(Part 2) Best products from r/languagelearning

The decision is up to you, and your final choice should pertain to your situation/interests, but if you do choose to learn Japanese, then I can give you some pointers:

Learning Material

Start by learning Hiragana and Katakana. This should take you 2 weeks tops. You can learn it through apps like Dr. Moku (apple and android), and practice with Drag-n-Drop.
After that, use the Genki textbooks I and II (make sure that it's the 2nd edition, which has more features added to it), which are the most popular by far within the Japanese learning community.
Japan Times, the company behind the books, also made some pretty neat apps to side with the book. Available for apple and android. There's also a workbook, which is a bit of a drag to buy after buying two $50 textbooks, so I uploaded the PDFs here.


Supplement your studies with Anki SRS (Spaced-repetition-system), which is essentially virtual flash cards.
There's also Tae Kim's Grammar Guide, which is pretty good as a reference, but not so much a sole learning material. His website is another good reference resource.


Please realize that it's okay to forget words and grammar points, and you're definitely going to have to revisit some of them along the way.




I should probably mention Kanji. Kanji are characters imported from China during the 5th century, although many have divulged from their modern Chinese equivalent. Genki I+II will teach you 317 kanji (image for scale (sorry for bad quality!!)), and Tobira (the textbook I'm about to mention) will teach you another. There are officially 2136 "Jouyou Kanji", or kanji used in everyday life (e.g. a newspaper). Some people use Heisig's Remembering the Kanji, which I wouldn't recommend since it only teaches you the meaning (which it sometimes lies about), and doesn't even teach the reading or any words that use it. I'd recommend learning words and then the kanji that they use. That way you're getting more bang for your buck. While I personally don't use WaniKani to learn kanji, I have used it in the past, and it's really good. Sleek interface, gets the job done, forums for questions. All the good stuff you'd expect out of a kanji learning site. The first couple of lessons are free, and then it's something like $8/month. Despite WaniKani and all its greatness, the creator behind it (named Koichi) also made an "online Japanese textbook" called Tofugu, which I definitely wouldn't recommend. It waaaay too much around the bush, and half of it is just "motivational talk" (which I'm pretty sure is just trying to get you inspired for a night or two, pull out your wallet, pay for a lifetime subscription, and then give up once you get to the 〜ます forms).


Edit: I also feel the need to mention that, despite what pop culture might tell you, only a tiny portion of kanji are truly pictograph (e.g. 川 (river), 山 (mountain), 人 (person), and 大 (big)). The more conceptual ones have almost no tie to their actual meanings, which is why kanji teaching resources that use mnemonics fall apart pretty quickly. After being written with a chisel on turtle shells (called "oracle bone script"), imported to Japan 1500+ years ago, written 1,000,000s of times from people in prefectures miles away, and reformed numerous times, almost all of them lost their original pictographic quality. Just take a look at 働, 色, and 起. What do you think those mean? The answer is: to work, color, and to get up (in the sense of waking up).

Edit 2: Learn the stroke order for the kanji, since it makes them much easier to break down in the long run. For that matter, learn the radicals, or parts, of the kanji. There's a list here.


To clear up any more misconceptions, Japanese is not like Chinese in the sense that a character alone can be a verb. The kanji "起" doesn't mean "to wake up" on its own; only when you add the "き" and "る" hiragana does it turn into the verb. This is called "おくりがな" (okurigana). There are also many different readings for each character, unlike Chinese where there's usually only one or two. For example, the character "日" (day, sun) can be read ひ (or び), にち, or じつ. One kind of reading is called 音読み (onyomi), literally meaning "sound reading" because when the Japanese came into contact with the Chinese, they didn't yet have a writing system (their language was called "和語" (lit. "native Japanese language"). So, they "borrowed" their characters and transcribed the Chinese pronunciation based on their phonetic system. The other kind of reading is called 訓読み (kunyomi), which literally means "riverside reading". This type of reading is native to Japan and was prescribed to the kanji that corresponded with the meaning. On the more extreme side, some kanji can have 10+ readings. Don't sweat it though (心配ないよ！), as you'll learn all of these different readings through context in your vocabulary.

Now to bridge the gap between "beginner"-ish to "intermediate"-ish, use Tobira (which literally means "bridge"). The book assumes you to have a certain level of knowledge, some of which might overlap with Genki and other words/grammar that you may have to look up. It's an uphill battle, but you'll come out triumphant in the end.


On a side note, I'd recommend Jisho.org as your go-to online dictionary, even if some of the example sentences are riddled with errors. "Imiwa?" is a great Jp<->Eng dictionary for android and iOS. If you're really serious, then get "Kodansha's Furigana Japanese Dictionary".
Also check out /r/learnjapanese. There's a lot of great questions/resource links on there, and you can ask any questions you might have.


Duolingo has opened up alpha testers for its Japanese course as well. I'm so-so on the quality of Duolingo, since it doesn't even really teach you grammar, but just in case.

There are a lot of great resources posted up on the Kanji Koohii forums, which is where I found ヨミちゃん for Google Chrome.


To go further, read 4chan's /int/ guide.
Oh, and in case you didn't know, stay away from Rosetta Stone!!

Native Material

After Genki II, give a go at よつばと！ (Yotsuba!), a simple children's manga with furigana, which is kana above the kanji (intended for little kids). There's quite a bit of slang in it, and almost always uses the casual form. Even in a simple manga like Yotsuba, there will still be words and advanced grammatical constructs you haven't even touched yet. You can get the "Yotsuba Learning Pack", which consists of an Anki deck and vocabulary list here.


You can practice speaking with native speakers on a wonderful app called HelloTalk (available for apple and android). It's pretty great.


There's also iTalki, where you can write journal entries in your target language (so you can do this for Italian too) and have them be corrected by native speakers. You can also correct journal entries in English.

About the JLPT

The "Japanese Language Proficiency Test [Number X]", commonly referred to as "JLPT N[X]", is the standard Japanese test. N1 (Number 1) is the highest and most advanced, while N5 is the most basic. You can see how ready you are for each one here. Honestly, N5 and N4 are so easy, they're really not worth the money you have to pay to take it. N3 is a good warm up to N2. Passing N2 will look pretty damn good on any business related Japanese job. I wouldn't worry about these tests until a good way into your studies.

Conclusion

While Japanese might not be the easiest language for an English speaker to learn (far from it, it in fact), and quite daunting due to the scores of kanji you're required to learn, the rewards are numerous. For one thing, you get 130,000,000 more people to converse with on this planet. You're also opened up to the world of anime (Japanese animation) and manga (Japanese cartoons), and the original language of the haiku (俳句). Not only that, but you're also introduced to the literature world Haruki Murakami and other such Japanese writers. Most importantly, you should enjoy it. After all, nobody who doesn't enjoy learning something gets very far into it. If you ever feel incredibly discouraged, take a break for as long as you need. Revisit the material when you feel ready. Never study something if it pains you to do so. PM me if you have any more questions.

Post Genki II Stuff

1. Watch Shirokuma Cafe on this website. Animelon is beautiful because all of its anime have subtitles available in English, romaji (latinized Japanese), hiragana, and normal Japanese -- start with English & normal Japanese for a few episodes to get used to how people talk, then turn off English and begin ganbatte'ing (doing your best). This anime is about a panda bear working in a cafe owned by a polar bear where they make food for guests and go on various adventures. It's great because the vocabulary is almost entirely every day (minus the polar bear's obnoxious puns), and it also has a variety of accents, so you'll begin getting used to Japanese sounds. If you like dry humor, you'll even enjoy the anime. I personally laughed so hard that I cried, twice.
   
   
2. Begin going through the N3 grammar videos from Nihongo no Mori, also feel free to check out their Dangerous Japanese (slang), and move on to N2 and N1 grammar as you feel ready. Their videos are great because they all have subtitles, they circumlocate to simpler Japanese to explain difficult words in the example sentenecs (explaining Japanese with simpler Japanese), and they have fun. These videos were personally the first "all Japanese" content that I consumed, and after I had been watching for a week or so I began with Shirokuma Cafe.
   
   
3. Buy Read Real Japanese Contemporary Fiction and Essays. These books are great: they present 7 short stories or essays that are 100% unaltered (except for adding readings to Kanji that appear for the first time in a given article), as a native speaker would see them. That's on the right page. The left page has a running gloss into English -- it's just enough to help you understand the meanings of parts you didn't quite understand, but not so much that you'd understand what was going on by only reading it. The real gem is that the 2nd half of the book is a running grammatical dictionary, as in the author devotes like ~130 pages to explaining all of the grammar that was contained in every single article that is more advanced than ~Late Genki II stuff. These are the holy grail of Japanese learning content for me; they're literally training wheels for reading read Japanese stuff. I read each one with a notebook: I went one sentence at a time, reading every grammar explanation, and writing down any grammar that I didn't know. Sounds time consuming, but I still went through a story in 1-2 days (2-4 hours? per story on average). After finishing the book I waited 2 weeks then read it again, highlighting the sentences that I still struggled with, double checking that grammar. Then I read it again a month later, not checking the grammar, and added any sentences i still didn't explain into Anki as Clozed Deletion Card.
   
   
4. I say again -- Read Real Japanese is training wheels to Reading Real Japanese. Written Japanese is quite different than Spoken Japanese, and this book really helps to iron out everything that might have not quite gotten through your system yet. When you finish the two books, begin looking for native books you can read on an e-reader/the computer. Just pick whatever you're interested in that has been written in the last 20 years. It's important to do it on a Kindle/computer because this enables you to highlight words to search them in the dictionary, rather than having to draw the characters out to search by hand in your phone dictionary. The Kindle is a pair of stilts that makes reading tolerable at a fluency level where it would normally be unbearable -- and I think this goes for any language, but particularly for languages like Japanese/Chinese where the primary writing system isn't necessarily phonetic.
   
   
5. In addition to reading, listen to lots of stuff. Find something that is interesting to you -- ie, something you find entertaining enough that you're willing to slodge through the beginning phase where it's not-pleasantly-difficult -- and stick to it. I personally liked/like Taigu Channel; a Buddhist monk here in Japan takes in letters from people struggling with life problems (what is happiness? what is freedom? How can I show the people around me that I appreciate them?) and then he answers them from a Buddhist perspective. Objectively speaking I think it's super for a first listening resource because he speaks clearly, somewhat slowly, a lot of the videos have subtitles, and he's talking about everyday-life problems meaning that the vocabulary is limited to practical things. If you're interested in Buddhism, I personally find the videos to be really enlightening. This is the ultimate goal of language learning, in my opinion -- to find a way to make your target language a medium; a gateway to knowledge or entertainment that you want, which just happens to be only in your target language... meaning that just by enjoying yourself and consuming content you want to consume, you naturally improve your language.
   
   
6. Check out Flowverlapping, find some music you like, and work at it to help you (a) learn the sounds of Japanese, (b) work into a more natural sounding rhythm/intonation, and (c) to (hopefully) get something of a feel for Japanese's two pitch accents. This is basically not necessary for being understood, but will definitely help you to sound more pleasant on the ears, and figured I might as well leave the link just in case you happen to be interested in pronunciation. Since it can be difficult to break into music in a new language, I'll also leave a few songs that I like in different genres. Yonedzu Kenshi-AiNekutai (indie), Mucc-Heide (visual kei), King Giddra-Bullet of Truth(uhh, hard? rap), Kohh-Don't Care If I'm Broke(uhh, soft? rap), Perfume-Flash(J-pop),Urashima Tarou - Voice of the Sea(makes me think of Japan) Kobasolo - Far, Far away (a playlist of soft music I gathered). Music is important to me, personally -- so if you enjoy music, I hope there's something you like here somewhere.
   

Perhaps something like this could help:

https://www.amazon.es/Gram%C3%A1tica-uso-del-Espa%C3%B1ol-A1-A2/dp/8467521074/ref=sr_1_4?__mk_es_ES=%C3%85M%C3%85%C5%BD%C3%95%C3%91&keywords=gramatica+de+uso&qid=1556999740&s=gateway&sr=8-4

Gramatica de Uso is awesome, comprehensive, full of explanations, great examples, and useful exercises. And this huge yellow book is just the first one out of three (and it is beginner friendly despite being monolingual). It gave me so much! The pace at which you can get through it, that depends purely on you. But it will be time well spent. The book focuses on the grammar, it is not a "communicative" coursebook with watered down explanations and tons of other content and cheesy photos in between the main parts. If you want to learn intensively and improve fast, I think this book is ideal. The blue book for the B levels is awesome as well, and with lots of chapters on subjuntivo. And the green one C is still lying on my shelf, waiting for this summer, but it looks great too.

​

https://www.amazon.es/Gram%C3%A1tica-Nivel-elemental-A1-A2-Anaya/dp/8467885297/ref=sr_1_1?__mk_es_ES=%C3%85M%C3%85%C5%BD%C3%95%C3%91&keywords=gramatica+A1-A2&qid=1556999956&s=gateway&sr=8-1

This series is much less dense and more easily portable. But still very well done and I profited from it too. It is less detailed, but perhaps the three smaller books (only up to B2) could work for you really well, as you want to improve fast. If you are not a beginner, but rather a learner in a phase of chaos and some knowledge of Spanish with gaps and confusion, it should work in just a few intensive weeks (I know because I did that. I wasn't perfect after those few weeks, but I was much better and could immediately apply the knowledge while speaking)

​

Or you can try https://spanish.kwiziq.com/my-languages/spanish

It is a really well made digital resource. It is bilingual (that is either an advantage or disadvantage, that depends on your personal opinion) and it really offers you the main advantage of a digital platform: it is personalised. You will be tested and given appropriate topics to study and practice, or you can go on a great "brainmap" and pick exactly the subjects you want to work on right now. The explanations are good and the library full of them is available for free. Ten execises per month are free as well, the rest is paid. If you want to improve fast, paying for one month and really making time for it is great and not that expensive (again, something I tried and definitely recommend).

> Also of course the language I'm most interested in is literally the most difficult one categorised, lol; looks like you're currently studying it (Japanese), how have you found it so far?

So it took me about 2 years to get to N3 in Japanese, entirely self-studying, and I've been studying it for about 2 and a half years now. I honestly don't find it too bad. Obviously learning all of the kanji takes time. I've chosen to learn them as I go along rather than memorise them all at the start and I know and can write about 600 but I can probably recognise and read ~800. The grammar is very different from English but it's difficult in a different way to some other languages. When I studied Russian that was difficult because you're trying to internalise all these case endings and perfective and imperfective forms of verbs and it just felt like a slog to me, whereas in Japanese most grammatical constructions are simple to construct, no complex conjugation rules or anything, but there are a lot of subtleties to meanings and usages that take time to really get familiar with.

I am a big fan of textbooks, so I did Genki I, then Genki II, then studied for N4 using textbook specifically geared for that, then Tobira, then textbooks specifically for N3. Now I'm using a combination of Kodansha Kanji Learner's Course (KKLC) for Kanji, Authentic Japanese: Progressing From Intermediate to Advanced, various materials that I'm reading (some native like manga, online news and a high school history textbook, and some geared for learners like this, this and NHK Easy News) and various stuff I'm watching/listening to.

Obviously the ability to actually speak is what gets neglected the most in self-study. I was pretty religiously having Skype lessons through iTalki for a while and that helped enormously but I have let that slip a bit. I went to Japan shortly after passing N4 and I was really surprised with how well I was able to communicate. My partner is a wheelchair user so we did have to communicate with Japanese people way more than the average tourist and it all went really smoothly.

What I'd say about Japanese is less that it's super super hard, but more that it's going to take a long time, especially if you don't already know how language-learning works best for you. If it's something you want to do, you probably can, but you have to know that it is a marathon, not a sprint. Going in, my idea was that if I'm not competent in Japanese until a decade into studying, that was OK. It was a long-term hobby I was taking up.

> How long did it take you to get to B2 in French?

That's a more complicated story. Technically I started studying French in 2006 but that was some really terrible teaching in a UK secondary school and I didn't put much effort in and dropped it after the first year with very little ability. I started seriously studying French at school in 2009 when I did a GCSE in it in one year (they're usually 2 years but they teach very little). I'd say I was a solid A1 after that. Then I did an A Level over 2 years finishing in 2012. After that I'd say I was probably a solid B1 or a weak B2. Then I was at university for 4 years and completely dropped all language study. After that my reading was probably at a B1 level but everything else had suffered a lot from lack of use. Then in 2016 I picked it back up again, got it back up to standard (it came back really quickly) and passed the actual B2 exam in December 2016. I've been intending to take C1 for ages and I'm fairly confident I'd pass it right now, but at this point I think I'll hold out for C2 which I'm debating taking later in the year. So I expect I was at B2 after 3 serious years in the British schooling system. I actually passed B2 after that plus 4 years of nothing plus about 6 months of self-study. It can be done way quicker than that if you self-study from the start though.

> Do you have time for other hobbies?

Language learning is definitely my primary hobby, but I do really enjoy it and it's not like I come home from work every day and do nothing else. I'm not a big gamer but when something comes out that catches my fancy I'll play it. I live with my partner so I spend time with him every day just watching TV and movies, spending time together, going out at the weekends etc. I cook every day and occasionally dedicate a whole day to cooking something special or baking. I do a lot of coding (which is also my job, but I do my own personal projects for fun). I read a lot. I am going back to university to get another Master's next year so that will definitely test out my time management.

For me, I think the best thing is to think of language study as a lifestyle change. If you want to get strong and fit, you make the change to go to the gym every day or 4 times a week or whatever, and if you keep on track and don't miss days too often, you'll eventually get there. And then once you're where you want to be, you keep going to maintain it. That's how I see language learning. It's something you'll have to find time for and incorporate into your lifestyle.

Phew, sorry about that essay.

The biggest issue with learning Hindi is the lack of resources. Most resources that are common aren't actually made by linguists or people who learned Hindi as a second language. Rather they're made by bilingual natives who rely on either their intuition or traditional Indian teaching methods (which work better if you already speak another Indian language fluently). Both of which, for an English native speaker, are not that great (read: very bad).

First learn how to read/write. There's a lot of good resources for that online, but I've heard great things about this book. That said, you could always just get a native's help, (tbf that's exactly what I did, and you don't miss much). Basically, however you do it, learn to read/write.

Teach Yourself Hindi is basically the holy bible of learning Hindi. It's by and large the greatest resource created for a language with few quality resource. Read it, learn it, memorize it. If anyone actually learned Hindi as a second-language learner (without speaking another Indian language) and didn't use this book, I'd be amazed (please pass me your resources too).

As supplemental resources, this website, by a Hindi learner who's also a linguist, so it goes even more in depth. A Primer on Modern Standard Hindi is basically a textbook written by linguists for linguists learning Hindi, so it goes even more in depth than the other two.

After Teach Yourself Hindi, just immerse yourself in native content (Hindi books, Bollywood, Hindi TV, etc.). Any questions can be looked up in the 2 supplemental resources or can be asked on this forum, which is pretty active (I've gotten responses within 24 hours consistently).

There's also no great Hindi-English dictionary. In a pinch (or for checking spelling in case you heard a word from a movie/TV show) Google Translate helps with 1-word translations. Anything beyond that though is inaccurate.

Good luck! Hindi's a great language to learn.

How much study time do you have available per day? Have you ever learned a foreign language successfully before? Do you speak any other Romance languages fluently?

Assuming you can study at least two hours per day, I would recommend:

1. Get Assimil's New French with Ease with the CD, and do two lessons per day. Spend 30 minutes on each lesson, following whatever variation of the Assimil Dutch instructions pleases you. In 25 days, this will give you a good, basic intuition for how French works, and teach you some useful vocabulary. The nice thing about Assimil is that if you follow the instructions, it works well for almost everybody, and it produces solid results. If you want a grammar overview to go with Assimil, get Essential French Grammar, which is dirt cheap, focused only on the essentials, and an excellent complement to Assimil.
   
2. Since you need to speak very soon, get Benny Lewis's book, which has some good advice on efficiently mastering survival stuff and polite conversation starting very early on.
   
3. A week or two before you leave, skim How to Improve Your Foreign Language Immediately, which is the bible of dirty tricks for faking a better level than you have. Definitely do his "islands" exercise, and prepare 10 or so islands, getting them corrected on lang-8.
   
   If you think of yourself as a hardcore geek, and you're generally good with languages, there are also a couple of ways to boost your listening comprehension substantially in 30–100 hours.
   
   Total cost: Less than $100, plus some money for iTalki tutors if you follow Benny's advice. But expect to work really, really hard—faking intermediate French after 30 days is a bit like sprinting straight up a steep mountain with a heavy pack. You're trying to compress 350 classroom hours into a month, which means working very hard and efficiently.
   
   Anyway, if you can spend an hour a day on Assimil, and an hour a day on Benny's speaking advice, then you'll get some pretty useful survival French under your belt by the end of the month. Going further than that will probably require studying obsessively.

As a Latin student, I'm obviously biased, but you should choose Latin. Latin is a really fun language, and it's really not that difficult. Since you've studied Russian, you already have a background in declined languages, and your Spanish will help with the vocab. English will help too, regardless of the fact that it's a Germanic language.

If you pick Latin, look into Wheelock's Latin. I use this book, and I think it does a really good job of explaining everything. It's also loaded with examples and practice work, and has a nice answer key in the back if you get stuck. Since it's a course "based on ancient authors," many of the passages are excerpts or adaptations from authors like Cicero or Caesar. It teaches you about Roman history and culture in addition to the language, which I think is nice.

I've also heard plenty of good things about Lingua Latina per se Illustrata, but I haven't used it very extensively.

There's also the Perseus Latin Word Study Tool, which is really helpful. They also have a Greek version, if you decide to go with Greek.

Wiktionary can be useful as well, as it gives full declensions or conjugations for tons of Latin words.

If you progress to a high enough level, you can read the news and tons of ancient authors in Latin.

Also, if you study Latin, we can be language twins. :P

Note that trying to speak in a new language for the first time can feel like you are trying to juggle, ride a unicycle and sing an opera all at the same time. Very little of skills you need are yet automatic, so you have to consciously think about each of them.
As everyone has said directly or indirectly, to get good at speaking, you must practice speaking. But there are sub-skills to it that you can try to practice on their own:

1. Pronunciation
   
2. Grammar (e.g. conjugations in many languages)
   
3. Word choice / collocations / idioms / stock phrases
   
   Initially just the physical act of moving your mouth differently to pronounce the language takes concentration. Depending on the distance of your TL from your L1, this can be VERY significant on its own.
   
   When someone says they can't speak well, my response: how many full sentences have you spoken in your TL? Even just reading out loud?
   
   One way to easy your way into speaking:
   Find a list of non-trivial, but not too long sentences (say 4-7 words each) and say them out loud. Make sure a) you know what they mean and b) you know how to pronounce them... even better if you can get a native to help you early on with pronunciation.
   
   Say each one over and over until you are satisfied with your "fluency" with each sentence. Practice the flow of speaking the language for a bit without worrying about "remembering" the content. (Actually, just speaking canned sentences a bunch of times will likely cause you to remember words and phrases from them.)
   
   Once you have some comfort speaking material provided for you, you can work on altering it or just generating your own sentences. You will find a lot of sentences can be usefully reused with simple noun/adjective swaps, e.g. "Where is the ?", "Can I have more ?" This is the beginning of simple conversations.
   
   A very effective way to start this is to create your own language islands (with the help of a native or lang-8), see:
   https://www.amazon.com/Improve-Your-Foreign-Language-Immediately/dp/0989387003
   (No affiliation, I'm just a fan of this book.)

Hey! Good to see someone interested in East Asian languages! The CJKV writing system normally throws a lot of people off.

CJK Writing System

I wrote a short little rant a while back on how the characters are constructed that you might want to read.

There are methods of learning the characters that make use of their structure. Heisig's RtK and RtH books (Amazon link) are the most well known books I think. Fansites such as Reviewing the Kanji and Reviewing the Hanzi also exist which you might want to take a look at.

Not sure if you like RtK? Here's the sampler. See if you like it after learning 276 characters~

Chinese-Specific

The only thing headache inducing about any Chinese dialect is the writing system and tones.

Note that though we call them "dialects", it is a matter of politics as most of them are mutually unintelligible. A Cantonese or Mandarin speaker is unlikely to understand a Hokkien speaker at all, for example.

Written chinese, on the other hand, is in Mandarin and only in Mandarin -- the other dialects do not have writing systems. Well... the notable exception is Written Cantonese, but that's can be seen as a variant of standard written chinese.

Oh! There are have two variants of the standard writing system: Simplified and Traditional. I had learnt the former in school, and I can read the latter after learning about the simplification process, so just pick one and stick with it.

I personally find Mandarin grammar to quite simple. This might be because it's an isolating language.

• Zhongwen.com -- I love the way he arranges related characters together in a tree.
  
• nciku.cn -- Online Chinese Dictionary
  
• Unfortunately I don't have that many online Chinese resources, and the physical ones I have are hard to obtain here in the UK.
  
• Reviewing the Hanzi has a nice list.
  
  Japanese-Specific
  
  Japanese folk have an easier time with Chinese characters. While 6000 Hanzi is roughly college-level (I think?) in Chinese, 6000 Kanji in Japanese is probably more-than-you-need-to-know-ever. There is a Kanji Aptitude Test which is pretty much the only reason one would learn that many.
  
  However, Japanese also have two syllabaries you'll need to know (~50 syllables each). These are phonetic, so they shouldn't pose much of a challenge; most who learn Japanese learn both of them in one or two weeks.
  
  Essential:
  
  
• Denshi Jisho -- Online Japanese dictionary (Basically WWWJDIC with a pretty interface)
  
  Beginner resources:
  
  
• TextFugu - An Online Textbook
  
• Tae Kim - Another Online Textbook, slightly more well-known. Free, unlike TextFugu.
  
• I would also strongly recommend grabbing Remembering the Kanji as soon as possible.
  
• Genki -- Textbook. Some will say to avoid this completely, but just for starting off I don't think it's /that/ bad. Get rid of it once you're past the beginner stage though.
  
  Books to get:
  
  
• Writing - Remembering the Kanji and Remembering the Kana
  
• Speaking / Listening - Shadowing Book 1, Shadowing Book 2
  
• Grammar - Understanding Basic Japanese Grammar
  
• Grammar - Japanese Sentence Patterns for Effective Communication
  
• Yes, I recommend both books.
  
  Mixed collection of Online Resources:
  
  
• Reading material - A list I posted a while back
  
• Listening material - Another list, though Koohii has a better one
  
• On Japanese flashcards
  
• Random learning resources from Koohii

Here’s my standard copy/paste:

LearnGaelic.scot has a lot of good resources including a dictionary with IPA and sound files and a good free beginner's course.

BBC Radio nan Gàidheal do weekly programme for learners called Beag air Bheag which is available on iPlayer or as a podcast from iTunes etc. Most of it will be beyond you as an absolute beginner, however they do a section at the start of each episode for beginners called Blasad Beag, and to date have compiled four downloadable beginner's specials which will be helpful if you're just starting:

• Beag air Bheag: Blasad Beag Special 1
  
• Beag air Bheag: Blasad Beag Special 2
  
• Beag air Bheag: Blasad Beag Special 3
  
• Beag air Bheag: Blasad Beag Special 4
  
• All the individual clips with Grammar notes
  
  Also well worth watching is Speaking Our Language, a dated but still good learner's TV programme (pretty much all episodes on Youtube there). There is also a version (without the presenter but with notes and transcriptions, so possibly better) available on LearnGaelic here.
  
  If you want to spend money, the best learner's books imo are:
  
  
• Teach Yourself: Complete Gaelic (Conversation / dialogue focused. Get the version with audio.)
  
• Scottish Gaelic in 12 Weeks (Hopelessly misleading title but very good grammar focused book. Get the version with audio.)
  
• Probably the best print dictionary for a beginner is the Essential Gaelic Dictionary
  
  And if you want to get serious, have a look at An Cùrsa Inntrigidh at Sabhal Mòr Ostaig.

Wheelock's Latin (link to the seventh edition on Amazon) is an excellent place to start, and at US$15, it's a pretty good deal, too, as textbooks go! I had six years of Latin in middle and high school, so if you need a hand, feel free to ping me. It's a fun language, and learning it taught me as much about the structure of English and other languages as it did about Latin. Best of luck!

No it isn't. I've been learning Korean for the past 10 months and it's been a blast.

The grammar is different, but you'll adapt quickly to it.

It's not a tonal language, and it has an alphabet, which makes it (relatively) easier than Japanese or Mandarin.

Here are my Korean Links:

First, you need to learn hangul. Watch these two videos below. You should be able to learn within a day and reading it will become easier with time. Hulu has many subbed Korean dramas to watch: http://www.hulu.com/tv/genres/korean-drama

Make sure that you find someone to Skype with in Korean and that you use http://lang-8.com/ to practice your written Korean. Listening is easy, but speaking and writing is hard. Reading takes a higher vocabulary, unless you're reading manwha, children's books, or the newspaper (Think People magazine, not The New York Times)

• Learn Hangul in a Day!
  
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntdiHDORtAQ
  
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtncEhWPls0
  
  I would go through TTMIK's grammar lessons, and then supplement it with:
  
  
• Korean Grammar in Use: Beginning to Early Intermediate
  
• Korean Grammar in Use : Intermediate
  
• Korean Grammar in Use: Advanced ; with Cd
  
  KOREAN
  
  Best:
  
  
• http://www.talktomeinkorean.com/ [Best resource]
  
• http://www.keytokorean.com/
  
• http://lei.snu.ac.kr/site/en/klec/click-korean/index.jsp
  
• http://www.hangukdrama.com/
  
• http://www.howtostudykorean.com/ [dull but covers all of the important grammar points]
  
• http://www.wordshowers.com/index.html
  
• http://www.learnkoreanlp.com/ [Best grammar guide]
  
• 
  
• http://dic.daum.net/index.do?dic=eng [Best Korean to English Dictionary]
  
• 
  
• Learn Hangul in a Day!
  
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntdiHDORtAQ
  
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtncEhWPls0
  
  Rest:
  
  
• http://korean.sogang.ac.kr/
  
• http://rki.kbs.co.kr/learn_korean/lessons/e_index.htm
  
• http://www.langintro.com/kintro/
  
• http://www.learnkorean.com/
  
• http://www.lifeinkorea.com/Language/korean.cfm
  
• http://www.declan-software.com/korean.htm
  
• http://hangulforest.com/index_e.htm
  
• http://learnkorean.elanguageschool.net/
  
• http://english.visitkorea.or.kr/enu/CU/CU_EN_8_6_1_1_1.jsp
  
• http://www.learn-korean.net/
  
• http://www.korean-course.com/
  
• http://www.learnlangs.com/RWP/Korean/
  
• http://www.korean-flashcards.com/
  
• http://www.korean-language.org/
  
• http://www.zkorean.com/english-korean-dictionary
  
• http://www.babylon.com/define/111/Korean-Dictionary.html
  
• http://www.indiana.edu/~koreanrs/kordic.html
  
• http://bluedic.com/
  
• http://dic.naver.com/
  
• http://dic.impact.pe.kr/
  
• http://alldic.nate.com/
  
• http://www.indiana.edu/~koreanrs/hangul.html
  
• http://www.learn-korean.net/learn-korean-classes-listarticles-1.html
  
• http://www.learnkoreanlanguage.com/index.html
  
• http://lovingkorean.wordpress.com/2012/04/20/how-to-learn-hangul/
  
• http://d24w6bsrhbeh9d.cloudfront.net/photo/3968335_700b.jpg [Hangul in 15 Minutes]
  
• http://www.langintro.com/kintro/toc.htm
  
  
• kDramas
  
  
• http://www.dramafever.com/
  
• http://www.viki.com/genres/korean-drama
  
• http://www.dramago.com/
  
• http://www.dramastyle.com/
  
  
• Books
  
  
• [Korean Grammar for International Learners](http://www.amazon.com/dp/8971415541/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?
  
• 
  
• _encoding=UTF8&colid=HEASP4JPX90F&coliid=I2EWHOH44HQA1X)
  
• [Step by Step Korean Bk 1 ](http://www.amazon.com/dp/1565911326/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?
  
• 
  
• _encoding=UTF8&colid=HEASP4JPX90F&coliid=I37SFAXCP4M4RR)
  
• [Wild Korean: A Fieldguide to Real Korean Conversation](http://www.amazon.com/dp/1484804872/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?
  
• 
  
• _encoding=UTF8&colid=HEASP4JPX90F&coliid=I14OCRZSEBBE6N)
  
• [Continuing Korean](http://www.amazon.com/dp/080483430X/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?
  
• 
  
• _encoding=UTF8&colid=HEASP4JPX90F&coliid=I3UBPN24V7NJBG)
  
• [Looking for a Mr. Kim in Seoul: A Guide to Korean Expressions](http://www.amazon.com/dp/1932457038/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?
  
• 
  
• _encoding=UTF8&colid=HEASP4JPX90F&coliid=I1PDSYC1IYGWK0)
  
• [McGraw-Hill's Korean Illustrated Dictionary](http://www.amazon.com/dp/0071769005/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?
  
• 
  
• _encoding=UTF8&colid=HEASP4JPX90F&coliid=I30XIJ7G4VCYYC)
  
• [Using Korean: A Guide to Contemporary Usage](http://www.amazon.com/Using-Korean-Guide-Contemporary-
  
• 
  
• Usage/dp/0521667887/ref=pd_sim_b_9)
  
• [Korean Grammar in Use: Beginning to Early Intermediate](http://www.amazon.com/Korean-Grammar-Use-Beginning-
  
• 
  
• Intermediate/dp/8959951986/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1390174333&sr=1-1)
  
• [A Resource for Korean Grammar Instruction (Klear Textbooks in Korean Language)](http://www.amazon.com/Resource-Grammar-
  
• 
  
• Instruction-Textbooks-Language/dp/0824838165/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1384615790&sr=1-1&keywords=klear+korean+grammar)
  
• TTMIK Book Store**

The best way to do that is supplement your "going around and talking to just about anyone you see" with some Assimil French exercises.

You're going to do great, just don't be afraid of sounding like an idiot at first. Another French curriculum that many people praise is the Pimsleur method. I loved the Pimsleur Vietnamese course I took, and it worked out great; I'm sure French is much better, being an easy language to learn.

Remember, you can "buy" these from the internet for an extremely low "price".

/r/learnjapanese's Getting Started Guide

> ###Online Guides
>
> Luckily for the modern language learner, the internet is full of free resources for study. When using them, however, make sure that you are using a credible source. One extremely popular and quality guide is Tae Kim’s Guide to Learning Japanese. Written, and even available through Amazon, as a book, Tae Kim’s Guide covers everything you need to know to get started learning Japanese.
>
> Another great choice is Pomax's Introduction to Japanese.
>
> If you’d like to follow a different path, you can follow the subsections below.
>
>
> ###Textbooks
>
> If you’re interested in a more traditional form of study, you may be looking for a recommendation of a textbook. In /r/LearnJapanese, the most commonly recommended textbook series is Genki. Currently available in its second edition, the Genki consists of two textbooks (GENKI I: An Integrated Course in Elementary Japanese and Genki: An Integrated Course in Elementary Japanese II) with companion workbooks. The books and associated media are designed to be used to help in learning speaking, listening, reading and writing skills, with additional segments for cultural information. These textbooks are commonly used in college and university settings and cover the first two years of study at a common pace.
>
> These books are available for purchase from many sources, such as Amazon.com (Amazon.com Purchase Links: Genki I | Genki I Workbook | Genki II | Genki II Workbook ) and traditional brick-and-mortar resellers.
>
> Additional choices for textbooks, such as the Nakama series, can be found on the Resources page of the wiki.

I tried Rosetta Stone in Korean briefly. It sucked. Like really, really sucked. It wasn't just that it did a bad job of teaching things, it taught some things in a way that was incredibly misleading and would result in you speaking some pretty absurd Korean. If you didn't know any better (I did, but obviously a complete beginner wouldn't), it would actually be harmful to your acquisition process if you used Rosetta Stone. It doesn't go up to a very advanced level either.

So now that that's out of the way:

• If there is a Korean class available anywhere near you, take it. Korean isn't easy, and self-studying it certainly doesn't make it any easier.
  
• Integrated Korean is the most widely recommended textbook series I've seen. I've never used it myself, but you should get a textbook, and it seems that theirs are good.
  
• Talk to Me in Korean is a great site to practice listening. It has lessons starting from complete beginner (including a few Hangul lessons).
  
• To practice speaking, you should find real-life Korean people to practice with once you've studied it a bit and have something to work with. Unless the person is a Korean tutor/teacher, don't expect them to do much in the way of teaching you though. You can try Meetup.com or classified ads like Craigslist to help you find Korean people if need be.
  
• Here's a list of other various resources I use.

I started learning to read and write Korean with Hangul Master, then the basics with the Integrated Korean series. Because Korean grammar can be no bueno, I used Korean Grammar in Use as well. All of those books were super worth the price and really helped me understand how the language worked.

If you're looking for something free, Talk To Me In Korean is always a good option, or if you wanna learn Hangul on your own, YouTube has a lot of good videos!

Good luck!

It's not crazy. I'm a fluent English speaker who has learned conversational Korean over the course of two years, albeit in a classroom setting. I've found it to be a pretty simple language when compared to other East Asian languages such as Chinese and Japanese. The best thing to do is get some books and learn the grammar patterns. I recommend [these] (http://www.amazon.com/Integrated-Korean-Beginning-Textbooks-Language/dp/0824834402/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1419721377&sr=8-2&keywords=klear+korean) because they come with listening resources and teach you the basics well. Once you get the basic grammar patterns and memorize the elementary vocabulary I would recommend getting yourself to the intermediate level with the same line of books. Supplement your education by listening to Korean pop music and watching Korean dramas (super fun). There are also many websites and apps that are willing to connect you with people that speak Korean fluently.

My biggest piece of advice is to focus on reading fluently and getting grammar patterns down. Once you have this down you will only have to learn more vocabulary to expand your grasp on the language. Going to South Korea will also help you learn, although a lot of people will only want to speak English with you. You will have to actively seek out people that are willing to speak Korean to you. If you have any other questions about learning the language or going to Korea, then don't hesitate to PM me.

Graded readers are books intended for language learners that use a reduced amount of vocab and grammar to make it easier to start actually reading, even before you have enough language to jump into young adult fiction or other easier native material.

I read McGraw-Hills Spanish reader, it was alright. They've got a french reader it looks like.. You could potentially check the torrent sites to see if there's a collection of graded readers anywhere, there was an awesome pack for German that helped me get started.

Either way, click the amazon link above, click the 'look inside' and scroll down to the start of the material. read a few pages (potentially unknown words and constructions are in the margins). If you like it, you might want to pick up a copy. They're a great way to build speed and comfort with the language without getting hung up on the thousands of rarer words that'll trip you up in real native material.

If what you want to achieve is A1 and nothing beyond, you best bet would be getting one of the many course books:

• Schritte (http://www.amazon.com/dp/3190018510/). You may simply ignore the 1 stars review as they're irrelevant.
  
• Lagune (http://www.amazon.de/dp/3190016240/) and a lot more others. Actually it doesn't really matter which one you pick. Any one of them is sufficient.
  
  A arguably better alternative would be the free online course offered by Deutsche Welle (http://deutschkurse.dw.de/KursPlattform/WebObjects/KursPlattform.woa/wo/6.1). Do register and try it. Really valuable resource. Together with Deutsch – warum nicht? (http://www.dw.de/deutsch-lernen/deutsch-warum-nicht/s-2163) you can go far. (In case you didn't realise already, both the sound files and pdf notes can be found on the right, featuring four series.)
  
  Maybe the only problem you would encounter is speaking. The speaking test is actually like this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGNd-6pDkEI), and you may panic if you don't already speak in German for a several hours. Try to find someone who speaks German and wants to do a language exchange with you. (http://www.language-exchanges.org/) is one of them. You may as well find one on Reddit.
  
  By the way, if you really want to have a strong command of German sooner or later, there are some good, though popular (popular doesn't always mean bad) books for foundation, apart from your already awesome German for Reading:
  
  
• German: How to Speak and Write It (http://www.amazon.com/dp/9650060359/)
  
• The Everything Learning German Book (http://www.amazon.com/dp/159869989X/)
  
  If you insist on getting a grammar book, a nice start would be:
  
  
• Essential German Grammar (http://www.amazon.com/dp/0340741899/)
  
• English Grammar for Students of German (http://www.amazon.com/dp/0934034389/)
  
  And eventually you may want to take down the boss:
  
  
• Hammer's German Grammar and Usage (http://www.amazon.com/dp/1444120166/)
  
• Duden 04. Die Grammatik (http://www.amazon.de/dp/product/3411040483/)
  
  Finally I recommend you to take a look at my favourite reading material when I started, Studien und Plaudereien (http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22160), freely offered by Project Gutenberg.

I have always used the Chinese Link textbooks. I also see Integrated Chinese everywhere. Also, I highly highly highly recommend all of the Demystified books! I have both the Chinese and German and they are fantastic! Also Heisig's books are really popular and they also come in traditional. Hope this helps! I am pretty experienced in trying out tons of different resources for Mandarin! :)

Would love to recommend this book to you:

https://www.amazon.com/Integrated-Chinese-Simplified-Characters-Textbook/dp/0887276385/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=integrated+chinese+level+1&qid=1573484927&sr=8-1

Integrated Chinese. You can use this in conjunction with the book you are looking to buy (glossika). When I first started learning Chinese in middle school they used much more juvenile books, but for my friends who continued Chinese in university, this is what they used. I've seen the book in real life and I really like it and would recommend it. Let me know if you have any questions :)

Practice translating? Three months into learning a language is way too early to be worried about translating. Your goal should be to immerse yourself in the language as much as possible -- that means avoiding English when you study French. Speak French, listen to French, write French, and read French (and when you read, try to turn off the voice in your head that murmurs a running English translation).

Consider downloading some free French-language podcasts (try the iTunes store). This book might be worthwhile. I haven't used it, but the same publisher's Spanish readers are good. Since you said translating, though, I'm wondering if your primary goal is reading French. Even so, I would still say to speak, listen, and write as much as you can -- it will help your reading. But if your primary goal is reading, this book is fantastic. I started using it after two semesters of college French (which were indispensable for helping me internalize the basic structures of the language) and it took me the rest of the way to doing research and reading literature in French (with a dictionary, of course).

I have read over 350 books on language learning.

That having been said, this very short book is definitely the best (even after 40 years of reading and learning about languages, I still learned a lot from this short book):
How to Improve Your Foreign Language Immediately
https://www.amazon.com/Improve-Your-Foreign-Language-Immediately/dp/0989387003

The second "must-read" is The Third Ear: https://www.amazon.com/Third-Ear-Chris-Lonsdale/dp/988988870X

These books are also terrific:
Art and Science of Learning Languages
https://www.amazon.com/Science-Learning-Languages-Amorey-Gethin/dp/187151648X

Language Logic: Practical and Effective Techniques to Learn Any Foreign Language
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0978064100

Actually Teach Yourself - Hindi by Rupert Snell is a pretty good course for beginners. Good dialogues to introduce vocabulary and different aspects of grammar.

The other books suggested here are also good ones. :)

I am no sure if a single text can help you achieve your goals for self-study.

However, I have heard great things about the "Erkundungen" and "Begegnungen" Deutsch Als Fremdspreche series from Schubert-Verlag for existing self-study learners, which also has an online site for grammar exercises, http://www.schubert-verlag.de/aufgaben/index.htm

Alternatively, an English and progressive teaching grammar like this well known one may suit you better:

"English Grammar for Students of German"

Amazon or their website. I believe it'd be cheaper on Amazon. Unfortunately, their website is quite user unfriendly for a website designed for language learning (it's only in French.)

Here's the link to their website one. It costs you 70 dollars on their website while it costs you 63 dollars on Amazon. Unless you buy it from another source where it drops down to 54 dollars. I believe somebody once told me you can find the audio online for Assimil French, so if you can find that, then you can just buy the book only, which would lower costs down a lot.

Interestingly enough, Assimil actually has a course on Ancient Greek, Latin, and Egyptian hieroglyphics so once you learn French, you can always have fun exploring that :P

As for Rosetta Stone, I don't think it's bad, I think it's ridiculously expensive for what you're getting. I know that for Chinese, it's absolutely terrible (I had some friends try to learn mandarin using it and they had barely improved when I found them after finishing RS Levels 1-3.) For the price of 200 dollars, it seems like RS only promises to get you somewhere around B1-B2 as well, and given what I've heard, Rosetta Stone in actuality after finishing all the way through level 5 gets you only to A2, maybe to B1 which would put you around the same level as other programs such as Assimil, except it's much more expensive. Once you get to B1 though, it's quite easy in my opinion to advance, as you can finally consume some native content.

I'm learning Hungarian with Colloquial Hungarian and I love it. This book does a very good job of introducing the most important grammar concepts and providing plenty of dialogue and short stories for examples.

Aside from that I use Hungarian Reference. I must forewarn though that this website should not bet used as your primary resource, but rather as a supplement. It even says on the home-page:

>The objective of this site is to serve as a reference to the beautiful Hungarian language. If is not intended to be a ground-up course, it is not intended to teach you Hungarian. It is meant to be a companion to your own study.

It should go nice with Duolingo though. Find a sentence you don't understand, and refer to Hungarian Reference for a more in-depth explanation.

I haven't been able to find any resources for actually practicing/using the language besides jumping into native-level content. I'm actually pushing through the Wikipedia page about Hungary at a snail's pace. I do write on the Babylonian Chaos thread every Thursday, so even though that's not getting corrections, at least it's making me use the language.

Lastly, I set Word of the Day as my homepage. Whenever I want to use the internet, I have to read each sentence provided before I'm allowed to visit any page.

Jó szerncsét!

> I've read that you should learn like a child

Your brain is not like child's brain, you have adult's brain. You can try to imitate the environment but you can't replicate what goes on in child's brain/mind. Take "learn like a child" advice with grain of salt. As for children's books, IMHO these are far from ideal for learning because for and adult it may be difficult to relate to the stories and they rarely elicit emotional response that would facilitate remembering.

Integrated Korean is widely used popular textbook series, you might want to look into that, perhaps your library has a copy.

Depending on what language you want to learn, there may be a book that explains the grammar you'll need for that language by connecting it to English. For example: German,
Spanish, Russian.

If there's a term that you're unfamiliar with, you can also poke around on Wikipedia to get a better idea behind some of the concepts. But when things get too technical, just keep looking up unfamiliar terminology and you'll be on your way.

For a little bit of fun, check out:
Split Ergativity,

where you can see this gem of a sentence:
>An example of split ergativity conditioned by tense and aspect is found in the Hindustani language (Hindi/Urdu), which has an ergative case on subjects in the perfective aspect for transitive verbs in the active voice, while in other aspects (habitual, progressive) subjects appear in the nominative case.

Find a copy of Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata. Libraries sometimes have copies, or you might be able to find a cheap, used copy. Even better if you can get the audio with it. It is a good, intuitive way to introduce you to the language, and makes learning basic declensions a bit more fun, because you are following along with a story, instead of just rote memorizing tables.

I don't believe that you truly learned French.
Start anew. This time around, make sure that you can actually "speak" French. Focus more on speaking, instead of passive listening comprehension.

As for the "best" way, I believe Assimil French with Ease is a very popular course. I am not sure if it's "best", whatever that means, for you. You will have to find out what works "best" for you.

Not sure if this if only for Prime but I searched for Assimil on a lark (I'd like to get my sister the Yiddish course) and they have a really good deal on French for English speakers right now: https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/2700518136/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1499731209&sr=1-1&refinements=p_27%3AAssimil&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&dpPl=1&dpID=51N5CwKAIiL&ref=plSrch

Definitely look into Assimil. It's one of the more renowned language learning systems. I really like the German version.

And it's actually a French company, so I'm guessing the French version is the best thing they have going.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/2700518136/ref=dp_ob_neva_mobile

It's a little pricy, but you can generally buy the CD and the book cheaper seperately. Just make sure the editions match if you go this route.

Here's a link to Assimil. You can find the book + the audio easily on torrents. And I think you should read the reviews on amazon, and generally reviews about assimil about what makes it so great. They probably word it better than I do, however even though assimil claims to take you to B1, I think A2 level is more likely, and after finishing the book, you can immediately continue with their advanced book which should take you above B1 called "Assimil Using French".

You can definitely afford language textbooks, especially pre-used ones.


http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/0061997226/ref=dp_olp_used?ie=UTF8&condition=used

The best latin textbook out there for $7. New for $12.

look on amazon, i'm pretty sure they have kindle versions for languages besides french

http://www.amazon.com/Easy-French-Reader-Roussy-Sales/dp/0071428488

-dftm

> Can anyone give me some advice, as well as any websites/books that I can read up on to improve in my understanding of the language?

The book Genki 1 is often recommended.

There won't be anything specific. This is because language learning depends on multiple factors that vary greatly between learners:

• language goals
  
• time available to study
  
• materials [being] used
  
• fluency in related languages
  
• target areas of difficulty (i.e., some people memorize words easier than they learn grammar, some people understand grammar faster than they learn vocab, etc)
  
  Essentially, though, any amount of time you spend productively learning your language will be beneficial. So with French, you can try:
  
  
• spend 30 minutes a day going through an online course, such as OLI
  
• spend 15 minutes reviewing vocabulary you learned the day before
  
• spend 15 minutes listening to French music, videos, etc or reading easy French passages
  
  Then after a month or so, adjust according to how far you've progressed. Or you could try Duolingo in the beginning and then moving onto different methods. Just try to be fluid and don't stress out :)

Yes basically writing a text in German without any explanatory notes. It just came to my mind since your approach is so heavy on cognates so students should be able to understand a text made up of those cognates and half cognates.

​

You can preview some pages of the book on Amazon, maybe it will help clarify what I mean: Amazon link

What about Colloquial Hungarian or Hungarian: An Essential Grammar. There's also Teach Yourself Hungarian, but I don't think the grammar focus is as strong.

I actually think this is a great book for German learners!

https://www.amazon.com/Integrated-Chinese-Simplified-Characters-Textbook/dp/0887276385/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1536811226&sr=8-2&keywords=chinese+textbook

get a used copy of this and start pounding away.

it is a great textbook. used textbook and workbook should run about 40-50. There are 4 "levels" it is equal to the first 2 years of college chinese

If you just want to learn it to read it, there's no better combination than Wheelock's Latin and Hans Orberg's Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata. Wheelock gives you the grammar, and reading Orberg will improve your reading speed and comprehension by leaps and bounds.

I read this one so many times I could practically recite it word for word. It's pretty good - starts out at a fairly simple level and gradually gets harder as you go. My only complaint is that it's a bit short.

Not a website, but I will always recommend Heisig's Remembering the Kanji. There's a sample (Pdf) if you want to try before you buy.

Here is a good example for learning French. The first chapters barely assume any knowledge of French, and by the end of the book you're reading (simplified) stories about French history.

Another example would be the Lingua Latina series for learning Latin. Starts off super simple, but by the end of the third book, you're reading unedited classics.

Get Assimil French (make sure you get the audio). You'll get further than what Michael Thomas would you give you. Then you can buy Using French for the advanced level.

It will take about 4 - 5 months to complete the first book, then about 3 - 4 months to complete the second book.

Memrise chinese a1 course with headphones is something you could do on your phone.

Also, your friendly local library also likely has the pimsleur tapes, which you could listen to.

This book is the standard beginners textbook, and you need the workbook to go with it. Buy both of them used, and then look at the library or university library to see if they have the cds/dvds so you can copy them.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0887276385?pc_redir=T1

Here is the desktop version of your link

Here is the mobile version of your link

Is this the book Easy French Reader?

1. Cry
   
   
   
2. Essential Japanese Grammar: A Comprehensive Guide to Contemporary Usage, Genki I, and Genki II
   
   
   
3. JAPAN: Understanding & Dealing with the New Japanese Way of Doing Business
   
   
   Even if you disregard my advice on everything else you must must must must follow three in getting some books in understanding how to do business in Japanese.
   
   
   Language barrier is easy to overcome if there's money involved, cultural barriers less so. For learning Japanese and/or doing business in Japan culture and etiquette is everything.