Focusing on vocab is an excellent shortcut to learning a language. But eventually you will need to learn sentences as well so that you can put your vocab to use.
When it comes to the importance of vocab vs sentence building, think of the 2 as different projects that need to be built at the same time. Grow your vocab while growing your other skills.
FSI Bootcamp
Vocab Viper was originally designed to only provide vocabulary. The Core and the Top 1,000 courses were (and are) the main project. This made Vocab Viper the perfect compliment to use with other language learning products on the market that lack vocabulary. This all changed with the inclusion of Bootcamp.
The Foreign Service Institute, a US government entity, designed and created various language courses in the 1960's and 1970's for the purpose of training diplomats in foreign languages to prepare them for duties around the world. Here's an example from a Spanish course that shows how intensive the training is:
These courses are in the public domain and are free to download and use on your own. They're the perfect fit for the content and style of Vocab Viper. So now they're included as a bonus!
Although the courses have amazing content, each is distinctly different in style and character. Here's what's in Vocab Viper's Bootcamp:
The benefit of having this content on Vocab Viper is that it's organized as an online course. The original content was a stack of cassette tapes and a booklet. Vocab Viper provides everything in a step by step system where you can mark units complete to save your progress.
Mission, Values, Vision
The old FSI courses were outstanding for their time, and are still useful to this day. But they relied on old technology and only included popular languages. Part of the Vision and direction for Vocab Viper is to create new Bootcamp courses for other languages as well as providing new ways to engage with the content. You can read more about that on the Mission, Values, Vision page.
This was Part 2 of How to Learn a Language. Click below to advance.