Getting Started with Learning Russian

Russian Language Course Russian Language Course Russian Language Course Hello everyone! Daria here and welcome to my new Russian language course. Here we're gonna learn the Russian language from scratch, from zero. So if you know anyone who wants to learn Russian, let them know about this video, so they can join and we can learn the Russian language together. Now immediately let's dive in. And let's talk about what you need to learn the Russian language with me in this course. So, first, and probably it's not what you have been expecting. That's pretty long. Goal. Yes, number one is always a goal. Right now I want you to stop the video and think why. You want to learn the Russian language. It's extremely important because your decision will influence the whole process of learning the Russian language. And this is one of the key points for motivation too. So, for example, maybe your goal is, I don't know, passing an exam. Maybe you're a student and you actually don't need the Russian language, you are not going to go to Russia, probably it's just one of your courses at the college. So if this is your goal, you should concentrate on grammar, on expanding your vocabulary, on reading, and not so much about pronunciation and not so much about speaking in general. So just relax, you don't need that. If your goal is I don't know. Traveling... travel to Russia. Ugly writing here. I'm sorry. So, travel to Russia. You probably just need to learn how to read Russian and to learn some basic speaking patterns. So, again, choose what's important to you. If your goal is communication... One of the most important goals for any foreign language learning. Communication. If you want to communicate with Russian people, concentrate on listening, on speaking, on expanding your vocabulary. And in this case you should not care about grammar too much. Because if you speak to a Russian person, actually, even if you don't use any cases, If you mispronounce things, if you do anything, Russians will still understand what you mean. So, decide what's more important to you. But always remember what your goal is. It will help you not to waste your time. Okay, number one goal. Again, this is very important. And please, it would be better even if you write it down. Write it down, okay? Number two. And again, maybe you were not expecting this one, but it's time. Time is extremely important. I know people who have been learning the Russian language for several years and they're still at the very beginning and I have no words for this. So, guys, you need time and you need dedication. You need dedication. The most common question that my students ask me How much time or exactly how many hours do I need to become fluent in Russian? And I'm always like... How on earth do I know? Jeez, it depends on so many things It depends on your native language Maybe you are from Slovakia or from Poland, maybe from China, from Japan, from the United States. I don't know. Depends on your native language. It depends on your memory. Maybe you easily remember things, maybe it takes much effort from you to remember new words and grammar rules and that stuff. It depends on your schedule. Maybe you can dedicate 10 hours per day learning the Russian language, which is too much actually, or 10 minutes. per day or two minutes every day of listening how fast can I become fluent in Russian. So it's up to you, it's not up to me, it's up to you how much time you spend, depend... influences and actually... wait a second, let me just... let's just say... 100 hours, okay? 100 hours just to satisfy everyone. At least 100 hours, no less than that. So, okay, goal, time, and number three. This is, I would say... I'm not gonna even... Let me paint it, to draw it, draw it, not paint, Jesus Christ. So, it's a notebook. if somebody didn't understand, notebook or some, I don't know, workbook, how do you call this stuff that you write in in school? Plus... oh my goodness, it's pen, pen, yeah, something to write. It's not gonna work if you're just planning to watch this video and other videos and then just go and forget about what we were talking here. You need some serious work. If you don't have some nice notebook right now, doesn't matter, at least try to find some piece of paper and we're gonna write today. So it's better to stop this video and search for a piece of paper and a pen or a pencil, I don't know. It is scientifically proved that writing by hand, I mean, helps us remember things. Much better, much deeper. So we're gonna write a lot and we're gonna speak a lot. So three things to work with my course. Goal, time, notebook and your desire to learn the Russian language. Okay, now let's dive in into Russian. And actually I kind of liked this Russian with this little heart here. So let's just leave it here. OK, let's dive in. And we start with saying hello, because actually I was the only one who said hello here. So, I want you to respond. And let's not actually say hello, because hello in Russian is this super scary word that you probably heard a lot of time. Здрасьте! РАСТВУЙТЕ! Who needs that? Nobody! Nobody needs that because we're all good friends here. Let's begin with ПРИВЕТ. Привет means Hi. Hi. Привет. This is stressing. And in English it would be like ПРИВЕТ. Priiivet! Okay? And I want to warn you that I'm going to try to make this course as interactive as possible for the video. So I encourage you to stop the video every time you need and to answer my questions out loud, to repeat anything you need to repeat out loud. So right now let's say hi! Priiivet! First repeat after me. Привет. Ok, now I'm saying Привет to you. And you say Привет, Дарья. That's my name. Let me write it down so we can know each other properly. That's my name, Дарья. So I'm saying Привет, you respond Привет, Дарья. Let's try it. Привет! Exactly that works perfectly. Where is my... Where is my... Oh, wait a second. How do you call this stuff in English? In Russian it's called губка. Or maybe I don't know the proper word for it. So actually it was just for fun now. Now let's get to the boring stuff, to the Russian stuff. And of course we start with the alphabet. We start with Russian alphabet. This monster, this nightmare, the Cyrillic alphabet. Everybody seems to be scared by it, but I don't know why, I don't know why. Actually, I have good news and bad news about it. So let's begin with bad news. Okay, so bad news. There are 33 letters. 33 letters in the Russian alphabet, in the Cyrillic alphabet. It might be pretty scary for those who deal with Latin alphabet, 24 is much easier than 33, right? But... Still better than learning the Chinese characters or... yeah, still a piece of cake, piece of cake for you. Some of the letters will be completely unknown to you, so that is really a bad piece of news. And the good... disgusting... the good news is that as soon as you learn These letters, actually the sounds of these letters, so once you learn them you'll be able to read any Russian word. Sounds good, right? Read Russian. It's not like English, it's not like... French people, please forgive me. It's not like French. There is some combination of letters that you... don't even know how to read together because they... the sound is absolutely different from what they look like. In Russian it's a piece of cake. What you see, that's what you pronounce. Very easy. So I encourage you to learn the Russian alphabet as soon as possible. Put everything else away and concentrate on learning the alphabet. That will help you tremendously. Ok, now... again, I need to put this thing for this stuff, so I don't have to look for it every time. Ok, now let's... I think I will move it to... Let's write down the whole alphabet first and you repeat after me the pronunciation. I'm not going to name the letter. like B, V, I'm gonna pronounce the sound that this letter makes. B, V, G and so on. So let's just not waste our time with that. So the first one is A. I encourage you to repeat after me. A. Okay. And by the way, I'm not gonna dwell too much on writing and on explaining the order of those lines. That's what good about the video. You'll be able to go back and watch it as many times as you need to learn the order. So A, B, B, okay? So this is like English B. B, V, V. Repeat after me. Let me... I don't know, do I need to put English versions? Not versions, but... Okay, just for the first time. A, B, V, I guess this one will be better. V, G, G, hard G, G. This is D, D. D. E. I'm not sure how to show it. E. The E with two dots on it is Y. This funny letter is Z. Usually they make it like this. R, Z, Z, both of them are Z. E, E, like double E. E, this is a letter called short E. And actually the sound is J, J. Just like in the... Word like YOGA Y. That short sound in the beginning like Y something. YOGA, YOGURT. That Y. So just short it down and you'll get Y. K. Geez, I forgot. L. What is it? Some fly? I don't need any flies here. So it's L. MN. O. Probably the easiest one, right? O. P. RR. S. Are you still with me? Are you repeating after me? I hope so. This one is T. It's so ridiculous that I started with huge letters and now I'm trying to squeeze them here. Sorry for that. T. What was the T? Like double sound. Looks like some beginning of... TANK. Sorry for this. So it's sound this one or I don't know this one. Oh god, sorry for this. So it's . Is this one. almost like English H, but certainly not like that. In the next video I'll explain the pronunciation and will try to help you a little bit with that. H, H, S, S. Usually with two letters T and S. S, S, H, S, CH. Oh, sorry, CH, CH. Like this one. CH. CH. It's a CH. CH. CH. I hope you can see this. Like that. CH. CH. CH. It's super complicated. I have another video about it. I'll put a link. You should just practice, because... Most of the foreigners confuse these two sounds, they can't make a difference. But in writing usually it's shown like that. or even something like that, but it doesn't make sense, you just need to feel it. So follow the link. Now it's funny. Tvérdy znak. It doesn't have any sound. it divides the word in parts, just like this sign sometimes in probably other languages. I'll tell you more about this letter later. Another difficult sound. I don't even know how to show it. Something between E and U. Again, I have... a link for this one. MÄHKÌ ZNAK. MÄHKÌ ZNAK. Something like this dude, but a little bit different. MÄHKÌ ZNAK. For now you just need to remember how to write them and the basic sounds. MÄHKÌ ZNAK. Э. Э like English... just like A almost. E. E. But it's harder like everything Russian. Then soft and nice. Like this one. Or let's just even write this. Perfect. And the last one. Finally it's over. It's . So, that is the Russian alphabet. It's not that scary, right? You see? Easy! Now I want you to look at this again, maybe stop the video, copy those letters, go back and try to follow me, my writing, and practice writing. But now I'm gonna remove it all. Ok, now a couple of tips on how to learn it faster. I always encourage my students to learn like Russian kids. Do. Let's have a look at... I guess one of the most... two of the most difficult sounds for English speakers, because this one might seem like English K sound, and this might be English P sound, but it's absolutely not right. And this one is S, this one is R. So, how to remember them? Russian kids always use their imagination. their associations, they play with those letters. So that's what you need to do. Always use imagination and weird associations. It's up to you, but I'm going to share just a couple of examples. So this one is . Let's imagine that this is a snake, right? It even makes this sound . and it's snake, snake. So write it down a couple of times. When you see this letter, think about this association. And in a couple of weeks you will forget about this stupid picture completely, but you will remember the sound. It works great. Same with this letter. I don't know, this is sound rrrrr, right? So let's pretend that... This is... looks like... looks like a breast. Sorry for this. So some eyes. Angry. We need angry. I don't know. It doesn't look that angry to me, but okay. Let's imagine that it's a lion. A lion and it makes sound... it's roaring. Or... I don't know... make anything that... who roars? What's with my mouth? Who can roar? So you can write it, maybe it's a bear, anyone, just use your imagination, but you'll remember the sound. So same with any letter that is difficult to you. Use your imagination and weird creepy associations, it will help. Now let's get rid of this. Second tip is that you don't need to learn the alphabet in the alphabetical order. We're not in the elementary school here. Remember that A, B, C, D, E, F, G, Y, X, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P. We certainly don't need that. We are grown-ups. We will learn it strategically. So... Let's divide those letters in several groups. This one is the first group. А, К, М, О, Т. And it's not a word. Let's divide it with commas. It's not a word, it's just a group of letters that are familiar to the most people who know English. no French, Spanish, all those languages, and the sounds are the same. Easy, right? But it's still not enough to learn them effectively. You don't need to learn the isolated letters, it doesn't make sense, because what's the point in just seeing this letter and recognizing it inside the word? You need to learn them in words from the very beginning. So, if you don't know what words to use, here I am to help you. The most wonderful word for the most... Let me do it here. For the most wonderful person. And you certainly know this word. Can you read it out loud yourself? Mama. MAMA. MAMA, of course, means MUM. Or should it be a capital letter? MUM. MAMA. So immediately write this word from the very beginning. Don't write M separately. Don't write A separately. Just use it in words. Another beautiful and lovely word. is a COT. I wonder if you can guess what this word means. Of course, this lovely dude. Boom! This is кот. Lovely Russian cat. Kot. So you see, you already know just from these letters, you already can make two words. Of course, you can make much more than that, but now I want you to remember just these ones. Write them down and then just when you're having a break for lunch keep writing the words. You will remember the alphabet in no time. The next group consists of those confusing letters that exist in Latin alphabet, but they are different in Russian. For example, this one. So let's read them. Oh, my writing is terrible. V, E, N, R, S, U, H. V, E, N, R, S, U, H. Be very careful with these ones because they are not the same as in English. And here you need to use that method with snake and with roaring lion. Use your imagination. Write something, draw something. Anything that will help you to remember the sound. V, E, N, R, S, U, H. OK? Now let's write down several words to practice. NET. Repeat after me. NET. NET. NET means... No. No. Нет. Useful word sometimes. Нет. Another word. Let's write it down just as good as the word mama. It's the word сестра. Let's put a stress in here. Сестра. I guess you... Oh. I guess you can guess. I guess you can guess. That's how I speak. The meaning. Sister. Сестра. Сестра. And as many times as you can write this word, pronounce it, say it out loud. Нет. Сестра. Next time you see your sister say Нет, сестра. Okay? It works great. Another nice word. Ре. С-ТО-РА-Н. Guess what it means? РЕСТОРАН. РЕСТОРАН. Yummy word here. РЕСТОРАН. And you see, you already know some words. Not even like 15 minutes learning Russian. You can already write and speak some Russian language. OK. RESTAURANT. What else? Let's write down. MOSKVA. MOS-K-VA. MOSKVA. What is it? Moscow, of course. MOSKVA. Moscow. Lovely city. Right now I'm in this city. In Moscow. Москва. So, write down these words to your, I hope, notebook, but maybe just a piece of paper for the first lesson. But next time I want you to have the normal workbook for this course. So, this group of letters and these words. Moving on. Now a group of letters that don't exist in... Latin alphabet. B, G, D, I, Z, J. I mean B, G, D, I, Z, I, J. And L, P, F, E, U, J. So you have those sounds in the Latin alphabet. but the writing is completely different. So these are very very difficult to remember too. But at least you... Again, good news is that you'll be able to read Russian. So now let's try several more words to practice. Okay? So write these down too. Stop the video if you need. Pause the video. We already learned... Actually, I'm sorry, let me get rid of these. I hope you paused the video and brought everything you needed. Let's just write down the words to practice. So we already learned mama, right? Mama. I'm not even going to write the translation, okay? The second word. ПАПА. So, MAMA, PAPA. Repeat after me. Let's train our pronunciation from the very beginning. MAMA, PAPA. SESTRA and BRAT. I guess you want me to write that transcription, that translate. Yes, I hate doing that. But, ok, for the first... just for the first letter. Actually it would be more like... so it's not NEMO. MAMA. Same with PAPA. СЕСТРА is more like СЕСТРА. And... Okay, but I hope that next week you already will remember these letters. Please, study for one week, dedicate all your time to learning the Russian letters. Because I'm not going to do this here. I hate, hate doing that. So you are... You're a bit... I can't speak already, it's evening. You'll be better off learning how to write Russian. So these words... What else? We can say DA. DA means yes. Yes. Like, can you speak Russian? DA. Perfect. Right? DA. Or the sad word NET. No. Actually I forgot. Forgot to. Yes and no. Yes and no. Then what else did we have? We had Moscow. Moscow. Let's write down another city. For example, London. London. What else? Another city maybe? M-A-D-R-I-D Madrid. Beautiful city. Never been there, but maybe one day. Madrid, London, Moskva. Write it down with me. And remember, write down the translation if you need. Next time, tomorrow, today, practice with those words. And what else we can? Let's write down the word pizza. P-I-C-A. Pizza. Pizza. I'm so hungry. Pizza. Pizza. Let's make some bad fast food here. Let's write down. БУРГЕР. БУРГЕР. And actually these are Russian words now too. ПИЦА, БУРГЕР, ПАСТА. You can start using them from now on. ПАСТА. And... A lot of international words, foreign words in Russian, so it will be easy for you to practice with them. So, now you know some words. Ok, and now let's add a little bit of grammar here, because it's the Russian language, for God's sake! We can't live without grammar here. So, let's learn how to say this is. You are probably surprised why on the first lesson, but I'll tell you in a minute. So, in Russian you... say ETA. ETA. Okay? ETA. ETA. I don't know do it? I hate doing the transcription. ETA. It's like Russian EY E E. ETA. ETA. Stressing goes here. ETA something. For example ETA доска Blackboard. ETA uchitel teacher. This is a teacher. ETA something. You don't care about genders here, don't care if it's a human or if it's some object, just ETA something. Okay? So why we are using it? Because here comes the homework. From now on and for the whole period of our learning I want you to speak out loud. to say things out loud. And we start with this one, because with this simple construction you'll be able to name objects around you. And I want you to do it right after this video. So right now let's write down several words. I don't know, we are in the room now, so let's just learn... I don't know what to write. For example, окно. Окно. Yes, it's a window. Window. Окно. Окно. Window. So repeat after me. This is a window. Это окно. Это окно. Agree? Right? Now let's write down... some words like computer. Computer. I'm not even sure. Computer. It's almost the same. Computer. Now, ETA computer. If you're sitting next to your laptop or computer, point with your finger and say ETA computer. ETA computer. Great! Next time you're eating pizza, you already know the word for pizza. Say, ETA pizza. ETA pizza. ETA computer. ETA okno. Next time your mom comes into room, you say ETA mama. Your dad ETA papa. Sister Sistra. Brother Brat. Let's write down MUSH I JINA. MUSH. Husband. MUSH. I'm not gonna dwell too much here with pronunciation. You can just type these words into Google Translate and press the button and listen to the pronunciation, so it's not a problem. Our goal here is just to make you start involving with learning Russian. So speak from the day... one and learn how to write. And ЖЕНА. ЖЕНА is WIFE. Again, if you don't understand my pictograms here, pictography, terrible writing, again, you just type WIFE in Google Translate and you will see it in perfect printed letters and you'll be able to listen to pronunciation. Use Google Translate for simple words. Not so good with phrases, but we'll talk later. So, this construction это something. For example, tomorrow you walk outside and you look around and you name your city. This is New York. Or this is... Jeez, waving! Oh my goodness! This is Bratislava or this is Prague. Say it in Russian. Eto... Prague. This is Moscow. And you can already make two sentences. You can say... I think I'll have to turn it off. We already learned the word Привет, which means Hi. And now you can say... This is something... So let's combine it and there will be two sentences already. For example, again, you walk out the door and you say ETA London. ETA London. And then you say Hi London. Privet London. Oh, no, no space left. So again, ETA London, Privet London. But be quiet, say it quietly, or people will think that you are a little bit weird, of course. So ETA London, Privet London. And use as many words as you can, use names. Perfect way to practice writing is using names. Write down any name you can remember with Russian letters. It works tremendously well. So that's it for today. Your homework. Your homework for the next week is to use this construction as many times as possible. Look at any object and say out loud. ETA something. This is a computer, this is Moscow, this is pizza, this is a burger. Search for the words you want to use and start using them immediately. Start writing them with Russian letters. And I hope that you dedicate at least one week to learn the alphabet intensively. Ok? So, I hope next time you'll be able to write and read. All the 33 characters of the Cyrillic alphabet. So that's it for today. Thank you for staying with me for so long. Next time I'll try to divide the lessons into smaller videos, but... Yeah, this was the humble beginning in learning the Russian language. So thank you again and I hope to see you in the next video. Bye-bye!

So if you know anyone who wants to learn Russian, let them know about this video, so they can join and we can learn the Russian language together. Now immediately let's dive in. And let's talk about what you need to learn the Russian language with me in this course. So, first, and probably it's not what you have been expecting.

That's pretty long. Goal. Yes, number one is always a goal.

Right now I want you to stop the video and think why. You want to learn the Russian language. It's extremely important because your decision will influence the whole process of learning the Russian language. And this is one of the key points for motivation too. So, for example, maybe your goal is, I don't know, passing an exam.

Maybe you're a student and you actually don't need the Russian language, you are not going to go to Russia, probably it's just one of your courses at the college. So if this is your goal, you should concentrate on grammar, on expanding your vocabulary, on reading, and not so much about pronunciation and not so much about speaking in general. So just relax, you don't need that.

If your goal is I don't know. Traveling... travel to Russia. Ugly writing here. I'm sorry.

So, travel to Russia. You probably just need to learn how to read Russian and to learn some basic speaking patterns. So, again, choose what's important to you.

If your goal is communication... One of the most important goals for any foreign language learning. Communication.

If you want to communicate with Russian people, concentrate on listening, on speaking, on expanding your vocabulary. And in this case you should not care about grammar too much. Because if you speak to a Russian person, actually, even if you don't use any cases, If you mispronounce things, if you do anything, Russians will still understand what you mean. So, decide what's more important to you.

But always remember what your goal is. It will help you not to waste your time. Okay, number one goal.

Again, this is very important. And please, it would be better even if you write it down. Write it down, okay?

Number two. And again, maybe you were not expecting this one, but it's time. Time is extremely important.

I know people who have been learning the Russian language for several years and they're still at the very beginning and I have no words for this. So, guys, you need time and you need dedication. You need dedication.

The most common question that my students ask me How much time or exactly how many hours do I need to become fluent in Russian? And I'm always like... How on earth do I know? Jeez, it depends on so many things It depends on your native language Maybe you are from Slovakia or from Poland, maybe from China, from Japan, from the United States.

I don't know. Depends on your native language. It depends on your memory. Maybe you easily remember things, maybe it takes much effort from you to remember new words and grammar rules and that stuff.

It depends on your schedule. Maybe you can dedicate 10 hours per day learning the Russian language, which is too much actually, or 10 minutes. per day or two minutes every day of listening how fast can I become fluent in Russian.

So it's up to you, it's not up to me, it's up to you how much time you spend, depend... influences and actually... wait a second, let me just... let's just say...

100 hours, okay? 100 hours just to satisfy everyone. At least 100 hours, no less than that. So, okay, goal, time, and number three.

This is, I would say... I'm not gonna even... Let me paint it, to draw it, draw it, not paint, Jesus Christ.

So, it's a notebook. if somebody didn't understand, notebook or some, I don't know, workbook, how do you call this stuff that you write in in school? Plus... oh my goodness, it's pen, pen, yeah, something to write.

It's not gonna work if you're just planning to watch this video and other videos and then just go and forget about what we were talking here. You need some serious work. If you don't have some nice notebook right now, doesn't matter, at least try to find some piece of paper and we're gonna write today.

So it's better to stop this video and search for a piece of paper and a pen or a pencil, I don't know. It is scientifically proved that writing by hand, I mean, helps us remember things. Much better, much deeper.

So we're gonna write a lot and we're gonna speak a lot. So three things to work with my course. Goal, time, notebook and your desire to learn the Russian language.

Okay, now let's dive in into Russian. And actually I kind of liked this Russian with this little heart here. So let's just leave it here.

OK, let's dive in. And we start with saying hello, because actually I was the only one who said hello here. So, I want you to respond. And let's not actually say hello, because hello in Russian is this super scary word that you probably heard a lot of time.

Здрасьте! РАСТВУЙТЕ! Who needs that? Nobody! Nobody needs that because we're all good friends here.

Let's begin with ПРИВЕТ. Привет means Hi. Hi.

Привет. This is stressing. And in English it would be like ПРИВЕТ. Priiivet! Okay?

And I want to warn you that I'm going to try to make this course as interactive as possible for the video. So I encourage you to stop the video every time you need and to answer my questions out loud, to repeat anything you need to repeat out loud. So right now let's say hi!

Priiivet! First repeat after me. Привет.

Ok, now I'm saying Привет to you. And you say Привет, Дарья. That's my name.

Let me write it down so we can know each other properly. That's my name, Дарья. So I'm saying Привет, you respond Привет, Дарья. Let's try it. Привет!

Exactly that works perfectly. Where is my... Where is my...

Oh, wait a second. How do you call this stuff in English? In Russian it's called губка. Or maybe I don't know the proper word for it.

So actually it was just for fun now. Now let's get to the boring stuff, to the Russian stuff. And of course we start with the alphabet. We start with Russian alphabet.

This monster, this nightmare, the Cyrillic alphabet. Everybody seems to be scared by it, but I don't know why, I don't know why. Actually, I have good news and bad news about it.

So let's begin with bad news. Okay, so bad news. There are 33 letters. 33 letters in the Russian alphabet, in the Cyrillic alphabet.

It might be pretty scary for those who deal with Latin alphabet, 24 is much easier than 33, right? But... Still better than learning the Chinese characters or... yeah, still a piece of cake, piece of cake for you.

Some of the letters will be completely unknown to you, so that is really a bad piece of news. And the good... disgusting... the good news is that as soon as you learn These letters, actually the sounds of these letters, so once you learn them you'll be able to read any Russian word.

Sounds good, right? Read Russian. It's not like English, it's not like... French people, please forgive me.

It's not like French. There is some combination of letters that you... don't even know how to read together because they... the sound is absolutely different from what they look like. In Russian it's a piece of cake.

What you see, that's what you pronounce. Very easy. So I encourage you to learn the Russian alphabet as soon as possible.

Put everything else away and concentrate on learning the alphabet. That will help you tremendously. Ok, now... again, I need to put this thing for this stuff, so I don't have to look for it every time.

Ok, now let's... I think I will move it to... Let's write down the whole alphabet first and you repeat after me the pronunciation.

I'm not going to name the letter. like B, V, I'm gonna pronounce the sound that this letter makes. B, V, G and so on. So let's just not waste our time with that. So the first one is A.

I encourage you to repeat after me. A. Okay.

And by the way, I'm not gonna dwell too much on writing and on explaining the order of those lines. That's what good about the video. You'll be able to go back and watch it as many times as you need to learn the order. So A, B, B, okay? So this is like English B. B, V, V. Repeat after me.

Let me... I don't know, do I need to put English versions? Not versions, but... Okay, just for the first time. A, B, V, I guess this one will be better.

V, G, G, hard G, G. This is D, D. D. E. I'm not sure how to show it. E. The E with two dots on it is Y. This funny letter is Z.

Usually they make it like this. R, Z, Z, both of them are Z. E, E, like double E. E, this is a letter called short E. And actually the sound is J, J. Just like in the...

Word like YOGA Y. That short sound in the beginning like Y something. YOGA, YOGURT. That Y. So just short it down and you'll get Y.

K. Geez, I forgot. L. What is it? Some fly?

I don't need any flies here. So it's L. MN. O. Probably the easiest one, right? O.

P. RR. S. Are you still with me? Are you repeating after me? I hope so. This one is T.

It's so ridiculous that I started with huge letters and now I'm trying to squeeze them here. Sorry for that. T.

What was the T? Like double sound. Looks like some beginning of...

TANK. Sorry for this. So it's sound this one or I don't know this one.

Oh god, sorry for this. So it's . Is this one. almost like English H, but certainly not like that. In the next video I'll explain the pronunciation and will try to help you a little bit with that.

H, H, S, S. Usually with two letters T and S. S, S, H, S, CH. Oh, sorry, CH, CH. Like this one. CH.

CH. It's a CH. CH.

CH. I hope you can see this. Like that.

CH. CH. CH.

It's super complicated. I have another video about it. I'll put a link.

You should just practice, because... Most of the foreigners confuse these two sounds, they can't make a difference. But in writing usually it's shown like that.

or even something like that, but it doesn't make sense, you just need to feel it. So follow the link. Now it's funny. Tvérdy znak. It doesn't have any sound.

it divides the word in parts, just like this sign sometimes in probably other languages. I'll tell you more about this letter later. Another difficult sound.

I don't even know how to show it. Something between E and U. Again, I have...

a link for this one. MÄHKÌ ZNAK. MÄHKÌ ZNAK.

Something like this dude, but a little bit different. MÄHKÌ ZNAK. For now you just need to remember how to write them and the basic sounds. MÄHKÌ ZNAK. Э. Э like English...

just like A almost. E. E. But it's harder like everything Russian.

Then soft and nice. Like this one. Or let's just even write this.

Perfect. And the last one. Finally it's over. It's .

So, that is the Russian alphabet. It's not that scary, right? You see? Easy! Now I want you to look at this again, maybe stop the video, copy those letters, go back and try to follow me, my writing, and practice writing.

But now I'm gonna remove it all. Ok, now a couple of tips on how to learn it faster. I always encourage my students to learn like Russian kids. Do.

Let's have a look at... I guess one of the most... two of the most difficult sounds for English speakers, because this one might seem like English K sound, and this might be English P sound, but it's absolutely not right. And this one is S, this one is R. So, how to remember them?

Russian kids always use their imagination. their associations, they play with those letters. So that's what you need to do.

Always use imagination and weird associations. It's up to you, but I'm going to share just a couple of examples. So this one is .

Let's imagine that this is a snake, right? It even makes this sound . and it's snake, snake.

So write it down a couple of times. When you see this letter, think about this association. And in a couple of weeks you will forget about this stupid picture completely, but you will remember the sound.

It works great. Same with this letter. I don't know, this is sound rrrrr, right? So let's pretend that... This is...

looks like... looks like a breast. Sorry for this.

So some eyes. Angry. We need angry.

I don't know. It doesn't look that angry to me, but okay. Let's imagine that it's a lion. A lion and it makes sound...

it's roaring. Or... I don't know...

make anything that... who roars? What's with my mouth?

Who can roar? So you can write it, maybe it's a bear, anyone, just use your imagination, but you'll remember the sound. So same with any letter that is difficult to you.

Use your imagination and weird creepy associations, it will help. Now let's get rid of this. Second tip is that you don't need to learn the alphabet in the alphabetical order. We're not in the elementary school here. Remember that A, B, C, D, E, F, G, Y, X, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P. We certainly don't need that.

We are grown-ups. We will learn it strategically. So... Let's divide those letters in several groups. This one is the first group.

А, К, М, О, Т. And it's not a word. Let's divide it with commas. It's not a word, it's just a group of letters that are familiar to the most people who know English. no French, Spanish, all those languages, and the sounds are the same. Easy, right?

But it's still not enough to learn them effectively. You don't need to learn the isolated letters, it doesn't make sense, because what's the point in just seeing this letter and recognizing it inside the word? You need to learn them in words from the very beginning.

So, if you don't know what words to use, here I am to help you. The most wonderful word for the most... Let me do it here.

For the most wonderful person. And you certainly know this word. Can you read it out loud yourself?

Mama. MAMA. MAMA, of course, means MUM. Or should it be a capital letter? MUM.

MAMA. So immediately write this word from the very beginning. Don't write M separately. Don't write A separately. Just use it in words.

Another beautiful and lovely word. is a COT. I wonder if you can guess what this word means.

Of course, this lovely dude. Boom! This is кот. Lovely Russian cat.

Kot. So you see, you already know just from these letters, you already can make two words. Of course, you can make much more than that, but now I want you to remember just these ones.

Write them down and then just when you're having a break for lunch keep writing the words. You will remember the alphabet in no time. The next group consists of those confusing letters that exist in Latin alphabet, but they are different in Russian. For example, this one. So let's read them.

Oh, my writing is terrible. V, E, N, R, S, U, H. V, E, N, R, S, U, H. Be very careful with these ones because they are not the same as in English. And here you need to use that method with snake and with roaring lion. Use your imagination. Write something, draw something.

Anything that will help you to remember the sound. V, E, N, R, S, U, H. OK? Now let's write down several words to practice. NET.

Repeat after me. NET. NET.

NET means... No. No.

Нет. Useful word sometimes. Нет. Another word. Let's write it down just as good as the word mama.

It's the word сестра. Let's put a stress in here. Сестра.

I guess you... Oh. I guess you can guess.

I guess you can guess. That's how I speak. The meaning. Sister.

Сестра. Сестра. And as many times as you can write this word, pronounce it, say it out loud. Нет.

Сестра. Next time you see your sister say Нет, сестра. Okay? It works great. Another nice word.

Ре. С-ТО-РА-Н. Guess what it means?

РЕСТОРАН. РЕСТОРАН. Yummy word here.

РЕСТОРАН. And you see, you already know some words. Not even like 15 minutes learning Russian. You can already write and speak some Russian language. OK.

RESTAURANT. What else? Let's write down.

MOSKVA. MOS-K-VA. MOSKVA.

What is it? Moscow, of course. MOSKVA.

Moscow. Lovely city. Right now I'm in this city. In Moscow.

Москва. So, write down these words to your, I hope, notebook, but maybe just a piece of paper for the first lesson. But next time I want you to have the normal workbook for this course.

So, this group of letters and these words. Moving on. Now a group of letters that don't exist in...

Latin alphabet. B, G, D, I, Z, J. I mean B, G, D, I, Z, I, J. And L, P, F, E, U, J. So you have those sounds in the Latin alphabet. but the writing is completely different.

So these are very very difficult to remember too. But at least you... Again, good news is that you'll be able to read Russian.

So now let's try several more words to practice. Okay? So write these down too.

Stop the video if you need. Pause the video. We already learned...

Actually, I'm sorry, let me get rid of these. I hope you paused the video and brought everything you needed. Let's just write down the words to practice.

So we already learned mama, right? Mama. I'm not even going to write the translation, okay? The second word.

ПАПА. So, MAMA, PAPA. Repeat after me. Let's train our pronunciation from the very beginning.

MAMA, PAPA. SESTRA and BRAT. I guess you want me to write that transcription, that translate. Yes, I hate doing that.

But, ok, for the first... just for the first letter. Actually it would be more like... so it's not NEMO.

MAMA. Same with PAPA. СЕСТРА is more like СЕСТРА.

And... Okay, but I hope that next week you already will remember these letters. Please, study for one week, dedicate all your time to learning the Russian letters.

Because I'm not going to do this here. I hate, hate doing that. So you are... You're a bit...

I can't speak already, it's evening. You'll be better off learning how to write Russian. So these words... What else?

We can say DA. DA means yes. Yes.

Like, can you speak Russian? DA. Perfect. Right?

DA. Or the sad word NET. No.

Actually I forgot. Forgot to. Yes and no.

Yes and no. Then what else did we have? We had Moscow.

Moscow. Let's write down another city. For example, London. London.

What else? Another city maybe? M-A-D-R-I-D Madrid. Beautiful city.

Never been there, but maybe one day. Madrid, London, Moskva. Write it down with me. And remember, write down the translation if you need. Next time, tomorrow, today, practice with those words.

And what else we can? Let's write down the word pizza. P-I-C-A. Pizza. Pizza.

I'm so hungry. Pizza. Pizza.

Let's make some bad fast food here. Let's write down. БУРГЕР.

БУРГЕР. And actually these are Russian words now too. ПИЦА, БУРГЕР, ПАСТА.

You can start using them from now on. ПАСТА. And...

A lot of international words, foreign words in Russian, so it will be easy for you to practice with them. So, now you know some words. Ok, and now let's add a little bit of grammar here, because it's the Russian language, for God's sake! We can't live without grammar here.

So, let's learn how to say this is. You are probably surprised why on the first lesson, but I'll tell you in a minute. So, in Russian you... say ETA.

ETA. Okay? ETA. ETA.

I don't know do it? I hate doing the transcription. ETA. It's like Russian EY E E. ETA.

ETA. Stressing goes here. ETA something. For example ETA доска Blackboard.

ETA uchitel teacher. This is a teacher. ETA something. You don't care about genders here, don't care if it's a human or if it's some object, just ETA something.

Okay? So why we are using it? Because here comes the homework.

From now on and for the whole period of our learning I want you to speak out loud. to say things out loud. And we start with this one, because with this simple construction you'll be able to name objects around you. And I want you to do it right after this video.

So right now let's write down several words. I don't know, we are in the room now, so let's just learn... I don't know what to write.

For example, окно. Окно. Yes, it's a window.

Window. Окно. Окно. Window. So repeat after me.

This is a window. Это окно. Это окно.

Agree? Right? Now let's write down...

some words like computer. Computer. I'm not even sure.

Computer. It's almost the same. Computer.

Now, ETA computer. If you're sitting next to your laptop or computer, point with your finger and say ETA computer. ETA computer.

Great! Next time you're eating pizza, you already know the word for pizza. Say, ETA pizza. ETA pizza.

ETA computer. ETA okno. Next time your mom comes into room, you say ETA mama.

Your dad ETA papa. Sister Sistra. Brother Brat. Let's write down MUSH I JINA.

MUSH. Husband. MUSH. I'm not gonna dwell too much here with pronunciation.

You can just type these words into Google Translate and press the button and listen to the pronunciation, so it's not a problem. Our goal here is just to make you start involving with learning Russian. So speak from the day... one and learn how to write.

And ЖЕНА. ЖЕНА is WIFE. Again, if you don't understand my pictograms here, pictography, terrible writing, again, you just type WIFE in Google Translate and you will see it in perfect printed letters and you'll be able to listen to pronunciation. Use Google Translate for simple words.

Not so good with phrases, but we'll talk later. So, this construction это something. For example, tomorrow you walk outside and you look around and you name your city. This is New York. Or this is...

Jeez, waving! Oh my goodness! This is Bratislava or this is Prague. Say it in Russian. Eto...

Prague. This is Moscow. And you can already make two sentences.

You can say... I think I'll have to turn it off. We already learned the word Привет, which means Hi.

And now you can say... This is something... So let's combine it and there will be two sentences already.

For example, again, you walk out the door and you say ETA London. ETA London. And then you say Hi London.

Privet London. Oh, no, no space left. So again, ETA London, Privet London. But be quiet, say it quietly, or people will think that you are a little bit weird, of course. So ETA London, Privet London.

And use as many words as you can, use names. Perfect way to practice writing is using names. Write down any name you can remember with Russian letters. It works tremendously well.

So that's it for today. Your homework. Your homework for the next week is to use this construction as many times as possible. Look at any object and say out loud.

ETA something. This is a computer, this is Moscow, this is pizza, this is a burger. Search for the words you want to use and start using them immediately. Start writing them with Russian letters. And I hope that you dedicate at least one week to learn the alphabet intensively.

Ok? So, I hope next time you'll be able to write and read. All the 33 characters of the Cyrillic alphabet.

So that's it for today. Thank you for staying with me for so long. Next time I'll try to divide the lessons into smaller videos, but... Yeah, this was the humble beginning in learning the Russian language.

So thank you again and I hope to see you in the next video. Bye-bye!

Transcript for:Getting Started with Learning Russian

Transcript for:
Getting Started with Learning Russian