Kerstin Cable's Blog, page 36

How to Hack Language Like a Lumberjack (or: What's Your Hacking Hobby?)

As a linguist it's not part of my job to criticize and begrudge the evolving use of language. When words like "selfie" enter the dictionary and half the country of Britain starts calling things awesome, I'm right there. Both teaching and describing language are more about being aware of the words that we use every day and documenting how people communicate. And today I wanted to dive into the deeper meaning of a word that seems to have completely transformed its meaning over recent years. It'...

Field Report: Three Strategies You'll Wish You Knew When You Hit a Wall Learning a Foreign Language

Boy, have I got a useful guest post for you today! Cher Hale's language of choice is Italian - she's best described as a relationship counsellor between humans and the Italian language. Once they’ve fallen in love and the honeymoon period ends, she helps them stay committed until they’re conversational. You can read her vocabulary speed-dates, grammatical musings, and cultural cocktail party facts at The Iceberg Projector on Twitter @cherhale.

In today's post, Cher is lending us a hand to help w...

Announcing How I'm Working to Combine My Three Passions

Today's blog post is an announcement, an open letter and something from the heart for everyone who follows the Fluent blog. I'm hoping to start a new chapter in my professional story. I will be announcing a few changes to Fluent Language, and introducing you to my new venture.

First of all, I want to give you the quick history of how far Fluent has come since its start in 2012. When I first launched this website, my first steps into offering lessons (without a teaching certificate!), I was abs...

Letters to Kerstin: German Book Recommendations and Spanish for Beginners

Recently, I've received a few messages from friends and readers asking me to recommend a few books to them. I imagine book fever is with you after enjoying the Fluent Guides (right?) so I'm more than happy to oblige. In fact, I would love to answer more of your questions here on the blog. If you have a question, submit it to jenny@fluentlanguage.co.uk and note that it's for the blog - I will select the questions and reply to you soon.

German Books - Not Grammar Books!

Dear Kerstin

What books w...

New Podcast! Randy Glover on Rosetta Stone, Starting at 57 and Why You Should Not Give Up

The new Fluent Language Podcast is out now. We are on episode 6, and I have got something unusual for you. I'm interviewing one of my own students - not a language tutor, a study guru or a 16 language outlier, but instead a busy and dedicated learner who started at 57 and gets better every month. We also reviewed the new version of Rosetta Stone, and there is A LOT in there for you.

Now on Stitcher

If you're using Stitcher, you can now find the Creative Language Learning Podcast on there too. H...

What Language Teachers Think About Learning 15 Languages

If you're on my mailing list you'll have heard from me a week ago ago to announce my appearance on Preston FM Radio. Since a few of you were unable to catch my interview and were asking for a podcast link, I'm very happy to say that the station manager has now uploaded our Chat City chat and you can listen here:

In the interview, we mentioned "UCLAN", which is the university I went to - University of Central Lancashire in Preston.

The host was actually a former language teacher himself, so we h...

How to Stop Worrying About your Language Talent [Infographic]

Today it occurred to me that we have not had an infographic on Fluent for a while, and I fancy sharing another good one with you. I do collect cool infographics related to language learning on my Pinterest boards, but every now and then it's cool to do a deep dive.

Before I jump into the points I'll be making, I just want to point out that my views on aptitude, attitude and training are not accepted by all. Linguists do often maintain that some natural aptitude for language learning exists. In...

Speak More Language After the Weekend: Bank Holiday Deal

Activity suggestion for a Bank Holiday with Fluent Guides

Another week has finished, and we are approaching the end of summer. Here in Britain, this means the dawn of a Bank Holiday. Bank Holidays are Mondays that you can spend in bed, or out exploring, or cooped up in the hobby shed.

If you're not British, you could of course try staying in bed all Sunday too!

Imagine studying languages in bed all day. Imagine using the time effectively to get started with a new notebook. Cuddling up on the c...

Should You Study Russian and German At University?

It has been one year since the last occasion of A-Level results coming out in the UK. If you're not familiar with the system in this country, here's a quick summary. A-Level exams are the school leaving exams that determine a student's future path at university. The courses are chosen by subject and after age 16 none are compulsory, so students choose whichever subject they feel most passionate about. Last year, my guest blogger Tom Pandolfino wrote a wonderful article about what it is like t...

How I Got Back Into Language Learning

Today our regular writer Angel Armstead is back - she's gone through a busy time and had to take a break from language learning. Busy being the key word - this lady is rocking so many projects! Like I have found myself, sometimes we need to cut to progress. Ouch. So how did Angel get back on the wagon?

Always Good Intentions

I started my language learning like most people with good intentions. I had good intentions of learning multiple languages and traveling to those countries and meeting th...