Ever feel like there's just too much coming at you?
You can use Evernote for free across mobile devices and computers to organize all the content you come across related to learning a new language.
This includes useful resources, helpful ideas, motivating tidbits, learning tips, study tricks, cool methods and so much more.
Evernote is in Android, iOS, Windows Mobile app stores and works with desktop computers and many browsers.
Evernote pulls together all the loose strings
As I consume or happen on any helpful information or come across a new idea, image, quote, resource, inspiration, basically any helpful info, related to learning a language I save it to Evernote.
It all stays in one place and when I want some motivation I can go and swim through all the cool things I thought would help me - quite an effective way to tempt myself into a learning session.
I have found the Evernote app to be a great tool for keeping all the many, many things that have to be held together when learning a language. This app is free and helps me to organize my thoughts and studies in one place, as well as quickly take note of any interesting content I come across while surfing the Web or doing something other than language learning that I would like to come back to later.
Turn potential distractions into a useful archive
As with anything, once you get surfing online, distractions abound and it's great to have a record of resources and content you want to remember for a language study session. So instead of getting sidetracked or frustrated with information overload, just save anything you deem useful to Evernote and come back to it another time, allowing yourself to finish your current task without veering off course.
Tips for using Evernote effectively to learn a new language
I photograph things I come across and don't understand or just want to learn. You can also scan in documents as well as images to make them searchable.
If you're learning many languages like I am, you can organize these into separate folders to make sure the stream of content you are keeping track of is nicely organized per language.
Tag any content to further break down the tidbits into related, useful flows. I use the following tags to guide me through and prioritize past tidbits when I sort through them: "ASAP", "Someday Definitely" and "Someday Maybe". These would be in the specific language folder it related to, or a Multilingual folder I also maintain.
I further tag notes with some kind of use or purpose, such as "Reading", "Writing", "Listening", "Speaking", "Vocabulary", "Apps", "Lessons", "Courses", "Videos", "Podcasts", "Radio", etc. You may choose to include the language name, such as "Czech Lessons" or "Spanish Radio", depending on how you decide to organize your info stream.
These technical bits will become clear if you start using Evernote to organize your language learning endeavors, there are amazing tutorial resources for effective use.
You can also do interesting things with your data over time, like search for words or concepts and see when you've been most active.
The free Evernote is all you need
If this all sounds interesting, have a look at Evernote. It's free (unless you go insane and start uploading tons of content at which point you may consider upgrading anyhow).