Hello!

Welcome to my first language learning blog post!

The other day I had come across a channel on YouTube called Polyglot Progress. I LOVED their idea of a Romance Language Challenge. I will be doing my response to this challenge, despite it being done about 6 months ago, this summer. I thought that I might use this post to be able to talk about what I’ve discovered learning two Romance languages at the same time. Considering Valentine’s Day is on Wednesday. I am sort of dedicating Valentine’s day to learning Romance languages as I accidentally scheduled my Italki lessons for Spanish and French back to back Wednesday after I arrive at my house from school. I’m hoping the odds are in my favor that day.

Anyways, if you’ve read the About page, it talks about my language journey and my travels. I am now a B2 prepping for the DELE test in Spanish for C1 and French I’m an A1 on the CEFR scale. So, I’m not exactly doing what Matt and Abigail did on their channel, but it’s close enough where I feel like I agree with their results. I feel like having learned Spanish for so long it has helped me to advance much faster than Spanish alone. I studied Spanish on-and-off for 5 years. My goal for French is to take the DALF C1 by next November. I really need to be a B2 by June though, to pass a test for school.

I keep getting off track! Oh well… anyways (again), I believe learning the two, not necessarily starting both from scratch, but spreading them apart a little is very beneficial to advance. I really related to Matt when he was trying to speak in either Spanish or Italian, and he was beginning to remember his Spanish, or Italian, and French words. I do this as well. I know it is not a good habit, but from my point of view, I feel like I’m on such a role, but I don’t want to switch back to English, so I switch to Spanish. It is challenging and very frustrating to me. Sometimes I’ll say something in Spanish while reading a French word, I end up feeling bad because it seems as if I’ve confused the languages, but really I just feel bad that I don’t remember/know the right response in French, but I do in Spanish.

They ultimately did a fantastic job, and really advanced in the one month that they showed us. I loved that we got to see the days where one of them wasn’t motivated, but they still managed to catch up. Also, I liked that they had different preferences to either Spanish or Italian. I believe Abigail preferred Spanish and Matt preferred Italian. It just goes to show that everyone’s different, and has different preferences.

They worked with Mango Languages, it was a nice way to review a product, however, I don’t know if Mango was sponsoring the two episodes. As much as I’d like to try Mango Languages someday, I am a bit overwhelmed with resources, so I’ll probably use the basics of Innovative Languages. My FAVORITE online language resource. I love Innovative Language. I’ve used them to study Thai when I went to Thailand, I’ll use them for my secret challenge video coming soon 2018. I’ve also used them to listen to Spanish podcasts, as well as flirt a bit with French and Portuguese a few years ago. I love them. I’ll probably only use them and maybe Teach Yourself to learn Arabic. Anyways, I hope to try Mango Languages like they did. However, Abigail talked about random phrases in the beginning chapters, but that’s another quality I like about Innovative Language. They have at least two sections on survival phrases.

Also, I really appreciated that they took notes, for their lessons. I’m still searching for a study method I like the best. Usually, I’ve learned a language in school, but I’m determining which self-study method I prefer. They use notebooks, as well as many other polyglots use. I’m right now switching between finding an index card system and finding a notebook system. Well either way, something will probably be used more than another.

let me know what you thought of the videos as well if you know anything about Mango you’d like to share!

Marina.