How to Make ChatGPT a Better Learning Assistant
5 incredible ways to to use it that are NOT as a teacher or conversation partner
Most articles about ChatGPT talk about it as a useful teacher to learn on our own. And yet, teacher and conversation partner aren’t the only interesting ways to use ChatGPT when learning a language.
That’s why this week we’re turning to a few different use cases for learners of all levels. As usual, these are only a start.
Your imagination is the only limit.
Alright, enough chitchat. Let’s get into the nitty-gritty.
Side note: what’s in brackets in the prompts I share needs to be updated to the language you want of course!
Transform anything into a bilingual book
Want to practice reading in your target language but still struggle with a lack of vocabulary? ChatGPT can make this easier.
And it doesn’t even need a complicated prompt!
Create a table with the [Language] in the first column, the English translation in the second, and indicate in the third column words that are of B2 or above level in [Language] (when there's any). Each row should contain one sentence only
With a simple prompt like the one above, I was able to get tables I could use to study any text I wanted. Convenient.
For those learning a language with a different script and not used to it yet, you can replace the third column or even add a fourth one with the Romanization.
If—like me—you don’t like the column with the target language being small, copy-paste this into an Excel file and make the first column larger.
Shorter complicated texts (or harder ones!)
One of the best tools I ever found for Japanese was a website called News Web Easy, by the NHK. It’s not the only website to give easier-to-understand news, but it was rare back in 2012 to have a website aimed at learners taking real news articles and making them easier.
I used that website extensively to increase my knowledge of “difficult” Japanese words and prepare for the JLPT N2 at the time.
I read the easier version in Japanese and then clicked a link to go to the real one for big boys that I’d have struggled to understand had I not gone through the shorter version.
Well, now, this method can be done for any news article. Hell, any piece of text at all!
All we need to do is copy-paste (or give a link if you have GPT-4) and request a shorter/easier version of it.
Give me a simplified and shorter version of the above article, for a [Language] learner.
Above is the simple prompt I gave and it transformed a German article that was 603 words into one that was 224. Much more manageable.
We don’t always have to dumb down the content we’re studying from. If you want to turn a simple text into a challenge, you can just turn the level knob to the exact level you want.
Make this article more complicated (in [Language]). Use longer sentences and difficult grammar patterns when possible.
Make sure you DO NOT add any new information in the text though.
SRS export made easy
I’m not much of an Anki user anymore because I hated the hassle and pressure of daily reviews that’d pile up if I took a day off. Still, I’d be lying if I didn’t say Anki, Quizlet, and other Spaced-Repetition Systems (SRS) are extremely efficient tools.
And now, ChatGPT can make creating flashcards extremely easy.
You can give it an example of the format you want and ask to take from your conversation certain (or random) sentences along with their translation.
Pick 5 sentences at random from the text and prepare them to be imported in anki easily with the [Target Language] on the front and the [Native Language] sentence on the back. Respond in a code editor to import with a semi-colon as a separator, as in “그의
정성스럽게 짠 편지는 내 마음을 따뜻하게 만들었다만들었다.;His thoughtfully written letter warmed my heart.”
If, however, ChatGPT doesn’t want to give you the response in a code editor, you can then ask it to “Give the same information in a code editor.
”
Why a code editor? Because you get a “copy code” button that’s quite convenient!
Get the next step
The higher your level, the easier it is to get lost with what to do next.
When that happens, ChatGPT can help get some direction with a prompt like:
I studied the まみれ grammar pattern recently and I'm not sure what pattern to study next. What could be a good follow-up at my level (JLPT N1)?
Give it a persona like saying it’s an expert teacher in said language and you’ll get quite a few recommendations. From there on, you can ask it to dive into one or turn to other resources you have that could help you.
Now, in all honesty, I’m not a big fan of responses from GPT3.5 and think the GPT-4 responses are much better and work as a clearer first step. See for yourself!
In this case, not only did GPT-4 add bold to make it easier to follow, it also gave examples. The patterns recommended are also much closer to the level required.
Going further with GPT-4
Of course, GPT-4 can help with even more things!
With the addition of DALL-E 3 to GPT Plus users a few weeks ago, we can now create images in ChatGPT and then study our language from the images we get.
Here’s an example where I created one image and then used it again to expand and get a short fiction filled with descriptions.
OpenAI also announced on November 6th a new functionality: custom GPTs. It gives the possibility to create our own bot that’ll follow rules and knowledge we give it.
I’ve only started playing with it but I’m still pretty happy with my first bot: Fable Sensei which creates fiction stories chapter by chapter with an image representing it and asks me questions to verify my understanding and move forward.
It only took me a few minutes to create it so I’m looking forward to seeing what I can create with more experimenting.
It seems it’ll be available to free users in the near future (maybe not creating but using them at least). I hope that’s true!
Large Language Models (LLMs) like ChatGPT are here to stay. They’ll evolve and become indispensable tools for all kinds of learners.
Language learners included.
Start today to experiment and find the many other ways you can use it to help you!
And let me know if there’s any other way you’re using it by responding to this or commenting 😉
Cheers for reading,
Mathias, an average polyglot