Motivation and language learning

It’s common to hear:

• “This year I’m going to learn … Spanish, because I’m going to Spain for a holiday at the end of the year.”
• “I desperately want to learn Japanese. It would be cool to be able to watch anime without subtitles.”
• “I want a raise, and to get it I need to improve my English.”
• “I’ve always wanted to learn piano. This will be the year I do!”
• “I want to eat healthier, so I’m going to learn to cook well.”
• …

You get all fired up and motivated at the start.

You research a bunch of different options, courses, textbooks, apps and language websites, perhaps you even purchase something or start to use an app/site like DuoLingo.

This motivation high lasts a short time, a few days or weeks, a couple of months if you’re lucky, and then starts to fade.

And then, it suddenly vanishes.

Motivation doesn’t last

“It’s too hard”, “I’m too old to learn a language”, “I don’t really have the time to spare”, and a hundred other small reasons to quit dance through your mind.

And you quit.

Or perhaps you put it off for another time (if that time ever comes).

I know. I’ve lost my motivation to learn languages and instruments, many times!

I vowed to continue to learn Spanish on my own after my high school cancelled the class. That lasted a whole week.

I stuck with Japanese a lot longer, learning for a few years on my own. But even that got put on hold when I moved to Germany. I still have a bookshelf full of Japanese language books, although I’ve only used a couple of them.

Even after moving to Germany, doing an intensive language class, I simply couldn’t find the motivation to learn German for a long time.

I was all fired up when I bought my electric cello, and when mum’s guitar was sent to me. However, several health hurdles that interfered with playing meant I stuck with semi-regular practice for only a few months. They’ve been gathering dust since the motivation left me.

Motivation is not enough.

I’m just not motivated

Language learning or learning an instrument is typically a ‘nice to have’, not a life-or-death skill you must develop. So it’s often the first thing we put off when our willpower is low and there is no motivation.

Instead of relying on motivation alone to keep us working on our languages, we need to take away the ‘willpower’ requirement.

When we are motivated, it doesn’t use much willpower to spend time studying or practicing. But when motivation has fled, it takes a tonne of willpower to choose to study or do a practice session.

We have a limited amount of willpower each day, and are faced with a lot of tasks we don’t like. Once our willpower is used up, we start making the easy choices, giving in to our lack of motivation.

Make learning a habit

Habits, like brushing our teeth, or getting up with an alarm don’t use much willpower. Rarely are there complaints about having no motivation to brush teeth, although it does feel like a boring chore at times.

Set up a system to make studying automatic and painless. Everyone’s system will be different as it’s tailored to their goals.

• Install a flashcard app on your phone. Whenever you are waiting somewhere, pull out the app. Uninstall Facebook or other distracting apps though!
• Have a regular meeting that you ‘have to go to’ with someone who only speaks the language you are learning. For me, that’s easy – my physiotherapy appointments would be boring and silent if I didn’t try to have a conversation with the therapist in German.
• Set up a weekly language exchange date, or hire a tutor. This kept me on track in Japanese for an extra 6 months before I moved overseas.
• Join a band or purchase music classes - then you’ll have to practice.
• If you are online only, join a music collective that records their own parts separately, that are then combined into the final music track.
• Load podcasts, music and audiobooks in your target language, to listen to when you travel, or while you do chores. Delete the other appealing audiobooks/podcasts/music to reduce the temptation to cheat.
• Switch your computer, phone, tablet and regular websites into your target language.

Some habits to help language learning

• Read for 15 minutes in your target language before sleeping. You get the bonus of your brain continuing to work in the target language while you sleep.
• Talk to yourself in the target language (no, it’s not a sign of madness!) When just starting, focus on naming the things you can see. Later, hold a conversation with yourself.
• Get your daily news fix from a site in the target language. This helps me expand my German vocabulary and fixes my terrible grammar.
• Write a 5-10 sentence journal in your target language each day.
• Use a Pomodoro timer and spend 20 minutes on your language learning every day.
• Use a site like Coach.me or Habitica to help you develop and stick to your habits.

Recruit a friend for accountability when learning anything

• Write to or chat with a pen pal in the country you are learning the language of regularly.
• Send recordings of your practice sessions to each other.
• Set up co-working calls on Zoom or a similar app so you can work together - there are many live streams on Twitch, YouTube and Patreon, and games on steam where you can study or work alongside other people studying or working on something.
• Join a hashtag challenge on social media. One of my favourite yearly challenges for finding motivation to spin more yarn is #TourDeFleece (on Mastodon and Ravelry). There are also many 100-day-challenge sites and hashtags on social media for whatever you are learning or practicing.
• If you’re a streamer or content creator, run a learning challenge with your community with daily or weekly check-ins.

Don’t try to do start with all of these things at once – overdoing it can lead to burnout.

Add one thing, wait for it to become a habit (somewhere between 30 and 100 days), then add the next.

We hate losing – apply penalties

Alternatively, or in addition to developing habits, we can put a very high cost on not studying.

Sign up for a class that costs a decent amount on money. Not like the $3-5 for an evening conversation class at my local community college – this amount of money is too easily thrown away when students don’t feel like attending, and it shows in the often poor student attendance. Pay a good amount for the class and we have some ‘motivation’ to go – we hate wasting money. Plus, more expensive classes are likely to have more engaged teachers and fewer students – better for learning!

• Rope in a friend to join you and learn the language together. Make it a competition, if that’s what you both like!
• Use a habit website like StickK, where you can choose to be fined a certain amount of money if you don’t stick to your habit.
• Promise family or friends to donate a certain amount to their choise of charity if you don’t stick to your schedule.
• If you are learning a new craft or learning how to cook, promise gifts to friends and family - we don’t like letting others down.

Find an inspiring reason

This is one area where I struggle. I live in Germany, I have a German partner, family and friends, yet these things don’t motivate me to learn German. Wanting to get my health problems treated finally gave me a motivating reason to learn at least enough German I could talk with doctors. My medical German is better than natives now, but I still can’t hold a conversation about things like sport or history.

I love the sound of Japanese, enjoy anime, and cooking from Japanese recipes, which makes it easier for me to stick to than studying German. Occasionally, I’ll combine them and watch anime with the sound in Japanese and the subtitles in German. And then I have fun picking apart where they have translated things incorrectly.

I’ve yet to find inspiring reasons or tricks to help me get back to practicing music (piano, cello, guitar), mostly as these can cause pain.

How do you manage motivation and language learning?

I’m still trying to tweak my systems to make it easier to stick to learning German. And to find something that works to help me return to my instruments and Japanese learning.

I’d love to know what systems or habits have you set up to keep you on track while learning languages.