It's always surprising to me how British you sound in English. I agree with you on that grammar should be left for later. Learning grammar is like reading books about cooking while sitting on the sofa. That's not learning to cook, that's just messing around. About subtitles, I see them as training wheels. They make you feel safe, they're useful, but you have to outgrow them. And finally, one thing I always knew and nobody told me is, indeed, language is not the subject. I learnt the English I know while doing other things (mostly surfing idly on the Internet and listening to music)
Ultimately for me language learning is about being able to communicate clearly with people - not necessarily with 100% perfect grammar, syntax and vocabulary- all that comes with experience and practice. Learning a foreign language has given me the opportunity to form new relationships with people and cultures different form my own- that I would never have been be exposed to-had I not endeavoured to speak and understand another language. This can enrich your life- it certainly has mine. As far as I’m concerned with my own personal journey of of teaching myself Spanish-it has been one of the most exciting satisfying and worthwhile things I ever done in my life.
I think the most important thing I learned so far was to move on to more engaging content. I love Dreaming Spanish, but in many ways I outgrew it -- not because I find it all comprehensible (I can still struggle with some intermediate videos), but because not every video on there will be engaging to me. In the beginning there was a novelty in just being able to understand. I could watch 2 hours of beginner videos and stay engaged because the very fact that I was understanding a new language kept me engaged and entertained. That stopped working once I hit about 200 hours of input (I'm not at almost 300). And now I find I have to watch much more difficult and less comprehensible content because it's what helps keep me engaged -- but I do think that the intermediate stage I'm in has been the hardest -- because I'm in a place where easy content isn't interesting enough and interesting content isn't comprehensible enough. But I know I need to just push through. I've started finding more and more native level content comprehensible WITH subtitles. Eventually, like you, I'll need to graduate out of using them. I use language reactor, so sometimes I'll hide or try not to look at the subtitles until the line is finished and then if I missed something, I'll check. That gives me some listening practice as well.
I spent sooo many extra hours watching videos on "how" to learn Spanish as opposed to actually watching or listening. Great point. I wanted to be at a certain level very quickly because I was so excited. Once I became patient and realized it was a process i learned so much. I can listen to a podcast now and follow everything that's being said after around 500 hours of input. And I think it's so cool how you always try to make time to respond to your followers. Bien consejos, buen trabajo compa
I´m a spanish speaker (mexican) and I´m hard working to learn English. I´ve been studying for 1 month and I feel I´m stuck, sometimes I wanna give up but I won´t so if you read this, believe I feel you, It´s complicated learn some lenguage but not impossible. You can do it! P.S: I feel uncomfortable when I write in english because I think there are mistakes but I try and do my best .
Yo se este estaba mucho tiempo pasado, pero tu ingles es muy, muy bueno! Desde un persona apprendiendo español. I get nervous about writing in Spanish as well!
Tu Inglés es bien. No perfecto, claro, pero muy bien para ¡uno mes solo! Soy de Inglaterra y aprendiendo español ahora, desde marzo. También, estoy nervioso a hablar y escribir específico en español para razones iguales. Aprendí con Babbel, leyendo, escuchando a podcasts y uno semana en Alicante de España immersion. Ahora, yo estoy empezando Dreaming Spanish, pero con Babbel también.
Great tips, very articulate. As far as subtitles (at least for beginners) just watch out for those automated subtitles. I've seen some really weird stuff with that even in my native language: English, so I can only imagine the errors it produces in Spanish. The thought of it just makes me shudder!
I’m at almost 400 hrs. I agree about listening to the same videos or podcasts a couple times. That has helped me hear words I missed the first time. I’m reading el alquimista and it has short sections. I read them twice and sometimes three times. First time, I just try to get a general idea of what is happening. Second to get a better idea. On the third time, I’ll try and look up the words that I didn’t understand to fill in the blanks. Thanks for bringing up this idea. It does help.
How did you get started initially? Like obviously watching a show at 0% immersion would do nothing right? How did you get the first initial basics in a language? I am learning Dutch and want to do it through immersion, but it's all gibberish to me currently. Should I learn like 1000 most common words first and then start immersion?
@@christianbrown3751 I used duo lingo to get started since I had no previous experience with Spanish. I found dreaming Spanish about a month after I started and watched all their beginner videos. I also got a pack of 1000 words and a list of 5000 words. I don’t use them very much. Someone had a list of the 50 most common verbs and I studied those. That was helpful. Once I got some words down I started listening to Mexican radio stations, Spanish RUclips channels, and read a couple beginner/intermediate books that Brenda from hola Spanish recommended. As for Dutch, when I lived in Germany in the late 80s-early 90s, I visited the Netherlands twice. Amsterdam and Groningen. Groningen was celebrating its 950th birthday. I really enjoyed the Netherlands! I wish you the best on your Dutch journey.
Congratulations Shane! Nice milestone. And solid reflections on learning languages. I’m at app 500 hours of Spanish and actively trying to wean myself off of (Spanish) subtitles. Part of me is still fighting to retain my safety blanket! I recently heard Matt vs Japan say something that to me really hit home re the language journey - something you were touching on in your passion/percentage point, to paraphrase: ‘learning a language successfully has a lot to do with your ability to tolerate ambiguity.’
Thanks Jeff! Yeah I remember him saying that, I think I’ve quoted it in a video in fact at some point, but yeah I totally agree that’s been huge for me
I qualified as an English language teacher 20 years ago and continue to teach in Spain but young Shane puts me to shame with his super articulate, enthusiastic messaging. Keep up the good work.
Yo llevo 40 horas. 2 horas diarias viendo contenido en inglés y la verdad es que se nota un montón. Es agradable, porque a pesar de que no entiendes una oración completa, sin darte cuenta la entendiste. Soy un A2 por si les interesa.
watched this video when it first came out. But it just popped up, so I watched it again. As I close in on 700 hours of active immersion this video hits different. It made sense back then but now it is so much more relatable lol.
This is a great video man, I'm really glad I found your channel. Focusing on input and immersion is definitely the way to go, and I can't see myself ever going back to traditional methods. I would love to have a chat with you some time!
I so agree with finding something that you enjoy in that language. This is easy in Spanish because it has almost everything dubbed and there is lots of content. It becomes much harder when learning a not so common language.
Great video! I completely agree with all of your points! I'm glad I found your channel! ☺I'm learning Levantine Arabic, not Spanish, but all the principles still apply. Thank you!
Thanks Shane, that's really insightful. I'm at a similar point with my own Spanish learning and I'm drawing similar conclusions, particularly re the idea of the new language itself not being the main point, but rather the opportunities it creates such as developing new interests VIA the new language and indeed forging new friendships as a result of the language learning journey. Para mi lo que realmente importa numero uno es LA GENTE, la verdad es que el idioma espanol en si mismo, casi me da igual! si tiene sentido.. :)
Oye! Estoy de acuerdo con todo! Uso “ the Netflix chrome learning extension” pone la series, películas etc en ambos idioma! Me encanta! realmente lo me ayuda.
I've found that everyone does time tracking differently and because of that time tracking is really only useful for tracking your own progress. I mean, I guess that would be true anyway, because even if Shane and I watched the exact same things and spent the exact same time, our 100, 500, or 1,000 hours wouldn't necessarily produce the same results. People are different. But, as an example, I record (roughly) the length of the show as immersion time. I'll only cut off a a few minutes for credits, for example. So my 50 minute show might be recorded as 45 minutes, not 30. I know some people record the time they spent with the show, so if they spend time rewinding, replaying, pausing to look something up, etc and it took them 1 hour to watch a 30 minute show, they record it as 1 hour -- because they're tracking their time spent learning the language. Also, I never record my time reading. I record the words read -- so I have no idea how long I've spent reading. I also do track "passive" listening -- but only what I'd consider "active passive listening." For example, if I'm listening to a podcast while walking or shopping, I'm given it 80-90% of my attention, so I track it. If I had something on where it was more background while I was more intently focused on something else, I wouldn't track that. But, any way -- it's a good lesson that if you reach a 1,000 hours, you may not have the exact same results as Shane. And that's ok.
An absolutely superb vídeo Shane. Really useful advice and a very interesting and perceptive take on journey of learning a language. Articulate, clear, thought provoking and extremely motivating. Gracias tío, te agradezco mucho 👍
Amigo, quiero decirte muchas cosas, espero que las puedas leer. Primero, tienes una manera de explicar las cosas EXTRAORDINARIA, increíble. Se ve que eres muy bueno en la materia y te expresas demasiado bien. Me has motivado y ayudado a ordenar mis pensamientos con respecto a la carrera profesional que estudiaré, ya que amo las matemáticas pero hace poco encontré el aprendizaje de idiomas como uno de las habilidades más hermosas en la vida. Así que me has ayudado a elegir mi carrera universitaria. Siento mucho que no tengas muchos subscriptores en tu canal. Espero que pueda crecer rápido. Te mando un saludo y un gran gracias por tu contenido de calidad...
@9:00 subtitles - I don't trust them. Having used them quite a number of times I have noticed that subtitles can sometimes be shorter than the spoken language. Or, if you are watching a show where the dialogue was originally in a different language that they one you are watching it in, the subtitles can be vastly different. Like the subtitles are based on the script while the spoken dialogue has to be aligned with the timing of the characters mouths talking, thus you can end up with a long subtitle that is three times too long for the spoken word. I get this effect from Netflix and Amazon. If you use subtitles, do with with a program that is in your language target natively so the subs do match. Best is Closed Captions as those are supposed to be word for word.
Hi bro! Good video! My lenguage mother is Spanish, actually I'm learning English, I'm beginers hahah, so my English is not fine; maeby your are my lenguage parent. Learn your lenguage is very emociont and satisfactory (I know have errors). Your pronnuntation is very good. Hasta luegoooooo!!
Excellent! The best way of learning is by practising it. Our conversational course allows you to speak conversational Spanish as a native fast. And why not learn about culture at the same time?
Excellent video. I wish, however, you had mentioned what level those 1000 hours of immersion yielded. B1? B2? Would love to know purely out of curiosity. (I fully realize everyone's results will be different.)
“Get comfortable being uncomfortable.” YESSSSS!!! I teach in Japan and it’s all about grammar-translation here and they want everything explained. And some things have no explanation. And even for things that can be explained, you can’t just memorize 6 million explanations. If you don’t understand some part of a sentence in a foreign language, that doesn’t mean you failed. It means you are normal. When you speak your native language and you don’t understand a word, you might stop the speaker and ask what it means, or you might figure out from context. You will not, however, freak out that you don’t understand and stop speaking the language. You need to pick that skill up in foreign languages too.
Really glad you enjoyed that point, it’s actually what my old basketball coach used to say before he made us do defensive drills 😂 I think it’s super important especially for adults because we get so frustrated so easily with not understanding things we assume should be “basic”
So true. I've learned to try and compare how I'd react or explain a certain thing in English when I "freak out" that I don't know or understand it in Spanish. To see if it's "normal" that I don't know that word and if I don't if it's necessary to learn it (ie add to anki). And I've actually been learning new English words as a result of spanish 😂
I am brazilian. Spanish is easy and straight forward to learn it. Because my mother tongue is brazilian portuguese. It is so close to spanish, Less than 06 months is necessary to speak it fluently. I speak the variety rioplatense. Like argentinians and uruguayans. I do Seseos and Voseos.
As for the constant use of subtitles, I can say that it didn't hurt me at all. For about 2 years of immersion (in a lazy way), I continued to use subtitles, but gradually, without forcing myself, I stopped using them. I just started not turning them on sometimes because I felt lazy to bother, and after 3-5 months, I stopped using them at all. So if you are worried that you will never stop using subtitles, I think it is possible to naturally outgrow it (at least for me). Also, I didn't do in passive immersion for 2 years. At the beginning of my third year, it helped a bit, but I can't say that it was crucial for active viewing without subtitles.
Congratulations Shane on reaching 1000 hours! I have a question on immersion, how do you start it with a new language? What do you watch/listen/read when you can almost understand nothing of your target language?
In short, comprehensible input. There are quite a few channels that make Spanish content for learners in a comprehensible way so that you can listen as a beginner and still understand. Channels like dreaming Spanish for example
@@ShaneGodliman I've been trying to look for stuff like that in korean. They're few and far b/n on youtube but they are there. Reason it's also difficult is because I want it to have the criteria of *not* having Romanisation. But many many korean learning channels have Romanisation which frustrates me. But ah well...
Now whenever I'm looking for input I like to use RUclips and make new accounts for every language. Trying only to watch content in that language on that account. When I look for input if I don't know any of the language I use Google translate to search for pretty popular and universal topics to watch, things like food, travel, videos made for comprehensible input like Easy languages' videos, or chess. You would obviously change these things depending on what you're interested in and things you know about that culture. I have a ridiculously high tolerance for ambiguity where I'm fine watching something without understanding a word, this is probably bad but the point is that Google translate can help you to find content you enjoy even if you don't yet know the words for what you're looking for.
¡Enhorabuena chaval! No sigo el método tuyo, pero al final no importa el camino que seguimos, con tal de que disfrutemos y lleguemos hasta dónde queremos. Así lo veo yo. :-)
Your grammar point is valid for a language like Spanish and even English, which have a relatively simple and somewhat flexible grammar, now try learning German without learning the grammar alongside with vocabulary and such. Good luck with that.
I don't think speaking early "hurts". But I do think it has great potential to delay language acquisition via input. What I found, when I spoke German early was that I was so caught up in speaking that I kinda thought I had it all figured out, and I assumed that my language would improve by speaking and conversing alone. That might happen if you are living in the country where your target language is spoken, but it definitely won't happen if you are not, and you'll find that the opportunities to converse are just not there enough of the time. The important thing to do is to avoid thinking you've "got it" and instead keep getting comprehensible input, because early speakers always have a long way to go - a lot further than they tend to think.
How did you get started initially? Like obviously watching a show at 0% immersion would do nothing right? How did you get the first initial basics in a language? I am learning Dutch and want to do it through immersion, but it's all gibberish to me currently. Should I learn the 1000 most common words first and then start immersion?
Nice vid Shane and you’re doing a great job with the channel! What do you consider active immersion? I ask because I guess most of my immersion would be considered passive as it is usually when I am walking/cooking/at the gym etc. The only active immersion I think I do must be reading or tv shows/films. Was just curious how you have been immersing when you’ve being doing so actively and how much more beneficial you think it might have been for you?
I consider active immersion to be when I’m actively focusing on the content and not doing other stuff. So for me it’s been similar most of my immersion has been series, books and RUclips. More recently I’ve been doing a bit more passive immersion with podcasts but not that much still. I guess I would say it’s probably been quite beneficial to be doing a lot of focused “practice” and I would imagine it would be the same for most people, but obviously I couldn’t tell you comparatively how much better it is.
@@ShaneGodliman sounds similar to me, although I think I listen to Spanish most through podcasts rather than tv etc. Ah btw, have a listen to aquí estamos, very funny (or I think so at least). When you say focused practice do you do anything in particular or just focus on taking in whatever the content might be?
Hi Shane your videos are really useful , I’m so glad I’ve found them so thank you! Please can you tell me what was the channel you watched every day for 8 months ?
Great video! I really admire your journey to learn/acquire Spanish and your insights are valuable for every language learner. I would just comment on the point of speaking early. The bad habits you cannot fix easily are concerning in my opinion pronunciation. It's easier to fix sentence structures, verb conjugations or word choices than a false pronunciation. When you speak from early on, I think you should focus on pronunciation.
Thank you! That’s a great point actually, I wouldn’t consider my pronunciation to be bad but I know there are a lot of ways in which it could be better and I’m not sure how easy that will be to correct.
@@ShaneGodliman Tu español es estupendo. Creo hay solamente ciertos sonidos donde no te quitaste de la pronunciación inglesa. Un profesor del español te podría indicarlo seguramente muy bien. Lo último que quiero es menospreciar tu nivel de español. Por lo contrario, creo que tu rico vocabulario hace resaltar los errores en pronunciación, los cuales no notaría tanto si tuvieras en general un nivel más bajo.
PS: I myself learnt Spanish two years ago in a speak from day one and massive immersion approach. I just share my experience and thoughts on that, I'm not a Spanish teacher :D
Thank you very much! I still haven’t really looked into pronunciation specific stuff that much yet to be honest where I’ve been thinking about other stuff, but it’s on the list. Appreciate the support 😊
I'm at 60 hours after immersing in Spanish for only 3 months. LOL. I've learnt a language before to a C1 level, so I know what it takes to reach fluency. I'm just focusing on connecting with the Spanish language first before I move on to more intermediate level content. I haven't even looked at grammar yet.
@@friedchicken892 For Spanish, I'm using a online language learning platform. In practice, I'm doing immersion (listening & reading) from home, or I access it from my mobile phone when I'm commuting. I'm up to 130 hours on the language platform now, and have probably put in about 20 hours of listening and reading short stories via You Tube.
How did you get started initially? Like obviously watching a show at 0% immersion would do nothing right? How did you get the first initial basics in a language? I am learning Dutch and want to do it through immersion, but it's all gibberish to me currently. Should I learn like 1000 most common words first and then start immersion?
@@christianbrown3751 For me, the beginning is the hardest part. I read (and listen at the same time if possible) to simple, short stories. A translation of the text is available in my native language of English. Lots of repetition is needed to internalise the meanings of words and the grammatical patterns. The more you do it, the easier it gets. Other people may start of in a language differently, but that's how I did it for Spanish.
I think people over analyze just because of a small amount of immersion. I have learned a lot of grammar and vocabulary before started immersion (about 5-6 years), but only after 2-3 months of immersion I don't have any problem to produce sentence in my head without analyzing or thinking about rules (but sometimes I definitely make mistakes). I don't think any amount of grammar can really hurt while learners continue immersion a lot. A lot of grammar is more like a waste of time.
Great video! One thing I wonder when it comes to immersion: I have several Spanish RUclips channels that I watch regularly, and each one has a ton of content. I usually alternate between each channel throughout the day/week/month to get more experience with different accents and speech patterns. BUT I wonder if that "inconsistency" of accents is slowing down my overall listening progress... would it be better to immerse in only one channel, and work my way through all of its content, and maybe improve more quickly with that one channel's particular accent/speech pattern?
Thank you, and thanks for watching! I guess realistically it would be quite hard to just watch one channel all the time, but I do think the consistency of specific voices and accents can help a lot, there’s a channel that I’ve watched literally every day for about 8 months and I’ve watched a lot of long series with a lot of episodes, and on top of that the audiobooks as well where I’m listening to anywhere from 12-30+ hours of the same voice. I guess I would say if you can try and be consistent with one channel/one source where possible but it’s not a bad thing to be getting lots of exposure to different accents and voices because obviously that’s what you encounter in the real world
@@ShaneGodliman I think that makes a lot of sense. Maybe the thing to do is just weight my viewing a little more heavily towards one channel for an extended period of time. Thanks for the reply, and for the insight!
I've found that , in french , the subtitles in movies are so off that It is hilarious , and so I just dispense with them and forge on picking up a much as I can on my own. Since I also have trouble sometimes when I watch Australian movies , I don't really feel I'm doing that bad with French !
I've only listened to you in Spanish so far, so I didn't know you were from the UK! I thought your accent in Spanish was "US American speaking Castilian Spanish"! (mine is "US American speaking Latin American Spanish")
Language is not the subject! And I think language is more like a skill like playing sports or musical instruments, especially in which one's body feeling condense. What we're doing is converting sensory stimuations like voices and words to the meanings until it truns into your intuition one day. Sports like volleyball for exmaple, I can't really do a reception in the beginning, ball always flew somewhere unpredictably. But gradually, I'm able to pass correctly to the front or even do sets. The most surprising thing to me is when I'm defencing spikes, it force my brain to make decision in a millisecond and my body just subconsciously moves itself. It's a moment that a skill really sinks in and becomes your native reflex, hope this is a better understanding when it comes to language learning.
So you don't think it is helpful for someone who is a beginner to listen to more advanced content if they only understand like .0005% of what they are listening to? I am trying to listen to the same things in English and then in Spanish so I can grasp a few things here or there, but the majority of it makes no sense to me. Not sure if I am wasting my time and should listen to something more basic.
Grammar is useless... I never took grammar until age 7? And it doesn't change how anyone speaks anyway. I also speak fluent Hungarian since birth and never learned any grammar... So with Spanish I'll never study grammar beyond any curiosity i noticed on my own.
Spanish is my mother language and I totally understand if you feel this way, but if you really want to learn Spanish, this video has really good ideas on how to deal with your problems. I am learning Japanese and it's quite hard but I am doing it only as a hobby so there's no pressure of time limits or tests, I am the only one putting those onto myself and when it gets too much I just take a little break but try to go back to it at least once a day. Good luck, I'm sure you can do it!
Grammar be damned. Look it up once you're intermediate to advanced, but so many things are idiomatic. "It's about time"/ "at last" = finally . "So many" = a multitude. These are phrases that don't make sense grammatically and there are lots of them in all languages that you only learn via immersion.
Yeah, I still think Pablo has it right - comprehensible input only, don’t speak (how would you know how much you’ve messed up your accent by speaking too early?? It’s not something you can correct). No subtitles. No reading until 1,000 hours. Just listen.
¿Porque no dices ni una sola palabra en español? Tendría que ser facilísimo darnos un ejemplo de tus destrezas linguísticas después de tantas horas de clase. Por la evidencia que nos das en este video, podrías ser alguien que no sepa nada del español.
What has been the most important thing that you’ve learnt so far on your language learning journey?
It's always surprising to me how British you sound in English.
I agree with you on that grammar should be left for later. Learning grammar is like reading books about cooking while sitting on the sofa. That's not learning to cook, that's just messing around.
About subtitles, I see them as training wheels. They make you feel safe, they're useful, but you have to outgrow them.
And finally, one thing I always knew and nobody told me is, indeed, language is not the subject. I learnt the English I know while doing other things (mostly surfing idly on the Internet and listening to music)
Ultimately for me language learning is about being able to communicate clearly with people - not necessarily with 100% perfect grammar, syntax and vocabulary- all that comes with experience and practice.
Learning a foreign language has given me the opportunity to form new relationships with people and cultures different form my own- that I would never have been be exposed to-had I not endeavoured to speak and understand another language.
This can enrich your life- it certainly has mine. As far as I’m concerned with my own personal journey of of teaching myself Spanish-it has been one of the most exciting satisfying and worthwhile things I ever done in my life.
That’s so awesome to hear! And I totally agree it has enriched my life in so many ways!
I think the most important thing I learned so far was to move on to more engaging content. I love Dreaming Spanish, but in many ways I outgrew it -- not because I find it all comprehensible (I can still struggle with some intermediate videos), but because not every video on there will be engaging to me. In the beginning there was a novelty in just being able to understand. I could watch 2 hours of beginner videos and stay engaged because the very fact that I was understanding a new language kept me engaged and entertained. That stopped working once I hit about 200 hours of input (I'm not at almost 300). And now I find I have to watch much more difficult and less comprehensible content because it's what helps keep me engaged -- but I do think that the intermediate stage I'm in has been the hardest -- because I'm in a place where easy content isn't interesting enough and interesting content isn't comprehensible enough. But I know I need to just push through. I've started finding more and more native level content comprehensible WITH subtitles. Eventually, like you, I'll need to graduate out of using them. I use language reactor, so sometimes I'll hide or try not to look at the subtitles until the line is finished and then if I missed something, I'll check. That gives me some listening practice as well.
lol i do the same of rounding down but other refolders told me im wack at 600 for listening and prop 1.2k overall studying
“Language is not the subject. Language is the tool to learn things.” I love this point!
It definitely helped me a lot when I realised that!
I spent sooo many extra hours watching videos on "how" to learn Spanish as opposed to actually watching or listening. Great point. I wanted to be at a certain level very quickly because I was so excited. Once I became patient and realized it was a process i learned so much. I can listen to a podcast now and follow everything that's being said after around 500 hours of input. And I think it's so cool how you always try to make time to respond to your followers. Bien consejos, buen trabajo compa
It’s an easy trap to fall into! But it sounds like you’re making awesome progress 🙌🏽🙌🏽
Watch videos on how to learn Spanish in Spanish
I'm learning Mandarin, and a native Spanish speakers, and I'm watching this video, lol. Procrastination is always a temptation, 😂.
I´m a spanish speaker (mexican) and I´m hard working to learn English.
I´ve been studying for 1 month and I feel I´m stuck, sometimes I wanna give up but I won´t so if you read this, believe I feel you, It´s complicated learn some lenguage but not impossible. You can do it!
P.S: I feel uncomfortable when I write in english because I think there are mistakes but I try and do my best .
Your writing in English is actually pretty good! Keep going! 😊
You’re doing great!
Yo se este estaba mucho tiempo pasado, pero tu ingles es muy, muy bueno! Desde un persona apprendiendo español. I get nervous about writing in Spanish as well!
Tu Inglés es bien. No perfecto, claro, pero muy bien para ¡uno mes solo! Soy de Inglaterra y aprendiendo español ahora, desde marzo. También, estoy nervioso a hablar y escribir específico en español para razones iguales.
Aprendí con Babbel, leyendo, escuchando a podcasts y uno semana en Alicante de España immersion. Ahora, yo estoy empezando Dreaming Spanish, pero con Babbel también.
Great tips, very articulate. As far as subtitles (at least for beginners) just watch out for those automated subtitles. I've seen some really weird stuff with that even in my native language: English, so I can only imagine the errors it produces in Spanish. The thought of it just makes me shudder!
I’m at almost 400 hrs. I agree about listening to the same videos or podcasts a couple times. That has helped me hear words I missed the first time. I’m reading el alquimista and it has short sections. I read them twice and sometimes three times. First time, I just try to get a general idea of what is happening. Second to get a better idea. On the third time, I’ll try and look up the words that I didn’t understand to fill in the blanks. Thanks for bringing up this idea. It does help.
How did you get started initially? Like obviously watching a show at 0% immersion would do nothing right? How did you get the first initial basics in a language? I am learning Dutch and want to do it through immersion, but it's all gibberish to me currently. Should I learn like 1000 most common words first and then start immersion?
@@christianbrown3751 I used duo lingo to get started since I had no previous experience with Spanish. I found dreaming Spanish about a month after I started and watched all their beginner videos. I also got a pack of 1000 words and a list of 5000 words. I don’t use them very much. Someone had a list of the 50 most common verbs and I studied those. That was helpful. Once I got some words down I started listening to Mexican radio stations, Spanish RUclips channels, and read a couple beginner/intermediate books that Brenda from hola Spanish recommended. As for Dutch, when I lived in Germany in the late 80s-early 90s, I visited the Netherlands twice. Amsterdam and Groningen. Groningen was celebrating its 950th birthday. I really enjoyed the Netherlands! I wish you the best on your Dutch journey.
Congratulations Shane! Nice milestone. And solid reflections on learning languages. I’m at app 500 hours of Spanish and actively trying to wean myself off of (Spanish) subtitles. Part of me is still fighting to retain my safety blanket!
I recently heard Matt vs Japan say something that to me really hit home re the language journey - something you were touching on in your passion/percentage point, to paraphrase: ‘learning a language successfully has a lot to do with your ability to tolerate ambiguity.’
Thanks Jeff! Yeah I remember him saying that, I think I’ve quoted it in a video in fact at some point, but yeah I totally agree that’s been huge for me
I consider watching with subtitles a different form of input. I listen to native podcasts to test my listening.
I qualified as an English language teacher 20 years ago and continue to teach in Spain but young Shane puts me to shame with his super articulate, enthusiastic messaging. Keep up the good work.
Thank you very much Mark!
Yo llevo 40 horas. 2 horas diarias viendo contenido en inglés y la verdad es que se nota un montón. Es agradable, porque a pesar de que no entiendes una oración completa, sin darte cuenta la entendiste. Soy un A2 por si les interesa.
Gracias por habernos dado una muestra de tus avances dentro de tan poco tiempo. ¡Es verdaderamente impresionante!
watched this video when it first came out. But it just popped up, so I watched it again. As I close in on 700 hours of active immersion this video hits different. It made sense back then but now it is so much more relatable lol.
Thats awesome! I haven’t watched the latest one yet but I’ve been enjoying watching your update videos too
This is a great video man, I'm really glad I found your channel. Focusing on input and immersion is definitely the way to go, and I can't see myself ever going back to traditional methods. I would love to have a chat with you some time!
Thank you very much! Any time man :)
Thanks Shane. I really liked the “language is not the subject” point.
Thanks for watching! I’m glad you enjoyed it
I so agree with finding something that you enjoy in that language. This is easy in Spanish because it has almost everything dubbed and there is lots of content. It becomes much harder when learning a not so common language.
Great video! I completely agree with all of your points! I'm glad I found your channel! ☺I'm learning Levantine Arabic, not Spanish, but all the principles still apply. Thank you!
Thanks Shane, that's really insightful. I'm at a similar point with my own Spanish learning and I'm drawing similar conclusions, particularly re the idea of the new language itself not being the main point, but rather the opportunities it creates such as developing new interests VIA the new language and indeed forging new friendships as a result of the language learning journey. Para mi lo que realmente importa numero uno es LA GENTE, la verdad es que el idioma espanol en si mismo, casi me da igual! si tiene sentido.. :)
Yeah I understand totally, your focus shifts a lot as your level develops!
Oye! Estoy de acuerdo con todo! Uso “ the Netflix chrome learning extension” pone la series, películas etc en ambos idioma! Me encanta! realmente lo me ayuda.
I've found that everyone does time tracking differently and because of that time tracking is really only useful for tracking your own progress. I mean, I guess that would be true anyway, because even if Shane and I watched the exact same things and spent the exact same time, our 100, 500, or 1,000 hours wouldn't necessarily produce the same results. People are different. But, as an example, I record (roughly) the length of the show as immersion time. I'll only cut off a a few minutes for credits, for example. So my 50 minute show might be recorded as 45 minutes, not 30. I know some people record the time they spent with the show, so if they spend time rewinding, replaying, pausing to look something up, etc and it took them 1 hour to watch a 30 minute show, they record it as 1 hour -- because they're tracking their time spent learning the language. Also, I never record my time reading. I record the words read -- so I have no idea how long I've spent reading. I also do track "passive" listening -- but only what I'd consider "active passive listening." For example, if I'm listening to a podcast while walking or shopping, I'm given it 80-90% of my attention, so I track it. If I had something on where it was more background while I was more intently focused on something else, I wouldn't track that. But, any way -- it's a good lesson that if you reach a 1,000 hours, you may not have the exact same results as Shane. And that's ok.
And I'm here looking for interesting media which I could enjoy in my target language, congrats btw!
An absolutely superb vídeo Shane.
Really useful advice and a very interesting and perceptive take on journey of learning a language.
Articulate, clear, thought provoking and extremely motivating.
Gracias tío, te agradezco mucho 👍
Thank you very much Peter, I’m glad you got something out of the video!
Amigo, quiero decirte muchas cosas, espero que las puedas leer. Primero, tienes una manera de explicar las cosas EXTRAORDINARIA, increíble. Se ve que eres muy bueno en la materia y te expresas demasiado bien. Me has motivado y ayudado a ordenar mis pensamientos con respecto a la carrera profesional que estudiaré, ya que amo las matemáticas pero hace poco encontré el aprendizaje de idiomas como uno de las habilidades más hermosas en la vida. Así que me has ayudado a elegir mi carrera universitaria. Siento mucho que no tengas muchos subscriptores en tu canal. Espero que pueda crecer rápido. Te mando un saludo y un gran gracias por tu contenido de calidad...
No pasa nada, el canal va creciendo cada día 😊 me alegro que hayas sacado algo tan bonito de uno de mis vídeos! Espero que disfrutes
@@ShaneGodliman filthy outputter
Lol seriously great video
@@novikane14 haha thanks man!
I'm a bit of a language and linguistics fanatic, and I like to watch videos about linguistics for comprehensible input xD
Same lol, I’m out here immersion in content about how to learn a language in the tl
Me too! When I realized I could watch videos about learning Spanish in Spanish it was a game changer. A sort of productive navel gazing LOL!
@9:00
subtitles - I don't trust them. Having used them quite a number of times I have noticed that subtitles can sometimes be shorter than the spoken language. Or, if you are watching a show where the dialogue was originally in a different language that they one you are watching it in, the subtitles can be vastly different. Like the subtitles are based on the script while the spoken dialogue has to be aligned with the timing of the characters mouths talking, thus you can end up with a long subtitle that is three times too long for the spoken word.
I get this effect from Netflix and Amazon.
If you use subtitles, do with with a program that is in your language target natively so the subs do match. Best is Closed Captions as those are supposed to be word for word.
Hi bro! Good video! My lenguage mother is Spanish, actually I'm learning English, I'm beginers hahah, so my English is not fine; maeby your are my lenguage parent. Learn your lenguage is very emociont and satisfactory (I know have errors). Your pronnuntation is very good. Hasta luegoooooo!!
I can teach u English 😊
@@lavishreacts8010 oh yes! How? Thank you so much🙏🏽
@@facundoaleman8629 but can u teach me Spanish ??
@@lavishreacts8010 Yes! With pleasure! No problem, puedo ayudarte con el español🙌🏽
@@facundoaleman8629 what’s ur WhatsApp number ?
Excellent! The best way of learning is by practising it. Our conversational course allows you to speak conversational Spanish as a native fast. And why not learn about culture at the same time?
Agree on grammar. Basic patterns so you can speak and understand. Everything else with time.
Excellent video. I wish, however, you had mentioned what level those 1000 hours of immersion yielded. B1? B2? Would love to know purely out of curiosity. (I fully realize everyone's results will be different.)
great video! thanks for the report, i agreed with so many of your points. subbed :D
I agree with you 100% on grammar I think of it like a wax or a polish.
“Get comfortable being uncomfortable.”
YESSSSS!!! I teach in Japan and it’s all about grammar-translation here and they want everything explained. And some things have no explanation. And even for things that can be explained, you can’t just memorize 6 million explanations. If you don’t understand some part of a sentence in a foreign language, that doesn’t mean you failed. It means you are normal. When you speak your native language and you don’t understand a word, you might stop the speaker and ask what it means, or you might figure out from context. You will not, however, freak out that you don’t understand and stop speaking the language. You need to pick that skill up in foreign languages too.
Really glad you enjoyed that point, it’s actually what my old basketball coach used to say before he made us do defensive drills 😂 I think it’s super important especially for adults because we get so frustrated so easily with not understanding things we assume should be “basic”
So true.
I've learned to try and compare how I'd react or explain a certain thing in English when I "freak out" that I don't know or understand it in Spanish.
To see if it's "normal" that I don't know that word and if I don't if it's necessary to learn it (ie add to anki).
And I've actually been learning new English words as a result of spanish 😂
Yeah I’ve learnt a decent amount of English words through Spanish too!
Desde mi niñez soleo oír estaciones de rádios de Argentina y Uruguay en onda corta. Hablo español fluído.
I am brazilian. Spanish is easy and straight forward to learn it. Because my mother tongue is brazilian portuguese. It is so close to spanish, Less than 06 months is necessary to speak it fluently. I speak the variety rioplatense. Like argentinians and uruguayans. I do Seseos and Voseos.
Excellent your advices!
Thank you!
Thank You Shane
Thanks for watching Janet!
As for the constant use of subtitles, I can say that it didn't hurt me at all. For about 2 years of immersion (in a lazy way), I continued to use subtitles, but gradually, without forcing myself, I stopped using them. I just started not turning them on sometimes because I felt lazy to bother, and after 3-5 months, I stopped using them at all. So if you are worried that you will never stop using subtitles, I think it is possible to naturally outgrow it (at least for me).
Also, I didn't do in passive immersion for 2 years. At the beginning of my third year, it helped a bit, but I can't say that it was crucial for active viewing without subtitles.
Estoy empezando aprender español después de universidad. Es difícil pero estoy mejorando cada día
gracias
Congratulations Shane on reaching 1000 hours! I have a question on immersion, how do you start it with a new language? What do you watch/listen/read when you can almost understand nothing of your target language?
In short, comprehensible input. There are quite a few channels that make Spanish content for learners in a comprehensible way so that you can listen as a beginner and still understand. Channels like dreaming Spanish for example
@@ShaneGodliman I've been trying to look for stuff like that in korean.
They're few and far b/n on youtube but they are there.
Reason it's also difficult is because I want it to have the criteria of *not* having Romanisation. But many many korean learning channels have Romanisation which frustrates me.
But ah well...
Now whenever I'm looking for input I like to use RUclips and make new accounts for every language. Trying only to watch content in that language on that account. When I look for input if I don't know any of the language I use Google translate to search for pretty popular and universal topics to watch, things like food, travel, videos made for comprehensible input like Easy languages' videos, or chess. You would obviously change these things depending on what you're interested in and things you know about that culture. I have a ridiculously high tolerance for ambiguity where I'm fine watching something without understanding a word, this is probably bad but the point is that Google translate can help you to find content you enjoy even if you don't yet know the words for what you're looking for.
¡Enhorabuena chaval! No sigo el método tuyo, pero al final no importa el camino que seguimos, con tal de que disfrutemos y lleguemos hasta dónde queremos. Así lo veo yo. :-)
Muchas gracias! Estoy completamente de acuerdo
Hey Shane loved this video, any recommendations for pretty much a beginner as in podcasts, Spanish tv or movies etc thanks 🙏
Your grammar point is valid for a language like Spanish and even English, which have a relatively simple and somewhat flexible grammar, now try learning German without learning the grammar alongside with vocabulary and such. Good luck with that.
I don't think speaking early "hurts". But I do think it has great potential to delay language acquisition via input. What I found, when I spoke German early was that I was so caught up in speaking that I kinda thought I had it all figured out, and I assumed that my language would improve by speaking and conversing alone. That might happen if you are living in the country where your target language is spoken, but it definitely won't happen if you are not, and you'll find that the opportunities to converse are just not there enough of the time. The important thing to do is to avoid thinking you've "got it" and instead keep getting comprehensible input, because early speakers always have a long way to go - a lot further than they tend to think.
Cheers Shane 👍
How did you get started initially? Like obviously watching a show at 0% immersion would do nothing right? How did you get the first initial basics in a language? I am learning Dutch and want to do it through immersion, but it's all gibberish to me currently. Should I learn the 1000 most common words first and then start immersion?
Nice vid Shane and you’re doing a great job with the channel! What do you consider active immersion?
I ask because I guess most of my immersion would be considered passive as it is usually when I am walking/cooking/at the gym etc. The only active immersion I think I do must be reading or tv shows/films. Was just curious how you have been immersing when you’ve being doing so actively and how much more beneficial you think it might have been for you?
I consider active immersion to be when I’m actively focusing on the content and not doing other stuff. So for me it’s been similar most of my immersion has been series, books and RUclips. More recently I’ve been doing a bit more passive immersion with podcasts but not that much still. I guess I would say it’s probably been quite beneficial to be doing a lot of focused “practice” and I would imagine it would be the same for most people, but obviously I couldn’t tell you comparatively how much better it is.
@@ShaneGodliman sounds similar to me, although I think I listen to Spanish most through podcasts rather than tv etc. Ah btw, have a listen to aquí estamos, very funny (or I think so at least).
When you say focused practice do you do anything in particular or just focus on taking in whatever the content might be?
Yeah I mean just trying to focus on taking it in, I have looked up some little grammar points here and there but mostly just the input
@@ShaneGodliman feels a little bit like cheating but it works haha
Hi Shane your videos are really useful , I’m so glad I’ve found them so thank you! Please can you tell me what was the channel you watched every day for 8 months ?
Thank you! I was talking about “Drafteados” it’s a channel that talks about the NBA
Great video! I really admire your journey to learn/acquire Spanish and your insights are valuable for every language learner. I would just comment on the point of speaking early. The bad habits you cannot fix easily are concerning in my opinion pronunciation. It's easier to fix sentence structures, verb conjugations or word choices than a false pronunciation. When you speak from early on, I think you should focus on pronunciation.
Thank you! That’s a great point actually, I wouldn’t consider my pronunciation to be bad but I know there are a lot of ways in which it could be better and I’m not sure how easy that will be to correct.
@@ShaneGodliman Tu español es estupendo. Creo hay solamente ciertos sonidos donde no te quitaste de la pronunciación inglesa. Un profesor del español te podría indicarlo seguramente muy bien. Lo último que quiero es menospreciar tu nivel de español. Por lo contrario, creo que tu rico vocabulario hace resaltar los errores en pronunciación, los cuales no notaría tanto si tuvieras en general un nivel más bajo.
PS: I myself learnt Spanish two years ago in a speak from day one and massive immersion approach. I just share my experience and thoughts on that, I'm not a Spanish teacher :D
Thank you very much! I still haven’t really looked into pronunciation specific stuff that much yet to be honest where I’ve been thinking about other stuff, but it’s on the list. Appreciate the support 😊
I'm at 60 hours after immersing in Spanish for only 3 months. LOL. I've learnt a language before to a C1 level, so I know what it takes to reach fluency. I'm just focusing on connecting with the Spanish language first before I move on to more intermediate level content. I haven't even looked at grammar yet.
Nice I’m about 50 hours mostly through dreaming Spanish
Did you ever do an immersion program! Or home
study
@@friedchicken892 For Spanish, I'm using a online language learning platform. In practice, I'm doing immersion (listening & reading) from home, or I access it from my mobile phone when I'm commuting.
I'm up to 130 hours on the language platform now, and have probably put in about 20 hours of listening and reading short stories via You Tube.
How did you get started initially? Like obviously watching a show at 0% immersion would do nothing right? How did you get the first initial basics in a language? I am learning Dutch and want to do it through immersion, but it's all gibberish to me currently. Should I learn like 1000 most common words first and then start immersion?
@@christianbrown3751 For me, the beginning is the hardest part. I read (and listen at the same time if possible) to simple, short stories. A translation of the text is available in my native language of English. Lots of repetition is needed to internalise the meanings of words and the grammatical patterns. The more you do it, the easier it gets. Other people may start of in a language differently, but that's how I did it for Spanish.
I think people over analyze just because of a small amount of immersion. I have learned a lot of grammar and vocabulary before started immersion (about 5-6 years), but only after 2-3 months of immersion I don't have any problem to produce sentence in my head without analyzing or thinking about rules (but sometimes I definitely make mistakes). I don't think any amount of grammar can really hurt while learners continue immersion a lot. A lot of grammar is more like a waste of time.
I often need subtitles even in english (my native) because it just helpes me absorb the content better. lol
Great video! One thing I wonder when it comes to immersion: I have several Spanish RUclips channels that I watch regularly, and each one has a ton of content. I usually alternate between each channel throughout the day/week/month to get more experience with different accents and speech patterns. BUT I wonder if that "inconsistency" of accents is slowing down my overall listening progress... would it be better to immerse in only one channel, and work my way through all of its content, and maybe improve more quickly with that one channel's particular accent/speech pattern?
Thank you, and thanks for watching! I guess realistically it would be quite hard to just watch one channel all the time, but I do think the consistency of specific voices and accents can help a lot, there’s a channel that I’ve watched literally every day for about 8 months and I’ve watched a lot of long series with a lot of episodes, and on top of that the audiobooks as well where I’m listening to anywhere from 12-30+ hours of the same voice. I guess I would say if you can try and be consistent with one channel/one source where possible but it’s not a bad thing to be getting lots of exposure to different accents and voices because obviously that’s what you encounter in the real world
@@ShaneGodliman I think that makes a lot of sense. Maybe the thing to do is just weight my viewing a little more heavily towards one channel for an extended period of time. Thanks for the reply, and for the insight!
No problem, hope it helps!
I've found that , in french , the subtitles in movies are so off that It is hilarious , and so I just dispense with them and forge on picking up a much as I can on my own. Since I also have trouble sometimes when I watch Australian movies , I don't really feel I'm doing that bad with French !
Nice! It’s definitely good to drop the subtitles at some point and just get used to listening at that speed 🙌🏽
I dont put subtitles on, but it helps to slow the video down than using its normal speed
I've only listened to you in Spanish so far, so I didn't know you were from the UK! I thought your accent in Spanish was "US American speaking Castilian Spanish"! (mine is "US American speaking Latin American Spanish")
A couple of people have said that to me actually haha
@@ShaneGodliman it's very cool! A foreign accent is a sign of bravery! Really enjoy your content man, keep it up!
¿Qué aplicación utilizaste para registrar tus 1.000 horas?
In my 65 years of learning foreign languages, I never bothered counting my hours and minutes of listening. What did I do wrong?
After how many hours did you start to output/speak Shane?
I started speaking pretty early on, after about 2 months, I’m not sure how many hours that would have been but not that many, I just went for it 😂
Hi, native Spanish speaker here, I'm curious, which country dialect are you immersing from?
I focus on the Spanish from Spain
How would you know how many hours you’ve done?
Because I track them on a spreadsheet
Can you learn two languages at the same time
Not a good idea
@@ジョンストーナー cheers I realise that a little time after I asked. Learning one to a high level is hard enough
Language is not the subject! And I think language is more like a skill like playing sports or musical instruments, especially in which one's body feeling condense. What we're doing is converting sensory stimuations like voices and words to the meanings until it truns into your intuition one day. Sports like volleyball for exmaple, I can't really do a reception in the beginning, ball always flew somewhere unpredictably. But gradually, I'm able to pass correctly to the front or even do sets. The most surprising thing to me is when I'm defencing spikes, it force my brain to make decision in a millisecond and my body just subconsciously moves itself. It's a moment that a skill really sinks in and becomes your native reflex, hope this is a better understanding when it comes to language learning.
what is your level after 1000hours? You shoulda start with that
Whatever happened to Shane?
who wanna exchange language ? i'm native spanish from colombian, my english level is A2/B1
So you don't think it is helpful for someone who is a beginner to listen to more advanced content if they only understand like .0005% of what they are listening to? I am trying to listen to the same things in English and then in Spanish so I can grasp a few things here or there, but the majority of it makes no sense to me. Not sure if I am wasting my time and should listen to something more basic.
Idk how many hours I'd be at, I've been living in Mexico for a year and live with my gf who doesn't speak English
Probably a lot I’d imagine!
I have also dedicated thousands of hours to Spanish since 1996 with no success.
What a waste of time…
Grammar is useless... I never took grammar until age 7? And it doesn't change how anyone speaks anyway. I also speak fluent Hungarian since birth and never learned any grammar... So with Spanish I'll never study grammar beyond any curiosity i noticed on my own.
spanish is soo hard 😖 im about to quit
Keep going, you can do it!
Spanish is my mother language and I totally understand if you feel this way, but if you really want to learn Spanish, this video has really good ideas on how to deal with your problems. I am learning Japanese and it's quite hard but I am doing it only as a hobby so there's no pressure of time limits or tests, I am the only one putting those onto myself and when it gets too much I just take a little break but try to go back to it at least once a day. Good luck, I'm sure you can do it!
@@NatalieYOT can u teach me plz ?
it seems a contradiction to focus on input and to speak
"irregardless" isn't a word.
Grammar be damned. Look it up once you're intermediate to advanced, but so many things are idiomatic. "It's about time"/ "at last" = finally . "So many" = a multitude. These are phrases that don't make sense grammatically and there are lots of them in all languages that you only learn via immersion.
Yeah, I still think Pablo has it right - comprehensible input only, don’t speak (how would you know how much you’ve messed up your accent by speaking too early?? It’s not something you can correct). No subtitles. No reading until 1,000 hours. Just listen.
I stopped watching after he said, input is the most important thing. I better listen to a Spanish video then.
Yes, you actually do have a lot of bad habits. Listen to your other interviews. You're repeating the same sentence patterns, same words too
immersion is a slow way to learn language
¿Porque no dices ni una sola palabra en español? Tendría que ser facilísimo darnos un ejemplo de tus destrezas linguísticas después de tantas horas de clase. Por la evidencia que nos das en este video, podrías ser alguien que no sepa nada del español.