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Interm. Spanish, Beginner Irish & French | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Indíritheach Senior Member United States Joined 3899 days ago 108 posts - 146 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Irish, French | Message 25 of 72 21 November 2013 at 12:55am | IP Logged | ||
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Vaya, vaya, vaya...¡que no he escrito nada en unos dias! Sorry for not posting, but I've been busy with the 6 Week Challenge and work and I have been too wiped out at the end of the day to do much...but I've made some great progress!
SP Spanish has been going great...I am on Unit 24 of Barron's Mastering Spanish, only six more units to go! I've also been browsing through a copy of Essential Spanish Grammar...for 5 bucks, these little Dover paperbacks are really great. I'm pretty sure that I'll be at basic fluency by next year. It's like finishing a jigsaw puzzle, all of the little bits of grammar that I've forgotten over the years is slowly falling into place. Now, the verb tenses seem laughably easy...I can't believe I didn't work on this stuff before! Oh well..it will be a huge sense of acomplishment to "finish" Spanish (not really...I'll be learning for life, but to "finish" with the courses and grammar books...). Portuguese is next, I think...I want to wait until I'm at an advanced level of Spanish. I met one of my daughter's friend's parents from Brazil, so I've got someone to talk to, and Portugal has always interested me. And Assimil just released El portugués de Brasil a few months ago so we'll see! IR Irish has been going great as well. I'm on Lesson 35 of Buntús Cainte, and Lesson 17 of Ó Siadhail's text. I've also been working through my daughter's copy of Irish for Beginners...it's actually a really great little book, even if it is aimed at kids! And best of all, I've been tutoring my daughter in Irish every day after school and she is getting really good! It's very encouraging and lots of craic. That's about it for now...more to come! Edited by Indíritheach on 21 November 2013 at 12:56am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Indíritheach Senior Member United States Joined 3899 days ago 108 posts - 146 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Irish, French | Message 26 of 72 26 November 2013 at 11:50pm | IP Logged | ||
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Shame on me for not updating this log. Well, I've been pretty busy, with work and all, but I still haven't fallen behind in my languages. I've been really working hard on the Irish, putting in 1 to 2 hours a day of study or more. I'm almost done with Mastering Spanish Level Two, and I finished the first Harry Potter book and have moved on to the second. I've also been tutoring my daughter in Irish for at least 30 minutes per day, and she is getting really good! I am on Lesson 18 of Learning Irish but I have decided to stop again and revise previous lessons, starting with Lesson 11, which starts explaining the copula is. Inspired by Monty's Welsh grammar rant, I've decided to go off on a tangent of my own since this is a topic that intially confused me and I always work things out better when I try to explain them to others.
So Irish, like Spanish (and I'm sure other languages) has two different ways of expressing "to be". There's the verb bí, or as Ó Siadhail calls it, the tá verb, and then there's the copula. And similar to the distinction in Spanish between ser and estar, they both refer to different aspects of "being". For example: Tá mé anseo. I am here. Tá an dochtúr glic. The doctor is clever. Is mé an múinteoir. I am the teacher. Is í an banaltra í. She is the nurse. So is is to link two nouns or pronouns, whereas tá is usually followed by a predicative adjective or adverb. Tá describes state or location, while is describes who or what something is (although is can be used with adjectives). When the topic is a definite noun, it is preceded by the appropriate pronoun. So for example: Is mé an léachtóir. I am the lecturer. The pronoun mé precedes the noun. But when the topic is indefinite... Is léachtóir mé. I am a lecturer. ...the pronoun follows the noun. Also, whenever the subject is é(he), í(she), or iad(they), it must be repeated. Is í an múinteoir í. She is the teacher. The other forms of the copula are: Is mé an dochtúr. I am the doctor. Ní mé an dochtúr. I am not the doctor. Ar mé an dochtúr? Am I the doctor? Nach mé an dochtúr? Aren't I the doctor? Deir sé gur/nach mé an dochtúr. He says I am/am not the doctor. Más mé/mara mé an dochtúr. If I am/am not the doctor. For the third person pronouns, ar becomes ab and gur becomes gurb, so Ab é an garda? Is he the guard? Apparently the copula can be omitted before mise, mé féin, mise mé féin; thusa, thú féin, thusa thú féin, or é (í, iad) seo (sin), but not before ordinary forms. Well, that's the end of my rant on the copula. I'm going to keep reviewing previous lessons before I start lesson 19. I'll try to update as soon as I can. Edited by Indíritheach on 26 November 2013 at 11:51pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6763 days ago 4250 posts - 5711 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 27 of 72 27 November 2013 at 10:25am | IP Logged | ||
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That ar - ab isn't something I've encountered yet (and maybe it's typical for Ó Siadhail's Irish?). If I see "Ar....?", I think of it as a question like:
Ar mhaith leat cupán tae? Would you like a cup of tea? (not *Do you like a cup of tea?) Hmm... I just saw this: ar Connemara for an, ab Connemara for an preceding é, í, iad e.g. ab é (Source: http://www.nualeargais.ie/gnag/gram.htm) 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Indíritheach Senior Member United States Joined 3899 days ago 108 posts - 146 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Irish, French | Message 28 of 72 27 November 2013 at 10:42pm | IP Logged | ||
Interesting website! Yeah, I'm sure that Ó Siadhail's text is full of Connacht forms. In fact, I've already noticed differences between forms I've seen/heard in Buntús Cainte and in Learning Irish. I don't worry about it too much, I'm going to stick with the Connacht pronunciation since Ó Siadhail's text is the backbone of my learning program. Honestly, at this point, I wouldn't know enough to tell you if I was hearing a Connacht accent, or an Ulster accent or any other. So today I only got in about 30 minutes of study with Buntús Cainte as opposed to my usual hour, but that's only because I was working on FSI Spanish and I really wanted to finish Unit 25. I may study more tonight, or I might just tutor my daughter and count that towards my study time, I'm not sure. I don't have to work tomorrow morning so hopefully I can set aside some extra study time. If I really work at it, by the time the 6 Week Challenge is over I'll have logged in about 150 hours of study time in Irish. I've also got to get better at doing Anki...I get busy and forget and it just piles up more and more. I've only added in the vocabulary from Lessons 1-6 of Learning Irish! That's got to be one of my New Year's resolutions! Edited by Indíritheach on 27 November 2013 at 10:43pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6763 days ago 4250 posts - 5711 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 29 of 72 27 November 2013 at 11:26pm | IP Logged | ||
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I can ask my teacher about the form, she's a Connemara Irish speaking Dubliner. In the meantime, I'll have a look at my material.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Indíritheach Senior Member United States Joined 3899 days ago 108 posts - 146 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Irish, French | Message 30 of 72 30 November 2013 at 2:13am | IP Logged | ||
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SP
Bueno, no hay mucho que decir, estoy estudiando con Mastering Spanish y sigue bien. Todavía estoy mirando series cómo Isabel y Águila roja, y he estado hablando con mis compañeros de trabajo, amigos, y mi esposa en español. Después de muchos años, ella por fin siente cómoda de hablar conmigo en español. Antes, cuando empecé una charla con ella en español, ella siempre me contestaba en inglés. No sé por qué, pero era una lata para mi. Pero ahora, ella me contesta en español y estoy satisfecho. Estoy pensando revisar Assimil, sólo para reforzarme los puntos gramaticales con cuyos todavía no me siento cómodo, como el subjuntivo, etc. Ah, y estoy leyendo Harry Potter y la cámara secreta, esta vez creo que es más fácil que el primer libro del serie. IR Still working really hard on my Irish, studying with my courses at least 1 to 2 hours per day and getting as much input as possible...With Irish, that's a real challenge! My daughter is enjoying learning Irish with me, and she's doing really well...she already knows how to say to much! I'll give more of an update on my progress tomorrow, tonight I am pretty tired and need to get to bed for another day of studying tomorrow! Edited by Indíritheach on 30 November 2013 at 2:16am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Indíritheach Senior Member United States Joined 3899 days ago 108 posts - 146 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Irish, French | Message 31 of 72 12 December 2013 at 12:30am | IP Logged | ||
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Wow, I haven't updated in a while. Well, I've been busy, this time of year is always hectic...also, I had a little car accident so I've been having to deal with that as well. Anyways, I have been plugging away at Irish and Spanish. I am almost done with Mastering Spanish Level Two, and it's about time because I don't know how much more drilling in the morning I can take. And I'm on Lesson 19 of Learning Irish. I feel like I'm making some progress with Irish, slowly...I'll update more later!
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| sctroyenne Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5245 days ago 739 posts - 1312 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Spanish, Irish | Message 32 of 72 12 December 2013 at 5:40am | IP Logged | ||
Going back a bit. You really must be my language learning twin. I too am planning on Portuguese next after "finishing" Spanish (as in getting to around a B2 level where I can maintain and make progress through more casual exposure). I haven't made the big decision between European or Brazilian Portuguese though - may opt for Brazilian due to the sheer numbers of speakers overall and near me. Working on Lesson 10 of Learning Irish now, though I've no where near mastered what I've learned thus far, but I manage to surprise myself sometimes with my ability to do the translation exercises. I'm going to contact the Irish Language Hunters teacher/consultant to figure out ideas for how to transform the lessons into digestable chunks that I can practice to fluency. I hope I can do it because it's such a great resource but it's so dense and doesn't give you much practice (either through exercises or through repetition in future lessons). 1 person has voted this message useful |
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