Speaker 1: Hello guys, welcome to my channel. This is Zoe. How's your language learning going? If you are learning several languages at once or want to do so, today's video is for you. I got a lot of questions from you like how to maintain the level of the languages while learning other languages. Some friends are not sure if they should start learning a new language because they may lose the level of other languages or they may mix them up. Other friends wrote to me like, Zoe, I've decided to learn four languages because you have inspired me. To be honest, I feel a bit worried about it because I don't want to mislead you. I know we are indeed interested in different languages and it's difficult to decide. I know it's exciting to study several languages and discover different cultures. Still, I need to make this video to tell you the reality. It's super challenging and it requires a lot of energy, passion and discipline. So today I will be sharing with you in detail my journey of learning six foreign languages, French, English, Arabic, German, Turkish and Persian. You will see how I gradually learned one language after another, what difficulties I encountered, how I dealt with these difficulties. I will try to give you some handy and practical advice as always. I hope this can give you some ideas and inspiration. If you like this video, don't forget to hit the like button and support me. Don't forget to subscribe to my channel. Is it possible to learn several languages simultaneously? A big yes. Theoretically, I'm learning six languages simultaneously, but I didn't start learning them at the same time. Here is a timeline. From September 2015 to September 2016, I focused only on French. I got a Diploma C1 and studied my MA in Sociology in France. Sometimes we had conferences in English and I realized that my English was very weak. I could understand, but I couldn't speak because I had never practiced before. Living in France was my first experience abroad. So I told myself that if I wanted to have an international academic career, I had to improve my English. So I started to work on my English and French simultaneously, even though I could already speak French fluently in everyday life, it was still difficult for me to follow the courses, and to read quickly, we had to read a lot. Writing dissertation or thesis in French was still a big challenge. So for French, I concentrated on the lectures, listening to the recording, checking the new keywords from articles and books. For English, I bought grammar and an academic vocabulary book. I watched a lot of online lectures in English, lots of open classes in philosophy, sociology, and history, and did a lot of shadowing exercises to improve my pronunciation. At that time, my French was much better than my English. If there were words I didn't know in English, I check it and wrote them down in French. I still use this method a lot today. I mostly take notes in English and French for other languages. I rarely take notes in my native language, Chinese. It was not difficult to balance these two languages because most of the time I was studying and using French. I just put learning English into my daily routine. If you are in the same situation, there is a dominant language like French. Devote most of the time, energy to it. And another language, put it in a fixed routine, 30 minutes a day, for example, from 7.30 to 8 a.m., for example, with a clear plan that targets your weakness, like shadowing for my pronunciation, grammar exercises for my grammar. What I have learned from that period is that we should do things with a long-term vision. At that time, French seemed more important to me to live in France, to get my degree, but my decision to improve English and integrate it into my daily life, into my daily routine, has changed my life three years later. Today, I can lecture in English. I'm not afraid to attend any international conferences. I can write articles in English, and now most of the content of my channel is in English to reach a wider public. I really got a lot of opportunities because of it. At the end of my NA, I decided to learn Arabic. At that time, my level of French was already sufficient to manage my academic tasks. So my goal became Arabic and English. The same principle, Arabic was my dominant language. English, the routine as before, but I reduced the time of studying English to only two, three times a week. Another tip, when I watch movies, series, or videos on YouTube today in Arabic, French, and English, even if I can understand everything, I always turn on the CC subtitles to see new words and expressions. This is how I learned new skills, and at the same time, many new words and terms about photography, videography, gym, and makeup, cooking. That's how I maintain my level in these languages without a lot of additional studies. A year after learning Arabic, I decided to learn German because of my academic vision, and I wanted to read sociology and philosophy books in German. It was the first time I felt overwhelmed, but I told myself the same strategy, to focus on Arabic and learning German, stayed in a basic daily routine. I studied one lesson with Divi Deutsche Welle every day. English and French, I always watch videos and read books and sometimes talk to a friend to maintain my level. Now, doing videos in English is a good way to practice as well. One of the challenges was that I studied to mix Arabic and German. Even though they are so different, especially as Arabic was my priority language, I used to think in Arabic and translate everything into Arabic. So I set two separate study blocks. I began studying Arabic in the morning, so I only studied studying German after 4 p.m. Another challenge was that I was frustrated because I didn't feel the same progress in German as Arabic, but I thought the goal of each period was different. At that moment, what I needed in German was a good solid structure, especially grammar. My time, energy and environment didn't allow me to do more. So different periods, different focuses. After three months in Egypt, I went back to China to see my parents, then came back to France and studied my PhD. I was very interested in Turkish and Persian, but I was afraid I wouldn't be able to balance everything. I assumed I should learn these two languages after my PhD. Now, I'm not gonna touch. But I wanted to travel to Turkey during the Christmas holiday. I was like, why not starting learning some Turkish just for discovering? So I just followed the lessons 15 to 30 minutes a day. In this video, I explain in more details how I study a language from scratch, and I give many examples of learning Turkish. After a month, I decided to learn Persian. I use the same strategy as for Turkish, less, but regularly. Sometimes I was too busy. I studied Turkish on even days or Persian on odd days. Guys, it seems that I have experience learning languages. I'm pretty organized and disciplined, but I still have difficulties in learning four languages simultaneously. First of all, the balance between them. Theoretically, I know the hierarchy very well, Arabic, German, Turkish, and Persian. But sometimes you feel more motivated to learn a new language like Turkish and Persian. I feel more progress in the beginning. It was more enjoyable to learn, to study. I knew I was going to travel to the countries and practice with people, but I couldn't find the motivation to learn German. I have to be honest, I didn't take lessons anymore. Sometimes I only talked to my language partner once a week. It happened, it happened to me. Sometimes you just couldn't find the motivation. So I was a bit stressed. I used to feel frustrated because of that, but I've trained my vision of language learning and set more realistic expectations, no longer tracing progress in each language simultaneously, but setting long-term goals. For example, from last year, when I started my channel November, 2021 until November, 2022, I set a general goal for each language. I want to have progress in each language. I split it into several short-term goals, depending on the situation at a given time. During a period, I focus on one or two languages, but I maintain the level of others. Like this semester, I studied more Arabic, and now I've just finished my studies. So my current focus is Turkish and Persian because I will travel to Iran and Turkey again this summer. I want to see more progress in these two languages, and I will only maintain my level in Arabic and German by studying like two times a week, but you really have to do it two times a week. From September, I will concentrate on German, and I will only keep my Arabic, Persian, Turkish level. Some friends are afraid to lose their level if they learn a new language, but it depends if you already have an intermediate or advanced level. You had a good speaking skill before, you won't lose your level quickly, like my French, English, and Arabic. Even I don't practice for a while, I have no problem switching to this language and speak, and I can speak fluently. But I suggest you integrate some activities with these languages into your daily life, like reading books, watching videos, to keep the level. Another difficulty is mixing languages. I don't mix English, French, German, and Arabic anymore, but when I started to learn Turkish and Persian, I used to mix them horribly because there are many, many, many similar words you can't imagine, guys, wallah. I still remember I used to talk to my language exchange partner in Turkish from 7 to 8 p.m. and in Persian from 8 to 9 p.m. because I only had time in evening and I wanted to study these two languages every day to progress. At that time, I thought it was a great plan, but it was not a good idea at all. I was mixing these two languages and it was so counterproductive. So I decided to do Turkish on odd days and Persian on even days. Even now, I can study Turkish and Persian every day. I will still try to set two study sessions with long intervals, morning Turkish and evening Persian. Another helpful exercise in separating two languages is thinking and speaking in one target language. For example, now I'm out, I'm going home. I know that tonight I'm gonna study Persian. I'm not gonna wait until I get home and sit at a table to learn Persian. Still, I'm already going to force myself to think in Persian while I'm walking down the street. It's like warming up exercise. It's not easy, but when you look up a word in Persian, it will train your brain to react in that language. It helped me a lot to separate the languages. At the end of this video, I want to say that if you are not sure whether you should learn another language or languages, ask yourself, why do you want to learn this language? What is a goal you want to achieve in one year? How much time should you invest in learning this language based on this goal? Can you do it? Don't forget to take into account the time you need to maintain the level of other languages. Pay attention to difficulties such as the balance between languages, the frustration of not progressing or progressing slowly, and the risk of mixing languages. I hope the tips in the video can help you. I hope this video can inspire you. If you have any questions and want to share your story, write in a comment. If you like this video, don't forget to give me a like. See you guys, bye.