I've improved my Spanish loads and am now working on German using this method. Hope this helps.

I understand the frustration with charades for sure lol.

1. Use Pimsleur (speaking, listening and ad libbing) and Duolingo (vocabulary and reinforcemen)
2. The USA diplomatic training (Foreign Service Institute) -- It's free, gets super advanced (at least in Spanish), but you end up sounding like a diplomat
3. Find a language exchange partner -- I used Italki

Learning a language from the same family shouldn’t be that hard.

My mother tongue is Spanish, so Portuguese or Italian would probably be the easiest path. My second and third languages are English and French, and those two were a different story. 😅

I’d also like to learn something completely different, maybe Chinese or Japanese. Just because… why not?

I would not use Duolingo because those I have known using it are not a good indicator it works. Also I think an app which congratulates too much is a waste of time and is for those suffering from short attention span.

If you mean by acquire being able to speak, read and write, then nothing beats buying or downloading a book to learn Dutch and practicing in real life.
You should also read short novels in Dutch or try newspapers. The translator on Kagi is quite good but unfortunately a specialized electronic dictionary is still better (in terms of time spent on a keyboard and quality of answers). If you are not serious about learning Dutch or don't want to spend the money yet, then I found Quickdic useful on Android.

TLDR: buy/download a book, don't use an app.

"Similar to German" feels a bit like a stretch.

The vowels are drastically different. Good luck finding anything with "ij" or the vowel used in "heeft", whatever that one is called, in German. Let alone some of the more fun consonants.
Scheveningen, anyone?

Putting all of that aside. I always advise to watch ads.
They're repetitive, enunciate really well, form part of popular culture over time, and usually you know exactly what they're trying to tell you anyway.
Pair that with some formal lessons for basic grammar and you're well on your way.

For me the key thing was not feeling like an (utter) idiot when trying to pronounce snippets. Then extend the incredibly well pronounced snippets' length successively until the language is spoken acquired. En klaar is Kees, daar heb je het.

Living there and using it everyday is probably the best way. Use Duolingo and watch TV shows in Dutch. Getting a Dutch speakinv girlfriend would create some motivation too.

As a Dutch person... just use English and save yourself the hassle... Dutch grammar is a mess, even for me. A gazillion exceptions, without logic. Dutch people will switch to English effortlessly and usually do not mind at all.

The fact that you have an Airbnb host, in Amsterdam no less, that does not speak English, is beyond me... you really won the lottery there lol...

Also: #1561428

Note: Learning Dutch is no great investment at all because you can just speak English, anywhere, especially in Amsterdam. Nevertheless, I did it too.

For me, not having much education in German prior, it was harder for me to learn German after Dutch, because Germans simply do not understand a word I say. I think the other way around ought to be easier and I know a bunch of Germans that think so too, but every native speaker will be rolling their eyes with every germanisering you'll pollute their language with (whereas they will not do that if you insert any English word anywhere)

For me, I worked with a bunch of Dutch people and I spent a lot of evenings in the pubs so I just picked it up like that at first, and then I took some classes because "street Dutch" is like English without self-censoring any bad word. It's probably better to do it the other way around: start with some classes.

I have been trying to learn French for years and still struggling with comprehension as you say

Reading writing speaking are intermediate but listening is the weakest discipline for me

Also french is basically a dead language like Latin, I mean apart from the French who are super protective of it, who else uses it? A few bygone former french colonies, Senegal, ivory coast, Algeria perhaps but even they prefer Arabic

I've tried evening school, Duolingo, apps, but I find proof of work is the only real way if you can't live in said country, so I literally take a video and slow it down and break it down piece by piece

The problem with french is, they have classroom french and street french, which I suppose they have for any language but the spoken way drops parts that are always written

My goal is to be able to listen to a political or cultural debate on french TV where there are 4 or 5 guests all shouting over each other lol

I should imagine Dutch is like french in that, it's only used in Holland and a few colonies like Aruba for example, I'm wondering if the Flemish region of Belgium is a type of Dutch?

I liked the book Fluent Forever to get some ideas about how to learn a language. There is also an app but I did not used it.

Basically

• learn lots of words
• expose yourself to the language (in the country/online)

I feel that you have to know your learning style. So Singapore is a multiracial country. Whenever I want to learn a Malay word from my students, I will get one of them to write it down. Once I see the spelling, I will internalise how to say it. I am blessed that I am thick-skinned, so I am the kind who will find an opportunity to apply the word I have learnt. Usually people are flattered and amazed that I know such a word. This small win makes me want to learn another word to impress them.

I also find that learning to say funny things helps. For example, I tell my students put your kaki gemok under your desk. Kaki gemok means fat leg. 🦵 Never fails to make people laugh whenever I use it

I've found the Pimsleur audio books are quite good, picked up enough german for a trip (combined with years of rammstein listening)

I like how you said "acquire," and not learn -- as if it's a thing to collect and gather. Very nice

My guess is that you would pick up Dutch a lot better than Portuguese, even from Duolingo, since it's a hybrid of languages you already speak fluently.

The same thing happened to me with Duolingo, hahaha... When we were leaving Cuba for Brazil, my wife and I spent four or five months studying Portuguese beforehand, watching some YouTube videos and using Duolingo... and when we arrived in Brazil, it wasn't very helpful. The only thing that saved us was that Spanish and Portuguese are similar... and even then, you still have to be careful what you say because you can offend someone without realizing it, hahaha. Even so, I can tell you that the best way to learn a language is to live with people who speak it. We learned Portuguese here on the fly, and once I lived with a guy who was Italian and I learned some Italian too, although I've practically forgotten it because I never practiced it with anyone again. But living with a native speaker helps a lot, or at least with people who are studying it or something like that.

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