Memrise vs Anki: Is Either Better? No, Just Different (and for a different application).
Anki vs Memrise People have bugged me about Memrise for years now and, although I've used it a fair bit, I'd never gotten around to writing a proper review of it, so I thought I would by comparing it with its obvious rival and answering a question many ask: Anki or...
Learn German Vocab Fast with this Fantastic Free Tool
The tool in question is ReadLang, it works with any website in a variety of languages, and makes the process of learning new words from online text much easier than it was before, saving you massive amounts of time and effort. You click the word you don't know, it...
Native Speakers are NOT Good at Teaching Their Own Language!
I just wanted to quickly talk today about a common misconception I see amongst beginning language learners, and that is that native speakers make good teachers of their own language. Imagine trying to teach someone English (or whatever your native language is). See...
Interested in the culture of other countries and habits of their peoples? I HAVE A NEW BLOG ABOUT THAT!
I've been wanting to write about the culture in other countries for a while now but wanted to wait until I actually started traveling to do so. I'm in Spain at the moment and have had just a ton of observations and interesting little insights into Spanish culture,...
How to avoid wasting months learning German the wrong way (and learning the wrong type of German)–get started the right way, learn to talk like native speakers do
The worst thing that can happen to you, and it happens to thousands of newbie language-learners every year (I've met several of them), is that you just don't know how to start off so maybe you try this, that, and the other random method or resource and, of course,...
Another Advantage of a Tutor: MUCH Faster Error-Correction Rate Than Anything Else I’ve Experienced (which means you LEARN faster than anywhere else)
As I'm fond of saying: You learn to speak a language by trying to speak it, poorly at first. What this means is that you learn by making mistakes which are then corrected, the corrections being where the actual learning takes place. Previously, I had recommended that...
One Advantage of Using a Tutor: They Have a Plan (based on experience with lots of students!)
I've tried six different tutors at this point (5 professional, 1 "community" tutor which is just someone who doesn't teach the language as their day job and does online tutoring on the side), kept four of them (the first pro was flat out bad, the community tutor was...
My First iTalki Tutoring Session in German: What You Can Expect
I'm currently doing the iTalki 2015 Language Challenge which is where if you take at least 20 hours of instruction via their tutors then you can win 400 ITC (iTalki Credits, which are used to buy lessons with the tutors on there, with ten of them costing $1US). The...
List of Sites to Watch German Videos, TV Shows, and Movies Online (most are free)
Ok, I'm going to maintain a list here of all the websites where you can watch German videos (of whatever content: TV shows, news, random YouTube stuff someone created, etc.) online with a strong emphasis on free (if it costs money it's going to have to be damned...
Best Online German Dictionary, Why It’s the Best, and 9 Other Good Ones (Runners Up)
First post ever! And I think I'll start it out by sharing something useful that I'm actually qualified to comment on, which is not a whole lot right now since I've only been learning German for about two months at this point. One of the first things I did when I...
