- I don't know if you remember,
but last September I studied in Berlin, Germany.
(upbeat music) (typing)
(water burbling) (slide whooshes)
(car honking)
(people chattering)
(person giggles)
Except my German was limited to (speaking foreign language).
And I also knew a few random words like, (foreign language),
'cause of that viral harsh tone words.
(speaking in foreign language)
- Ambulance.
(speaking in foreign language)
- Next semester,
I'm so happy to say that I'm studying in Berlin again.
Except this time, I want to speak German, mm-hmm.
Throw it back to six weeks ago,
when I enrolled in a three month German course,
I am committed.
Every other day for the last six weeks,
I have had a one hour German class, with a German teacher,
and I am learning German, and it's so cool!
I chose the learning platform Lingoda,
because, one of my closest friends at university,
did the German Lingoda course,
and this girl, my God, she's incredible.
She went from beginner's German, to C2 level,
because she studied so much.
She could think in German,
she could have a conversation in German,
by the end of the three months.
I'm not as dedicated as her,
but I would love to be able to speak a little bit of German,
by the end of the three months.
And talk to the staff in shops,
I can have a hot girl summer,
I can hit up all the cute Germans.
In this video, I'm gonna take you through,
some of my journey of learning German,
in the last six weeks, the kind of things that I'm doing,
how I found the classes,
and I'm gonna end the video by, (chuckling)
trying to speak some German to you.
Honestly, I'm still not that good,
gonna be honest, (chuckling).
But if I compare myself to where I was six weeks ago,
it is insane (chuckling).
(upbeat music)
So, let's do it.
Let's see, before we get into it,
one of the most insane and exciting parts about this video,
is that it's actually sponsored by Lingoda.
The context, I purchased this course, I paid my money,
I chose this, because I thought it was good,
my friend had an amazing experience.
I did it for over a month, was enjoying it,
and then I reached out to Lingoda,
and was like, "Would you like me to talk about this?
Because I love your service".
So, it's so cool to say this video is sponsored by them.
What is so special about Lingoda and why I love it,
is this concept of a Sprint.
You sign up for three months,
that is incredible accountability,
but the cool part is, it's a challenge.
And they got the Super Sprint,
if you decide to have a class every single day,
for three months,
and you don't miss a single one,
you get all your money back.
(cash register chiming) That is insane.
I couldn't commit to every single day,
because I was certain I was gonna miss one,
but I am doing the classes every other day.
And if I don't miss a single one,
I get half my money back, which I would love, please.
And what's cool is, it's so flexible,
you can book any time of class within the day.
I'm so spontaneous with my life in summer,
so sometimes I literally book a class on the day.
You have native teachers,
and people in the class are from all around the world,
which is really special.
Classes are through Zoom,
there can be anywhere from one or two students,
to five students.
And it's so focused on speaking and pronunciation.
It's like the opposite of how I studied language at GCSE,
which was very much learn the grammar, and then don't speak.
Here, we speak a lot.
The sign up for the next Sprint ends on July 16th,
and then the Sprint starts on August 2nd.
You can learn English, German, French, Spanish,
and business English.
You put a deposit,
and then you can pay in monthly installments.
But what is so cool, that I can offer you this,
because I would have loved to have this,
is I have a voucher code where you can get discount.
You can get 20 Euros off the deposit,
and if you want to do the 100% cash back option,
you have to sign up for the Super Sprint by June 24th,
which is very soon.
As you can see in this video,
I absolutely love it, and it has helped me learn so much.
I wish they had a Dutch option,
so I could do some speedy Dutch learning (chuckling).
(soft music)
First time going into a German class.
Today's one is called,
Check, I Can Do my Groceries in German.
Although I'm suddenly really doubting myself.
Why have I gone for a topic about grocery shopping?
Where I literally don't even know how to say
where I come from?
If in doubt, speak Dutch (chuckling).
Hello?
(speaking in foreign language) Jade.
Oh, okay.
Yeah, (speaking in foreign language).
(speaking in foreign language) English.
(speaking in foreign language)
(speaking in foreign language) Alice.
Yeah.
I have a question.
Yeah (speaking in foreign language)
Why did I think it would be a good idea
for my first class to go to a chapter 13 class?
That was so (mumbles) me.
The teacher was lovely.
The people in the class were lovely
but I don't know German.
And so then I entered a class that was not
chapter one where I should be.
I went to chapter 13, oh, gee!
I knew it was a red flag when I entered the class
and she was asking everyone
to introduce themselves in German.
And I said, (speaking in foreign language) Jade,
which apparently is grammatically totally incorrect.
So I bet the second I said that I just
totally expose myself as having
no clue in the German language.
But hey, we live in, learn from tomorrow.
I know which classes to book.
(upbeat music)
Hey guys, welcome to my second lesson of German.
This time I know of what to expect.
I have literally gone over the learning
resources before the class.
I think it is more my level.
I'm optimistic.
Let's give it a go Vita.
I think that means next.
Yeah.
(speaking in foreign language) Jade.
(speaking in foreign language)
(speaking in foreign language) England.
(speaking in foreign language) Berlin.
(speaking in foreign language) Shan.
(speaking in foreign language) Debra.
That was so much better.
I love this so much.
I find it so fun.
These people were so much more at my level.
There was a woman from Canada, a guy from Peru,
a guy from China and me, and then the German teacher.
We're learning basic introductions
of questioning each other.
Like, what's your name?
Where'd you come from?
How old are you?
So much more foundational.
And I'm just gonna go in order
of the foundational classes.
Because when I assume that I already know stuff
I clearly do not (chuckling).
In my head, I'm like, "Oh yes, I know numbers."
I don't think I do (chuckling).
Exciting, I need to find out a good way to make notes.
(soft music)
Okay, okay, I think anyone who's ever watched a bit
of Nathaniel Drew, a bit of Ike Hanau.
Any of the language learning video people,
will know how useful it is to try
and learn the 1000 most common verbs
and words in a language.
That is what I'm gonna do now.
I'm gonna make some flashcards.
I'm going to look on Quizlet
and see if they've got some pre-made flashcards
of the 1000 most common words.
True, if you're familiar with the concept
of speech repetition.
But it is the most effective way to learn anything.
If you want anything to stay in your long-term memory
you have to be aware of the forgetting curve, which is here.
Which was discovered by Hermann Ebbinghaus.
The idea is that human memory decays over time.
But if you reviewed the information
with regularly increasing intervals
you boost your memory back up to 100%.
Like, you're reviewing it.
You almost forgot it.
And then you boost it.
You've got it again in your head.
But being aware of that, I need to come up
with some way of getting speech repetition
into my life of going over vocab.
(song in foreign language)
(speaking in foreign language)
- What's (speaking in foreign language)?
(speaking in foreign language)
- How do you know that?
- [Male] Because we learned that stuff.
(speaking in foreign language) Oh!
(speaking in foreign language)
I know that. - What!
(speaking in foreign language) - Oh, that that.
- (speaking in foreign language) that is like Dutch.
(speaking in foreign language) children.
But still, I learned today
that when it's like an S P or an S T it's like a sh,
or sh, by sh-peel.
Sh-peel, it's so useful to have people correct you
in a class schiebern, schiebern, schiebern.
(speaking in foreign language)
Oh (speaking in foreign language).
(speaking in foreign language)
Something I still have no idea
about is like an O with a, the, or the U with an umlaut.
I just don't know how they sound different.
I'm not there yet.
I've got class in a few days, which is about umlauts,
and the sounds of different letters, and I need it.
♪ Move with the mic boo ♪
♪ You know how we do ♪
(upbeat hip-hop music)
(soft music)
- Hello, oh, do you like my sticker?
Is that true?
I am just gonna blot for memory.
Some of my (for language word sounds).
(upbeat jazz music)
I love a bit of verb conjugation.
Almost certain I've got some of these wrong.
I find them so hard to remember.
I'm a German (chuckling).
(upbeat music)
- Jade (computer voiceover speaking in foreign language).
(upbeat music)
I have found some absolute German bops that I love.
When I'm going for a run,
when I'm going for a bike ride.
I listened to them.
I'm looking at the lyrics,
I find myself humming along.
Like, I think this is such a good way
to learn pieces of language.
I'm not gonna lie, at first,
I was judgy of German music, a lot of just German rap.
But now I appreciate this, it's really good.
(upbeat music)
Tell me this isn't a bomb.
Apache, Bausa, KitschKrieg, they know.
(upbeat hip-hop music)
(singing in foreign language)
I can't rap in English, I can rap in German.
(singing in foreign language)
(upbeat music)
(speaking in foreign language)
(speaking in foreign language) Jade.
(speaking in foreign language)
(speaking in foreign language) England.
(speaking in foreign language) Berlin.
(speaking in foreign language)
Business economy.
(speaking in foreign language)
Ah!
(speaking in foreign language)
Okay, that is all.
(speaking in foreign language)
It's just like a month in and I can understand a lot.
My classes are totally taught in German now
and I can understand what is going on like 99% of the time.
Which is amazing!
Also, the fact I feel comfortable enough
to try and speak to you is pretty cool.
If you're trying to learn a language
you are incredible, that's amazing!
Languages are not easy,
it requires so much dedication and work.
I believe in you.
Definitely, look up Lingoda if you want to try speaking
and the awful one that I'm looking to learn.
Get me to Berlin (chucking).
Bye!
(upbeat music)