The Dutch Pronunciation Trainer Resources

Gabriel Wyner

August 25, 2017
6:39 am

Pronunciation Training

Hi! If you’re seeing this, you’ve probably purchased my Dutch Pronunciation Trainer (if not, you can get it at the store). I’m going to be using this page to keep track of changes, to provide instructions for repairing problems, and to have a central place to keep the instructional videos that you should watch before using your pronunciation trainer.

Want to get the Fluent Forever App? You can still help Fluent Forever create the first app that can bring you all the way to fluency — find Fluent Forever on Indiegogo.

NEXT STAGE OF THE FLUENT FOREVER METHOD

– I’ve completed the pronunciation trainer, what do I do next?

BUG REPORTS

– Issues, errors or bugs in the current version

ESSENTIAL VIDEOS TO START LEARNING

Instructions for using your pronunciation trainer effectively:

Dutch Video 1: Dutch Phonetics and Spelling

Dutch Video 2: Dutch Vowels

Dutch Video 3: A Handful of Dutch Spelling Rules

Note: If you’d like more information on phonetics and the IPA, check out this series of videos. I’ve also create the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) Anki deck, which is available at the Fluent Forever shop.

HOW TO USE ANKI

How to use Anki for the first time

First, you’ll need to install Anki onto your computer if you haven’t already. The details of how to install Anki is provided in the ReadMe file you received with your Pronunciation Trainer. Once you have followed these instructions and installed Anki, you’re free to start studying using the pronunciation trainer deck.

If you have more questions about Anki and learning Dutch, there’s also the Anki language learners community on Reddit. You can even check out this Anki language learning blog for other Anki tips and tricks for learning Dutch.

If you’ve never dealt with Anki before, we’ve created Anki video tutorials to help guide you when using Anki for the first time. You will find tutorials about:

Getting Anki installed and making your first flashcards
Installing the Model Deck
Learning Simple Spellings and Sounds with the Model Deck
Learning Simple Words with the Model Deck
Creating Flashcards with images and sound files

Go to our Using Anki page to access the tutorials.

Creating an AnkiWeb account

Create a free AnkiWeb account to regularly and automatically save your Anki data online by syncing your computer’s Anki account with an AnkiWeb account.

This is useful if you lose all your Anki files on your computer and want to download the latest version of your Anki decks and cards. Having an AnkiWeb account means you can also study your Anki deck and cards on several devices, such as your computer, smartphone and tablet, and you can easily move your decks and cards to different devices.

Getting Anki synchronized across your various devices (Laptops, smartphones, etc.)

I’m having trouble installing Anki or the deck, where can I get help?

If you are having difficulties installing Anki or the deck, please check out the Fluent Forever Help Center as your question may already be answered there.

If you can’t find the answer at the Fluent Forever Help Center, you can send us an email. Please include as much detail as possible and screenshots of the issue.

MODIFYING YOUR DECK

Optional spelling test version

This is an optional version of the deck that asks you to actually type in words to test your spelling, rather than just spelling out the words in your head. Here is an explanation of what this is:

I’ve included a pre-made version of this called the “Optional Spelling Test Version” in the pronunciation trainer download. If you would like to have this feature in your deck, please follow the instructions in your ReadMe file.

LANGUAGE LEARNING RESOURCES

Other useful resources specifically for learning Dutch

We have a dedicated page of other Dutch learning resources. These are books, websites and tools that I personally recommend using.

There is also a general language learning resources page on our website that provides a list of tools and resources that may also be useful for you.

There are also some useful Anki flashcards for Dutch to improve your pronunciation, such as the Dutch alphabet, IPA pronunciation and other useful goodies.

You can even access ready-made Dutch Anki decks to boost up your Dutch vocabulary which is recommended, as it could save you time and get you started faster.

Fluent Forever Help Center

The Fluent Forever help center provides you with advice and answers from the Fluent Forever Team about the most common questions users have. You can access articles about:

FLUENT FOREVER PRONUNCIATION TRAINER VS FLUENT FOREVER APP

Are the Fluent Forever Pronunciation Trainers the same as the Fluent Forever App?

Nope, they’re different!

The Fluent Forever Pronunciation Trainers are a set of videos and audio-visual flashcards. To use them, you watch some videos on YouTube, then you download a flashcard app called Anki, load our pronunciation trainer flashcards into Anki, and start studying. After 2-3 weeks, you’ll have a solid foundation in the sound system of your target language, both in terms of ear training and in terms of the spelling system. After that, you can go create flashcards on your own within Anki, as described within the Fluent Forever book. We began creating these trainers in 2013, and finished in late 2017.

The Fluent Forever App is a much bigger project that we’re currently working on. Many of our users have had trouble learning how to use Anki, or have found that parts of the flashcard creation process were overly tedious. Instead of spending all of their time exploring their new language, they were getting stuck, spending their time struggling with flashcard creation.

In response, we decided to make our own mobile app that could automate the entire Fluent Forever method, so that a student could focus all of their time on exploring their target language, while the app created flashcards automatically, based upon that student’s choices. While the Fluent Forever App DOES teach pronunciation in the first few weeks, that’s only a small part of what it can do. It’s designed to take you all the way to fluency, teaching you vocabulary and grammar from 1,875 sentences we’re making, and letting every user of the app share their original content with every other user of the app. Within the next year or two, this will become the largest database of easily learnable sentences in the world. We began this project in late 2017, and we should have a final version ready by August of 2018. If you’d like to get early, discounted access, join our Indiegogo campaign: http://indiegogo.fluent-forever.com

I heard you have an app in development, but I just bought your other materials. What do I do?

Want to get the Fluent Forever App? You can still help Fluent Forever create the first app that can bring you all the way to fluency — find Fluent Forever on Indiegogo.

NEXT STAGE OF THE FLUENT FOREVER METHOD

I’ve completed the pronunciation trainer, what do I do next?

If you have completed the pronunciation trainer deck you will no longer see any daily cards to review in Anki. If you’re still having problems with pronunciation, you could ask for help at the Reddit Forum for Anki
Language Learning or try Rhinospike.com for help. There are also other websites that have pre-made flashcard deck resources which are highly recommended, such as the alphabet flashcards, IPA pronunciation flashcards and other useful goodies. There’s also blogs about language learning tips with Anki in general which could help you.

The next step in becoming fluent in Dutch is to learn a set of extremely common, simple words using pictures, not translations. There are 625 basics words that are commonly used. You can purchase the Wordlist for Dutch at the shop and begin creating cards to study.

There’s also the option of using ready-made decks of Dutch vocabulary, or checking out a Dutch frequency dictionary.

You can read more about this stage of the Fluent Forever method in Chapter 4 of the Fluent Forever Book entitled “Word Play and the Symphony of a Word”. If you don’t already have the book, you can purchase the audiobook version at our shop or purchase a physical copy online.

BUG REPORTS

Issues, errors or bugs in the current version

If you encounter problems, either email it over or post it to the forum. Include screenshots if possible (if you need an image upload service, use Imgur.com), and be as detailed as you can! If the forum won’t cooperate or if you have something you’d prefer to send in private, send an email.

Please read through the bug report below to check whether the bug has already been reported before sending an email or posting on the forum.

Current Version: Dutch Beta v1.01: No bugs reported yet! (Checked 01/21/18)