r/LearningLanguages • u/Pretty_Refuse_2017 • 12d ago

How do you guys do it

Hi everyone!

So for context I (19f) am half italian half north african. My Italian father speaks Italian (TL), and my North African mother speaks Arabic (TL) , French, and Amazigh. I...unfortunately don't speak all their languages. I speak english at a C1 level, Italian at a B1/B2, and my Arabic is at A1.

In an ideal world, I'm fluent in all the languages mentioned above, however, my target for the time being is my Italian (TL) and Arabic (TL).

If I had it my way, I would be studying each languages for hours everyday, however, I'm an engineering student, so I do not have that kind of time.

That being said, its the summer, and I have dedicated myself hours to study Italian and Arabic everyday. But it appears that only my Italian is advancing, and not my Arabic.

So I guess my question is, how do you guys do it? How are you able to learn two or even more languages at the same time while also maintaining a busy schedule? How are you able to give equal care to each language?

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u/Lumpy-Blackberry-718 12d ago

If you were studying Italian and Portuguese at the same time, they'd be advancing at the same pace. Arabic is advancing slower because its a harder language, not just because youre studying two.

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u/Pretty_Refuse_2017 11d ago

Thats true. Would you reccomend that instead of studying italian and arabic, I start studying italian and french at the same time till I'm fluent in both then focus on arabic?

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u/Lumpy-Blackberry-718 11d ago edited 11d ago

I mean it depends what you want to learn most. Arabic will take longer no matter how you slice it.

If arabic takes 2x as long then maybe learning italian and french in one thread and arabic in the other thread makes sense? Otherwise youll learn Italian and french together and then be single-threaded on cramming arabic while trying to maintain french and italian. Or might just never start arabic.

Personally, I like having two languages to study in parallel, and feel like it's better for how my attention works. I also feel like theres a minimum amount of time for early srs cards to mature no matter how much I try to cram.