Word of warning to others tempted to learn another language. Your brain has a place reserved for it called the language centre. It has limited amount of space in there. Thus anything new you add to it such as another language something gets replaced/overwritten so expect your ability to remember English words to be great reduced.
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When you get to a certain age I think you'll find that anything new edges out all the stuff that is already there!
So t
rue!
Without practice and contact with native speakers of a language I find that now my language skills are very "rusty"....
For about 18 months now I have been speaking for an hour every week on skype with an Italian bloke (Maurizio) - who is now a good friend - with half an hour all in Italian and half an hour all in English. I think that this weekly contact is just about the next best thing to living there or living with a native speaker. I spend about an hour before our conversazione preparing generally for what I want to say and how I will say it - but don't use a prepared script. The benefits of this continual practice really showed when I last went to Italy a few months ago. I felt more comfortable there than I ever have before.
I got in touch with him via
this site - Conversation Exchange - it is free.
However ..... you need a basic knowledge of the language before you can do this - I had been learning Italian on and off for about 7 or 8 years (but not been to any classes for over 4 years) when I first used the site. It is good way of practicing and improving but NOT for initial learning. It is a place to have a
conversation so don't expect lessons.
On the plus side ..... there are a lot more Italians who want to learn English than there are English wanting to learn Italian so you shouldn't have a problem finding someone suitable. I say 'suitable' because I could have chosen from several young Italian women but decided against them because - in all honesty - I didn't think I would have enough in common with them to carry on conversations long term. (I don't like shopping for shoes).
As I say, Maurizio is now a good friend and because of Conversation Exchange, I have stayed with him and his family and he is due to come over and stay with mine
I'd also strongly support the Michel Thomas CDs. Even after 4 years of evening classes I still learned a tremendous amount from them. The Spanish and German ones are also very good (but not tried out the French ones) and have now forgotten most of the Spanish and German as I used them to prepare for holiday so not used those languages for several years.
I got the CDs out of the library and copied them. I used to listen to them in the car on the way to work and so used time that would otherwise be wasted. I suppose these days you would copy them on to your phone/MP3 player etc