Can You Learn a Language with Google Translate?

A B O U T T H I S V I D E O
In this video, I will share with you my best 3 strategies to make the most out of Google translation when learning a new language.
Translators for Japanese:

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F O L L O W M E

C R E D I T S

[LucaLampariello]

If you liked the video, share it with your friends & spread the word!

[AntipodePolyglot]

Hi from Google! I would like to share a tip: whenever possible, use English instead of your mother tongue when you translate to or from your target language. The thing is that Google Translate usually does not support direct translation L1 -> L2, it translates from L1 to English and then from English to L2. That's why if you use English, you can avoid extra errors in the second automatic translation.

Here is one example of indirect translation.
Russian: Это колос.
Italian (correct): Questo è una spiga.
Italian (Google Translate): Questo è un orecchio.

The last actually means "Это ухо" in Russian. Both колос (spiga) and ухо (orecchio) translate to English as "ear". Google Translate first created an English phrase "This is an ear" and then translated it to Italian.

[sebastianstemplowski]

I started to learn Portuguese accidentally. I just like talking to people. I use italki to meet new cultures, I spoke with Brazilians, some woman said me that she doesn't speak English. To communicate in Portuguese I used Google translator. After 4 months I reached the B1+ level, I talked every day for 2-3 hours. Google Translator is not perfect, however, thanks to this tool I went to São Paulo and now I have the best friends in the world.

[lygo]

If you are translating in an uncommon language Google translate is the best, otherwise Deepl is the perfect choice !

[japanrain]

I save almost every word in the favorites section in google translate because of compulsive behavior rather than learning

[diegozlotogora]

Love the books you have behind you! Can you do a video with the titles, your favorites, etc?

[coach]

Great video Luca. I'd like to highlight that Google translation accuracy is based on the number of of translations and not on the difficulty of the text. The more you'll translate the more the AI will learn, that's why Google translation works better with major languages (English, Spanish, German, etc.).

[mitchbernard]

I only recently and happenstantially discovered your YouTube videos and am enjoying them! Thank you! As a social scientist who has learned and used languages for decades, this online world of polyglots and language-learning strategies has been quite orthogonal to mine.
In relying on Google translator to go from European to many East & Southeast Asian languages (less with standard Chinese than with Japanese & Korean or, as I'm now discovering, Thai) there are a couple of tricky 'issues' that users of Google Translate need to be aware of . 
One is that machine learning techniques for translation cannot adjust for the level of politeness you may need because that usually belongs to the deeper context outside of the text. 
The other, even more fundamental issue, especially if you are planning to use the output of a translation in spoken communication, is that important elements in the spoken target language that have no counterparts in the European source language, such as using sentence endings that render a sentence 'incomplete' in the Indo-European sense or particles that add 'feeling' but not any literal meaning, will be missing from any translation. All upper intermediate and advanced speech will have these elements so users need to be aware that the output of the translation will still require some work to make it presentable in ways that might be unnecessary in languages without these features.

[tuskaroraowl]

I actually used it a lot when learning Hebrew. It was so effective, I was going to write a book about it :) but daily realities of a busy family man 👞 me out of this dream.

[coldfusionmusical]

Great advice!
I used Google Translate to translate English texts to Chinese as a means to help me get a rough sketch and then I'll go through the Chinese text to check the text to make sure it sounds natural to a native, since it's my mother tongue.
I'm learning Hebrew, and always a bit concerned with what you've mentioned, so I often have to go through several stops before coming to a conclusion. I'd use Reverso Context, Google Translate, Pealim, Morfix and then I'll try to search on YouTube or elsewhere to see if it's actually used in the correct context in real life.
It's quite a task but totally worth it, but unfortunately the service isn't always available in all languages, especially when one is learning a less known/popular language.

[gustavschnitzel]

I love to occasionally read various articles on Wikipedia (especially on topics like politics, geography and history). Sometimes I change to English and it's nearly every single time that I learn new expressions. Google Translator is already opened in another tab. It helps me dramatically when I want to express my thoughts on topics I am interested to and not be stuck with basic words.
I recommend reading about everything you like on Wikipedia in your target language with Google Translator besides. One of the best ways to get from an intermediate to a more advanced level.

[Laura-xzev]

I've got "wordreference" and "reverso context", I don't like Google Translate

[avioengine]

Il tuo canale veramente e’ uno tra i migliori al mondo per la capacita’ di dare consigli circa l utilizzo della tecnologia.
Si vede che oltre alle lingue sei al passo con i tempi.
E ovviamente, da italiano rappresenti per noi un motivo di orgoglio.
Grazie Luca :)

[ericb_german]

I didn't hear or see it mentioned, but there is a chrome extension for google translate (maybe a firefox one as well) that allows you to popup translations. If you are reading on the web it is very useful and quick. For a single word, double click the word to popup up the translation. For longer translations (phrases, sentences, paragraphs, etc) highlight the section you want to translate and it will popup automatically. No need to keep a separate tab or browser page open.

[moisessanchez]

Justo hace unos días empecé a usarlo para mí aprendizaje de idiomas, este video me queda como anillo al dedo. Muchas gracias.

[johntyb]

Sometimes when I need cheering up, I copy & paste the menu from Chinese restaurants into GT, this often produces hilarious results!

[DjNovaSpinova]

I use it daily to talk to people all over the world. It helped me be able to speak to my Ecuadorian boyfriend and he taught me Spanish 🎉

[santiglot]

Haha I use Google translate everyday, it's sooo useful for studying so many different languages! (Very bad for studying others tho haha, specially Tagalog).

Great video as always~

[DekritGampamole]

I use Google Translate to train my pronunciation. I think Google Translate is extremely helpful especially in tone language like Chinese. This is how I use it: First, I translate a simple phrase like "I eat my breakfast" into Chinese, click the speaker button to listen to the Chinese pronunciation. Next, I reverse the translation from Chinese to English, but this time I click on microphone to use voice to text feature. I will try to say the Chinese sentence until Google translate got it right.

[AngelDucattiforever]

Another excellent video Luca! For English learners who want to search for just a word, I do recommend that they just type the word + meaning, like "stick meaning" in the Google search bar. You will get the many meanings of that particular word in English with examples plus translation in your language and pronunciation.