5 Reliable Techniques for Learning Polish at Home!

Discover our techniques for learning Polish on your own at home!

Remember: attending a Polish language course at Varia School is a milestone on your path to mastering Polish, but it’s only 60% of the success. You’re probably wondering where to find the remaining 40%. Look in the mirror – you and your effort can secure a place on the podium for the best students.

How can you achieve this? Let’s get down to the specifics.

Do it yourself!

When learning Polish, immediately turn theory into practice! How? When you memorize new vocabulary, such as new verbs, you can perform the action that the word describes at the same time. For example, if you are learning words related to cooking and the word “mieszać” (to stir) appears, say out loud “mieszać, ja mieszam, mieszam zupę” (“to stir, I stir, I am stirring the soup”) and pretend to stir – or even better, actually stir something in your kitchen. Your brain not only remembers the word and its meaning, but also connects it with your body’s movement, creating a mental image of the action, making it much easier to remember the word.

Be a teacher!

Do you know who learns new things the fastest? A teacher! Yes, you read that correctly. Why is that? Because a teacher must be fully focused and analyze the material from many different perspectives—so that no question from their students catches them off guard. If you’re learning something new, like a new grammatical case, try explaining it to someone close to you—your spouse, a friend, or your mother. Be their teacher. Believe me, after such a session, nothing will slip from your mind!

Be an examiner! Test yourself!

Do you get nervous just thinking about an exam? I understand, but… preparing tests and completing them is also a form of learning. 😊 You just need to change your perspective! Test yourself—make tests for yourself!

Why is creating your own tests such an effective method? First, you have to thoroughly analyze the material yourself and pay attention to tricky elements. Second, when you think intensively about the correct answer, your brain works more efficiently and absorbs information more easily, helping you remember it for longer! Third, by creating your own tests, you get used to taking tests and exams, and the official ones stop being so stressful for you.

Take notes! But do it smartly and in a way you like!

Why take notes on everything when all the information is in books and online? It’s difficult—listening and writing at the same time is much more tiring… And that’s the point!

First of all, taking notes helps us learn better because our brain works more intensively. You feel a bit tired after the lesson because you had to think a lot. That’s a good sign! The results will be at your door soon.

Before I tell you the second important thing, I have a question for you: do you know what is on the twenty-zloty or ten-zloty banknote? Don’t remember? You’re not alone! Most of us see these banknotes often, but we usually can’t say who or what is on them. Why? Because we look at them mechanically, automatically, without any analysis.
What does this mean for you as someone learning another language? It’s worth reviewing lesson material, but not automatically! Be creative! Don’t read the same table of accusative, genitive, or dative endings for the tenth time… Analyze everything and create something that will help you remember the new information. It could be a table, or something else entirely. Draw, add your own examples, include pictures, funny sentences, or examples from your life—personal, emotional! Use mind maps, arrows, colors! Have your own unique way of taking notes!

Rent a room in your house for the accusative, genitive, or imperative mood!

Don’t worry, this will only happen in your imagination! Close your eyes and imagine walking into your apartment. You know it well, so you easily find your way to the kitchen. In the kitchen sits your favorite actor—Brad Pitt—eating brown rice and drinking orange juice. Brad is male, so he can help you with the masculine gender (man – masculine). You go to the living room. In the living room, your sister (an expert in the feminine gender, sister – feminine) is enjoying a vegan salad. Meanwhile, in your bedroom sits a child (who will tell you everything about the neuter gender, child – neuter)—drinking milk with chocolate cake smeared on their face. Voilà! Singular forms for the accusative are now easy for you!

Your Apartment – Visualization:

The technique I’ve described here is a mnemonic system, where you place a visually strong symbol of the information you want to remember for a long time in a place you know well. It’s important that these symbols are somehow connected to your life, are emotional for you, or so unusual that they easily stick in your memory.

Justyna Szybińska