the FSOT isn't insanely difficult. I did well on it, still didn't get selected despite polyglot. Basically if you're white you better have gone to yale etc. It's weird. I don't think an all white all male foreign service is at all good, but yeah, it's much harder to get selected as a white paradoxally and no its not sour graps i could get a consular fellowship anytime if I wanted.
I don't think FSI and DLI have particularly different curricula albeit FSI will focus much more on military vocabulary whereas FSI must do a broader range including economics e.g.
I think more DLI material is available online for free. The FSI Mandarin course is certainly available for free but it's from ... the 1970s. I don't think either had particularly innovative methodology, though DLI materials are both solid and extensive.
You might want to contact BiancaLearns, she does videos on Mandarin learning and did a video on memory and stories (unsponsored) that one and your method seem like an obvious overlap.
even though I don't use path method or memory palace both might be compatible with your story method. I'm all about the peg system and literary devices (alliteration rhyme rhythm syononms antonyms). I don't think there are many short stories in Chinese.
I thought that was harder to be honest. In Brazil, we must be fluent in 3 languages, level C1, to have a chance to be accepted at the diplomatic school.
Right?? I'm studing to become a diplomat and I am surprised they're only required to learn a foreign language AFTER they're accepted in the Foreign Service Institute.
I once taught Japanese to a man from Australian government's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. He was going to be sent to Tokyo as a third secretary of the Embassy there next year. But there was nothing special about his one on one tutoring except for 1) He was already fluent in Spanish and Indonesian. 2) For the whole year his only job was studying Japanese. 3) So he had a two-hour class every day, and then went home and (supposed to) studied on his own. I and two other tutors taught him just like we did to our university students, and he studied no different from our university students. We used a textbook from the bookshop (This was not our choice. Someone who taught him before us did), and taught him daily conversation (such as talking about weather) in a very ordinary (old fashioned) way. After about 6 months I left this job because I got another one, so I don't know how he progressed after that, but I don't think he became able to talk or read about politics or economics in Japanese by the end of that year. If I were him I would focus on the vocabulary of politics, economics and other words that is directly useful for his job, and practice reading comprehension on such news articles. But I was not in the position of giving such advice to him.
With four 90 minute classes per week and a female teacher anyone can learn a language in 6 months provided you also live in that country - total immersion - and avoid speaking your native language to friends. You have to want to learn. Why a female teacher? - because children learn their native language from their mothers. Humans have evolved to learn that way.
I was friend with a usa diplomat, he learned arabic in less than 5 months. He could speak french, english, spanish and arabic. I really liked talking to him as I speak 4 as well, the same as him expect from arabic, I speak portuguese instead
I'm curious, on the chart you showed, each quarter was devoted to something different...do you know what the difference between "output" (25 percent) and "developing fluency" (25 percent) could be?
Paul Nation has a few videos. There is one on categorizing 20 exercises into each of the four strands. If you take notes, you will have a good idea. The references other teaching methods, such as 4-3-2, writing without correcting, and speed reading (yes), to develop fluency, which is my main interest, so lots to learn.
Good question. It's not a good distinction. However, in one it's writing and I would imagine Controlled speaking practice with a focus on using a specific structure correctly. In fluency, it would be free practice developing a topic in depth with the focus on expression and not accuracy. Simon brampton
depends on what "learning a language" means. after having spent 15 years on studying and using Japanese in real life, and then it took me additional whole 5 years to pass the Kanji Kentei level 1 and Nihongo Kentei level 1 - 2 top credentials in Japanese language
Hakuho, the former Yokozuna, now Magaki Oyakata, is fluent in his spoken Japanese, Nevertheless, he has said that his 9-year-old daughter has to help him with his kanji from time to time.
Nice video Olly! Why don't you make a video about how to choose which language to learn? A lot of people including me have a few languages that we really want to learn, but have a hard time choosing which one to start with and often end up trying to learn them at the same time; then ultimately giving up all together from frustration. This is especially apparent in monolinguals who want to start learning new languages, and I hate to see people get interested in foreign languages for a month or two then giving up on it.
I've been following your content on and off for a couple of years or so, but I think your channel's quality really skyrocketed lately. Especially because you tackle language learning from so many different perspectives: there is the techniques' bit, the interesting/curiosities' bit, the approaches' and motivational bit etc; and it seems to me that the video editing improved too. A great job, for real! Without detriment to the the handful of other people that post amazing content about this, but I think your channel became my favourite one when it comes to this topic. PS: as for your stories-based courses... any chance for Swahili?
I love FSI language courses. I used an FSI courses 30 years ago to learn to speak Spanish fluently. At the time, I was a teen and spent all of my free time studying. Many years later, once their courses were in the public domain, I bought the Brazilian Portuguese course from eBay for $10. I was fluent in 3 months.
Thank you, Olly for replying to the comments as well. Shows you're really sincere with the audience. I myself am learning Mandarin Chinese right now because I have been admitted to a Chinese university and their requirement is that we must learn the language upto HSK 4 in the first year, and I have had quite a fun journey learning it. My motivation is not as good as before now but I still study it everyday and am definitely improving little by little everyday. I am from Pakistan so my native language is Urdu, and I am also fluent in English, almost as good as a native speaker. I also plan to learn Italian next because I have always been attracted to Italian culture a lot.
@@eoghancasserly3626 Thank you so much. English is quite a difficult language to wrap your head around if you haven't grown up surrounded by it, but I've never felt it to be difficult for me, so it seems a little weird to me when some people are fussing over how difficult it is to learn English. 🤭
I was curious enough to go check the materials FSI Language course in Russian, omg I was not expecting that! It is incredibly thorough, very specific, and useful. It's basically telling them what to expect in any situation, what to do, and say... Very long but definitely worth it, thanks for sharing!
7 years? It depends on your approach, if you are really focused on learning that particular language or if you move to the country where that language is spoken and use it 24/7 once there, I’m pretty sure those 7 yrs you’re taking about will be narrowed to 1 or maybe 2 years, it also depends on the language you’re studying, the closer the language you are learning is to your native Language, the faster you’ll learn it.
This is....simply not accurate. Like the chart shows, it varies tremendously. I became fluent in Mandarin in 1.5 years, but it required living in China, almost total immersion, and personal dedication to thinking in the target language.
This was interesting to me because my Dad was a diplomat for another country (not the US) and as a child, I did learn several languages. I learned English because most countries have an international or American schools. Yes, that is where all the kids of all the diplomats from foreign countries go to school, as well as kids whose parents are executives for American or International companies who have offices or factories in the country as well as the children of the US military. I learned both Italian and Brazilian from living in those countries and making friends with local kids. Well anyway that was my personal experience.
I have a question, I technically speak 2 languages with English being my second language but werdly my most comfortable language. I speak dutch abit, but its very hard for me to concentrate on learning one language.... I keep jumping from one language to another... is this a bad thing or should I just really try concentrating on one?
I learn 2 languages right now. One is from Germanic family, the other is from Slavic one. I know English already, so it helps with one, and I'm a native Slavic language speaker. Those languages don't overlap, so I switch between them when I get bored or my brain stops processing new info.
Excellent video. I tell you my story. I learned Mandarin Chinese in China in 1 year and 5 months. I managed to learn an advanced level, I have the HSK 5 certificate. With my experience, which they called me crazy, I consider that the best way to learn a language is immersion and the higher it is, the faster the learning. As it happens with diplomats, I experienced it almost similarly, obviously without experience of bombs hehe. But yes, living the cultural and linguistic experience in its entirety gives you greater results, whether in the country of the language or your country. 再见
This is awesome. DLI, FSI and MTC are the top three places to learn languages and for a deep commitment for anyone that attends them. You covered all three of them finally. I am curious Olly if you will do videos covering the certifications of governing bodies, such as HSK, JLPT, DELE, TOEFL, etc...? I am sure there is a lot of people interested, as that helps to gain employment and/ or study in a post secondary school.
Soooo ... I'm learning Russian and have an online tutor one hour per week. I've just started so according to the chart (6:21) only another 25 years to go, at which point I'll be 101 years old.
I'm surprised some languages are only at a level 3, like Vietnamese with its six tones, and Hungarian and Finnish, which are agglutinative. It makes me reconsider learning them. I would have expected these to be within the hardest group.
If you look at the languages in the hardest group they have a different, often difficult script and that's presumably why they're in that group. Finnish uses latin letters with just a little extra to learn for English speakers.
Last year, I attempted the FSOT (Foreign Service Officer Test). I passed on my first attempt with a decent score, but I still didn't make it through the evaluations panel. It's hard at 25 to have gathered the professional experience necessary for the role 😷 You didn't mention it, but there's another role (Consular Fellows Program) that is language specific (Mandarin, Arabic, Spanish). The test is similar, but the selection seems less rigorous.
I love these videos! I want to know about all the speed learners everywhere 😂 Wish the general public could enroll in the physical courses like these...
I want to visit Bhutan in Asia. I want to speak basic Bhutanese But no one in this big wide world teaches Bhutanese. Thus I will try to get by with English. Greetings from Germany...🍺🖐
I did the FSI courses for Arabic and Serbocroatian and I can say that they are quite boring to be honest, although I did benefit from them as well. The audios are only in the target language which is a good thing and I found some of those drills beneficial too. In my opinion the Serbocroat course was better than the Arabic one. It tackled basically both the Serbian and Croatian at the basic level and both writing systems (latin and cyrillic). But I wouldn't maybe recommend those courses for the beginners and not maybe as the only source but they are good ones when you combine them with some more modern courses, since the information in those courses is a bit outdated (those courses are usually from the 60's, 70's or 80's).
@@alanguages Well, I would start first with something like "teach yourself" or the colloquial series, or something similar to them. Do you have some particular language on your mind?
@@alanguages For languages like Uyghur there might not be many sources available. Actually the only sources available might be the FSI or DLI ones. Then you just have to use what you got, therefore can start with those in that case.
This is the kind of videos that I really like to know about and obviously learn from, I mean real life examples. Thanks olly!! Next time I'd like to see the same content especially for guides people who speak more than one Language.
All the “romance” languages derive from Latin: Italian, French, Spanish, Romanian, Portuguese. Plus ENGLISH also has a lot of Latin derived words as well
@@storylearning No doubt today I would jump at any of these opportunities. The military or diplomatic school. I had no idea these were even options in 1995. Of course, whether or not I could've handled them is another story. Certainly I would have done it after college in 1999.
I didn’t see German on that list? I’m studying Spanish right so it’s not applicable but my ex-in-laws were German. If we had the internet and the availability to learn languages the way we do now….I would’ve studied it just to shock them. 😂
passed the FSWE three of five attempts, but failed the all-day assessment...oh well...should have returned to navy as LDO intelligence officer and DLI /PGS Monterey....
You can repeat all of the FS tests as many times as you want to. Go thru the process until you get thru all of them successfully, if you’re really serious about becoming an FSO
You must react instantaneously with that occurences, as well. EQ is a paramount and of course if you are sincere... it shows. Remember the one that was working in turmoil land around a decade ago (rather knowing their culture, languages and mingles with local) but was tragically harrased because he looks different? It shocked the local
In order to be accepted in Brazilian diplomatic service you need to pass an exam where you need to write perfect English, Spanish and French. Not counting Portuguese, our native language, of which they also require an extreme high level of proficiency and writing.
Honestly wish I'd have known about these kind of resources before the Lockdown, wanted to start learning a language during it, but struggled a bit with motivation and trying to decide which language.
Love your content, Olly. I've been dabbling some in the FSI courses lately to see if they really are as dry as their reputation suggests. It would appear that they are! On another note, I'd love to hear your opinion on how one would tackle learning a minority language where resources are scarce. Using Welsh as an example: there is not an FSI course for Welsh, nor is there a Pimsleur, Assimil, Language Transfer, Michel Thomas, etc. (there is something called "Say Something in Welsh", which is a pimsleur/Michel Thomas-esque audio learning program) There is also no StoryLearning book by the one and only Olly Richards in Welsh! There is a Duolingo course, but.... let's not go there!! So, that being said, I'm curious for your thoughts regarding minority languages and how you would suggest learning one.
The fsi Portuguese course was the best thing I ever came across, worth more then every textbook I bought combined. And it was free ! But I've heard not every course is as well made. If you can be disciplined enough to get through it you'll see all the rewards. It took me about 4 hours every day for almost 4 months to finish it
@@alex10291 wow. 4 hours every day? Would you care to share your routine? Is be interested in learning how you used it. Currently, I'm treating it in a similar way to how Assimil is used (30 mins a day)
@@JohnBrute Look up commercial resources like Colloquial, Hippocrene's Beginner's series, Teach Yourself or if you are lucky enough the old Linguaphone Welsh.
Is there a table sorting language by level of difficulty for russian speakers? I guess it doesn’t change much except all slavic language moving from third column to the first one but still I am curious.
Great material and very interesting topic as always, but unusually for your videos, rather hard going. Your presentation style was frantic and this was accentuated by the video editing. You also repeatedly referred to what you would be doing later, which was fine a couple of times but you can't really keep doing it. I must emphasise that your work is excellent and I always recommend your channel. Perhaps this time you were too conscious of the amount of material you needed to get through. Another approach would have been to split it into two parts and this would have enabled you to use your normal lively but still conversational style.
@@Geoplanetjane most?...I've personally stopped some of these gangsters...they tried to s/a the child support office where I reside...lone female worker terrified but put to a stop
You know Olly. The Israeli army has a special program for learning Arabic fast. You can get punished if you don't complete some tasks. You can interview people about that. Some of those that learnt Arabic fast in the army. Then later on develop all kind of start up. For learning Arabic fast in non army life. An app. A course. And so on.
@@jacktagan7222 hey jack. I Know of a single Israeli app For learning Arabic. But maybe there is more. You can Google it And find it. I think That app is only in Hebrew...... Sooooo. Unless you know Hebrew that that can be a problem. Hebrew comes from the same family as Arabic. And there are about 60 percentage Of lexical similarities between them. And there are a lot of sources in Hebrew. For learning Arabic. I saw even an online live course in Hebrew for Arabic. And Hebrew is much more simple then Arabic. And Hebrew is a one of the most logical Language. Good for thinking and the brain. Soooo maybe it's better for you to learn Hebrew first. Same as that experiment In which one group of people learn Esparnto for one year and then France for three. And then they knew France better than just those That learn France for four years. Not sure how legit That experiment though. I think that maybe it's Some obscure experiment from the 50's. But you can look that experiment up. I hope i helped you.
Can anyone recommend a good Cyrillic alphabet keyboard for Android phones? I have a Samsung and I am currently learning Russian and Ukrainian. I want to be very careful NOT to download something with a virus.
Nope. You learn a new language and then immediately go to live and work in the country where that language is used. You stay there usually from 2-4 years and then you recieve your appointment in a country where you do not know the language so you back to FSI to that language
If only you would sound-treat your room, your videos would be so much more pleasurable to listen to. Your room sounds horrible, as there is a ton of reverberation :/
these courses and method may well be insanely efficient, but at 16:01 as a native Italian speaker I cringed a little at the use of the word "tassì" for taxi, like come on, literally no one says tassì, it's just taxi
Pffff... Many are very good at languages, yet others, those of purely political appointment... We had nominally Italian-American ambassadors who couldn't even speak Italian.
Yes, but if there is an emergency and you need to get word to the President, often having an appointee ambassador whom President knows can help cut through the red tape.
By the way, do you have some short stories in english? I have this friend who is stuck with his school level of english and can’t improve at all for a long time. I’d advise him to learn through stories but can’t think of any good source.
This is so funny when this happened to fall into my hands. I’m an 18 year old American, in the middle of my senior year, but I’m currently in France doing a foreign exchange program for the first semester. Literally yesterday in my Science-Po cordée (extracurricular science-politics class), we received a former French ambassador to a number of countries. I have had no clue what I wanted to do for a long time, except that I wanted it to be with foreign languages and cultures. But now… I think I might know what I want to do finally and how to get there
I'm sure you have probably had this question multiple times already but what is your opinion on Duo Lingo? You didn't mention it in the language learning apps video. I was just curios about your thoughts on it as it does include some story methods of learning now.
I'll tell you what I think of your video - in just a little bit. I do wish you would stop doing 'teasers' like this - very annoying. Otherwise, super interesting!
Olly, The fact is that the top Diplomats a political appointment, rarely speak the language of the country where they are sent and knowing anything about it is a liability:) That's plausible deniability ,and they can blame their ineptness on the staff which may actual speak some of that lingo and have studied and know what they are doing. Cheers, Rik Spector
The video was very interesting, but I found the way the camera zoom kept jumping and the number of times Olly told us “but I’ll tell you about that later” annoying
Check out these FAST language learners 👉🏼 ua-cam.com/video/8XBOeymqPek/v-deo.html
the FSOT isn't insanely difficult. I did well on it, still didn't get selected despite polyglot.
Basically if you're white you better have gone to yale etc. It's weird. I don't think an all white all male foreign service is at all good, but yeah, it's much harder to get selected as a white paradoxally and no its not sour graps i could get a consular fellowship anytime if I wanted.
I don't think FSI and DLI have particularly different curricula albeit FSI will focus much more on military vocabulary whereas FSI must do a broader range including economics e.g.
I think more DLI material is available online for free. The FSI Mandarin course is certainly available for free but it's from ... the 1970s.
I don't think either had particularly innovative methodology, though DLI materials are both solid and extensive.
You might want to contact BiancaLearns, she does videos on Mandarin learning and did a video on memory and stories (unsponsored) that one and your method seem like an obvious overlap.
even though I don't use path method or memory palace both might be compatible with your story method.
I'm all about the peg system and literary devices (alliteration rhyme rhythm syononms antonyms).
I don't think there are many short stories in Chinese.
I thought that was harder to be honest. In Brazil, we must be fluent in 3 languages, level C1, to have a chance to be accepted at the diplomatic school.
Wow! That's a lot!
Fala sério meu irmão?
Que merda em
kkkkk já tô
falo inglês e espanhol quase ao nível de um falante nativo
e também o português
Right?? I'm studing to become a diplomat and I am surprised they're only required to learn a foreign language AFTER they're accepted in the Foreign Service Institute.
Pro tip - if you call your video "How U.S. Diplomats Learn Languages Fast" then make that the topic of the video. Far too much fluff in the video.
I once taught Japanese to a man from Australian government's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. He was going to be sent to Tokyo as a third secretary of the Embassy there next year. But there was nothing special about his one on one tutoring except for 1) He was already fluent in Spanish and Indonesian. 2) For the whole year his only job was studying Japanese. 3) So he had a two-hour class every day, and then went home and (supposed to) studied on his own. I and two other tutors taught him just like we did to our university students, and he studied no different from our university students. We used a textbook from the bookshop (This was not our choice. Someone who taught him before us did), and taught him daily conversation (such as talking about weather) in a very ordinary (old fashioned) way. After about 6 months I left this job because I got another one, so I don't know how he progressed after that, but I don't think he became able to talk or read about politics or economics in Japanese by the end of that year.
If I were him I would focus on the vocabulary of politics, economics and other words that is directly useful for his job, and practice reading comprehension on such news articles. But I was not in the position of giving such advice to him.
Thanks!! Your advice is helpful for me and others who learning new language for a specific purpose.
With four 90 minute classes per week and a female teacher anyone can learn a language in 6 months provided you also live in that country - total immersion - and avoid speaking your native language to friends. You have to want to learn. Why a female teacher? - because children learn their native language from their mothers. Humans have evolved to learn that way.
Italian is "easy" and I'm having a hard enough time with it. I feel stupid now.
Grammar and vocabulary are familiar
@@Geoplanetjane I'm doing much better now but it still isn't easy.
I was friend with a usa diplomat, he learned arabic in less than 5 months. He could speak french, english, spanish and arabic. I really liked talking to him as I speak 4 as well, the same as him expect from arabic, I speak portuguese instead
I'm curious, on the chart you showed, each quarter was devoted to something different...do you know what the difference between "output" (25 percent) and "developing fluency" (25 percent) could be?
I would imagine output is the speaking and writing you do from the start, but fluency is next level... i.e getting really good at your output.
Paul Nation has a few videos. There is one on categorizing 20 exercises into each of the four strands. If you take notes, you will have a good idea. The references other teaching methods, such as 4-3-2, writing without correcting, and speed reading (yes), to develop fluency, which is my main interest, so lots to learn.
Good question. It's not a good distinction. However, in one it's writing and I would imagine Controlled speaking practice with a focus on using a specific structure correctly. In fluency, it would be free practice developing a topic in depth with the focus on expression and not accuracy. Simon brampton
depends on what "learning a language" means. after having spent 15 years on studying and using Japanese in real life, and then it took me additional whole 5 years to pass the Kanji Kentei level 1 and Nihongo Kentei level 1 - 2 top credentials in Japanese language
Hakuho, the former Yokozuna, now Magaki Oyakata, is fluent in his spoken Japanese, Nevertheless, he has said that his 9-year-old daughter has to help him with his kanji from time to time.
Nice video Olly! Why don't you make a video about how to choose which language to learn? A lot of people including me have a few languages that we really want to learn, but have a hard time choosing which one to start with and often end up trying to learn them at the same time; then ultimately giving up all together from frustration. This is especially apparent in monolinguals who want to start learning new languages, and I hate to see people get interested in foreign languages for a month or two then giving up on it.
Thanks for the idea!
@@storylearning anytime)
@@storylearning Let me second the suggestion.
I've been following your content on and off for a couple of years or so, but I think your channel's quality really skyrocketed lately. Especially because you tackle language learning from so many different perspectives: there is the techniques' bit, the interesting/curiosities' bit, the approaches' and motivational bit etc; and it seems to me that the video editing improved too. A great job, for real!
Without detriment to the the handful of other people that post amazing content about this, but I think your channel became my favourite one when it comes to this topic.
PS: as for your stories-based courses... any chance for Swahili?
♥
I love FSI language courses. I used an FSI courses 30 years ago to learn to speak Spanish fluently. At the time, I was a teen and spent all of my free time studying. Many years later, once their courses were in the public domain, I bought the Brazilian Portuguese course from eBay for $10. I was fluent in 3 months.
Thank you, Olly for replying to the comments as well. Shows you're really sincere with the audience.
I myself am learning Mandarin Chinese right now because I have been admitted to a Chinese university and their requirement is that we must learn the language upto HSK 4 in the first year, and I have had quite a fun journey learning it. My motivation is not as good as before now but I still study it everyday and am definitely improving little by little everyday. I am from Pakistan so my native language is Urdu, and I am also fluent in English, almost as good as a native speaker. I also plan to learn Italian next because I have always been attracted to Italian culture a lot.
I'm sure you're aware but your English seems absolutely perfect! Well done sir
@@eoghancasserly3626 Thank you so much. English is quite a difficult language to wrap your head around if you haven't grown up surrounded by it, but I've never felt it to be difficult for me, so it seems a little weird to me when some people are fussing over how difficult it is to learn English. 🤭
Prepare well, there are non-stop lockdowns in china. I have given up on china.
Good luck with Chinese. I wish you well. It sounds like a great opportunity.
@@nendoakuma7451 I am very grateful for your words.
Thank you for chapterizing your videos! I still watch beginning to end, but that's perfect for referring back and demonstrates respect for the viewer.
I was curious enough to go check the materials FSI Language course in Russian, omg I was not expecting that! It is incredibly thorough, very specific, and useful. It's basically telling them what to expect in any situation, what to do, and say... Very long but definitely worth it, thanks for sharing!
only way to master a new language is memorization and practice, try not to translate...fluency takes seven years, just like your first language....
7 years? It depends on your approach, if you are really focused on learning that particular language or if you move to the country where that language is spoken and use it 24/7 once there, I’m pretty sure those 7 yrs you’re taking about will be narrowed to 1 or maybe 2 years, it also depends on the language you’re studying, the closer the language you are learning is to your native Language, the faster you’ll learn it.
This is....simply not accurate. Like the chart shows, it varies tremendously. I became fluent in Mandarin in 1.5 years, but it required living in China, almost total immersion, and personal dedication to thinking in the target language.
@@gaoda1581 and
I bet you have a superb memory too!
This was interesting to me because my Dad was a diplomat for another country (not the US) and as a child, I did learn several languages. I learned English because most countries have an international or American schools. Yes, that is where all the kids of all the diplomats from foreign countries go to school, as well as kids whose parents are executives for American or International companies who have offices or factories in the country as well as the children of the US military. I learned both Italian and Brazilian from living in those countries and making friends with local kids. Well anyway that was my personal experience.
I have a question, I technically speak 2 languages with English being my second language but werdly my most comfortable language. I speak dutch abit, but its very hard for me to concentrate on learning one language.... I keep jumping from one language to another... is this a bad thing or should I just really try concentrating on one?
same here
I learn 2 languages right now. One is from Germanic family, the other is from Slavic one. I know English already, so it helps with one, and I'm a native Slavic language speaker. Those languages don't overlap, so I switch between them when I get bored or my brain stops processing new info.
Olly: Can you choose your language? Absolutely not!!
Also Olly: I choose them ALL 😎 StoryLearning #FTW
Excellent video. I tell you my story. I learned Mandarin Chinese in China in 1 year and 5 months. I managed to learn an advanced level, I have the HSK 5 certificate. With my experience, which they called me crazy, I consider that the best way to learn a language is immersion and the higher it is, the faster the learning. As it happens with diplomats, I experienced it almost similarly, obviously without experience of bombs hehe. But yes, living the cultural and linguistic experience in its entirety gives you greater results, whether in the country of the language or your country. 再见
This is awesome. DLI, FSI and MTC are the top three places to learn languages and for a deep commitment for anyone that attends them. You covered all three of them finally.
I am curious Olly if you will do videos covering the certifications of governing bodies, such as HSK, JLPT, DELE, TOEFL, etc...?
I am sure there is a lot of people interested, as that helps to gain employment and/ or study in a post secondary school.
I could barely believe that the 1st man speaking Mandarin in your video was real!!
He was
A diplomat is a person who loves his/her country so much that decides to live away from it, serve it miles away and die unnoticed.
Soooo ... I'm learning Russian and have an online tutor one hour per week. I've just started so according to the chart (6:21) only another 25 years to go, at which point I'll be 101 years old.
nice. never too old to learn.
You need to speak as much as possible, if you need help, just let me know
😂
Places where foreign aid is abused should be blacklisted...
They are
I'm surprised some languages are only at a level 3, like Vietnamese with its six tones, and Hungarian and Finnish, which are agglutinative. It makes me reconsider learning them. I would have expected these to be within the hardest group.
if Zulu was on there it would have murdered the chart. . Most southern african languages are crazy hard
If you look at the languages in the hardest group they have a different, often difficult script and that's presumably why they're in that group. Finnish uses latin letters with just a little extra to learn for English speakers.
Last year, I attempted the FSOT (Foreign Service Officer Test). I passed on my first attempt with a decent score, but I still didn't make it through the evaluations panel. It's hard at 25 to have gathered the professional experience necessary for the role 😷
You didn't mention it, but there's another role (Consular Fellows Program) that is language specific (Mandarin, Arabic, Spanish). The test is similar, but the selection seems less rigorous.
The counselors program is max 5 years. And you also can’t become an fso afterwards it’s a shame
I love these videos! I want to know about all the speed learners everywhere 😂
Wish the general public could enroll in the physical courses like these...
So interesting! Whenever I feel unmotivated about language learning I watch one of these videos and I get inspired again. Thanks for the great video!
I want to visit Bhutan in Asia.
I want to speak basic Bhutanese
But no one in this big wide world teaches Bhutanese.
Thus I will try to get by with English.
Greetings from Germany...🍺🖐
I did the FSI courses for Arabic and Serbocroatian and I can say that they are quite boring to be honest, although I did benefit from them as well. The audios are only in the target language which is a good thing and I found some of those drills beneficial too. In my opinion the Serbocroat course was better than the Arabic one. It tackled basically both the Serbian and Croatian at the basic level and both writing systems (latin and cyrillic). But I wouldn't maybe recommend those courses for the beginners and not maybe as the only source but they are good ones when you combine them with some more modern courses, since the information in those courses is a bit outdated (those courses are usually from the 60's, 70's or 80's).
Can you list down your recommendations for beginners?
@@alanguages Well, I would start first with something like "teach yourself" or the colloquial series, or something similar to them. Do you have some particular language on your mind?
@@a.r.4707 I was interested in Uyghur.
@@alanguages For languages like Uyghur there might not be many sources available. Actually the only sources available might be the FSI or DLI ones. Then you just have to use what you got, therefore can start with those in that case.
@sy [ODAE] Yes like in Finnish too which is my language.
This is the kind of videos that I really like to know about and obviously learn from, I mean real life examples. Thanks olly!!
Next time I'd like to see the same content especially for guides people who speak more than one Language.
Thanks for the idea Joe
Could you go through how the Peace Corps trains their volunteers?
When will the video on Latin come out??
We’re working on it! :)
Everyone waiting on Sanskrit as well.
All the “romance” languages derive from Latin: Italian, French, Spanish, Romanian, Portuguese. Plus ENGLISH also has a lot of Latin derived words as well
@@nsevvThey do teach Hindi, Urdu, Pashto, not sure about Tibetan, Nepali
I wish I had known about all of this stuff when I was younger. My life would be totally different now.
How do you feel it would be different?
@@storylearning No doubt today I would jump at any of these opportunities. The military or diplomatic school. I had no idea these were even options in 1995. Of course, whether or not I could've handled them is another story. Certainly I would have done it after college in 1999.
@@accent77 ♥
I didn’t see German on that list? I’m studying Spanish right so it’s not applicable but my ex-in-laws were German. If we had the internet and the availability to learn languages the way we do now….I would’ve studied it just to shock them. 😂
German is in Category 2.
Can you make a video about J R. R. Tolkien and of his life as a linguist
passed the FSWE three of five attempts, but failed the all-day assessment...oh well...should have returned to navy as LDO intelligence officer and DLI /PGS Monterey....
You can repeat all of the FS tests as many times as you want to. Go thru the process until you get thru all of them successfully, if you’re really serious about becoming an FSO
Yeah.
@@Geoplanetjane
So...the anti kurist is going to speak different languages...
Whaaaat?
I wonder where Irish would be on that list. Probably in the 44 weeks section.
You must react instantaneously with that occurences, as well. EQ is a paramount and of course if you are sincere... it shows. Remember the one that was working in turmoil land around a decade ago (rather knowing their culture, languages and mingles with local) but was tragically harrased because he looks different? It shocked the local
In order to be accepted in Brazilian diplomatic service you need to pass an exam where you need to write perfect English, Spanish and French. Not counting Portuguese, our native language, of which they also require an extreme high level of proficiency and writing.
It's solid material for language learners, greet thanks Olly.
Cheers!
Honestly wish I'd have known about these kind of resources before the Lockdown, wanted to start learning a language during it, but struggled a bit with motivation and trying to decide which language.
You should try Olly's StoryLearning courses. Truly amazing.
Love your content, Olly. I've been dabbling some in the FSI courses lately to see if they really are as dry as their reputation suggests. It would appear that they are!
On another note, I'd love to hear your opinion on how one would tackle learning a minority language where resources are scarce. Using Welsh as an example: there is not an FSI course for Welsh, nor is there a Pimsleur, Assimil, Language Transfer, Michel Thomas, etc. (there is something called "Say Something in Welsh", which is a pimsleur/Michel Thomas-esque audio learning program) There is also no StoryLearning book by the one and only Olly Richards in Welsh! There is a Duolingo course, but.... let's not go there!!
So, that being said, I'm curious for your thoughts regarding minority languages and how you would suggest learning one.
Same with Irish! I’m a student and struggle to find good sources for learning the language!
The fsi Portuguese course was the best thing I ever came across, worth more then every textbook I bought combined. And it was free ! But I've heard not every course is as well made. If you can be disciplined enough to get through it you'll see all the rewards. It took me about 4 hours every day for almost 4 months to finish it
@@alex10291 wow. 4 hours every day? Would you care to share your routine? Is be interested in learning how you used it. Currently, I'm treating it in a similar way to how Assimil is used (30 mins a day)
@@JohnBrute Look up commercial resources like Colloquial, Hippocrene's Beginner's series, Teach Yourself or if you are lucky enough the old Linguaphone Welsh.
You just advertised your sponsors . Nothing is beneficial for learners.
VPNs are useful
I wonder if there's a small transitional course of around 1 lesson where they learn other English for the UK, Australia, South Africa etc.
Currently learning Dutch, thank you for the motivation and resources.
Aware
@@finnvictorsson so many juicers/bajs
Veel geluk! xqcL from the Dutch speaking part of Belgium
@@Skerathh xqcL
Is there a table sorting language by level of difficulty for russian speakers? I guess it doesn’t change much except all slavic language moving from third column to the first one but still I am curious.
Great material and very interesting topic as always, but unusually for your videos, rather hard going. Your presentation style was frantic and this was accentuated by the video editing. You also repeatedly referred to what you would be doing later, which was fine a couple of times but you can't really keep doing it. I must emphasise that your work is excellent and I always recommend your channel. Perhaps this time you were too conscious of the amount of material you needed to get through. Another approach would have been to split it into two parts and this would have enabled you to use your normal lively but still conversational style.
Thank you, I’m grateful for the feedback!
I think those that abuse diplomatic immunity should have it revoked
It is sometimes, but most FSOs do not abuse such prvilegrs
@@Geoplanetjane most?...I've personally stopped some of these gangsters...they tried to s/a the child support office where I reside...lone female worker terrified but put to a stop
@@Geoplanetjane he's tried this before...
Is there a book on the FSI method explaining how they arrived at it? Was it mostly trying and failing or do they go scientific as well?
1100 hours for a diplomat to be fluent in Kurdish. That makes me feel better about not knowing much after a year of on and off learning.
Great video, I would love to attend a program like the Foreign Service.
I learned Spanish "back in the day" by watching telenovelas on VHS tapes.
You know Olly.
The Israeli army has a special program for learning Arabic fast.
You can get punished if you don't complete some tasks.
You can interview people about that.
Some of those that learnt Arabic fast in the army. Then later on develop all kind of start up. For learning Arabic fast in non army life. An app. A course. And so on.
Great idea!
👍
What's the app's name exactly. I'd like to download the app.
@@jacktagan7222 hey jack.
I Know of a single Israeli app
For learning Arabic.
But maybe there is more.
You can Google it
And find it.
I think That app is only in Hebrew......
Sooooo. Unless you know Hebrew that that can be a problem.
Hebrew comes from the same family as Arabic.
And there are about 60 percentage
Of lexical similarities between them.
And there are a lot of sources in Hebrew. For learning Arabic.
I saw even an online live course in Hebrew for Arabic.
And Hebrew is much more simple then Arabic.
And Hebrew is a one of the most logical
Language.
Good for thinking and the brain.
Soooo maybe it's better for you to learn Hebrew first.
Same as that experiment
In which one group of people learn
Esparnto for one year and then France for three.
And then they knew
France better than just those
That learn France for four years.
Not sure how legit
That experiment though.
I think that maybe it's Some obscure experiment from the 50's. But you can look that experiment up.
I hope i helped you.
Can anyone recommend a good Cyrillic alphabet keyboard for Android phones? I have a Samsung and I am currently learning Russian and Ukrainian. I want to be very careful NOT to download something with a virus.
ONE language in 5 years?? That's a joke, you should Learn about brazilian diplomat's training
Nope. You learn a new language and then immediately go to live and work in the country where that language is used. You stay there usually from 2-4 years and then you recieve your appointment in a country where you do not know the language so you back to FSI to that language
Smoothest transition into a sponsor ad I've ever seen. Fair play!
If only you would sound-treat your room, your videos would be so much more pleasurable to listen to. Your room sounds horrible, as there is a ton of reverberation :/
Are those courses for non-Americans? Can anyone take these courses? Are they free? 17th March,14h25.
Magari facessi questo lavoro... Aspetto una chiamata sperando che qualcuno mi metta in una classe come questa. Mi piace davvero imparare le lingue
these courses and method may well be insanely efficient, but at 16:01 as a native Italian speaker I cringed a little at the use of the word "tassì" for taxi, like come on, literally no one says tassì, it's just taxi
Hi olly! I'm really glad to discover your channel. Do you have a video about yourself and what languages you know, and how you came to learn each one?
Pffff... Many are very good at languages, yet others, those of purely political appointment... We had nominally Italian-American ambassadors who couldn't even speak Italian.
Yes, but if there is an emergency and you need to get word to the President, often having an appointee ambassador whom President knows can help cut through the red tape.
I think this method is good because you would feel more motivated because you have had some input into what you want to learn.
Would be interesting to see non youtube polyglots… good stuff here btw!
A foreign service officer spoke at my Arabic class. It was really cool. I really liked it, but the down side is that you have to move every few years.
Interesting informative video! 😊🎉
I didn’t anticipate that my first language, Filipino (Tagalog), is in category 3.
That’s because the grammar is different
American people that can say two foreign words in a row? Wow, fantastic. Never met those people.
哇哦 一个会讲英语的意大利人，好厉害啊！！你应该为自己感到很自豪吧
There are quite a few of us out here. Even my kids both learned at least 2 new languages
By the way, do you have some short stories in english? I have this friend who is stuck with his school level of english and can’t improve at all for a long time. I’d advise him to learn through stories but can’t think of any good source.
Short stories in New Yorker magazine are good for that
This is so funny when this happened to fall into my hands. I’m an 18 year old American, in the middle of my senior year, but I’m currently in France doing a foreign exchange program for the first semester. Literally yesterday in my Science-Po cordée (extracurricular science-politics class), we received a former French ambassador to a number of countries. I have had no clue what I wanted to do for a long time, except that I wanted it to be with foreign languages and cultures. But now… I think I might know what I want to do finally and how to get there
Me watching this video hoping to get tips on continuing the learning process, also me realizing the language i picked was in category 4 difficulty 🥴👍🏻
😅
Very ineresting video! Thanks Olly!
Amazing video! it was very informative
I'm sure you have probably had this question multiple times already but what is your opinion on Duo Lingo? You didn't mention it in the language learning apps video. I was just curios about your thoughts on it as it does include some story methods of learning now.
I think many know you aren’t going to learn the whole langauge on there it’s just an app to supplement your learning
Any FSO personnel here? Would love to connect and learn more about your work! (I’m thinking of joining).
Love this channel
You should do a video on US Army Special Forces (green berets). They have to learn multiple languages during their training pipeline (Q-Course).
For being an ambassador her korean sounds terrible tbh
this was extremely insightful, I did not know much about it 😮Thanks a lot for sharing the links!
How is called and how can i find such training in Germany?
I expect you would find that at the Foreign Ministry
I’m studying Koine Greek. This channel inspires me.
Ωραία
I'll tell you what I think of your video - in just a little bit. I do wish you would stop doing 'teasers' like this - very annoying. Otherwise, super interesting!
Could you please cover the karenic languages? Specifically Sgaw Karen. It has a very interesting script and no tense or gendered words.
Olly,
The fact is that the top Diplomats a political appointment, rarely speak the language of the country where
they are sent and knowing anything about it is a liability:)
That's plausible deniability ,and they can blame their ineptness on the staff which may actual speak
some of that lingo and have studied and know what they are doing.
Cheers,
Rik Spector
The language categorization seems to match the Defense language Institute one so I’d assume it’s just the government scale
Diplomats are cream of the crop.
We have worked hard to learn how the world really works.
Really informative
"No English rule" when you learn foreign language.
People who learn English: Fuck
Yup.. it's in the list 😂 that I am learning now 6:36
They use duolingo with speakly combo.
Great video!
Do they learn one language at a time or multiple at the same time
I mean since you speak English well, learning Latin languages are kinda easy since they are similar
One a time
Probably a typo
Get all your keyboards from device maker
The video was very interesting, but I found the way the camera zoom kept jumping and the number of times Olly told us “but I’ll tell you about that later” annoying
Me too
Great video, Olly! Informative!
For the difficulty of languages from Category I - IV, see 6:30