wolfette

I like to listen to music in other languages to pick up words I hadn't heard before. I find this often happens when I listen to Spanish music, despite being fairly fluent in Spanish. I also like to listen to music in other languages as well. I listen to bands from Spain, Portugal, Poland, Korea, Finland, Denmark and Japan fairly often, despite not being fluent in all of those languages. I've definitely picked up words and phrases that way though.

I'd be interested in learning more Polish. I know a few words and sentences as I have several friends that are Polish. I'd love to learn more of the language and be able to join in more with some of their conversations. One of their sisters isn't as good at English as the others so they all tend to talk in Polish with her, so if I was able to communicate with her I'm sure she'd appreciate it too!

I'll check something through google translate more if I'm unsure of whether I've got the right word. For example if I write something out in Spanish two words I always mix up somehow are ahora (now) and ahorra (save). I just can't seem to get my head around which is which. So for terms like that I'll sometimes run it through a translator like Google just to make sure I've chosen to use the correct one. If I need to translate longer sentences I might run it through Google, but I'll do it in smaller sections to make sure I'm getting it as correct as possible. Sometimes I'm sure I still make mistakes, especially in languages I'm less fluent in. I'll also use Google to translate something if I'm reading it and don't quite understand the meaning, or if there's a spelling mistake in the text to try to work out what it could've been supposed to say, but it's a way to get the gist of things if I'm unsure of something at least. I certainly wouldn't rely on it for everything though.

I agree with you completely that it isn't right to mock people for their accent. It can really hurt to have something as simple as the way you talk getting mocked. It's nice to hear that a British accent is something that people in other countries might like more though! When I've visited France before people there didn't seem to mind the accent so much (so I guess my French teacher was maybe more in line with other French people in being more particular about the accent?). I'd love to go back there but haven't had the chance to yet!

I learned Spanish so that I was able to help a guy that didn't speak much English to learn English. He lives here in England but didn't know any English before he came here. I helped him to understand things in English and in the process of helping him I began to learn Spanish. We're still friends several years on and still have conversations in both languages. I took up Spanish in secondary school as well as a means of advancing my Spanish so that I would be able to help my friend more with his English. I'm sure there are still many words I need to learn in Spanish though!

I like a lot of songs in Spanish. Listening to songs is a great way for me to discover new words I've never heard in Spanish before! I love Bailando by Enrique Iglesias at the minute. I've liked it since it came out a couple of years ago.

Hello everyone. I love languages so this seemed like a great site for me to join. My native language is English but I speak Spanish often as a close friend is Spanish. I'd love to learn more languages though!

I have a languages bucket list too! I didn't realise this was such a common thing so I'm glad to see that there are more people out there with a languages bucket list! The languages I'd love to learn before I die are: Korean (I know a little, but I've got a lot more to learn yet!) German (I know a few words but have a lot more to learn here too!) Italian Finnish Portuguese Polish (I have several Polish friends, so it'd be a handy one for me!) And I'd also like to learn more Spanish, although I have qualifications in Spanish and can speak it fairly fluently as I have a friend that is Spanish and we often switch between English (my native language) and Spanish (his native language).

I've been mocked for my accent. I'm British and here in my own country I've been mocked and told I sound too "posh" and not understanding regional terms. I went to secondary school in a different area to where I grew up and I was mocked a lot for my accent there. By teachers too, not just pupils. One in particular when I was trying to learn French used to mock me for my accent and say I couldn't speak French properly when I was trying to learn it because of my accent. It really put me off wanting to learn it actually. Since then though my accent hasn't ever been mocked. I'm told I say some words a little oddly in certain languages, Spanish in particular somehow, but I think the more I speak it the better it becomes and I learn the correct way to pronounce words more and can correct my accent a bit.

I found it really difficult to learn French when I was in school. I had a French teacher that I just didn't get on very well with and she seemed to make it so much more difficult for me. I'd rather have things written down in front of me to learn them that way, too. And this particular teacher preferred we learned everything by speaking it. Without having anything really written down I found it very difficult to learn anything of the language. At that point I thought that languages simply weren't for me. Then I met a guy that's still one of my closest friends to this day. His first language is Spanish and he spoke very little English. I spoke next to no Spanish. He needed help with something and was getting upset with not being understood by anyone and between us we were able to sort out the issue he was having at the time. He then came to me for help with the language a few times after that and gradually I began to learn Spanish from him and he learned English from me. He also helped me with learning French. I found that his writing things down as well as speaking them was what I needed to learn languages better. I suppose what I'm trying to say is that sometimes it's the technique you're using to learn that's making it difficult for you. I need things written down to remember them and understand them. Some people may prefer to have things spoken and participate in conversations in that language. It's about finding what you need to be able to learn. And you can't rely on someone else showing you the way to learn either. Sometimes you have to seek out something that works for you if the methods you're being given don't work.