Recommended resources

If you’ve already got a good grounding in German and are ready for decisive focussed action to get yourself well on the way to “independent user” status, check out my flagship course Dr P’s Weekly German Workouts: Into Intermediate German. It’s a self-study programme that runs for ten weeks (or at your own pace). You’re not on your own: you’ll have my one-to-one email support throughout.

This is for you if you’ve covered a lot of the basics in Russian, maybe through an intro course or app, maybe through listening and speaking practice, and you now want a bird’s-eye review of the key nuts and bolts of Russian. Reinforce the foundations, ready to build to the next level of fluency. Check out the “Focus in Five” info an enrolment page.

Olly Richard’s exciting new story-based courses. Let the story carry you along, with video lessons, worksheets and more.

Beginner level will take you from complete beginner to lower intermediate. Intermediate helps you break through that intermediate plateau!

Beginner level available for: German, Spanish, French, Italian, Japanese and now (new): Russian, Chinese, Turkish.

Intermediate level available for: German( Intermediate), Spanish (Intermediate), French (Intermediate), Italian (Intermediate), Japanese (Intermediate).

Fun new courses at several levels for French, Spanish or Mandarin from Ari Smith (aka Xiaoma), who has millions of YouTube views enthralled with his language learning exploits. These are beautifully produced courses that won’t weigh you down with too much material. You’ll get the essentials and be entertained at the same time.

The Foundation level courses concentrate on key words and phrases that will be your opening gambits in simple conversations (Ari’s “chessboard method”). There are ten units, each with video vignettes filmed on location: key dialogues in common situations. At the three further levels (up to Intermediate), we follow three characters in a soap-opera style story. Short explanatory lessons, quizzes and worksheets too.

Available for French, Spanish or Mandarin (German and Japanese coming soon).

Super popular app with a “fremium” subscription model. Babbel lessons (levels range from beginner to intermediate) for 14 languages. Fullest level coverage for French, Spanish, German.

Many lessons focus on a particular conversational situation (or vocab theme). Interactive audio (listen and repeat), uses gamification and spaced recall (built in flashcards) to keep you engaged and consolidate what you learn. “Fill in the blanks” writing practice..

Great as a supplement to a main course (a better option than, say, Duolingo). Click here to check out the April 2023 offer. (Ends 2nd May, 10 am Central European Time)

Grammar explained in the context of short stories. The best way to learn!

Available for French, Italian, Spanish, German, Russian or Brazilian Portuguese.

You’re leaning because you want to speak. Here are courses that will get you understanding real language and using it yourself in less than 90 Days.

Available in French, Spanish, German, Italian, Japanese, Mandarin, and Cantonese.

MosaLingua is one of the most popular language learning apps out there, with over 12,000,000 (!) users. At its core are electronic flashcard decks (with fully integrated audio)(desktop and mobile).

You get access to eight languages (English, Spanish, French, Italian, German, Brazilian Portuguese, Chinese and Russian).

Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass

Understanding how memory works is a must if you want to get fluent. I got to know memory champ and long-term language learner Anthony Metivier at the Polyglot Gathering in Berlin back in 2014 and later attended one of his in-person all-day trainings in London.

The Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass has to be the best set of memory trainings out there.

You’ll get access to all the Anthony’s memory courses, showing you step-by-step proven techniques to skyrocket your ability to memorise vocabulary, names, numbers, faces, poetry…anything!

You also get are eight bonuses, including The Ultimate Language Learning Secret and Visualisation Mastery.

Successful Self Study (any language)

Ready learn that language at lat without the constant stress and worry that you’re not getting fluent fast enough? Successful Self-Study is a self-paced online course that teaches you how to learn successfully as a solo language learner from inimitable language teacher, learner, vlogger and coach Lindsay Williams from LindsayDoesLanguages. A super fun practical course, packed with actionable information. Click on this link for the info and enrolment page.

100 short conversations. Hone your listening skills and learn those key phrases you need to use your language. With transcripts, short vocab and grammar notes and handy culture notes. From Kris “the Dane” Broholm from Actual Fluency. Available for Spanish, French, German, Italian, Russian and Danish.

“Supercharged phrasebooks” from Michele “Intrepid Guide” Frolla. All about getting you from clueless to confident in some basic travel phrases for when we can hit the road again. Video lessons, engaging explanations and quizzes, audio and dialogues with a “role play” twist.

Master French for Travel, Master Spanish for Travel, Master Italian for Travel, Master Norwegian for Travel

The most comprehensive guide to getting started (or improving) your Japanese. This isn’t a language course, it’s all about showing you how to get good at Japanese yourself. All the advice on mindset, methods, materials and insights into the language itself. From John Fotheringham at Language Mastery. Check out the deal: Language Mastery Japanese

Regular practice SPEAKING your new language is essential if you want to get fluent. I’m a real fan of the italki platform. I’ve booked over 700 Ione-to-one lessons there as a student of various languages.

Create your own profile (I’m Efrogwr). You can check out other members’ profiles and a teacher’s experience and prices.  You can find literally thousands of teachers or informal conversation partners in tens of languages.  

Booking slots is made easy as the calendar shows everybody’s slots in your local timezone. You can have the lessons “on platform” or on Skype, Zoom etc. If you use my partner link, we’ll both get some extra credit when you add / spend your first USD20. Go to italki.com and get started!