If you are a systematic person, the best way might be to use a textbook. I know that there are many bad textbooks out there, and they give language textbooks a bad name. But if you want your language studies to be organized around some kind of system, a good textbook can provide this system for you. But a lot of people are not systematic. They are being bored by the very systematicity of a textbook. They want to have something new and unexpected, they want to chase the excitement. Those people are well advised to let go of their textbooks as soon as possible. They could try to chat with foreign friends, they could watch videos, they could listen to some podcasts. There is no "one size fits all".

Hi, this is a perfect question for starting a Discussion -- you'll get more answers. As a student of Mandarin, I have found a nice online course made with dialogues, which gave me the initial push, but I passed some extra-time to search the 字. Generally speaking, I think that there are two important things to consider when "studying" -- and when studying languages. 1) Concepts should be studied as soon as possible and repeated 3/4 days: there's no place for bulk notes to be studied "one day". This is just "piling up", not studying. It's better to know perfectly lesson#1, than to "take notes" up to lesson#3 but having just lost time, isn't it? 2) The good command of a foreign language is an ability to translate "concepts" in another language than one's own native. So a continuous activity in translating from one's own language to the target language is a really good exercise. Now some may reply: -- This is not actually "thinking" in the target language. // Yes, but before being able to think "directly" in the target language, it is very useful to have a basis to do this step -- like using a bridge. Then we will need that bridge no more -- nevertheless, translating is always useful . I personally suggest using translated song lyrics: because when translating from my language to the original text, I will see my mistakes, learn the new words, get trained in associating words( and concept with them) and even pronunciation. The next part of the exercise is the "listening comprehension", writing down the original text, which is fundamental. Not everyone likes Grammars, in any case language learning is meant for an application, not for learning rules: I always think to immigrants -- "using fools ruling".

Go to china first if you wanna study mandarin at university