The secrets of learning a new language Summarize

 Intro

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I love learning foreign languages.

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In fact, I love it so much that I like to learn a new language every two years,

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currently working on my eighth one.

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When people find that out about me, they always ask me,

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"How do you do that? What's your secret?"

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And to be honest, for many years, my answer would be,

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"I don't know. I simply love learning languages."

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But people were never happy with that answer.

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They wanted to know why they are spending years trying to learn even one language,

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never achieving fluency,

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and here I come, learning one language after another.

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They wanted to know the secret of polyglots,

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people who speak a lot of languages.

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And that made me wonder, too,

 

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how do actually other polyglots do it?

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What do we have in common?

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And what is it that enables us

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to learn languages so much faster than other people?

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I decided to meet other people like me and find that out.

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The best place to meet a lot of polyglots

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is an event where hundreds of language lovers

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meet in one place to practice their languages.

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There are several such polyglot events organized all around the world,

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and so I decided to go there

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and ask polyglots about the methods that they use.

Methods

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And so I met Benny from Ireland,

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who told me that his method is to start speaking from day one.

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He learns a few phrases from a travel phrasebook

 

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and goes to meet native speakers

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and starts having conversations with them right away.

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He doesn't mind making even 200 mistakes a day,

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because that's how he learns, based on the feedback.

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And the best thing is, he doesn't even need to travel a lot today,

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because you can easily have conversations with native speakers

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from the comfort of your living room, using websites.

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I also met Lucas from Brazil

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who had a really interesting method to learn Russian.

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He simply added a hundred random Russian speakers on Skype as friends,

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and then he opened a chat window with one of them

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and wrote "Hi" in Russian.

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And the person replied, "Hi, how are you?"

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Lucas copied this and put it into a text window with another person,

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and the person replied, "I'm fine, thank you, and how are you?"

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Lucas copied this back to the first person,

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and in this way, he had two strangers have a conversation with each other

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without knowing about it.

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(Laughter)

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And soon he would start typing himself,

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because he had so many of these conversations

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that he figured out how the Russian conversation usually starts.

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What an ingenious method, right?

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And then I met polyglots who always start by imitating sounds of the language,

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and others who always learn the 500 most frequent words of the language,

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and yet others who always start by reading about the grammar.

Polyglots

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If I asked a hundred different polyglots,

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I heard a hundred different approaches to learning languages.

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Everybody seems to have a unique way they learn a language,

 

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and yet we all come to the same result of speaking several languages fluently.

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And as I was listening to these polyglots telling me about their methods,

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it suddenly dawned on me:

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the one thing we all have in common

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is that we simply found ways to enjoy the language-learning process.

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All of these polyglots were talking about language learning

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as if it was great fun.

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You should have seen their faces

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when they were showing me their colorful grammar charts

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and their carefully handmade flash cards,

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and their statistics about learning vocabulary using apps,

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or even how they love to cook based on recipes in a foreign language.

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All of them use different methods,

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but they always make sure it's something that they personally enjoy.

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I realized that this is actually how I learn languages myself.

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When I was learning Spanish, I was bored with the text in the textbook.

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I mean, who wants to read about Jose

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asking about the directions to the train station. Right?

Enjoy the process

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I wanted to read "Harry Potter" instead,

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because that was my favorite book as a child,

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and I have read it many times.

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So I got the Spanish translation of "Harry Potter" and started reading,

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and sure enough, I didn't understand almost anything at the beginning,

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but I kept on reading because I loved the book,

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and by the end of the book, I was able to follow it almost without any problems.

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And the same thing happened when I was learning German.

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I decided to watch "Friends," my favorite sitcom, in German,

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and again, at the beginning it was all just gibberish.

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I didn't know where one word finished and another one started,

 

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but I kept on watching every day because it's "Friends."

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I can watch it in any language. I love it so much.

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And after the second or third season,

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seriously, the dialogue started to make sense.

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I only realized this after meeting other polyglots.

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We are no geniuses

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and we have no shortcut to learning languages.

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We simply found ways how to enjoy the process,

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how to turn language learning from a boring school subject

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into a pleasant activity which you don't mind doing every day.

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If you don't like writing words down on paper,

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you can always type them in an app.

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If you don't like listening to boring textbook material,

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find interesting content on YouTube or in podcasts for any language.

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If you're a more introverted person

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and you can't imagine speaking to native speakers right away,

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you can apply the method of self-talk.

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You can talk to yourself in the comfort of your room,

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describing your plans for the weekend, how your day has been,

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or even take a random picture from your phone

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and describe the picture to your imaginary friend.

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This is how polyglots learn languages,

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and the best news is, it's available to anyone

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who is willing to take the learning into their own hands.

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So meeting other polyglots helped me realize

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that it is really crucial to find enjoyment

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in the process of learning languages,

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but also that joy in itself is not enough.

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If you want to achieve fluency in a foreign language,

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you'll also need to apply three more principles.

Effective methods

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First of all, you'll need effective methods.

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If you try to memorize a list of words for a test tomorrow,

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the words will be stored in your short-term memory

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and you'll forget them after a few days.

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If you, however, want to keep words long term,

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you need to revise them in the course of a few days repeatedly

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using the so-called space repetition.

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You can use apps which are based on this system such as Anki or Memrise,

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or you can write lists of word in a notebook using the Goldlist method,

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which is also very popular with many polyglots.

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If you're not sure which methods are effective and what is available out there,

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just check out polyglots' YouTube channels and websites

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and get inspiration from them.

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If it works for them, it will most probably work for you too.

 

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The third principle to follow

System

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is to create a system in your learning.

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We're all very busy and no one really has time to learn a language today.

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But we can create that time if we just plan a bit ahead.

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Can you wake up 15 minutes earlier than you normally do?

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That would be the perfect time to revise some vocabulary.

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Can you listen to a podcast on your way to work while driving?

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Well, that would be great to get some listening experience.

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There are so many things we can do without even planning that extra time,

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such as listening to podcasts on our way to work

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or doing our household chores.

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The important thing is to create a plan in the learning.

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"I will practice speaking every Tuesday and Thursday

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with a friend for 20 minutes.

 

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I will listen to a YouTube video while having breakfast."

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If you create a system in your learning,

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you don't need to find that extra time,

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because it will become a part of your everyday life.

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And finally, if you want to learn a language fluently,

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you need also a bit of patience.

Success

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It's not possible to learn a language within two months,

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but it's definitely possible to make a visible improvement in two months,

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if you learn in small chunks every day in a way that you enjoy.

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And there is nothing that motivates us more

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than our own success.

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I vividly remember the moment

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when I understood the first joke in German when watching "Friends."

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I was so happy and motivated

 

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that I just kept on watching that day two more episodes,

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and as I kept watching,

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I had more and more of those moments of understanding, these little victories,

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and step by step, I got to a level where I could use the language

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freely and fluently to express anything.

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This is a wonderful feeling.

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I can't get enough of that feeling,

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and that's why I learn a language every two years.

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So this is the whole polyglot secret.

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Find effective methods which you can use systematically

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over the period of some time in a way which you enjoy,

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and this is how polyglots learn languages within months, not years.

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Now, some of you may be thinking,

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"That's all very nice to enjoy language learning,

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but isn't the real secret that you polyglots

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are just super talented and most of us aren't?"

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Well, there's one thing I haven't told you about Benny and Lucas.

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Benny had 11 years of Irish Gaelic and five years of German at school.

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He couldn't speak them at all when graduating.

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Up to the age of 21, he thought he didn't have the language gene

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and he could not speak another language.

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Then he started to look for his way of learning languages,

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which was speaking to native speakers and getting feedback from them,

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and today Benny can easily have a conversation in 10 languages.

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Lucas tried to learn English at school for 10 years.

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He was one of the worst students in class.

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His friends even made fun of him

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and gave him a Russian textbook as a joke

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because they thought he would never learn that language, or any language.

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And then Lucas started to experiment with methods,

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looking for his own way to learn,

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for example, by having Skype chat conversations with strangers.

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And after just 10 years,

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Lucas is able to speak 11 languages fluently.

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Does that sound like a miracle?

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Well, I see such miracles every single day.

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As a language mentor,

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I help people learn languages by themselves,

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and I see this every day.

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People struggle with language learning for five, 10, even 20 years,

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and then they suddenly take their learning into their own hands,

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start using materials which they enjoy, more effective methods,

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or they start tracking their learning

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so that they can appreciate their own progress,

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and that's when suddenly

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they magically find the language talent that they were missing all their lives.

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So if you've also tried to learn a language

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and you gave up, thinking it's too difficult

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or you don't have the language talent,

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give it another try.

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Maybe you're also just one enjoyable method away

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from learning that language fluently.

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Maybe you're just one method away from becoming a polyglot.

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Thank you.

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(Applause)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_XVt5rdpFY&t=8s