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Kerrie Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Kerrie2 Joined 5387 days ago 1232 posts - 1740 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 153 of 236 27 August 2012 at 3:35pm | IP Logged |
sillygoose1 wrote:
Kerrie wrote:
I'm getting really frustrated with Assimil's Using French. I just passed lesson 50 after about a week's hiatus. It's taking me more than an hour to get through each lesson, yesterday it took almost two hours. It was over four minutes long. It's too much for one day, and I don't like starting something and only doing half of it, although I suppose I might do that for the rest of this book. Only 20 lessons left.
Ugh, ugh, ugh. Ugh. I want to be done with this thing. |
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I felt the same exact way with Using French at around lesson 55. I had to just stop using it because it became too much of a burden. :/ |
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I won't quit what I started. I might start mixing it with other materials, though.
Plus, I am still learning a lot from it.
1 person has voted this message useful
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5199 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish
| Message 154 of 236 27 August 2012 at 6:24pm | IP Logged |
I had similar feelings with Using French, and am now having them with the Italian
equivalent Perfectionnement Italien. After around halfway the lessons get quite heavy-
going, specialised, and long. Which is a shame because they start off so well. I'd have
much preferred them to just continue with the general conversational lessons, but I guess
they have to try to cover more bases and go into subjects like literature, history, and
business, and for these subjects it's hard to keep them to 10-line dialogues.
1 person has voted this message useful
| kanewai Triglot Senior Member United States justpaste.it/kanewai Joined 4881 days ago 1386 posts - 3054 votes Speaks: English*, French, Marshallese Studies: Italian, Spanish
| Message 155 of 236 27 August 2012 at 9:30pm | IP Logged |
I had a similar experience with Using French. You have one more rough period
ahead, where they introduce a lot of more obscure and literary tenses. Then the course
gets more interesting for a period. I ended up having to modify my style just to finish
it; there were too many chapters where I thought: I really don't have any need or desire
to learn all these idioms and acronyms.
I made it through by scaling back on my approach, and really trying to keep the lessons
at 30" to 45". Like you said, you still learn a lot, and I still recommend the book to
people.
1 person has voted this message useful
| Kerrie Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Kerrie2 Joined 5387 days ago 1232 posts - 1740 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 156 of 236 28 August 2012 at 10:15pm | IP Logged |
I think I was getting burned out with life on top of too much French. Children should NOT get a 12-1/2 week long summer break from school to forget everything they learned. It doesn't make any sense. Plus, it drives moms nuts. Especially work-at-home moms who can't find time to work and do everything else life requires when there are three or four children in her face every second of every day.
Seven days til school starts back up, and mom can breathe again, and get work done, go back to her beloved languages, and actually have time to breathe without children in her face all day long.
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So I have gotten back into the groove a little with the last few lessons. I don't know if it was the break I took from it, or if things got substantially easier between lesson 49 and 51. It's still a lot of information to work through, but even the long lessons seem more doable to me. I've basically just cut back to my regular work schedule, a French lesson, and then a movie at night. Until the kids go back to school, I'm not pushing myself with studying.
I did, however, get two French lessons done today. I had to take the car in to get my brakes fixed, so while I waited, I put my time to good use. :)
1 person has voted this message useful
| Kerrie Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Kerrie2 Joined 5387 days ago 1232 posts - 1740 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 157 of 236 28 August 2012 at 10:20pm | IP Logged |
@garyb: I will keep that in mind when I approach the Perfectionnement Italien. Italian is far easier for me than French, though, so I may just find a grammar book and then jump into Harry Potter. I've been really surprised how much I can understand with all the movies I've been watching. Granted, I'm still watching with subs, but it's a little like LRing.
@kanewai: More literary tenses? I've only got about 15 lessons left, so I can handle it. :)
Edited by Kerrie on 28 August 2012 at 10:21pm
1 person has voted this message useful
| Kerrie Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Kerrie2 Joined 5387 days ago 1232 posts - 1740 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 158 of 236 29 August 2012 at 6:53pm | IP Logged |
If anyone is interested, I am keeping track (with links to the IMDb) of the movies I've watched, or have on my "to-watch" list on my On Deck. There is a link to it near the top of my Super Challenge page, which is also listed as my website under my name to the right.
There's a lot of stuff there, most of it is taken from recommendations from others, or from "best of" lists, and I've found a lot of great movies that way so far. Most of them are Spanish, French, Italian, German, and a little Croatian and Russian as well.
I have found that there are a lot more Serbian movies than Croatian, and very few Bosnian ones. Considering the recent history of the area, that doesn't surprise me. I haven't watched any of the Serb films yet, but they are on my list.
1 person has voted this message useful
| Kerrie Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Kerrie2 Joined 5387 days ago 1232 posts - 1740 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 159 of 236 01 September 2012 at 6:01pm | IP Logged |
Okay, this is what I got done in August.
Spanish - 19%
Movies
20. F*cking Åmål / Show me Love
21. The Milk of Sorrow / La teta asustada
22. The Orphanage / El Orfanato
23. Altiplano (High Plain)
24. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 1
25. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 2
26. XXY
27. The DaVinci Code / El Codigo DaVinci
Writing
18. Assimil transcription (100 words)
French - 23%
Movies
22. Forbidden Games / Jeux interdits
23. Intouchables / The Intouchables
Writing
38-46. Assimil transcription (1800 words)
Italian - 17%
Movies
9. The Lion King / Il Re Leone
10. The Lion King / Il Re Leone
11. Life is Beautiful / La Vita è Bella
12. The Little Mermaid / La Sirenetta
13. Il Grido Antonioni 1957
14. Peter Pan
15. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
16. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
17. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
18. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
19. Fists in the Pocket / I pugni in tasca
20. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
21. Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince
22. Il Postino / The Postman
23. Suspiria
24. Io Non Ho Paura / I'm not Scared
25. La sconosciuta / The Unknown Woman
26. Non ti muovere / Don't Move
27. Nuovo Cinema Paradiso / Cinema Paradiso
28. The Son's Room / La stanza del figlio
Writing
13-18. Assimil transcription (1200 words)
German - 4%
Movies
2. Nirgendwo in Afrika / Nowhere in Africa
Bosnian/Croatian - 10%
Movies
8. No Man's Land (Nicija zemlja)
9. Shrek 1, Croatian audio, Eng subs
Brazilian Portuguese - 2%
Movies
1. Harry Potter e a Pedra Filosofal
Turkish - 3%
Movies
1-3. Sensiz Olmaz, Episode 1-3
On one hand, I didn't get as much studying done as I would have liked. The kids have been off of school for 12 weeks (summer break), and between children and work, I just have not had the mental energy the last two weeks to get a lot done. They are going back to school in a few days, though, and I expect I will be back into a routine, primarily with Assimil, for French, Spanish, Italian, German, and Croatian. If I can get back into a regular routine in the next few weeks, I will be adding Portuguese (when my Assimil course gets here, which should be in the next week or two), and possibly Turkish as well. I have a lighter workload than normal for September, and I want to maximize the extra time I have available.
Even though I didn't get as much studying done as I'd have liked, it was still a relatively successful month. I watched a lot of really great movies. If anyone is looking for movie ideas, feel free to check out my On Deck page. All of the movies I've watched are listed on there, as well as movies I want to see. There are IMDb links to all the movies as well. There's also a link to that page from my Super Challenge page, which is listed under my name on my posts. I will be posting some reviews as well.
I have been very pleasantly surprised by how many really great foreign movies there are out there. Every time I find one really great movie, I go look it up on the IMDb and find five more to check out. It has been a lot of fun. :D
2 persons have voted this message useful
| Kerrie Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Kerrie2 Joined 5387 days ago 1232 posts - 1740 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 160 of 236 02 September 2012 at 7:05pm | IP Logged |
How ironic.
I'm working on lesson 39 of Using Spanish, which is about Luis Buñuel.
Who just happens to be the director of Viridiana, a movie I have had on my Super Challenge to-see list for awhile.
1 person has voted this message useful
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