Learning French through a language learning app has helped me connect with my friends, enhance my skills, and more.
I’ve tried learning different languages throughout my life, and didn’t have much success until committing to the practice in 2023.
Read on for more about my experience and how learning a language has supported my health.
I tried German, Spanish, Latin, and French through a rotation of languages at my public middle school. I then chose to take Latin for 3 years in high school.
I took Italian to satisfy the language requirement in college. The mistakes I made were frequently in Latin… despite my efforts, I just could not pick up a foreign language.
Then I became an editor and writer. I didn’t need to know another language for my job or personal life, but I still felt a desire to learn a language for traveling and to communicate with others as needed. My brother is fluent in Spanish and Portuguese, and I’ve seen his enhanced ability to navigate conversations and situations with these skills.
In my thirties, I decided to improve my French. I had traveled to France twice and had learned some rudimentary skills, but I finally started with a language learning app in the summer of 2020.
I didn’t get consistent with daily-ish French practice until May 2023.
I added a few of my IRL friends to the app. It seems silly, but encouragement from them on the app helps me stay on track. We high-five each other, do challenges together, and more. Celebrating the little wins is fun, too.
On weekdays, I tend to practice my French before bed, as part of my routine. It’s the last thing I do on my phone for the day. I find that it helps relax me to do 5-10 minutes of practicing, and then setting my alarm for the next day and putting my phone away. Even after a long day, I find that the muscle memory of practicing French before bedtime helps relax my brain.
Some days I don’t practice at all. If I miss a day or two, I just pick up where I was. Even when I’m tired, it feels good that my brain is still awake enough to do the lesson. If I start a lesson and can’t focus or feel too tired, I allow myself to give up for the day and close the app. I’ve found that if I make learning a language a relaxed option, and not a requirement, I’m much more likely to want to practice and enjoy myself.
I’ve been on track for about two years, and my next step is to start practicing French in person with a few of my friends. I’m interested to see how taking my skills off the app and into real life will work out and what I’ll remember.
A 2021 study of 33,247 students in the U.S. found that bilingual students in kindergarten were able to learn more language skills later in life.
It seems that the earlier you learn a second language, whether at home or at school, the better equipped you may be to expand your language skills as you get older.
According to a 2022 U.S. Census Bureau Report, the number of people in the United States who spoke a language other than English at home nearly tripled from 23.1 million (about 1 in 10) in 1980 to 67.8 million (almost 1 in 5) in 2019.
It’s also important to keep in mind that not everyone has access to learn a second language at school.
If you’d like to start learning a new language, there are several apps and programs that can help support your journey. You can also start by looking up the most popular 1000 words in the language you’d like to learn, and make flashcards.
I’ve enjoyed learning a new language on my own as an adult, on my own time. It’s been great to see my skills develop—now I need to take a trip to Quebec or back to France to practice some more!