I'm not sure how Draak learn best in general but that's probably how I would best learn something like this as a matter of personality.

"Then it's convenient that that's how I know how to teach it!"

The grace of the Onesong, or simple luck? Either way, yes. What next, now that I think I know the alphabet?

"Now we can start with enough simple vocabulary words to make some basic sentences. Are there any topics you'd especially like to be able to read and write about first?"

What I call Essence, and what you call Genetics.

...Or food. Or plants. Genetics is my life's work but food is delicious and plants are a compelling hobby.

"The words for food and plants are mostly simpler than the ones for genes, mostly because they're older commoner words, and the longer a word is around and the more it's used, the more it gets abbreviated and generally smoothed over for speakers' convenience. So -"

And here is how you write "I eat a steak" in Baravic.

After learning which word means what she carefully writes it herself, sharp claws moving with extreme precision to hold the writing tool.

Interesting. Sensible, efficient. Common words should take less effort. The... Connecting words... Will be the most challenging. 'I', 'eat', and 'steak' all make sense.

"Different Amentan languages use different kinds and numbers of connecting words. It's one of the things that's harder to pick up if you learn a language that doesn't use them how you're accustomed."

And I don't know a language unless you consider thought-forms to be one. Your mind is doing most of the work to understand what I Sing. I am thinking without words.

"Yes, I'm finding it really interesting - in particular language makes concepts come in an order, and in Baravic it's a very particular order too - other languages can shuffle things around more - but the order isn't present in what you're telling me."

If Baravic has a very particular order that will be easier to remember. Thoughts come in an order but this is mostly relevant for arguments and logic. Great Elder Darktooth invented sigils and you write many of them directly on top of each other to make a whole thought. I only know a few, I never thought they were useful enough to learn, but I would show you some if you want?

She pauses, sounds out 'steak', then sends an image of bacon and a vague notion of a question.

"That would be really interesting, though I'm meant to be here to teach you, not to take up your time teaching me! I think bacon isn't usually considered a kind of steak in particular."

There is a small joy in teaching and it wouldn't take long. But if you insist, I won't. Bacon is a piece of meat... 'Usually'? The meanings are not necessarily rigorous and explicit, then? Usage defines meaning?

"That's right. There are ways to use words that are very wrong, or could only be right as metaphor, but 'is bacon a kind of steak' isn't quite so clear - the distinction doesn't matter for communicating often enough that everybody would know for sure if they thought about it."

Messy. Not that mess is bad. Subtleties like that will surely escape me even if I practice a lot.

"Most Amentans are never perfectly comfortable with languages they acquire at age two or later, but we can get really close. I don't know what to expect for you."

We will see if I don't get frustrated and give up. And I won't. Some more words now?

She can learn "I buy a steak", "I eat a stew", "I buy a stew" - to have a nice grid of examples - and then they can start complicating it with who she is buying the steak from and whether the steak is hot.

She's not particularly fast or creative but very methodical about it and makes no mistakes, even if it takes her a half a minute or longer to compose more complicated sentences.

That's an entirely reasonable clip for a brand new learner, Kimya assures her! Now the steaks and stews can also be spicy or not, and people can sell the things she buys, and she can say please and thank you, and they can cover numbers to describe how many steaks she wants, and how much they will cost.

Can she not-buy the not-spicy steak or does that require a different word?

Different word, in Baravic. Here's how you negate verbs.

Slightly frustrating that there's different ways to negate a thing. But at least there's only a few. She would like to collect extra vocabulary for a while instead of moving on to more complications of grammar.

Sure! Here are colors, and castes, and more foods, and body parts.

How would you decide what word to use if it turns out Draak have a body part no other animal you've studied does?