The Fastest Way to Learn a New Language: The Video Game Map Theory
Video Overview & Insights
How video games helped me rethink language learning.
Love this! We’re in the process of learning Dutch…it’s a challenge 😅
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Here's in-depth language learning course I mentioned: https://brighttrip.com/course/language/
I been playing stardew valley in spanish
My iTalki Teachers:
Margherita https://www.italki.com/teacher/7035984/?ref=FcdB0d
Clicked instantly when I saw "learn a new language" and the Link to the Past map, one of my fav childhood games
Federica https://www.italki.com/teacher/6511159/?ref=FcdB0d
Nathaniel's take on this topic : https://youtu.be/95NgtNgmnWA
Method description:
1) Memorize loads of words (500 - 1000).
2) Start talking early (week 1 - preferably with a native speaker).
3) Make the learning process fun (e.g. studying cooking in the target language).
4) Start learning grammar after 2 to 3 months.
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- where to find me -
П здец
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/johnny.harris/
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zzz
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JohnnyHarrisVox
Iz's (my wife’s) channel: https://www.youtube.com/iz-harris
Hey Johnny how many languages have you become fluent in using this method?
- how i make my videos -
Tom Fox makes my music, work with him here: https://tfbeats.com/
I make maps using this AE Plugin: https://aescripts.com/geolayers/?aff=77
All the gear I use: https://www.izharris.com/gear-guide
Solid insight
- my courses -
is there anywhere we can find a list of these 1000 most useful words to memorize first?
Learn a language: https://brighttrip.com/course/language/
Visual storytelling: https://www.brighttrip.com/courses/visual-storytelling
I'm seeing this almost 5 years later from when you made it. How did your journey with Italian turn out?
1.5 years ago, watching the Paris Olympics I decided I wanted to learn French and I've had the same realizations you had.
I had Spanish from 7th grade into college (and 1 year of German in 12th grade) and then after sophomore year of college I got the opportunity to travel to Spain and discovered I couldn't understand people at all or speak it! That was devastating--but in hindsight, I realized I'd only ever had classroom Spanish. Another realization I had right before then was the college class I had covered the subjunctive and I realized I'd been missing being able to make statements like "I think that..." or "I hope that..." or "I want that..." which unlocked whole avenues of ways to express things. I use these structures a lot in English.
Being an adult learning a language for fun as a hobby is completely the opposite from school. Looking back it's interesting to see how the school method academicized learning a language, like learn a grammar rule + this chapter's vocab list then repeat a thousand times = fluent, like you point out. It's also like the academic method is if you go ahead or outside of whatever the textbook has shown you so far, you're going to contaminate your brain and get bad habits and be wrong forever.
Thinking about it from this perspective, this is an example of how doing something in a class in school, they need to be able to grade you at the end, so then it reduces learning a language down to memorizing vocab (can grade) and being able to do grammar exercises (can grade). There's no way to put a grade on actual language learning and development and being able to communicate and it doesn't happen linearly or smoothly.
I jumped in the deep end with French and normal sentences have like 50 different things going on in them you'll eventually need to learn. You figure out what the biggest most crucial pieces are and start on those and then work into more complex or advanced things as you encounter them or wonder what's going on when I see such-and-such happen. Otherwise the academic method is you can only say sentences like "I eat food" or "I bake a cake" or "He has a car" for the whole first year or two and these are super boring things to be stuck saying and they're not very relevant to real world usage of language and I think this puts the damper on people's interest in learning a language.
In my learning with French I've also noticed concepts need "soaking time". The first time I encountered something, it's hard and difficult and confusing. But then it's just there and I know I'm going to need to know it eventually and it's like my brain is like a tree slowly growing around a post to absorb it. It just takes some time and then the next time I work on that concept, it's not so difficult and eventually it becomes normal.
- about -
Johnny Harris is a filmmaker and journalist. He currently is based in Washington, DC, reporting on interesting trends and stories domestically and around the globe. Johnny's visual style blends motion graphics with cinematic videography to create content that explains complex issues in relatable ways. He holds a BA in international relations from Brigham Young University and an MA in international peace and conflict resolution from American University.
- press -
NYTimes: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/09/opinion/democrats-blue-states-legislation.html
but for real now, I must say that although I do employ a large procent of the methods here evoked to learn languages, I would not agree that a language is just for communication, for I see the language, no matter what, as a tool of logic, also as a way to communicate my own thoughts to myself, to imbody them in some way, it is not the fastest method, of which I am aware, nonetheless this is considerable, it is also a well-known fact that the language in which you reson does affect your resoning. I honestly wouldn't say that I need to communicate with anyone who knows neither French nor English; however, just for the pure sake of intelliging I have learned and study multiple tounges, even created some on my own
NYTimes: https://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion/100000007358968/covid-pandemic-us-response.html
Vox Borders: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLrFyjGZ9NU
Glossery book or flashcards? I orefere physical paper. Othervice i would just use anki
Finding Founders: https://findingfounders.co/episodes/johnny-harris-2esj3-c3pet-2pg4c-xbtwa-5gaaa
And that‘s similar to how we learn music. Nobody starts with music theory and rules 😂. You start playing a few simple sounds on the instrument. Only much later do you learn the theory – and it fits your intuitive experience and strengthens it. Heck, some people never learn the rules and make great music. It seems we also learn our first language as a child pretty much the same way, as you said – only that we don‘t even need to learn the grammar.
NPR Planet Money: https://www.npr.org/transcripts/1072164745
I like how you subtly jab at the traditional education system through how you navigated language learning. I think it works it general to focus on empirical knowledge (real-life application and experience) using the theoretical knowledge we learn, not just by a series of memorization and result focused outcomes, rather than learning focused outcomes, which is really starting to show in our current century with standardized curriculums. I loved this video, and I'm looking forward to learning languages the same way in the future. Thank you Johnny and the team for putting this one together. 🤝🏻
More User Perspectives
I love northern Italy! ❤
@the_meccaneerYou don’t love JK Rowling because she stood up for women? WOKE
@RicheyRich-GLOmg, I actually used this method to learn a new language to communicate with my then girlfriend around 8 years ago and it absolutely worked without me knowing the theory behind it. Till today I still can speak the language although not fluent in it but still people there understand me!
@justingoh5778Bro is really traumatized by Zelda 😂
@monaliza8419This is refreshing as someone who lived in a Spanish speaking country for 5 years. I can talk to the locals and do almost everything but I never considered myself even close to fluent because I don't know grammar or learn any Spanish in school.
@ZynthzMusicI learnt Japanese to the point of fluency (combination of formal academic study and moving to Japan and therefore getting ALOT of listening and speaking practice) and I’m trying to learn Korean now. This method was really eye opening, I learnt Japanese kinda the long way and I don’t wanna spend another 8-9 years to become fluent in Korean, so imma try and do this, I’m going to Korea in February and hopefully by then I’ll be able to speak some Korean!
@anitapea774i hate myself
@chrisalex82this is what I have been telling ppl for years
@ADRIAN.RTX4090This is literally art (drawing)
Get the rough idea down first on the paper so it's not blank anymore (learn the words) AND THEN refine it with the details (grammar)
Learning the rules first is like immediately going in drawing all the details from the start - just nobody does this
@johnnyharris What’s your thoughts on the app Duolingo
@yehudajosephs8679Я шукала способи геймифікаціі вивчення мови і знайшла натхнення, але загалом посил відео досить примітивний( Здається, вже всі знають, що практикувати говоріння треба з самого початку і таке інше
Немає такого концепту як інша дорога без охоронців. Завжди є перешкоди і труднощі, подолавши які студент виходить на новий рівень. Це просто нереалістичний концепт
Jesus loves you! Thank you for making this video I am trying to learn French but I was like while I’m not looking to learn Italian yet I’ll look at the principles stated and it’s so good. My first goal is to be able to speak and understand what others are saying then working on reading and writing. This was a refresher that you just have to find what works and make it fun!
God bless you!
3:51 Hard to Say Goodbye - Johnny Stimson
@memomartinez1315This process helped me communicate and live in Spain. It's the only way my brain understands. Learn by doing.
@jimmyhumaniaThere are 5 level of fluency you are going for the most basic level of fluency and yes your way is the best to do that.
It all depends on what you need to do and want to do.
Another way I had to learn new languages → I learned how to speak tagalog by dating a filipina, on the common grounds that we both understand english, but I told her to speak daily things using tagalog and I'll automatically knows what it means because I'm seeing what she's doing and what activity we're doing at the moment helps give context (tagalog got one of the hardest GRAMMARS ever in my experience of language).
I also had a Spanish ex who taught me things and I think it supports Johnny's take on "speaking with a native speaker weekly" but I took it to daily.
Then there's the extreme method which my sister used, she wanted to learn Chinese and she outright js moved & lived there & guess what. She speaks like a native in js a month 😂
you like spending peoples time
@Eva-vw3etAn important addition: watch and read. Memorize important words, then just watch shows in that language. You’ll see how people talk in that language everyday. Few Italians speak full on textbook Italian. They speak the same Italian you’ll see in shows and ads. Listen to music too. Read books. If you want to learn more professional grammar, watch news and political stuff. Read scientific and linguistic studies in that language.
@AuthorMostafaRIP Laoshu. You have to go level up, getting those xps off native speaker npc out in the wild. The goat knew the video game method long ago
@BluNutsHangin15
@Irfan_121:02 "I love harry potter; don't love J.K. Rowling though; I love harry potter" A Man after my own heart. By the way, this is almost exactly what I do to learn languages. (What I do differently is I do learn phonology first so locals can understand me better, but I learn how people say it, not how it's "supposed" to be said.) Thanks for revealing the truth about linguistics: it's not math (because math is a language in and of itself,) rather, it isn't LIKE game, it IS a game, and goodness is it fun! Thank you again, John, this is awesome.
@ChristianDArnoldA little late, but you should check out Anki
@runedaleulleb4154Italian here ,we don’t know the past whatever tense. Most of us get the congiuntivo sbagliato and passato remoto as well. You’re doing amazingly ❤
@MypurposediaryIm a native danish speaker, Heres how I aquired english: I learned the basics in primary School, the same Way native english speakers learn the basics of spanish in their primary School, as their second language, which fortunately dident force me to learn any of this complex grammar, and then i just watched english YouTube videos that found interesting! Not english-laerning YouTube-videos, just YouTube videos, made by english speakers, who spoke in english, about topics that I found interesting! I have no memory of what the first english YouTube-video I watched was, or when I watched it, or when i aquired english, or how, but I did it, without even noticing it! First I understood it, then I started writing comments, a bit badly, but enough to be understood, and eventually I Got better, and now I am fluent enough to understand this video, and write this comment! I Will say that I understand english as Well, or even better than my native language of danish!
@ChristianDall-p2jEvery time you try to talk Italian, all I hear is you calling me a fatty. And did you really have to take 13 minutes to say “let’s go here it is……” and actually tell us what u were trying to say? Other then that, good video
@Charlie-b2iI don't want to learn a language. But this video is interesting. My ads are all language apps now 🤦♂️
@georgegividenI think you nailed it, you basically "discovered" a way for you to learn something, not just a language, i think that with a good mentality it could be applied to basically everything and, i'm not saying you are the only one, probably is just the way our brain works. I was born in i. Romania but i live in Italy since i was a kid and i can tell you one thing, even tho i went to school i did not learned italian there... My experience with school as a foreign kid was horrible, i learned italian in the school's corridors, while defending myself however i could from bullies, i learned by watching tv and reading a lot, i learned the language as i was memorizing the most needed and most used words in my situation and eviorment without even realizing it, even if i try very hard, i can't recall the precise moment in my life when i realized i was able to actually speak italian. Now if it wasn't for my name, no one would even realize i'm not italian. When i grew up, i began to play a lot of games and a lot of them where online, that is how i learned english, for sure i'm not perfect, far from that but i can certainly hold up to a conversation and express myself, and is getting better and better.
One more thing i noticed is that every language has its own kind of framework that influences at a very deep level the way we think and the perspective we have, how we percieve things and the world in general, so, once you really start to kind of master a language is like having a tool kit box with different "frameworks" from wich you can pick to tackle different situations. At least this is what happens for me.
I'm really into this aproach and i'm using it right now to learn coding and programming.
To make language learning somewhat fun I played videogames with lots of dialogues, like Fallout
@A38-d7yyou make great videos and make youtube worth watching
@laffinyI mean this is exactly how we learned our primary language growing up, so it would make sense that it's the optimal order to learn our second, third, fourth, etc.
@Jacksplaguethis guy's like American PewDiePie
@E2trpcan you pls share this list of 1000 words you made to help humanity beat the to fluency quicker :)
@UnforgetableArslanOh you speak english then?
Name every english word then