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日本語 and me the next round TAC 2012 Team い | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Brun Ugle Diglot Senior Member Norway brunugle.wordpress.c Joined 6612 days ago 1292 posts - 1766 votes  Speaks: English*, NorwegianC1 Studies: Japanese, Esperanto, Spanish, Finnish | Message 73 of 333 16 April 2012 at 7:55am | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
I do that! Right now it's mostly English and Norwegian. Especially if I'm using both at the same time. For example, if I'm concentrating on reading something in English and suddenly have to answer someone in Norwegian. But when I have two languages that are both fairly weak, it's like my brain latches on to any "foreign" word with the right meaning. As long as it's foreign, it doesn't seem to care what language it is.
One of the best feelings in the world!
I've done the same thing many times. Until I finally learned Norwegian, I never thought I could really learn a language. Those who succeeded at it seemed to have some kind of magical power. Part of the problem was not really knowing how to learn a language. The other part was not knowing what it means to "know" a language. It really doesn't mean that you are perfect. And it doesn't mean you are perfectly comfortable speaking it.
Me neither!
Same here! Edited by Brun Ugle on 16 April 2012 at 7:56am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Woodsei Bilingual Diglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Woodsei Joined 4789 days ago 614 posts - 782 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Egyptian)* Studies: Russian, Japanese, Hungarian | Message 74 of 333 19 April 2012 at 6:36am | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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I won't let that happen with Japanese either! (giving up) I think that because I love
Japanese so much, that I won't let that happen. So, I believe it's love, which I can clearly see from your post :) Falling in love with a language is an amazing feeling, and the best. The Super Challenge is so hard to resist, and it's so tempting with all the books and movies :) I can't wait, and I've been trying to sneak at my books reserved for the challenge. It's an extra plate, not just a bite, but I don't mind. It'll make me fatter only with Japanese, not calories!) :))) Looking forward to your progress on your blog. I might bow under the pressure and set one up, too. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| g-bod Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5974 days ago 1485 posts - 2002 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, German | Message 75 of 333 20 April 2012 at 5:31pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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Oh dear me so now I'm in France and now I want French all over again. I am 80 euros lighter but I think my personal French library has now doubled in size (it was small to begin with...)
My French is somehow at roughly the same level it was when I last came to France some five years ago which is a surprise. My speaking skills are very limited (but they never were great) but bizarrely my comprehension seems to have improved! The only explanation I have for this is that having learned to listen for the gist in Japanese I am now much more relaxed about doing it in French too. I'm also no longer shy about trying to use French (even though I can't say much right now) which is a complete reversal of how I used to be. Again, I think the confidence I've picked up from practicing Japanese has somehow rubbed off. I also realised that as my French seems to be not that far behind my Japanese in terms of ability, I have a pretty good idea about what kinds of activities I need to do to improve it. The only issue is time...i don't think I could do two concurrent super challenges! To make decent progress I'd have to promise myself an hour a day for French and I'm not sure I can do that consistently while keeping up with Japanese and not ending up divorced! But right now I really want them both... 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| kraemder Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5176 days ago 1497 posts - 1648 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Spanish, Japanese | Message 76 of 333 20 April 2012 at 5:48pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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lol I know what you mean about wanting to study two languages at once but knowing it'll mean less progress in one. It's frustrating. I'll say this about French - it's loads easier to reach an advanced stage in terms of passive understanding - IE reading/listening. Heck you could probably devote 80% of your time to Japanese and just 20% to French and see progress in both since French should be a lot easier to learn.
I think the hard part about French is being able to imitate their accent well enough that they don't look down on you - which to me is more trouble than it's worth. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| g-bod Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5974 days ago 1485 posts - 2002 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, German | Message 77 of 333 22 April 2012 at 9:09pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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To stick up for the French a little bit, I don't think I have been patronised any more by French people than I have by Japanese people, and my active skills in French are now very rough indeed!
And you're right, it is frustrating. I think that given the fact that the time I can devote to languages is ultimately limited, the correct answer would be to get my Japanese up to a level where I could pass JLPT N2 and feel that I could assess myself to be around a B2 in terms of active skills, then maintain that while bringing my French up to the same level. And in the short term, I've already entered myself for the JLPT N3 so I need to make sure I stay on form to give myself the best chance at passing that... But B2 in Japanese still seems so far away and I think I could make French more immediately useful for myself, if I really wanted to... I did have quite a funny linguistic experience on the Paris Metro. I was trying to listen to the station announcement and work out what it was saying (well, it's all good practice) but it felt like my brain was just trying to turn the sounds I could hear into Japanese words instead of French ones. I started to wonder what on earth was going on inside my head, when suddenly I realised the announcement actually *was* in Japanese! Oh dear.. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Woodsei Bilingual Diglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Woodsei Joined 4789 days ago 614 posts - 782 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Egyptian)* Studies: Russian, Japanese, Hungarian | Message 78 of 333 24 April 2012 at 4:57am | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
That was INCREDIBLY funny, lol :DDD Happened to me once before, too. I know what you mean about wanting to go for an additional language in the Super Challenge. I'm in the same tizzy myself with Russian, and also suddenly, French or German. But love Japanese so much that I don't want to ruin the purpose of the challenge, which is to focus intensively on a language in order to master it in a shorter time, rather than stretching it. And Japanese reading will be one heck of a challenge. Then again like kraemder mentioned, French is comparably easier than Japanese, at least in terms of cognates, and in a shorter time you'd probably get somewhere. I'm really tempted to sign in another language for Super, but then I don't know what I'll be getting myself into. I think I'll hold out these first couple of months and by July I may know if it's worth it adding another language :) By the way, you could do half a challenge in French, not necessarily the full one. Take a look at the Super registration thread, there are people who signed on with more than two languages, and elected to go half with all, or 1 and a half, or a combination thereof.... がんばってね！ 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| g-bod Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5974 days ago 1485 posts - 2002 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, German | Message 79 of 333 24 April 2012 at 9:17am | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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Actually I don't really feel that inclined to put myself forward for a French Super Challenge. I don't think I'd need to read 100 whole books to get comfortable with it. Whereas with Japanese I don't think 100 will be enough!
I am contemplating making French a 6WC language though. Using the twitter bot to track time spent over that period should give me a clearer idea about whether I can afford enough time for both. But I really shouldn't distract myself too much from JLPT prep either... 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| g-bod Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5974 days ago 1485 posts - 2002 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, German | Message 80 of 333 28 April 2012 at 2:56pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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I have managed to transition myself right back into Japanese study mode now (apart from the occasional whistful glance at my French books - I shall not abandon them forever). I was listening to a Japanese podcast on the bus (one of the many random TBS podcasts I've downloaded over the years) and the cosy familiarity of Japanese compared to French was quite soothing!
I am trying to get myself into a bit of a rhythm for JLPT preparation. I am trying to set myself an hour a day to study specifically for the test, and splitting that hour into two half hour sessions to focus on different things. The aim is to spend my time a bit like this: Day 1: vocabulary drills; grammar study Day 2: listening drills; reading drills Day 3: grammar drills; grammar study Day 4: listening drills; reading drills Then repeat until test day... For the grammar study I am taking notes in a small notepad with a pencil making sure I understand the meaning of each grammar point and including a few example sentences, so I can take the notepad in my handbag and review at my leisure. I am also making notes on the computer for any new vocabulary or confusing issues or wrong answers I need to learn from when I do the drills. I'm printing them out to review from. I might try and get a nice folder to put them in to make it a bit more portable. Apart from that I am trying to listen as much as possible and take up any opportunities I can for speaking practice. I had to do some writing this week for an assignment for my class which made me realise quite how uncomfortable I am with writing anything in Japanese. 100 short essays should solve that problem... I am holding off on reading for now, simply because I know once 1st May comes I will have to be reading all the time anyway! Although I am experimenting again with doing some intensive reading of news articles and editorials. It's hard work but useful, and is something that can be done in relatively short bursts. I really ought to get stuck back in to formally studying kanji as well. Although my knowledge is fine for the N3 test, I still have to learn more stuff before I am ready to prepare for N2 (and ready to be comfortable reading anything other than children's books...) so the sooner I get into a routine with that the better. But I am struggling to motivate myself and find the time to do it. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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