Learning two or more languages at the same time is easy if you do it right. But don’t rush out and buy a bunch of language courses just yet.
The key to learning any foreign language is active exposure. Active exposure means that you speak and listen a little every day. In the beginning, you just want to parrot the sounds back in context. If you are studying French, for example, you could start out with “Ça va?” and hear the response “Ça va bien.”
Don’t try to learn. If you repeat anything enough times, it will stick. Just make sure you do it every day. Even if you pick only three new phrases a day to speak and parrot them back, you’ll be amazed at your progress in a week or a month.
The same goes for listening to a foreign language. Don’t try to understand the meaning at first. With repetition, the sounds, and the rhythm will sink in. Look for audio recordings that have both your native language and your target foreign language. That will go a long way in helping you understand the meaning. The easiest and perhaps best source of dual language audio comes from movie DVDs. Normally DVDs have two or three sound tracks with different languages.
After a while, you will start to find the right words to express ideas without remembering every having consciously learned them. This comes from hearing the language spoken repeatedly.
With time and repetition, the flow of the language will sink into that intuitive part of the mind that makes everything seem effortless and automatic.
And you haven’t even TRIED TO LEARN yet. You have just been practicing active exposure and you have let the language sink in.
That was language number one. Once you start to have that deep understanding of phrases and flow of foreign language number one, you can begin with language number two.
As you continue with your first foreign language, you can add a second foreign language using the same method as with the first.
Let one foreign language sink in before starting with the second one. This may take a few weeks to a few months or longer depending on how much time you spend each day.
That doesn’t mean that you have to have total mastery of one language before you begin with another. As long as you feel comfortable with the first one and some basic dialog seems automatic and effortless, you’re ready for another.
What are you going to do with this information right now?