Language learning starts at birth as we learn our own mother tongue. In my case, that was Scots.
At primary school I began learning English. It has many words in common with Scots and some say Scots is just a dialect of modern standard English. However, the EU has granted it language status.
We used to refer to what we were taught at school as “BBC” English as the radio was the only place we ever heard it spoken outside of school.
When I look back on those formative years, I can see that Scots is rich in words and phrases that helped define us. It helped define who we were, how we thought and our whole outlook on life and it bound us together as a community. The language that made me the person I am was not English, but Scots.
At high school I learned Latin, French and German but I was really only interested in Science. That interest lead to two degrees, a lifetime in electronics and never a thought about language learning, until now.
Back to language learning with a purpose this time.
I have finally become interested in language learning!
My wife and I have started going on holiday to Cyprus. Suddenly, I have a reason to learn Greek.
Unfortunately, Greek is more difficult for an English speaker to learn than French, Spanish, Portuguese or Italian. See here: https://howtogetfluent.com/how-long-to-learn-a-language/ However, I really don’t care because I love the culture and now I have an incentive to learn the language.
I just want to be able to sit on a bench on the seafront in Paphos and talk to a local of my age in their own language about the things we have in common from our youth.
My son is a professional Apple programmer, so together, we developed two language learning apps with some unique features that speed learning vocabulary, phrases and pronunciation.
We called the first one Hyperpolyglot because of the number of languages it can support. It runs on iPad(IOS13+) You will find details here: Hyperpolyglot Language Learning App.
It has speech input and output for ease of use and works with Apple Translate and Google so you can quickly and easily get and save translations of your own phrases. I love drawing on the canvas and linking the drawing to a word or phrase. The more clever and personal the drawing the more effective it is in helping you learn.
Our latest language learning app is called Polylingo and runs on iPhone(IOS16+). It builds on Hyperpolyglot while adding new exciting features such as instant translation and your own conversations.
Speed language learning: Link words to images
