How to Learn Any Language

Avoid these 10 mistakes and become

fluent in your target language

Copyright © 2022 Smart Language Learning Academy Srls

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 Table of Contents
Introduction ........................................................................................................... 1

Mistake 1: Start for the Wrong Reasons ..................................................... 2

Mistake 2: Set Vague Goals ............................................................................. 5

Mistake 3: Learn Only When You Feel Like It ............................................. 8

Mistake 4: Buy As Many Resources As Possible ..................................... 11

Mistake 5: Look for the “Best Way” To Learn (and Don’t Start Until

You Find It) .......................................................................................................... 14

Mistake 6: Speak Early, Speak Often (and Ignore Everything Else!) .. 17

Mistake 7: Make Learning Grammar a Priority ......................................... 20

Mistake 8: Avoid Listening at All Costs ...................................................... 24

Mistake 9: Cram Words Into Your Brain, As Fast as You Can ............. 27

Mistake 10: Force Yourself To Do Things You Don’t Enjoy ................... 30

Conclusion............................................................................................................ 33

About the Author............................................................................................... 35

About the Smart Language Learning Academy....................................... 36

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 Introduction
Language learning is more accessible than ever.

Why has the increase in accessibility not led to an increase

in success rates among language learners?

I believe it’s because people are not trained to learn effectively on

their own.

We’re stuck in the old paradigm of language learning, where we

need a teacher to tell us why to learn, what to learn, and how to
learn it. The new paradigm is different. Here, the learner is in charge
of all of those decisions.

To walk the learner’s path effectively, you need to know how to

decide well between all of the options available to you. If you can’t,
you’ll inevitably make mistakes, which lead to struggle and uncer-
tainty.

In this guide, I’ll cover a series of ten such mistakes. If you can avoid
these, then you’ll be more likely to succeed.

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 M I S TA K E 1

Start for the Wrong Reasons

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No one starts learning a language without some idea of why they
want to do it.

These reasons (or “whys”) can vary, and their effectiveness varies
from person to person.

Despite this, I believe there are “right” reasons and “wrong”

reasons to learn a language.

In general, the best reasons for learning a language will have three
specific characteristics.

They are:

• Incredibly motivating for you

• They are well-defined

• They come from within, rather than from an outside source

Conversely, the worst reasons for learning a language are:

• Not particularly motivating (or worse, demotivating)

• They are vague, and poorly-defined

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 • They are imposed on you by other people, rather than yourself.

If you start learning a language for the “wrong reasons” as de-

scribed above, you might not end up learning for very long. Wrong
reasons are dangerous because they are not durable. They cannot
withstand the inevitable stresses and challenges that come along
with language learning.

Right reasons, on the other hand, are durable. When you encounter
stresses and challenges, you’ll want to overcome them because of
your reasons.

So avoid the mistake of learning a language for imprecise reasons,

or because someone else told you it might be a good idea. In cases
like that, you might be motivated for a little while, but you won’t be
pushed to keep learning once the going gets tough.

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 M I S TA K E 2

Set Vague Goals

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A goal is a target. If you know exactly where the target is, you’ll
have a much better chance of hitting it. If, however, you only have
a general idea of where the target is (or even what it is), it’s much
less likely you’ll even aim in the right direction, let alone hit the bull-
seye.

You want to avoid setting goals that are:

• Vague

• Hard to measure

• Too ambitious (or not ambitious enough)

• Unrelated to your goals and ambitions

• Lacking a strict deadline

Let’s take a common goal that is popular among inexperienced

learners:

“I want to reach fluency”

This is a poor goal for all of the above reasons.

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• “Fluency” is a highly controversial term with multiple competing
meanings

• There is no clear way to measure “fluency”, since overall fluency

depends on the growth of many interrelated skills

• The attainability of fluency depends on the timeframe within

which you want to achieve it, which was not included in the
goal statement. Achieving fluency in a handful of months might
be too ambitious, but achieving fluency in a few years might
not be ambitious enough.

• Fluency might not even be necessary for your overall goals.

If you want to travel around Italy, for example, knowing some
Italian will help, but you don’t need to be fluent to make it work.

• Without a deadline, we won’t be able to tell when this goal is

achieved or not. On top of that, we won’t feel any pressure to
stick to our routines.

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 M I S TA K E 3

Learn Only When You Feel Like It

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For most people, whether or not they actually sit down and learn
a language is decided by a simple mental flowchart:

Yes Do I feel like No

learning today?

Learn! Don’t learn

Following this formula, motivation is a prerequisite for action. If you

have motivation, you take action, and if not, well, maybe you’ll try
again tomorrow.

Thinking of language learning in this way often prompts learners to

look for a source of infinite motivation. If they only had such a “fuel
source”, they would learn every day!

I’m sorry to say that such an infinite source of motivation does not
exist. There are ways to increase motivation (see “right reasons”

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in section one), but no ways to keep it going forever. Heck, even
I have days where I don’t feel like learning at all.

What separates successful learners from unsuccessful ones is the

mental flowchart. Whereas yours is probably similar to the one
pictured above, mine goes a little more like this:

Yes Do I feel like No

learning today?

Learn
Learn! anyway!

I don’t depend on motivation to take action because, as author Hal

Elrod states, “by taking action, the action itself will produce the
feelings & motivation you need to follow through.”

So don’t let motivation be a prerequisite for action. Instead, flip the

formula on it’s head and let action be a prerequisite for motivation.

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 M I S TA K E 4

Buy As Many Resources

As Possible

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I grew up in the proverbial “dark ages” of language learning, in the
time before the Internet. Resources for independent learning were
extremely rare, and you were generally limited to what you could
find in your local library or bookstore. Choices were practically
nonexistent.

This is how it was in 1999, when I first decided to learn Dutch

on my own. I had one, single resource, and so had no choice but
to learn from it until I either finished the book or outgrew what it
could teach me. This helped me stay focused on the task at hand,
and helped limit my distractions.

Trying to learn a language nowadays is entirely different. In recent

years, when I’ve tried to pick up a popular language (like Japanese,
for example), I don’t have one option, but thousands. And they’re
not limited to books, but rather include video courses, smartphone
apps, online tutors, and much more.

This might seem like a good thing, but it makes the act of getting
started a lot more difficult. Having so many choices causes you to
waste time on figuring out which of those choices is the best one,
or even a good choice, period.

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Many people in this position get caught in a loop of buying and
trying so many resources that they can scarcely call themselves
language learners—instead, they’ve become resource collectors.

Avoid this mistake by placing artificial constraints on your resource

selection process. Do a few hours of research, and then commit to
purchasing only two or three resources. Then, make a conscious
decision to use those materials (and ONLY those materials) for at
least three months before moving on to a new batch.

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 M I S TA K E 5

Look for the “Best Way” To Learn

(and Don’t Start Until You Find It)

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There is no shortage of language learning methods that claim to be
“the best”, “the fastest”, or the “most effective”. Is there one method
that can really claim to be all of those things? The one method which
can help‌anyone learn a language? Lots of learners take up the
quest of trying to answer that question before they ever sit down
to learn for the first time. They scour forums, read endless reviews,
and (again) buy resource after resource, hoping to find the “holy
grail” of learning.

I’m here to tell you that there is no “holy grail” of language learn-
ing. Even if there were, it wouldn’t be a good use of your time
trying to find it. In nearly all cases, you’d be much better off just
getting started, and then refining your process from there.

The truth is that in the absence of a true one-size-fits-all language

learning method, we have something much better: a variety of
“good” methods, which are ideally suited to people with particular
interests and learning styles.

Finding a “good” method for you is much easier to do than finding

the “best” method. Furthermore, it’s something you can do in a few
hours, rather than days, weeks, or months.

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Just go on any language forum, and ask around for a bit. How are
people learning? What are they using? While you’ll probably find
some strong opinions that X method is better than Y method, it’s
more likely that both X and Y are decent methods, and you should
give one (or both) of them a try.

After you’ve tried one for a bit, you’ll then have enough information
to decide whether you want to stick with the method you have, or
try the other alternatives out there. Rinse and repeat. It won’t be
long until you find some part of some method that works great for
you, and then you just have to iterate from there.

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 M I S TA K E 6

Speak Early, Speak Often

(and Ignore Everything Else!)

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Bring up the topic of language learning with nearly anyone you
meet, and they’ll probably tell you one thing: they wish they were
able to speak a foreign language well.

There’s something about speaking that makes it stand out among

all of the other activities you can learn a language for. Even if the
idea of conversing with another person in a different language is
something a lot of people find scary, they will undoubtedly say that
it’d be super cool if they could actually do it.

With this thought in mind, it’s not uncommon to find language

learners who begin their journeys with speaking as their sole focus.

With little knowledge of vocabulary, sentence structure, or pronun-

ciation, these people speak right away, and hope that by speaking
a lot, they won’t have to worry about the less flashy and less
attractive skills of listening, reading, or even writing.

Unfortunately, I can say from experience that this doesn’t really

work. While there are certain language skills that can boost others,
speaking isn’t one of them.

Generally, when learners focus primarily on speaking, it results in

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a number of negative outcomes, including difficulties related to
expressing yourself with clear ideas and pronunciation, and
understanding what others are saying to you.

To avoid these difficulties, I don’t recommend going all-in on

speaking practice, especially at the very beginning. Even if
speaking is ultimately very important to you, it is better to focus on
listening and reading for a majority of your language practice. If, for
example, you do listening- and reading-related activities for 80%
of your learning time, the other 20% can be spent on speaking.

Approaching your learning in this way will account for the

developmental gaps that a speaking-only routine will create,
and will help you speak more effectively in the long run.

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 M I S TA K E 7

Make Learning Grammar a Priority

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As I mentioned in the introduction, most people’s first experiences
with language learning come from a language classroom. Because
of that, people who are learning by themselves for the first time
tend to lean on approaches and techniques they remember from
their school days.

This holds true most of all for grammar learning, which is often
cited as the hardest and most unpopular part of the language
learning process. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard
people tell me that they hated learning grammar in school, and
that grammar study was their biggest motivator for giving up on
the idea of reaching fluency in a foreign language.

Despite this general distaste for academic grammar study, it’s

rare for learners to look for a better way. Instead, people generally
assume that since this is how grammar is taught in school, it
therefore must be effective, so they should use the same methods
to learn on their own.

So, they grab a grammar book and get to work. They write out the
conjugation tables, they do the grammar drills, they complete all
of the fill-in-the-blank exercises, and (surprise!) they get the same

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result they got in school—they’re tired, confused, bored, and ready
to give up.

Here’s the plain and simple truth. You don’t have to learn grammar
like this. In fact, I will wholeheartedly say it’s a mistake to do so.

Instead, you should look to a different model, one we are all familiar
with. The model of how children learn their first languages.

When you learned your first language as a small child, I can guar-
antee that you did so without ever opening a grammar book. Your
parents never had to teach you the difference between a noun and
a verb, and you didn’t learn what a “tense” was until you were
already in school.

Instead, you learned grammar through exposure. You were

immersed in years of listening and reading your target language,
and your brain deduced grammar patterns from there.

You’re not a kid now, but you can still learn grammar in much the
same way. Listen to your target language a lot. Read a lot.

Nowadays, it’s not hard to get massive exposure to things like

texts, podcasts, TV shows and movies, even without going to the

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country where your target language is spoken.

If you can focus on getting that exposure, your grammar

knowledge will expand gradually, without you needing to ever
explicitly focus on it.

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 M I S TA K E 8

Avoid Listening at All Costs

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In the last section, I mentioned how spending lots of time learning
grammar can be an ineffective and demotivating way to attempt
to acquire a new language. All that being said, it can lead to other
problems as well.

If you make the mistake of devoting too much time to grammar

study, you’re reducing the time you could feasibly be spending on
more effective techniques like listening. Again, this is an approach
to learning that likely came from school—I mean, do you remember
getting lots of listening practice in language class? I sure don’t!

Listening, however, is perhaps the most important of all of the

language skills. In fact, when I mentioned in an earlier section
that there are certain skills that can boost others, I was specifically
referring to listening.

Considering that writing is actually a human invention, listening is

really the input skill par excellence. By practicing it early and often,
you can develop a whole host of linguistic sub-skills, including:

• Accurate pronunciation

• Accurate intonation

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 • An authentic accent

• A robust vocabulary (built from words you’ve heard)

• And more

If you’re learning a language that has a relatively phonetic writing

system, you’ll even be able to spell words accurately just by hearing
them, which directly improves your reading ability, as well!

The takeaway here is simple: make listening to your target language

your biggest learning priority each and every day, and it will make
the entire learning process go much more quickly and smoothly.

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 M I S TA K E 9

Cram Words Into Your Brain,

As Fast as You Can

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Yet another poor habit people develop from learning languages
in a classroom is an overreliance on learning words through “rote
memorization.”

If you’re familiar with flashcards and vocabulary lists, then you

know exactly what I mean: deliberately reviewing information over
and over in the shortest time possible, with the goal of forcing it
into your long-term memory.

Despite the fact that rote memorization is still a hugely popular

learning tool in the modern classroom, recent advances in neuro-
science have revealed something you might have guessed long
ago: rote memorization doesn’t work!

While you might be able to read a vocabulary list enough times in

one day to pass a test on it the next, it’s extremely likely that you’ll
have forgotten all of that information in a week. That might not be
a problem for a learner in a high school class, but it sure is one for
the learner who wants to retain and use the language for months,
if not years.

The key issue with rote memorization is not the repetition itself,
but rather the frequency of it. Getting lots of repetition over a short

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time will do little to store information in your brain. On the other
hand, getting lots of repetition over a long time will do wonders for
your learning, and is exactly the approach you should be looking to
take.

In previous sections, I talked about getting massive exposure to

your target language. If you can listen to and read authentic content
in your target language over a long time, you will naturally get all
the repetition you need in order to get useful words, phrases and
sentences into your long-term memory.

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 M I S TA K E 10

Force Yourself to Do Things

You Don’t Enjoy

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I’ve spent a lot of time here talking about the pitfalls of learning
methods that are most commonly used in school, such as:

• Explicit grammar study

• Minimal listening practice

• Rote memorization

But you know what might be the worst part about all of these
approaches?

None of them are any fun!

When you go about your learning using these methods, you fall
into the trap of believing that this is what language learning has to
be like. Since the most popular academic techniques for learning
a language are highly boring and highly frustrating, you feel like
your independent learning has to go the same way.

But this is simply not true. Language learning doesn’t have to be

boring at all. You can get fun and enjoyment out of the process all
the way through. And the way to do this is to never force yourself
to learn in ways you do not enjoy.

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I’m being serious here. I love every bit of my language learning,
and it’s only because I’m absolutely ruthless about cutting out any
parts of the process that don’t invigorate me and excite me, and
keep me learning, each and every day.

You don’t have to listen to the experts. You don’t even have to listen to
me. If I’ve suggested something in these pages that totally doesn’t
align with the way you like to learn, just drop it right away, and go
find something better. I won’t be offended, I promise!

You need to enjoy your learning because enjoyment, in many ways,

is the thing that keeps you coming back. Not only for a few days,
or a few months, but weeks, years, and decades. And that’s the
kind of consistency you’ll need if you want to absolutely crush your
language learning goals!

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 Conclusion
No matter your previous experience with language learning, it’s
inevitable that you will make lots and lots of mistakes.

This is an unavoidable part of the process. Heck, I’ve learned over

a dozen languages in the last thirty years, and I make mistakes all
the time! In most cases, mistakes should be seen as a welcome part
of the process, and an opportunity to learn, and do better next time.
In some cases, though, there are mistakes that can have lasting
consequences for your learning, and should be avoided entirely.

In this guide, I’ve outlined ten such mistakes:

1. Start for the wrong reasons

2. Set vague goals

3. Learn only when you feel like it

4. Buy as many resources as possible

5. Look for the “best way” to learn, and don’t start until you find it

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 6. Speak early, speak often (and ignore everything else)

7. Make learning grammar a priority

8. Avoid listening at all costs

9. Cram words into your brain, as fast as you can

10. Force yourself to do things you don’t enjoy

With just this guide, you now have plenty of information to help
you recognize, avoid, or even fix these issues in your own life and
language learning.

However, if you’re interested in learning more about how to

structure your language learning so that you’re fully protected
against making these mistakes, I recommend you check out
my Ultimate Guide to Smart Language Learning, which will dive
into each of these topics in deeper detail.

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 About the Author

Luca Lampariello is an expert language learner from Rome,

Italy, and the founder of the Smart Language Learning Academy.
Currently, he speaks fifteen languages, ten of which at a fluent
level. Since 2008, he has shared his language learning techniques
and methods via his personal YouTube channel and his website
LucaLampariello.com. Luca has also spent the last twelve years
working independently as a language coach and building courses
on how to learn foreign languages, helping hundreds of thousands
of language learners achieve their goals. Altogether, his teachings

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have attracted hundreds of thousands of followers, and inspired
people from all around the world to become proficient in foreign
languages.

About the Smart Language

Learning Academy

Founded by noted polyglot Luca Lampariello, the Smart Language

Learning Academy is an online platform dedicated to helping
language learners reach their full potential in any—or as
many—languages as they want. This is done through the sharing
of Luca’s tried and tested learning methods, developed over
decades of learning and teaching foreign languages. Those who
wish to learn from the Academy can do so through enrolling in
online courses, reading blog posts, articles, and guides,
participating in expert webinars, and signing up to receive
one-on-one language coaching sessions from coaches trained in
Luca’s methods. If you’re interested in learning more about the
Academy, feel free to visit https://www.lucalampariello.com

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