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When to take a break? | ||
Tags: Burn-out | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| tomgosse Groupie United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 3937 days ago 90 posts - 143 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 1 of 8 05 February 2014 at 7:41pm | IP Logged | ||
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Looking at my log (http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp? TID=37763) I see that I've been studying for fifteen days straight. I usually do a number of exercised during the day. They include, but are not limited to, watching Spanish lessons on YouTube, practicing with Duolingo and Memrise, listen-read to the New Testament in Spanish, and watch Destinos.
Right now I feel a little exhausted. So, my question for the forum is: Do you take breaks from studying? Once a week? Of when you just feel tired? Do you think the brain needs a break? My one fear is that if I start taking breaks I might just stop studying altogether. Any thoughts? Tomás 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7150 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French | Message 2 of 8 05 February 2014 at 9:15pm | IP Logged | ||
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I generally don't take a full day off. I may lighten the load at times, but always do something.
On the other hand, splog had a good video blog about taking one day off per week and having one course that "takes you all the way there" that you give 50% of your time to. The other 50% of the time you do stuff you enjoy related to the language you're learning. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Lizzern Diglot Senior Member Norway Joined 5854 days ago 791 posts - 1053 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English Studies: Japanese | Message 3 of 8 05 February 2014 at 9:35pm | IP Logged | ||
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I try not to take breaks, because when I do they have a tendency to grow and then before I know it I haven't done anything in weeks. That said, I allow myself to shift things around if I'm tired or busy, but I try to make sure I stay on track with my plan overall. I believe the brain needs a break eventually - like after exams are over - and regular rest is probably a good idea too.
It really depends on the person but I would say make sure you at least have something fun you're doing in the language - whatever that happens to be for you. Then if you're having one of those days, maybe see if you can just do the fun things. Listen to music or something. Everything is helpful, and it keeps you in touch with the language that day. But taking a day off won't really harm you (unless you're worried about study speed) so go easy on yourself if you feel like you need a rest :-) You wouldn't be asking yourself and others this question at all if you didn't feel like you needed it on some level, so maybe it's time to have some planned/unplanned breaks... Liz 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| daegga Tetraglot Senior Member Austria lang-8.com/553301 Joined 4466 days ago 1076 posts - 1792 votes Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Swedish, Norwegian Studies: Danish, French, Finnish, Icelandic | Message 4 of 8 05 February 2014 at 9:53pm | IP Logged | ||
No wonder, where is the fun part? Conduct your studying in a way you don't feel exhausted and you don't crave breaks. Better yet, try to make it so interesting that you actually want to "study" more, if only you had the time. This might mean cutting back on more efficient techniques and adding in less efficient ones. But remember, it's not about efficiency, it's about effectiveness! The most effective student is he who doesn't quit. edit: It's a bit hard to find interesting/fun things to do as a beginner. iguanamon's post might give some ideas. Edited by daegga on 05 February 2014 at 10:11pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Elanguest Newbie Malta elanguest.com Joined 3811 days ago 19 posts - 26 votes Speaks: English* | Message 5 of 8 02 May 2014 at 3:52pm | IP Logged | ||
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One day off every week. It works. :)
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| BaronBill Triglot Senior Member United States HowToLanguages.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4634 days ago 335 posts - 594 votes Speaks: English*, French, German Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Persian | Message 6 of 8 02 May 2014 at 7:22pm | IP Logged | ||
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I haven't taken a complete day off of language study/practice in a little over 2 years. For me, I have integrated by languages so much into my daily life, that I would actually be a little panicked if I didn't do SOMETHING in a language other than English on any given day. Now, this could be a 10 minute Chinese Podcast on the way to work or 30 minutes of a German TV show but I always manage something.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| shk00design Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4389 days ago 747 posts - 1123 votes Speaks: Cantonese*, English, Mandarin Studies: French | Message 7 of 8 02 May 2014 at 11:49pm | IP Logged | ||
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When learning any language, the beginning stage is the most important. You need to spend many more
hours to get yourself up to the intermediate level before you slow down. It is like putting up a building without a strong foundation. In the beginning you may be tempted to stick with phrase books / textbooks, computer software, other video & audio sources dedicated to learning. Once you get yourself into the intermediate level, you can start listening to news broadcasts, radio discussions and movies & TV programs with captions. You don't want to get stuck with a few textbooks for the next 10 years. Eventually we get to the point where we're doing the same day-to-day routines in the new language we'd do in our native language like shopping, watching TV, listening to the radio. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6542 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 8 of 8 03 May 2014 at 1:12am | IP Logged | ||
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I have to say that to me this all does sound like fun. Well, not the New Testament (no offense meant). I hope you're using it because it's acually an important (and familiar?) text to you and not just because it's available - there are plenty of LR materials for Spanish.
But it's about what you find fun. Drop whatever resources you're not enjoying. That's the beauty of the multitrack approach. It may also be tha your brain is tired of suddenly having so much contact with L2. Don't worry, you'll get used to it :) Oh and try lyricstraining :) 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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