Why you don't feel progress in your language learning

In my 20 years of teaching,

there is one thing I have seen every language learner experience.

A plateau

It is a period in your language learning journey

where you feel you're not making the progress you need to.

And it usually happens after a few months

when you are past learning the basics of a language

and are studying the language at an intermediate level.

In this video, I will talk about how you can get over this plateau.

So, if you are a language learner, pay close attention

because at some point, you will have to deal with this

or maybe you already are.

And the actions you take once you reach a plateau will likely decide

whether you become an advanced user of a language

or remain a basic or at best an intermediate level user.

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Now, back to the video

Okay, we were talking about plateaus.

Now, the best way to solve a problem is to understand why it happens.

So let's first discuss why language learners hit a plateau.

When you start learning a language, you usually begin with the basics.

You start learning greetings, introductions, telling time,

and describing simple daily activities.

And in the beginning, you can quickly see how much you're learning.

You move from not being able to say anything to having simple conversations,

asking basic questions, and understanding simple responses.

This is very motivating because you can easily see the result of your hard work.

However, as you continue and

move to the intermediate level of learning a language, things change.

At this stage,

the focus moves from simple conversations to more complex aspects of the language

such as more difficult grammatical structures,

or words and expressions that can have different meanings

and be used in different ways and situations.

It's not like when you started and could see big improvements quickly.

At this stage, you might not notice your progress right away.

You could spend weeks or even months working on your pronunciation,

learning more words, or getting better at using different types of grammar

without noticing any major improvements in your language ability.

And this slower, less visible progress can be discouraging

and make learning feel more challenging.

This situation can get even worse because sometimes language learners

move from basic to intermediate level lessons without fully learning the fundamentals.

I'm not saying they haven't studied the fundamentals.

They have

But they haven't fully learned everything yet.

Language learning involves constantly building on previous knowledge

and what you learned before.

So if you haven't learned the basics well and don't have a strong foundation,

learning more complex vocabulary,

grammar, and other language aspects will become significantly more challenging.

Alright, we now know why language learners hit a plateau.

Let's talk about what we can do about it.

It's clear that the plateau is unavoidable.

However, you can take steps to move past it more quickly

and make the experience less challenging and stressful.

First, you have to make sure you build a strong foundation

so you are better prepared to learn and deal with

new topics and lessons at the intermediate level.

And if you can, you have to increase the time and effort you spend on studying

because you're learning more complex language lessons.

so learning them will obviously require more time and effort.

Also, please do not compare yourself and your progress to anyone else's.

Sometimes language learners hear stories

about people learning a language in only one year,

or they notice a classmate or a friend improving much faster than they are.

Each person's language learning journey is unique and influenced by many factors,

such as for example different backgrounds, learning styles, and life circumstances.

So focus only on your own goals and make sure you're doing the best you can.

And as long as you do that, as long as you really do that, you will be fine.

Last but not least, and most importantly,

you need to change your mindset and attitude.

Language learners usually evaluate their progress by

the change they see in their language skills.

If they don't see any improvements,

they feel they're not making progress.

But as I said, at or around an intermediate level,

it will take time for you to see the results you want.

So if you look for significant changes as a way to check if you have improved or not,

you will probably get disappointed.

You will become discouraged and you will not continue your language journey

with the same amount of focus, time, and energy

as you did when you started.

This decrease in effort will slow your progress even more,

which will lead to more disappointment.

And this cycle will likely continue until you eventually give up.

If you remember, in the beginning of this video,

I said a plateau is a period in your language learning journey

where you feel you're not making the progress you need to.

And the key word here is feel.

It is a period where you will not see the results you want

as quickly as you want.

And because of that, you feel or think you're not making good progress.

But that's not true.

If you don't see any changes,

it doesn't mean that all the time, energy, and focus you spend studying is wasted.

You might not feel it,

but every time you pick up a book,

watch a video,

or practice on a language learning app,

you are making progress in your language learning journey.

And you're getting one step closer to reaching the result you want.

So what you need to do is to be more patient

and change your goals and focus.

The goal shouldn't be

I want to see improvements,

or I want to fluently speak about everything.

Instead, you should focus on whether you are making sure to

consistently study and spend time, effort, and attention

on learning and reviewing your lessons.

Make that your goal.

Don't worry about seeing results.

And don't let that discourage you.

Worry about whether you have studied the number of hours

you had planned to study this week.

Worry about your concentration, focus, and the quality of your studying

or about whether you are regularly reviewing your lessons

because if you focus on these things, and consistently put in

the time, effort, and focus required,

the changes you want will happen.

It will take time

but you will see those changes.

You should also know that the concept of hitting a plateau

is not limited to only language learning.

It relates to many other skills as well.

Every one of us has probably tried to become very good at something in our life

and when we look back at that experience

in the beginning, things were relatively easy

but at some point,

it stopped being fun and easy

and we had to put in a good amount of time and effort

to get the result we wanted.

If you are a good programmer,

think of what you had to do,

the amount of time and effort you had to spend

to get to where you are.

If you are good at playing a musical instrument,

you probably had to go through a period

where you wouldn't see the results you wanted

but you kept practicing

to eventually reach the goal you want.

This happens even with activities

that are supposed to be enjoyable like video games.

When you want to get to a high level

in a competitive video game,

you will likely hit a plateau

and it will stop being as exciting and fun.

You will have to put in time, effort and focus

and spend months working and analyzing your gameplay,

watching tutorials and much more

to finally overcome your plateau.

Language learning is no exception.

It is fun at times.

You can study with movies or YouTube videos,

use apps that offer language learning games,

go to a language class and talk to others

but at some point in your language learning journey,

you will stop seeing the results you want

and it won't be as fun.

And if you want to succeed,

you need to stay motivated and keep studying.

There will be moments

where you get frustrated and feel discouraged.

And if that happens, that's fine

and completely normal.

Just make sure you recover from it quickly.

Remind yourself of your goals

and let that give you the motivation

and focus you need to continue studying.

It won't be easy

but it's simple.

You know what you have to do.

You just need to do it.

That's all, everyone.

I hope you found the video useful

and if you did,

please like, subscribe, leave a comment

and don't forget,

let your friends know

you have found a good English learning channel.

Thank you for watching.

I will see you in the next video

and until then,

keep studying, keep improving

and stay motivated.

Bye.