Learning another language is impressive, but imagine learning 20 languages.
Well, this incredible feat has been achieved by today's guest, Steve Kaufmann from YouTube
channel, Steve Kaufmann, lingosteve. He's also the CEO of lingQ, which I will link down below,
which is a fantastic learning resource for anyone learning another language.
So, what can we learn from such an incredible linguistic brain? Let's find out.
Hello, Steve, it's lovely to meet you, I'd like you to just spend a few moments telling
my audience a little bit about who you are, and what you do when it comes to languages.
I enjoy learning languages, I've learned languages, you know, throughout my life
for various reasons. And in particular, in the last 15 or 16 years, I've been very much
involved with learning languages online, I have a YouTube channel called lingosteve,
together with my son, I co-founded a platform for learning languages called link lingq.com.
I'm currently learning Arabic and Persian. And, yeah, I like languages.
Okay, so how many languages do you actually know?
To some extent, I would say 20! I can easily communicate, like right away now
10, or 12, and other 8 languages or so that I did learn well enough to use when I was in
the country or that I'm in the process of learning? And it would, you know,
I'd need a little bit of work to get them up to a decent level, let's put it that way.
You said you had a method. So, tell me my students are desperate to know, What is your secret?
I believe that the brain gradually gets used to a language, you have to be exposed to a
certain amount of the language for the brain to start to get used to it. And so, I spend
most of my time in sort of listening and reading and then when I have the opportunity I speak,
but my focus is on comprehension, accumulating vocabulary through a lot of listening and
reading. That's the sort of approach that we have, you know, made, I think, more efficient
in lingQ. But but the idea is that you have to give the brain a chance to acquire the language.
Just in the same way, I guess that children when they're learning to speak, do they are
absorbing the language all around them, aren't they before they even start to
really try to communicate back with us.
Right! And we have a big advantage over children. And we already have
a large vocabulary in our own language, whatever language that may be. So, we have concepts,
words in our own language that the children aren't even aware of in their own language. So, we do
have a head start over the kids, although they are more natural and less inhibited. Let's say.
I think that's one of the biggest things I try and teach my students in particular is to
try not to let your fear of mistakes hold you back. I think it's important to try and
just, just make mistakes and put yourself out there and try to use
the language as much as possible. I fully agree with that. Yeah.
You are a native English speaker, right? So, what motivated you? What was the first
language you learnt? What motivated you to learn so many languages.
I was born in Sweden. So, for the first five years of my life, I spoke Swedish. Now, I've been in
Canada for 71 years. So, I mean, English is my natural language. It's my native language. It's
the one that I speak the best, most naturally. But I think the fact that I was exposed to
another language when I was a small child probably helped, you know, as a 1617 year old in Montreal,
I got very interested in French because of a professor that we had, and I ended up going to
France spent three years there did my university education in France. And then after that,
I worked for the Canadian government, and they were looking to train people in Mandarin Chinese.
So, I was selected, and I was sent to Hong Kong to learn Mandarin Chinese. And then thereafter, I
learned I lived in Japan, my family, my wife, and kids, we lived in Japan. And so, once you realize
that, in fact, is not that difficult to learn languages, then it's something I like to do. And
I've continued doing. And particularly in the last 15, 16 years, since the age of 60, I decided to
learn Russian and after Russian then Czech and you know, I learned Ukrainian and Korean and Greek and
so I put more effort into it the last 15, 16 years than I than I did in the previous sort of period
of my life where I was mostly working didn't have so much time to spend on language learning.
How do you navigate switching between the languages when you
if you ever in a situation where you do have to switch? How do you
navigate that? And do you have any tips or tricks for switching into a different language?
I mean, you just have to get going in the language and the brain will take over. Like I trust my
brain and and I'll make mistakes you know the language is.. I'm obviously.. my Spanish is a
lot stronger than my Portuguese so when I speak Spanish, I will or at least Portuguese I'll mix
in Spanish. If I'm with Portuguese people more or Brazilian people more than there'll
be less of a mixture. I never worry about that the main objective is communicating.
Communication. And, and of course, my goal is comprehension. So as long as I
have that level of comprehension, and I can understand what the person is saying, I don't
really worry too much about how you know elegantly I express myself how many mistakes I make,
it doesn't really bother me. I don't consciously switch. It's not something that I deliberately do.
Ok. I know when my background previously was in acting, and I would, I would learn different
accents. And I had a trick, which was to or just have a phrase that belonged to each accent that
would give me the target sounds for that accent that I would say that phrase, and that would
help me to sit into it. But it's not I guess it's not the same when you have different languages.
No, no, no, no, I think that's true. Sometimes, if you're having trouble switching,
you got to find a word or a phrase, in that new language, I gotta find something that I can say
in Russian now because I've been speaking Chinese. And so, I'll say that and then
stumble a bit and slowly I'll slide into the Russian. So yeah, I think that's a good strategy.
You mentioned age, but you didn't say how old you are. Do you mind me asking how old you are now?
Yeah. I'm 76.
Wow. 76! And what age were you when you picked up your last language?
Well, you know, right now I'm working on I say Persian and Arabic, the Arabic is tougher,
because I'm doing a bit of Egyptian and a bit of Levantine and a bit of Standard Arabic. And
it's hard. The Arabic is difficult. Persian. Those are the two languages
that I'm working on right now. With the Persian it's not that bad, actually.
I understand a lot of podcasts, newscasts I talk if I there's a lot of Iranian immigrants
here in Vancouver, and I can chat with them. And they're very encouraging when I do that.
What do you think is the biggest obstacle for learning any language, just a blanket obstacle?
The important thing is to put in the time, put in the time with the language however you do it,
you can watch TV programs, you can read, you can talk to people, just spend time with the language
Don't worry about things you don't understand, there's always going to be
things you don't understand. And some people will pronounce better, and some people will
pronounce less well. And it really doesn't matter. I think the main thing is
to just stay with it and keep going you will continue to improve.
Have you approached every language in the same way
or like your method, your your resource that you'd like to use? Has it all been a very similar
strategy that you've used? Or have, you had to adjust your strategy, depending on the language?
The strategy has been the same, you have to do a lot of reading, reading and listening, reading and
listening. That's what I did. Long before I had ever heard of Stephen Krashen, who, of course, you
know, is the great guru of input-based learning. But it was obvious to me that that's what I had
to do. And I let the speaking kind of look at, you know, look after itself. It's not something
I worry about. It'll develop gradually through, you have to speak a lot to speak well, you can't,
you know, I like some I remember speaking to a group of immigrants here in Vancouver,
who were from China. And they wanted to learn enough English so that
they could speak to their kids’ teacher, or if ever a policeman stopped them on the highway,
you can't just, you know, get enough English so that in a particular situation, once a month,
you can use it, it's not going to happen. If they really want to get good in English, they
have to watch English television that they have to get in, you know, spend a lot of time with the
language. So, the only thing that I did a little differently was when I was learning Mandarin
Chinese. In order to learn the characters, I used spaced repetition system for the first
1000 characters. That was a system that I designed by myself. But it was based on the principle that
I had to keep on relearning, relearning, those that I thought I learned, I put them aside, then
I worked with the others and stuff. It was a form of spaced repetition, I won't go into details.
And the other thing that's changed, of course, is lingQ because all of those activities are now
more efficient. They’re taking advantage of you know, modern technology, mp3, online dictionaries,
the ability to bring in content from YouTube, from Netflix, you know, everything that
the internet makes available to us now for language learning. So that has changed.
You said that you're learning two languages at the moment.
In general, if someone has aspirations to learn many languages, do you recommend
learning more than one language at a time? Or do you think that's.. No. ..quite tricky to do?
Not a good thing to do. I don't know why I did it. I initially I also had Turkish in there,
too. I said, I don't know much about the Middle East. I'm going to try to learn Persian,
Arabic and Turkish. So, I was sort of three months on one. Three months on the other.
I dropped Turkish because because it's written in the Latin alphabet, essentially, it's going
to be easier. On the other side. Sometimes people get tired of learning one language
they feel they aren't getting anywhere. You can't keep on doing the same thing all the time.
The brain likes variety. So, to that extent, occasionally moving off into
another language can be a good thing, but it slows you it slows you down.
Do you do anything to maintain the languages that you've previously
learned? So, you're now working on new languages, but do you continue to listen
to different languages and just keep a hand in to make sure you don't go rusty?
I mean, I would love to, but there's just not enough time in the day. You know, I like to
play golf with my wife, I have other activities and have an hour and a half, two hours a day,
maybe at most to spend on language. If I were to spend that time on reviewing languages that I'm
you know, would like to improve in or whatever, maintain, I just don't have the time.
That's one interesting thing. When you relearn something that you've forgotten,
you end up better. And so, everything that I put into it is all there it's stored. I can't
bring it up right away, but I can go back to it, quickly bring it up to where it was,
and just move on. So, I don't worry about maintaining my languages, no.
You mentioned that you have a YouTube channel as well as LingQ.
Right. Yeah. What do you do on your YouTube channel? So,
if my guys want to come over and see what you do over there, what do you offer there?
What I try to do is encourage people. You know, relax, you can learn. Put in the time. Enjoy it.
That's the message. I mean, I and I cover it in different ways, different aspects of how we can
enjoy our language learning. Because enjoyment is the key. If you enjoy it, you're gonna stay
with it. If you stay with it, you'll improve. It's that simple. I think a lot of language teachers,
sometimes they overcomplicate things, there's too much of an emphasis on trying to get people
to master stuff, master the grammar. First of all, you can't master anything, but you're not
going to get very good at incorporating, you know, different aspects of grammar or even vocabulary,
if you haven't been exposing yourself enough to the to the language. And that's the message.
Most of my videos are in English. I try to speak clearly. And I think many people who are learning
English, listen to my videos. And of course, the script, the transcript is available on LingQ,
so they can actually study those as lessons in LingQ. They listened to improve their English.
Many say they find me easier to understand that many,
you know, average native speakers that they run into, but I also speak another language.
Fantastic. Fantastic. So, Steve, if it's alright with you, I'd like to do a very short,
quick fire round of questions if that's okay. Yeah, please. Yeah. Okay. So.
Favorite language to learn?
There is no favorite language, the one I'm on is my favorite.
Easiest language to learn?
The one that has the most common vocabulary with a language you already know.
Hardest?
Well, I would say you know, right now, Arabic but Chinese. I mean,
wherever there is no common vocabulary and a different script. It's more difficult.
Is a person ever too old to learn a new language?
I haven't reached that age yet. So, I don't think so.
Fantastic. Grammar rules, love them or hate them?
Grammar rules are fun. If you have enough experience with the language,
once you're familiar with the language,
it's fun to read grammar rules. And I would like to see more grammar texts in the target language.
Will you be learning any more languages after you finish learning the ones, you're on now?
Likely, maybe Indonesia, and maybe Swahili? I don't know. Whatever, it's fun, I enjoy it. And
every time you learn a language, you learn about the people, the culture, the history.
So, it's more than just the language. It's a whole,
you know, discovering different parts of the world sort of thing.
Another question that’s just popped into my head, and you've probably be one of the best people
to answer the question is I always have this debate with people about whether or not
some people who advertise you can be fluent in a language in 30 days,
or you can be fluent in just two weeks. Do you think that's true?
Not at all. Is it possible?
Not possible. Well, I shouldn't say
not possible. I don't. It's not possible for me. Very hard. It's not possible for me. And I
don't think there are many people who can learn so quickly. One of the people I enjoy reading is this
German neuro scientist, I guess he says the brain will always learn the brain is always dealing with
different experiences forming patterns. And so, it learns, but the brain learns slowly,
the brain learns slowly and I think everyone learning a language should be patient. Even if the
vocabulary is very similar, say French and Spanish or Spanish and Portuguese, it's still going to
take a long time to get used to it to develop new habits to feel comfortable. No, no, one month,
three months, no, it takes time and you're never perfect. So, you can always get better.
Brilliant. So, the takeaway message for people learning English because that's
my audience's goal and mission. I know it's not a language you learn but you're you know,
very well versed in taking on languages. The takeaway message is to not worry about grammar
until later down the line. Lots of listening lots of reading immersion and get speaking and make
mistakes and don't worry did I miss anything else? No, no, that's it. Develop your.. You have to
develop habits and you will. And there's all these different tenses in English but and you'll
get comfortable with certain tenses you mean, and you'll hear other people using them and
it's just a gradual process of acclimatizing yourself and getting used to a language and
don't overanalyze and try to enjoy it. The more you enjoy it, the better you'll do.
That's a really great message. Well, Steve,
it's been an absolute pleasure. I wish you all the best of luck with the new language.
Thank you! And Same to you. Brilliant. Okay, then. Thank you!
Take care. Bye bye. Bye bye.
Did you enjoy that? I did. If you enjoy watching these
interviews and have another person in mind that you would like me to interview them, please
do put their name down in the comments below and tell me what you'd like me to talk to them about.
I want to say a huge thank you to Steve, please do go and check out his YouTube Channel and his
website the LingQ, which I will link down below. And if you're new here, don't forget to subscribe
before you leave so you don't miss out on any future lessons.
Until next time, take care. Bye