What is the best way to learn another language?

[Shirley Ujest]

We are going to be doing our next couple of trips to Germany over the next few years. Having just returned from 3 weeks of a Fabulous Vacation and realizing that having a tenuous grasp of the words when listening and using pantomime, charades and baby words to communicate, are just not enough to truly enjoy the company of everyone.

I will be sharing this with my children as well.

I need suggestions of What Worked For You to learn another language.


Danke.

[emekthian]

What helps me with Spanish is looking at long, complicated grammar tables. I personally seem to pick up the information quickest that way.

[JThunder]

Being born in a foreign country really helped me.

[Rhiannon8404]

Well, I will be spending some time in Italy next spring. I bought the 8-CD set Italian with Michel Thomas. He also does German and other languages.

I've been listening to the CDs and I'm really beginning to understand the language. It teaches you to think in the language, not just translate you thoughts word by word.

Good luck and enjoy your trips!!!

[Shirley Ujest]

Has anyone or does anyone know anything about the Primsleur way/method?

[FruitPie]

Actually hearing the language helps.And it with someone.
The number of languages I tried to learn and gave up either cos I couldn be bothered to keep up the work or cos I knew the structure but had no idea what it sounded like or cos learning out of a dry textbook didnt appeal.
Or I flew through the first couple of chapters and then either forgot it or had to spend time doing the same exercises over and over to bang it in.
Most of the languages I tried had only boring grammar books or ancient textbooks.German has plenty of easy,simple to learn,fun books that'll get you through enough to survive.

I tried Norwegian evening classes.
The only thing I remember is
Jeg har en mandelformede forhod.
Unlikely to ever benefit me at all...

[gouda]

Personally, those learn at home books/cds never work for me - zero motivation to keep at it regularly!

I was reasonably fluent after a bunch of courses at the local Goethe Institute, but I learnt best (rather, improved immensely the quickest) within three months of living in Hamburg. After that, I could get by pretty much anywhere in Germany, including Bavaria and Bayern

[hildea]

Originally Posted by FruitPie

I tried Norwegian evening classes.
The only thing I remember is
Jeg har en mandelformede forhod.

"I have an almond shaped foreskin"???
What kind of Norwegian class was that?
(Note to self: "Evening class" is obviously an euphemism in English )

As for learning other languages, I suggest getting hold of films, books and/or comic books. I admit I only got through the first third of Ende's "Die Unendliche Geshichte", but I did manage "Schwüle Haremsnächte" (don't remember the author), with frequent curses at my German-Norwegian dictionary, which never seemed to have the right words. It might have given me a German vocabulary somewhat similar to FruitPie's Norwegian.

[Iris]

Those learn-at-home books and CDs never worked for me either in keeping up my Spanish. I found reading newspapers to be really helpful, of course I had to reference the English/Spanish dictionary on a frequent basis.

This didn't do much for my listening and speaking ability though. I think the most beneficial way to really learn how to speak a foreign language is to submerse yourself in the language. Do you know any German-speaking people that you can get together with a couple times per week to practice speaking German? Even if you can only speak a little, this will help you gain an ear for the language. I've probably spent a total of 3 months in Spanish speaking countries, and this time was much more valuable than any class, book, etc.

[FruitPie]

Important note:in German,Nachte is nights.Nakte is naked people.They sound the same.I created confusion in the German class when I booked a hotel room for three nights