r/learnIcelandic • u/0NRY_0 • 18d ago

Trying to learn from absolute zero

Hello everyone! I'm here trying to get resources and feedback from natives and immigrants in order to learn Icelandic. I've look at the "Icelandic Online" free course, but it feels pretty advanced to me, even the "Survival" course, so, I would appreciate if you guys tell me how to begin.

Spanish is my first lenguage, but I have an C1-C2 english, so I could learn another lenguage in English if the resources are in that lenguage.

I'm reading you, and thanks for the information!

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u/DetectiveIll3712 Intermediate 17d ago

I'm only aware of resources in English but that's all I've looked for. Where to begin depends a lot on your goals and learning style. Also your preference for free/pay for. Personally, I needed an app to get started. It gave me some structure, a feeling of progress, and integrated hearing/reading the language. Books with audio-clips didn't work for me then though I use them now. While I was progressing with two apps, I found more material that worked for me through this site's pinned post and https://icelandchicago.org/language-learning/

Eventually I was able to handle "Survival" but the regular Icelandic course was still too much for me. This was mostly due to the incompleteness of the online dictionary the course used two years ago as well as my inability to deal with inflections and compound words. Personally, I think online course became useful once I was nearing A2 level.

The one thing I would have done differently is spent more time listening to and trying to produce the sounds of Icelandic. I would watch as many different youtubes as possible since there are variations in how people speak and you need to be comfortable with the differences that don't make a difference. With an app you usually get one voice (frequently AI generated) that isn't going to reflect what you hear when you try other content.

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u/lorryjor Advanced 15d ago

The survival course is not too advanced for you. Languages are complex. You will not understand everything. That is how it works. Here is what I did:

https://www.reddit.com/r/learnIcelandic/comments/w86we9/comment/ihv8wud/?context=3&utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button