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Kuji’s Krazy Log II | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| kujichagulia Senior Member Japan Joined 4839 days ago 1031 posts - 1571 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Portuguese | Message 457 of 706 24 February 2014 at 1:54am | IP Logged | |||||
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@Expugnator - I don't have DLI with me right now, but I believe it was published around 1968 or so, so that would explain the outdated social aspect to that dialog I read. The Michael Palin book, however, was published in 2012, but I think your information, Expugnator, helps give a different view to the situation, so I'm happy about that.
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| kujichagulia Senior Member Japan Joined 4839 days ago 1031 posts - 1571 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Portuguese | Message 458 of 706 25 February 2014 at 6:16am | IP Logged | |||||
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YAY, A DAILY UPDATE!
Hahaha. Writing Dialogs Back in October I committed to a writing challenge. These were my goals:
I'm nowhere near that mark. I wrote a handful of dialogs and islands for each language, but no need to list the number here, because it's not even close. I think the main reason for this is that I don't dedicate enough time to writing. My language-learning routine is input-heavy: textbooks, stories, articles, podcasts, watching TV, listening to the radio, etc. All of that is certainly important; yet I believe that, short of perhaps meeting with a tutor every week (which I can't really do right now), writing regularly and often will help me think faster in a language and increase my active vocabulary. But I can't really test that hypothesis if I don't give it time. Writing is nice and relaxing, but it takes more time than I realize. So I've changed up the rotations for both my languages. They go something like this: - Textbook lesson - Practice a dialog - Write a new dialog - Practice a dialog - Listen to a podcast or other new audio - Practice a dialog - Write a new dialog - Practice a dialog As you can see, there is a lot of practice time in there. I want to not only write the dialogs, but internalize them. Practicing the dialogs doesn't always mean doing them out loud. That is ideal, but I'm almost never by myself in a place where I can talk to myself in a loud voice. So sometimes, doing the conversations in my head or whispering them will have to suffice. Japanese I finished the dialogs in Chapter 14 of IAIJ. I went through them, learned the new words and grammar, and listened to all three of them repeatedly. I'll leave the rest of the chapter to a later time. There is so much to do in each chapter of IAIJ that I find it better to break them down into smaller "pieces" to work on, then distribute them throughout my rotation. I hadn't watched a lot of TV the last two weeks because of the Winter Olympics. Come to think of it, that IS watching a lot of TV. Anyway, I'll go back to my, uh, regularly-scheduled programming, especially on Sundays with Sazae-san and Chibi Maruko-chan. Portuguese I'm still working through the "Angola Highway Corruption" article. I do probably one paragraph a day. But I've been falling asleep a lot in the afternoons lately - perhaps due to a cold I have - missing my afternoon Portuguese shifts on the train. So the rate is more like one paragraph every two days. And there are six or seven paragraphs in the article. So it's slow going. But I'm not too concerned about that. There are still so many unknown words in each paragraph that going slow is probably the best thing for me right now. And I'm proud of myself for not adding all new words from the article into Anki, like I used to. Lately, unless a word or phrase makes me go, "WOW! I would sound so cool saying this in Japanese/Portuguese," I don't add every unknown term I read into Anki anymore. I make an exception for textbook dialogs, my own corrected writings, and some stories, but other than that, it has to be something WOW for me to add it. I find that it makes the whole Anki "experience" a lot better. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6589 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 459 of 706 25 February 2014 at 5:21pm | IP Logged | |||||
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| Expugnator Hexaglot Senior Member Brazil Joined 5158 days ago 3335 posts - 4349 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, Norwegian, French, English, Italian, Papiamento Studies: Mandarin, Georgian, Russian | Message 460 of 706 25 February 2014 at 8:05pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I'm curious to how your attempt to write more will come along, kuji. Now I admit I
didn't suceed in incorporating the dialog writing into my routine. On the other hand, I don't really feel the need to pursue active skills, living in a monolingual South American country. Whenever I actually need to come up with a few sentences, I usually manage to remember what is common. Besides, it's hard to have online conversations/chats that go beyond the A2 vocabulary. That is to say, with only the A2 vocabulary I can already say almost everything I need in an online context. So, I get this weird feeling that when I try this I'm only just repeating basic vocabulary instead of learning new words I'm going to need for better reading and listening of authentic native materials. I know this sounds like a set of excuses, but it's rather a trade-off. My own experience says that, provided that I've reached the A2 level before, if there is actual demand I can focus on activating my knowledge a few weeks before the trip or whatever. I have the feeling that once you know the basic structures it's all a matter of acquiring the fillers, the new vocabulary. Think about islands: I have the feeling I have enough islands for French, Papiamento and maybe even Georgian (for text-chatting, not talking); I still need to build the most important islands for Russian and Chinese, though. Anyway, this sounds like spoiling. I'll have to write the same when the challenge is over. There's a lot to reflect upon activating languages, as I haven't done it so often. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| kujichagulia Senior Member Japan Joined 4839 days ago 1031 posts - 1571 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Portuguese | Message 461 of 706 26 February 2014 at 1:44am | IP Logged | |||||
awwwwww, Serpent, thanks for replying! I think I'm coming around (slowly) to your way of thinking. That might be scary, though. ;) 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| kujichagulia Senior Member Japan Joined 4839 days ago 1031 posts - 1571 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Portuguese | Message 462 of 706 26 February 2014 at 2:01am | IP Logged | |||||
I understand, and I've thought about that, too. Whenever I go through a period of writing, I find myself writing the same words over and over, and I wonder if I am learning anything new. But I tell myself that repeating words I already know will help the words ingrain themselves into my mind, and I could use them quickly in conversations. I have no idea, though, if this is true. And yes, it does get boring writing the same type of situations over and over - that is usually why I end up not writing for long periods of time. In fact, as I write this, I wonder if I have set my rotation up to fail, with so many periods of writing and practicing and reviewing. But I wonder if there is a nice balance somewhere between not writing at all and writing too much. I'll be looking for that.
I haven't had such experiences yet, but this seems to make a lot of sense. Islands probably have a shelf life; at a certain point a person becomes so advanced that they don't need them anymore. So at that point, one probably doesn't need to do that kind of writing. They just need to get more and more vocabulary, more exposure to native materials, etc. As for me, I'm finding that I'm not even close to that point, not even in Japanese. I now know a ton of words and structures that I didn't know two years ago... but passively. I'm just so slow to recall words and phrases other than ones that a) are in my short-term memory because I've just studied them, or b) I learned years ago and use often. So I'm hoping the writing - the extra active practice - will help move my active Japanese from beginner to intermediate, and to help me speed up my speaking somewhat. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| vonPeterhof Tetraglot Senior Member Russian FederationRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4764 days ago 715 posts - 1527 votes Speaks: Russian*, EnglishC2, Japanese, German Studies: Kazakh, Korean, Norwegian, Turkish | Message 463 of 706 26 February 2014 at 5:32am | IP Logged | |||||
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| Expugnator Hexaglot Senior Member Brazil Joined 5158 days ago 3335 posts - 4349 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, Norwegian, French, English, Italian, Papiamento Studies: Mandarin, Georgian, Russian | Message 464 of 706 26 February 2014 at 7:03pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Yes, my bad. I just don't fancy using a native Amerindian language for any official or
travelling purposes. If I were into linguistics I'd gladly delve into some native languages, some of these even got interesting resources published. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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