6 Ways to Find Time to Improve a Language

By Ethan | July 9, 2014

One of the biggest excuses I hear from English learners is, “I don’t have time.”

Think about it, have you ever said this when it comes to improving a language?

I completely understand this concern. We’re all busy. But in the end, this is just an excuse. I honestly do not believe that anyone is too busy not to improve a foreign language. You just need to find the time that you already have for it: your convenient moments.

Remember, these six things may not seem like much, but short increments of practice make a BIG difference over time.

Learn more about my 30-day challenge here

Good evening and good afternoon everyone!

So, today I want to speak to you about how to use your convenient moments to improve the language that you’re learning.

Is this RealLife?

Aww yeah!

So I’m going to speak in Catalan because obviously I’m doing this challenge. If you haven’t seen the other video click here to watch, where I’ll explain to you what I’m doing in this 30-day challenge.

So it’s very important, as I’m doing this challenge, that I find convenient moments to practice Catalan because I work, like you probably do, too, and I don’t have a lot of time to sit down and study.

So, I’ve found some other ways to take advantage of these moments, and if you’re like a lot of people that I know who say that they don’t have time to practice, I’m sure that you’ll be able to find it.

There are six things that I want to recommend that you do in order to take advantage of these convenient moments.

1. Listen to Podcasts

The first is to listen to Podcasts. I spend almost all day listening to Podcasts: when I go for a run or exercise, when I go grocery shopping, or if I’m walking somewhere or going to teach, I am always listening to a Podcast. So, I listen to a lot that are in English, but I also listen to “la Competència,” and this way I can practice listening to Catalan and also get up-to-date on what’s happening in Catalonia and I laugh a bit, too.

2. Use a Spaced Repetition System (SRS)

So, the next thing is an application called Anki. Anki is phenomenal. I recommend it to all of my students and my friends and to anyone who is learning a language. It’s the best tool that I know for practicing and for memorizing vocabulary. As I’m doing this challenge, I’m learning a lot of new vocabulary and it’s great because this way I don’t forget it.

3. Read

The next thing to do in your convenient moments would be reading. I try to read every day before going to bed, and that way I also note down new vocabulary that I don’t know. I don’t look for it at that moment because if I did I’d get too bored. But I note it down and after I look it up and then I put it in Anki to study later. Anki is great because you only need five minutes to review the vocab and it works with your mind, with your memorization. I have an article that I wrote about Anki that you can read here.

4. Watch Series

Next would be watching. Watching series. When I’m eating, often I put on a series, a 20-minute episode and I spend the time eating and watching the series, and this way I practice listening. Obviously in English you have a lot more options than in Catalan. You are luckier than I am.

5. Chat with Natives

So the fifth thing would be Whatsapp. Whatsapping. I also spend a lot of time Whatsapping my friends, so I also practice writing a little bit even though it’s by Chat, but it’s still good.

6. Sing, sing, sing!

The last thing is singing. I spend a lot of time singing, too: when I’m in the shower, or I’m walking somewhere, even though people might think I’m a little crazy, but I like singing a lot and in addition, in other languages if you sing you can improve your accent a little bit. It’s a good way to practice your pronunciation by training the muscles in your mouth to make the sounds from other languages that you don’t have in your mother tongue.