<story><title>I used the internet to painlessly relearn a foreign language</title><url>https://medium.com/@robertwiblin/how-i-used-the-internet-to-painlessly-relearn-a-foreign-language-and-you-could-to-63139f0dc5b6</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>giorgosera</author><text>Almost a year ago I decided to start learning Russian so that I can talk with my girlfriend in her native language (the things we do for love )&lt;p&gt;Initially I tried the usual things like Duolingo, Babbel and some other apps. Out of those things the only one I found useful was Duolingo because it can get you started pretty quickly.&lt;p&gt;However, I got stuck after that. I couldn&amp;#x27;t see myself making any progress. Then I stumbled upon the Comprehensible Input theory and TPRS and since then I&amp;#x27;ve been studying Russian using a method that loosely follows these.  Here&amp;#x27;s what I do:&lt;p&gt;- I find short stories, news articles, social media posts etc online. 
- I read those texts and mark down the new words as I learn them. I add those words in a flashcard app and I practice them using SRS. I use an app called Ulangi.
- I ask my girlfriend (a native speaker) to ask me short questions about the text and I have to answer in my target language.
- Once I feel comfortable with that text I repeat the process with the next one.&lt;p&gt;And it works (at least for me). I grew my vocabulary immensely, I can acquire grammar rules naturally (like I did with my native language) and I get to actually speak the language from day 1. As an added bonus I get to learn a lot about the culture of my target language.&lt;p&gt;However, translating and saving words in my vocabulary became tedious so I decided to automate this whole process. So I started building a tool for me. I, then, realized that this might be useful for others so I made it public. You can use it for free at Talkabl.com</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>interestica</author><text>This is excellent! Lots of potential here.&lt;p&gt;On mobile, I just tested the default French lesson. Right now, the &amp;#x27;dictionary&amp;#x27; seems to be displayed dependent on where the last appearance of the word in the text. This means that if I select a word in the first paragraph but the word also appears in the last paragraph, I have to scroll to the bottom to see its definition (and add it to &amp;#x27;my list&amp;#x27;). (ex: &amp;#x27;protestaires&amp;#x27; in the default FR lesson) The column, in mobile view, gets bumped to the bottom.&lt;p&gt;I don&amp;#x27;t think you have to go as far as a modal window - something as simple as &amp;#x27;position:fixed&amp;#x27; would let it pop on top of the text (though right now, the dictionary box doesn&amp;#x27;t have a defined independent class and is not contained). It&amp;#x27;s probably best for the large-screen view as well: you don&amp;#x27;t want your text body to be moving around while reading.&lt;p&gt;But seriously, this is one of the simplest, smartest and most extensible language learning tools I&amp;#x27;ve come across. Thank you for sharing it.&lt;p&gt;edit&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;
It&amp;#x27;s a FF&amp;#x2F;Webkit quirk, but because the parent element (.bx--content) has &amp;#x27;transform&amp;#x27; property applied to it, it will prevent the child div from actually responding to &amp;#x27;position:fixed&amp;#x27;.</text></comment>
<story><title>I used the internet to painlessly relearn a foreign language</title><url>https://medium.com/@robertwiblin/how-i-used-the-internet-to-painlessly-relearn-a-foreign-language-and-you-could-to-63139f0dc5b6</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>giorgosera</author><text>Almost a year ago I decided to start learning Russian so that I can talk with my girlfriend in her native language (the things we do for love )&lt;p&gt;Initially I tried the usual things like Duolingo, Babbel and some other apps. Out of those things the only one I found useful was Duolingo because it can get you started pretty quickly.&lt;p&gt;However, I got stuck after that. I couldn&amp;#x27;t see myself making any progress. Then I stumbled upon the Comprehensible Input theory and TPRS and since then I&amp;#x27;ve been studying Russian using a method that loosely follows these.  Here&amp;#x27;s what I do:&lt;p&gt;- I find short stories, news articles, social media posts etc online. 
- I read those texts and mark down the new words as I learn them. I add those words in a flashcard app and I practice them using SRS. I use an app called Ulangi.
- I ask my girlfriend (a native speaker) to ask me short questions about the text and I have to answer in my target language.
- Once I feel comfortable with that text I repeat the process with the next one.&lt;p&gt;And it works (at least for me). I grew my vocabulary immensely, I can acquire grammar rules naturally (like I did with my native language) and I get to actually speak the language from day 1. As an added bonus I get to learn a lot about the culture of my target language.&lt;p&gt;However, translating and saving words in my vocabulary became tedious so I decided to automate this whole process. So I started building a tool for me. I, then, realized that this might be useful for others so I made it public. You can use it for free at Talkabl.com</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>OJFord</author><text>That looks great! Definitely warrants its own submission in my opinion.&lt;p&gt;What do you have to do in order to support extra languages? Perhaps ensure font support if loading from web, and the dictionary comes from Wiktionary so you do need to know what language it is, but other than that should &amp;#x27;just work&amp;#x27;, anything else?</text></comment>