Category: Language Learning

Headphones and an internet-connected device - all you need to start chatting on iTalki

Justifying iTalki : bumper bang for your language learning buck

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I’ve been spending a fortune on iTalki recently. This very popular website is a kind of language teacher directory service, where students can browse and contact hundreds of experts for one-to-one lessons on Skype. I learnt about the service some time ago from Benny Lewis’ site fluentin3months.com, and have since found out how highly addictive it is for language junkies.

But it can be an expensive business, scheduling countless lessons a month – especially if you learn several languages at once. Ever a good home economist, I’m always trying to justify my spending. So here is my reasoning on why iTalki is still an excellent use of my dosh.

Cheaper than travelling

Countless online articles expound the necessity of immersion for advanced fluency. However, ‘traditional’ immersion – travelling to hear and speak a language – can be costly. As a casual learner of Russian in the UK, I know that only too well. Flights and hotels are not cheap. Add to that the difficulties of getting visas and travel documents in many cases, and immersion abroad is simply off the cards for many.

iTalki offers immersion in short, intense chunks for a much smaller outlay. Russian teachers are available from $5 (about £3.60 at the time of writing) per hour upwards. You could have scores of lessons at that price before you hit the budget for a trip to Russia. Even at $20+, you’ll go a long way before it gets cheaper to travel abroad to learn and practise.

Immersion in an iTalki lesson is also very focussed, intense and directed. That contrasts with a wide variability of experience quality when travelling to learn languages. When travelling, you might go a whole day without managing to strike up much conversation beyond asking directions. On iTalki, you have up to an hour or more, exclusively for you to practise. That’s bumper bang for your buck.

Cheaper than competitors

Generally speaking, iTalki prices compare very favourably with other teacher directory / lesson sites. One of the other ‘biggies’, VerbLing, seems quite expensive by comparison. Likewise, when searching online for independent tutors, prices can be prohibitively high.

For mainstream languages like French and Spanish, the sheer number of tutors, and resulting competition, results in some very favourable prices for lessons. Additionally, most teachers offer a trial lesson for an extremely small sum. Under these conditions, students can more easily try multiple tutors to find a perfect match. Chopping and changing was never so easy!

iTalki’s tiering system of professional / community tutors makes for more affordable lessons, too. Good community tutors can be just as good as professional tutors, but often charge significantly less. Often the distinction is not one of teaching quality, but simply a case of hard qualifications. Some of my best iTalki tutors of all have been community tutors.

Community learning

Being part of iTalki is about more than just lessons. The creators have tried hard to create a dynamic community, as well as a market for teachers. There are many free, peer-to-peer features, which aim to get members helping each other. And there is nothing like helping others to boost your own motivation.

The question and answer forum is particularly busy, and somewhere you can also give a little back by addressing learner questions about your native language. The peer correction service can also be a real godsend, especially in lesser-taught languages.

What’s more, the site regularly hosts events that aim to egg students on. From February this year, for example, the iTalki Challenge will chivvy along the most dedicated amongst us, with leaderboards and prize badges awarded for the number of lessons taken. Some might criticise this as a cynical marketing move to increase lesson turnover, but the promise of public reward is surprisingly effective!

Turning the tables

As a language learner, you have your own unique insight into the learning process. That means that you, too, could help others by giving lessons in your native tongue, either as a community or professional tutor, depending on your background. As such, you can earn back iTalki dollars to keep a steady stream of lessons going. And of course, there’s always a chance that you’ll really enjoy it, and decide to turn it into an extra stream of income.

If you’re not quite ready for that step (and I’m not quite there yet, despite a professional teaching background!), then you can earn back in other ways. The site has a decent referral scheme, awarding you $10 for every friend you sign up for lessons. The friend also gets $10 credit, so it’s win-win. Here’s my link if you want that to start you off – and I’d be very grateful for your click! 😊

Peripheral benefits

As a fairly shy person by nature, another minor benefit of iTalki has occurred to me a lot recently: it is excellent practice at one-to-one conversation with new faces. Practising social niceties and the art of chat is a really useful side-effect of regular lessons on the platform.

Moreover, some of my long-term teachers have become good friends over the years. And if that isn’t a great peripheral plus-note, I don’t know what is.

Make the most of your iTalki dollars

Of course, it is vital to be prepared to make the most of your investment, too. Plan what you want to cover, perhaps using speaking bingo sheets. Make sure you write up your notes from the lesson. Transfer them to digital formats like Anki, where appropriate. And, most importantly, keep going, even when it seems difficult. Be honest with your tutors about the expected level of work, and they can adjust and tweak to suit you best.

iTalki can be a shot in the arm to your language learning, especially if you’ve been used to studying alone with your books. Those prices are deceptively cheap, given the return on your cash. Give it a go today.

The Commonwealth Games offer local linguists some amazing opportunities.

Commonwealth Games 2022 : Birmingham’s Local Language Boost

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In December, you might have noticed the fanfare around my hometown, Birmingham, winning the chance to host the Commonwealth Games in 2022. The decision has generated a lot of local pride. No wonder, as all four corners of the world will grace Brum for the two-week event. But as well as a wonderful opportunity for local commerce, the event represents concrete opportunities for linguists.

Languages of the Commonwealth Games

The last UK hosting was the hugely successful Glasgow games of 2014. For that event, Capita Translation and Interpreting produced a really useful infographic to illustrate the languages spoken in competing Commonwealth lands. Due to the origins of the Commonwealth, English dominates.

However, quite a few ‘mainstream’ foreign languages make the list, too. In 2022, locals have the chance to hear French, Portuguese and Spanish on the streets of Birmingham. And with both volunteering and commercial job boosts going hand-in-hand with hosting the games, speaking one of them might well be a route to opportunities for local learners.

Ready-made motivation for the classroom

For local language teachers, the chance for games tie-ins are unmissable. What better motivator can there be for languages than the chance to use them practically on the street?

What’s more, international games also offer rich pickings for fun lesson topics. Much like the Eurovision Song Contest, they are great for topics like countries, numbers, like/dislike phrases, descriptions and more.

I’ve used an Excel spreadsheet to create sweepstake-style cards to play classroom games with country names, for example. You can easily spool cards from Excel in a mail merge. Here is a sample list I have used (in CSV format). Although this one is based on the 2011 Eurovision Song Contest final, it is useful for other events, and – of course – extendable!

Beyond Birmingham

There are plenty of events to work into your learning or teaching beyond Birmingham, of course. While local pride make Brum a special highlight for me, forthcoming extravaganzas include:

  • 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang (the official site is available in Chinese, French, Korean and Japanese)
  • 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia (the official site is a bit of a goldmine for linguists, with French, German, Spanish, Arabic and Russian versions!)
  • UEFA Euro 2020
  • 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo (the official site is also in French as well as English and Japanese)

Plenty of resources for languages-sport crossovers there – have fun mining them!

Fireworks at New Year - a great time for Language Learning resolutions!

Happy New Language? Linguaphile Resolutions for 2018! 🎉

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It’s that time of year again, when we take stock of the last twelve months, and formulate resolutions for the next. And a major part of my planning for the next year will focus on my favourite topic: language learning.

I’ve had a packed year when it comes to languages. It hasn’t always been a breeze, especially when trying new techniques or tackling new languages. But easy or difficult, it’s all been a valuable learning experience! Picking through the spoils of 2017, here are a few things I want to take forward into the coming year.

Try new techniques

It’s easy to get stuck in your ways. In 2018, I’ll be making a concerted effort to research and try out new learning methods. Particularly helpful sources of new ideas this year have included language guru Benny Lewis’ packed website and newsletter – highly recommended.

One technique I want to try over the coming months is bidirectional translation, popularised by polyglot legend Luca Lampariello and recommended to me by fellow polyglot friend Marcel, one of iTalki’s very best German community tutors. It looks like a great way to approach learning from texts in a systematic, efficient way.

But I’ve also made a pact with myself to continue old, tried-and-tested techniques. Why mess with what works? Even better if old mingles with new, like when pen and paper meets the digital.

Not get carried away

I have a tendency to want to learn anything and everything. I’m slowly coming to terms with the fact that I only have a single lifetime to fill, and am maybe better off focussing on a few, choice areas to excel in. That means a few – not a hundred – languages. (Boo!)

As such, 2018 will be about consolidation of my two lifelong ‘biggies’, German and Spanish. I’ll also carry on learning Norwegian (B1), Icelandic (A1) and Polish (A1/2). And maybe Russian. And perhaps a bit of French and Chinese? OK, I’m already mentally breaking this resolution…

Be a couch potato

Well, not exactly. But I want to carry on watching fab foreign-language TV series on Netflix and other platforms. I was late to the party, discovering these treasures in 2017, and I keep uncovering new gems with every passing week.

I’ve already worked my way through Norwegian Okkupert, Icelandic Hraunið and Brazilian Portuguese 3%, amongst others. I’ve just discovered the Cold War, DDR-themed Der gleiche Himmel, too, which I’m sure I’ll devour in a matter of days. Hopefully Netflix will keep the foreign series flowing throughout 2018.

In terms of audio-only entertainment, trusty companions throughout 2017 have included NRK’s Språkteigen podcast on the Norwegian language and ORF’s news journal radio programmes from Austria. They’ll continue to keep me company in 2018, and hopefully be joined by others. I managed to switch out a lot of my trashy TV watching for foreign-language entz in 2017, and I plan to carry on that trend.

Keep blogging

2017 was the year of the blog for me. And I’ve enjoyed it hugely; it’s allowed me to crystallise my own approaches to language learning in writing. Simply putting words onto a page can be a fantastic way to consolidate your thoughts and plans.

What’s more, it’s a great way to share. And the more I learn about the online polyglot community, the more I see that sharing reigns supreme in our world. I hope that my humble blog has also helped or inspired others to try new things with languages.

Set targets

Setting and maintaining targets, like my aim of one blog article per week, has been a great self-confidence boost. It’s all about about sticking to personal goals, which has everything in common with language learning. I’ll be keeping this up in 2018, making full use of productivity scaffolds like the 12-week year system.

We all have our favourite apps for doing this. Personally, Evernote, Wunderlist and Anki are my workhorses of choice, and I’ll continue to milk them for their maximum organising power.

Resolutions for fun

Of all my resolutions, one jumps out as the most obvious. Above all, I’ll continue to love learning languages, and enjoy travelling to practise them (on a budget, of course). It’s probably the easiest of all resolutions to keep, too.

Whatever your own personal resolutions, may your 2018 also be filled with success and language fun. Thanks for reading and learning along with me. I hope to spend lots more time with you on our learning journey next year!

Notebook for note-taking

Note-taking: boost your language learning with old-school style

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Technology has transformed the day-to-day business of the language learner. Note-taking is now a matter of a few clicks and taps. Always on, vast storage, and the ability to index and edit – modern devices, apps and browser widgets take the hassle out of collating and reviewing vocabulary .

But there’s almost something too easy about turning to electronics every time. Try as I might, I can’t quite shake off my old-school habits of pen and paper. There’s something about physically writing down notes that helps my brain to process them. It gives them salience, lifting them from the mundaneness of tapping some lines into a phone or computer. Here are a few tips for boosting your own language learning process with a bit of old-fashioned writing.

The workhorse: Pukka Pads

You have to start somewhere, and usually, that’s with the roughest sketches and scribbles. I find it helpful, for instance, to make pre-lesson notes on things I want to talk about with my teachers.

For rough drafts and ideas, you can’t beat an A4 Pukka Pad. The 3-pack is particularly good value on Amazon.co.uk at the moment, and with 200 pages each, they should last a fair while.

When I’m preparing for a lesson or session, I’ll take a whole page of A4 to sketch out ideas and new vocab I want to practise. A4 is the perfect size to create speaking bingo sheets, too.

Embracing Pukka for note-taking doesn’t have to mean turning against technology, either. After my notes are done, I like to use a document scanner app to store them electronically. Scanner Pro for iOS is my favourite, and Adobe Scan is a good alternative for Android. This way, I also have access to my written notes any time, any place.

Old-school pride in your work

After the initial work, there is an important extra step: transferring to ‘best’. Admittedly, this is a hangover from my school days. Several of my teachers would give us kids a rough and a best exercise book for the school year. We’d do our note-taking and practice work in the former, then neatly write up our final work in the latter.

It might seem like meaningless escritorial vanity at first, but there’s a logic to this finickity madness. Writing up to best adds an element of selection and organisation that mimics the brain’s indexing of memories according to salience, or importance. It adds an extra stage of processing, giving weight to the bits we really value and want to keep.

The Monarch of note-taking: Moleskine

To boost that sense of salience, it’s a good idea to go all-out on your best notes. And there are few more appropriate vessels for these than a beautiful, classic Moleskine. They come in all shapes and sizes, but the slightly-larger-than-A5, standard Moleskine is my favourite. If, like me, you love your stationery, Moleskines are a real treat.

Premium-bound with an elasticated bookmark, the Moleskine notebook is a rewarding place to record your work. I like to organise mine by topic / language function pages. These range from individual language topics like ‘health’, ‘animals’ and so on, to pages for structures like ‘conversation fillers’ and ‘discussion / debate phrases’. If you want it to make it extra special, get yourself a nice fountain pen to fill it up.

Perfecting your process

So, in summary, this is our old-school, optimised note-taking process, with a bit of new-school thrown in:

  1. Pre-lesson and prep notes on a page of an A4 Pukka Pad
  2. Scan notes using a document scanner app like Scanner Pro
  3. Transferring notes and vocabulary to best in a beautiful Moleskine

It’s a simple approach, but it adds another useful level of cogitation and brain-processing to your language work. Keep that vocab churning – and enjoy that lovely, premium stationery while you’re at it!

Phyllis Soley and Richard West-Soley picking flowers. My Nan - my hero.

My language hero – a personal dedication

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Our love of languages is so much more than words on a page. It is about the journey language facilitates for us, and the people that join us on that journey. The most special of these people become our language heroes, for one reason or another. And with this post, I mark the memory of a very, very special language hero of mine: my Nan, Phyllis Soley.

Nan was a sharp and witty lady. Although she didn’t learn languages herself, she was a dab hand at general knowledge rounds on TV quizzes. But she saw something in my love of languages that she appreciated and wanted to nurture.

Books, books and more books

She spotted early on that my fascination for language was tightly bound with a love of books. My very first language book – Teach Yourself French (the lovely old 80’s blue cover version!) – was bought with my couple of pounds of pocket money on one of our many family trips to Burnham-on-Sea. Barely even 10 years old, those early days rummaging around the tiny language section set off a journey of exploration that had no end.

When I was a bit older, I graduated from the little seaside bookshop to “the big Waterstones” in Birmingham. After the half-hour train journey from our home town, Nan would wisely ask the staff for a chair. She knew I’d need lots of time looking at the language books. Nan never complained, but sat there patiently, watching me pick out countless courses and grammars. It was a passion she was happy to indulge.

Years later, when her legs failed her, she’d still sate my hunger for books, insisting that I buy a new tome from her to me on birthdays and at Christmas. My shelves are still full of books she gifted me.

Everyday hero

In 1995, when I won a place to study languages at the University of Oxford, she was my chief cheerleader. My whole time there, she would send care parcels and pocket money to ease the bumps. To my student shame, she would even take in my laundry with Mum on my home visits. In a hundred ways, Nan typified my family’s love and encouragement for the path I’d chosen to follow in languages.

One certain language-based memory I have is particularly special. A fervent fan of the Eurovision Song Contest in the 1990s, I tended to travel back home from uni to watch it each year. Naturally, I would insist on all members of my family watching it too. Back then, of course, the songs were in the national language of each country – a bit of a linguist’s dream-come-true in those pre-Internet days, when foreign-language TV was something you needed a special satellite dish for.

In May of 1997, I travelled home for the weekend, and watched it at her house. It was just Nan and me, that night – and the UK won. She sat patiently with me through all of those songs in Norwegian, Estonian, Polish and more – and was rewarded with a win.

Nan didn’t mind watching at all – or at least, never admitted to it. She knew I loved music and knew I loved languages, and joined in the fun with me. (I’m sure it could get annoying, years later, when I’d call after the show and request the lowdown on all her favourites, in detail!)

Celebrate your everyday heroes

Language heroes don’t need to be amazing linguists themselves. They are more often than not the loving people around us, who encourage and nurture. As much as the teachers and inspirational figures that guide us, they help us to achieve our goals. Maybe it’s that person who bought your first language book, or took you on your first holiday abroad where you spoke a foreign language. It might even just be someone who kept you going with kind words. Whatever they did, we are lucky to have them in our lives, and perhaps, one day, we can do the same for others.

As a linguist, it feels fitting that I created a tribute to her through language – in fact, in her own words. Some years ago, I gave Nan a dictaphone and said she could record whatever she liked, in order to relieve some of the boredom of being wheelchair-bound. The result was a collection of recordings of Nan retelling her early life story. It’s a wonderful, precious thing that we’ll cherish forever. (And, incidentally, it permanently preserves her lovely Stourbridge accent – something of interest if you like exploring British dialects!)

We said goodbye to my wonderful Nan only very recently, which is my reason for celebrating her in this post. It’s important to find a hero like Nan for your journey. Someone who will always believe in you; someone who will be your greatest fan. She will always be with me, by my side, proud of me and egging me on. She will always be my hero.

Phyllis Soley - my everyday language hero

Phyllis Soley – my everyday language hero

The world is even more accessible today, with a range of foreign language TV available online.

Netflix’s foreign language TV bonanza

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The Internet truly has made the world smaller. That’s lucky for linguists; a raft of foreign language TV is instantly at hand. Anglophone subscription TV services have been a little slow to catch up, but are finally opening up to content in languages other than English. Netflix in particular has done language lovers proud, even producing several non-English projects like Dark and 3%. Here are a few of the overseas gems I’ve been enjoying recently.

German 🇩🇪

Dark

Mysterious and other-worldly, there’s more than a touch of Grimm to the production of the Netflix offering Dark. At once disturbing, mysterious and intriguing, it’s already getting a lot of positive criticism. If you liked the Netflix smash hit Stranger Things, you might well get sucked in to this very quickly!

Icelandic 🇮🇸

Hraunið (The Lava Field)

This crime series puts a uniquely Icelandic slant on the Scandi noir genre. Full of impressive, sweeping landscape shots, it boasts a dark storyline and some very quirky characters.

Norwegian 🇳🇴

Nobel

Gritty and hard-hitting, this series follows a Norwegian Special Forces officer in Afghanistan. It can make for difficult viewing, but provides a vehicle for some stunning performances by the cast.

Portuguese (Brazil) 🇧🇷

3%

I’m not actually learning Portuguese, but I enjoyed this series so much that it deserves a mention. Set in a dystopian near-future, young adults battle it out to reach ‘the offshore’, a paradise reserved for the few. It makes for compelling viewing. And if you get hooked, no problem: a second series is in the making.

On the list

These are just the few that I’m watching right now. Others are on my list to get round to on Netflix, including:

That’s plenty of watching hours in the pipeline – hopefully Netflix will continue to support international projects like these, both through funding / production, and simply making other series available across their platforms. Bring on the binge!

We feel enthusiasm for chocolate, but it's not healthy to gorge on it!

Rationing enthusiasm for more effective language learning

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Some things can be moreish. Chocolate, for example. You might think you can’t get enough of it. Your enthusiasm for the sweet stuff takes over, you race through your stash of secret supplies, and before you know it, you’re feeling bleugh. Those four Mars Bars and the family size Galaxy have done you no good.

Likewise, if you enjoy learning languages, extreme enthusiasm can be a hindrance. That sounds like a terrible thing to say – enthusiasm for learning is truly wonderful, of course. But, at the sharp end, it can be too much of a good thing.

When I’m on a learning kick, and the enthusiasm bug bites, I speed up. I want to devour words, rules, facts, figures.

And often, that means I rush ahead and skip the basics.

Dangerous enthusiasm

Now, I could pick any number of languages I’ve tried learning in the past to illustrate this. For example, the Icelandic language truly fascinates me. Historically a pretty conservative language, it’s as close to Old Norse as a modern foreign language gets. And as Norwegian learner too, there are tons of common points of interest between the two. It’s just incredibly interesting.

I spent a good year thrashing away at it some time ago. I did reasonably well, too, learning lots of grammar in particular (I am a total grammar boffin). However, I never really gained any colloquial fluency.

The reason for that is the chocolate problem. I found the language enthralling, and developed a real taste for it. But that meant I raced ahead, guzzling up the interesting stuff long before I should have. That’s a great recipe for learning without practical application.

I became the kind of linguist who could explain and conjugate complex verb paradigms in Icelandic, but couldn’t tell the time, count or say hello. Oops. Not so handy in Reykjavík.

DeFEating my nemesis

Because of this, Icelandic was always a bit of a ‘nemesis’ language for me. Every time, it would entice me a little too much, and I’d gorge on it to the point of saturation. Every time, it beat me, leaving me bursting with grammar, but with little practical application.

But I like a challenge, and if anything, Icelandic is the perfect vehicle to exercise a new, restrained enthusiasm. I picture myself down but not out, bellowing “you shall not beat me!” at it from the boxing ring floor. To that end, I’ve returned to the language recently, and thanks to a really good teacher on iTalki, am systematically filling in the gaps in the basics. We’re using a set of beginner’s resources that are available for free: Íslenska fyrir alla (Icelandic for everyone), and, for a change, I’m sticking to the plan.

Pig out – but not too often!

So, to return to chocolate (what a great idea), taking it bite by bite is advised. Little, but often. It doesn’t mean you can’t sometimes pig out – but don’t let it ruin your diet!

Learning multiple languages CAN be as simple as putting together coloured blocks!

Tackle multiple languages by blocking your time

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I am a language hog. I’m eternally curious about them, and genuinely love studying them. So, I’m often actively learning multiple languages at the same time.

However, advice on learning multiple languages usually suggests plenty of caution and good planning. Now, you can be over-cautious; some suggest avoiding languages that are quite closely related, such as Norwegian and Icelandic, or Polish and Russian. However, I find that sometimes, this can actually help.

But overstretching yourself – however fun the activity – is a recipe for burnout. And, I’ve found, successful study sessions in a foreign language require a bit of conscientious preparation. You have to get in the mindspace for that language. At the very least, you need to (re-)activate your existing knowledge and plan to have something to say.

Because of that, few students will learn effectively by cramming three or more different languages into back-to-back study blocks on the same day.

Multiple languages pile-up

The problem was this: when I first started taking online lessons on iTalki, I had a tendency to spot any free time in my diary and fill it up. A sucker for punishment, you might think; rather, kid-in-a-sweetshop syndrome! So many languages, so little time…

For all busy people, it’s very tempting to do this. A free afternoon on Saturday? Squeeze in your German and Spanish. Only have one free evening in the week? Schedule three different language classes in it to make sure you’re getting your practice.

Nonetheless, this was a disaster for me. The result was always the same – I’d do well in the first class, then struggle to switch mindset for the following ones. I noticed the problem even when I left slightly longer, like a single day, between lessons. And, frankly, it’s a waste of the money to spend money on lessons and not be able to do the best you can in them.

Language blocks

However much I wanted to chop and change, it was necessary to create some separation. This way, at the very least, I could give each language a fair allocation of my time and energy. To this end, I’ve used trial and error to find an approach that works. And the trick, I’ve found, is spacing different languages into learning blocks of a few days.

What I do now is to carve my time into blocks of learning. Each one leads up to the big lesson ‘event’, where I can practise what I’ve learnt. Importantly, as much as possible, I keep each different language lesson separated by at least a couple of days on my calendar. In effect, you are spending your block working up to the pinnacle, which is the face-to-face lesson.

Short, sweet and focussed

It’s probably best not to make the blocks too long; two to four days working on a language is probably optimal before you cycle to the next one. You don’t want any one language to have too much downtime. But for those few days, ensure that your all your active learning is focussed on the single language.

The exception to the rule is with your languages in maintenance mode. These require less fresh learning and intensive vocab prep. For example, German and Spanish are my degree languages, and my strongest; therefore, I’ll pop a Spanish or German class on the same day as an Icelandic or Norwegian one – but never an Icelandic and Norwegian one on the same day.

Finally, it’s important to ‘sign off’ properly after you finish a block. For instance, I write up my lesson notes, add new vocab to Anki and spend some time putting any new vocabulary into example sentences. Tying it all off nicely after the big event is as important as preparing for it.

Why limit yourself?

If languages are your joy and passion, then why limit yourself? It’s true that you may well learn more quickly if you concentrate on a single one. But if you are a language guzzler, like me, then timing tricks like these will help keep you satiated, while still squeezing the most from your lessons.

A jumble of letters - sort them out and have something to say!

Something to say for yourself? Preparing for conversation lessons

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When I taught languages at school, one of the toughest challenges was the reticent teen. They would be bright, receptive and learn the material in class. But then, in speaking tests, they would struggle for something to say.

What are your hobbies? Maybe a one-sentence response – and then blank. What did you do at the weekend? Um… Where did you go on your Summer holidays? “Just make something up!” we’d implore, but the silence was deafening.

To be fair, it’s hard to enthuse teens in their native language, let alone a foreign one. But as an adult language learner, I’ve come to find a bit more sympathy for those untalkative kids.

The fact is, it’s often hard to talk about ourselves on-demand, on the spot.

Be honest – if someone stopped you on the street right now and asked what you’d been doing over the past week, could you reel it all off? (That is, after you’d got over how creepy it would be for a stranger to do that!)

Beating the blanks

I take a lot of language classes on the digital tuition platform iTalki. General conversation makes up a large part of those lessons. And so often in the past, I’ve been caught off-guard by general questions about my recent activities.

It’s not that I don’t do much – I’m pretty much busy all the time! But the sheer void that greets me when I try to answer that question would make you suspect I lived in a cave. It’s a simple case of frame of mind. Being in ‘ready to learn mode’, it’s disconcerting to have to think back to what I was doing six days ago. On top of that, what finally pops into my head might be something I don’t have the target language for.

Be prepared

The trick to beating the blank is simple: be prepared.

It is very likely that most of your conversation lessons will involve the teacher asking what you’ve been doing recently. It’s just human nature, and a nice, friendly topic to talk on. So before the lesson, make sure you have prepared something to say on it.

I’ll spend five or ten minutes before a lesson brainstorming my past week, scribbling down target language words and phrases around what I’ve been up to. I’ll also note down some time phrases – days of the week, constructions like ‘in the evening’ and so on – as these are super-useful when talking about your activities (and so tip-of-your-tongue elusive in the heat of the moment). Much like my speaking bingo sheets, this essential prep creates a conversation framework that supports language flow, and helps you get the most out of the lesson.

Icelandic pre-lesson prep notes - ensuring I have something to say

Some very basic pre-lesson preparation notes in Icelandic to ensure I have something to say! As well as some more specific vocabulary (like ‘Christmas Market’), I’ve added the days of the week for support.

Conversely, if it’s your very first time with a teacher, you can preempt other types of likely conversation. You’ll probably be talking about your life, your background and your job, amongst other things. Much like Benny Lewis advocates having a learnt script for the early stages of learning and speaking a language, you can create a list of ready responses to ensure you have something to say.

And, like we tell the kids, if you really don’t have anything interesting to talk about:
just make something up!

Notebook for note-taking

Conversation turbo-boosting with speaking bingo sheets

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I’ve been having something of an iTalki renaissance lately. iTalki, if you haven’t come across it already, is a website that connects language learners with teachers all over the world for online lessons. There are few easier ways to get some face-to-face tuition from a native speaker. And it is perfect for getting some conversation practice in.

Conversation is king

If you’re working on languages beyond entry / A1 level, general conversation is an important part of any lesson. For me, the best kind of iTalki lesson is one split between general chat in the target language, and structured learning. The latter can be organised through a grammar or textbook agreed with the tutor. But conversation is vital, being a safe space to practise the end goal of language learning: real-world communication. However, it’s daunting, and one of the biggest leaps of faith (in your own ability) to make.

Although lesson prices can be very reasonable on iTalki, they do mount up. But, somehow, I felt wasn’t getting the best value out of my lessons. It was nothing to do with the actual teaching. Rather, it felt like I was lacking a bit of dynamism on my part. And it was all to do with those conversations.

This is getting awkward…

I’d arrive in the Skype chat like a blank slate, ready to be instructed; a passive but eager student. But an hour is a lot of time to fill, one-to-one. Often, gaps would open up. Teacher and student would both be stumped for what to say next.

A bit of panic would sometimes fill these gaps, as I’d mentally grasp about, frantically thinking of something to say. A counter-productive instinct kicks in; the need to say something interesting, along with the realisation that the vocabulary for it is simply not there yet. In my floundering, something pops into my head in the target language, but I realise I already said it two minutes ago. I think of something else, but it won’t come out intelligibly as I lack the vocab or structures for it. Agh!

This kind of thing, if you’ve experienced it, can be really disruptive. It can trigger that spiral of confidence-eroding self-doubt, too. I hope I’m not a boring student… Am I really good enough to be trying to converse in X/Y/Z? The teacher must be reconsidering my actual level right now…

Just wanna be loved

First things first: it doesn’t mean you’re a bad linguist. Wanting to converse interestingly and fluently is a perfectly normal goal as a human being. It is connected to our basic need to be liked – which, when it all gets too much, can tip into neurosis. Psychology Karen Horney, for example, theorises it as one of the ten ‘neurotic needs’ that can be problematic when they get out of control.

We’ve all experienced it in our day-to-day conversations in our native languages – awkward pauses and strange silences with people we want to impress.

But I needed to stop this from making my lessons less effective. I needed a crutch. What I needed was a crib sheet of vocab and phrases to use in my classes.

Speaking bingo sheets

Now, crib sheets on themselves can be rather dull. To spruce up the concept, I decided to add an element of gamification.

First, I sketch out the words and phrases I want to focus on this week in conversation. They could be items that I’ve come across in my reading, or listening to podcasts. They might also consist of vocabulary I’ve looked up to describe things I’ve been up to that week, or topical items from the news.

Then, crucially, I’ll put a tick box next to each of them. 

During the lesson, I have my speaking bingo sheet in front of me. As I converse with the teacher, I make an active effort to use my words and phrases, and tick them off as I do. Obviously, conversation is organic, and I won’t have chance to use them all. But the unused ones can go onto the next lesson’s sheet, and the process continues.

A speaking bingo sheet for supporting conversation lessons

A speaking bingo sheet for supporting conversation lessons

 

Don’t overscript it

Speaking bingo sheets shouldn’t be rigid, like a script. The aim is to support more natural speech through a set of cues. For instance, you might note down a central theme – I used ‘Remembrance Day’ in a recent Polish example (above) – and spider off some related words like ‘war’, ‘army’, ‘parade’ and so on.

In terms of phrases and language patterns, a frame or scaffold approach works best. This kind of technique is very popular for literacy in schools, but it works a treat for speaking lessons too. One example might be to have the phrases ‘I went to…’, or ‘I am going to…’ ready on your sheet to use several times with different vocab slotted in.

I also find it useful in the early stages to have a list of general opinion phrases that you can slot in anywhere. Just simple reactions like ‘great’, ‘terrible’ and so on. Also, ‘I (don’t) agree’ is a good conversation keeper-upper!

Why it works

We reinforce linguistic memories through usage, and through positive and negative associations that give them salience. To capitalise on that, you should fill your bingo sheets with favourite turns of phrase and interesting vocab you really want to ‘stick’. It sounds trivial, but if I feel proud of myself for working in a lovely, colloquial phrase like “mér finnst það gott!“ (I like it!) into an Icelandic lesson, I’ve reinforced that vocab item with a positive emotional association.

Give them a go!

Speaking bingo sheets have really helped me to get the most out of my iTalki lessons. It’s part of being a well-prepared student (and a well-prepared teacher certainly deserves that!). Now, if I don’t use them for whatever reason, I really notice a difference.

Give them a go – and enjoy the flow!