Quick question before you read today’s article: do you know anyone who teaches German online?
In February I might be working with a high school to help them launch a Foreign Languages program. One of the languages they want to include in this program is German, but my German instructor’s teaching schedule is currently full.
Let me know if you know anyone and I’d be happy to provide more details :)
And now, let’s move on to today’s article.
Tracking progress daily has motivated me to study Mandarin more often.
I use an app called LingQ lately to practice reading and listening. One of my favourite features in the app is the vocabulary tracker. The app keeps a tally of words you:
Know. These are called known words in the app
Have come across, but haven’t internalized/memorized yet. These are called LingQs in the app
It motivates me to see the number of known words and LingQs increase as I continue using the app. It’s especially motivating in the early days of using the app because your word count increases rapidly as the app catches up with how many words you already know.
For example, in the picture above you’ll see that I supposedly learned 968 words in a single week. Most of those words were ones I already knew, but the app just didn’t know that I knew them.
I like that LingQ allows me to concretely measure how far away I am from my desired level of fluency.
Let me explain. I speak two languages at very advanced level: French and Spanish. In those two languages, I know a little over 40,000 words according to the LingQ vocabulary test. I want my Mandarin level to be the same as my French and Spanish level.
Therefore, I’m treating 40,000 known words in LingQ as my personal finish line.
When I hit that number, I will likely have a very advanced level in Mandarin, just like I do in French and Spanish. LingQ has built-in badges as you reach different levels (e.g., beginner 1, beginner 2, intermediate 1, etc.)
I recognize that learning a language is not only about reading and listening comprehension.
Speaking is also important. I do a little bit of speaking practice now, but I will double down on speaking in the future.
The vocabulary tracking feature is not free. However, there are other free alternatives.
One free alternative is a habit tracker.
There are numerous habit tracking apps in the app store. I have been using one lately as a tool to better manage my business. I track the number of action steps I take per day in the business categories such as:
Growth (i.e., increasing sales and profit)
Goodwill (i.e., helping language learners for free, no strings attached)
For instance, writing this blog post will give me 1 point in the Goodwill category. Earlier today when I followed up with a new, potentially large client, I gave myself a point in the Growth category.
Try using a habit tracker for your language studies.
If you want a printable habit tracker, you can see this one that I made a year or two ago. There are other templates too if you search “habit tracker” on Google. Alternatively, simply download any habit tracking app from the app store.
Track the amount of time you spend per day on:
Reading
Writing
Listening
Speaking
Grammar
Other
Feel free to set daily goals in each category, if that’d motivate you.
Thanks for reading this article!
I hope you found it helpful. As a reminder, if you know anyone who teaches German online please let me know as I might be able to hire them p/t.