IWTYAL 237: Do we need vacations from language learning?

Nicolás asks: “Do we need vacations from language learning?”

Episode Summary:

• My life is full of examples of doing things better after a long break
• Our brains can only achieve so much by focused attention
• The Pomodoro technique works on this principle
• Focus mode vs diffuse mode
  • Small scale – i.e. my daily writing habits in one day
  • Large scale – i.e. learning patterns over many months
• Breaks are essential… even many months can be fine
• It works even better if you can take “study breaks” while also speaking or using the language a lot

Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode:

• 5 Lessons I Learned from Barbara Oakley – a great video from my friend Nasos

https://youtu.be/HYkY22pP6go?t=2m7s

Start Speaking Today:

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Olly Richards

Creator of the StoryLearning® Method

Olly Richards is a renowned polyglot and language learning expert with over 15 years of experience teaching millions through his innovative StoryLearning® method. He is the creator of StoryLearning, one of the world's largest language learning blogs with 500,000+ monthly readers.

Olly has authored 30+ language learning books and courses, including the bestselling "Short Stories" series published by Teach Yourself.

When not developing new teaching methods, Richards practices what he preaches—he speaks 8 languages fluently and continues learning new ones through his own methodology.