How I'd Learn a Language for Work From Scratch

25 Nov 2024 #misc

It took me two years to learn English.

And by “learning English” I mean, a traditional language school gave me a signed piece of paper that says I speak English. After two years, lots of repeat-after-me sessions and grammar exercises, someone finally said I was able to speak English.

I didn’t start learning English from scratch. We’re taking English classes in school since kindergarten, probably.

But if I had to start from almost scratch to learn a language for work, here’s what I’d do:

With AI

1. Make a list of common situations at work: Daily meetings, 1-1s, or retrospectives.
2. Ask ChatGPT or Copilot to generate short conversations or stories for those situations using the most common words. For example, a daily meeting where you report that you’re stuck with a task.
3. Use elevenlabs or any other text-to-speech tool to turn those conversations into spoken words.
4. Rinse and repeat.

With YouTube

1. Take a beginner’s course on a subject you already know. In your target language, of course. The goal is not to learn that particular subject but to learn new vocabulary.
2. Turn the course subtitles or script into phrases to assemble and interchange.
3. Rinse and repeat.

Et voilà!