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CZ’s TAC 15 CHN/JPN/KOR | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| The Real CZ Senior Member United States Joined 5641 days ago 1069 posts - 1495 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 641 of 844 08 December 2012 at 3:34am | IP Logged | ||
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I've been studying grammar a lot in Korean the past week. I didn't study the rules or anything. I simply just read out loud all of the example sentences. I think reading AND hearing the sentences allows me to become more comfortable with the structure. My focus is to simply get used to the structures. Along with that, I haven't done much intensive reading this week, but I have done some, but then I also thumbed through my Korean-English dictionary that I do from time to time.
I also started learning German today. This is a language I had wanted to learn for a long time seeing as half of my ethnic makeup is German. (Yes, when I was younger, I used to joke around that I was the combination of Adolf Hitler and Kim Jong Il.) I have reached the point in Korean where I don't make noticeable progress. Even with my huge vocabulary gains from the past couple of months, it seems like my comprehension hasn't improved as fast as I had hoped. I'm just at the stage where I just need a lot of input and to learn new words. To avoid burnout, I will still learn Korean everyday, but not to the speed which I was. It will probably take me a few years to get to where I want to be regardless (entering my last year of undergraduate school, so I'll have 40-50 hour work weeks instead of 15 hours of classes and very little studying), so I know I won't make the giant leaps I hoped I would. However, following the Antimoon/AJATT style like I have been, I'll just make sure to get a lot of input, get more comfortable with less common grammar structures, and continue to learn more words. I have found that active production hasn't really helped me. I can speak and write effectively to a point, it's just that I need more words. When I actively try writing about something like business or politics, I spend too much using the dictionary, making it ineffective. Usually when I write something, I aim to rarely have to resort to the dictionary for help. Onto German, I "acquired" German Without Toil, the 1974 version and downloaded the FSI German course books. For Assimil, I always do multiple lessons per day. That one lesson per day thing is for people who really aren't motivated to learn in my opinion. I probably only spend 10 minutes on a lesson anyway, so it'd be pointless to just do a lesson per day. I plan on doing Assmil first, then going through FSI. However, I won't use FSI according to the directions. FSI has a lot of example sentences, so reading those out loud will help me remember the grammar and vocab a lot more easier. I'm still having trouble finding interesting German content online, but I've only been looking for a day. I could always look for manga translated in German as a start, but I want authentic German material. It'll also be nice learning a European language. My brain has been beaten up like a red-headed stepchild these past three and a half years learning Korean and Japanese. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Haksaeng Senior Member Korea, South Joined 6190 days ago 166 posts - 250 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Korean, Arabic (Levantine) | Message 642 of 844 08 December 2012 at 4:30am | IP Logged | ||
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For Korean grammar, I've been doing something similar. I have the book Korean Grammar In Use: Intermediate and it comes with a CD containing all the sentences. I put the CD on my phone and listen to it on shuffle whenever I'm exercising or commuting. I never realized before how well you can learn grammar just by listening. So many of the grammatical constructions have a strong, distinctive rhythm. I don't memorize the sentences, but they do become familiar after a while so that I've started to be able to "feel" the meaning of some of the grammar, and it does carry over to my listening, because sometimes now I can recognize certain grammatical patterns by their rhythm.
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| The Real CZ Senior Member United States Joined 5641 days ago 1069 posts - 1495 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 643 of 844 09 December 2012 at 6:31pm | IP Logged | ||
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Yes, listening helps a lot with grammar. I had just tried learning grammar through rote memorization and reading before, but I think reading + listening helps a lot. Working two senses to learn something seems to be more effective.
-------------- I've found plenty of German stuff the past few days. Now I can really just concentrate solely on learning the language for now. As of now, my plan of attack is to run through German Without Toil and then run through FSI German. I have learned a lot from learning Korean and Japanese as to how I should learn a language and what works for me, so German is going smoothly so far. I go through roughly 9 chapters a day in German Without Toil. I listen to each lesson four times. The first and third time is following the German side and the second and fourth time is following the English side. I have a pretty good idea of what is going on after the fourth lesson and reading the notes clears a lot up. I don't try to understand 100% because that's actually ineffective. 60-70% is good enough. A lot of the stuff will get repeated. After that, I'll go through FSI. The drills will be very helpful, but I won't do them as to how FSI wants people to do them. For example, in the substitution drills, they give the correct answers on the right column. I can just easily plug those into the sample sentence. This is the first time I'll spend any decent amount of time with a European language, so I need lots of exposure. Seeing the cases in many example sentences will be more effective than trying to memorize what goes with das/die/der. After Assimil and FSI, which I plan to go through both within a month, I'll move onto native material. I found some news sites and a video game site, so I can get plenty of reading and listening practice. I've also found some German online TV stations and some places that have American shows dubbed in German. (I watched some of South Park in German the other day.) ----- I also plan on resuming Japanese. I'll need to zip through my grammar books, look at some vocab lists, and go over RTK quickly to regain a lot back. With respects to kanji, I only learn to plan how to read it. I don't see myself ever needing to write it on paper. I did get to around 1900 or so in RTK last time I was studying Japanese. ------ With Korean, I've realized that I've been treating it like a school subject, trying to cram as much as I could within a short amount of time. It just wasn't working out. The grammar was fun because while I was learning a lot and getting in some speaking practice, it didn't feel painful. However, intensive reading is painful, especially at my level. I learned a lot from doing intensive reading, but it burnt me the f**k out of reading, so I stopped. I believe IR is a great tool, but should only be used on short articles or at a more advanced level when you're trying to pick up the few remaining unknowns instead of trying to learn half of the vocab on every page. So I have gone back to my old reading method, which is the gray area between intensive and extensive reading. Basically, I do a lot of reading like I would with extensive reading, but also write down some words/grammar that I want to look up. Usually I only write down a word if I've seen it two or more times while reading or if it's the only word I don't know in a sentence. This helps me because I get the benefits of extensive reading (reading a lot, internalizing vocab and grammar structures) while also writing down new words to learn later. As I posted previously, I want language learning to be fun again. I want to use my time to keep improving daily, but I will not set super high goals to try and learn a huge amount in a small amount of time. Plus, I'll probably end up learning more this way since I'll end up doing it everyday instead of doing an intensive week or two and not doing anything for a month. So even if it takes a few more years to get where I want in the languages, that's fine. The hare may be faster and improve quicker, but there's no guarantee he'll finish the race. The tortoise on the other hand may be slow, but he'll finish the race. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Warp3 Senior Member United States forum_posts.asp?TID= Joined 5527 days ago 1419 posts - 1766 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Korean, Japanese | Message 644 of 844 09 December 2012 at 6:55pm | IP Logged | ||
That's similar to how I felt when I decided to take the plunge and start Japanese. I'd likely still be learning Japanese more heavily if I hadn't had such a complete lack of time lately. It definitely was not a lack of interest that stalled me. {sigh} 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| The Real CZ Senior Member United States Joined 5641 days ago 1069 posts - 1495 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 645 of 844 09 December 2012 at 7:36pm | IP Logged | ||
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Yeah, I know what you mean when it comes to a lack of time. Being in the finance field, I know I won't have the vast amounts of free time that I have now, but there's always something easy to do to make it seem like you're moving forward. If you have Rikaichan, you can go read a short article and learn new words. If you want to watch a video, you can go on a Japanese news site and watch a 2-3 minute video. Since I still have a year left of school and barely have to do any studying, I still have the time to watch a bunch of shows and read a lot of articles, books, etc., but there's always something small that you can do that doesn't require Anki.
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| The Real CZ Senior Member United States Joined 5641 days ago 1069 posts - 1495 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 646 of 844 13 December 2012 at 2:15pm | IP Logged | ||
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I decided to wait on German. It's really hard for me to juggle three languages. The reason why I restarted Japanese was due to searching for German stuff to watch. I kept on finding sites to watch anime in German or with German subs. Then the itch to learn Japanese came back. I still dislike Jdramas (I can only watch a few of them, mainly ones with actresses I like. J dramas are really low budget, so it really distracts me when I see blood that looks like ketchup or jelly smeared on a person.) However, I found some new anime to watch (Sword Art Online) and resuming watching some older anime I like (One Piece, Fairy Tail, etc.) My Japanese isn't totally back yet, but as I spend more time skimming through my textbook and grammar books, looking through word lists, etc., it's coming back to me very quickly.
With Korean, doing the same as usual. Reading novels, reading web toons, watching dramas, listening to music. It's taken a little bit of a backseat this past week due to getting back into Japanese. I'm trying something different for learning vocabulary. I've come to realize that I hate flashcards, so I won't ever rely on those again. Pre-made word lists are working for me right now. My goal is to definitely not remember the words, but to start recognizing them. I know I'll end up learning a lot of these words through repeated exposure, either from going over the lists several times or seeing them in context, so it doesn't bother me. I'm also trying something that I used to do two years ago in Korean when I finally graduated from textbooks and relying on subtitles for dramas, but I plan on using it a lot more effectively. I'll outline it in the next post since this one is long enough as it is. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| The Real CZ Senior Member United States Joined 5641 days ago 1069 posts - 1495 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 647 of 844 13 December 2012 at 3:01pm | IP Logged | ||
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This works for me, but it may not necessarily work for everyone. I've tried several methods, and oddly enough, the one with the least amount of effort works the best for me. Go figure. 1) Word lists: They can be pre-made or ones that you make yourself (since the writing process could aid you in remembering the word), but I prefer pre-made ones. I'm also referring to dictionaries, X000 vocab books, etc. here. The goal is to simply go through the lists/books/etc. one time through. Don't try to force words into your memory. The goal is to simply make a connection between the word and the definition. Repeated exposure over time will do the trick. After you go completely finish the dictionary/word list/book, etc., either wait a certain period of time (say a month) or start going through it again right away if you wish. 2) Grammar Books With Example Sentences: This is also an easy way to learn vocabulary. Grammar is easier for me to learn with seeing a lot of example sentences instead of trying to remember the rules and then trying to create sentences based on my limited exposure to the structure. With example sentences (and the translations of those example sentences), you'll not only learn the structures, but you'll learn new words too. 3) Extensive Reading: If you have a physical novel, just read it. Don't mark down words to look up or anything. Just pay attention to how vocabulary is used and how sentences are constructed. It can feel like you're not really learning anything, but be patient. You need the exposure to these words and constructions. If you focus while reading, you'll intuitively pick up how a lot of the language works. I'm not saying you need to study each page for 5 minutes. I speed read in every language I read. I probably read 2-3 pages a minute in Korean, but it requires focus to do that, so I still pick up stuff while reading. 4)Semi Intensive Reading: Use this with books you have already read. Preferably you have this book close to your computer. Start reading it again as you normally would, but type out 3-5 words (I only do 3) per page and look them up in the dictionary. Pick out the important words in the sentence to look up. For example, in Korean and Japanese, there are a lot of onomatopoeia words. Those can be ignored in the early stages, but pick them up later when you're deepening your knowledge, not when you're trying to understand what is happening in the book. This is a good alternative to intensive reading since you make faster progress, it is easier, and you'll avoid the burnout. Your first time through the book, you may learn roughly 1,000 new words, which is good. With this method, just know that you'll have to go through these books multiple times. Make sure you have several novels in your target language to use. As of now, I have 25 novels in Korean, 10 light novels in Japanese, and 5 Japanese video games. You can also use this method with online articles. Look up the 3-5 most important words in the article and move onto the next article. 5) Monolingual Dictionary: There will be words where you'll need a monolingual dictionary. Just think of it as graduating to the next level. I'm not sure if you'll need one for Japanese due to the online bilingual dictionaries being so good, but around the mid to high intermediate level in Korean, you start running into a lot of words without an English definition on Naver. LOOK AT THE EXAMPLE SENTENCES. THIS IS CRITICAL. Korean-Korean Dictionary Example 죄다 1. 느슨하거나 헐거운 것이 단단하거나 팽팽하게 되다. 또는 그렇게 되게 하다. 살이 쪘는지 바지가 너무 죄어서 불편하다. 신발이 작은지 발이 조금 죈다. 나사를 죄다 I don't understand the definition until "팽팽하게 되다. 또는 그렇게 되게 하다." However, looking at the example sentences, while not a 100% understand, I have a good idea what this word means. 살이 쪘는지 바지가 너무 죄어서 불편하다. [literal] Put on weight, pants very XXXXX uncomfortable. 신발이 작은지 발이 조금 죈다 [literal] Shoes small, feet bit XXXXX From that, I can infer that it means that it's a really tight fit, it's uncomfortable, etc. This relates to step 3 with extensive reading. You'll end up doing this a lot subconsciously, so that's why you need to keep reading, keep looking up word lists, keep reading the example sentences in your grammar books, etc. Look at this AJATT article for instance. "To get used to language, you have to kind of embrace a paradox, whereby you: Let go of perfectionism, but you Don’t let go of improvement" With SRS, intensive reading, mnemonics to learn words, etc., I was trying to be perfect. That's why I always burned out when SRSing. You can be perfect if you add very little, but it's very ineffective to try to be perfect on a small amount of language when there's a lot you don't know. Why Forgetting Can Be Good Instead of trying to be perfect and try to get everything right in Anki and continuously regurgitating the same cards at you, aggressively go and meet a lot of new words. The brain will eventually learn what it needs to learn, so keep trying to learn new words. Through constant reading and listening, you'll end up learning more. This is how I got my Korean up to speed quickly in 2010 and Japanese up to where I could play video games in 2011. When I tried more intensive and efficient methods this year for learning, I made progress, but I wasn't learning enough because I was trying to learn a small set of words/structures very well right now instead of expanding my knowledge. I'll only have to spend a month to get my Japanese to where it used to be, and that's the conservative estimate. I could probably get back to where I was within two weeks. It's the kanji I really have to crack down on, but I had learned most of them already, so I could easily skim through RTK and a lot of reading and vocab work will help. This won't work for everyone since there are people who: 1) prefer to speak asap. This method really focuses on comprehension first, as I largely follow the advice of Antimoon, AJATT, and Steve Kaufmann while taking what works for me from the guys on the deliberate practice side of the debate. 2) are perfectionist. You have to be willing to not understand everything you read/listen to. This is what falls into the deliberate practice theory. Instead of spending time on easy stuff that you already understand with little effort, you'll always spend your time trying to improve. That's why I don't advise people to use SRS since you're going over information you already know. Just read a lot. 3) want tangible results. With this method, you can't jack off to adding 3000 cards to your Anki deck within a month (which is what I did when I tried 100 cards/day for a month.) However, just know with this method, you will most likely have seen 5x or more words in that same amount of time through semi intensive reading, word lists, and example sentences. You may not remember every single word clearly, but you will have established a connection with a lot more words. As you keep doing this, it gets easier to remember new words. You can use this method if you only have 15 minutes of free time in a given period of time or have a day off and can devote a couple more hours that day. Steve Kaufmann on effortless learning This method really mixes effortless learning and deliberate practice. People are inclined to do something easy and fun. It's fun for me to read, but intensive reading sucks dinosaur dick. However, looking up a couple of words in the article I'm reading online doesn't kill me. I get enjoyment out of seeing the definition for a couple of new words. However, like I said, the deliberate practice comes from always trying to learn more instead of repeatedly going over the words you already know in Anki. Oh, I realize this is mainly about reading, but I really advocate for people to get off the subs ASAP when watching videos. When I did study German this week, I went straight for videos without English subs. It forces you to pay attention and try to grasp what is being said instead of just focusing on the subs at the bottom of the video. I had watched subbed anime for 5 years and only picked up a handful of phrases. I watched Korean dramas subbed for a year while only picking up a few phrases. Once I started watching both without subtitles, I went through a painful first month, but as I used the strategies above for learning vocabulary, everything started becoming clearer. Really, once you've learned the basics in the language and have around 1 to 2 thousand words, dive into native videos without subtitles. The subtitles give you a faux sense of understanding more than you actually do. Edited by The Real CZ on 13 December 2012 at 3:11pm 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| The Real CZ Senior Member United States Joined 5641 days ago 1069 posts - 1495 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 648 of 844 25 December 2012 at 3:59pm | IP Logged | ||
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I really haven't done anything with Japanese this past week. I think I played a couple hours of Tales of Xillia, but that's really it. I'm thinking of making it a backup language, one that I'll try to keep at a constant level and slowly improve, but my main focus is Korean. If there's one language I want to be C2 aside from English, it's Korean. I'd be fine with every other language I learn being at the B2 or C1 level.
I've been really focused on Korean lately. I'm back to translating interviews for my Yeoshindeul tumblr. I'm working on translatingthis Hwang Jung Eum interview. I actually like translating these interviews, it's just that I sometimes try to do too much at once, which makes me burn out. For me, translating is probably the most useful exercise because it's intensive reading and intensive grammar work. You have to know everything before you can translate it, and I tend to remember words and grammar structures better through translating. It's not for everyone, but it works for me. I did finished reading The Second Fever, which is the second time I have read this book. The first time was in 2010 when I barely understood it. This time I did a mix of intensive reading (looking up every unknown word) and semi-intensive reading (looking up roughly 3-5 unknown words per page). I find that this works for me, since it's a natural SRS when you intensively read a book. You'll see the words that you need over and over again. A lot of the words I encountered here showed up in other books I have read too, so I'll probably make a goal to at least get through 1 book a month with this method. I also plan on extensively reading the books I have already read in order to strengthen my reading foundation and see if I can learn more words through context rather than dictionary work. I can read most of the novels I have within 2-3 hours, so this will be the easy part. I'll probably end up memorizing parts of the books and sentences due to reading them so much. I have also started something new for me. I made a word document to keep track of the number of articles I read under certain subjects. These are the subjects that I divided everything into. Anything I read from Chosun.com and Naver.com will fall into these categories. 정치 오피니언 스포츠 연예 라이프 경제 IT/과학 사회 문화 국제 Now, to make it into like a RPG, for every 25 articles I intensively read, I "level up" that skill. Since RPGs are my favorite game genre, I decided to take an element of that and apply it to language learning. The reason I'm doing this is that I'm reaching the point where I know a lot of the "essential" vocabulary, but what is holding me back from greater understanding is specialized vocabulary. For instance, I'm watching the drama Giant and I can understand a lot, but the business vocabulary flies over my head because I don't know them. The political vocabulary also goes over my head. Since languages aren't compartmentalized, I know becoming much more familiar in each of these subjects will help with overall understanding. I feel like I'm on the cusp of breaking the next level of understanding, I just need to start broadening my knowledge base for that to happen. Also, speaking of Giant, if you want a great drama to watch, watch that. I've already watched 30/60 episodes, and most of them being this week. I'm addicted, and I haven't been addicted to a drama like this since History of a Salaryman, produced by the same team director/writer duo as Giant. That makes 돈의 화신 my most anticipated drama of 2013 now, since it's also by the same team. Edited by The Real CZ on 25 December 2012 at 4:03pm 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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