Create shorter goals
How do you make sure your language tool and methods are the best at developing your skills?
Deliver working language skills, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a preference to the shorter timescale. (From the #AgilePolyglot Manifesto)
If you want to ensure you’re making progress, set short experiments as your goals. Creating short goals allows you to adapt easily to what you learn about your tools, your methods, and the information you learn about yourself.
Maximizing the value of your tools
Let’s say my goal is to understand my landlord better. I will definitely need to know more vocabulary, for example. But is my time better spent creating a new deck of flash cards with specialized vocabulary (eg, “overdue,” “plumbing”) or should I save time and use pre-made flashcards I find for Anki or Memrise?
You can find an answer to this question by researching on the internet. Ask your friends or language experts or language forums, for example. Read articles. You’ll have a better answer.
This method may take an hour or two. You now hold information. As far as speaking to your landlord, however, you have not progressed.
As an #AgilePolyglot you can try another approach. Run an brief experiment and collect data from your own experience. For two weeks, set a goal for what you want to be able to do (for suggestions on how to set a goal, please read here) and use a pre-made deck. It takes less time to set up, and if it works, great. If it doesn’t work, try another experiment for the next two weeks, such as putting the time into creating a custom deck.
This method also takes a couple hours, but what you lose in general information you gain in two different areas. First, you were spending your time studying vocabulary. Surely you will gain some new words. Second, you know something about what works for you because your progress was the success criterion.
The #AgilePolyglot Manifesto holds a “preference to the shorter timescale,” so you don’t invest too much in one method before you know it’s effective. Learning quickly what works best will ensure the best use of your time.
Sizing two-week goals
Let’s go back to the landlord example. “Understanding him better” will take months. I could imagine so many different conversations about so many topics, I would have to learn hundreds of words. If he brings up unexpectedly a wedding he went to with his wife’s family, I will have to study for a year to get down every angle of conversation.
Is there something I could accomplish in two months? I could probably master “plumbing” in two months. Between vocabulary for tools and hardware and some grammar for procedural discourse (eg, “First, I’ll have to order the U-trap. Then, they’ll tell me how long till the part comes in.”)
How about two weeks? I could probably master “tools” in two weeks, and future tense will take me a couple weeks, just to be sure I have all the irregular verbs.
My preference will be for the shorter timescale. I think learning vocabulary will be most valuable, so my goal will be to use and understand references to plumbing tools and hardware. I will favor learning new words over new grammar, because, for example, a verb tense without verbs is less useful. Vocabulary study will be central, but maybe scheduling some time in a week with a tutor or even my landlord could show me if I’m on track for achieving my goal.
At the end of two weeks, I evaluate where I succeeded and where I failed (no judgment). If some method made me really happy or showed great progress, I will be sure to stick with that method. However, I might not have achieved my goal. Even if I’m frustrated, I can learn from data gathered from my experiment. What happened? Did I not have enough time? Was the goal too big for the amount of time I had? Did the tool take too long to set up? Did I spend too much time with the tool on things that weren’t so useful?
At the worst, assuming I learned zero in my language (very unlikely), I only wasted two weeks. Recovering from two weeks is not that hard. It’s like coming back after a vacation. I’ll be wiser and refreshed and ready to take on the next two weeks.
The best result comes once I realized I’ve accomplished several goals in a few months, making measurable progress and adding to my confidence.
