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Staying Motivated to Study is Hard
It takes the average adult 200 to 500 hours to reach an upper-beginner (A2) level. If you were to dedicate 5 hours a week to learning your target language, that would take 1-2 years. Very few people have the discipline required to consistently spend 5 hours a week for 1-2 years. Furthermore, life happens. For instance, earlier this year I stopped studying Mandarin for a week or two due to catching COVID-19.
This is why many of you should consider implementing intensive bursts. Let’s use the example of attempting to reach an upper-beginner level to demonstrate what an intensive burst entails. Instead of studying 5 hours a week for 1-2 years, do something more like this:
Regular Weekly Studying: 2.5 hours a week for 46 weeks (115 hours)
Intensive Burst: 15 hours a week for 6 weeks (90 hours). These 6 weeks can be divided into smaller chunks (e.g., three separate two-week bursts)
Total: 205 hours
I personally follow the intensive burst approach because I find it reasonably straightforward to carve out 4-6 weeks a year for an intensive burst and do 2.5 hours of study during the other weeks. In my experience, this is easier than dedicating the same amount of time consistently every week. There is the added bonus studying intensively typically leads to accelerated progress. In other words, you progress more by practicing 10 hours a week for 5 weeks than 1 hour a week for 50 weeks.