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Radioclare’s tac log 2015 (*jäŋe/*ledús)

 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log Post Reply
292 messages over 37 pages: << Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ... 32 ... 36 37 Next >>
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 249 of 292
02 July 2015 at 9:18pm | IP Logged 
These are fantastic results though. (And as I was writing the post, you tweeted about achieving Memrise zero too!)

There's still lots of time to reach B2 :) Would you say you're B2 passively yet? From my perspective, and comparing to myself, I think you might have reached B2 in reading already last year, and with Budva you've got much closer to B2 in listening (if you're not already there).

BTW, the consensus appears to be that basic fluency is passive B2 and active B1 :)

Maybe some of your goals on the path to B2 were not quite right/needed. For example it seems like you've significantly improved your grammatical accuracy through lang-8, which isn't reflected in your list(s), but which is very important.

And there's nothing bad about not having goals :)

Have you considered doing more GLOSS lessons btw? There's comprehensible input (always with audio), grammar notes and suggested writing topics :)

Edited by Serpent on 02 July 2015 at 9:18pm

3 persons have voted this message useful



basica
Senior Member
Australia
Joined 3528 days ago

157 posts - 269 votes 
Studies: Serbian

 
 Message 250 of 292
03 July 2015 at 2:31am | IP Logged 
I would agree with Serpent in that if you're able to follow along to a show and read
books, that's a pretty strong indicator of B2 abilities more than B1. I think you've done
quite well so far, but obviously at these higher levels it becomes harder to notice
progress :)
2 persons have voted this message useful



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 251 of 292
03 July 2015 at 10:35pm | IP Logged 
You've reached almost all of your goals, and that's impressive! I couldn't agree more with Serpent and basica that you're around basic fluency now, because from what we can infer you are already at a B2 level for listening/reading and B1 active. I can't write in my B1 languages as much as you write in Croatian, my brain would explode if I tried! For much less than you've done with Croatian other people in this forum claim to speak one new language every fortnight.
4 persons have voted this message useful



Radioclare
Triglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
timeofftakeoff.com
Joined 4575 days ago

689 posts - 1119 votes 
Speaks: English*, German, Esperanto
Studies: Croatian, Serbian, Macedonian

 
 Message 252 of 292
03 July 2015 at 11:10pm | IP Logged 
Thank you guys, you are all a lot more positive than me :) :)

Perhaps I have unrealistic expectations of how "fluent" I should be at each CEFR
level! I do really struggle with assessing where I am on the scale; I've never taken a
CEFR exam in any language and I think perhaps you need to be quite a confident person
to assess your own abilities against the grid.

I definitely think I have reached the B1 definitions of listening and reading. The
spoken interaction definition says "I can deal with most situations likely to arise
when travelling in an area where the language is spoken" and I think that after my
experiences in Montenegro and Serbia last summer I can definitely tick that bit :)
But the definition continues by saying "I can enter unprepared into conversation on
topics that are familiar, of personal interest or pertinent to everyday life" and I'm
not convinced I can tick that; I can discuss those things if I give them some advance
thought, but possibly not "unprepared". But then to be quite frank I don't normally
launch "unprepared" into conversations with strangers in English either... I think I'm
okay on spoken production and writing for B1, although again I don't think I could do
something like narrate the plot of a book "unprepared".

I've just read the B2 definitions and I think I do meet bits of them, but not others.
I can understand most TV news and current affairs programmes, or if I can't it's my
lack of knowledge of Croatian politics which is hampering me and not the language :D
I'm not sure whether I can follow extended speeches/lectures with complex lines of
argument, because I've never listened to any. I can definitely read news articles, and
do so every day; that's something which has got to the level of being actively
enjoyable for me now, rather than a chore. Can I understand "contemporary literary
prose"? I'm not sure; I can definitely understand contemporary trashy fiction without
too many problems, but (much as I love Twilight!) I don't think anything I've read
during the Super Challenge merits the title "literary" prose...

Getting too hung up on CEFR levels probably isn't productive, especially given that I
can't figure out if it's even possible to take a CEFR exam in Croatian. I guess when I
said I wanted to be "B2" by the end of the year, I meant I wanted to be able to
express myself confidently and without major hesitation, and I still feel like I'm a
long way away from that.

Serpent - GLOSS is on my list of things I feel guilty for not doing more of :D When I
first started learning Croatian I used to moan a lot about how few resources there
were in comparison to those available for people learning a major European language
like French (for example!). But as time has passed I've realised that I haven't even
succeeded in fully utilising the resources which are available, never mind wishing
that there were more!

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 253 of 292
04 July 2015 at 12:30am | IP Logged 
CEFR is more of a guideline, something more specific than "I can understand 80% of a regular newspaper and can hold regular conversations about any topic" :) I'm sure not everyone with basic fluency would pass CEFR exams with no preparation. For example I think here on HTLAL we tolerate more grammar fails.

Annette has passed B1 at some language school in Croatia. AFAIU they organized it specially for her, at the end of her stay (and even took her general work into account, not just the exam itself). Definitely seems like it's nothing like the conveyor of Spanish/French/German exams :D She can probably tell you more about it :)

Vrata Rima definitely didn't sound like trashy fiction ;D And I'm sure you'd understand more now than when you first read this :P

Really, I've kinda accepted that I won't understand Budva as well as you do by season 3. There's just so much vocabulary that goes past me because I've read very few books. (I'm fine with it, since I love listening early on, and I find that Budva has made reading easier :D) You can't imagine the sort of basic words I'm still picking up :D

Edited by Serpent on 04 July 2015 at 12:40am

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Radioclare
Triglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
timeofftakeoff.com
Joined 4575 days ago

689 posts - 1119 votes 
Speaks: English*, German, Esperanto
Studies: Croatian, Serbian, Macedonian

 
 Message 254 of 292
04 July 2015 at 4:19pm | IP Logged 
Oh that's true, I forgot that Annette had done the exam. I must ask her about it :) I
know where it is she went to do the course, but their website is extremely vague about
exams. If you could just take an exam without attending the language course I would
probably try to arrange to do it at some point when I'm passing through Zagreb, but I
don't have enough annual leave to attend a course there (much as I would love to!)

You are right about 'Vrata Rima', Serpent - it was quite difficult! I will have to locate
it on my bookshelf and see whether it seems any easier now...
1 person has voted this message useful



solocricket
Tetraglot
Groupie
United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 3668 days ago

68 posts - 106 votes 
Speaks: English*, French, Italian, Spanish
Studies: Dutch, Icelandic, Korean, Polish

 
 Message 255 of 292
04 July 2015 at 4:27pm | IP Logged 
Radioclare wrote:


Serpent - GLOSS is on my list of things I feel guilty for not doing more of :D When I
first started learning Croatian I used to moan a lot about how few resources there
were in comparison to those available for people learning a major European language
like French (for example!). But as time has passed I've realised that I haven't even
succeeded in fully utilising the resources which are available, never mind wishing
that there were more!


Yeah, I've had that experience with Icelandic, but some of the available resources are
quite dull, so I still don't use them.... I'm not familiar with GLOSS, so I'm not sure
if it's the same thing-- it might be better to stick with things that are fun and
interesting for you :D
3 persons have voted this message useful



Radioclare
Triglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
timeofftakeoff.com
Joined 4575 days ago

689 posts - 1119 votes 
Speaks: English*, German, Esperanto
Studies: Croatian, Serbian, Macedonian

 
 Message 256 of 292
04 July 2015 at 4:33pm | IP Logged 
I've managed two days in a row of writing in Croatian now, which is a start :)

Quote:
Thursday
Odlučila sam da ću svaki dan nešto napisati na hrvatskom. Ne znam hoću li uspjeti, jer
nemam puno slobodnog vremena, ali želim vježbati prije nego što odem u Hrvatsku ovog
ljeta. Moj cilj je napisati barem sto riječi na hrvatskom svaki dan. Mislim da bi to
trebalo biti moguće.

Danas sam tužna zato što sam upravo pročitala da je umro Val Doonican. On je bio
slavni pjevač iz Irske, premda prepostavljam da vjerojatno nije dobro poznat u
Hrvatskoj. Majka mi je Irkinja, pa sam uvijek slušala irsku glazbu dok sam bila
dijete. Kada sam imala sedam godina, moja omiljena pjesma je bila "Paddy McGinty's
Goat". U pjesmi se radi o kozi koja jede sve. To nije ozbiljna pjesma; veoma je
smiješna :)

Pitam se koliko grešaka ima unutar ovog kratkog teksta!


Quote:
Friday
Jučer sam napisala da će biti lako svaki dan napisati barem sto riječi na hrvatskom.
Danas mi se čini, međutim, da je to veoma teško, zato što sam popila dvije velike čaše
vina prije nego što sam počela. Sada sam malo pijana.

Danas je bio strašan dan i jako sam umorna. Teško mi je objasniti na hrvatskom, ali
smo imali posebni sportski dan na poslu. Nisam osoba koja voli sport (zapravo nije
pretjerano reći da mrzim sve sportove!) i sigurno nemam talenta za sport. To nije
problem, jer uostalom radim kao računovođa a ne kao atletičar. Međutim, šefovi su
odlučili da ćemo svi bolje raditi zajedno ako se bavimo sportom. Na engleskom se to
zove "team-building".

Više volim raditi sama, jer nisam osoba koja voli društvo. Ipak se bavim ovim poslom
već deset godina i dobro razumijem kako je raditi zajedno s drugim ljudima. Čak i kada
ne bih razumjela, ne znam kako bih to naglo mogla naučiti zbog toga što sam se morala
baviti sportom s kolegama.

Treba mi još vina!


I'm particularly proud of Friday's effort, although it had more mistakes in it than
Thursday's, because I wasn't entirely sober when I wrote it ;)




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