Let me introduce you to my new favorite language teacher, Claude. Claude is infinitely patient, never makes me feel bad about my language skills, gives me detailed help to sound more natural, and is willing to talk about almost anything. He even role-plays people I might meet while doing fieldwork, helping me practice my language skills in specific obscure domains.
I absolutely love learning with Claude, and it is absolutely free (unless you end up talking to much within an 8 hour period, in which case he will lock you out until the 8 hour window is up and then you can talk again.)
Special Note: As Claude himself will tell you, he was not trained in foreign langauges, so he does make mistakes, but in my experience these are rare and worth the trade off.
Here are some tips for working with Claude for Language Learning.
Prompt suggestions are in BOLD GREEN.
Formatting with Translations
If you want a nicely formatted table for each response with English translations, add the following to any of the following prompts.
Format as a table with Vietnamese on the left and English on the right.
If you want additional additional notes on grammar or usage, you can also add:
Add a column to the right with any special tips on grammar or how to sound more natural.
Having a Conversation
Let’s have a conversation in simple Italian. I am at the beginner level. Teach me and help me look more natural.
Notice that I added a formatting prompt to add the English translations in the follow up.
Ask for corrections.
If I make a mistake, please correct me and help me sound more natural.
Then, go for it. You don’t have to worry about being wrong. Claude will probably know what you are trying to say and help you say it more naturally. Since I am a total beginner in Italian, I completely flubbed this sentence, but Claude helped me out.
Speaking Conversation
If you want to converse with audio for free you can install Voice GPT as a free extension and converse with Chat GPT in multiple languages. If you can swing the $20/month for Chat-GPT+, it has an excellent conversation function on the mobile app.
Story Prompts
You can ask for any kind of story with any characters at any level of difficulty. If you are learning a special domain of words, ask Claude to generate a story to help you learn those words. (Remember to use the formatting prompt above if you want the parallel English translation.)
Tell me a funny story in simple Vietnamese that will help me learn color words and animal words. Try to include as many animals and colors as possible.
You can also ask for famous fairy tales, myths, legends, movies, and television shows in your target language / culture.
Tell me a famous Vietnamese fairy tale in simple Vietnamese.
Output: Claude tells me the famous story of Tam and Cam in simple Vietnamese.
Jokes
Tell me a joke in Vietnamese that is a common joke in Vietnam.
Conjugation & Grammar Tables
Make a table showing common endings for regular verb conjugations in Italian. Include a column for English and another column for an example.
Make a table of 10 Vietnamese structures that are common in Vietnamese but not in English. The table has 3 columns. In the left column, list the grammar structure in Vietnamese. In the second column, give the English translation. In the 3rd column, give at least one example in Vietnamese with an English translation.
Word-lists
Give me a list of the 100 most common Vietnamese words with English translations in a table format.
If you ask for moire than 100 you will likely get turned down, but you can use:
Give me a list of the 100 2nd-most common Vietnamese words with English translations in a table format.
and just keep going until you have a frequency word list as long as you like.
You can also do specific domains:
Give me a list of 50 Vietnamese words about (colors, body parts, personality traits, school, work, travel, etc.) with English translations in a table format.
For more advanced learners:
Give me a list of 100 common but difficult Vietnamese words with English translations in a table format
And there is so much more that you can do. Just ask, and more than likely, Claude will give you what you want.
