Idahosa Ness

How to Learn a Sound that Doesn’t Exist in Your First Language

August 30, 2017 By Idahosa 2 Comments

Have you ever listened to native speakers of your target language and thought “how are they making that sound!?”

You’re not alone.

One of the most challenging parts of learning a new language is learning the sounds that don’t exist in the language(s) you already know.

That’s why we’ve created and premium courses to help you master all of the sounds in Spanish, French, Portuguese, German, Mandarin, and English.

But I know some of you out there will want to learn a new sound in a language we don’t offer yet.

So in this article, I’ll go behind the scenes to show you how to do it on your own.

Warning, this can get a little technical and requires some understanding of phonetics. So if you’re a beginner, stick to our and premium courses.

The 9 Biggest Myths in Language Learning – Busted

August 29, 2017 By Idahosa 2 Comments

Language is everywhere. We hear it all the time in conversations, in the streets, on TV. We read it all the time on street signs, books, computers. We even have language going on non-stop in our heads all day.

As fish are to water, we humans are to language.

As such, there are certain myths about language that most people never take time to consider. In this post, I would like to debunk nine of these myths…
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4 Language Learning Truths to Fight Your Fear of Strangers

August 18, 2017 By Idahosa 11 Comments

There are two types of fear: Good Fear and Bad Fear.

You’re hiking through the woods, you turn a corner, and you stumble upon a bear. It’s drinking from a river and hasn’t noticed you yet.

In this moment, it’s the “Good Fear” that takes control of you:

“OOOOH CRAP! STOP STOP STOP! TUUUURN AROUND! WALK AWAY SLOWLY! DON’T LET IT HEAR YOU!”

You get away safely, get back to your car, and return home safely. You wake up the next day, give thanks that you’re still alive, then get ready to head to work.

Now you’re walking through the office, you turn a corner, and you stumble upon a coworker you’ve secretly loved for months but never spoke to. She’s drinking from a water fountain and hasn’t noticed you yet.

In this moment, it’s the “Bad Fear” that takes control of you:

“OOOOH CRAP! STOP STOP STOP! TUUUURN AROUND! WALK AWAY SLOWLY! DON’T LET HER HEAR YOU!”

The good fear is good, because it keeps you alive. The bad fear is bad, because it keeps you from living.

All the good things in life come when we overcome the bad fears- the fear of rejection, the fear of failure, the fear of embarrassment – and these fears are all present when we learn a foreign language.

We all know that the only way to learn a foreign language is to have lots of conversations with natives. But sometimes, approaching a native speaker for conversation can be as scary as approaching a wild bear for conversation.

So to inspire you to overcome this fear, I have a challenge for our favorite twin brothers (click here for details on this case study). They had to approach five random strangers in the streets of New York and San Francisco to try their basic Spanish skills on.

As we watch video footage of their interactions, I’ll remind us all of four important language learning truths…

How to Learn Basic Conversation By Ear

August 11, 2017 By Idahosa 5 Comments

In our current case study, twin brothers John and Bryan Tublin are competing to learn Spanish before they turn 30.

This is the first foreign language they’ve learned, and they’re doing it with The Mimic Method.

In The Mimic Method, there are three stages to learning a foreign language:

Capacity
Conversation
Command

In the first posts of this series, we discussed how the Tublins built their capacity to hear and pronounce the sounds of Spanish.

First, they focused on the 39 Elemental Sounds of Spanish. Then, they practiced combining these sounds in syllables. Finally, they practiced pronouncing whole sentences by memorizing song lyrics.

Through this training, the Tublins built the ability to mimic native speakers of Spanish. With this ability, they can now build their conversational ability through mimicry.

In this post, we will look at what they did to build their simple conversation abilities

Twins Connect with Native Speakers Through Singing

August 4, 2017 By Idahosa 3 Comments

There are two reasons why I chose to incorporate music into our language learning process. The first reason is practical.

Mastering pronunciation in a foreign language requires lots of repetition to ingrain the muscle patterns.

Rote repetition is boring, but musical repetition is fun. So the musical element is a sort of motivation hack for language learners.

But I also had a more philosophical reason for linking our brand to music.

Language is a tool for connecting with people, and so is music.

To demonstrate this point, I had the twin brothers from our current Spanish case study (read more about that here) go out and ask native speakers to teach them a song in Spanish.

At this stage in their learning, they haven’t learned any vocabulary or grammar, so they can’t converse yet.

They did, however, complete our musical pronunciation training program – The Flow of Spanish. Therefore, they now have the ability to listen to Spanish and mimic it.

In this post, you’ll see how they use that skill to connect with native speakers on their favorite music.
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How to Learn Portuguese Vowel Sounds “E” & “O”

August 1, 2017 By Idahosa 2 Comments

If you want to master Portuguese, you must learn to pronounce the Portuguese vowels.

In this article, I’ll go over the pronunciation of the Portuguese “e” and “o”.

First, need to know that there are three ways each to pronounce “e” and “o”.

Sometimes, you can figure out the correct Portuguese vowel pronunciation by looking at the accent marks.

The “open” vowels are sometimes written with an acute accent (é/ó). The “closed” vowels are sometimes written with a circumflex (ê/ô). (More on what “open” and “closed” means later.)

Bust in most cases, these vowels are written without any accent, so it’s not obvious what the pronunciation should be.

Pronounce “e” or “o” the wrong way, and it’s a dead giveaway that you’re a gringo.

If you want to get closer to Brazilians by impressing them with your accent, you need to master these vowel pronunciation distinctions.

This post tells you everything you need to do precisely that.