The NOT To Do List for Successful Language Learners

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The Language Learner's Not To Do ListTo do lists seem like a good idea in theory, but they have one major disadvantage: there is an infinite number of potential to do items. With this in mind, Timothy Ferriss, best-selling author of The 4-Hour Workweek (and a speaker of 6 languages), recommends “not to do lists” instead. Since they isolate a finite set of behaviors that are getting between you and your goals, they are far more effective than traditional to do lists. This tool applies perfectly to language learning, where most learners waste a lot of time on ineffective methods and bad materials.

 

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  • http://eastasiastudent.net 葛修遠

    I do generally agree with these points, but I think there are a lot of caveats to #1. It seems like it’s become quite fashionable on the Web to criticise traditional language learning methods. If you spent 50% of your time memorising and studying grammar (i.e. ‘learning’), and the other 50% actively engaging with the real stuff (‘acquiring’), I think you’d make excellent progress. 95:5 seems a bit extreme.

    Also, I’m not sure about downplaying translation in that way. Translation is a real art and takes a lot of practice to become proficient. If you just want to communicate with native speakers then sure, it’s not that necessary. But I think learning foreign languages without studying translation skills is a real wasted opportunity.

    • John

      Thank you for your comment. While some criticism of traditional methods may be a matter of fashion, I think the bulk of it stems from a growing realization that all the time and money spent in classrooms produces very poor results for most learners, while more and more are successfully acquiring languages on their own through intensive, self-guided immersion using readily available online (and offline) tools and an ever growing pool of both learner-specific and authentic content.

      I have worked in translation and have nothing but respect for the profession (and the skills required to do it well). But it all comes down to each individual’s goals. Not every foreign language learner wants to become a translator; most just want to use the language as a communication tool at work, with friends, or on the street.

      In my experience as both a learner and teacher, translation is one of the major impediments to reaching fluency. On the other hand, once you actually reach an advanced level of oral and written fluency in a language, learning to translate will be that much easier.

  • http://howlearnspanish.com Andrew

    I agree with most of these, I think this is a pretty good list that will go a long ways towards getting a beginner on the right track in that it does address common mistakes people tend to make, though I would say that at the VERY beginning it’s useful to just rote memorize like maybe the 200 most common words in a language (“is”, “go”, “person”, “he”, “she”, etc.) prior to doing anything else, if you wanted me to point out an exception.

    Cheers,
    Andrew

    • John

      Thank you for your kind feedback, Andrew. Memorizing a small set of basic words can certainly be a good way to jump into a new language, and there are many excellent tools to help one do so more efficiently (spaced repetition, Tony Buzan’s “Master Memory Matrix”, etc.). But in my experience, memorization of explicit information lends itself better to the written word, and does little for the ability to understand or produce the spoken language. WIth this in mind, I prefer to get my ears used to the language first, and then back up my listening tasks with reading.

  • John

    By the way folks, these articles were originally posted years ago and have collected quite a few comments that I am now working to reinstall as I rebuild the site.

  • http://www.everydaylanguagelearner.com Aaron

    John, Great list. As always great stuff and good reminders. I just added this article in my “read more” section of a new ten week email program I have to help people get started. I am excited to send people over to your writing. Glad you got all the bugs worked out too and are back up and running.

    • John

      Thank you, Aaron. While it is a hassle to rebuild the site, I am taking it as an opportunity to make things even better than before. And please feel free to include excerpts of any other articles you want.

  • http://fluent-language.blogspot.com Miss Language Learning

    I definitely don’t spend more than 5% of my time studying English formally. Very nice post!

    • John Fotheringham

      Thank you “Miss Language Learning”.

  • http://inquisitive-learner.blogspot.com/ Lana

    Thank you John! I agree with all information in this post. I help learners to organize their time, life and learning. So this post is more than helpful.

    • John Fotheringham

      Thank you very much, Lana! Life is learning, and I think it’s great you help people better manage time and free up more time for learning.

  • http://l2mastery.com John Fotheringham

    And on this one, too.

  • Jack

    Awesome article! What are your recommended methods of input? Should I listen to audio in a foreign language even if I don’t understand barely any of it?

    • http://l2mastery.com John Fotheringham

      Thank you, Jack. I recommend audio, video, and text input (in that order of preference) that fits your interests and is not too far beyond your level of comprehension. That is more difficult in the beginning of course (when almost all input will be incomprehensible) but you can help make sense of audio or video input with the help of transcripts and sub-titles. I usually pick podcasts which have transcripts available and then alternate between listening only, listening while reading, and reading only.

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