Tag Archives: positivity

This Question Is Sabotaging Your Language Learning—Please Stop Asking It, My Friend

“HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE FOR ME TO LEARN (insert language here)?” We’ve all heard it. “A person can learn Italian in X amount of time.” “You need X amount of hours to reach conversational fluency in Russian.” “It takes X years to master Japanese.” I’ve been teaching languages since 2015 and I’ve been learningContinue reading “This Question Is Sabotaging Your Language Learning—Please Stop Asking It, My Friend”

How Learning a Language is Like Climbing a Mountain

“In every walk with nature, one receives far more than he seeks.” John Muir My wife and I love to be in the mountains. Recently on a hike on Mt. Rainier I thought to myself “Self: You know, learning a language is really a lot like climbing a mountain.” In what ways? No Two MountainsContinue reading “How Learning a Language is Like Climbing a Mountain”

Get Emotional—Why Language Learning Is Not Just Business, It’s Personal

What we learn with pleasure, we never forget. – Alfred Mercier As you probably know, English is currently the international language of business. Therefore it’s not surprising that most of my English students are business professionals. Many of them are very highly educated and very successful in their fields. But I’ve noticed that it’s notContinue reading “Get Emotional—Why Language Learning Is Not Just Business, It’s Personal”

An Accidental Polyglot

pol·y·glot (/ˈpälēˌɡlät/) Noun: a person who knows and is able to use several languages. Ex: “Slovenians, being surrounded by many countries, are mostly polyglots” ac·ci·dent (/ˈaksədənt/) Noun: a whoopsie-daisy, oops As Groucho Marx said, “I was born at a very early age.” But maybe that’s going back too far. I am a polyglot. At the timeContinue reading “An Accidental Polyglot”