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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| 236factorial Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6532 days ago 192 posts - 213 votes  Speaks: Mandarin, English*, French Studies: Spanish | Message 65 of 94 05 September 2007 at 9:03pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Not too much time on my hands with school starting, so I'm pacing myself through unit 24.
My Spanish class seems quite exciting this year: at least 15 vocab words a week (with quiz), a book report in Spanish on a novel in English written by a Latin American author due every quarter, plenty of homework and readings, a poem to memorize and recite every 2 weeks, and regular classroom discussions (in Spanish). I have plenty of vocab work to do... hopefully by the end of this school year I can learn 800 new words. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| patuco Diglot Moderator Gibraltar Joined 7007 days ago 3795 posts - 4268 votes Speaks: Spanish, English* Personal Language Map | Message 66 of 94 06 September 2007 at 6:59am | IP Logged | |||||
I wish all my pupils were this enthusiastic at the thought of all the work they'll have to do! 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| 236factorial Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6532 days ago 192 posts - 213 votes Speaks: Mandarin, English*, French Studies: Spanish | Message 67 of 94 06 September 2007 at 9:51pm | IP Logged | |||||
Ah, are you a Spanish teacher? Our class recieved our first poem, and we have a week to memorize it. Of course, me, being myself, memorized it today, because it was only 8 lines. In the FSI world, I finished unit 24 and starting unit 25. I hope my Spanish is good enough for the classroom discussions. Judging from the other students' Spanish, I know I'm not the worst! 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| patuco Diglot Moderator Gibraltar Joined 7007 days ago 3795 posts - 4268 votes Speaks: Spanish, English* Personal Language Map | Message 68 of 94 07 September 2007 at 7:40am | IP Logged | |||||
No. I am a teacher but of maths and physics. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| 236factorial Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6532 days ago 192 posts - 213 votes Speaks: Mandarin, English*, French Studies: Spanish | Message 69 of 94 07 September 2007 at 9:56pm | IP Logged | |||||
Oops, sorry for the unjustified assumption. Today I finished unit 25. Can you imagine? In one day. Yesterday I only did half the dialogue, so I guess it can be counted as one day, right? This was partially possible because the lesson was so short; only one grammar point. But the authors of this course would never let the students have any break, so the unit, as I guessed, was probably difficult. And it was a good guess. This unit introduced the construction like "se me olvidó una taza" ("I forgot a cup"). Most Spanish students probably have experienced this difficulty. Actually, since the programmatic course had a long discussion on this also, I was quite a bit better off. The problem is that one has to conjugate such verbs for the object as one would see it in English, and the subject is transformed into an indirect object pronoun. This seems to be sounding like "gustar", "faltar", and verbs of the like, but olvidar, romper, etc. require an extra "se". My brain is having a hard time believing that "forgetting a cup" can turn into "a cup forgetting ifself on me". After so many exposures to this concept and having excessive practice, I can do this quite spontaneously, which is a good sign. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| 236factorial Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6532 days ago 192 posts - 213 votes Speaks: Mandarin, English*, French Studies: Spanish | Message 70 of 94 09 September 2007 at 9:18pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Unit 26 was another short unit, and I finished it not so long ago. I wouldn't think that it was really hard, but my Spanish was not working today and I was erroring everywhere.
The passive "se" construction wasn't hard, and a couple of mess-ups here and there made me a little nervous. And then the replacement and variation drills... uh there was where I fell apart. I could do only one of the drills well on the first pass, which was a first. After a few tries, there were still some problems, and I became increasingly frustrated. This was worsened by the fact that I couldn't pronounce certain words correctly, for some reason (such as 'arreglarlo'). Finally, the typos drove me crazy (they usually are things to laugh at). Pretty soon, I was done with the unit, and was not pleased. Perhaps I should say that I'm "done" with the unit (with quote marks); my mastery of the drills is a little shaky, as you've read in this entry. Edited by 236factorial on 09 September 2007 at 9:19pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| 236factorial Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6532 days ago 192 posts - 213 votes Speaks: Mandarin, English*, French Studies: Spanish | Message 71 of 94 13 September 2007 at 9:09pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Today I realized that I realized that the people in my class, including myself, have nearly no proficiency in Spanish. I was probably the best, and if you ever hear my Spanish, you will doubt that I've learned it for more than 1 year. Now think about the other students, who can't conjugate verbs at all and can never figure out the gender. According my teacher, students are to be able to participate in Spanish-only discussions. Using all infinitives, it can be a little difficult to convey meaning.
In class, we read a segement of a short story by some author I forgot. The story was quite engaging; about confusing reality and dreams. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| 236factorial Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6532 days ago 192 posts - 213 votes Speaks: Mandarin, English*, French Studies: Spanish | Message 72 of 94 16 September 2007 at 9:21pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I don't get the intentions of the authors. They have only two types of units: super short units and deadly long units.
And unit 27 is a ridiculously long unit. Besides, it is filled with commands. You learn all the command forms in one unit. I wonder if students that finish the unit in a single day would go home and start commanding everyone in the house to do random things (in Spanish of course). Even though I'm not completely finished with the unit, I already have the desire to do such things. It appears that the grammar of the whole course is presented in huge chunks; if it's not learning all the preterit forms in one unit, it is learning all the commands. Will all the uses of the subjunctive be crammed into one unit? I hope not because it would have 2000+ sentences, and will be nicknamed "the never-ending unit". 1 person has voted this message useful |
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