Gabriel Wyner | Fluent Forever: How To Learn And Remember Languages (Episode 316)

Hack Your Language Learning.

“You get to meet different parts of yourself by going through the process of learning other languages.” – Gabriel Wyner

About Gabriel Wyner

Gabriel Wyner is the author of Fluent Forever: How to Learn a Language Fast and Never Forget It. He double majored in mechanical engineering and voice, and he trained as an opera singer, which gave him a practical reason to learn German, Italian, French and Russian. After a poor experience with classroom language learning, he built his own methods around ear training, images, and spaced repetition. He shares them through his book and at fluent-forever.com.

Key takeaways

• Fluency is a spectrum, and the European A1 to C2 scale is a more honest way to measure it than calling yourself fluent.
• There’s no special language gene. Everyone picks up the language they’re exposed to, and adults beat kids when you compare equal hours of exposure.
• Start with two to three weeks of pronunciation and ear training, because words that sound familiar are much easier to remember.
• Learn your first 600 or so concrete words from images, and search in the target language so you see what native speakers picture, not an English translation.
• Mix up the words you study instead of learning all the colors in one unit, which can boost retention by around 40%, and thematic grouping adds roughly another 10%.
• When you hit a word you don’t know, stay in the language and talk your way around the gap, because that skill is what fluency actually is.

Gabriel’s point that you get fluent by pushing through the uncomfortable moments applies to people skills too. If you want a structured way to practice connection and presence, the X-Factor Accelerator starts with a 1:1 onboarding call with Johnny and adds weekly group coaching over 90 days.

The Cheat Sheet:

• What is the European scale of fluency? (8:00)
• There is such thing as the language gene: true or false? (11:10)
• A simple language hack you can do at home watching TV. (14:00)
• How to boost your retention by 40% and 50%. (27:00)
• The first way to start learning a language: it’s NOT the way we’re taught in school. (32:00)
• Why you don’t need grammar drills. (38:30)
• And so much more…

There are people who are fluent in multiple languages: are they freaks of nature or do they have the “language gene”? Or are there tricks, tools and life hacks the rest of us can use to learn and remember foreign languages?

Our guest today is Gabriel Wyner is the author of Fluent Forever, a book about how to learn languages quickly and how to retain them forever. Join us as we talk about his techniques for learning a language quickly and retaining it, what the tremendous benefits are to fluency, the obvious and not-so-obvious ones, and where to get started when you decide to learn a foreign language…and loads more!

   

More About This Show:

Even though Gabriel Wyner has authored Fluent Forever, a book on language learning, he wasn’t always a language aficionado. He was a good language student in middle school and high school, but only in the respect that he tested well. He couldn’t speak any language he learned outside of the classroom and after awhile, he had forgotten much of the vocabulary he had learned.

In college, he double majored in Mechanical Engineering and Voice. He always wanted to be an engineer so he opted to go that route, but he also loved singing so he wanted to make that more than just a hobby. As a voice major, he had to learn to sing in Italian, Spanish and German. Not knowing a lick of German, his friend suggested he go to a school in Vermont called Middlebury and take a summer program. If Gabriel opted into one of their programs, it meant he had to speak the foreign language of his program for the entire time he was there. If he slipped up, he would be kicked out and would lose all of the money he had paid to be there. It sounded crazy enough to work, so he signed up and spent the next 7 weeks immersed in German. At the end of those 7 weeks, he was a B1 or a B2 on the European fluency scale, meaning he could order in a restaurant and carry on an in-depth conversation with ease. But that wasn’t enough for him, he returned the following summer and earned a C1 certification in German. That certification meant he was fluent on the European scale; in Europe, if he had wanted to, he could teach in their school system and he could write an academic paper with ease. Even though immersion works, Gabriel realizes not everyone has time for that. Most of us can’t take 7 weeks off and run to Vermont to learn another language! If you’re like most people and need to learn a language within the confines of a typical life, he has plenty of suggestions for you in this episode. His first suggestion when getting started is to learn the pronunciation of a language. Train your ear to hear the words in that language, before you do anything else like learning the alphabet or colors or numbers. After you’ve trained your brain on how to hear the language, which will take about 2-3 weeks, then learn basic words. But here’s a critical life hack to doing so: use images. And not just any images, use the Google search tool in your target language to learn the images associated with words. Often simple words mean something else to their native speakers. Once you’ve moved through those stages, then go on to learn the grammar. But all you need is your grammar guide, you won’t need grammatical drills…Gabriel tells us why. One last tip he leaves us with is a way to expand our vocabulary and become fluent faster after we’re speaking a new language. When you find you don’t know a word, you can either revert back to English or you can use the other words you do know in the new language and get other people to help you fill in the blank. You’ll have the added benefit of having learned something new from someone (and perhaps giving them a laugh in the process), and having learned while under a bit of stress which makes your brain retain it better. Please join me in thanking Gabriel for being on the show. He was a fun guest to have on. I loved that we debunked some language myths, gave you some life hack language-learning tools and generally set the foundation for the fast, easier way to learn and retain a language. Thanks for being here and we’ll see you next time.

THANKS GABRIEL!

Resources from this episode:

Gabriel’s web site Fluent Forever, Gabriel’s book Anki   You’ll also like: -The Art of Charm Toolbox -Best of The Art of Charm Podcast

Best quotes from Gabriel Wyner

“I think the more you study a language, the less you’re convinced that you’re fluent.”

Gabriel Wyner, 7:00

“When you really control for the amount of time each person’s been exposed to, adults learn better every time.”

Gabriel Wyner, 12:30

“You see these different parts of yourself and you only get to meet these parts by actually doing it.”

Gabriel Wyner, 20:00

“When you look at the data, going in random order compared to learning all the colors at once, you’re boosting your retention by 40%.”

Gabriel Wyner, 25:30

“The more you struggle, the more effective your test becomes.”

Gabriel Wyner, 39:30

FAQ

Who is Gabriel Wyner (Gabe Wyner)?

Gabriel Wyner is an author and opera singer who writes about how to learn languages. He double majored in mechanical engineering and voice, and he wrote Fluent Forever. In this episode he explains how he went from earning C’s in school languages to learning several of them as an adult.

What is the Fluent Forever book about?

Fluent Forever: How to Learn a Language Fast and Never Forget It lays out Gabriel’s method for learning and keeping a language. The method relies on ear training first, then image-based vocabulary, then grammar, with spaced repetition software like Anki to make it stick. In the episode he says he built it because he has a poor memory and needed a system that worked.

How did the Fluent Forever author learn German?

He had no German when he signed up for Middlebury’s summer program in Vermont, where students pledge to speak only German or get kicked out. After seven weeks he was around B1 or B2 on the European scale. He went back the next summer and reached C1, the level he calls fluent.

What does Fluent Forever suggest doing first when learning a language like German?

Spend the first two to three weeks on pronunciation and learning the language’s spelling system, so you can hear and represent every sound. Then learn about 600 simple, concrete words using images instead of English translations. Only after that does he suggest opening a grammar book.

Do you need grammar drills to learn a language this way?

No. Gabriel says that once you know the most frequent words, you can work through a grammar book page by page. You pull out a few examples from each page and add them to a spaced repetition program like Anki. The software repeats them just enough, so you don’t have to do endless drills.

Related reading

• How to keep a conversation going
• How to get better at small talk
• How to have deeper conversations
• Overcoming anxiety when meeting new people

Learning anything new works best with reps, feedback, and people in your corner. See what the 90 days look like →