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To address more directly his question: it sounds like his health is about where I am on a migraine day, only for far longer (sorry, dude, hang in there). And for me, comprehensible input videos have been absolutely where it's at. Over the last few months I've been so tired and done from moving to Germany and trying to do all the accompanying paperwork and learning German that I had a little time but basically no energy to invest into Arabic. What I ended up doing was going, okay, I need to get *just far enough* that I can get something out of the super beginner MSA youtube videos. So I ended up basically doing several run-ups? I'd take a period of a few days or weeks where I was feeling well to try and get to that "~150 known words and I know roughly how a basic sentence works" point, and then although there were like multiope weeks or actually months between those little sprints - though it was much more of a shuffle compared to the actual sprints I can do when I have more energy - it still worked. I think it took 4 separate tries? And in between I did literally nothing and still came back with just a little more familiarity with the most basic words, with just a little easier of a time with the arabic writing system. Finally it clicked. Having hit this point, I'm not even planning to do much anki because I know I won't have the energy to consistently make cards. My actual plan is to do CI videos and Lingq. And that's great, because CI videos are so easy on the brain once you've watched them once, and they're usually quite short. They're not passive, but you can follow along just sortof like a toddler staring at the TV, watching the pictures and not really trying to actively work out anything that's not obvious. I would also, to get to that point, use premade stuff and apps over planning your own process. Do busuu or drops for 5 minutes just to get a few vocabulary words, follow a course someone else uploaded onto lingq, watch a playlist of A1 videos, whatever. Don't try to learn all the greetings they'll try to teach you and focus the very little brain you have on a tiny number of vital words: but, and, yes, no, he, she, etc. Then do CI. And honestly, although my German atudies were much more intense, I feel I almost got the most long term benefit out of just watching league of legends videos in German, too tired to Try about the language and just enjoying the chill streamer's voice and any words I happened to recognise while I watched the game. As a result, German has rarely felt tiring or unnatural to me to listen to or use even at higher levels where other advanced learners around me seemed to easily burn out or run out of concentration. This is very un-Refold-like advice in a way, but in my time on the Heavenly Path Chinese learning server we used to direct beginners to a learning app called Hello Chinese, because it was good enough and you overall spend so little time at the total beginner stage that as long as you can get through the first bit to start with the easiest graded readers, it's fine. ETA: expect to feel sleepy after maybe even 1 CI video. This is actually a good sign! You'll give your brain sleeping time to process what you just watched. So "ten minutes of CI, 30 minute nap" is a totally useful language learning plan for a bad day.
Thank you for the advice! I feel like I've gotten my comprehension ability to a decent level, but now that I'm finally starting to dabble with output, I'm finding it very fatiguing and I'm not able to keep a consistent practice schedule like compared to before when I was just listening and learning vocabulary... It's also really demotivating to notice that after spending sooo much time inputting, my output level is 1000 times worse than my comprehension.
Thank you very much. This is exactly what I needed. I can play games for 4 hours straight, but I just cannot learning English. A 15min method is the best for me.
Hey there, language learner! Are you looking for some more information about Refold and our method? Sign up for our free email list, and we'll share with you the Six Secrets of Language Learning! refold.la/learn-the-six-secrets
i just wanna say thank you alot for making these Q&A videos, they give many important insites that the roadmap doesnt cover
Insights?
Thank you for all your videos I love you guys. And Ben you are my language parent 😅
He's mine, too 😂
To address more directly his question: it sounds like his health is about where I am on a migraine day, only for far longer (sorry, dude, hang in there). And for me, comprehensible input videos have been absolutely where it's at. Over the last few months I've been so tired and done from moving to Germany and trying to do all the accompanying paperwork and learning German that I had a little time but basically no energy to invest into Arabic. What I ended up doing was going, okay, I need to get *just far enough* that I can get something out of the super beginner MSA youtube videos.
So I ended up basically doing several run-ups? I'd take a period of a few days or weeks where I was feeling well to try and get to that "~150 known words and I know roughly how a basic sentence works" point, and then although there were like multiope weeks or actually months between those little sprints - though it was much more of a shuffle compared to the actual sprints I can do when I have more energy - it still worked. I think it took 4 separate tries? And in between I did literally nothing and still came back with just a little more familiarity with the most basic words, with just a little easier of a time with the arabic writing system.
Finally it clicked. Having hit this point, I'm not even planning to do much anki because I know I won't have the energy to consistently make cards. My actual plan is to do CI videos and Lingq. And that's great, because CI videos are so easy on the brain once you've watched them once, and they're usually quite short. They're not passive, but you can follow along just sortof like a toddler staring at the TV, watching the pictures and not really trying to actively work out anything that's not obvious.
I would also, to get to that point, use premade stuff and apps over planning your own process. Do busuu or drops for 5 minutes just to get a few vocabulary words, follow a course someone else uploaded onto lingq, watch a playlist of A1 videos, whatever. Don't try to learn all the greetings they'll try to teach you and focus the very little brain you have on a tiny number of vital words: but, and, yes, no, he, she, etc. Then do CI.
And honestly, although my German atudies were much more intense, I feel I almost got the most long term benefit out of just watching league of legends videos in German, too tired to Try about the language and just enjoying the chill streamer's voice and any words I happened to recognise while I watched the game. As a result, German has rarely felt tiring or unnatural to me to listen to or use even at higher levels where other advanced learners around me seemed to easily burn out or run out of concentration.
This is very un-Refold-like advice in a way, but in my time on the Heavenly Path Chinese learning server we used to direct beginners to a learning app called Hello Chinese, because it was good enough and you overall spend so little time at the total beginner stage that as long as you can get through the first bit to start with the easiest graded readers, it's fine.
ETA: expect to feel sleepy after maybe even 1 CI video. This is actually a good sign! You'll give your brain sleeping time to process what you just watched. So "ten minutes of CI, 30 minute nap" is a totally useful language learning plan for a bad day.
Thank you for the advice! I feel like I've gotten my comprehension ability to a decent level, but now that I'm finally starting to dabble with output, I'm finding it very fatiguing and I'm not able to keep a consistent practice schedule like compared to before when I was just listening and learning vocabulary... It's also really demotivating to notice that after spending sooo much time inputting, my output level is 1000 times worse than my comprehension.
Thank you very much. This is exactly what I needed. I can play games for 4 hours straight, but I just cannot learning English. A 15min method is the best for me.
A lot of minutes for very few actual tips.