinese and those that excel.
I learnt my first English word in the age of 12, now I am 29, I would say I am fluent in but I just starting adopt my American accent. And I learnt French for 2 years and still I can't do routine dialogue. Am I so not talented at language learning?
Memorizing vocabulary is not fun but it is absolutely necessary when learning a language. Babies learning their first language and adults learning a second language is comparing apples to oranges.
...and yet the most experienced language learners of all will all tend to agree that input trumps memorisation.
Comprehensible input is everything. SRS vocab learning helps supplement that.
Agree!
I started learning kanji because I had a desire to write symbols so in average I learned 100 kanji per month. I slowly practiced writing each kanji at least 400 times or about 8 Kanji per day but I had to stop at about 1500 Kanji because I developed tendonitis. I read Wikipedia in Japanese and although I know the kanji of a word sometimes I still don’t know their meaning. For example the word population and entrance have the same kanji but swapped and a different meaning even though the kanji the makes up the word is mouth and person. Anyways I speak zero Japanese and actually can understand Traditional Chinese subtitles better than Japanese because Im a little afraid of Katakana and Hirangana because I don’t know what it means unlike Kanji which I know what it means.
Entrance uses a different kanji than population. Entrance is 入口 and population is 人口. Similar looking, but different.
It took me 3 years to get to HSk5... i doubt its humanly possible to learn chinese in 1 year... not to mention learning is one thing.. then you need at least 2000 hours of conversations to practice tones..
After 5 years i still consider myself a B2 at most...
If you want to learn a language fluently in 6months -1 year... try norwegian or french..
Bud, just because it’s not possible for you doesn’t mean it’s not possible for him. His brain and approach is way different than yours.
@@HistoryShell1786 sorry I speak 7 languages.. its just a smoke screen.. fake RUclips polyglots
if you only study for HSK exam, I met someone who made it from 0-HSK6 in 10 months. Then he immediately started writing his PHD thesis in Chinese (a Russian, so not east Asian). But yeah it took him another 6 months of conversation to actually be somewhat fluent - just learning vocab for passing HSK6 doesn't make you talk at all. Also possible to do it the other way round - first immerse and learn to talk, then put down those 6-8 months 10 hours a day to pass HSK6.
i lived twice a half year in Germany i can speak basic but i wasn't surrounded with foreigners so most of the time i used my language or englsih as it was easier to use and i knew just a little more than german. Since than my english not real good but improved a lot and i wish i will reach an C1 level in my life.. And ofc learn other languages as well. :D
Hard words (mnemonics, flashcards) and with sentences
Sentences (beginning parts) I would like - Je voudrais... (no one does this though)
Comprehensible input is the secret plain n simple language learning ppl. How can an input be comprehensible?? Simple you have to know what they are saying. If it’s a movie watch it in English once or twice then watch it in the language you’re learning or even a show. Comprehensible input guys get it in your head already. Just keep listening to input you understand and your brain will pick it up no matter the language. Japanese Mandarin it doesn’t matter
Then after you get good start reading
english subtitle or english dubbed? im trying to learn korean.
@@zakky4175 it could be English dub or just subtitles in English. You just have to know what’s being said first Then turn off the English sub/dub and listen to it again in Korean. You won’t notice at first but your brain will eat it up. Watch tones of Korean shows like that. Then after you get good enough you can start reading or listen to an audiobook. It has to be fun.
For example I’m in my first week of learning French and I watched lupin in English first now I’m watching it again in French. I’m telling you it works
@@zakky4175 that’s how I learned my first language Spanish. Anki n studying doesn’t work
@@Trillvil1 Thanks for the reply. 1. should I rewatch it again without subtitles if i don't understand. how many times? 2. should i read online stuff in korean? what if i don't understand what it says should i use a translation? 3. should i memories variety shows/movie sentences until i memories it fully then go to next sentence?
I am a Chinese person who is currently learning English.
I am hoping to find a native English speaker or someone who is fluent in English and also learning Mandarin.
This way, we can learn from each other and help each other check grammar issues.
Videos like this are cute. But we're not all going to other countries for 1-2 years to get a grasp on the language. One of the best tools I was taught was to put sticky notes around the house with the language - wall, fridge, door, picture, soap, bureau, etc.
I think the top tip is to actually have a goal or enjoy it . I’m British and before studying Chinese , i tried Spanish which should’ve been extremely easy as grandmother moved to the uk and only spoke Spanish and is also regarded as one of the easiest languages to learn as a native English speaker but it was the most hardest, most boring thing ever .
yeah it is very boring studying Spanish. Did you end up learning it ?
I am a native in Spanish and it might be actually boring for you because culturally it's not very different to English and most of deep Hispanic things are available in English already... In Chinese, however you enter into another dimension@@introvertdude99
Come on Olly, I thought you were better than...he didn't learn Chinese in a year.
fair enough!
@@jboops6664 its not clickbait. Its a supporting video for you to take it or not. Watch his other videos.
If you watch this whole video and consider it nothing but clickbait, I’d be genuinely disappointed.
@@storylearning I don’t consider it clickbait. Just didn’t like the title.
This might sound dumb, but I had no idea that Xiaomanyc and Ari in Beijing were the same person.
I've tried all that. I've spent over a year studying basic vocabulary and I live in China, so yes I have to speak some Chinese to people. I've been stuck at HSK 2 level for years. The truth is that learning a radically different second language comes down to talent. I know talented expats who've never studied in their life and speak fluent Mandarin (maybe not writing) and people who've studied hard and are stuck. I'm afraid talent is the dominant variable in language learning.
Yes he's right though, memorization is the wrong approach for language.
I fear you might be succumbing to confirmation bias. In my experience it comes down to hard work and persistence, whether you’re talented or not. Of course it is possible to work hard and get nowhere, but that’s when method becomes an important variable.
@@storylearning I used the methods mentioned to be effective in the video. I could study more but I don't have time for formal lessons as I work a lot. Perhaps I have it but I would probably need an intensive program. Perhaps when I get back to America I can take classes. Learning in China isn't working.
"it" is confirmation bias, thought I try to avoid it
HE LEARN CHINESE FAST, IT IS BECAUSE
1. CHINESE GRAMMAR IS SO EASY
2. CHINESE CHARACTERS ARE CAME FROM SIMPLE PICTURE, THEY ARE DESIGNED LOGICALLY AND YOU JUST KNOW ABOUT 500 COMMON CHINESE CHARACTERS
3. CHINESE VOCABULARY ARE MAINLY BASE ON ABOUT 500 CHINESE CHARACTERS. AFTER YOU KNOW THIS 500 COMMON CHINESE CHARACTERS, THAN YOU CAN HANDLE 90% OF CHINESE VOCABULARY
4. CHINESE VOCABULARY ARE MAINLY BASE ON THE CHINESE LANGUAGE THEMSELF, NOT OTHERS LANGUAGE. INSTEAD, THE ENGLISH VOCABULARY HAVE SO MANY WORDS ARE CAME FROM ANCIENT GREEK AND LATIN
love that picture (@0:59), it looks so photo shopped.
Kinda suits him tho
Now Xiaoma makes clickbait videos, like how he learned fluent Spanish in 20 days, or White Guy Shocks Strangers by Speaking Perfect Indonesian.
That’s not clickbait lmao
@@ducklifee_6260 It is just bullshit then.
@@alanguages it is complete bullshit. You’re right. His Chinese is intermediate btw, not fluent
Ordering Chinese in the hood... Made me cringe
@@liqritrs8391 xiaoma Chinese is very good, but I think laoma Chris or xingyue are better, they are in that level where if they speak to a Chinese person in the phone they might not realize they are foreigners.
Interesting to see how Ari's recommended learning method places a large amount of importance on output while MattvsJapan - certainly when he was younger at least - strongly advocates against it. It's good to get opinions from different people who have achieved huge success learning language(s) so you don't hold treat any single person's opinion as scripture.
But they both use immersion and SRS, the foundation of their philosophies is the same
Honestly, this mindset can be seen from the result. I speak mandarin pretty well, understand japanese quite a lot, and grew up listening to both languages. Grammar-wise, I might not be able to nitpick matt’s japanese as I can with Ari’s grammar, but i can definitely hear their pronunciation level. As matt values input very much and spent such a long time processing those input, he’s focusing more on mirroring the natives. Mirroring their grammar, word choices, pronunciation, mannerism, cultures, basically everything. Resulting in a close to perfect japanese pronunciation and mannerism. Unless he made a mistake in grammar or vocabs no one can hear the difference between his japanese and a native’s japanese. Whereas Ari focuses more on output, so as we can see, he makes progress from cant say anything to daily conversation level fluency really quickly. But, his chinese pronunciation and mannerism is very off. He has that very heavy english accent in his chinese and a very american mannerism. Just from listening to him speak a few sentences, I know he’s a foreigner. Obviously, both method works, but in my opinion, output focus works well if you’re just aiming for daily conversation fluency and if you have a “i don’t care if i sound bad as long as the other party gets it I’m good” mindset. But if you want to go closer to native level fluency, input based learning is very important. It’s simply because from conversational fluent to close to native there just aint that many books to study from and way too many little aspects books don’t usually cover. The best is just to analyze it yourself from a native’s speech.
@@sharonzhong What if you start with Ari's method focusing on output and the switch to Matt's method? Wouldn't it be better?
Yes but this dude mentioned before that he did a lot of immersion. He said he had head phones in constantly with an mp3 on loop. If i remember right he also listed to tv in Chinese like news and stuff. So it's likely his immersion combined with anki. Were responsible for the majority of his progress. That's probably were most of his and ability came from. Also him going out and speaking gives him even more input listening practice. When natives respond to what he says. Sure you need to practice speaking. But immersion was a huge part of his time spent with the language. He also said he listened to sentences over and over to practice the accent. So his approach was the same as matts in those ways. Only real difference was the speaking practice early on.
I've watching both for a long time while studying Japanese. I've thought about this topic a lot, and I've found that I generally agree with Matt on this topic. From hearing about how others learned, and from my experience, speaking is just not crucial in acquisition. In my experience learning Japanese, I didn't really find trying to speak early helped me understand Japanese any faster. It was just more stressful because I didn't know enough words of grammar to be easily understood. I just didn't really speak Japanese to other people for about 3 years of learning except to some Japanese exchange students a few times at my university.
My speaking ability had to be practiced separately from my ability to understand the language as the listening and pronunciation are separate from the ability to comprehend meaning. Speaking is the hardest skill and forcing beginners to do the hard stuff first is just frustrating and causes people to quit learning.
I would say that unless someone is already living in the country where the target language is spoken, focusing on reading, writing, and listening will make speaking much easier later as they'll already have a foundation of vocabulary and grammar knowledge to build spoken sentences with. From there, the learner can focus most of their attention to accent, pitch, and cadence instead of trying to remember words or grammar.
Ari really likes speaking because it's active recall, but I'd argue that writing (or typing these days) is just as active and is much less stressful for learners as they have longer to think about what they want to say without awkward pauses. Plus they can look things up if they are completely stuck. It's a good training for learning to speak as the learner learns to write more quickly. They will naturally increase the words per minute they can think in, which is very useful for being able to speak at a natural rhythm.
Once I started speaking, I had to fix some problems, but it didn't take long to to fix them as I could isolate the problems in my mind and focus on fixing them. I definitely think speaking is an important skill to do well eventually, but like any skill that's built on the foundation of other skills, jumping in too early will just be overwhelming and confusing. It's like saying you have to play basketball in the NBA from the beginning to learn basketball. Take the time to learn the basics and work up from there to be able to do the hard stuff well.
OK, I partially agree, but I remember having vocabulary tests every year in grade school
I hate that the only language I'm determined to learn is super hard. Japanese is hard to think in since the different grammar structure, and kanji throws a wrench into reading. Chinese, Spanish, or any other Germanic languages seem so easy to learn, but I'm already 2.5 years into Japanese
The grass is always greener on the other side!
I hear you, I studied Japanese for a year before I quit it. It was around 2002, and there were not a lot of materials available to a poor student at the time. I wish you luck! It is hard, but so beautiful.
@@sharonoddlyenough You should try to pick it up again!
@@Matthew-fj6eu Thanks, I would, but Swedish has my heart at the moment
@@KAIZENURAMESHI I disagree. Anime and manga are popular, but there are tons of movies, music, and books that are never translated. Anyone with enough curiosity can be rewarded with unique experiences whether they visit or not.
Watching the thumbnail I realize that learning chinese to xiomac made him chubby
One question I do have for you, Olly Richards, is any advice you might have on picking my third language to really dive into. So I’m bilingual and I love learning my second language when I was a missionary. Currently I’m very interested in Several languages and I’ve been working on a handful simultaneously and I enjoy it but I know I would learn one of them much more quickly if I picked one to start with. I know some polyglots like Lindy spends time in several languages but I feel like she focused on one at a time in the initial phases. anyway any advice on prioritizing a particular one so I can learn it more rapidly wills be great. I just know that I want to be polyglot like Lindy and yourself and in 10 years I want to be comfortable and conversational in like eight languages or 10.
New subscriptor! 😃😃
Excellent video! Thanks!
Cheers Joseph!
@@storylearning Thanks!!!
Olly, I see the points you're trying to make and I agree they are very valid and match lots of theories out there...but when he mentions that still nowadays he cannot read a book in Chinese as he does in English, and that he does not see the benefit of it, how can he (and you) consider him fluent?
Fluency is not just about speaking an "scripted" form of the language. With scripted I mean he has learned parts of the language very well, maybe not so well others but he knows how to get by very well by now.
However, he's far from fluent if he cannot read a book or a newspaper in Chinese and understand it yet.
A language is a tool to communicate, speaking is key and we should start first listening, then mimicking sounds, then speaking but it does not stop there, it is simply not just about speaking.
If one wants to get fluent reading is key to get us there sooner and with a solid knowledge under our belt.
Based on what he says he's not fluent yet. He can be pretty good at conversational speaking by now, no doubt.
Well I think this just comes down to your definition of fluent. Why should it not be just about speaking? Who decides? I'm not a fan of dogma, and by any objective standard he is highly fluent in Chinese. (Whether or not he reads a lot.)
I think what your trying to say is he isn’t as advanced enough to read a newspaper. There are different levels of fluency. So because he can’t read a newspaper or a book to me that just means he isn’t fluent to that level yet but is fluent enough to converse daily with Chinese people.
Fluency is not about the skill. I'm not judging him either. A native that does not how to read nor write can be fluent in his language but that person knows a number of words and expressions that Ari (XiaomaNY) probably does not know if he cannot read a book un Chinese and understand it.
I have agreed he's probably very good at conversational speaking but I still think he's not fluent in Chinese based on his own description on what he can/cannot do yet.
Marie, I agree one can put levels on almost everything (eg. basic fluency, intermediate fluency, advanced fluency) but fluency is an end state, i.e. it's like being alive or not.
You're fluent or you're not, and this clear cut approach is done on purpose, and curiously it is only because there are so many different ways to get to fluency that it is done this way.
Think about this in the following way, no native knows all the words and meanings in their language. This is so as each speciality uses same words with different meanings or level of detail, and also words that are not used elsewhere.
If we would consider levels no one would be considered really fluent, ever. There is also a distinction between fluency and proficiency but that's for another time I guess.
Sorry, I couldnt really take anyhting away from this video. How should you go about speaking when you don't live in the country? Meeting a Tandem partner 2 times a week is not enough. When I was in South Korea i met with korean friends about twice a week and I also spoke in class. But after 2 years of Studying my speaking ability was still not anywhere near fluency. Maybe we need some concrete numbers? Is speaking 3 hours a week even enough to see progress or should you speak every day for 1 hour? And what about Matt vs Japan who became fluent in Speaking only by reading and listening. I feel like theres not a single person out there you can give a somewhat satisfying answer to these questions.
It’s all a question of degree. You don’t have to do exactly what Xiaoma did, but can learn from his experience. To answer your question directly: If you want to become a fluent speaker then *at some point* you need to spend an extensive amount of time speaking. To put some numbers on it, I’d say this means speaking for few hours a day for a year or more. This is obviously hard to do, and requires significant lifestyle engineering. I’ve done this in a few languages and I did it by creating total inversion environments around me. But remember that you don’t have to do this right now. It can wait. Btw, your comment about MvJ is not accurate - he spent years immersed with a japanese community at college, with extensive daily speaking practice. It doesn’t matter what your primary learning method is, sooner or later you need to spend a LOT of time speaking.
Well said "Irrational passion for languages".
This was so helpful in my Chinese journey. If you have any tips to help a 12 year old on his journey of learning Chinese that would be so helpful. Thank you ahead of time. Hopefully lol
Looking at the methods of how people achieved what they did is prone to 'selection bias'. What happened to the people who followed the same method and failed?
Probably the majority would fail. It's not possible to present every side in a videos like this, nor is there any one path to truth in language learning, so my goal is to present interesting case studies.
Yeah I went through the same exact path as him but with Spanish (immersion, anki, etc) although yeah obviously writing wasn't an issue. I'm learning Chinese now and I've run across him at xiaomanyc and honestly... I find his videos to be pretty clickbaity/cringey.
Greattt💜💜
too many people talking about how to aquire a new language. It is very easy but it takes time. You have to play with the language like babies do. Dont do anything a baby does not do. Don´t do grammar, not srs, dont try to memorize. Frequent words you need will appear, try not to use dictionary. Tons of listening hours at an apropiate level. Dont try movies or news at the begining. Learning basic things like colors is boring but you need it so be ready for a boring begginer phase. Modulate your input level. Do not try to speak. It will become natural with in a 8-12 months. Be patient.
Man I’m turning 21 this year and this feels like I wasted time in my life
same
Y'all can't be serious lol. I'm 31 and just started learning Chinese. Y'all are good. I promise. I wish I was 21 again
I recommend learning some vocab before immersion. Kids can play together despite not knowing each other's languages. Try that with an adult and see how fast they ignore you.
I started to learn Mandarin 2017, several months after Trump was inaugurated.
I got Hsk-3 in October 2019.
I've never been to China.
Just learned weekly every Saturday on a course until 2019, and from RUclips channels...
Long time ago I learned German for about 4 years, and been to Munich to learn German at EF.
I can still speak German now, though not as fluently as English....
What videos do you recommend?
@@carlx8409
What video....???
Chinese....???
There are many of them in RUclips.
You can browse and pick it up...
Chinese zero to hero by John Long is one of the good ones....
@@ayi3455 Yes, Chinese. Thanks!
I speak chinese and can tell you that it wasn't one year and he isn't fully fluent. To be fluent and know 成語 need above 5 years
5 years studying every day?
10 minutes per day?
Because if you do that , 10 minutes per day in 1 year = 3250 minutes, or 60 hours, or less than 3 days. (Without sleeping)
😆
@@Felhek 5 years at least an hour each day. If you think otherwise you Definately haven't studied chinese and if you had you're a beginner or low level. 尤其是成語，古代電視劇的詞彙，等等。
doesnt take 5 years to learn Chinese. Learning full time in an immersion environment you'd learn darn quick. Chinese is a crazy difficult language but it is still only a language.
@@josephjoebrown11 I'm curious at your chinese level lol
@@edmerced1522 conversational. HSK4ish. That took like 1-2 years of very casual studying. 成语 isnt some extra secret hard part of the language, it is super built in. You can be HSK0 and know renshan renhai.
I wonder what languages that you know and to what profundity.
Excellent.
great idea for videos. please do more 🙏🙏🙏
also i hope one day you can do Persian short stories 🙏
Thank you! Will do! Any requests?
@@storylearning Just more kinda interviews with other language learners from youtube on their methods of learning languages. =]
If one cannot read and write and understand the language, it means that he is not good at it. Speaking itself is not enough. Reading and writing is what takes time. What’s the point of learning a language without reading and writing? You cannot do much with it!
... except speak it with everyone you meet? For many people speaking is their only goal.