Innovative Language: Getting Back into Language Learning

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Years ago, when I was in high school I was hellbent on learning Japanese. I was really into anime, manga, and had even started watching Japanese dramas. I figured it would be easier to learn the language than read subtitles. My high school offered Japanese as one of two foreign language options (the other being Spanish) and I was excited to sign up for Japanese. But that never happened. My parents felt that Spanish would be more useful in the long run so I had to take Spanish instead. I’ve lived in Southern California my whole life, so they definitely weren’t wrong. I’ve had numerous opportunities to speak Spanish. My first part time job, after high school, I spoke more Spanish than I ever thought I would. Talk about real world applications. But back to the story.

I finished high school with four years of Spanish under my belt but the desire to learn Japanese was still strong. Through numerous Google searches, this was back in 2009, I was finally able to find a free language course to learn Japanese. It was Innovative Language’s “JapanesePod101.” The website had free audio and video lessons that taught Japanese. I was so excited and I tried to learn what I could. Unfortunately, I didn’t stick with it and ended up forgetting all about language learning for a while. When I say “for a while,” I mean like almost ten years. Do you know how much Japanese I could’ve learned in that time? But alas, I didn’t try and learn a language in that time.

That suddenly changed one day when I was watching a Korean tv show. It featured foreigners in Korea, fluently speaking the language, and living their best lives. I found myself wanting to learn a language again. For similar reasons that I wanted to learn Japanese, I now wanted to learn Korean. I had been a big Kpop fan since high school, enjoyed watching Korean Dramas and tv shows so figured why not go back into language learning. I went back to Google to see what resources I could find. Unlike back 2009, when even YouTube was relatively new, I found a whole new world of resources. Books, apps, websites, and language learning communities. All of which were free (or had free options).

One of the website came across was “KoreanClass101” and it immediately took me back to when I first discovered “JapanesePod101.” That’s when I learned that Innovative Language had a website for over 30 languages. Each of those websites is dedicated to one particular language, so naturally I signed up for KoreanClass101 and have been using it ever since.