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 Language Learning Forum : Members profiles |  | |
| Signwave Newbie United States Joined 4628 days ago 2 posts - 2 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin | Message 1 of 5 16 March 2012 at 2:04am | IP Logged |
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Hello, everybody. I'm a 26-year-old guy from (and still living in) Los Angeles,
California. I'm pretty excited to be a new member of what seems like such an amazing forum. I've been interested in languages my whole life, or at least as far back as I can remember. Growing up in California, I've had a lot of exposure to Spanish through the large Central and South American communities here. In fact, when I was very young, I had a babysitter who was from Guatemala, and she spoke only Spanish to me. While my first words were in English, many of my first complete sentences were in Spanish. I was extremely lucky to grow up in a neighborhood that offered Spanish immersion elementary school, and so I attended that program from 1st to 5th grade. Our normal primary classes were all in Spanish, and we had only 2 hours of English a day. By the time I was in 5th grade, I was fluent (for a 10 year old). I spent a month in Guadalajara, Mexico on an exchange program in 1995, and the exposure to the language and culture is something I will never forget. Then there was a gap. I took some Spanish in high school, and nearly ten years later I can understand a lot, but speaking fluidly poses me some problems. I find that it is much like riding a bike, though, in that the more I talk to Spanish-speakers the quicker I pick it back up. I'm sure that if I spent some time in Mexico I could become fluent in under a year. Since that isn't a possibility at the moment, I have been brushing up on my own. In college a few years back, I took two semesters of Mandarin (Chinese) so I can read and understand the four or five hundred most common characters, but my pronunciation is awful and I can only pick out certain words in spoken Mandarin. One of my goals is conversational fluency and visual literacy in Mandarin, though I am putting that on hold for a bit to learn French. I have no prior knowledge of French, save for a familiarity with the other Romance language of Spanish and some knowledge of Latin roots. I have decided to reward rather than punish myself by tackling French and practicing my Spanish concurrently. I figure if I can regain and then achieve a higher level of fluency in Spanish, I will feel positive feedback and will feel even more motivated to learn Mandarin, Arabic, German, etc. Not necessarily in that order. :) Well, I hope that wasn't too long and boring. I'm off to search for some best practice tips for Anki (I have Anki on my phone; I love the future!) and for any recommendations for software or learning methods. I have just started using busuu.com, which--while by no means perfect--seems to suit my needs at the moment. TL;DR: If anyone can recommend or suggest a good starting point, be it French movies, Spanish grammars, or just a simple link, I would appreciate it greatly. Thanks! -Signwave 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| manish Triglot Groupie Romania Joined 5537 days ago 88 posts - 136 votes  Speaks: Romanian*, English, German Studies: Spanish | Message 3 of 5 16 March 2012 at 12:05pm | IP Logged |
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Spanish seems to be one of the languages most affected by attrition. The ability to speak it, at least.
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| nway Senior Member United States youtube.com/user/Vic Joined 5406 days ago 574 posts - 1707 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Japanese, Korean | Message 4 of 5 16 March 2012 at 9:24pm | IP Logged |
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Greetings from a fellow Southern Californian. I could be mistaken, but there doesn't seem to be a lot of us 'round here...
For French, this YouTube resource is a goldmine: Imagiers __________________________________________ For languages in general, if you're at all interested in international relations and current events, here's a nifty site that features English translations of online articles and editorials originally written in other languages (mostly about political affairs regarding the U.S.), and links back to the original versions for reference: Watching America For example, I often like to read the Spanish articles and then reference the English translation if I need to clarify anything (though more often I'll just use Google Translate for a single unfamiliar word). __________________________________________ For help with spoken Mandarin, you might want to check out this brilliant YouTube user's "Learn Chinese Mandarin (中文)" playlist, which features an organized curriculum of around 40 comprehensive spoken lessons—each typically around 40 minutes in length—most of which (except for the first couple of videos) include a native speaker. Glossika The playlist also includes some videos on Chinese calligraphy, though I personally haven't checked them out yet. Edited by nway on 17 March 2012 at 7:03am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Signwave Newbie United States Joined 4628 days ago 2 posts - 2 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin | Message 5 of 5 17 March 2012 at 3:13am | IP Logged |
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Wow, nway. I can't thank you enough.
I'm actually a pretty rabid current events/political junkie, and one of the (many) reasons I'm trying to learn as many languages as possible is to break out of the all-too- often insular culture we find ourselves in, here in the States. At least, that's how I feel sometimes. The WatchingAmerica link is pretty much exactly what I've been looking for without even knowing it. And re Imagiers: I've never even seen a YouTube channel that useful before. "Goldmine" might not be a strong enough term ;) I can't wait to trawl my way through. Thanks again. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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