On today’s episode I interview arguably the world’s most popular language learner, the one and only Benny Lewis.
To many listeners, Benny or Benny the Irish Polyglot as he’s also known, will need no introduction.
He first began blogging over a decade ago at a time when the online language learning community was still in its infancy.
His engaging style and optimistic message that learning languages is about communicating, having fun and embracing mistakes stood in contrast to other polyglots whose methods seemed more dull and academic.
Through his blog, books and Ted Talks Benny brought the idea of self learning a new language to millions of people, many of whom had been put off by bad experiences at school.
In 2012 ago he set himself the challenge of becoming fluent in Mandarin within three months. Ten years on I caught up with Benny to reflect on his Chinese learning experience as well as discuss his approaches to language learning in general.
Links:
Benny’s Blog: https://www.fluentin3months.com/
Benny’s Ted Talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0x2_kWRB8-A
Benny’s Book on Learning Mandarin: https://www.amazon.co.uk/LANGUAGE-HACKING-MANDARIN-Learn-Mandarin/dp/1473674271
My Blog on Learning Tones: https://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/02/12/its-never-too-late-to-learn-chinese-tones-heres-how/
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