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Expug’s All at On(c)e Log - TAC14 | ||
Tags: Papiamento | Estonian | Georgian | Native Materials | Norwegian | Total Annihilation Challenge (TAC) | Mandarin | Russian | German | French | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| 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 129 of 415 18 February 2014 at 9:55pm | IP Logged |
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Today I managed to get rid of all the SRS in the morning, while also working on one
Duolingo lesson. Spending a long time reading the Georgian Structural Grammar, but I thinkit will pay off. As much as I am familiar with most subjects, I manage to focus on detail and I also reinforce some vocabulary through the examples. I'll be spending at least another month using material from Hewitt, since I'm also working on the Georgian Reader - which is much more boring at this respect. Maybe I should start reading non-fiction in French. Even though I find contemporary novels to bring important insights into daily life, it's hard to find something that isn't either too cheesy or too post-modernistically apocaliptical. I'm considering reading Alain de Botton's books, even though he wrote initially in English. Overall, I feel like reading more often and more each time, but there is the difficulty of keeping focus at a busy and noisy environment. I can take care of shorter activities much better. Actually delving into a book for over 30 pages is pretty much a challenge, though. And now I don't have much time for reading at home and I'd like to read non- language stuff. I have several books on social psychology and behavioral economy standing in line. I'm well equipped with Norwegian series for the next weeks. I didn't bother checking if I was going to find subtitles. Maybe if I don't that will force me to lose the fear of subtitleless videos. 1 person has 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 130 of 415 19 February 2014 at 9:55pm | IP Logged |
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Today at Georgian: A structural reference grammar I read a very interesting
section on particles. I will keep it as reference for particles such as განა and აბა which I always had doubts about. I finished the book Paloma today. I'm glad I could finish what might be my third book in Georgian - and the first one which is not a translation - it actually is billingual but written originally in Georgian then translated into English. Now I'm going to start Paulo Coelho's book and I believe it will be the easiest so far. Simple language, just like Paloma, and less narrative-descriptive or fairy-tale related vocabulary. I really want this to work as a boost for my Georgian reading. I can get translations quite easily, so if things go well I may even consider aiming for a star at Super Challenge. The Russian film Космос как предчувствие is a bit boring and I'm not THAT learning much from it. Ideally, I'd need subtitles in both Russian and English, but at my current level that'd slow me down and would be as effective as just reading in parallel (well, perhaps a bit less because the subtitles would obviously focus on dialogues, daily, spoken language). There's another film I'd like to watch, Связь - Relations. Maybe I will watch this one and pause for a while. Btw, I don't have an idea of my level at Russian now, but I have this feeling that I've been building up some structures, some ground and now i'm starting to build up, both in vocabulary and in grammar. I can figure out a fozen TY Russian sentences I read in Russian before looking up the English translation. Previously I'd get only a couple. My next resource will have to be a wise decision. I'm almost considering an intermediate book, even if it's just to push me up. 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 131 of 415 20 February 2014 at 1:32am | IP Logged |
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Just wanted to say that I love reading your log, Expugnator! Because I don't have much computer time, I've started to save pages of your log as PDFs and read them on my Walkman when I have free time and am away from the computer. How crazy is that!
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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 132 of 415 20 February 2014 at 7:07pm | IP Logged |
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Thank you kuji! It's nice to hear that. I hope the notes can actually distract you from
the routine instead of bringing more stress with my language-learning struggles hehe. I've finished watching the TV series in English I've been watching for the past years. Now I want to start another one as part of my studies. I'm not sure if I'm going to start one over or resume one of those I watch once in a while. I didn't like the mockumentary style of The Office that much, the text doesn't flow and the camera is a bit too 20-min episodes would be fine, as I'd be less tempted to let it just play on the background as I've done with the previous one. Verbal morphology started! It is been quite tiresome and I've been spending half an hour at reading 10 pages a day from Georgian: a structural grammar, but I'm happy with what I'm learning. As I read more from this Georgian grammar and from TY Russian, i start to wonder if those sample sentences don't have an SRS effect for me (with less emphasis on the repetition of each sentence on its own and more emphasis on the repetition of the necessary structures and commonest words). I like to read from a grammar when there are sample sentences because I learn a lot from those sentences and their translations. I usually overlook declension charts, so I learn more from the sentences (I do check the declension charts when necessary, though). So, I started reading "Na margem do Rio Piedra sentei e chorei" in Portuguese. This book is a blessing. Not only it has a simple language and is short enough to be part of my routine. It also deals with spiritual issues and existential questions I'm familiar with. I'm familiar with this language and this talking. So, that itself catches up my interesting and males me feel close to the book right from the beginning. Also, the book was written in my native language, Brazilian Portuguese. That means the person who wrote the translation went through the same process I go when I try to write something in Georgian (with the exception that the translator is decyphering Portuguese and rendering it into his native language). So, reading a translation from Portuguese is having access to the closest association I could find between my thoughts and Georgian's unique way to express them. I don't have to use an intermediary this time. While I still don't see Paulo Coelho as important in litterary, style terms, I value his message and the importance it will have now at one significant part of my daily life, which are my Georgian studies. My ultimate goal in learning languages or anything else is to become a better person, and this book will surely help me see things brighter and with even more confidence. Now to the experience of the first two pages itself. It is crystal clear that the combo [familiar subject] + [native language in a simple, non-literary, non-scientific language] is a boost. I don't spend much time searching for word correspondences as I'm much more familiar with the Georgian syntax now. Therefore, I can focus on learning the average 2-3 words per sentence. That's quite encouraging! When I read the Georgian Reader by Hewitt, which is supposedly aimed for learners, I get 10-words long sentences at which I only know about 2-3 of them. At Paulo Coelho's translation I get shorter sentences at which only 2 or 3 are missing, that is, I don't know them, they're not cognates and I can't infer them from context. So, this time I can actually focus on learning those new words. This is more suitable to my idea of when and how to use native materials. Let's see how the I will keep the experience. Funny how sometimes the Georgian translation is rather verbose, bookish while Paulo Coelho uses simple, daily, familiar language (although it is always standard written Portuguese, should I let it clear to BP learners). At such cases, I happen to have a Georgian sentence that is longer than the Portuguese one. That's a translator's choice, and at those cases I seldom fail to make the word-to-word corresponde. Even at those cases, I decided I won't enforce word looking-up and will stick to the original and translation. 1 person has 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 133 of 415 21 February 2014 at 9:01pm | IP Logged |
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I went out last night and thus got less than 5 hours of sleep. Yet I managed to work at
5h40 again and had a great German conversation. I'm getting embarassed now because my partner initially wanted to hire Portuguese classes from me and now she spends almost 40 minutes talking to me in German and even forgets to delve into Portuguese, I have to remind her sometimes. Today we simulated an interview and I learned and confirmed so many words on the go. Watched the first episode of The Office. No background listening, but actual attention even though I'd browse elsewhere sometimes. It is not difficult to understand with earphones. I'll still try to find something better, though. Most comedy series are 20- min long and that alone makes my life easier. Started watching 大耳朵图图 instead of XiYangYang. I understand much better from it and the language is more related to daily life. I still haven't got hold of all the episodes, I will search later at home. I'll leave the other comments for the overview on my current resources and activities. I've been willing to do this for a while, and I'm making good use of a calmer Friday. I will try to focus on evaluating how much each resource adds for my daily life, whether it's fun to do that activity or not. Before that, I'd just like to share two YT channels, one for Georgian, with comedy: Comedy-შოუ and another one on Russian, bookboxinc . Warning: long text follows. You may quit anytime. A review of my current activities 1. Anki decks - It's my first resource and I use it to get fully awaken. I still have a German, a Chinese and a Georgian decks. The first two won't finish anytime soon. I'm about to finish the Georgian one, though, and I may not add anything else to Anki. I'm enjoying those decks a bit more now, as my level for all languages improved, but months ago they were a nuisance. 2. Memrise - I'm doing HSK Chinese. I like the app but I'm starting to wonder if for every one of the HSK courses there I'll have to review the previous courses entirely. In that case, I should have started directly from level 4 then. I think it's effective, especially for learning radicals, though any dosis of SRS is enough for me. Once I finish the Georgian deck I may add one Memrise course for a different language or maybe just enjoy the free time. 3. Tuttle's Flashcards - This one isn't likely to end soon. I skim through 10 characters/20 pages a day. Now that I have the Memrise course, which is much more fancy, it is not that much essential; yet, the synergy between them strikes me up. Anyway, once I'm done with it I probably won't replace it with another book on characters as I already have Memrise. 4.TV series in English - This is the first refreshment of the day. So far I'd been doing only background listening. It worked wonders for my development of a more complex and simultaneous attention which is so typical of one's native language. I bet emk and iguanamon can report similar impressions on French and Portuguese, respectively. Still, the fun aspect was gone because I didn't actually follow the plot. Today I started a new series. Not sure if I will continue, but with 20 minutes I can totally focus on it or at least actually view it while doing something else mechanically. I want this to be a fun part of my day, as it often is the case with Norwegian series and French films. 5.Chinese podcast - The lessons were boring a few levels ago but now they're totally appropriate. I usually read the pdf and just listen to the podcast in the background, even when reading Georgian (!!! - Don't do it at home, children). My multiple attention improved both for English and for Chinese which I'm still learning, thanks to that. I'm starting to get the excerpts of the conversation transparently, and having a good guess of the dialogue before I read the pdf (I play the audio before I open the pdf, so I usually listen to the dialogue the first time before getting down to reading). I'm happy about this resource and don't plan to leave it soon. 6.Georgian grammar or textbook #1 - By now only grammars are left. I do want to be done with the textbook stage for Georgian so I can start Estonian, but I'm happily surprised with how much I'm learning from Hewitt's grammar. The following has been happening to my Georgian: 1) I learned basic A1 skills 2) I started delving into grammar, clueless at some points and with timid insights at others 3) As I tried more advanced textbooks - there was no A2-transitional textbook when I started - I noticed how my vocabulary was still weak and I was reading grammar that went too much into the details while I still didn't have enough vocabulary to be able to read sentences and focusing on consolidating the basics of the grammar. Complicated, indeed, but that's how I feel when I start dealing with longer, untranslated texts when my level just isn't high enough for learning in a comfortable way. Anyway, I really want to rush with this book so I can move on, but I'm enjoying Hewitt's Georgian A Structural Reference Grammar. 7.Georgian grammar or textbook #2- This one is a nuisance. From the same author mentioned above, A Georgian Reader makes the same - mistakes - in my view - of almost all other textbooks I've met. Too much info on Georgian classical authors, rural life, specific vocabulary before the student gets any insight on contemporary daily life and the language they will actually use if they go to Georgia or decide to watch TV/read post-USSR novels. I'm not having fun and I want it to finish asap. I will go to the end so I won't leave any regrets for the future. I'll try to speed up if I have time on weekends, but the texts are so boring and out of this world that it is quite complicated to speed up at anything. Well, at least I've actually managed to read faster in the past days, even if sometimes it's just skimming. 8.German textbook - My German saw a boost as I restarted it two months ago. I'm about to finish my 3rd beginner's Assimil. Two other intermediate Assimils and I will resist doing any other cool textbooks I may have and proceed to native-material only. 9.Russian textbook - Three weeks to finish TY Russian. Then I don't know, maybe a level 2 textbook (Colloquial 2, LL Advanced). I've struggled a lot, but now I start to build up some foundation. 10.Norwegian series - I like them a lot. Still at Svarte Penger, Hvite Løgner. I don't plan to replace this activity. Maybe if I run out of series I will start watching films 10 minutes a day, the way I do with French. I don't know how effective it is now in terms of vocabulary acquisition - I don't look up more than 10 words each set of 20 minutes. Maybe it's time for the big step of dropping subtitles. Who knows...my active Norwegian is being eaten up by German, and I don't know what is the future of that language. 11.French reading I read 20 pages a day. I'm having trouble finding contemporary novels about contemporary lives which I really like and aren't just cheesy or simplistic language. I'm working on a medieval trilogy - Le chant des sorcières, final tome, and I don't know how good it is for my French. In fact, I don't know at which level my French is now. So, this book csn't work as a parameter. If I start another novel that takes place after the 80's and I realize there aren't many new words to look up at each page, I'll then evaluate my speed. If I am still slow nonetheless, I may consider reducing the daily amount to 10 pages.Oh wait, there's the Super Challenge. Anyway, it's a necessary task and I want to have fun with it as well. On the other hand, I don't know how effective it's being. I read semi-intensively: I'm at a level at which I can more or less tell a really too-specific word apart and focus on the important ones I keep running into but still don't stick. I just have to assess their ratio. 12.Norwegian reading It's so much fun now. I'm speeding up. I am better now than I was in French when I started reading French, which means: I've learned Norwegian up to a level that is higher than my French level when we consider mostly vocabulary discount. Let me try to explain: if, when I started French reading, I could understand about 70% of it without a dictionary thanks to previous textbook studies + the vocsbulary studies; considering that I don't have such vocabulary discount for Norwegian and yet my passive skills approach that of someone (myself, in this case) who's been through the necessary textbooks in French, that means I've been through a long way in Norwegian. Actually, most of the way is already gone. Reading a Norwegian text and getting 70% (much more when just reading subtitles) means I'm close to a B2 level and I'm learning in an organic way, that is, I've incorporated the necessary, non-cognate words that make it actually possible to speak a non-related language. Back on topic: It's much more fun when there's the audiobook, even if now I read faster than the audio. So, I'll focus on getting books that also have their audio forms. I even feel like increasing the 10-page daily threshold, which would then make Norwegian elligible for a Reading Super Challenge. 13.Georgian reading - Still with translation. Since I'm using a work that is originally in Brazilian Portuguese, I will try to speed up in the next months. 14.Georgian series - I watch one episode of ჩემი ცოლის დაქალები. It is long and I can't get more than 30% of it when I focus. Due to this, I use it mostly as my background listening activity. I may play it anytime during other activities. I'm slowly trying to watch a couple of minutes with full attention now and then. 15.Papiamento news videos - These videos are rather short - 2, 3, 4 minutes. Thanks to consistency, I can say I've reached the same improvement on background listening I saw with English. I just have to tune in and I can understand anything. 16.Papiamento reading - Two pages a day - I have only 3 actual books left, that's life. I do it sometimes while something not so interesting is being played. I'll finish this book and the other two and then unfortunately there won't be much besides just the plain news. I'm learning quite a lot about the cultures from such books, though. 17.Chinese educational TV series - It's a nice resource. I was just unlucky about Travel in Chinese - I can't watch the full episode. Nevertheless, the dialogues are appropriate to my level and I'm getting happier each day when I notice that every new dialogue actually has less unknown words thanks to the work on the series itself and the synergy with other resources. I will stick to this activity for long. There are many 100-episodes long series at CCTV. 18.Chinese cartoon - I just dropped XiYangYang in favor of 大耳朵图图, as stated above. I need to get hold of as many episodes as possible and watch them calmly and wit full attention. I hope to have a lot of fun. 19.Chinese textbook - I do try to do a lot for Chinese, even if not always attentively. Current resource is actually one of the best ever - Everyday Chinese Fables and Anedoctes. They have been adapted from classical and they all have text, pinyin, audio and translation. I'm finding it easier each day to understand the fables and I'm really enjoying the fables. That brings up an issue of what to do next. I don't think I have much to learn from beginner's textbooks. Yet I can't cope with textbooks that have no pinyin and/or translation. They will slow down my studies for no reason. So, maybe I will drop textbooks at least for a while - since the Chinesepod has been doing the job brilliantly - and make this just my Chinese reading slot. 20.French film - Lots of comedies. I recently had another comprehension breakthrough. My next goal is that stage at which I can just listen to French in the background and tune in and catch up when necessary, as mentioned for English. I won't do with films, for obvious reaons. It's just 10 minutes a day, which I strech a little when the film is nice and the day has been calmer. 21.Russian film - My latest addition to an already hectic routine. Due to technical constrains of adding both Russian and English subtitles simultaneously, I decided I'll keep just the English subtitles for the moment. Yet it's been quite effective! I've just finished my first movie ever, Космос как предчувствие (thank you, renaissancemedi ). I want to do a second one but then I'll just let go for the moment. I may as well reach a level in Russian at which trying to cram up grammar details will be ineffective and then I may start parallel reading - I'm looking forward to that actually. 22.German duolingo - It's great for activating my German, but it is also a lot of pressure. I want to finish it asap. It's stressful when you can't finish a chapter because you lost all your hearts because of dumb translations into English, and you have to start over. There's no other duolingo that suits me, maybe only Italian for a quick review, so I might use it again only if some new language does show up. All in all, it's great, it's effective but I want to finish it off asap just to get more free time and less stress. It's a busy schedule but I'm happy with the results. Being using so many native materials or textbooks with longer texts, I can't expect everything to be of my interest all the time. I'm just happy the darker days are over, where I had 3 hard languages at a A1 level. Now I'm making progress on those and starting to enjoy the process. Edited by Expugnator on 21 February 2014 at 9:18pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4699 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 134 of 415 21 February 2014 at 9:11pm | IP Logged |
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How the hell do you even manage to put that all into a day. That's not even iron
discipline. That's... kevlar. Dyneema. Jesus Christ on a pogo stick with banana monkeys. Edited by tarvos on 21 February 2014 at 9:11pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| prz_ Tetraglot Senior Member Poland last.fm/user/prz_rul Joined 4851 days ago 890 posts - 1190 votes Speaks: Polish*, English, Bulgarian, Croatian Studies: Slovenian, Macedonian, Persian, Russian, Turkish, Ukrainian, Dutch, Swedish, German, Italian, Armenian, Kurdish | Message 135 of 415 22 February 2014 at 10:39am | IP Logged |
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Great sources, as always.
1 person has 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 136 of 415 24 February 2014 at 9:34pm | IP Logged |
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Thank you guys. It's not as difficult as it seems. If we consider each activity to be
15 min long, that would mean around 5 hours. Currently there are a few longer activities, especially the Georgian ones, but it's a matter of adjustment. It gets easier after you reach a B1 level (which I hope I will for Georgian, Chinese and Russian). I'm starting to develop a consistent routine for the weekend, at least for when I stay mostly home. I did all the SRS and Duolingo both on Saturday and Sunday, and I could also read a couple of pages from Georgian - a Structural grammar and from the Georgian Reader. I believe it won't take longer than two months to be done with these two books, then the situation will be a bit more comfortable. There is only one month ahead in duolingo too. There will be holidays - Carnival, for instance, but I do hope to finish these 4 resources as well as the Georgian Anki deck and the Tuttle flashcards. As for the weekdays' schedule, everything but Duolingo accomplish by now, but there's still time. I started a new Russian film, Связь. It's interesting and useful. I'm starting to process the Russian speech according to the English translation, and getting a little more familiarized. I've ordered the book that will probably be my first one in Russian. It's a translation of a Brazilian book, on a topic I'm already familiar with. I read one such book for French, it worked. I really expect to end the year being able to read in Russian. If that happens, it will have taken one year longer than expected (in November that will be 2 years of me studying Russian). Yet, that's something to be happy about, as Russian has been the one I have assigned the shortest daily sessions to. Now, German. I'm starting to see a breakthrough. Considering that it's much better than Russian, then this year I may as well attain basic fluency. That will leave room for Spanish then Italian. I'm really happy that it seems to take me much less time with textbooks for German than I thought. That means this time will be even shorter for the Romance languages. I'm focusing on Assimil books and on doing as many lessons as possbile each day. There's a lot I can figure out on my own, don't need to read grammatical explanations on, so I believe in this case Assimil is fulfilling its job pretty neatily. I got the feeling I need to start something new. As my hardcore languages Chinese, Georgian and Russian approach B1, I think I can enjoy textbook studying from scratch one again. I like it when I start from scratch and there is plenty of learning material as well as small linguistic facts. Once I get to an A2-ish level, I start to run out of textbooks and the transition to intermediate is always traumatic. I'm still living this stage somehow for those three, but I believe I can take a start-over refreshment with Estonian. I only have to finish working on 4 (or was it 5?) more Georgian resources. I'm enjoying a lot to read from my native language into Georgian. Even though the translation doesn't exactly match and is longer than the original Portuguese text, the vocabulary just happens to get more and more familiar. I get the feeling that this book will represent a breakthrough. If by the end of the book I notice I'm able to read Georgian with occasional look-up of words, I'll have to focus on listening because that'll mean I'll be able to get most of what I hear on TV shows if I focus. I got another Georgian contact from italki. That guy is available for Skype conversations but only in the evening, which is early in the afternoon for me here (7 hours of difference). So, I couldn't make a Skype call. Yet I could chat almost effortlessly. I could handle the situation (that of not being able to make a call) entirely in Georgian, I only had to look up one word once, and yet I could have made myself understood with a different construction. That made me really happy. I saw a steep evolution from my first attempts. The words just keep popping on my head. Maybe if we don't manage to find a time that is ok for both I'll just text chat. On Friday I finished my schedule much earlier and spent a few hours doing nothing or thinking about what to do next, or browsing randomly, which gives me a headache. Thus, I decided to make a list of all books I'm reading now, considering ebooks and physical books. That way, I'm always going to have a suggestion of what to do next and avoid being idle and getting exposed to the screenlight for no reason. So, once I'm done with language tasks I'll go straight to that list. I do employ the same tactis of alternating through books after a single pages so I don't feel asleepy too early. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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