The Live Method

www.livelanguagelearning.
eu
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3 AUDIOBOOK COLLECTIONS
6 BOOK COLLECTIONS
www.livelanguagelearning.eu
Author: Ott Ojamets
Distributor: © Embassy of Education
www.embassyofeducation.eu
Publisher: Creative Intelligence Group OÜ 2016

Printhouse: Trükkal OÜ
All rights reserved.
“The LIVE-method” is a part of the LIVE Language Learning system.
No part of this eBook may be reproduced or transmitted in any form

or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without
written permission from the author or from the publisher.
ISBN 978-9949-33-376-9
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION 6
WHY A NEW LANGUAGE LEARNING METHOD? 7
HOW CAN LANGUAGE LEARNING BE NATURAL? 9
WHY TRADITIONAL SYSTEMS DON`T WORK? 13
PREPARATION FOR LIFTOFF 15

CONSCIOUS LEARNING VS. UNCONSCIOUS LEARNING 16
WHY DO PERSONAL INTERESTS MATTER? 19
WHAT KIND OF LEARNER AM I? 21
SOME EXAMPLES OF ENGAGING MY LEARNING STYLE 24
CHOOSING A LANGUAGE 26
KEYS FOR A SUCCESSFUL FLIGHT! 28
FIRST CHAPTER - WORDS 30

HOW TO MEMORIZE WORDS? 35
HOW TO USE MEMORIZATION TOOLS? 35
MNEMONIC TECHNIQUES 38
HOW TO PRONOUNCE WORDS CORRECTLY? 43
HOW MANY WORDS SHOULD I LEARN? 44
KEY IDEAS FROM THE FIRST CHAPTER 47
SECOND CHAPTER - LISTENING/PRONUNCIATION 48

HOW TO ENGAGE YOUR PERSONAL INTERESTS? 53
LET`S SET SOME GROUND RULES 55
HOW TO FIND THE PERFECT KEYWORD? 58
FINDING THE PERFECT LISTENING MATERIAL 61
SOME ADDITIONAL OPTIONS FOR DAILY LISTENING 74
KEY IDEAS FROM THE SECOND CHAPTER 76
THIRD CHAPTER - TEXTS AND IMITATING 78

IMITATING THE LANGUAGE USING INTEREST RELATED ARTICLES 81
HOW TO MEMORIZE SENTENCES EFFICIENTLY? 87
HOW TO DEAL WITH GRAMMAR? 89
MOST COMMON VERBS 93
A SIMPLE ROADMAP FOR LEARNING THE MOST COMMON VERBS 99
DECLENSION TABLES 103
KEY IDEAS FROM THE THIRD CHAPTER 106
FOURTH CHAPTER - SUMMARY 108

GUIDELINES FOR DAILY LANGUAGE LEARNING 113
LIVE-GUIDELINES FOR BEGINNERS 114
LIVE-GUIDELINES FOR INTERMEDIATES 119
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INTRODUCTION
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First of all - welcome! You are reading the LIVE-method.

It´s an innovative language learning solution that gives
you everything - every tool and all the knowledge that you
need to learn basically any language out there. There are
more than 25 languages in our language selection at the
moment and we are adding new languages constantly.
The LIVE-method is a combination of an e-book and a web-

environment. The e-book is like a guide that will direct you
to the goal of efficient language learning and it will teach
you to use all these learning tools and materials that you
will find in our web-environment.
It´s important that you understand the foundation and the

main ideas of this innovative learning system before you
start using it, and therefore we will first explain you where
this methodology comes from and what its foundation is.
All this to make sure that we are on the same page before
you start with specific learning steps.
WHY A NEW LANGUAGE LEARNING METHOD?
Often when learning we mimic the actions of others, and we

presume that it’s the best way. But that is not always the
case. This same principle also applies to learning languages.
If you want to learn languages fast and efficiently then
you actually have to do things very differently and the
following book will be your guide in this journey.
I’ll describe in a few words how this methodology was

conceived and the main reasons for publishing this book in
the first place. 10 years ago I went to university to learn
French and Spanish. Before that I had also studied several
languages, but never acquired the level that I was hoping
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for. At university the learning process was also pretty slow,
and because of that my motivation dropped to zero – I
had the feeling that I was no good at memorizing words,
understanding French dialogue (which to my ears sounded
like Chinese for a really long time) and languages altogether
were something really hard, not playful, interesting and
natural, as they actually should be.
I remember studying Spanish in a group with 15-20

students and consequently I only got a really basic level
after learning the language for 2 years and I was never
really into it. Despite the fact that I wanted to speak in
Spanish, for some reason the learning experience in the
classroom didn´t engage me – so I felt down and lost
hope of speaking fluent Spanish some day. I´m sure that
you have felt the same at some point in your life and you
can really relate.
A few years later - after researching about innovative

language learning, to be better at languages myself - I
understood that the feeling of having low motivation for
doing the homework and feeling down in general was the
direct result of how I was taught – the learning methodology
and its foundation was basically built on the wrong values
and beliefs, which don´t work with human beings in
general. And when I say that they don´t work in human
beings, then I mean it literally. The traditional language
learning methods don´t take into account how our minds,
bodies and psychology work to acquire a language in the
first place.
I understood that the way that we learn languages at

school and in language schools everywhere – from the US
to Japan – is fundamentally wrong and has to be changed
to get good results that everybody is looking for.
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This was a revelation for me and after having this epiphany
I started researching everything there is to know about
efficient and innovational language learning. I wanted to
understand how we as human beings acquire languages
in the most efficient and natural way. This process took
about 5 years, during which time I tested everything
myself, trying to learn different languages individually. And
with every experiment and every new idea I came closer
to the understanding that the key idea here is NATURAL
LANGUAGE LEARNING.
After much research and preparation I published the LIVE-

method as a book for the first time 5 years ago and today
an international language learning company is based on
the foundations of this same book and web-environment
that I once created. Today more than 25,000 people all-
over Europe use the LIVE-method actively on a daily basis
and this number is growing fast.
This book is the latest version of the LIVE-method, which

has been polished and updated to give you the best results
in learning any language you need.
HOW CAN LANGUAGE LEARNING BE NATURAL?
For example, how did you learn your mother tongue? Did
your mother come to you, as a baby, and start repeating
the conjugational patterns for verbs that you really need
to know? I presume that the answer is no. This question
even seems a little silly to you - doesn´t it? But isn´t
this the way we acquire languages at school? We take a
holistic system, hack it into pieces and try to learn it. This
is basically the system that traditional language learning
uses, isn´t it?
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Now, if you think about your learning manuals at schools
then there are subjects that are formed into little exercises
to make learning as easy as possible for you. Rather than
being individually tailored, they have been designed for
the mysical “average learner” that actually doesn´t exist.
This is a big problem and we will adress it later on.
Let´s come back to the example of your mother and verb

conjugation tables. This silly example carries us forward
to the right path and to the right questions.
If my mother didn´t teach me how to use the grammar of

the language and she actually didn´t teach me words or
verbs then how is it possible that I could use the language
at a very early age?
Let´s go even further. How is it possible that many have

learned to understand and to speak several languages just
by watching cartoons from the television as a child? I´m
sure that you know many people like that. I´m one as well. I
watched German cartoons as a child and later on I realized
– as a teenager – that I could actually understand German
very well. Looking back, I understood the language without
consciously realizing I did so, because it was so natural for
me. Isn´t it weird? I´m sure that you or someone among
your friends or family has had the same experience. It´s
very typical.
But how is it possible to learn a language like that? Without

learning any sentences or words separately? And to speak
a language absolutely well. Doesn´t it sound profoundly
divorced from the way we learn languages at school using
learning manuals and dictionaries? But why is there such
a difference in these approaches and what is the reason
behind that?
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Finding the answer to these questions is actually the key to
understanding efficient language learning and I can promise
you that if you use the following learning methodology
exactly as it´s described then you will excel at languages
as well. It just requires a different perspective. We need
to change everything you have known and experienced
about language learning and give you a concrete structure
and tools that you can use on a daily basis. This is exactly
what the LIVE-method is all about!
BUT WHAT ABOUT OTHER LEARNING SOLUTIONS?
Now – if you´re reading this and you´ve come into contact

with different language learning solutions online that give
you the opportunity to click and write (and sometimes even
repeat) words and sentences, then you may be thinking:
“All these online solutions like Rosetta Stone or Duolingo
and etc are actually quite good and I´ve heard that they´ve
helped many people”. And you´re absolutely right – they
have helped people to acquire languages, but the question
here remains “How efficient is it really?” What you will see
throughout this book is that no computer program can ever
connect perfectly with an individual person, because all
computer programs are created for the “average” learner.
But this learner doesn´t exist. You may think that it does -
but it doesn´t. There is too much scientific proof otherwise.
And if something is created for everybody, then it´s actually

created for noone. This is an important idea that you really
need to become accustomed to, because it´s one of the
foundational ideas of the LIVE-method.
This is something that you will see very clearly in this book
as well – if particular learning activities work well for one
person, then they may be highly inefficient for another.
Therefore in traditional language learning the results are
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random and can not be controlled.
This is the main reason for why the LIVE-methodology is

based on the individual choices you make, once you are
aware of the manner in which you learn the most efficiently.
Therefore it´s important that you get to know yourself,

before you take the plunge into learning a new language.
The main idea of the LIVE-methodology is not to provide

you with a pre-prepared online learning environment, but
instead to give you all the knowledge that you need to find
and use all the best innovational tools that you will need
to excel in language learning.
And the second main idea is to give you all this, no strings
attached, totally for free. Everything that you need to learn
a language very efficiently is available on the internet and
after reading this book you will never need to buy a learning
manual or pay for a subscription to a learning program
ever again, because you will see that everything that you
need is available for free if you have the knowledge of
what tools to use and the way to achieve the best results.
And we will give you this knowledge in a very simple and

powerful package. Only then is it possible to really engage
your individuality, because you will harness your inner
powers as a learner and as a human being!
I have been an expert in innovating language learning for

a long time and I can assure you that if you take in account
your personal interests, individual strengths and the whole
learning system is optimized for your individuality (your
goals and needs), then you can start speaking almost any
language in a mere 4-5 months without the need to go to
any language schools or take any language classes. And
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this book and our web-environment is all that you need for
that.
If you´re the kind of person who needs support then I can

tell you that we also provide learning solutions that include
a personal language tutor and our experience shows that
people who come to us to start learning a language from
zero - using the possibility to have a personal tutor in our
successful LIVE-learning - will start speaking the language
well in an average of 3-4 months.
Again, it means that individually it´s possible to get to a

good level in 4-5 months and with our special tutored LIVE
Learning system in 3-4 months.
That´s really quick if you compare it to other language

learning solutions and we are very proud of this fact.
WHY TRADITIONAL SYSTEMS DON`T WORK?
The ugly truth is that about 90% of the activities that we

do in language classes have a very-very low efficiency and
it´s basically wasting our time. There are many reasons
for that and we will analyze them thoughout the book.
It´s basically simple science.
Therefore, if you have had bad language learning results

in the past then it has one and only one reason: your
individual interests, strengths and goals were not taken
into account and the learning system didn´t support your
individuality. The same applies for everybody else with no
exceptions.
And our goal is to give you every bit of knowledge and

every single tool that you need to start learning the right
way.
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To help you start the learning process, we have based the

whole LIVE-method on principal ideas that we call KEY
IDEAS. In the end of every chapter there is a list of those
key ideas that you can use to start learning the right away.
There is also a special chapter at the end of the book

where we bring all the KEY IDEAS together so that you can
easily have an overview of all that you have accomplished.
The following language learning approach is presumably

very new to you and therefore we want to make the
transition as comfortable as possible.
The next chapter “Preparing for liftoff” has exactly this

purpose – to go through some preparational steps that
would give you a better understanding of the methodology,
before you start using it on a daily basis to learn whatever
language you need.
We will look into what are some of the hidden secrets in

innovative language learning and we will get you ready for
a totally new language learning experience.
So step onto the runway and let´s get ready for liftoff!
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PREPARATION FOR LIFTOFF
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CONSCIOUS LEARNING VS. UNCONSCIOUS LEARNING
To achieve great results in language learning you have to

know how to start your inner processes - in your memory
and in your body - to acquire information fast and then
your body and mind will do the rest.
Language learning is something so natural – it´s something

that we have all done in at least once in our lifetime.
Therefore the answer to finding the secret to language
learning is already there inside all of us. We just have to
understand how to unlock it!
Our bodies are immensely powerful – every second there

are billions and billions of processes going on in our cells and
in our brains and it´s something that we can´t understand
by reasoning. But consciously, how many things can you
think about at any given time? Maybe a few - not more.
The same idea applies to language learning as well and

to understand it better we have to make an important
distinction between conscious and unconscious learning.
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WHAT IS CONSCIOUS LEARNING?
It´s something that we do by reasoning. A good example of

conscious learning is the object of the traditional learning
system. For example in the language class the teacher
takes the foreign language, divides it into small bits and
then tries to offer it to you in the hopes that it will be
easier for you to understand.
Usually it´s already prepared for the teachers by the

people who create the learning manuals. They divide the
language into simplified exercises and simplified parts.
It´s basically removing things from out of their context in
order to make them easier to digest.
We have all experienced this thousands of times.
WHAT IS UNCONSCIOUS LEARNING?
It´s something that we all do automatically, when our

mind and body feel that the new knowledge is important
to us and engages us in a special way. Therefore our mind
captures the new knowledge automatically and with great
success.
To simplify this difficult notion: it´s something that we do

naturally when we are genuinely interested in the subject
that we are learning and if we – our body and mind –
feel that the language environment surrounding us is as
genuine as possible.
Why is this important you might ask? The answer is simple.

Conscious learning is very slow and unconscious learning
is very fast.
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Unconscious learning harnesses the powers of our mind

and body much more than conscious learning, which is like
using the tip of the iceberg of our capabilities as human
beings.
If we come back to the example of how I and many others

have learned a language just by watching television, then
this is actually one of the best examples of unconscious
learning.
But what is so special about this situation? Why was I as

a child so engaged in watching these foreign language
cartoons? The answer is simple. Because I had great
interest in these cartoons. And being interested always
tops everything else. Actually, being interested in the task
at hand is the key idea for success that we will use in the
LIVE-method as well.
So - we have arrived at a very important conclusion.

Personal interests are one of the key ingredient in activating
your innate capabilities for language learning.
Secondly, the language environment that we create in our

everyday lives has to be as genuine as possible, because
only then can we harness the powers that we posess.
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WHY DO PERSONAL INTERESTS MATTER?
What are your biggest interests? Mine are innovational

language learning, basketball (NBA), business management
and recording music. That´s basically it.
But why is it even important to know that and how could

I use my interests to learn a language better?
To answer this question, we have to start with some

scientific background. There has been a large number
of studies that show how using our personal interests as
human beings is the most efficient way to memorize and
acquire new information. A conclusion of these studies is
the following:
If we look at different international studies made in school

systems all over the globe then we can see that usually
80% of our competence in the classroom – in actually
whatever subject, not only in languages – comes from
about 20% of learning materials.
20% of usual learning materials = 80% results

80% of usual learning materials = 20% results
So, basically only 20% of the learning materials are usually

remotely beneficial to us and the other 80% is highly
inefficient. This same rule applies to all learning manuals,
CD-s or anything else that you have used for language
learning.
But what is this 20% and why is it more efficient than

the other learning materials? The answer is very simple –
this 20% is directly or remotely connected to our personal
interests as human beings.
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Now if we would change the way we learn and if we would

ONLY use the kind of learning materials that are directly
connected to our personal interests, then we can make
the learning process 4-5 times faster.
So, just by using the materials that are directly

linked to my biggest interests, I can accelerate the
learning rate by a measure of 4-5.
It sounds amazing, but it´s just a simple scientific truth.
Now, if we compare this idea to the way that we learn

languages today at school and with private tutors, then
think about how many of your learning materials have been
directly connected to your personal interests. I presume
that the answer is “not many”.
The reason for that is simple. When someone has put

together a learning manual or prepared a lesson plan, then
they have never based it on your individual interests. It´s
something that our educational system doesn´t do. There
are several reasons for this:
1) Usually languages are learned in groups and therefore

it seems to be impossible to take into account the personal
interests of all the participants.
2) The teachers just don´t know how to engage personal

interests as powerful learning tools
Let´s continue, but keep the above in mind.
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WHAT KIND OF LEARNER AM I?
Before learning anything it’s important to know what kind

of learner you are. Everyone is unique and so is the way
their memory works. We memorize things differently.
It´s quite logical that we all have certain individual strengths

and weaknesses and it is a normal part of being a human
being. But when we are learning something, then usually
these strengths are not taken into account and we engage
our strengths and weaknesses in an inconsistent way.
It´s the same as when you fill your glass with water but
you don´t pour it directly into the glass but you use a
sprinkler and try to fill the glass with it from a distance.
It will eventually be full of water, but it isn´t really the
best way to fill a glass of water, is it? This is exactly what
happens in traditional language learning.
But when we find out what is the most efficient way to

channel new information to you personally, then we can
use this knowledge with great success.
The first step of getting to know yourself as a learner is to

go through special learning style tests that would give you
a good overview of your strengths and weaknesses as a
learner. We advise you to do it right away.
FOR THAT:
STEP 1: Open www.livelanguagelearning.eu
STEP 2: Select “SIGN IN” from the main menu and

enter the LIVE© web-environment
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STEP 3: Click on the button “TESTS”. There you will find

all the necessary information about learning style tests
and how to implement their results.
There are several learning style tests in our web-

environment but the main one is the VAK-test that will
let you know if you are a Visual, Auditive or Kinesthetic
learner.
When you go through the VAK-test and get the results

then read them through thoroughly and print them out as
well, because you will need to come back to the results
during the learning process to make sure that you are
doing everything according to your personal learning style.
It´s also important to understand that we all have those

three learning styles present at all times – just in different
amounts. For example we know that about 65-70% of
people have a visual dominance in their learning style,
about 18-20% have an auditive dominance and 10-12%
have a kinesthetic dominance.
So, the strongest of those three is the dominant in our

learning style. The large majority have a visual dominance.
That is because we live in a world that communicates with
us mainly via the Visual channels.
If you have discovered the dominant aspect of your learning

style then it´s important to also know your subdominant
– the second strongest learning style present in your
personality.
Studies show that the most common subdominant for a

visual learner is kinesthetic. Therefore the most common
learning style is Visual-kinesthetic.
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It´s now time for you to complete the learning style tests
yourself. If you would like to read the whole book first and
then come back to the tests, then you can do that. But
it would actually be better if you would go through the
tests at the moment, because then you will already have a
good overview of yourself as a learner before reading the
recommendations in this book.
Keep in mind that you have to support both

your DOMINANT and SUBDOMINANT learning
style while neglecting totally the style that
has the minority in your personality.
HOW CAN I USE THIS KNOWLEDGE?
Now when you have gone through the learning style tests
and printed out the results, then it´s important to keep
those results at hand because you will need them during
the learning process.
The most common mistake that people make is that they

read the test results and conclude “Okay, I´m a visual
learner, therefore I have to watch stuff”, which is a total
simplification and actually doesn´t help you in any way
as a visual learner. The real important stuff is in the test
results themselves - the specific recommendations given
in the test results.
Usually these test results have 10-15 simple

recommendations for what you should do to engage your
learning style in the best possible way. And implementing
these recommendations makes a big difference. Studies
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show that with every implemented test recommendation
you can raise the efficiency of your language learning
by about 20%. Therefore if you actively implement 5
recommendations from the test results, then this by itself
will raise your learning efficiency by 100%. And this is
something that we see in our practice on a daily basis as
well – engaging your personal learning style really makes
a big difference!
SOME EXAMPLES OF ENGAGING MY LEARNING STYLE
A. If you´re a Visual learner then one of the

recommendations in the test results is to be alone in the
room when you´re learning something, because even if
somebody is with you in a room just watching TV, then your
results in memorizing something will drop about 20%.
B. If you´re an Auditive learner and you´re learning 10

new words then doing this in silence is 20% less efficient
than reading the words out loud - and even listening and
repeating with the aid of a pronunciation tool - because
you absorb new information aurally.
C. If you´re a Visual learner then always use headphones

when you´re listening to your daily listening material,
because it helps you cut away the outside world and it
increases the efficiency of memorizing new information.
D. If you´re a Kinesthetic learner then you have to have

an enjoyable experience such as a good taste or you have
to engage in a physical activity after every 15 minutes
of learning, because if that doesn´t happen then your
memory will receive new information very poorly from that
point on. Therefore, after every 15 minutes of listening or
learning you have to eat something that has a pleasurable
taste, do some physical exercise or feel positive emotions,
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because all these things revitalize your memory.
Remember that the most common learning style is Visual-

kinesthetic – therefore if you´re a visual learner then it´s
highly likely that this is important for you as well
E. If you´re a Visual learner then you can´t use any

learning materials that only have an auditive context and
no images/video at all, because it´s highly inefficient for a
Visual mind.
If we take into account that the majority of people are

Visual dominant then all the listening exercises that they
have done at school have therefore been highly inefficient.
Remember this!
F. If you´re a Kinesthetic learner then the best way to

do daily listening is to integrate it into your daily schedule
as you are moving from one place to another, because at
those times your memory is the most active.
If you would like to integrate watching a video

into your daily schedule, but you can´t drive a
car while you´re watching a video - obviously -
then we advise you as a visual learner to watch
the video 1-2 times with the image and then
just listen to its audio, because you already
have the images present in your mind!
These were just some little examples of how to take the

recommendations for your learning style on board. We will
give you more useful advice throughout this book.
But now let´s continue.

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CHOOSING A LANGUAGE
The LIVE-methodology gives you the freedom to learn

whatever language you wish, while still using the same
system for any language you can think of. Having said
that, it´s better to make an educated choice for your first
language. This is what we recommend when it comes to
making the choice:
For starters, choose a language that is necessary for your

everyday life, or that you feel being able to converse in it
would improve your life in some way. This is because we
are subconsciously less invested in the learning process
when we know deep-down that the language in question
“is not needed”; otherwise it is even more of an uphill
journey than it needs to be.
Which language would make your life significantly better

today if you spoke it better? Which language would provide
you with a more comfortable standard of living, greater
contentment, or other benefits?
These are the main guidelines in deciding what language

to learn. Of course it´s also easier to start with a language
that is not significantly different from your mother tongue.
For example, at least the script (writing system) should
be the same; this is because starting with a totally new
learning methodology and at the same time having the
challenge of learning a new script (Cyrillic or Chinese
characters for example) may be a tall order for many
people. It´s possible, of course, but we advise you to get
some practice under your belt with something easier.
We recommend that you employ the LIVE-methodology

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for every language learning journey you embark on. It
may sound like a stereotype, but the more you train your
brain with languages, the easier it is to acquire them.
Now it´s time for you to choose a language; we wish you

a wonderful learning experience!
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KEYS FOR A SUCCESSFUL FLIGHT!
A. As you read the book do the activities as they come up. For
example, when we speak about the most common words, look
them up in our web-environment. That way we can be sure that
your reading experience will be hands on!
B. Go to the LIVE web-environment at www.livelanguagelearning.

eu and select “SIGN IN” from the main menu. Then register yourself
as a user and sign in to get all the good stuff! Also memorize your
user name and password, because you will be using the site a lot!
C. When you encounter the pointing finger it means that you have
come upon a very useful bit of advice. Read the advice from the
perspective of your personal learning style.
D. The key sign marks the place at the end of each chapter where
all the key points are brought together and summarised.
E. When you see the question mark you have come to a frequently
asked question, which we have been asked during our years
working on innovative language learning and helping people
achieve great results.
Should you have a question that you can´t find the answer to in
the book feel free to write to us at info@livelanguagelearning.eu
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Now we´re all set for you to start with the LIVE-
method and we wish you a great language learning
experience!
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FIRST CHAPTER
WORDS
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Now that you’ve chosen the language you want to learn,

let’s move on to the first part of the methodology, the
most important aspect of a language: words.
Like everyone else who has gone through the education

system, you have without a doubt had experience learning
vocabulary. At school we have to learn thousands of words
in different languages, but in a real life conversation we’re
not usually able to use them. Why is this? The answer lies
in the fact that we memorize these words for just a second
and then we move on to learn some other words. The
whole problem can be summarised as follows:
a) we usually study the completely wrong words, without

considering what would be useful and what would not.
b) we use fundamentally wrong methods to memorize
these words.
On second thoughts, we usually don´t employ any methods

at all, and this is where the problems begin.
What would be the solution, therefore? The answer is

actually quite simple – firstly, you have to understand that
in everyday conversations we use a very small part of
the whole vocabulary of a language. So, if you learn the
most commonly used words in a given language and if you
repeat these over and over again, then it is possible to
understand a language really quickly. It’s true!
Now imagine a situation where you start to learn a totally

new language from zero. You will learn the 300 most
common words in the language and know them by heart.
And now you take a newspaper article about a subject that
you are personally interested in and you try to understand
it. Research says that in a situation like this you will
31
understand about 50-60% of this article from the overall
context. This is wonderful, isn´t it? And at the same time
quite logical as well. But what happens when we learn
more words from the list of most commonly used words?
If we look at the research then it tells us the following:
the 75 most commonly used words make up 40% of

occurrences in real life situations
So, you can see that if you hit the 3000-word mark, then
you are indeed very close to being absolutely fluent in
the language in almost ANY situation that you may find
yourself in. That means that if you compare this with a
usual dictionary, which contains some 40 thousand words,
then you can see that the large majority of the words in
dictionaries are absent from everyday language situations.
And going even further – if you just know the small part of
the language that is used the most, then you can handle
whatever life-situation that may occur in the foreign
language!
When you´re starting from scratch with a language, the

3000-word limit is a tall order and we need to simplify
the learning experience a whole lot. Therefore – as you
see from the stats above – if you know just the 200 most
commonly used words you can handle 50% of real-life
occurrences in the foreign language. That’s a great start!
32
On the other hand, if you already have in place a small

foundation in the foreign language in question and you
would like to make big strides in the language, then we
advise you to take a larger list of words, for example the
1000 most commonly used words. Make sure to check the
list and find out which ones you already know and which
ones you don´t.
If you already have a nice foundation in place in your

language but you want to really build upon it fast, then
take an even larger part of the most common words list
and see which are new.
It´s important to stress that you should never

study separate words that are outside the 3000-
word list, because they are very seldom used in
real-life situations. And when you choose the first
list of words to learn, then always start from the
words that are higher on the list, because that
means that they are also much more frequently
used in real-life situations.
Now let´s take a look at the list of most commonly used

words in your chosen language:
STEP 1: Go to the LIVE web-environment. Open www.

livelanguagelearning.eu – select “SIGN IN” from the main
menu and sign in.
STEP 2: Choose the language that you want to learn (you

can always change it later on if you want to learn another
language)
33
If your desired language is not on our system

yet, then please let us know about it at info@
livelanguagelearning.eu, and we will do our best
to make it a part of our web-environment as
quickly as possible!
STEP 3: After you have made the language selection, a

page will open and hover on the image “Most common
words” and click on the “View More” button to find the list
of most commonly used words in your language.
How are these words lists created?
Basically a large amount of everyday texts (like

newspaper articles and everything else) are put
into a computer program that calculates which
words are used more than the others. It´s quite
a simple but powerful process!
STEP 4: Scroll down the word list and discover which ones
are new acquaintances, and which ones are already old
friends.
Now you know which words to learn, we turn our

attention to what is the best way to learn them.
34
HOW TO MEMORIZE WORDS?
There are several ways to learn words efficiently. In our

LIVE-methodology we use two powerful approaches ‒
memorization tools and mnemonic techniques ‒ together
to get the best possible results.
HOW TO USE MEMORIZATION TOOLS?
A memorization tool is a special type of software that

helps you memorize the words that you yourself choose to
learn. These are powerful programs that our learners use
to learn tens of new words every day and you can do it as
well. And you can download and use them for free.
The main idea of a memorizing program is to let you focus on

the words that you need (to learn/use) and it will emphasize
the words that you have a hard time memorizing, so that
you would be as efficient as possible. Thus, a memorizing
program basically works in an optimized manner, aligning
with your personal pace and your personal needs. They
are especially powerful therefore, because they take into
account the way you learn best.
There are a number of memorization tools out there

that you can download and install onto your computer or
smartphone. So, let´s find one right now that you could
start using on a daily basis:
STEP 1: Sign in to the LIVE web-environment by clicking

“SIGN IN” from the main menu of www.livelanguagelearning.
eu
STEP 2: Choose the language that you are interested in.
35
STEP 3: Hover over the image “YOUR MNEMO TOOLS” and
click on “View More” to find several of them for Windows
and Mac operating systems.
STEP 4: Choose the one that you prefer and install it onto
your computer or tablet.
STEP 5: Start creating a new list of words to memorize.

Take the words that you don´t know (one after another)
from the list of most commonly used words and submit
them to the memorizing program.
STEP 6: Always add a new word into the program with the
translation and always save your word list after you have
finished adding new words into it.
What is the best tool for translating words?
Usually the word lists already include a

translation, and you don´t need to worry about
manually translating the words. But if you do
need to translate, then we advise you to use
online dictionaries, such as www.sensagent.com.
You can find many different online dictionaries
when you Google “Italian to English dictionary”,
for example.
You should avoid paper dictionaries at any

cost, because studies show that they have a
negative effect on a learner’s psychology, as
they make the learner feel stupid. The reason is
the ridiculous number of words in the dictionary
and the subconscious feeling that this creates in
a learner as regards their level.
36
STEP 7: Use the program 10-15 minutes a day. How it

works is that it displays words and it asks you what they
mean. It´s a very straightforward approach and you will
get used to it in no time.
You can of course choose the study tempo yourself, but

we advise you to insert at least 7-10 new words into
the memorization tool every day. This will take about 5
minutes. Spend another 10-15 minutes using the program.
Making a consistent effort such as this is a big part in being
successful in your language learning.
Keep in mind to always add new words to the

same word list – don´t create a new one. The
main idea behind the memorization tool is that
it will understand which words you know already
and which ones you don´t and it will use a special
optimized approach to help you move forward
really quickly!
We advise that you start with your own word list also right
away! Before long you’ll have made a great list for yourself.
But now let´s move forward to the second powerful

approach to memorizing words ‒ mnemonic techniques.
37
MNEMONIC TECHNIQUES
Here is another great way, in addition to using memorization

tools, to really cement the new words in your memory.
It´s mnemonic techniques.
The name of this technique leaves the impression that it´s

something difficult, but it´s actually quite easy to do. The
main idea of a mnemonic technique is to make a meaningful
connection between a new bit of information – that you
wish to memorize – and already existing information in
your memory structure.
So, for example, if you wish to memorize a word, you don´t

simply try to push it into your memory, rather you make a
meaningful connection between this word and something
that you already know.
Let´s make an example. Let´s imagine that you would like

to memorize the Icelandic word ÉG (‘me’ or ‘I’ in English).
The best way to do so would be to connect it to something
that you already know and that exists in your memory
structure. So, are there any words that you already know
and that are maybe somehow similar to the word ÉG?
Maybe “EGG”?
Putting the two words side-by-side, it’s quite clear that

there is a similarity between them.
ÉG
EGG
38
Now, just thinking about the fact that the word ‘I’ or ‘ME’
in Icelandic is visually similar to ‘EGG’ is usually sufficient
to create such a mnemonic connection, which we need to
memorize a word.
However, to really make sure that the mnemonic effect

happens, we have to take some additional steps in our
thought process.
There are three steps that we usually have to take to

achieve a successful mnemonic effect:
STEP 1: Find a similar word that you already know and

compare it in your mind with the new word that you want
to learn (such as the example of ÉG and EGG)
Keep in mind that the previously learnt word

that you use to memorize a new word has to be
similar in a written form, not in pronunciation.
And it has to have an identical beginning; at least
one syllable has to be the exact same, because
your memory will link these words together by
their similarities.
STEP 2: Think of an image where these two things are

present (for example ‘I´m holding an ostrich egg’)
This image has to involve the meanings of both

words. Your memory has to be able to connect
these words; therefore you need to help it by
creating an image in your head where the two
meanings are bound together.
39
STEP 3: Use your emotions! Make sure that the

image that you imagine would be as funny or as weird as
possible, because we tend to memorize things better when
they are out of the ordinary. Funny images are especially
good for memorizing.
HOW DOES IT WORK?
When you think about your own experience learning words,

how have you memorized them?
Usually we “learn” words without a meaningful technique,

just as we all did in school, for example. The problem
with that is that when you just learn something and try to
memorize it without a meaningful technique, you actually
don´t save the knowledge into your memory at all, because
you don´t give your mind the command to save it.
In order to memorize something like a single word, you

need to anchor it into your memory. We use the term
‘anchoring’ because it describes exactly the process that
happens in the memory structure when you employ the
mnemonic effect.
The more connections you create between the new

knowledge and the knowledge that you already have in
your memory, the more anchors it will create. The more
anchors a ship has in the middle of an ocean, the better it
stays in place. Simple!
So, every time you want to achieve a successful mnemonic

effect, make sure that you employ all three elements at
once. Also try to have as much fun with this technique as
you can. The more you do it the more natural it becomes.
40
Remember that the best mnemonics are the ones that
make you laugh!
Here are some examples of efficient mnemonics:
FIRST EXAMPLE
Say you want to learn the French word for ‘poster’, ‘l’affiche’.
You think about this word, ‘l’affiche’, and at the same time
imagine a man putting up a poster with a fish on it. And
really, ‘l’affiche’ sounds similar to the word ‘fish’. If you
have memorized an image like this then you can recall it
afterwards with ease. So, a man who puts up a poster with
a fish on it. Of course: ‘L’affiche’.
SECOND EXAMPLE
Let’s say you want to learn the Spanish word ‘parar’,

meaning ‘to stop moving’, ‘to block’, ‘to bring to a halt’.
‘Parar’ sounds a lot like ‘a parachute’ to me. At least the
first syllable, which has to be the same in a mnemonic
technique! So I imagine a scene where I’m standing (a
parachute on my back) ready to jump from a plane. Out
the door of the plane I go and after gliding in the air for
a few minutes I land in a tree. I’m stuck there and can’t
move. Of course! “PARAR”. “To stop moving”.
41
THIRD EXAMPLE
Some time ago one of my friends and I were driving in

Germany and she saw the word ‘Wurf’ written on a lorry.
She asked me what the word meant. I told her that it
meant ‘a throw, a shot’ and asked her to use a mnemonic
technique to memorize it. She thought for a while and the
only similar word that came to her mind was ‘Smurf’. Then
I asked her to imagine an image in which the two words
were present. We joked that there should be an event in
the Olympic Games where they throw smurfs instead of
discuses. So, ‘Smurf-Wurf’. To this day she still remembers
that word.
Many languages are connected through loan

words. When you learn words think whether
any of them resembles a word in your language
or in some other language you know. If so, then
try to memorize them exploiting this fact. In
every language there are many foreign words
– if you train yourself to recognize them and
connect them in your memory with the words
you already know, you’ll be able to learn words
faster!
42
HOW TO PRONOUNCE WORDS CORRECTLY?
To be sure that you pronounce the words you learn

correctly from day one, you need to use a pronunciation
program that can imitate a native speaker in an authentic
fashion. Basically you copy a word into the program, click
“pronounce” and imitate out loud, repeating often.
Later on we will use these programs to produce whole

sentences; therefore, using these programs will be a big
part of your everyday LIVE-Learning.
We advise you to keep one of the pronunciation programs

open at all times while you are learning with the LIVE-
system.
Let´s now find a pronunciation program:
STEP 1: Sign in to the LIVE web-environment by selecting

“SIGN IN” from the main menu of www.livelanguagelearning.
eu
STEP 2: Choose the language that you are interested in.
STEP 3: Hover onto the image “IMITATE THE LANGUAGE”

and click on “View More” to find several good pronunciation
programs that you can use from now on.
STEP 4: Take a word from your list of most common words

and try to imitate it with the the pronunciation program.
As you just saw, it´s really simple to imitate the language

in its most natural form. This is a big part of the LIVE-
methodology.
43
HOW MANY WORDS SHOULD I LEARN?
Keep in mind that being almost fluent in a language means

scientifically that you know the 3000 most commonly used
words. But that doesn´t mean that you have to know all
these 3000 words to speak well. If you read the beginning of
this chapter again you will see that the difference between
being 70% competent and 80% competent in a language
is very small in real-life experience. To be exact:


So you see that there is only a 10% difference between

these two when we look at real-life experience. But there
is a massive difference in how long it would take to learn
1200 or 3000 words.
We have been working in innovative language learning for

a long time and our daily experience with real language
learners bears the above out. I´ve also had the same
experience with Spanish and German myself. I felt that I
really started to speak these languages well when I already
had these 1200 words in my competence. Therefore, setting
yourself the goal of acquiring the 1200 most commonly
used words is a very smart idea, especially if you´re a
beginner in a language.
Now, we have shown that learning 1200 words will give you
the freedom to express yourself really well. But it doesn´t
mean that that´s the first time when you will feel that you
understand and speak the language. Not at all.
44
Remember that...


Therefore, if we look at the science then we can conclude

that if you already have about 300 words in the foundation
of competence in your language, then it´s something that
you can already work with pretty well.
Why do I state the figure of 300 words? Because

it´s something that our daily practice has taught
us. People who have already memorized the
300 most commonly used words show massive
development in comprehension and production.
Therefore, it´s in a way like a threshold to pass,
so that great results would start to come!
We all have different lives and different goals. Let´s give

you therefore some guidelines that you could use in your
daily life to excel in learning the most commonly used
words.
SCENARIO 1: If you´re a beginner set as your goal the

top 300 most commonly used words. Use the memorizing
program on a daily basis for 15-20 minutes to learn at
least 5-7 new words every day, until you have memorized
them all. Of course, if you have more time to invest, then
learn 7-10 words a day.
45
SCENARIO 2: If you already know the top 300 most
commonly used words set as your goal the 1200 most
commonly used words. Learn at least 5-7 words a day, but
if you want to make really quick development learn 10-12
new words a day.
If you learn 12 words a day – always adding words to the

same list and using the memorization tool every day for
approximately 20 minutes – then it´s possible to get to the
1200-word mark in a quick 100 days. That´s something
that we see with our learners all the time!
SCENARIO 3: If you already know the top 1200

commonly used words, and you wish to enhance your
skills even further, then we advise you not to take the
total 3000 most commonly used words and learn all the
words that you don´t know yet. Instead focus on imitating
interest-related texts as it´s described in the Third Chapter.
The reason is simple: words memorize better through a
meaningful context - and it´s highly advised to those who
already have the 1200-word foundation in place.
It´s important to understand that learning

words other than those on the most commonly
used words list is not an efficient use of your
time, as those words do not occur with a great
deal of frequency. For example – while the 200
most commonly used words make up 50% of
an everyday text, the word at 3500th position
occurs in 0.01% of instances, and therefore
we can conclude that it would be unnecessary
to know word at number 3500! We advise you
to never go past the words on the list of 3000
most commonly used words and study only the
words on this list and not anything else! It´s
even better if you stop at 1200 words!
46
KEY IDEAS FROM THE FIRST CHAPTER
Find the list of the most commonly used words

in your chosen language from the LIVE web-
environment: www.livelanguagelearning.eu
Choose a section of the word list that you would

like to start learning and print it out. If you´re
a total beginner then start with the top 300
words. If you already know the first 300, then
start with the top 1200 words. Do everything
according to your current language level.
Underline the words that are new to you.
Start using a memorizing program that you

found from the LIVE web-environment and
start to insert the new words into the program.
A sensible rate is 7-10 words per day. Do that
every day for at least 15-20 minutes and add
words to the same existing word list.
Listen to the pronunciation of every word

with translate.google.com and write it in the
memorization program with your own words,
so that you could reproduce the correct
pronunciation again later on.
If you already know all the 1200 most commonly

used words then don´t learn any separate words
at all and instead work with texts as described
in the Third Chapter.
47
SECOND CHAPTER
LISTENING/PRONUNCIATION
48
Now let´s move on to the second element in the LIVE-

methodology, which is creating yourself a language
environment through daily listening.
Our practice shows that using this learning element

consistently – on a daily basis – is the most important
foundation for achieving great results. Therefore we advise
you to use this element exactly as described in the following
chapter.
IS THERE A RIGHT AND WRONG WAY TO LISTEN TO

A LANGUAGE?
But before finding your first listening material, let´s discuss

the importance of daily listening. And let´s start with a
question.
Do you know someone who as a child watched television

in a foreign language and started to understand and speak
the language without any pre-existing knowledge and
without studying it at school?
I´m sure that you have a friend or relative who has learned
a language exactly like that. I experienced the same thing
with German as a child. When I was little I watched German
cartoons on a daily basis and in high-school I “discovered”
that I could understand German. Before that point I hadn’t
even realised that I understood it, because I had never
given it a moment’s thought. It was simply a natural part
of my daily life as a child – to understand the cartoons that
I was watching when I turned on the TV.
But let´s take a look at how I started to understand a

language by just watching cartoons and listening to it. How
is that even possible? Doesn´t it sound irrational that you
49
show a child cartoons with some reasonable consistency
– without them having any pre-existing knowledge of the
words and grammar of the language – and they start to
understand the language. How does that even happen?
If you were to ask a friend who has learned a language

like that, then they would tell you that it is something that
happened automatically without them even thinking about
it, that it wasn´t something that he or she was consciously
thinking about. The friend just wanted to understand the
cartoons, but little by little they understood more and
more, until the cartoons made sense. Your friend might
even tell you that they don´t remember even watching
the cartoons without understanding them. This is because
the way he or she acquired the language was natural.
This rarely happens to people following only traditional

language learning systems. Traditional language learning
would even tell you that it´s not possible.
At the same time, the people who have learned languages

in this natural manner will tell you that they don´t know
the names of the declensions or conjugations, but they
still correctly employ the grammar of the given language,
because their understanding of the grammar has developed
automatically within their language function, without them
needing to make a conscious effort to learn all the little
details of that same grammar.
Now, when you think about how you learned a language

at school then there had to be preparations made before
you could start listening to something. The teachers told
you to learn a certain amount of vocabulary and then you
were ready to start listening to an audio text where two
people where speaking about something and you had to
consciously make an effort to understand what was being
50
talked about. Nothing about this situation was natural.
In all likelihood the whole experience was mind-numbingly

boring and thoroughly unenjoyable.
But as a child, not once did anyone tell me to watch

those cartoons in German. I myself wanted to do it, no
matter what. So what is the difference between these two
situations when it comes to learning efficiency? Why was
my mind totally open in one situation as a child, without
anyone needing to push me to learn, but totally closed in
the other?
The first major difference brings us back to a subject we

covered in the introduction: YOUR PERSONAL INTERESTS.
When your interests as a learner are taken in account and

put at the center of the learning process, then your mind
opens up and takes in everything that you have to learn
almost automatically.
But if you are placed in an environment or context that

is not directly concerned with your personal interests
then your mind will shut all the channels through which
information travels the most efficiently and the learning
process becomes slow, unmotivating and unenjoyable.
It´s as simple as that.
But let´s ask ourselves again, how is it possible that

someone learns thousands of words in a language by just
watching television? Without ever writing them on a piece
of paper or without investing time in learning these words
one at a time? The answer here leads us to our second
powerful keyword: CONTEXT.
51
It´s the visual context of watching a cartoon that will
generate meaning automatically in your memory and this
will develop a language in a gradual and consistent way.
The same thing happens when you move to a foreign

country. Your mind and your body understand that in order
to cope well, and be happy, in this new environment, it
needs to acquire the skills to do so. Therefore, it will start
acquiring the language in a very concentrated way, which
you would never be able to simulate consciously using
memory tricks or the like. It just doesn´t work that way.
Therefore, the only way to start acquiring a language at

a quick pace is to make your body and mind believe that
you need this language in order to improve your life and
that on a daily basis you inhabit an environment where
competence in this language is really important in order to
be successful. There is no other way.
Of course, all of us cannot live in Paris when we´re learning

French, but here is the trick, you can make your body
believe that it is in the target-language environment by
simply listening to the language on a daily basis in a very
special way. We discuss exactly this point in this chapter.
Therefore, follow our guidelines exactly as they are

described below and you too will be able to create a situation
where you simulate the target-language environment in
your everyday life.
Now that we have touched on all the important keywords

that we have to take into account in our daily listening,
let´s run through them once again:
52
A. ENGAGE YOUR PERSONAL INTERESTS

B. BE MINDFUL OF THE CONTEXT
C. CREATE A GENUINE LANGUAGE ENVIRONMENT
HOW TO ENGAGE YOUR PERSONAL INTERESTS?
If we look at what happens in a situation like this –

when automatic and efficient learning occurs – we will
understand that the notion of learning itself can never be
at the forefront of the whole process. Instead, the notion of
learning has to be as hidden as much as possible, because
when you “learn something consciously” then you are the
least efficient at doing it.
Basically, if your mind feels that you´re “learning

something” consciously, then it is less efficient than just
“listening about things that I like”. Think about your life
and you will see that we are right.
Another thing that is a catalyst in this situation is the most

important keyword “NEED”. As a child I never wanted to
understand these cartoons. Rather I NEEDED to, because
they were interesting and I felt the natural urge to get
behind the meaning.
So, if we use these two powerful notions – INNER NEED

+ INTEREST – then our system will start to acquire a
language automatically if we place ourselves in a language
environment that is directly linked to our deepest interests
as a human being.
Exactly!
53
This is a powerful idea that, if used the right way, will help
you start speaking a language faster than you ever thought
possible. And at the same time it´s something that is never
taken into account in language learning manuals or by
language schools, as we mentioned in the introduction.
But now that you know this powerful idea, keep in mind
that all of your learning materials have to be directly linked
to your inner most powerful interests and to language
learning needs that come from real life. And nothing else.
Ever.
Now we have a good foundation in place and we can move

forward to set some ground rules for finding your first
listening material.
54
LET`S SET SOME GROUND RULES
Let us be very clear right from the start – the main

objective of this learning element is to start listening to
the language from day one and to let your ears and your
memory get accustomed to the language. Therefore, the
objective is not to achieve direct language competence,
but rather to create a language environment that will help
you acquire direct competence with the aid of the other
learning elements in the LIVE-system.
This learning element uses the powers of your mind to

start forming the language using subconscious learning,
which we discussed in the beginning of this book. We will
use the power of your personal interests and put them
together with your individual learning style and we will let
the language come to you in its genuine form, as a whole.
We encourage you to follow the advice below

exactly as it´s described, because it works
wonders only this exact way and no other.
Therefore, if we tell you to listen to the same
podcast every day for 15-20 minutes for 7 days
in a row then do exactly that and don´t change
the podcast before that. If we tell you to find
a podcast that is directly connected to your
biggest personal interests, then don´t settle for
materials that just seem to be okay and “also
quite interesting”. Everything in this book is
here for a reason and we advise you to follow it
meticulously.
55
First of all, let´s lay out some ground rules that will help
us find the most efficient possible listening material.
The listening material that we will find for you has to be:
A. Directly connected to your personal interests
We already discussed above the importance of having

learning materials that are directly in line your personal
interests. So, think of a topic that would make great
listening materials for you.
It has to be of great interest to you personally and you have

to have knowledge about the real-life context connected
to the subject of the listening material. This is so that
it attracts your attention as much as possible on many
different levels.
Therefore, keep in mind that:
1. It has to be directly connected to your biggest interests.
2. You have to have contextual knowledge about the

learning material that you are using. In other words, you
have to have pre-existing knowledge of the subject of the
listening text.
B. Real-life related
There are a number of great studies that show how

inefficient fabricated listening exercises that you usually
find on a language learning CD are. And it´s quite logical
as well – they usually don´t have real-life context and
they are very seldom linked to your personal interests.
Therefore, always use learning materials that have a real-
life cultural context about them. For example, radio shows,
56
television shows, international news, etc.
C. Max. 15-20 minutes long
We emphasize the length of the listening material because

your memory can only manage so much of information in
a short period of time. Therefore, be thoughtful when you
start listening on a daily basis – the text has to be 15-20
minutes in length, and no longer. Therefore, if you come
across an audio text that would be perfect, but which is 45
minutes long, just listen to a part of it.
If you´re a beginner in the language it´s very

important that you understand precisely the
context of the material that you are listening to.
As a beginner, your video cannot be just based
on your interests. Therefore, keep in mind that
you have to know what is discussed in the text
before you listen. To be certain, always translate
the description of your listening material with
translate.google.com
If you´re an intermediate learner who already

understands a good deal of the language, your
listening material has to be directly linked to your
biggest interests, but you don´t have to have
pre-existing knowledge about the discussion
contain therein. We advise therefore that you
find listening materials that would provide
you with new and interesting information. For
example, if you´re a company manager and
you´re interested in strategies to motivate your
staff, then listen to a discussion on that.
57
HOW TO FIND THE PERFECT KEYWORD?
Before moving forward to helping you discover your first

listening material, let´s find some really good keywords
that you will need in this process. Finding great keywords
is an important part of focusing the process so you concern
yourself with only those learning materials that will help
you succeed.
You´ve read many times already that the daily listening

material has to be directly linked to your biggest interests.
While you may be trying to think about what your interests
are, our experience has told us that many people do not
have a very concrete interest, such as politics, NBA, kite
surfing, language learning, wine, etc. And if they have,
then they do not know a lot about it, because they don´t
educate themselves about this subject on a daily basis.
But in the LIVE-methodology it´s important that you know

a lot about the subject that is discussed in your learning
materials. There are many reasons for that, but the main
reason is that new knowledge “attaches” to your memory
best when it comes in an interest-related package and
when it can create as many “anchors” as possible. You
should remember that we mentioned those “anchors”
when we talked about mnemonic techniques. And the
more the information in your listening exercise can make
connections, anchors, in your memory structure, the better.
SO, THERE ARE TWO OPTIONS:
OPTION 1: IF you have an interest or a profession

that you really like and that you know a lot about,
then use it as the subject of your learning materials.
58
In this case your best keywords for finding listening

materials would be something like that: Bill Gates,
motivational speaker, The Oscars, Julia Roberts, Steve
Jobs, Vladimir Putin, Kobe Bryant, NBA, Ken Robinson,
innovative education, Angela Merkel, refugee crisis, Tony
Hawke, Denver Broncos, Yoga theory, tricks for raising
children, Miles Davis, etc.
These are some examples of the keywords that I have

used to find great videos/podcasts myself.
You can see that many of the keywords that I

brought up as an example are actually names of
very specific people. The fact that some of these
names may be new for you shows that they are
great as keywords – because they are specific
enough to a certain individual. Names are great
keywords, because usually we are more up-to-
date with a particular person than with particular
subjects. For example, as a politics fan, you may
know what Angela Merkel or Barack Obama did
last week, rather than knowing about the ins
and outs of the political situation in the Middle
East. Of course, it depends on the person, but
that´s what we see in our daily practice. And
of course, choose the best keywords based on
your individuality.
When you´re searching for videos for example,

then it´s great to add the keyword “interview”
or “documentary” as well, because it will help
you find better and more focused videos. For
example “Steve Jobs interview” or “Bill Gates
documentary”.
59
Even if you want to use the foreign language in

your everyday life as an accountant or an auditor,
then keep in mind that your daily listening has
to be on the subject that you are personally
interested in, not professionally. If these two
match, then it´s a wonderful thing, and you´re
a lucky person, but for many people this is not
the case.
To take a personal example, if I wanted to start
learning Italian to move our head-office to
Rome, then I would not use listening materials
on the subject “Italian business environment”,
despite that seeming like a very logical thing
to do. No, I would listen to discussions about
NBA basketball in Italian, about the players,
about the games, and all related issues. And in
4 months, having used all the elements in the
LIVE-methodology, I would be having successful
business meetings in Italian. It´s important to
understand that INTEREST is something that
translates the information into the language of
your mind, so that it would pick it up quicker!
OPTION 2: IF you´re a beginner and you don´t

have a specific interest or it´s too general, then use
listening materials about subjects that you know a lot about
already – usually the answer in this kind of situations is
international news. That´s because international news is
usually the same in all countries and you should know about
world affairs because you´ve read or heard about them in
your mother tongue. Therefore, if you follow international
events use keywords that refer to what’s current.
60
FINDING THE PERFECT LISTENING MATERIAL
Now that we know what to look for, let´s find your first
listening text. For that we have two different possibilities
and which of the following possibilities you choose is
dependent on the result of your learning style tests that
we talked about in the beginning of this book.
Therefore, if you still haven´t completed your learning

style tests we strongly advise you to go back to take them
right now. If you already know your learning style you can
continue.
IF YOU´RE A VISUAL LEARNER
It´s vital that your daily listening be a video, because

you need to see the visual context of all your listening
materials. Therefore, any listening exercises where you
don´t see the visual context have very low efficiency for
your memory and you need to always keep that in mind.
The best environments for finding quality video content

that is real-life related are Youtube.com and Ted.com, with
which you are surely already accustomed to. If not then
check them out right now as well.
And remember that you need your keyword(s) now as

well, so if you haven´t thought about them yet, then start
with choosing the keywords that are connected with your
personal interests.
61
The formula for finding a video is very simple:
STEP 1: Open Youtube.com and into the search box

write:
KEYWORD (in the foreign language)

+
NAME OF THE LANGUAGE (in the foreign language)
For example “NBA basket + Français” to find French-

language videos that are about NBA basketball.
Or “Dirk Nowitzki NBA + Deutsch” to find German-language

videos about the basketball player Dirk Nowitzki. For
example an interview that I could use for my daily listening.
As you saw with these examples, the keyword

has to be as specific as possible to make sure that
you will find learning materials that are directly
linked to your biggest interests. Therefore –
what would your keyword be? When you´re
interested in music, then use a specific band
name or a musician name. If you´re interested
in politics, then use a name of a politician or
a movement. If you´re interested in business,
then use a company name or a name of a
person that inspires you in the business world.
For example Elon Musk!
62
STEP 2: If you´re a beginner use the help of Google

translator to translate the video’s description to ensure
that a video is indeed a good choice for you and really a
topic that you have knowledge about. The translation will
not be word perfect, but that’s fine, as you only need the
gist anyway.
If for some reason you can´t find great videos

from YouTube, then go back to basics and open
Google and insert your keyword there. Keep in
mind to always insert the keyword in the foreign
language + the word “video” + the name of the
language in the foreign language as well.
You can find the translations easily with translate.
google.com
Now the most important thing to keep in mind is that you

have to watch this video every day for at least 5-7 days in
a row, without changing it. We will repeat this point many
times throughout this book, because it´s absolutely vital
that you give your memory time to get used to the nuances
of a certain video, before moving on to another one. There
are many scientific reasons for that and we advise you to
trust us with this one!
Therefore, always make use of a listening text for a whole

week, regardless of whether you´re a total beginner or
you´re already at an advanced level in the language.
If you have now found a good video as your first listening

material, you have several options of how to start working
with it on a daily basis:
63
OPTION 1: Find 15 minutes every evening to take a nice

cup of coffee or tea and watch the video. Or take 15 minutes
during your lunch and watch the video from your tablet or
from your smartphone with headphones.
We emphasize the fact that you have to use

headphones, because background noise is
something that reduces learning efficiency in
visual learners. Therefore, if you are watching
the video, always use headphones.
OPTION 2: If your sub-dominant learning style is

kinesthetic, which is true for the majority of visual learners,
it´s important to integrate the daily listening into these
moments in your daily schedule when you´re on the move.
Therefore, we advise you to watch the video as a part of
your day, when you´re in the queue of the grocery shop,
when you´re waiting for your child at the kindergarten
gate, when you have 5 minutes before the start of your
business meeting, when you´re out jogging or walking
your dog!
I obviously can´t watch the video while I´m

jogging, so what should I do?
In this case we advise you to watch the video

for 1-2 times with the image and then keep on
listening to the same video without watching
the image, but only listening to the audio. That
way you are still supporting your learning style,
because you already know the visual context of
the video.
64
If you need to convert a YouTube video to an

audio file, you can do so by simply going to the
website www.youtube-mp3.org and copying
the link of the YouTube video into the program
and clicking “Convert video”. It´s that simple!
IF YOU’RE AUDITIVE OR KINESTHETIC
You will need a listening text that you can integrate into
your daily schedule and the best option for that is to use
podcasts in the foreign language. You have two options to
find great podcasts for daily listening:
OPTION 1: You can go back to the basics and insert the

keyword into the Google search box. Keep in mind that
you have to insert the following words, which all have to
be in the foreign language that you are learning:
KEYWORD + PODCAST + LANGUAGE
Always use translate.google.com to translate keywords.
PODCAST has the same meaning in (almost)

every language on the planet – therefore you
don´t have to translate it.
For example: PAU GASOL + PODCAST + ESPAÑOL
Our example concerns basketball – to find a
podcast about NBA basketball in Spanish. We´re
sure that the keyword “Pau Gasol” was new and
unknown to you. This shows that MY keyword is
specific enough to find a podcast that is related
to MY specific interest. It´s a famous Spanish
basketball player. 65
We advise you to use keywords that are very

specific and related to your biggest interests.
Names are always great keywords because
then you can be sure that you know about a
certain context. For example instead of writing
“skateboarding” you could write “Tony Hawk”
or instead of Formula 1 you could write the
name of a specific driver like Fernando Alonso.
These examples are about sports but you get
the idea.
If you have now inserted a good keyword together with the
other attributes into Google search and clicked “Search”,
then you will see many different options that you can
choose from.
If you´re a beginner in the language then you won´t

understand the context of the search results. Therefore
just open the links one by one and put the description of
the podcasts into translate.google.com and make sure if
the podcasts is on a subject that you...
- Are interested in
- Are familiar with
If you have found a good podcast then there is always a

“play” button and a download button available on the page.
The latter is usually a sign of an arrow pointing down.
We´re confident that you will find it easily.
If you are unsure of how to download a certain

podcast, then just right-click on the arrow-
shaped download button and click “save link
as...”. You can always stream it directly from
your phone or computer as well!
66
If you find yourself in a situation where you

can´t find a download link for your podcast or
you would like to have any other type of advice
feel free to write to our support team at info@
livelanguagelearning.eu and we will gladly be
of assistance!
OPTION 2: Another option is to use Radio archives to find

great podcasts. This process is also really easy and here is
the roadmap for doing it:
STEP 1: Sign in to the LIVE web-environment at www.

livelanguagelearning.eu
STEP 2: Choose the language that you wish to learn.
STEP 3: Hover over the headphones image in the web-

environment and open the daily listening section by clicking
“View More”.
STEP 4: You will see guidelines for finding Radio archives

in your desired language. Choose one link and click “View
More” again.
STEP 5: In every Radio Archive there is a search box that

is usually located in the right top corner. If you have found
the search box then plug in the keyword that is related to
your personal interests. Make sure to write the keyword in
the foreign language and use translate.google.com to get
the translation.
STEP 6: Once you have clicked “Search” you will see

many different results that are all related to your chosen
keyword. Make sure which one of these podcasts would be
the best by using translate.google.com to understand the
67
podcast description.
Make sure that the podcast would really interest

you directly and would not just be “okay”.
There is a big difference in learning efficiency
when you make an educated choice. For that
reason take a cup of coffee, enjoy the process
and take time to search for a really good one.
It typically takes about 15 minutes at first.
A good thing is that the searching process itself
is already a very valuable learning experience.
STEP 7: If you have now found a great podcast that is

directly linked to your interests then download the file into
your computer or stream it directly from your computer or
phone.
Listen to your audio material for some 15-20

minutes per day. This means that if your audio
file is 5 minutes in length listen to it 3-4 times.
Vice versa, if your file is 40 minutes in length,
simply listen to a part of it.
Remember to listen to the same file for
between 5-7 days before swapping it out for
fresh material.
68
Many of our learners put their podcasts on CD-s

and listen to them in their car while driving.
Many learners put the podcasts onto their
smartphones and use headphones to listen to
the podcasts during their daily activities. There
are many options. The most important thing is
that the listening activity becomes as natural
a part of your day as possible.
Keep in mind that if you´re a kinesthetic learner

it’s likely that your sub-dominant learning style
is visual. Therefore you have to use videos for
daily listening, as described in the beginning
of this chapter.
It is only if you´re a solely kinesthetic learner
or a kinesthetic-auditive learner that you have
to use podcasts, with audio only, as your daily
listening text.
For that reason be absolutely certain as to your
learning style before you start searching for
listening material and do several tests in our
web-environment to be absolutely sure!
69
IMPORTANT GUIDELINES FOR DAILY LISTENING
If you have now found a great podcast episode remember

to listen to that one episode – regardless of your current
language level – every day for at least 15-20 minutes for
5-7 days in a row.
Don´t change your listening text during this time. If you

have more time to invest into your daily listening, then
just listen to the same podcast more.
The findings of research backs up the above advice. We

therefore advise you to trust us and you will also see great
results.
ADVICE FOR BEGINNERS
Keep in mind that even if you are a total beginner in

the language then you have to start listening to real-life
videos/podcasts that are linked to your personal interests
and not fabricated listening exercises as you would find on
traditional language learning CDs or in language learning
manuals.
The people who create those materials base their knowledge

on traditional language learning and they don´t know what
they are doing. The human brain and the human memory
is not created in a way that could communicate with such
fabricated exercises. Our memory needs context that is
meaningful on a personal level directly for us!
So it may seem to you that “starting with the more simple

stuff” is a reasonable choice, but it isn´t. Trust us on this
70
one. Also, when somebody tells you that using “simple
texts” like fairy-tales is a wise choice for starting with
a language, then they really don´t know what they are
talking about. Fairy-tales have the least mutual context
with real life and our memories can´t and will not relate to
them in an efficient way. Keep that in mind!
Being a beginner it can be somewhat of a strange experience

to start listening to a real-life video/podcast because you
likely won´t understand a word. But remember what we
wrote about conscious and unconscious learning in the
introduction. It´s absolutely vital that you start listening
just the way we describe it.
Keep in mind that “understanding” is not the main point

of the daily listening when you´re a beginner. Its main
objective is to create a target-language environment in
which you can immerse yourself.
ADVICE FOR INTERMEDIATES
If you´re already at a passive intermediate level in the

language – you understand the language to a certain
extent, but you cannot express yourself as you would like
– then it will be quite easy for you to understand the daily
podcast; it would seem logical then that the best course of
action would be to start a new listening text. Don´t!
It´s very important that you listen to the daily video/

podcast the same way as we described – using one podcast
episode for the whole week, listening to it every day. Only
this way will you get over your speaking block – which is
in the large part psychological in nature.
This idea is a really simple one. You have a speaking block

71
because you have led your memory and mind to believe
that you are at a lower level than you actually are.
You have basically hard-wired yourself throughout your

life to believe that it´s difficult to express yourself because
expressing yourself means making mistakes and mistakes
are bad.
It´s a really simple process that has been running thousands

of times in school – where grading based on the mistakes
made is something foundational – and language schools
that base their methodologies on outdated ideas.
So what is the solution? It´s quite simple. We need to

re-wire your system to believe that you´re really good in
the language. Your mind and your memory need to FEEL
it. And the solution is to listen to the same material every
single day for a whole week – to get all of the nuances
from a specific video or podcast.
Now let´s imagine that you listened to a different video or

podcast every day after just listening to every one of them
once. What happens at the subconscious level?
It´s simple. You would hard-wire your system with the

following ideas:
A. language is something hard because the words in it

change all the time
B. I understand the context but it’s actually too much for

me to express and to feel confident about
Now when we´ve discussed what happens in your memory

and in your mind while listening one way versus the other,
you can clearly see for yourself that it´s absolutely vital
72
– to overcome a passive language level – to listen exactly
the way we recommend above.
As you´re doing your daily listening don´t be

scared to start imitating the language on the
go as well, with the audio playing! Remember
that in our methodology it´s important that
you listen to the one single listening text
every day for at least 5-7 days. That means
that you will become very accustomed to all
the nuances in this material and as soon as
you start to understand parts of the audio
or even whole sentences we encourage
you to click the “pause” button and to
imitate the sentence yourself as well. This
recommendation follows from a powerful idea
that we will talk about in the next chapter ‒
“imitating the real-life language in its natural
form” as much as possible.
Our experience shows that rewiring a person’s

system takes about a month and a half – This is
because the psychological effects of grading in the school
system and fear of making mistakes are deeply rooted in
the majority of people. But if you listen to videos/podcasts
(according to your learning style) every day for a month
and a half you will surpass your passive level and you
will find yourself expressing yourself in the given language
without the usual feeling of having a blockage. It´s just
about rewiring your system, nothing more!
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SOME ADDITIONAL OPTIONS FOR DAILY LISTENING
Here are some additional recommendations that you can

implement if you feel that you want to invest more time into
your language studies. It doesn´t mean that you can swap
the daily video or podcast episode for any of the following
elements; you still have to keep that video or podcast
episode nicely integrated into your daily activities. But if you
wish to do more then below are some recommendations:
A. If you´re an auditive or a kinesthetic learner

then listening to music in the foreign language is a great
additional activity that can help you create a target-language
environment in your daily life. For that we advise you to
Google “Most popular Spanish musicians” for example and
you will find a list of great musicians. Our practice shows
that surrounding yourself with the culture of the language
will actually increase your chances of success, because it
strengthens the illusion of being in the target-language
environment for our mind and our memory.
When you´re listening to a song then there

is an innate mnemonic technique working
in your favour. That´s because notes and
melodies have mnemonic attributes as well.
For example, try to learn 10 science terms just
by memorizing them and then make a song
out of them, and you will see that the latter
approach will help you memorize these terms
much more successfully. That´s because notes
and melodies generate automatic connections
in our memory and the best part is that it
happens automatically! You just have to listen
to music you like in the foreign language and
74 then sit back and enjoy the experience!
B. If you´re into literature then we advise you to use
audiobooks for daily listening. Keep in mind that using
audiobooks is a good option only if you are already at an
intermediate level or higher in the language – with the
sole goal of activating your passive language. To find great
audiobooks Google the term “audiobooks” in the foreign
language and add the keyword “PODCAST”. For example
“audiolibros podcast” for Spanish, or “livres audio podcast”
for French!
It is definitely not recommended for beginners and anyone

with less than an intermediate level in the language to use
audiobooks.
C. Our practice shows that many people out there

don´t have a specific interest, a knowledge of which
they can exploit in their language studies. When you use
an interest as a theme for your daily listening then you
have to genuinely know about everything about it. For
example, if you´re a basketball fan and you follow the
NBA on a daily basis – and I do so – then you can exploit
this knowledge for your benefit.
Your daily listening can be about NBA because you know

everything about it ‒ news, teams, players. But if you don´t
have such an interest then it´s best to use international
news. The reason is simple: usually international daily news
are the same across languages. Therefore, you already
have a contextual knowledge about the news and it will
work the same way as with using interest-based materials.
Remember that for your memory it´s important that you
have pre-existing knowledge about a subject when you use
learning materials in which that interest is discussed. This
is necessary because it will increase your understanding of
the text and will let you achieve much better results!
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KEY IDEAS FROM THE SECOND CHAPTER
Find yourself your first listening material – keep

in mind that it has to be on a subject that you
are deeply interested in.
The key is to come up with a great keyword to

use for searching. Keep in mind that the more
specific the keyword is the better. For example,
use specific names (peoples, companies,
political parties, etc.)
Choose the best way of finding your daily

listening exercise according to your learning
style. If you´re a visual learner then choose a
video from Youtube.com. If you´re an auditive
or kinesthetic learner choose a podcast episode.
Follow the guidelines provided above!
Start listening on a daily basis and keep in mind

the recommendations in your learning style
test results. Just read them every once in a
while to be sure that you´re really supporting
your memory in acquiring the language.
Listen to the chosen listening exercise once a

day for at least 15-20 minutes, 5-7 days in
a row. Even if you´re at a really good level
in the language already and you just wish to
express yourself better. It doesn´t matter. Do
it exactly as described and you will see great
results fast!
76
KEY IDEAS FROM THE SECOND CHAPTER
If you´ve listened to a video or a podcast episode

for 5-7 days then just choose a new one that is
also aligned to your personal interests and start
the cycle again. Always keep in mind that daily
listening has the objective of creating a target-
language environment in your everyday life
and you don´t need to understand everything
– just let the language come to you.
As you start understanding the language more

and more with every listening material, try to
pause the audio every once in a while and imitate
the sentences expressed by the speakers. This
kind of imitation is very powerful and do it as
soon as you understand parts of the audio well.
Try to be as consistent as possible in your daily

listening. If you listen to your video just for
2-3 days a week, then your mind will not be
tricked and it will understand that you´re not
really in the target-language environment.
Therefore, if you want to get good results then
listen to the audio at least 5 times a week,
because then it will have its real effect.
77
THIRD CHAPTER
TEXTS AND IMITATING
78
We have arrived to the third element of the LIVE-system,

which is expressing the language in a smart way to really
start speaking it from day one using texts that are directly
related to your personal interests.
First let´s take a look at what we already have talked

about.
- First of all you have completed the learning style tests

that you have found in the LIVE© web-environment and
you have printed out the results to take them into account
to guide your decision-making process
- Secondly, you have the list of most commonly used words

and you have started to learn the words that are new for
you in this list using a memorization program that you
have installed on your computer.
- Thirdly you have found your first listening material and

you will listen to it every day for 5-7 days in a row.
This is where we stand at the moment. Now let´s get into

expressing the language!
As we´ve mentioned many times already throughout

this book, imitating the language is the most natural and
most powerful way to start expressing it. It´s the way we
acquire our mother tongue as well, isn´t it? Your parents
say something that is real-life related and that has useful
context for you, and you start to understand it pretty
quickly. For example “Do you want to eat?” is a really
beneficial sentence and it makes sense to understand
it. But at the same time you probably agree that if your
father expressed the sentence “I have to take my car to
the carwash” then it didn´t grab your attention as much
79
because being a baby you probably didn´t care about cars
and whether they were clean or not.
So, basically this is something that your brain chooses itself

– what to understand and what not to understand. It´s a
cute and lovely understanding that we choose ourselves
what we acquire and what we do not. Usually it´s not
like that at all. The environment and the needs determine
what we acquire and memorize, not the other way.
You probably agree that when you were a baby you didn´t
make a conscious choice to memorize something. It
just happened, didn´t it? This is again linked to the idea
that unconscious learning, which we talked about in the
introduction, is immensely more powerful than conscious
learning.
The idea of this chapter is to give you all the tools and all
the knowledge to activate your acquisition of the language
in the most efficient way – so that you would feel that
you are expressing yourself in the language from day one,
creating a language environment in your everyday life.
80
IMITATING THE LANGUAGE USING INTEREST

RELATED ARTICLES
As already described in the previous chapters, it´s vital

that all your learning materials be on subjects that you
are deeply interested in. The same applies to using texts
to start expressing yourself in the language.
Before looking into how to use interest related texts on a

daily basis, let´s find the first text that you could start to
use as reading and writing material.
STEP 1: Sign in to the LIVE© web-environment, choose

your desired language and click on “View More” in the
YOUR DAILY TEXTS section.
STEP 2: Choose one of the options provided to find a

great source of articles in your desired language. For that
click one of the links provided.
STEP 3: If you now have the website open then find the
search engine text box that is usually located in the right
corner of the screen.
STEP 4: Use translate.google.com to translate your

interest-related keyword(s) into your chosen language
and copy one of the keywords in the search box.
Keep in mind that the keyword has to be very

specific, so that it would really give you the
results that you are interested in and that you
know a lot about. Therefore, always keep these
two notions in mind: interest + pre-existing
knowledge.
81
STEP 5: Now you have narrowed it down and you have a

list of possible articles that you can use as your first text
to start expressing yourself. To make the best selection,
open these articles one by one and copy a part of them
to translate.google.com to make sure that they are really
directly related to your personal interests.
Usually the images next to the articles will

provide you with a good understanding of
what they speak about. Also all those little
keywords in the title can be of assistance to
find a good article. Names, dates and etc.
STEP 6: If you have now found a good article, then open

a Word document and copy a part of the article into the
document. Keep in mind that is should be about half an A4
page in length. You can just choose a part of the article if
the original is longer.
STEP 7: Now take the same text that you copied into the
Word file and put it into translate.google.com to translate
it into your mother tongue or in another language that you
speak well. When I usually do it, then I translate the text
into another language that I´m learning or speak well. But
it´s easiest to translate into your mother tongue of course.
It isn´t a problem that the translation will be a little bit

inaccurate, just do it.
Now that you have the translation part done as well, then
copy the translation also to the Word file.
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STEP 8: Now you have a Word document with a part of

the article and with the same part translated.
The main idea of using Google Translate is so

that you can refrain from translating words
and sentences as much as possible. Studies
show that translating – using dictionaries – has
negative effects to us psychologically while
learning a language and translating in general
decreases the pace of learning substantially.
Therefore we need to stop ourselves as
much as possible from translating texts. We
need to feel that we understand the text
“automatically” as much as possible. And it´s
possible BECAUSE it is on a subject that we
know a lot about and we have a translation of
the text as well – even if it´s not perfect.
STEP 9: In traditional language learning the next step

would be to translate all the words that you don´t know
and then move forward to learning these words. Please
refrain from doing this.
Instead we need to start IMITATING this text right away
on a daily basis. To do that it´s best if you print out the file
(with the article and the automatic translation on it).
STEP 10: Now open translate.google.com, take the printed

page and write the first sentence into the translation box
with your own hands. It´s important because you need to
start imitating the correct language with your own hands
from day one as well.
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While writing the sentence, check from time to time the

translation that you have on the page and on the translator’s
other window (that will show you the automatic translation
as well).
But what if I don´t understand the sentence

in its entirety right away?
Don´t worry if you don´t understand

everything right away – it isn´t necessary to
understand everything right away. Meaning
is something that comes to you best by
imitating and by understanding the context.
It comes during the process of imitating, as
a gradual result. The understanding that you
have to know everything before you imitate
something comes from outdated approaches.
It´s important to keep that in mind; only
then will you give the right signals to your
memory to start acquiring a language in a
natural way.
STEP 11: Now if you have written the first sentence into
the translation box, click on the “pronounce” button that
is shaped like a speaker.
The speaker button will appear in Google

Translator as soon as you type something
into the text box. You can not miss it. It´s
right below the text box itself.
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When you click the speaker button you will hear the correct
pronunciation of the sentence. Imitate the pronunciation
and say the sentence out loud together with the program.
You will also realize that it’s probably too difficult to repeat
the whole sentence at once – especially if you´re a beginner
in the language. Therefore, write three to four words and
imitate those. Repeat them out loud several times. Then
add another two words from the sentence and imitate the
whole thing again. Continue like this until you have the
whole sentence together.
Remember to always keep your eyes on

the translation as well, so that you would
“automatically” understand what you are
repeating.
Just to repeat this important idea once again:

we need to evade old-school translating as
much as possible, because it is very negative
on many different levels of language learning.
And translating the way we just presented

can help you evade the old way of translating
words individually (with a dictionary). That´s
great!
Imitation is immensely powerful – therefore do it as much

as possible. Our experience shows that you will get great
results fast if you imitate for at least 15-20 minutes a day.
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STEP 12: You have now imitated the sentences several

times ‒ starting with 2-3 words and building up to whole
sentences. In this process you have clicked the “speaker
button” many times. And of course you have imitated the
words many times after the program yourself as well.
STEP 13: As the next step underline the verb(s) in the

sentence and find out what is its dictionary form. You can
just Google the verb as it sits in the text with the keyword
“verb”. If you see that it’s an important verb that you would
want to use in your daily life as well, then add it to your
memorizing program. Otherwise just make a mental note
of what the verb means.
STEP 14: If you have now repeated the sentence many

times and you are still not certain about what some words
in the sentence mean, then NOW you can use translate.
google.com or www.sensagent.com to translate it.
Our practice shows that IF your text is on a subject that

you really like AND that you have a lot of knowledge about
it, THEN you will have very few of those words that you
have to translate separately, BECAUSE the CONTEXT will
allow you to understand everything you need.
As with daily listening, the main idea is that

you need to use this same article for the
whole week, 15-20 minutes a day, especially
when you´re a beginner. If you´re already
at a more intermediate level it´s totally
okay if you imitate the text for 3-4 days.
But not less. It´s again important because
you need to give your memory time to get
all the nuances and only repeating the same
material does that!
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HOW TO MEMORIZE SENTENCES EFFICIENTLY?
Now it´s important to understand how to really memorize

these sentences that you have imitated with the
pronunciation tool on a daily basis.
Of course if you have repeated them with the aid of the

pronunciation tool for several days, then our practice
shows that your mind will effortlessly memorize them, like
a poem or like lyrics of a song.
But let´s look at another way how to get these sentences,

and the words contained within, into your longterm memory.
You probably remember that we spoke about memorization

programs in the first chapter, which concerned itself with
learning words. The same program will become really
useful for learning sentences as well.
Therefore, we advise you to do the following:
STEP 1: Look at your chosen article and choose the

sentences that contain words and expressions that seem
to be useful for your everyday life. Try to think about your
own objectives and which expressions and words you would
need to use in your everyday life. The choice is of course
dependant on the individual; choose the sentences that
seem useful for you and that contain the most words that
are used in an everyday speech and everyday situations!
You will find these sentences easily – just

ask yourself what words you need to express
yourself in your everyday life? Think about
your mother tongue – what kind of words
and expressions do you find useful?
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STEP 2: Underline these sentences one by one.
If you feel that choosing certain sentences by their

usefulness would be difficult for you, then just choose the
ones that you like best.
STEP 3: Open your memorization tool and insert these

sentences into your list as well with their translations, to
accompany the words that you already have there.
STEP 4: Every time you work with the memorization

program, you will now also have sentences coming up and
it will be a great way to memorize expressions and whole
sentences that you can use in your real life later on.
Now you have a good overview of how to use interest

related articles on a daily basis. Remember that it has to be
a constant effort; therefore, choose an article, imitate it for
a week ‒ take time for it ‒ until you have really mastered
all the sentences, and then choose another article for the
following week.
Every once in a while come back to the previous articles

as well, just to read them out loud and just to go their
pronunciation all over again. This kind of repetition is an
important part of building a steady foundation in a given
language.
Therefore always use an article for the whole week, and

when you finish with an article at the end of the week, then
also take some time to go over the previous article(s).
But now let´s move on to grammar.
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HOW TO DEAL WITH GRAMMAR?
As you saw in the introduction already, it´s always better

to start expressing yourself in the language and only after
that deal with any grammar issues.
We have all had quite the opposite experience at school

– before we start to express the language, we are lead to
believe that we have to know the system, the grammar, of
the language to even be capable of producing something
worthwhile.
In other words – before we are worthy and capable of

producing something so natural as a language, we have
to have a set of rules to do so. When you think about how
you learned your mother tongue, I´m sure that you´ll see
a fundamental problem with this thought process.
Yes, it would seem reasonable that before starting to speak,

you would need a firm foundation on which to stand. That´s
what we have experienced at school and it really seems
like the logical progression.
But science doesn´t bear this out. As we have pointed out

many times throughout this book already, science shows
that if you learn something (like a grammar rule) without
a meaningful context – without a sentence that you heard
on the streets in Malaga or a sentence you imitated from
your interest based text – then it will not be memorized
efficiently.
Only after your memory has received a life-related context

or an interests related idea, will it be able to acquire the
grammar as well.
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Therefore, the first rule of grammar for your language

learning journey is the following:
All grammar explanations have to be related to specific

questions that you yourself have during your imitation of
the language!
What do I mean?
Keep in mind that when you learn something that is not

directly linked to your present interest or a direct question
that you have at this very moment, then your memorization
of this fact is very low – about 4-5%. For example in the
classroom – if the teacher is explaining something that
you didn´t ask about (which is usually the case) then just
because of the fact that you don´t have an inner openness
to knowing about it, the chance of you memorizing it is
minimal.
Now let´s imagine that you have a specific question about

grammar and you get an answer to this question, then
about 80% of it will be memorized because you had interest
in it. And you had a specific question. Quite logical, isn´t
it?
I´ll give you an example.
Let´s say that the Spanish text that you are using to
imitate the language with the pronunciation tool contains
a Spanish sentence “Quiero ir a la playa con mi novia”. It
means “I want to go to the beach with my girlfriend”.
When you imitate this sentence – as described above in this

chapter – then you will get a pretty quick understanding
of all the words, because you have the translation before
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your eyes and if you need then you can check some words
separately with Google Translate as well (though usually
it´s not necessary and you will understand everything
well just by using the automatic translation that we talked
about).
Now if you feel that you have a question – for example

“OK, “quiero” means “I want”, but what is the root form of
this verb and how do I say “We want” and other forms of
this verb?” Then this is a direct question and the solution
is extremely easy.
STEP 1: Open Google and type QUIERO + VERB + ESPAÑOL

to the search box. Click “search”.
Of course keep in mind that the keyword for

the language has to be the language that
you´re learning and it has to be translated.
Like “Español” for example.
STEP 2: You will see many links with the verb “QUERER”
and its conjugations (about how to use it). Click on the first
link and you will see all the tenses of the verb QUERER.
STEP 3: If you want then print this sheet out, so that you
could have an overview of an important verb as “TO LIKE”.
We advise you to always address grammar on a case-by-

case basis. That is, if you have a specific question always
search an answer to that specific question, and only that
question. Do not be tempted to broaden it in any way. For
example, if you find out that QUERER in the present tense
is “Yo quiero, tu quieres….” then don´t start researching
the patterns of other verbs.
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Just always keep your focus on expressing yourself and
imitating the language from your chosen interest-based
article.
Otherwise used, research shows that a detailed study

of grammar can close up your ability to acquire new
knowledge, because you are hard-wired to believe that
grammar is something difficult. Therefore, the only way to
solve this situation successfully is to SIMPLIFY and move
from one question to another.
You can simplify the grammar system of a language by

focusing only on the things at hand, without broadening
the field of interest. This will assure that you will not be
overwhelmed by the grammar, which otherwise has the
potential to dampen your confidence the second you start
diving into it.
Therefore, a smart learner always knows how to find

answers to specific questions they have while expressing
themselves in the given language.
But there are also some other very cool tricks that you as
a learner can use to build yourself a strong grammatical
foundation
And for that let´s move on to the powerful idea of the

most common verbs.
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MOST COMMON VERBS
In addition to learning the most common words of a

language, as we addressed in the first chapter, it´s important
to start building a foundation of the most commonly used
verbs as well.
Verbs are the foundation of a sentence. Without them you

would be lost, because they create meaning and they are
a big part of a language.
But I´m also sure that you remember that learning all
these verbs in school was pretty tiring for you and on top
of everything every verb has its own conjugation patterns
(changing with tense, person and mood).
Just to remind you what tenses look like and how confusing
they are, follow these steps:
STEP 1: Google “French conjugation” or “German

conjugation” and choose the first link that comes up. You
can also do it in the language that you are learning.
STEP 2: Now you will see a page that gives you an overview
of how to conjugate verbs in a certain language.
Choose one verb that you see on this page and click on it.
STEP 3: Now you will see all the different forms of this
specific verb and it´s very confusing, isn´t it?
Let´s now come back to our LIVE-methodology and let´s

find out how would it be possible to hack this verb system
without going crazy in the process.
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SO how can I learn the different forms of the verbs, but at

the same time simplify the process?
There are great solutions to these problems and they are

an important part of our LIVE-methodology.
First you need to understand that knowing about 50 of

the most commonly used verbs is already enough to
start expressing a language with ease.
And it´s quite logical as well. As with most commonly used

words, there are only a number of verbs that we use on a
daily basis to fully express ourselves. And our experience
shows that 50 of the most common verbs will already give
you the feeling that you express yourself with confidence.
To find the most common verbs of your language follow

these steps:
STEP 1: Open Google and write for example “Most common

verbs in Italian” and click “search”.
STEP 2: Now you will see many links with the most common
verbs of your chosen language. Open one of the first links.
Now you will see the list of the verbs. It´s almost always
possible to click on the verbs and see all the tense forms.
This is great!
STEP 3: To start building a strong foundation in your

language we advise you to print out the first 5-10 pages
of verbs and start learning them.
Therefore, if you´re a beginner it´s very important to learn

the most commonly used verbs simultaneously with the
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most commonly used words. And you should set as your
goal the 50 most commonly used verbs.
If you´re at an intermediate level, then look at the list of

most commonly used verbs and make sure that you know
all of them.
If some of them are new to you, then make sure that

you add them to your memorizing program and memorize
them together with the most commonly used words.
Another way to find the most commonly

used verbs of your language is to sign in
into the LIVE web-environment, click on the
“Most common words” section and voilà!
Okay, so now you know which verbs you should learn.

The next thing to do is go to the most commonly used
verbs page, either via our web-environment at www.
livelanguagelearning.eu or by finding it yourself, and click
on one of the verbs.
You will see that it also has all its tense forms and everything
else on this page and it may be a little confusing, if you´re
not used to conjugation tables. But let´s simplify it all a
little.
When you look at the conjugation tables

then always keep in mind that the six
forms given for one grammatical tense
are the following: me, you, he/she, we,
you (in plural), and they
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For example if I take the Spanish verb QUERER (to love, to

like) then I can see that the present tense looks like this:
Yo quiero - I like
Tu quieres - You like
El/Ella quiere - He/She likes
Nosotros queremos - We like
Vosotros queréis - You like
Ellos/Ellas quieren - They like
It´s an important and most used tense of a language ‒ the

present. And it would be important to know every present
from of the verb QUERER, because it is indeed also in the
list of the 50 most commonly used verbs in Spanish. So it
makes sense.
Therefore, as the next step I would take the present tense

of this verb, open my memorization program, and add all of
its six forms onto a memorizing card, so that I could come
back to it later on, when I´m working with the program to
memorize words.
Which other tenses, apart from the present, should I learn

so that it would make sense? Should I learn all of them?
Or just some of them?
To answer that question, we actually need to look at science

again, which shows us very clearly that only some of these
tenses on the verb conjugation tables are used consistently
on a daily basis, while some of them are virtually useless.
To go even further, our longtime studies show that you

actually only need a very small selection of all the possible
tenses to feel that you can really express yourself in the
language well.
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THE LIVE VERB SYSTEM
When you´re starting with a new language then conjugating

verbs can be gruelling, because there are so many different
tenses and forms and it´s quite impossible to memorize
them all straight away.
And you don´t have to, because there´s a better solution.
We call it the LIVE verb system. The main idea is to simplify

the verb system according to what is actually used in
everyday life.
That means that we need to discard everything that isn´t

absolutely necessary.
You probably know this feeling of being uncertain about

what tenses and forms to use to express yourself correctly.
For your language learning experience to be successful,
we need to avoid this inner insecurity and come up with a
solution that would help you do that.
So – how do we simplify a verb system?
What your teachers and your learning manuals didn´t tell

you in schools and language schools is that the majority of
the tenses of a verb are seldom used and they only give a
certain nuance to a thought that you want to express.
So, what is absolutely essential to know about verb tenses

so that you would be able to express yourself without any
problems on a daily basis?
The answer is that you only need three tenses

and nothing more. Studies show that these three most
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commonly used tenses give you the most freedom and the
most confidence in expressing yourself in a language.
Usually these three tenses are:
PRESENT
PAST PERFECT
FUTURE SIMPLE (or FUTURE)
To know which tenses are the most

commonly used in the language you are
learning, Google “most common tenses in
Italian” and you will find out.
If you need advice for finding the most

common tenses of your language, then
write to info@livelanguagelearning.eu and
our team will be glad to be of assistance.
This approach may seem a little weird to you at first, but

when you start thinking about your daily life and about the
language that you use as a part of your everyday activities,
then you will see that this powerful idea is absolutely
true. We don´t need all these verb tenses, especially as a
beginner. You will feel wonderful using the language with
only these three tenses, without the hassle of being hesitant
about whether you are expressing yourself correctly or
not.
Therefore, only learn the most commonly used verbs in

the three most common tenses and don´t try to learn any
other tense forms. Ever. Everything else that you need will
come later on, when you already speak the language well.
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A SIMPLE ROADMAP FOR LEARNING THE MOST

COMMON VERBS
STEP 1: Take 1-2 new verbs every day from the most
commonly used verbs list and add them to your memorization
program.
You can print them out onto paper as well, if you feel that
it´s something that would be beneficial. And you can put
them together in a folder, just to have them around.
STEP 2: Insert the tense patterns into the memorization

program separately in three tenses. One memorizing card
for the present, one for the past and one for the future.
STEP 3: Use the memorizing program on a daily basis, for

at least 15-20 minutes a day.
Now you have three types of information in your

memorization program, most commonly used words,
sentences from your text and most commonly used verbs.
This kind of mixture is perfect for memorization, because
it all has a great deal of context for you already and it will
be memorized better as a whole.
STEP 4: Also insert the same most commonly used verbs

into your memorizing program in their negative forms.
You will start to create a very solid verb system for yourself
if you know both the affirmative and negative of the most
common verbs.
Negation is usually very simple in all the

languages - usually you have to add one
or two words, depending on the language.
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To find out how to use negation in your

language, Google “Using negation in
French” or “Negation in Icelandic” and
you will get a good overview. Make
sure that you feel confident using both
affirmative and negative forms in the
three most used tenses. For that, again,
insert them both to the memorization
program and practice them often.
STEP 5: If you like to learn on the go, then write the

verb forms of 1-2 verbs (positive and negative) into your
notebook or plug them into your smartphone and study
them during your daily activities (while in a supermarket
queue or waiting for your child at the kindergarten gate).
STEP 6: Try to be consistent in adding words to the

memorization program, at least 5-7 new words and 1-2
new verbs on a daily basis.
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AN IMPORTANT REMINDER
The above information about the three most commonly

used tense forms and most commonly used verbs are
mainly meant for beginners or pre-intermediate level
learners, i.e. for those who still have to build up their
grammar and verb foundation and who don´t have the
most commonly used verbs in their competence yet.
If you´re already an intermediate learner at a passive

language level trying to get to an active level, we advise
you NOT TO focus on checking verbs or grammar at all.
Though you may have an urge to do so, it´s well researched
that focusing on expressing yourself and imitating the
language and not focusing on grammar questions AT ALL
will get you to the active language level much faster.
The reason is simple: you already have a grammar

foundation in place, even if it seems to you that it´s
insufficient. The feeling of having insufficient grammar
knowledge often comes from psychological fears and they
are usually unfounded.
So, just take a look at the list of the 50 most commonly

used verbs and if you feel confident with them and you
know them all, then it´s already sufficient!
As an intermediate learner you have to totally focus on

reading the articles out loud on a daily basis, focusing as
little as possible to grammar.
This is because at your level we see from studies that you

will get to active language production quicker if you just
focus solely on expressing yourself in the language.
101
That means that you will let the language come to you in
its natural form, by imitating and expressing yourself in it.
It´s a wonderful process that will happen in your memory

if you just take the time to produce the language the way
we described at the beginning of this chapter.
102
DECLENSION TABLES
Even though I’ll explain to you how to find and print out the
DECLENSION TABLES of a language (because everyone is
different and maybe you need to have these kind of tables
around just in case), I encourage you not to use them.
I myself prefer not to use them at all because I want the

learning process to be as natural as possible – I want to
learn all the “rules” of language naturally from videos/
podcasts and newspaper articles. It might be a big leap for
you compared to the school system but I know from my
own experience that grammar comes more quickly when
it’s learned only inside the context, the natural way. It
means that you will let the context create the meaning.
Read the next part where I describe how to understand

declension and how to find (if necessary) the declension
tables of a language. And then decide whether you need
them or not.
Let’s presume that you don’t know what declension or

noun case are:
Declension is the inflection of nouns, pronouns, adjectives,

and articles to indicate number (at least singular and plural),
case (nominative, genitive, dative, etc.), and gender.
In English there is no declension, instead the language

uses additional words to give additional meaning.
In Estonian (my native language) grammatical case plays

a big part in the language. So let’s see an example with the
word “car” (“auto” in Estonian). “Into the car” in Estonian
is “autosse”, it uses a different ending of the word to give
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the meaning that someone or something is going “into the
car”. Thus:
(a/the) car – into a/the car

auto – autosse
You can see that in Estonian there is still only one word (no
words are added), but the ending of the word is different
– that’s declension.
With French it’s the same as with English – there is no

significant declension. “Into the car” is “dans la voiture”.
So, “dans” means “in(to)” and “la voiture” means “the car”.
I hope that’s clear.
In some languages declension plays a big part, in others

it doesn’t. The ones that don’t have declension are easier
to learn. For example, in Finnish there are 15 noun cases
which make this language a difficult one to learn.
In Estonian there are 14 noun cases and that’s the reason

why many foreigners never learn the language properly.
But there are many languages that don’t have declension,
instead they use prepositions (i.e. additional words):
French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Swedish, amongst
many others.
How can you be certain that your language doesn’t have

declensions and cases? It’s really simple. Just check the
Wikipedia page of the language that you are learning – if
there is no “declension” or “noun cases” mentioned then
you’re good to go. There are also many great forums out
there where people discuss this kind of questions all the
time.
104
If you would like to find the declension tables in your

language, then just Google “Declensions in Finnish” or
“Noun cases in Icelandic” and you will have many useful
links that will give you the answers that you are looking
for.
But again, keep in mind that focusing on additional grammar

– outside of verbs ‒ without context is highly inefficient and
therefore we advise you to focus solely on expressing and
imitating the language via articles, podcasts and videos.
This is a much more efficient way to acquire something
like noun declinations, because you will do it in a natural
way.
But if you are more of a traditional learner and you feel that
you would need this kind of information as well right from
the beginning, then print out the different noun cases of
the language with examples, so that you could keep those
declension tables on hand (or slightly further away) during
the learning process.
If you need advice finding the declension

tables of your language, then write to
info@livelanguagelearning.eu and our
team will be glad to be of assistance.
We have now covered everything related to texts and

grammar, so that you would be ready to start using interest-
related texts efficiently in your everyday learning. Let´s
now summarise the key points of the chapter!
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KEY IDEAS FROM THE THIRD CHAPTER
Find yourself your first article, following the

guidelines in the beginning of the chapter–
keep in mind that it has to be on a subject that
you are deeply interested in.
The key is to come up with a great keyword to

use in the search engines. Keep in mind that
the more specific the keyword is, the better.
For example, use specific names (people,
companies, political parties, etc.)
To make sure that the article is very closely

related to your interests and that you know
a lot about its subject, translate the text of
the article with translate.google.com to have a
good overview.
Take a part of the article and copy it to a Word

file. It has to be about half an A4 sheet.
Take the translation, from Google Translate,

and put it in the same Word file as well.
Now you have a word file with an interest

related article and its translation. Print it.
Now open translate.google.com and type the

first sentence word by word into the text box.
Don´t copy it from the computer, type it with
your own hands.
106
KEY IDEAS FROM THE THIRD CHAPTER
Click on the speaker button that appears under

the text box, to hear the correct pronunciation
of your sentence. And imitate it out loud. Do
it many times, at least 7-10 times for each
sentence.
Always underline the verbs in the sentences.

If you see that the verb is an important one,
which you would like to use in your daily life
as well (and you already do in your mother
tongue), then check what its dictionary form
is and add all of its six forms in three most
common tenses into your memorizing program.
This applies also to words. If you see words
that would be useful for you add them to the
program as well and start learning them on a
daily basis.
Take time and work with this same print-out

for a week. Every day read the text out loud
for at least 15-20 minutes and gradually move
forward until you have mastered all of its
sentences with the correct pronunciation
If you have any grammar questions, then

always address them case-by-case, as we have
discussed in this chapter.
Once you have worked on the one print-out for

a whole week, choose another one and from
time to time come back to the previous text to
repeat it with confidence.
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FOURTH CHAPTER
SUMMARY
LET´S BRING IT ALL TOGETHER
108
INTEGRATE ALL THE LIVE-ELEMENTS INTO YOUR

DAILY SCHEDULE
Now you know what to do and how to do it, so that you

can excel in your language learning journey. But you also
have to know what moments of your daily schedule would
be the most efficient for implementing the LIVE-elements.
So, let´s take a look at how to do that.
Before we can give you specific guidelines on how to act

on a daily basis, you need to understand how and why we
acquire knowledge and in which circumstances our minds
are closed to new information.
Our bodies have developed a strong unwillingness to

acquire information due to the school system. Our minds
understood quite well in school that when some new
information was given to us, then we had to memorize it.
And it usually did become memorized after some study –
think about all those facts and all those things that you
knew about history and everything else when you were in
high-school for example.
But later on when you became more focused on family

life and work, those facts weren’t memorized as well as
they once were. And usually people complain that they are
getting older and they aren’t as sharp anymore.
This is not actually the truth, as science has shown us that

the difference in brain plasticity between a high-school
girl and an elderly lady is really small. This means that
memorizing something should be equally efficient for both
of them.
So what is different? Why don´t many adults memorize

109
information as well as they used to as children and teens?
The answer is really simple – your memory has developed

a system where things that are related to your interests
and your goals are memorized well, while the things that
are outside of your interests and goals are not memorized
at all. It´s again the same idea about the need to have your
learning materials on a subject that you´re interested in.
It´s very logical, isn´t it?
It´s quite obvious that if you´re leading a company as a

manager and doing your everyday job, then you´re not
usually interested in the information that somebody tells
you about their lives and things that they are doing. It´s
just common sense – as the saying goes, “our heads are
not trash cans”. Therefore, your memory makes a choice
– “I will only remember the information that is useful for
me”. And “I will only acquire information that will benefit
me”. Simple!
The same idea applies also to how we acquire new information

and which channels do employ to do so. Therefore, if you
go to a language school and you sit there in a classroom
with 8-10 people, using learning manuals and having a
proper classroom experience, then an automatic process
is triggered in your mind that hinders your efficiency in
learning the language. Why? Because your memory has
learned that these kinds of situations are highly inefficient
and are not related to your interests.
This simple description explains well how the environment

affects the way we memorize information.
Therefore, every time when you put yourself in a situation

that resembles “learning”, then your memory will be less
110
efficient, because it will try to block out unnecessary
information. Because it is used to the fact that unnecessary
information usually comes in big loads while learning
something.
This is an important rule for achieving success in language

learning – the less your mind realises that you are
learning, the more efficient you are.
So what is the solution?
It´s quite simple. All learning situations have to be as much

as possible a part of your daily life. They have to resemble
your daily life and they can´t resemble “learning”.
I´ll give you some examples:
A. When you´re listening to your podcast episode/video

from your smartphone while having lunch, for example, then
it resembles the usual situation when you are skimming
your Facebook profile and watching interesting videos. It´s
not different from your real life and your memory is open
to new information because of that.
B. When you´re sitting at home on your sofa and you have

your computer on your lap and you have the headphones
on, and you are using some LIVE-elements, then your
memory is open, because it´s a usual situation from your
life as well. You have your own coffee mug with you, you
are in an environment that you know, etc.
These are just some examples, but you get the point.
111
Therefore, it´s important to use the LIVE-elements as much

as possible as a natural part of your everyday life, using
the same tools (smartphone, computer, etc.) that you are
used to use on a daily basis, because then your memory
is more open to the information that you will acquire. And
the difference between great results and average results
in language learning depends greatly on that.
Now let´s move forward to start with your language

learning experience.
112
GUIDELINES FOR DAILY LANGUAGE LEARNING
Now you have a good overview of the LIVE-methodology

and of all of its elements to create yourself a successful
language learning experience. To make sure that you do
just that we will take the main ideas of this book and bring
them together again, to form exact guidelines that you
can follow on a daily basis.
To make sure that you are doing the right things when
using the LIVE-methodology, we provide you here with
two different guidelines – one for beginners and one for
intermediate learners who have already a foundation in the
language in place and just want to activate it. Our years
of experience show that these are the two main learner
groups that get a lot of help from our learning approach:
A. BEGINNERS. Starting from zero with a new language

or having just minimal competence in the language.
B. INTERMEDIATES. Having a passive intermediate

language level – it means that you can usually understand
the language pretty well, but you need to activate your
language to really start speaking it, because for some
reason you feel that you can´t express yourself and words
just don´t come out of your mouth.
You probably found yourself in one of these descriptions.

So now let´s move forward to give you specific guidelines
of how to really start excelling in your daily language
learning:
113
LIVE-GUIDELINES FOR BEGINNERS
For successful language learning do the following:
A. Finish the two learning style tests that we talked

about in the Introduction and print out the results.
Now keep these results close to you, because you need to

take them into account when you start implementing the
LIVE-elements on a daily basis.
Remember that every recommendation in the test results

makes a big difference – therefore try to take them into
account as much as possible.
For example – if you´re a visual-kinesthetic learner then

always eat a piece of chocolate when doing the daily
listening. It will make the process more efficient.
B. Follow the guidelines in Chapter One and start

learning the most commonly used words and the
most commonly used verbs in the language.
A good rhythm for doing that is 5-10 most commonly used

words and 2-3 most commonly used verbs per day.
Get used to using the memorization program as well,

because it will be your best friend in the learning process.
It will take a little time to get used to it in the beginning,
so start to make it a habit to work with this program for
about 15-20 minutes per day to get great results.
If possible then print out the page of the most commonly

used verb and highlight the three tenses that are useful
for you. And keep in mind that learn only these three most
114
common tenses from every verb and nothing more – it will
help you move forward faster.
C. Follow the guidelines in Chapter Two and start

with daily listening also from day one.
Keep in mind that you have to be deeply interested in the

subject that you are listening about and also you have
to know exactly what you are listening to. For that follow
meticulously the guidelines given in the second chapter.
Also keep in mind that if you´re at a beginner’s level then

it´s obvious that you won´t understand a lot from your
first listening materials – don´t let yourself be hindered
by this fact. For you as a beginner it´s not important to
understand the daily listening texts – their main objective
is to help create a target-language environment in your
daily life and we addressed this in great detail in the
second chapter. Therefore, keep listening as described in
the second chapter, even if you don´t understand a word!
Also keep in mind that daily listening has to be continuous

– to make your body feel that you´re in the language
environment, you need to listen every day for at least 15-
20 minutes. Otherwise it will realised that you are playing
with it and the necessary changes will not happen.
At the same time keep in mind that you need to listen to

the one chosen listening material for 5-7 days in a row,
without changing it. There are many reasons for that and
we addressed them in the second chapter.
Therefore – listen to the one listening material for 5-7

days and then choose a new one. Always make sure that
it´s on a subject that you are deeply passionate about and
that you know what it speaks about. To ensure this, copy
115
the description of the podcast episode/video into Google
Translate.
D. Follow the guidelines in Chapter Three and start

to produce the language from day one.
Choose an interest-related article and start using it as it is

described in the third chapter.
It´s especially important that you would repeat the sentences

in the articles out loud, using one of the pronunciation
tools recommended: either Oddcast or Google Translator.
If you feel that your pronunciation is not as good as that

of the program, then just don´t think about it and keep
repeating – correct pronunciation is the result of much
effort and it will take time.
If you´re a visual learner or a kinesthetic learner, then

it´s important that you manually type the sentences into
the pronunciation program. Do not simply copy and paste
them!.
Produce the language for at least 10-15 minutes per day

as constantly as possible – try not to skip many days,
because your memory needs to get constant input to start
developing a good language structure.
Keep in mind that for great and fast results you need to
implement all the three LIVE-elements simultaneously,
because they all have a very specific role in the whole
learning system. Therefore, if you drop one of the LIVE-
elements, and don´t do it at all, then your results will
be average. Always implement all the LIVE-elements
consistently and you will get great results.
116
SOME ADDITIONAL RECOMMENDATIONS FOR

BEGINNERS
Depending on how much time you have to invest into

language learning, you can also start with one or two LIVE-
elements and then later on add the third one. Ideally it´s
important to use all three LIVE-elements simultaneously
because they all have very specific roles in developing a
language, but if you don´t have much time then we advise
you to start with the Chapters One and Two – with the most
commonly used words and daily listening – and then after
some weeks add the Chapter Three and start imitating the
language and working with texts.
But keep in mind that it´s very important to start with the
listening part from day one, because it´s the main LIVE-
element that prepares your memory to start receiving
information in a more efficient way, simulating a target-
language environment in your daily life.
So, ideally you will start and continuously work with:
A. Most commonly used words and verbs

(10-15 minutes per day)
B. Daily interest-related listening

C. Daily interest-related texts and imitating

Our practice shows that implementing these LIVE-elements

will take about 50-60 minutes per day, but keep in mind
that the daily listening part has to be, as much as possible,
117
integrated into your daily schedule. Therefore, we advise
you to listen to it while driving, while having lunch (and
watching a video from your smartphone), or while you´re
jogging or walking your dog. This way you can already do
an important learning element during your day and not
invest special time for it outside your activities.
There are many possibilities and you have to find the best
solution by looking at your own daily schedule. The most
important thing is that your body feels that you´re learning
as a part of your daily schedule and not separately like in
the classroom – then it will think that you really need the
language.
If you need advice to assist you in

using the LIVE-elements as a part of
your daily schedule, then write to info@
livelanguagelearning.eu and our team will
be glad to be of assistance.
118
LIVE-GUIDELINES FOR INTERMEDIATES
For successful language learning do the following:
A. Finish the two learning style tests that we talked

about in the Introduction and print the results.
Now keep these results close to you, because you need to

take the results into account when you start implementing
the LIVE-elements on a daily basis.
Remember that every recommendation in the test results

makes a big difference – therefore try to take them on
board as much as possible.
For example – if you´re a visual-kinesthetic learner then

always eat a piece of chocolate when doing the daily
listening. It will make the process more efficient.
B. Follow the guidelines in Chapter One and start

learning new words from the most commonly used
words list.
As the first step, look at the list of the 1200 most commonly
used words and make sure that you learn all the words that
are still new to you. Having all of the 1200 most commonly
used words in your competence is a great step in giving
you confidence while speaking.
Therefore, follow the guidelines given in Chapter One and

download + install the memorization program and start
learning new words daily. A good rate would be to learn
5-7 new words a day.
119
Our experience and many studies show that 1200 of the

most commonly used words are already enough to feel
confident in everyday situations. Therefore, we advise you
to only move forward with the daily listening and with the
daily imitating of texts, if you have acquired the top 1200
words.
BUT KEEP IN MIND that if you don´t have so much time

and you have to choose which learning elements you use
on a daily basis, then after making sure that you know
all the top 1200 words, focus ONLY on daily listening and
daily imitating as described in the Second and in the Third
Chapter!
Also make sure that you already know all the 50 most
commonly used verbs of the language in the three most
common tenses. If you don´t then add them to your
memorizing program as well.
Take 15 minutes a day to work with the program and

memorize new words.
The most important thing is that the whole learning

experience is enjoyable. Take that into account at all times
when planning your learning activities.
C. Follow the guidelines in Chapter Two and start

with daily listening from day one.
Keep in mind that you have to be deeply interested in the

subject that you are listening about and it´s also a great
idea if the listening material gives you useful information
that you can practically use in your everyday life. It can
be useful for you spiritually or materially, but it has to be
useful – then the listening task will yield better results.
120
For example if you´re a blogger, then listen about how to

increase traffic to your blog, or anything else that you are
interested in.
The main objective of daily listening is to help create a

target-language environment in your daily life and we
addressed this in great detail in the Chapter Two. Therefore,
if you feel that you already understood the whole text
after 2-3 times of listening, just keep listening to the same
thing for 5-7 days in a row regardless. It´s important that
you don´t change the podcast episode/video even if you
understand it well.
Also keep in mind that the daily listening has to be

continuous – to make your body feel that you´re actually
in the target-language environment, you need to listen
every day for at least 15-20 minutes.
Try to integrate the daily listening into your daily schedule

‒ when you´re driving, walking with your dog, jogging,
etc.
After listening to the same listening text for 5-7 days choose
a new one. Always make sure that it´s on a subject that
you are deeply passionate about.
D. Follow the guidelines in Chapter Three and start

to produce the language from day one.
For that, choose an interest-related article and start using

it as it is described in the Chapter Three.
It´s especially important that you would repeat the

sentences in the articles with loud voice, using one of
the pronunciation tools recommended: either Oddcast or
121
Google translator.
If you´re a visual learner or a kinesthetic learner, then

it´s important that you type the sentences into the
pronunciation program yourself, to get the necessary
practice. Avoid copy and pasting!
Produce the language for at least 10-15 minutes per day

as constantly as possible – try not to skip many days,
because your memory needs to get constant input to start
developing a good language structure.
And keep repeating the same system ‒ all LIVE-elements

‒ over and over again.
122
SOME ADDITIONAL RECOMMENDATIONS FOR

INTERMEDIATE LEVEL LEARNERS
To efficiently overcome your fear of speaking and to activate

your language, you need to start off with the daily listening
and with daily production from day one. These are the two
most important LIVE-elements for you.
Our experience shows that if you actively use these two

LIVE-elements then you will achieve an active language
level in a month and a half to 2 months.
If you feel that you have more time to invest, then also
focus on learning the missing words from the list of the
top 1200 most commonly used words.
So, you will start and continuously work with:
A. The top 1200 most commonly used words until you

have mastered them, learning 5-7 words a day
B. Daily interest-related listening

(20 minutes per day)
C. Daily interest-related texts and production

Our practice shows that implementing these LIVE-elements

will take about 50 minutes per day, but keep in mind that
the daily listening part has to be, as much as is possible,
integrated into your daily schedule.
Therefore we advise you to listen to it while driving, while

having lunch (and watching a video from your smartphone),
123
or while you´re jogging or walking your dog.
There are many possibilities and you have to find the best
solution by looking at your own daily schedule.
The most important thing is that your body feels that

you´re learning is a part of your daily schedule and not
separately like in the classroom – then it will think that
you really need the language.
Therefore, try to do these LIVE-elements as much as

possible as a natural part of your daily schedule.
If you need advice to assist you in

using the LIVE-elements as a part of
your daily schedule, then write to info@
livelanguagelearning.eu and our team will
be glad to be of assistance.
124
Now you know everything there is to know about the LIVE-

methodology. I hope that with the help of this book you
found a totally new approach to start moving towards your
goals in language learning. I can guarantee you, that if you
use all the LIVE-elements on a daily basis as we described
them, you will start speaking a totally new language well
in about 4-5 months. If you want to just activate your
language and overcome your fear of speaking, then this
will take a mere 1,5 or 2 months to do so.
The most important thing - when using the LIVE-method

- is to keep believing in yourself and to keep following the
guidelines that we provided. Therefore always take into
account your learning style while doing all the learning
activities and always be conistent in your efforts, because
then you will achieve the results that you have always
dreamt about but never believed to achieve.
I have experienced that myself. I remember telling myself

10 years ago that I will speak 6 languages, that I will speak
French like they do in the movies and I will speak Spanish
like the people on the streets of Malaga. But I didn´t know
how. Everybody told me that it takes a lot of time. But it
doesn´t if you do the right things. And this book here has
helped thousands of people do the right things and achieve
the level that they want. You can do it as well!
Author, Ott Ojamets
125
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PREPARATION FOR LIFTOFF 15

FIRST CHAPTER - WORDS 30

SECOND CHAPTER - LISTENING/PRONUNCIATION 48

THIRD CHAPTER - TEXTS AND IMITATING 78

FOURTH CHAPTER - SUMMARY 108

First of all - welcome! You are reading the LIVE-method.

The LIVE-method is a combination of an e-book and a web-

It´s important that you understand the foundation and the

WHY A NEW LANGUAGE LEARNING METHOD?

Often when learning we mimic the actions of others, and we

I’ll describe in a few words how this methodology was

I remember studying Spanish in a group with 15-20

A few years later - after researching about innovative

I understood that the way that we learn languages at

After much research and preparation I published the LIVE-

This book is the latest version of the LIVE-method, which

HOW CAN LANGUAGE LEARNING BE NATURAL?

Let´s come back to the example of your mother and verb

If my mother didn´t teach me how to use the grammar of

Let´s go even further. How is it possible that many have

But how is it possible to learn a language like that? Without

BUT WHAT ABOUT OTHER LEARNING SOLUTIONS?

Now – if you´re reading this and you´ve come into contact

And if something is created for everybody, then it´s actually

This is the main reason for why the LIVE-methodology is

Therefore it´s important that you get to know yourself,

The main idea of the LIVE-methodology is not to provide

And we will give you this knowledge in a very simple and

I have been an expert in innovating language learning for

If you´re the kind of person who needs support then I can

Again, it means that individually it´s possible to get to a

That´s really quick if you compare it to other language

WHY TRADITIONAL SYSTEMS DON`T WORK?

The ugly truth is that about 90% of the activities that we

Therefore, if you have had bad language learning results

And our goal is to give you every bit of knowledge and

To help you start the learning process, we have based the

There is also a special chapter at the end of the book

The following language learning approach is presumably

The next chapter “Preparing for liftoff” has exactly this

We will look into what are some of the hidden secrets in

PREPARATION FOR LIFTOFF

CONSCIOUS LEARNING VS. UNCONSCIOUS LEARNING

To achieve great results in language learning you have to

Language learning is something so natural – it´s something

Our bodies are immensely powerful – every second there

The same idea applies to language learning as well and

WHAT IS CONSCIOUS LEARNING?

It´s something that we do by reasoning. A good example of

Usually it´s already prepared for the teachers by the

We have all experienced this thousands of times.

WHAT IS UNCONSCIOUS LEARNING?

It´s something that we all do automatically, when our

To simplify this difficult notion: it´s something that we do

Why is this important you might ask? The answer is simple.

Unconscious learning harnesses the powers of our mind