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I was self-studying Russian for quite some time, with decent progress. But when I came to Seoul and ran into some native Russian speakers, I discovered that I c
by kevinstubbs 6y ago
I was self-studying Russian for quite some time, with decent progress. But when I came to Seoul and ran into some native Russian speakers, I discovered that I could barely put my sentences together in real-time. I made some changes to my approach and a year later was able to conversate, read articles, and watch movies without any aid.
The "one weird trick" to it was to spend literally hundreds of hours one on one with tutors online. It's not an option for everybody, of course, but if you can do it - do it. Studying with flash cards and apps helps too, but your brain more importantly needs to practice understanding strings of words and putting them together yourself in real-time.
- saint_angels 6y agodid you try language exchanche apps like Hellotalk? If so, how would you compare it to online tutors? Paid tutors are probably much more focused on your progress than random natives, but is there something else?
- kevinstubbs 6y agoI did try Hellotalk actually - and it lead to spending a week with a Russian family in Sochi during the World Cup in 2018! The thing about Hellotalk if you're serious though, is that it will take _twice_ the amount of time to get practice in than dedicated tutors, because if you spend 30 minutes practicing another language, then your partner will want to spend 30 minutes practicing your native language. Either way, you will have to try different partners/tutors out until you find a few that really click with you personally & also teaching style-wise.