Language learning is a peaceful martial art.

When you begin the process of learning a new language, starting from zero, you wear the White Belt. But before you can even wear the White Belt, you have to understand what it means when we say that language learning is a peaceful martial art.

In my experience, most language learning classes assume that the goal of learning a language is for the student to learn the grammar and vocabulary of the language with the hopes of being able to converse in that language. We think this is entirely backward.

I once read a quote by a polyglot who said ‘you don’t learn a language in order to speak it, you speak a language in order to learn it’. And this is exactly right. Learning to speak a language is like learning to ride a bike. How can you learn to ride a bike without actually riding the bike?

Quick disclaimer here … I have heard this objection: well, some languages like Latin are no longer spoken so maybe people do want to just ‘learn’ the language without ever speaking it. I’m not talking about that. If you are a person who is content ‘learning’ Spanish, or German or French or Arabic or Italian with no intention of ever having a conversation with a human being in that language, knock yourself out. This message is not for you.

The method we use, known as The Language Matrix or TLM, which currently taught only by me, and my friend Fabio Colivier, founder of Legacy Idiomas out of São Paulo Brazil, puts conversation first. Learning happens as a result of conversation — not the other way around.

If you’re still with me, then let’s talk about what we mean by conversation.

We believe that the proof that you’ve learned anything is your ability to respond to questions in the language you’re learning. This approach has been adopted from the concept of the OPI — or Oral Proficiency Interview — which is the speaking test used by the US Military and other government agencies such as the FBI.

The format of the OPI is that your tester asks you a series of questions that gradually increase in difficulty until they’ve established how well you can speak on a scale of 0 to 3. 0 being no proficiency whatsoever, and 3 being complete professional proficiency.

Being asked a series of questions, that you have to answer on the fly, is the best model (that I know) for evaluating how well you can speak your target language.

And this is where the martial art of it all comes into play.

In the OPI, you need to defend yourself against the testers’ questions. The tester is there to see what you can do, and also see what you can’t do. It’s not blatantly adversarial, however it’s not entirely friendly either. Your tester is the person who stands between you and, say, a promotion, or a pay raise. So it’s in your best interest to be able to defend yourself well in the conversation. In Spanish, one of way of saying ‘I can get by in the language’ is saying ‘me defiendo’, literally, I can defend myself. And that’s totally the idea. Conversation, especially for the purpose of learning a new language, is like sparring in boxing or Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.

And like Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, which was developed to enable competitors defeat much larger and stronger opponents relying solely on technique, the TLM and Legacy Idiomas peaceful martial art approach to conversation will provide you with a technique for becoming conversational in a new language more efficiently than you may have ever dreamt possible.

If I may brag for moment, TLM Arabic students coming from the FBI scored a 1.5 on the OPI in 4 weeks, which normally takes 63 weeks when being trained by the military. Doing the math, that makes the method roughly 15 times more efficient than military language training.

So how does it work? And how can you get started right now?

As I mentioned before, in order to wear the White Belt, you must understand what we mean by language learning being a peaceful martial art. And I think now you do.

But there is one more bit of criteria that is required in order for you to become an official TLM and Legacy Idiomas White Belt. And that is to understand the basic ‘fighting stance.’

Imagine you’re standing in front of your opponent, one leg behind the other, as if in a boxing match or Tai Chai Push Hands contest. Imagine that your back foot is carrying most of your weight, meaning that your front foot is free to move. Now imagine that your ‘opponent’ who is in front of you is about to attempt to push you or throw a punch. In this metaphor, that opponent is your conversation sparring partner who has just asked you a question in your target language, the language you’re learning.

Now … your back foot … or pivot foot … the foot which is carrying most of your weight and is going to provide leverage for you as you counter the opponent’s advance … is a verb. For example, if your opponent asks, ‘What are your hobbies?’, you will rely on the verb ‘I like’ as your jumping off point. If the question is, ‘Have you ever been to Brazil?’ Your pivot point will be ‘Yes, I have…’, or ‘No, I haven’t’. Once you have established your verb pivot point, you are free to move around with freedom using the front foot, which is your vocabulary. You may say, I like … running, or playing the guitar, or doing yoga. Or, I have been … to Brazil; I have been to Rio and São Paulo, but I haven’t been to Natal.

Another way of looking at it as that your verb pivot point, or Verb Starting Point as we call it is like the ‘seed’ of your response, while the vocabulary choices that follow are like the ‘branches’. This is the basic strategy of the OPI peaceful martial art game.

The essence of this strategy is to develop your reflexes within the conversation. One of our mantras is: Reflex! Not recall. In other words, we’re not interested in how many words you can remember; we’re only interested in how well you can defend yourself against questions in an unscripted conversation.

After White Belt, you will advance through Red, Orange, and Yellow Belt until reaching Green belt, at which point your completely conversational in the language. After Green Belt, you ‘descend’ with the help of momentum through Blue, Indigo, Violet and Black Belt. The skills required at each of those levels will be covered in future publications.

For now, if you can explain back to me what it means to say that language learning is a peaceful martial art, then you have earned the White Belt, and I’ll even send you a signed certificate making it official.

To summarize: 1.: Conversation, for the purpose of learning a language, is a form of sparring. And 2.: the basic stance is relying on a Verb Starting Point, or Verb Seed, which you combine with Vocabulary Branches in order to answer the question.

Learning a Language with One Question a Day

According to the peaceful martial art of conversation for the purpose of learning a new language, the smallest unit of measurement of your progress is the Question. In other words, we don't measure your progress in the language by how many words you know, or how accurately you can conjugate verbs, but by how many questions you can answer and how well you can answer them. 

With this understanding established, we can begin the work of learning to answer questions. Remember: it's about reflex, not recall. 

Recently we came upon a theory that if a person were to learn to answer one question a day, five days a week, for one month (20 questions total), that person would be ahead of others using traditional methods in terms of OPI readiness. Learning just one question a day would make that person more ready for conversation than if they weren't using that method. 

Part of the crux of this theory, however, is that the person must commit to truly mastering their Question of the Day. We believe it's better to learn one thing a day for 5 days rather than 5 things on one day. 

We imagine it's like saying ... listen, I'm not going to go out and plant a whole garden, that would be crazy! I'm just going to go outside once a day a plant one seed. In a matter of months, I will have a blooming garden. 

For 20 questions is not only 20 questions. The bits and pieces we used to construct our answers to each question begin to rearrange themselves in our minds (sometimes while we sleep) and we surprise ourselves when we can say way more than we thought we knew. 

The trick is in holding fast to the course. It's one question a day, 5 days a week, no exceptions. 

I don't know if I even learn one new thing every single day. Do you? And if I do, I certainly couldn't tell you what the one thing I learned on, say, July 17th 2015 was. There's no record of it! With the One-a-Day method, I will be able to ask you: what did you learn last Wednesday? And you will open your One-a-Day journal day the Question of the Day was such-and-such, and my answer was this.

It's like that trick question would you rather have $1 million right right now or a penny today, two pennies tomorrow, four pennies the next day, eight pennies the day after that and so on for a month. At first glance, $1 million sons like a lot more than a few pennies, but when you do the math you find out that the doubling quantities reach a sum of over $10 million. It's the power of exponential accumulation.

In upcoming publications, I'd like to talk about the theory of which questions you should learn and when, as we are looking for conversation that will teach us the structure and vocabulary of the language, and we would like our biggest possible return on investment in terms of the questions we learn. For now, any one question per day is good. Just sure you record your work in a journal.

You can think of it this way: just because you can answer 50 questions in your target language doesn't mean that you are necessarily fluent in that language. However if you can't answer those 50 questions, then you definitely can't be fluent in the language. So start here.

I find there is a pesky language learning negative thought that can say: well, I'll just wait until I've learned the language to master a set of questions. Of course, you'll never learn the language unless you master that set of questions! It's like saying I'll wait for the house to be built before I start laying bricks, or I will wait for the fire to be blazing before I add firewood.

My challenge to you now is this: choose your target  language if you haven't already, get a notebook, and choose your question of the day. You can use ChatGPT to help you, you don't need a teacher. Also use ChatGPT help construct your answer. And then commit that question and answer to memory (by reflex, not recall). And repeat the following day.

TLM-Legacy Method Explained Simply

I've heard it said that if you can't explain something simply, then you don't understand it well enough.

Has anyone ever really explained language learning? There are certainly a lot of people talking about it online.

But do you really understand how language learning works? If so, could you explain it back to me?

If not, it hasn't been explained simply enough.

The goal of the TLM and Legacy method of language teaching is that you understand language learning so well, that you can teach yourself any language..

I don't believe in clickbait and things that drag you along for 20 minutes without saying anything. So I'm going to attempt right now to explain the 3 most important principles of the method. 

The first, is that your job is not to memorize words. Your job is, and will always be, to express thoughts in the language that you're learning. Even if you knew every word In your target language you would not be able to have a conversation, any more than you could study every possible boxing combination and then step into the ring and be successful. Communication is both the means and the end of this training method.

Second, we visualize verbs as the "seeds" of your thought, and the vocabulary as the "branches". By mixing in matching verbs and vocabulary you are able to "defend yourself" against questions being asked of you by your conversation partner.

And finally, if you haven't noticed already, we think of conversation as a "peaceful martial art". If I ask you a question in the target language, you must find a way to answer the question. We are interested in reflex, not recall.

I've taken this approach to language teaching for over 15 years as a Spanish, Portuguese, and Arabic teacher for the US Military and FBI. My students routinely reach a conversational level in as little as two weeks. And it is thanks to the three core principles I've just outlined.

If you think this sounds fake, or too good to be true, or just another bit of internet nonsense, I invite you to please reach out and allow us to personally demonstrate how this method will work immediately for you too. 

I myself, as well as my colleague and expert teacher Fabio are standing by to give you an entirely free language learning consultation. 

In the coming months you'll see that a real revolution in language learning is happening, and we invite you to be at the forefront of it with us.

Thank you for taking the time to read so far, and we look forward to serving you on your language learning path.

Language Learning and the Chess Metaphor

"We believe language learning is like learning to play a game such as chess"

But how much can you really separate the learning from the playing?

But how much can you really separate the learning from the playing?

And if learning and playing are essentially one and the same, then what does playing mean in terms of language learning?

The answer to this is simple: conversation.

What is conversation? Questions and answers.

That's the essence of the method. Having understood that, you'll find that Legacy-TLM is just a set of tools combined with a particular style of coaching designed to get you playing as quickly as possible.