I love words.
I was the sort of kid who read the dictionary for fun.
I've always dabbled with other languages, but never got serious about them.
Until March 2023 when I decided to see if I could actually learn a language if I focused on it.
I'd spent the previous few years learning how to better harness my Autistic special interests and ADHD hyperfixations, and it was sort of a "proof of concept" to see if I could just kickstart one at will.
What resulted was six months of studying Chinese for 6-8 hours a day, reaching a point where I can pick my way through novels in Chinese, and discovering I really, really dig languages because they're just a whole bunch of new words and I LOVE WORDS.
English is my native language. I'm pretty good at it.
I took two years of French in high school in the 90s and don't remember any of it. Took half a semester of German in college before dropping out. Also don't remember any of it. Dabbled in multiple language courses on Duolingo and other language learning apps. None of it stuck.
But when I shifted my mindset, and developed a strategy that worked for me? Blew away my own expectations for how fast I could learn a language and got totally hooked on the whole process!
I do something for language learning everyday.
Not gonna lie. Sometimes, that something is a Duolingo lesson. Streaks = Dopamine and Dopamine = Doing the Thing.
I don't do exactly the same thing every day. I do a mix of things. As I aim for posting daily here, I'll share those. Like how I use ChatGPT to develop lesson plans for self-studying languages, and how I find external resources to verify those ChatGPT lessons.
Right now, I'm working on improving my Chinese and on learning Korean.
Future plans include adding Japanese and Thai before possibly switching to another geographical language grouping.
I picked Chinese cuz it was hard, figuring if I could learn that to even an intermediate level it would make learning other languages seem easier in comparison, and I've just been rolling with it.
Welcome to The Curious Linguaphile. I'm Gwynne, The Curious Hermit, and this is one of many of my Curious Paths.