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Spanish Log (TAC 2014 Team Lobo) | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| dbag Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5012 days ago 605 posts - 1046 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 65 of 271 11 August 2011 at 1:26am | IP Logged |
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Havent managed quite as much Spanish so far this week as I would have liked. Lesson 11 and 12 of LSLC where quite easy. However, things completly change once you hit lesson 13, which is about reflexive verbs. It introuduces a LOT of new vocab, and lots of sentences which are something of a mouthful.
While in many respects this program is very similar to Pimsleur, it really is in a different leaugue. My feeling is that I am going to end up repeating most of the lessons several times. They dont reintrouduce new material in as systematic a fashion as does Pimsleur, so you can ignore the "80 % correct rule". I am not surprised I had to take a diversion into Pimsleur when I was using this course before. I cant imagine being without both courses, although Pimsleur 3 seems like a waste of time. FSI, still on unit 13. Didnt do any on Monday as I spent the evening watching the unprecedented violence erupt in London. I will run through the last couple of drills a few more times tomorrow, then move on. As per usual, I will not be doing the convo stimulus straight away. I really must catch up with those. Assimil, active wave lesson 99. So 9 more days until Im done with the first Active / Passive combo. Edited by dbag on 11 August 2011 at 1:27am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| dbag Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5012 days ago 605 posts - 1046 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 66 of 271 16 August 2011 at 12:09am | IP Logged |
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Quick update.
Among other things, yesterday I did maybe half an hour or so of unit 14, and today 2 hours or maybe a bit more. It is one of those welcome units which are incredibly easy. So much so, I will spend just a short amount of time with this unit tomorrow, and move onto unit 15. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| dbag Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5012 days ago 605 posts - 1046 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 67 of 271 19 August 2011 at 12:44am | IP Logged |
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Unit 15 has really helped me. I have learnt when to put le, les, me, te, and nos in front of sentences. I cant believe it has taken me this long to grasp this concept. I have of course come across these constructions lots of times, but they always confused me.
Its so simple! I cant see why courses dont just explain this sort of thing properly. There are only a couple of drills I need to focus on before moving on to unit 16. I havent done any platiquamos today becuase I have just been done the pub with friends, but I did lesson 15 and some of 16 of LSLC on the way to work, and lesson 17 and some of 18 on the way back. I have also done my Assimil lesson, and spent half an hour to 45 minutes flicking through margaritas magic key. That really is an awesome book, the way it explains the grammer is so easy to grasp. I may put some sections of this book ahead in priority of the practice makes perfect book. I will use it to get a quick overview of the tenses without getting bogged down in vocab. Edited by dbag on 19 August 2011 at 12:46am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| dbag Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5012 days ago 605 posts - 1046 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 68 of 271 21 August 2011 at 10:49am | IP Logged |
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Finally finished Assimil yesterday, both active and passive waves.
I was eagerly looking forward to this point when I started the book, imagining that I would be nearly fluent in the language. Well, thats not the case at all, but I had worked that one out a while ago. Assimil is probably the best comerially available course out there, but I would urge anyone reading this not to get sucked up in all the hype surrounding this course. I think those who have learned a language to "fluency" with this course are the exception rather than the rule, and I think there are some who may be grossly overestimating their own ability. I personally doubt I would pass a B1 test at this point. I do "know" quite a bit of Spanish now, I feel, although the bulk of this knowledge is very passive. There are many aspects of Spanish grammar which I am unsure of at the moment, because of the obscure way it is presented in the book. I had thought that I would just "pick it up" (assimilate it) but the truth is I havent. I am only really comfortable in the present tense, if I am completly honest. If I hadnt completed Pimsleur, MT etc beforehand I think I would have got very little out of the course. This may be down to the fact that I am a first time language learner, and many of the concepts presented are very new to me. I would definetly use Assimil again, indeed I plan to. The difference is that this time I wont have unrealistic expectations, and if I choose a romance language I will have some idea of what patterns to look for. Despite the above I am absolutely in love with this book, and I dont consider myself finished with it at all. I am going to be working with the book every day until at least christmas, I think , but only as an aside to my main studies with platiqaumos. Shadowing I think may be very effective, as well as reading through several parts of the book in one siting, repeatedly. Next time I try assimil, I might pretty much ignore the whole active / passive wave thing, as I dont see any particular value in it. I will have to give this some thought. I am going to add my thoughts to the thread "how far can assimil take you", and I will also update this log later as I have been a busy boy. Edited by dbag on 21 August 2011 at 10:56am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5365 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 69 of 271 21 August 2011 at 12:53pm | IP Logged |
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Congrats on finishing Assimil. I got a chuckle because when I started Spanish I remember thinking I would be nearly fluent after Pimsleur 3. I found this forum by googling "after pimsleur." That got me to Assimil. I concur almost entirely with your assessment of Assimil. I did a second active wave, however, and I felt that active wave pulled everything together and really advanced me very far. I got about 3-4 times as much out of the second active wave as I did out of the initial passive and active waves. After doing the course (passive and active) I was definitely not at B1, but after doing the second active wave I felt it definitely brought me to B1.
You are keeping me motivated... I am slowly catching up to you on FSI :) 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| dbag Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5012 days ago 605 posts - 1046 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 70 of 271 29 August 2011 at 10:45pm | IP Logged |
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Thanks James. I will definetly be doing another active wave of Assimil at some point, but at the minute, Im just reading a few lessons a day, as an aside to working with platiquemos.
In the last cou[ple of weeks I have revised units 5 - 15, and Ive not really had any problems with any of the units. I had a couple of days where I did some long drives for work, and did 2 or 3 units in a day. This is an awesome experience which has Spanish buzzing around in your mind for ages afterwards. I will probably do this quite a lot once Im formally finished with the course. I still havent caught up with all of the Conversation stimulus exercises yet, and Im not sure why I have such an aversion to them. I am currently on unit 17, which focuses on the preterite. I just need to get the replacement and variation drills down well, and I will be ready to move on to level 3. I have decided that I am going to try and race through the next 2 levels without stopping to look back. This is the point at which Spanish should start to feel like a coherent whole, and the last unit in level 4 revises everything in the previous levels. In fact, Spanish is starting to come together for me as a result of doing some work with Margaritas Magic key. Today, I have been writing out all the conjugations for a long list of verbs, arranging them in to present, preterite, future, present perfect and present progresive forms. This is taking ages, and Im far from done with this exercise, but its amazing how helpful this exercises has been. Good old fashioned repitition always seems to win in the end. I wish more courses would explain things properly. Thesse are really simple concepts which most courses deal with in a very obscure way. Oh how I wish Id had this book in the begining! Take it from me, if your just beginning Spanish, do yourself a favour and get hold of a copy. I have also contacted several tutors over the weekend, and theres a chance that Il be meeting with one on Saturday. This will be solely to work on pronounciation, which is something I have concerns over. I'll try and update again on Sunday, and maybe set some September goals. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| dbag Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5012 days ago 605 posts - 1046 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 72 of 271 12 September 2011 at 11:52pm | IP Logged |
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Thanks for the comments buttons! I will take a look at that site.
So, I havent updated for a few days, and to be honest I have slowed down a little. I even had 2 or 3 days in which I only studied for maybe half an hour. I raced through unit 18, which deals with the imperfect tense, but got a little intimidated by Unit 19, which bombards you with mixed tense drills. I think I have this unit just about down now. The problem for me is that I now do quite a lot of work from home, so I dont have that hour of study in the car everyday like I used to. I will find ways around this as I get used to my new rutine. I met with a tutour in the end, which was fantastic. I recieved some very positive feedback. He was impresed with how much I knew from self study alone, and said he is unused to teaching people with the background I have in Spanish. We had a small conversation,which went okay. The only stumbling block was that he asked me not to use the usted form. According to him, it is very rarely used in Spain nowadays. This is something of a problem, because as we all know most courses focuss massively on this form, and many seem to treat Tu as almost a sidenote. I enjoyed my lesson a lot and will be meeting with him regularly. Im far too busy this week, but I will try and squeeze in a two hour lesson most weeks. I really need to sort out a microphone and camera so I can start doing regular language exchanges. I wish I had done this before now. If I decide to learn another language one day I think I would do this within something like the first 6 weeks. In other news, I have been re-listening to some MT CDs while going to sleep. They make a lot more sense to me now, and I think I will run through the whole set. *(Apologies for spelling mistakes. I am tired and dont have speel check!) 1 person has voted this message useful |
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