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2010 a Language Odyssey (Team H) - CLOSED | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| ellasevia Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2011 Senior Member Germany Joined 6146 days ago 2150 posts - 3229 votes  Speaks: English*, German, Croatian, Greek, French, Spanish, Russian, Swedish, Portuguese, Turkish, Italian Studies: Catalan, Persian, Mandarin, Japanese, Romanian, Ukrainian | Message 73 of 85 10 November 2010 at 11:43pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Sprachprofi, I know that this log is closed, but I just wanted to ask you a number of questions about this year's method of focusing on two languages per season and just maintaining the others in the meantime.
1. Do you think it was effective, or would it have been better, do you think, to have just focused (or perhaps "focused") on all of them simultaneously? 2. What were some of the advantages and disadvantages of this system that you found? 3. Did you find that it restricted any wanderlust that you might have, or did it provoke it further? 4. Could you briefly describe what sort of activities you do to maintain the languages that are not your current focus languages? 5. Do you plan to use this system again in 2011 and future years? 6. Whatever the answer is to number five, what are your linguistic plans (as of now) for 2011? What languages do you plan to study? Thank you very much. I'm considering trying this method out for myself in 2011. :) 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Sprachprofi Nonaglot Senior Member Germany learnlangs.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6474 days ago 2608 posts - 4866 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Esperanto, Greek, Mandarin, Latin, Dutch, Italian Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swahili, Indonesian, Japanese, Modern Hebrew, Portuguese | Message 74 of 85 11 November 2010 at 2:34pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Sure, questions are welcome. The log is only "closed" in the sense that I'm not posting
updates here as I used to. Yes, I'd say the focus helped me a lot. I had less clutter around me, I saved time debating what to do, and I also observed some synergy effects because I did more hours per language at any point of the year. I felt better about not studying certain languages yet because I knew I'd get to them later that year. It was relieving not to have to squeeze in every language every week and it allowed me to work more and guilt- free with the materials I really enjoyed. On the down side, I fell in love with some of my materials and kept wanting to squeeze them in after the 3 months, e. g. some days in July I still hit 4 hours / day of Chinese even though I was supposed to focus on Italian and Arabic. I did way too little Italian this year; just didn't have the motivation at the time when I was supposed to study it and I wound up neglecting it first in favor of Arabic (as planned for that 3-month period) and then Chinese (not planned, but necessary to reach the TAC goals). For Arabic I studied very intensively in the first of the three months, I studied averagely in the second, and had shifted to focus Chinese in the last month because I hit a brick wall (too many conjugations and too many due Anki cards) and needed time to absorb. So I wouldn't recommend dropping one of the two languages and focusing on just one - eventually it gets too much. In short, the schedules are not set in stone, and you may want to extend a little from the 3 months or shorten them a little, particularly if you are having too much fun, feel overwhelmed or are in danger of not hitting your TAC goals. I would suggest a freer "study any language when you feel like it but only two at a time" system, but then I wouldn't be guaranteed to study all my target languages and that plan really helps my motivation and helps me not to flitter around so much between languages. So I prefer to plan out the year in three-month segments and then be a little flexible on the start/end dates or the amount of hours I do "maintenance" on languages that still fascinate me. Don't misunderstand me. While the third quarter came out strange, I actually stuck right to the scheduled start/end times for the other quarters. The dates can be relieving, too - it was easier to motivate myself to do more for French (my only target language that I do for school rather than pleasure) knowing that I was scheduled to drop the focus in summer. In terms of wanderlust, I've been really good this year. The only thing unplanned was a brief experiment with Russian L-R (a few days), because I thought it would be fun to test L-R on a language I didn't know at all. I didn't enjoy it that much though and especially found it difficult to dedicate enough hours to it, so I'll restart that experiment when I have no other project. For maintenance I did some reading or kept up on my Anki decks, chatted in the language, re-read lessons I had done, took the occasional private class through Skype and things like that. I had planned to spend 2 hours per maintenance language per week for that. However, for example in the first quarter I had to accept more freelance projects than foreseen so I wound up only spending a little over one hour per week on average on Greek and 1 1/2 hours per week on Swahili during that time; it was still enough not to lose any progress though. In 2011 I will definitely use this system again, even knowing that my studies won't reflect the original plans 100% - it's close enough, and very motivating. So far, I'm thinking: January-March: Dutch, Swahili (a few friends of mine are doing an intensive Dutch session in January and if I'm lucky I'll travel to Africa before March) April-June: Arabic, Chinese July-September: Spanish, Italian (have to see about that, I think the similarity requires me to work on both at the same time even though I'd prefer more variety) Oktober-December: Russian, Modern Greek Now a question of my own: how did you plan your trip to Africa? Did you go with an organization? If so, which? I'm looking into possibilities of spending time in a Swahili-speaking area myself next year. Any tips? 5 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| ellasevia Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2011 Senior Member Germany Joined 6146 days ago 2150 posts - 3229 votes Speaks: English*, German, Croatian, Greek, French, Spanish, Russian, Swedish, Portuguese, Turkish, Italian Studies: Catalan, Persian, Mandarin, Japanese, Romanian, Ukrainian | Message 75 of 85 11 November 2010 at 6:04pm | IP Logged | |||||
Thanks so much Sprachprofi! I'm definitely going to consider this approach for the coming year.
That sounds great. No doubt your Dutch study will progress at lightning speed because of your proficiency in German and English already. I studied the language briefly this summer and thanks to this and its similarity to German (and Swedish too I suppose) I can read it fairly comfortably. Are you aiming for basic fluency in it in these three months? The Spanish and Italian does sound like it could cause some confusion. Maybe if you have Chinese and Italian switch places? (Congratulations, by the way, on finishing your first book in Greek!)
Actually my parents did most of the planning for the trip and my brother and I just came along. We went with Overseas Adventure Travel though, which was very good. We did the two-week-long tented safari trip, which was in Tanzania and took us to most of the important tourist spots but we also got to meet up with local people in markets, schools, and in a Maasai village. I think they also have trip extensions whereby you can also visit Rwanda to see the mountain gorillas, Mount Kilimanjaro, and/or Zanzibar. They booked the trip in late January, I think, and we were filled up the last four spots on the trip, so they fill up very quickly (the trip itself was the first two weeks of July). Once you're there, make sure to take every opportunity to try out your Swahili even if it's just a simple "asante" or "hujambo." The people there are very proud of the language's role in promoting the country's developing status within Africa, so they are delighted to see Wazungu who are trying to learn it. The guides on our trip were very enthusiastic about my Swahili and would speak to me in it and teach me words, and tell people at places we visited that "yeye anasema Kiswahili vizuri sana" even though it wasn't quite true. As a result of this I was able to have conversations with people my parents and others on the group couldn't because they didn't speak English--I spoke with women from a Maasai village, with a Maasai warrior who took us on a nature walk, with schoolchildren at a primary school we visited... The people are incredibly friendly and they'll warm up even more if you try out even a little bit of your Swahili. If you want to have some more practice in Swahili before you go to Africa we do have a Swahili thread in the Multilingual Lounge if you'd like to participate in that. :) I hope this has helped. If you have any more questions, just ask. :) Edited by ellasevia on 11 November 2010 at 7:42pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Sprachprofi Nonaglot Senior Member Germany learnlangs.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6474 days ago 2608 posts - 4866 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Esperanto, Greek, Mandarin, Latin, Dutch, Italian Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swahili, Indonesian, Japanese, Modern Hebrew, Portuguese | Message 76 of 85 12 November 2010 at 7:09pm | IP Logged | |||||
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For me, the biggest advantage of the 2-languages-per-3-months schedule was really that
it allowed me to wantonly spend a lot of time on one language some week without feeling guilty about neglecting all the others. The others are scheduled for later in the year, hence I can stop worrying about them. Thank you for your help. I'm actually looking into homestays now, maybe coupled with some volunteer teaching. That should give my Swahili conversational ability a real boost. True to my experiment idea, I'm only using Assimil Swahili for my studying and I still avoid other texts or materials at this point (except for a dictionary to clarify meanings of words I find in Assimil). I wasn't going anywhere using the method that is sometimes recommended in other Assimil books, so I did add Anki to the mix. I studied vocabulary passively using Anki to great effect and now I'm creating a deck for the active wave containing each sentence with audio and an English translation. The French occasionally slowed me down. Creating an audio deck is also slow, but it feels really helpful to my studies. Already I find that I can express myself well and I've only studied sentences up to lesson 24 of Assimil's active wave; I still need too much time to come up with phrases though. That's something a stay in the country should easily fix. The idea of studying Spanish and Italian together was that so far, every time I started on Spanish I lost some Italian, and every time I re-started on Italian I lost what little knowledge I had of Spanish. So I have to do something to remind me of the subtle differences between these languages. I've now found an Assimil in Italian for learning Spanish though; maybe using that as a primary resource I can narrow my studies down to just Spanish. Then I'd have time for Indonesian, which has also been calling out to me ever since I bought a great textbook... Hmmm... What are your plans for the year? Edited by Sprachprofi on 12 November 2010 at 7:11pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| ellasevia Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2011 Senior Member Germany Joined 6146 days ago 2150 posts - 3229 votes Speaks: English*, German, Croatian, Greek, French, Spanish, Russian, Swedish, Portuguese, Turkish, Italian Studies: Catalan, Persian, Mandarin, Japanese, Romanian, Ukrainian | Message 77 of 85 13 November 2010 at 3:18am | IP Logged | |||||
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I agree with that idea. When I obsess over a certain language exclusively for a few days, I definitely make noticeably more progress, and can only imagine that it would be even greater when I'm concentrating on just two over a three-month period. My only worry is that I won't be able to focus on just the two at a time. Well, I suppose we'll see.
That's great that you want to spend even more time there, you'll love it. I definitely want to go back there soon. Are you thinking of going to Tanzania or Kenya? English is widespread in both, but I think Swahili plays a larger role in Tanzania than in Kenya. How do you like Assimil's Swahili? I remember you writing a quick comment about it in my old log when I was starting Swahili earlier this year, but I don't quite remember. I think I'm going to start going through that fairly soon. I see what you mean with Spanish and Italian. For me it was hard to forget the Spanish because I've had it since I was so little, but I can see where there might be a problem for someone who is learning them both as a second language. The Italian-language Assimil for Spanish sounds like a good idea to me, especially since it will also be able to connect and explain the language better than the English or German versions could. What do you think about the different versions of Assimil? From what I've seen the French-language editions seem better, but I've only truly used two so far (Romanian via French, and Japanese via English). I'm still trying to decide for next year. I think I'm going to give this method of yours a try because it sounds like a very good idea. I mentioned in January in this log that I would be watching with curiosity how this year goes for you, and since it seems to have gone well, I think the idea is worth testing. As for my languages, I'm thinking of keeping the ones that my profile to the left shows that I'm currently studying, along with German and Greek. I also intend to do some review and study this spring for French, because I'm planning to take the French AP exam in May, even though I'm not in the class at school this year. Likewise, I'm thinking about doing some more review and study with Italian and Dutch (and potentially Portuguese or Esperanto). Finally, I've told myself for a long time that I would allow myself to start some new stuff this next year, but I'm pretty certain that I'll be completely occupied with these other ones. However, if I am able to think up some sort of solution that can accommodate all of these, I'd like to start on one or two of Finnish, Arabic, Georgian, or another Slavic language (probably Czech or Slovenian). As of now, I'm thinking this: January-March: Swedish, Persian April-June: German, Romanian July-September: Japanese, Russian October-December: Greek, Swahili Perhaps if I instead alter the schedule to include three languages per period, it would work better: January-March: Swedish, Persian, French April-June: German, Romanian, Italian July-September: Japanese, Russian, Dutch October-December: Greek, Swahili, [other] Or then again, maybe not. ;) I guess I still have a month and a half to get it all sorted out. What do you think? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Sprachprofi Nonaglot Senior Member Germany learnlangs.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6474 days ago 2608 posts - 4866 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Esperanto, Greek, Mandarin, Latin, Dutch, Italian Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swahili, Indonesian, Japanese, Modern Hebrew, Portuguese | Message 78 of 85 13 November 2010 at 11:01am | IP Logged | |||||
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I would say that two focus languages is probably best, but you could try a third
language during school holidays, especially if you're using an Assimil program for it, at a maximum of 30 minutes / day. That way it won't interfere much with your other languages and you still get to try something new and exciting. From this point of view and given the four languages you indicated, Finnish or a Slavic language would be best because there is no Assimil for Georgian and the one for Arabic sucks. Also, I found that Arabic is a big time-leech in general. If you want to do Russian before another Slavic language (very reasonable idea), that narrows it down to Finnish, or changing your schedule around or turning one of your other beginner language into an Assimil project. Am I helping? ;-) I don't think that you need to focus on French or Portuguese; at Advanced Fluency it should be enough to read the occasional book, watch the occasional movie or talk to people in order to stay ahead, which you can do in the Maintenance hours; you don't need to set aside intensive study time. Your proposed schedule looks good; it's a nice mix of beginner and advanced languages. This way, you should be able to always find something interesting to do. I'm not sure yet between Kenya and Tanzania. I'd prefer Tanzania, but there are more projects for Kenya, probably because primary education is in Swahili in Tanzania. I like Assimil Swahili a lot; it contains loads of useful vocabulary and phrases, the dialogs are realistic and sometimes funny and the recordings are clear. On several occasions, the explanations in the lesson notes were not enough for me though and I was despairing at ever understanding the complexities of this language until I forced myself to plow ahead and look at the 7-unit summary. In those summaries, the explanations are very good. The lessons introduce 15 new words on average, which is a lot when you don't have cognates to associate them with, hence my need for Anki. Since you already have a basis in Swahili grammar and vocabulary though, I believe that these two aspects won't be an issue for you. If you want, I can send you my Assimil Anki decks (work in progress). I believe that the French versions are generally a bit better because Assimil usually uses the same dialogs for all versions of a book, and the dialogs are designed with French people in mind, to explain the things that they would find puzzling. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| ellasevia Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2011 Senior Member Germany Joined 6146 days ago 2150 posts - 3229 votes Speaks: English*, German, Croatian, Greek, French, Spanish, Russian, Swedish, Portuguese, Turkish, Italian Studies: Catalan, Persian, Mandarin, Japanese, Romanian, Ukrainian | Message 79 of 85 13 November 2010 at 8:16pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I think I've finally come up with a solution that will fit my needs and wishes.
January-March: Svenska, فارسى April-June: Deutsch, Română July-September: 日本語, Русский October-December: Ελληνικά, Kiswahili My goal will be to study each focus language for one hour per day and each non-focus language for 1.5 hours per week, not including daily Anki or kanji reviews. For my already-spoken-and-no-longer-studied languages (Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian), I will read, watch, or listen to at least one thing in the language each week (news article, book, TV program, radio, etc.). In addition, an extra hour of French study/review per week will be suggested (but not required), for the first quarter and first half of the second quarter, simply because I will have had very minimal contact with the language since this summer. If all of these minimum weekly goals are fulfilled, than I can choose to either continue with my focus or non-focus languages, or study a new language (Arabic, Finnish, Georgian, Turkish, Czech, Dutch, etc.) for pleasure. Lastly, I will allow myself to substitute in up to two of these new languages for Swedish and Romanian, should I wish to conclude my studies of those languages, but only after their focus period ends. Therefore, if I decide to discontinue my Swedish studies I may instead add in Finnish, for example, beginning in April and acting as a non-focus language for the rest of the year. In this case, Swedish and/or Romanian will be added to the list of weekly-contact languages, like Spanish, Portuguese, French, and Italian above. Does this sound reasonable? I might be hard to squeeze all that in every week, but I suppose they don't call it a total *annihilation* challenge for nothing. :) The Assimil Swahili sounds good then. I've finished the Living Language course for Swahili and am most of the way done with the Teach Yourself one, so I think I am at least familiar with most of the grammatical patterns and a lot of vocabulary, so Assimil sounds like it will be a good fit. I have heard several times previously that Arabic is a "time-leech" like you've mentioned. I know the language is immensely difficult, but what exactly are some of the very challenging aspects? Pronunciation of languages usually doesn't daunt me, but the fact that I've never particularly been able to get past the sounds of Arabic (although I adore its sound) has put me off the language in the past, so I'm interested in knowing what else I'm in store for should I begin Arabic... Thank you very much Sprachprofi! Edited by ellasevia on 13 November 2010 at 8:21pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Sprachprofi Nonaglot Senior Member Germany learnlangs.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6474 days ago 2608 posts - 4866 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Esperanto, Greek, Mandarin, Latin, Dutch, Italian Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swahili, Indonesian, Japanese, Modern Hebrew, Portuguese | Message 80 of 85 15 November 2010 at 11:33am | IP Logged | |||||
Yes, reasonable. ;-)
I think you will forget too much of what you study to make it a worthwhile use of time, but if it's just to motivate you to finish your goals then that's okay.
Sounds are definitely one of the issues, with 5-7 letters having extremely similar counterparts. I've had someone record a few at http://rhinospike.com/audio_requests/Sprachprofi/2191/, this was helpful for me. Also, the way nouns and verbs completely change their shape, the lack of vowels in writing and the dialects. You heard about these probably, but together they mean that you have to stick to textbooks for a long time until you can enjoy any native materials. You can't just go for reading fluency first and then work on the rest, because reading requires a lot of vocabulary and grammar and simply familiarity with the patterns language, because otherwise you can't fill in the vowels or understand anything. You also can't go for conversational fluency first, or at least not effectively, because that means studying a dialect rather than MSA, only one dialect and it won't help you on your quest to understand books, audiobooks or even TV news. So basically you're stuck with textbooks much longer than you would be with other languages and that means that maintenance-time (where you just relax using native materials) is far, far away. 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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