How should I gain experience in a language?

[suchipi]

I have, many times, found myself reading about and learning the syntax and structures of a language and finding that I liked the language and its methods, and wanted to gain more experience in it by using it. As great as a language looks on paper, it's not until you use it that you learn all the great things and annoying things that are unique to it.

Because I want to learn by doing, I try to find a project to pursue. However, with limited knowledge of a language, that path is not always clear.

I could try to contribute code to open source projects, but due to my lack of experience in the language, my pull requests will be riddled with worst practices.
I could start a project from scratch, but without any direction or inspiration it's not entirely easy to know what to do.
I might try using popular frameworks built around the language like Rails or node.js, but I sometimes worry about the unportability of learning within a specific domain.

What are some best practices for learning a language? How have you learned languages in the past? After learning a language, was there anything you wish you could have gone back and learned in a different way?

[Zezibesh]

Immersion is by far the best way (assuming you go outside and interact with people instead of being a NEET shut-in), it's how I learned English. I can't speak for formal language education from schools and textbooks because that has never worked for me.

[Loopoo]

Harvest the tongue of a local and perform demon rituals upon it to transfer it's ability to speak the native language unto you.

Immersion is the best way, though. If you can join an international language school as well, they're awesome to help you learn.

EDIT: Oh shit, I just realised I misunderstood your post.

[NoRegard]

[QUOTE=loopoo;47196014]Harvest the tongue of a local and perform demon rituals upon it to transfer it's ability to speak the native language unto you.

Immersion is the best way, though. If you can join an international language school as well, they're awesome to help you learn.

EDIT: Oh shit, I just realised I misunderstood your post.[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE=Zezibesh;47195592]Immersion is by far the best way (assuming you go outside and interact with people instead of being a NEET shut-in), it's how I learned English. I can't speak for formal language education from schools and textbooks because that has never worked for me.[/QUOTE]

This is the programming forum, not the linguistic forum.

My advice is probably to start a slightly 'big' project. You might not finish it but you'll learn a lot.

[octopod]

I went from scripting e2 in wiremod to scripting in minecraft to coding java for minecraft to coding c# programs. Not to mention learning git and all that stuff.

The one thing they all have in common is that all the small projects I've made have a purpose, and learning your way to getting your project to work exactly how you want them to and that access to constant playtesting is more worthwhile than an example written on a book or webpage, at least in my opinion.

I think what's more worthwhile to know is the concepts, not just the syntax. I remember back in gmod I absolutely could not understand arrays. Epiphanies feel great.

Also, I have a github if you're interested in helping with those kinds of projects.

[bonickhausen]

Make games with it.

I'm not even joking, creating videogames really is an awesome way to learn a language!

[Fourier]

Just code stuff with that language, it's so obvious.