People always learned this way
You’ve already done this onceAges 0 to 5You learned your first language, grammar and all, from the talk around you, with no rules, no tests and no flashcards.
Ten seasons of Friends, no classesSeoul, the 2000sA generation of K-pop idols learned English from one sitcom, watched with Korean subtitles, then English, then none.
English before the first lessonFlanders, 2020Belgian ten-year-olds know hundreds of English words before their first lesson, picked up from games, videos and TV.
Stories beat grammar, two to oneFiji, 1980Fijian classes given storybooks learned English twice as fast as classes drilled in grammar, and stayed ahead for two years.
Sixteen languages, no textbooksBudapest, 1944Kató Lomb learned sixteen languages, each from a novel she couldn’t yet read. The Russian one she read in a cellar under siege during WW2.
From no English to Heart of DarknessAt sea, 1878Joseph Conrad learned English at sea in his twenties, kept a Polish accent all his life, and wrote Heart of Darkness in it.
Adults can learn faster than kidsThe Netherlands, 1978Adults who moved to the Netherlands learned Dutch faster than young children all year. Teenagers were fastest of all.
Ten meetings and a word is yoursWebb, 2007Meet a word about ten times in real sentences and you know its meaning, its spelling and how to use it.
Read and listen, remember moreWebb & Chang, 2015Read a story while you hear it read and you learn more of its words, and still know them three months later.
Forty-nine studies agreeJeon & Day, 2016Across forty-nine studies, people who read a lot in a new language got measurably better at reading it.
How many words you really needNation, 2006The 2,000 most common words are about four fifths of any book. A novel takes 8,000 to 9,000, and stories get you there.
Listening counts as readingRogowsky, Calhoun & Tallal, 2016Adults given a book as text, as audio, or both understood it equally well, right after and two weeks later.
Babies crack a language in minutesSaffran, Aslin & Newport, 1996Eight-month-olds pick out the words of a made-up language after two minutes of hearing it. Nobody taught them.
How diplomats get fluent fastForeign Service InstituteThe US Foreign Service trains diplomats all day in small classes, and gets them to Spanish in about 30 weeks and Japanese in 88.
Grammar comes secondTomasello, 2003Children build grammar from the sentences they hear, not from rules.
695 books in 118 languages
Browse Lingala books →
La liste sous la tableFrenchLevel 1Mystery
Léa attend son bus devant le café Lino.
Il passo chiusoItalianLevel 2Adventure
Marco e Luca erano nella casa di famiglia, vicino al passo di Nera.
Dwie filiżankiPolishLevel 1Slice of life
Marek jest w kawiarni.
בְּרֵאשִׁיתBiblical HebrewLevel 8Classic
Genesis (Jewish Publication Society Tanakh)
Genesis (Jewish Publication Society Tanakh)c. 6th–5th century BCE
पंच परमेश्वरHindiClassic
प्रेमचंद1916
Два стаканаRussianLevel 1Slice of life
Сегодня Сергей приходит в это место не один.
O último autocarroPortugueseLevel 2Romance
Hoje é o último dia de Inês naquele trabalho.
Der letzte BusGermanLevel 1Romance
Anna steht an der Bushaltestelle am kleinen Platz.
Orodha Chini ya MezaSwahiliLevel 1Mystery
Amina yuko katika hoteli karibu na kituo.
튼튼한 칸KoreanLevel 4Cozy fantasy
경주의 작은 달문 서점에서 서윤은 처음으로 밤 문을 닫았다.
الحافلة الأخيرةArabicLevel 2Romance
في هذا الصباح، يقف سامر عند موقف الحافلة.
阿Q正传ChineseClassic
鲁迅1921
aloglot
/ˈæl.ə.ɡlɑt/AL-uh-glot
- 1n.noun A person who speaks a language other than their mother tongue.
- 2adj.adjective Speaking a non-native language.
- 3n.noun You!
Origin
French alloglotte, from Greek ἄλλος “other” and γλῶσσα “tongue”.
Compare to polyglot “speaker of many languages”.
Why stories, not flashcards?
You’ll want to study
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It actually works
Knowing phrases beats memorizing rules
Key words keep coming back in context
Reading, listening, speaking, AND writing
It fits with a class
Extra practice anytime, judgment free
Grammar lessons become instinct
Turn this week’s lesson into a story