Planning my summer vacation was simple: Italy, Spain, France. Done. Those three countries have been on my bucket list for years. I knew I wanted to have a culturally authentic experience, not just tour buses and tour guides. I wanted to be able to maintain a basic conversation in each of the languages, and know more than just Hello and Where's the Bathroom? My colleague who recently went on a trip to Peru has become pretty proficient in Spanish by using an app called Babbel, and told me it really helped her to better communicate while traveling. This sounded like a perfect way for me to learn a bit of all three languages, so I decided to check it out.
Babbel is a language learning site that offers beginner to advanced level instruction across a variety of languages. It was developed by a team of over a 100 language experts from more than 40 countries around the world. The exercises are divided into short, bite-sized lessons which allowed me to study on my own time: a Spanish lesson during my morning commute, an Italian lesson while on my coffee break, and a French lesson right before bed. Learning three languages at the same time can be daunting and confusing - I found myself mixing up some words since the root of these three languages are similar. Thankfully though, Babbel's lessons helped me stay on course and really nail the pronunciation. I was determined to be able to hold a conversation...fluency was not my goal!
I didn't want to butcher the languages and I knew I would need extra practice getting the right pronunciation and accents down. Babbel had that covered as well. Babbel has voice recognition software that made it possible for me to listen to the words and repeat them the right way. After using Babbel for a couple of months, I felt pretty confident that I could follow simple conversations in all three languages, with Italian being my strongest! I liked that it wasn't just about practicing verb tense on repeat. I learned and progressed at my own pace, meaning I didn't move on until I understood all the components in each lesson.
As I prepared for my trip, I knew the true test would come once I was abroad. My first stop was Naples and I was eager to put what I learned to the test. I was so excited when I ordered Pizza Margherita and a bicchiere di vino and the waiter understood me. I naturally felt a little shaky about my sentence formulation, but with the waiter's encouragement and a little bit of wine, I was surprised that I knew even more of the language than I thought!
The rest of the trip was an incredible experience; not only did I visit all the sites and places I had envisioned, I was able to carry a conversation with strangers in all three languages. Babbel made it possible for me to achieve my goal of learning the basics of Italian, Spanish and French--something I never could have done on my own. It also helped me discover my passion for language. I continue to use Babbel to study Italian, and can't wait to start learning some Danish. Denmark here I come!
Update: The folks at Babbel are extending a special offer to our readers Follow this link to get three months free!
