Hello everyone, welcome to this new video. Today I want to talk a little bit about language learning at home, you know, like how can you learn languages in a very relaxed way and what are different options in order to improve, you know. Because I hear from some people like, yo, I want to hear something more about how you learn languages, what you're doing at home.
So that's why I'm making this video. Yeah, I also want to say something about my Twitch channel. Because like today at two o'clock afternoon, Dutch local time, I will I have a new special live stream today. It's very special because today there will be one winner and that person can unlock a custom board game character.
So that means that I will create a custom board game character based on the instructions in the chat. So that person in the chat can tell me what kind of character he or she wants and I can even put the nickname in there. So it's very cool. And when I play the board game and that person, exactly that person is in the chat, That person can tell me like, yo, can you use my custom board game character in the game?
And then I will use that. And also that's very cool. And after unlocking the character, like three times more winning, if you win three times more since that, I can even send the custom board character to you if you want it, of course, you know.
And yeah, so as I said today, 2 o'clock local time, my Twitch channel link is the first link below this video. And it would be very cool if you can join. join like i also have like a stream on this day and uh yeah that's like also the special live stream where you can uh unlock a custom uh design like this so um yeah i really want to say like uh that i want to talk today about language learning in general like what am i doing uh how are these um yeah how is it going basically with language learning like um sometimes it can be very difficult you know so can you imagine you're learning a language and you're like oh I expected more progress or things like that.
I also have that sometimes, that I think that I need, I have a schedule, I think, okay, I need so many months to learn a language, and then later I find out that it takes more time. Well, I just want to say, you can always edit your schedule. I think that should not be a problem, that you could tell yourself, okay, I need a little bit more for this language, okay, and then write down how many hours more per week you need, and how you can find extra time.
So, this is also why I think, I think language learning can be very entertaining, it can be very cool, and it's always good to look at your daily routines, so the things which you are already doing. So how can you make it easier for yourself to learn a language faster? So yeah, these days, many people are at home. So I also want to talk about that, like what can you do at home and learn different languages. I told before that I really like to watch movies on Netflix, for example, that I've read down to which, which I don't know, right?
That's very effective, but I also think it's good to listen to what other people are saying. You know, so if someone is saying something. in a different language, make sure that you write down the words which you don't know yet, right?
And try to use the same word in different contexts, you know? You could even try to, yeah, to write something, like an article or something with that specific word, you know? Like, and try to be creative, you know? In my opinion, language learning is creative, and I think that we should think about that creativity, you know?
Like, how can we improve and still learn on a very entertaining way, you know? I think... I think it's important to have many people around you who are also learning languages and that you talk to them like, how's it going with them? And maybe even learn from the mistakes which they made. So I think it's good to have people around you who speak different languages than you and you also might speak different languages and that you talk to each other like, okay, which mistakes did you made and you wish that you knew that before.
That's how you can learn from each other. And in exchange, you could tell the same thing. So for example, you learned, let's say, you're learning Chinese. Chinese and you can tell that person like, okay, this is what I've found out. I wish that I started learning that before, for example, you know, and then you can have a sort of advantage by talking which difficulties there are in the language and help each other.
So I think language learning means also like learning from other people, inspiring each other and learn the best things from that, you know. I think that's very, very important. So I must also say that I've learned a lot from other people around me.
And yeah, without these people, language learning would be very difficult. So again, I want to say thank you to all those people around me, motivating to learn any language, even a rare language, you know, and that's just so cool. Okay.
I also think it is cool to learn something about the culture right so to read something about the different cultural rules you know like and if you understand that it is also way more interesting and yeah how do you say it like you will see more result because if you understand the culture if you know how these people talk to each other, what is useful, how do you say it, like which expressions are normally or not. Then you can also learn way faster. So at the beginning, I made this mistake a lot of times.
I was thinking about, okay... This phrase, I want to translate it to another language, right? And I was learning like that. But then I found out they're not using that phrase like that. It doesn't make any sense.
So right now, I understand a little bit better what the small contrasts are between cultures and how important it is that you cannot translate a phrase literally. So it's sometimes better to forget what you're thinking and to ask other people like, OK, what is common to say? Should I maybe not edit this phrase which I want to translate for an other phrase which sounds differently but maybe saying the same. Yeah, you're basically giving the same message, maybe not, you know, that makes it so difficult. You want to say something and you cannot say exactly the same thing as what you want to say in your mother tongue, you know.
And that's just something which is about cultural differences and also about... It's just very difficult to translate your feelings or your ideas to any other language. So I think what I've found out is that when I learn a language for a longer time, let's say Spanish, I will use the words...
which some people from a certain country are using, you know, but I maybe have this feeling in six languages or something, you know, in six languages, I maybe have a sort of feeling that I can have like deep conversations, but that I can also use some phrases without thinking, you know what I mean? That you, you're like, Hey, I hear that before and without realizing you're already using that phrase. Right.
I think then I realized, Oh, this is going better, you know? And I wish I had more time, you know, that I could have the same feeling with these, other languages but I guess that that's a normal process you know and that's also again what I yeah you know I want to ask people like please give me feedback also about my English because I want to improve my languages you know that's very important for me also the people who speak like two or three languages on a very high level you know they inspire me a lot you know like so whatever if someone is speaking 10 languages on different levels or yeah 10 languages or more on different levels or someone speaking two languages at a very high level or three languages that that person is as impressive for me you know like I think that's inspiring me a lot you know so I think it's very cool that we have this language learning community of people with different language goals and that we can learn from each other and that's also why I admire so many different language channels with the different goals the different messages and I think it's cool that we all have different goals so we have something to talk about, you know? And if everyone would have the same goals, it might be a little bit boring. So again, I want to say everyone, you know, like who's creating language content, like thanks for the cool content which you're creating and inspiring so many people. And we can learn a lot from each other and that's very cool.
And yeah, I just want to say that, yeah, if you're learning a language, variation is important. If you realize that a language is too difficult for you, then try to realize why the language is so difficult. And yeah, like you can even emphasize some parts of the language, right? So for example, I have a lot of problems with the tones in Mandarin. So what I'm doing, I'm focusing a lot just on tones.
And I'm asking, like I have a friend, he's Italian, he speaks Chinese like a native speaker. And yeah, he has a very native accent. And I just talk about, I just talk to him about how can I improve that, you know?
And I'm just trying to listen and listen and listen and try to get it in my head first before I reply it. You know what the difference is? So patience is really important.
So you're hearing something and before pronouncing it. You just try to listen, the same as like how you listen to music. Do you know this feeling?
You're listening to a music song and it takes some time before it's in your head. When it's in your head, it's way easier to, yeah, to say, to... Same as with languages, it's way easier to know how to pronounce it or how to repeat it by hearing it in your head.
So language learning is also a little bit like music for me. It's literally music in my ears. But it's also like music, yeah, because it's in your head, you know.
And we have special feelings when we're learning languages. And every language has its own character. So I want to say, you guys, like, good luck with language learning. And I, yeah, I just want to say that I want to motivate you guys and keep it up, keep learning.