Pros and cons of teaching yourself a new language: is it worth it?

While learning a language by yourself is a constructive challenge with many perks, we just can´t ignore the difficulties that sometimes arise during the process. Is it worth it?

For some people it´s the best, for some people it just won´t work. If you´re still on the fence, a list of pros and cons can help you out. Although those items are all based on my opinion, I have heard of them from other self learners many times before as well. Judge them by yourself and I´m sure you´ll be more certain about your decision, be it self learning or not!

Pros:

-It´s cheap.

Studying a language by yourself comes at a much friendlier price than going to a languages school in person. For me, my entire Basic unit of French online cost me less than two months of a face-to-face course. That was the only way I could afford learning French and even English, before that - by teaching myself!

When you teach yourself a new language, the process tends to range from low cost (if you want to buy textbooks nevertheless or if you want to rely on some form of online course) to completely free (there´s many Youtube channels where people teach languages for free, like Learn Korean with KoreanClass101.com. Complementary learning tools, like Duolingo and Anki Cards, are also free!).

-You can learn at your own pace.

Whether you have a job or occupation that leaves you with little time to study, or if you actually have a lot of free time, like someone on vacations - teaching yourself a language lets you go your own pace.

Differently from a face-to-face course, where the number of absences you reach can make you have to take the entire unit over again, in your sole learning you can be absent from your learning process all the time you need (although it isn´t recommended, of course, sometimes life just happens and you need to take a break for some reason!). On the other hand, you can also quickly master an entire unit of basic Italian in that one month of vacations you have from work, or at a quarantine where you necessarily need to be at home, like the one we´re going through right now in many countries (language learning is a way to de-stress and also have fun while doing something productive!).

-You can learn languages that sometimes are unavailable in-person where you live.

Specially if you live in a small to medium city, like I do - sometimes you have to teach yourself a language because there´s simply no other option. Some years ago I was really into German and began searching for a classroom-based course I could take. It was no use; there wasn´t a single local language school that offered German classes. A couple of years later, I also had difficulty finding French classes that were both in my city and at an affordable price, so I decided to stick with self learning for the time being.

If the language you want to learn isn´t available where you live, teaching yourself a new language is always an option!

Cons:

-It´s a little lonely.

I´ve decided to start the list with this one because, for me, personally, that´s the hardest "con". I´ve taken in-person English classes for some years when I was little and in my experience, they were far more fun that learning by myself at an older age. Getting to talk to people who are learning the same language as you are, getting to practice with friends, having group activities, having a teacher to motivate and help you - those were the things I missed the most in my sole learning.

I believe that real life socialization is very important to any learning process. So if you discover you aren´t the kind of person to self learn, don´t push yourself! Same works if you start as a self learner, but decide along the way you want to switch to in-person classes. It doesn´t mean you aren´t as smart as someone that teaches themselves; you just have different needs, and respecting and supplying these needs will make your learning a lot easier and more fun.

If you do decide to teach yourself a new language, there are lots of ways for you to wipe away loneliness.

-You can try language learning communities online - there are specific websites for that, like https://forum.language-learners.org/, and there are communities that exist inside social media like Facebook or Reddit. You can use them to both socialize with fellow language learners and to solve any possible doubts you might have.

-You can also try finding a friend in a country where the language you´re learning is native, so you two can exchange snail mail or even just email each other to practice! In exchange for their help, you can also help them learn your own language. Surely your communication will be constructive for both of you.

-Finally, you can get out of your comfort zone and be the one who actually starts a studying group somewhere. If you´re in a university or church, for example, you can try to find people who also take interest in the language you´re meaning to learn and organize studying meetings with them. Hand out flyers, post about your idea on a social media... You´ll surely find someone to study with you!

-Teaching yourself a language requires lots of motivation and discipline.

So does teaching yourself anything: how to cook, how to embroider, how to exercise... That happens because learning anything without anyone forcing you to do it requires that it become a regular habit of yours, or else whatever you want to learn just won´t stick for too long in your brain. And getting something to actually become a habit requires both motivation and discipline. In my opinion, it goes more or less like in this scheme I made:

If you start with a little discipline and motivation, you can soon build a habit out of learning a language. Start out by studying a little French on weekends, for example, and slowly increase the amount of hours you study until you find the perfect routine for you (maybe you´ll find out it´s studying just a little on weekends, after all! That´s fine). You can use techniques like the Pomodoro Timer to keep track of your studying hours and plan in advance what you´re going to see on your studying day.

If your problem isn´t organization but rather keeping motivated, fear not! There´s plenty of ways to keep motivated for learning a language - and that´s very important because it should in fact be exciting! Start a personalized journal or a blog in your new language, start watching movies (first subtitled in your native language, then with closed captions for your new language, then unsubtitled) or reading books you like, find a penpal to snail mail with you... Depending on your finances, you can even plan a trip to a country where you can practice what you´ve learned so far. It´s up to you!

-It´s harder to plan your studies and to solve your doubts.

Unsupervised studying tends to be harder, of course. Having a learning schedule set for you by a languages school is a lot simpler than having to plan everything by yourself - and also keep up with your own schedule by solving your doubts somehow. Fortunately, technology is here to help us in our needs!

Many websites offer helpful "timelines" of which lessons you need to take, one after the other, to progress smoothly in a language. Here´s an example:

Picture from:https://sydneylanguagesolutions.com.au/french-for-beginners-1/

You can adapt the schedules you find online to supply you own needs - maybe you want your learning to be intensive, or casual, or maybe there´s one specific lesson you want to get out of the way (learning to say "I´m sorry, I´m still learning your language. Could you speak ---- instead?" is a must, for example!).

To solve your doubts, you can go on online language learning communities like the ones I cited earlier or resort to a friend or teacher (online or offline) to help you out. There´s websites where you can pay for a single class with a native teacher who´ll solve your doubts, like on Preply.

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What do you think? It´s up to you to decide whether self learning a language is the ideal to you or in-person learning is what´s best. Try both of them out and don´t be afraid to change your method - what works for seemingly everybody does not in fact works for everybody, and you´re a person with your own needs and goals. Respect them no matter what!

If you have already decided what works for you, post a comment down below telling me about your experience! ;)