Learning a language late in life?

Junglist

Junglist

Junglist

Soldato
Joined
11 Jun 2015
Posts
12,674
Location
Bristol
I didn't pay enough attention in school and now I'm paying the price.

I get really jealous of bilingual people and when I go abroad I get embarrassed when someone has to speak in English to me rather than the language of the country I am in.

So I've decided I'm going to take some lessons. It's out of French or Italian mostly because I frequently visit those countries. My french is a 2/10 at best. I can get by and be polite but I can't have a conversation.

I know learning a language is supposed to be harder the older you get so I'm just wondering if anyone has attempted this? I did download Duolingo a while back and got quite far but then just stopped. I'll give it another go soon but I feel a course may be the better way for me to learn.
 
I quite like the French lanagiage. With Italian a close second. It's the masculine and feminine which throw me off currently
 
AndyT said:
I'm learning French at the moment (33) and it's rock hard, but well worth it. It's just so different to English in many ways, but also similar in others. A lot of English words are taken from French. I recommend this site:

https://radiolingua.com/coffeebreakfrench/

The full course is 250 odd quid - work paid for mine, but the free stuff is excellent too - I started out with season 1 and 2 just using the free resources. You can get a lot of material for free, particularly in seasons 1 and 2.

I am definitely not fluent yet by any stretch, but I am a quarter of the way through Season 3 and already a lot better and more confident than I was.

EDIT: I found DUOLINGO a bit irritating and not really that useful. Particularly the iPhone app. No explanation is provided whatsoever.
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Awesome I'll have a look into that. I was looking around for some local classes and found 10 x 90 minute sessions for £135. Think I may ask for it for my Christmas present.

memyselfandi said:
Define late in life .... I started learning a language in my late 30's and my Dad did in his 70's.
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Well, I'm 26 (27 tomorrow, shameless birthday plug) so i guess it's all relative as I'm probably early in life compared to some on here :p

Avenged7Fold said:
Biggest tips i can give for the learning curve:

1.Speak as much as you can
2.Dont be afraid of sounding stupid or be embarrassed of your accent
3. over-pronounce rather than under-pronounce if you struggle
4. Ask people to annoyingly interrupt and correct you
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Pretty good tips, thanks :)

The reason I've picked either French or Italian is I go to either place a few times a year for a few weekends. I find, especially in Italy, that after being there for a few days I start to pick it up rather quickly (when I'm reading things anyway - I butcher it when I speak) and it helps a lot of their words are very similar to ours
 
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I'm jealous that you're able to do that! When I was in my teens I used to work at Ikea whilst I was at college and one of my co-workers was insane. He was Swedish-Peruvian and could speak fluently in English, Swedish, Spanish, French, Italian and a bit of German. Was always amazed at seeing him switch between the langues as if second nature. I know the ship has sailed for me to do that but I'd love to be able to fluently talk in at least one other language.
 
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