Language isolation when learning

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plengfruit
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Language isolation when learning

Postby plengfruit » 2017-04-23, 19:16

I'm not sure whether this is the right board to post a thread like this, so let me know and I'll post it somewhere else.

Basically, what I want to know is your approach to keeping in touch with the languages you are learning. I think it's safe to assume most of you is in the process of learning more than one at the time. Which is why I'm curious on how you manage to remain actively in contact with each and every one of them.

A thing or two about me. I'm currently learning three: French, Russian and Italian. The first I speak at high-intermediate/low-advanced level and I'm actively trying to elevate it to my English level, which is something that could pass as fluency. The other two are, I'd say, on a comfy around B1 level - as in: I can read in them and understand the context (mostly), I can watch youtube videos in them, I can form some not too complicated sentences and so on. Being Slavic helps with picking up new things in Russian, speaking English and French is a huge boost to learning Italian. These days I don't have much time to spend on learning (which may sound like a sorry excuse, yes, but bear with me for a moment), so I pick one language to brush up on each day, one per day every day. But, while learning one language I leave learning the other two on another day, I still find myself reading and/or watching something in them. Be it a journal article or a youtube video.

So here's the question: do you follow a similar approach, do you narrow down your stuff to learn, leave the other stuff for another day, but do you still keep in touch with it or do you isolate yourself completely? When learning language A do you ensure you leave behind language B for that particular day? Or do you keep in touch, like I previously called it? I'm looking for ways to improve my learning approach and I'm interested in your opinions.
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vijayjohn
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Re: Language isolation when learning

Postby vijayjohn » 2017-04-24, 2:21

I think it all depends on where exactly in the language-learning process you are. I've been learning languages for longer than I can remember, and I'm 28 years old. I need to be exposed to some language other than English every day, but that's about it. I don't bother with practicing my languages on a daily basis or anything (I don't think that's even possible). I usually don't even bother with trying to get exposure to all of them on a regular basis. I pretty much just study and expose myself to them as often as I personally can; usually, that means there will be a stretch of time at least once a year when I focus on a few languages at a time at most.


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