The intro of today's episode makes reference to the 8th of the month. This is because the episode publication was delayed by a week after recording to allow all listeners to get a chance to hear the Fluent Show statement about racism. Right, let's get to it: When there's something étrange in your vocabulaire, who you gonna call? A LINGUIST! Today I've got a very special linguist on the show: Mathilde from Elles Comme Linguistes, a French YouTube channel dedicated to linguistics pour tous! Mathil...
Jun 15, 2020•1 hr 8 min
I really want to say "this goes without saying" about many of the things I'm saying to you today. But maybe it does not. Racism is not welcome here. Thank you for listening to today's episode. And as maker of the Fluent Show, I can also tell you that every person who works on the team stands behind this message. Please read Lindsay's very well-written perspective here (https://www.lindsaydoeslanguages.com/lets-talk-about-racism/). Here are 4 wonderful Fluent Show guests who have represented the ...
Jun 06, 2020•6 min
You're probably taking your fair share of online lessons in your target languages these days. Add to that a few Zoom hangouts, maybe some extra business meetings...and soon they add up to 10-15 hours of online meetings per week. For many online language teachers, this kind of online meeting schedule is part of a standard working week. It really is exhausting! In this week's episode, I'm helping an online teacher who has experienced this for herself and sent a call for help to the Fluent Show. He...
Jun 01, 2020•29 min
Every 6 months or so, the Fluent Show brings you a new set of top tools. These are our recommendations for language learning tools you might have missed. It's a LONG episode so follow along with our full list of top tools on the blog if you like. (https://www.fluentlanguage.co.uk/blog/top-tools-2016-2020) Intro: Lindsay's Language Marathon and our italki Language Challenge progress Top Tools Hall of Fame Top Tools has now been running since 2016, with a total of 42 tools recommended. It's easy t...
May 25, 2020•1 hr 42 min
This week on the show, I answer a cry for help from a frustrated listener in Denmark. Imagine you can speak your target language beautifully. But when it comes to the person you love most, suddenly you clam up and worry and you realise you can't speak to her at all! Why does this happen? What's going on? Listen to hear more about these three problems and how anyone can solve them and get things moving again: English is your life admin language You struggle to switch languages with your partner B...
May 18, 2020•30 min
Do you dream of travelling the world and living in other countries? Want to see it all, live everywhere, and enjoy the best every country has to offer? In today's episode, you'll meet someone who knows how to do all that! Sara Maria Hasbun is a language-loving entrepreneur who loves to travel the world. And she's as awesome as all of that sounds! In today's episode, Sara shares her story and experiences, including recent lockdown life under Coronavirus in Beijing. It's a motivating conversation ...
May 11, 2020•1 hr 23 min
Welcome back! I start by sharing my love for 爱情公寓 (iPartment) on Yabla, and answer Sara's question: What’s the best tool you use for making sure you get some language learning in every day? To answer this question, I talk you through the Language Habit Toolkit (https://www.fluentlanguage.co.uk/language-habit-toolkit) method which brings together psychology, motivation, and a lot of handy templates that get you started immediately. Here's the system in a nutshell: Set up your vision for language ...
May 04, 2020•24 min
Lindsay is back on the Fluent Show today and we're talking about the best books about languages and linguistics. *NOTE: The Fluent Show is now on a podcast break until 6 May, but you can catch up with mini episodes of "Fluent in Isolation" at Patreon.com (http://www.patreon.com/fluentshow) We discussed the following books - all linked below on amazon.com and on hive.co.uk. Popular Science David Crystal’s ANYTHING, out of which we discussed Encyclopedia of Language You say Potato Spell it out Bec...
Apr 06, 2020•1 hr 1 min
Hot Potato News: Scottish Gaelic Learn about the true pronunciation of this language's name, and why it's important to get it right. Where and How to Start Teaching Online It’s a great time to start offering online lessons because Life has just moved online Your school or in-person tutoring may just have been cancelled You can connect with people around the world, and right now that’s even more rewarding and exciting than usual In fact, any time is a great time because working as an online langu...
Mar 30, 2020•36 min
"In languages, when you want to learn, you learn." Steve Kaufmann is a language learner from Canada who has studied over 17 languages so far. He is an advocate of reading in other languages, even from the start...and turns out this is something he did even back in the 60s. I've met Steve in person a few times at events like the Polyglot Gathering and Langfest, and he is ALWAYS full of energy and excitement about the opportunity of learning another language. "It's all about getting your brain use...
Mar 23, 2020•1 hr 12 min
Word of the day: Hamsterkaufen - to hoard or panic buy. 🐹 Listener Elizabeth asks for advice about what to do when she remembers words in her target language on one day, but finds that they've disappeared the next day. It's a dilemma: Should she review and get the information perfect before moving on? Or just stick with the programme and hope that things will stick eventually? This show contains plenty of great ideas and tips about digital flashcard systems, vocabulary learning, and how memory ...
Mar 16, 2020•32 min
What makes a language textbook great? Why should you use a language textbook? And which ones are the best ones out there? In today's episode, Lindsay and I sat down to dig through our language bookshelves and bring you a HUGE list of language textbooks that we have loved. Click or tap here to download a PDF of all book recommendations (https://successful-writer-7680.ck.page/1d76545aa1) This PDF is a great file full of links to both Amazon and Hive, so you can browse and order all the books you w...
Mar 09, 2020•1 hr 7 min
It is difficult to learn several languages together. You may forget some, you may lose some, BUT hey you’re learning more than one language. In this Q&A episode I answer a question from the wonderful Elizabeth: When did you know you were ready to start Mandarin? And how do you keep your Welsh healthy, happy and well-fed? What does a two language study routine look like for you? In my answer, I'll take you on a trip through my language love life featuring English, French, Italian, Latin, Spanish,...
Mar 02, 2020•39 min
NEW PATREON LEVEL!! I've just set up a brand new supporter tier at the $2/month level - join us here. (http://www.patreon.com/fluentshow) The patron benefits for the $2 level are access to the patron-exclusive feed with added posts, early access, and bonus clips. You can ALWAYS upgrade or downgrade your tier and you'll never lose access to the patron-only messages. The show is free for all, and your support is valued no matter what. "There’s a kinda type of person out there who I hadn’t had a lo...
Feb 24, 2020•1 hr 9 min
NEW PATREON LEVEL!! I've just set up a brand new supporter tier at the $2/month level - join us here. (http://www.patreon.com/fluentshow) The patron benefits for the $2 level are access to the patron-exclusive feed with added posts, early access, and bonus clips. You can ALWAYS upgrade or downgrade your tier and you'll never lose access to the patron-only messages. The show is free for all, and your support is valued no matter what. If you think reading in another language is all about boring di...
Feb 17, 2020•36 min
This week, we discussed two topics: Topic 1: Teaching Methods! After watching a few episodes of Welsh reality TV Welsh learning celebrity knees-up cariad@iaith, we decided to pick up on their 3 big methods for teaching languages and explain what they mean and who they work for. These are immersion, TPR, "communication" and story time a.k.a. the "input method". What is natural language learning and why does everyone lay claim to it? Which teaching methods work in our opinion? How do we teach? Whi...
Feb 10, 2020•1 hr 7 min
In this podcast episode, I explain how to use similar languages and language families to get a head start in your multilingual life. If you've ever wondered how to work out which languages belong to the same family, or how to decide if you should learn related languages as a group, listen in as I go through linguistics and geopolitics to work out how to make your learning life easier. I'll tell you about the power of intercomprehension, and how it can serve you in language learning. In this epis...
Feb 03, 2020•26 min
Do you know someone who grew up speaking a language at home as a child, but never fully developed it because their environment wasn't able to support it? This community of speakers who grow up with a different dominant language is called heritage language speakers. They are often found in immigrant communities. In fact, here in the UK there are many thousands of them all over the country. In this episode, I spoke to academics Petros Karatsareas and Katie Harrison who study heritage and community...
Jan 27, 2020•1 hr 16 min
SURVEY TIME: Please take 5 minutes and participate in the annual Fluent Show survey. Click here to start. (https://forms.gle/2u6D8jjnzPXZ4LZ8A) Are you looking for a new language tutor, but you can't find one online? Does it feel like no one is teaching your target language? Today on the show, I've got your back and I'm sharing lots of ideas for hidden places to find great people. You'll learn * how to use your own network and get other people to find tutors for you * why your local community co...
Jan 20, 2020•26 min
Shannon Kennedy is back!! It's been a whole year since we recorded our review of 2019 and this year it's time to do "the same procedure", if you get my Dinner for One reference. Shannon is an accomplished language learner who's studied 13 languages including French, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Italian, German, Hungarian, and Russian. In this podcast we talked about music and motherhood, the power of saying no, and having languages as a natural part of your life. Here are the year review questions...
Jan 13, 2020•1 hr 7 min
In this episode I share my own review of language learning in the year 2019 and what's next for me in 2020. It's like an audio #clearthelist article on my goals and what matters most in the upcoming year. In 2019, my main foreign languages were Chinese, French and Welsh and I'm sharing where I am at in each of them. In Chinese I am finding myself in a plateau - that frustrating slog where it feels like nothing is moving. You'll hear my answers to the questions I asked myself to get unstuck: * Wh...
Jan 06, 2020•27 min
In this episode, Lindsay and Kerstin wrap up the year by reviewing a BIG crop of Words of the Year from Australia, the USA, the UK, Germany, Portugal and Japan. We also create a Spanish version of #yolo, explain why Austria is going to Ibiza, and figure out the Portuguese nominations (even though we don't know a lot of Portuguese). Thank you for listening to the Fluent Show! If you enjoyed this episode, please consider supporting the show by leaving a review in your podcast app or becoming a mem...
Dec 23, 2019•1 hr 19 min
Grab a Brandy and a Mince Pie! This is the festive Fluent Show. Is your mind wrapped up in gift wrapping and hosting this week instead of flashcards and language partners? Don't worry, because in this show I have put together some quick tips for staying in touch with your target language during the festive season. Click or tap here to read my Christmas learning tips on the blog (https://www.fluentlanguage.co.uk/blog/language-learning-christmas) Feliĉan Zamenhofan Tagon to all my Esperantist list...
Dec 16, 2019•18 min
Shahidah Foster is an American expat in Germany, creator of the Black Girls Learn Languages community, and a passionate language learner. She's an English native speaker but her German is 💯 so prepare for a bilingual show today! Bilingual Show: German and English Conversation If you are not an experienced German learner, there will be some parts of the podcast that you don’t understand. You can learn it by the way using my German Uncovered course (https://school.fluentlanguage.co.uk/p/german-un...
Dec 09, 2019•1 hr
In today's podcast, I'm excited to tackle a big question: Listener Maria writes that she hears people sounding different to her depending on the language they speak. Could it be that learning another language can change your entire personality? Listen in to hear me discuss a few of the aspects that contribute to how we perceive personality through a language: Language Attitudes and Egocentricity: What you think about different languages and accents Pragmatics: How people use language to navigate...
Dec 02, 2019•27 min
Wrap up warm, it's the autumn/winter edition of Top Tools for language learning, bringing you ingenious solutions to common language learning problem. This podcast has chapter support, so if your podcast player supports chapters, you can skip to relevant parts as your little linguist heart desires. Click or tap here to read the full show notes and get all links (http://fluentlanguage.co.uk/blog/toptools-autumnwinter-2019)...
Nov 25, 2019•1 hr 12 min
Today I am answering a listener question from Jessica who is an English native speaker, but so advanced in German that she wants to use it to learn a third language, Spanish. Can you learn a language through another language? Of course! Here are some advantages: You boost your 2nd language as well as your 3rd - double result! Sometimes you can find much better materials, for example when learning an African language through French (more about this here (https://www.fluent.show/122)) You gain a f...
Nov 18, 2019•31 min
"Polyglots and language creators...that Venn diagram is almost a circle." In this episode, language creator David Peterson sat down with me to talk about language creation, language ownership, and the joy of it all. No other interview has had such an impact on me, the level of mastery in language creation was completely unclear to me. Every single choice that you're making is an active choice. Nothing in a language has to be that way. Here are just a few of the questions we discussed on this sho...
Nov 11, 2019•57 min
When you are learning a language and selecting courses and materials, it's important to assess your level accurately. But how do you do that? In today's episode I've got English teacher Michael Lavers on the show and we go into the deep detail of what determines your level...and when it even matters to know. If you've ever wondered about the real difference between A2 and B1, this conversation will bring you some clarity. Bonus Episode: British Slang Fancy learning some British English slang, gu...
Nov 04, 2019•1 hr
Lindsay is back from Korea and Kerstin is back from America, and we're all together again to talk about finding yourself a GREAT language tutor! We discussed what the research tells us about the 5 signs that a teacher is extremely competent how to get super clear about what you want from language lessons why your first lesson is NEVER going to be a normal language leasson whether it's ever okay to ghost your tutor! ...and so much more! Support This Podcast Become a Patron! Fluent Show patrons ge...
Oct 28, 2019•1 hr 8 min
