Post-it Notes, Flash Cards and Google Translate
When you begin learning a new language, you typically start by learning verb conjugations and common, easy phrases like: Hi, my name is ____ and I’m from ____. Once you’ve gotten a handle on introductions, sentence structure and verbs conjugation, you dive into what sometimes feels like a never-ending sea of vocabulary.
We understand how overwhelming vocabulary can be especially when you’re trying to learn a language on your own. Do you grab a dictionary and work your way from front to back or do you highlight the new words in a book you’re reading or song you’re listening to and translate them all? There are all kinds of methods to make learning vocabulary more manageable and we’d like to share our current process for learning new words with you.
…and the best part is, it’s FREE!
First, we wrote down common places and topics that we often go to or talk about.
Then we picked one topic and made a list of all the words we associated with that topic. For example, our first topic was living room, so we wrote down things like ceiling, couch, carpet, light switch, candle, wall, etc. Next, we translated each word using Google Translate, Reverso and Google Images and created a set of flashcards on Quizlet. (If you haven’t tried out Quizlet, it’s a great way to create and find vocabulary lists to study! They even have a section devoted solely to Language & Vocabulary! Woohoo!)
Since some of us prefer pictures to flashcards, we also wrote out all of the new words on sticky notes and posted them on all the objects in the living room.
For the next couple days, we reviewed the sticky notes and flashcards and quizzed ourselves at the end of each day until we had the new words down. Now we can walk into a living room and feel confident that we can pick out and talk about the objects in it.
We’re all about easy and cheap ways of learning a new language. Let us know some of the creative ways you’ve come up with to learn new words in the comments section below!
Happy language learning!
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