Comments on: How to make time if you are too busy

By: Ketutar

Ketutar — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 21:25:03 +0000

“which here in Prague has actually mostly been in French and Portuguese”' Ajabaja, as they say in Sweden. Bad boy, bad, bad, bad!
It's not only English you need to stop talking, it's EVERY LANGUAGE THAT IS NOT THE ONE YOU ARE TRYING TO LEARN! Sure, it was your birthday, and all that, but what's the darn difference in speaking in French with your French-speaking friends and speaking in English with your English-speaking friends, when you are actually trying to learn Czech and should be speaking Czech with your Czech-speaking friends?
No wonder you found a new way of not learning to speak a new language fluently in three months. Or, let's say, you proved that the old way of not learning a new language is still strong and valid

By: GlobalButterfly

GlobalButterfly — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 08:35:10 +0000

I've uploaded language podcasts to my itouch and listen to them every chance I get, helps a lot!

By: Cheap & Useful Resources for Learning Spanish

Cheap & Useful Resources for Learning Spanish — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 16:03:21 +0000

[...] attitude towards learning languages. He thinks everyone can do it and shares his secrets including how to make time if you are busy, memory techniques and using couchsurfing to practice with natives in your own home. His biggest [...]

By: Georgina

Georgina — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 02:59:06 +0000

Hola. He estado leyendo varios de tus posts y pienso que están llenos de cosas útiles para gente como yo que quiere aprender muchos idiomas. Yo ya me había dado cuenta de que perdemos mucho tiempo en las filas y ese tipo de cosas, pero lo que hago es leer libros. Lo malo es que como son periodos de tiempo muy cortos, se lee una línea que se entiende a la mitad y no funciona. Pero las ideas que escribiste son geniales. Las fotocopias no pesan, no estorban… son perfectas. Muchas gracias y muchas felicidades por tu blog. Tienes una lectora más. Saludos desde México.

By: Vessen

Vessen — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 20:23:20 +0000

Hello Benny. I came across your blog a few weeks a ago and I’ve really been enjoying it since becoming a polyglot has been one of my goals for a while now. This post is the one I’ve found most useful.
Last summer when I went to an amusement park with some friends I brought along a list of the words I was studying in Arabic. I figured that if the line was an hour long for each roller coaster I could get more studying time in than I normally do in a day, although my friends thought it was a little strange.
A way I have used to get more time are to see what tasks I can do in the language I’m learning. If I ever have to write anything that no one else will read I write it in French.

By: benny

benny — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 15:32:25 +0000

Sorry no-one has responded yet Rene. If you install itunes you can subscribe to several stations that are in Czech (in downloading them you can listen to them even if you don't have an iPod). Otherwise if you do a search for Czech news podcast, and you'll see a few options! Best of luck!!

By: Rene

Rene — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 17:30:12 +0000

Can anyone post a link to some website where I can get a summary of the news in Czech in MP3 format?

Thanks!

By: Rene

Rene — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 14:37:35 +0000

Nice post SplogSplog. Can you give us the link where we can find Czech weekly news highlights in MP3 format, as well as their bilingual transcripts?

Thanks,
Rene – a polyglot from Florida, USA

By: benny

benny — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 14:03:55 +0000

I haven’t taken a bus in Prague since I got here, so that definitely wasn’t me I’m only ever on trams and metros and if I don’t have a phrasebook and I look like I’m starting into space, I’m actually trying to translate the public transport’s advertisements
Keep looking! I warn you; distinguishing me from all the other foreigners in Prague with Lonely Planet phrasebooks in their hands will be quite hard

By: benny

benny — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 14:01:20 +0000

Yep, this time-squeezing does involve a little bit of obsessive-compulsiveness It depends on how motivated you are; for this 3 month period I prefer to be studying in free minutes than staring into space. After this my next 3-month project will allow me to relax somewhat
Thanks for the good wishes; IJK in Liberec was fantastic, I’ll be posting a video about it soon!

By: benny

benny — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 13:59:13 +0000

Thanks for the good look wishes! I’ll talk about how to be a polyglot later

By: cestina

cestina — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 22:24:03 +0000

Just don’t change the menu of your mobile phone into Hungarian when you are bored in a meeting…..I then couldn’t find the way to change it back since Hungarian is one of the most unrecognisable of languages

A language I could deal with finally emerged after a very great deal of button pressing!

(I notice that the last two phones I have had offer a far smaller menu of languages….irritating)

By the way I thought I saw you (IP) on the 119 bus from Dejvicka to the airport last Friday at around lunchtime. But since the person in question had no language aide memoire in his hands but just sat staring into space for the whole journey I guess it can’t have been you

By: linguaholic

linguaholic — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 13:21:37 +0000

I tried the “studying in ‘useless free time’”-method a year ago with Dutch and even if I probably learned quite a bit it made me totally stressed out because I started feeling kind of obsessive-compulsive. “OMG half a second without studying, I should be DOING something!” I find it much better to use waiting times for taking a break and relaxing consciously. But to each his own. Good blog btw and have fun at the IJK (I suppose that’s what you’re doing in Liberec- ĉu ne?).

By: nastaran

nastaran — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 09:08:19 +0000

you can listen to your language course on the IPOD when you are doing the washing up or any other house chore.
downloading the softwares you need in the language you are currently learning to improve your vocabulary.
change the menu of your cell phone into the target language.
.-= nastaran´s last blog ..Giro d’italia – Numero 1 =-.

By: nastaran

nastaran — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 05:28:31 +0000

hi,you have a nice web site.
I love languages & I am very keen about them.
but being a polyglot seem to be a bit hard specially if the languages are not your mother tongue.right?

good luck benny

By: Matthew Daly

Matthew Daly — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 22:59:55 +0000

I started watching spanish soap operas about 30-60 minutes a day a couple of weeks ago. So far so good. I think it is a great addition to my previous spanish learning tools, reading the phrasebook and listening to podcasts.

By: benny

benny — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 21:31:47 +0000

Thanks for your great comment as always Anthony Very important to point out that audio MP3s are also an excellent way to fill the time!
Most people may prefer this to my phrasebook and photocopied papers. As long as they are using their normally wasted time, that’s what matters

By: SplogSplog

SplogSplog — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 15:44:23 +0000

Great suggestions Benny. As well as reading, of course, you can spend the time listening. Instead of watching the Czech news on TV, I download weekly highlights in MP3 format and listen to them in small 5-minute-or-less “snatches” of time throughout the day. Not only does this mean I fit the news into my schedule (rather than the broadcasters’), it also means I can replay the bits I don’t get the first time. And I download the (bilingual!) transcripts for all the MP3s which later on I read through (usually on the toilet to be honest) to check on any words I misheard while listening.