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Amy’s Spanish Viaje | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Stelle Bilingual Triglot Senior Member Canada tobefluent.com Joined 4142 days ago 949 posts - 1686 votes  Speaks: French*, English*, Spanish Studies: Tagalog | Message 57 of 104 12 May 2014 at 10:40pm | IP Logged | ||
I'm glad you like it as much as I did! I liked both Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and The Witches by Roald Dahl. Neither book is as beautiful as Despereaux, but they're very accessible to beginning readers, and the stories are engaging enough. The Witches was the first book that I read in Spanish without first reading an English copy. I think that my reading order looked like this over the course of almost a year (since I started learning Spanish at the end of May last year): 1) Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - recommended! 2) Despereaux - you know how I feel! 3) Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator - meh. 4) The Witches - recommended! 5) The BFG - nooooooo! I didn't even finish it. 6) Harry Potter 1 - tricky! But after reading four children's novels and several articles, I was ready. 7) Harry Potter 2 - easier than HP 1, probably because I was used to the voice 8) Percy Jackson 1 - tricky again. It took me a few chapters to get into it, but I ended up really liking it 9) Despereaux a second time - no less lovestruck the second time around! 10) Percy Jackson 2 - currently about halfway through This year, I'd like to finish the Percy Jackson series and the Harry Potter series. I love kids' books, so I don't mind that - as of yet - I've only read children's literature. I do try to read articles as well so that I also read stuff actually written for grown-ups. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Crush Tetraglot Senior Member ChinaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5863 days ago 1622 posts - 2299 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Mandarin, Esperanto Studies: Basque | Message 58 of 104 13 May 2014 at 12:11am | IP Logged | ||
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If you're interested, you could check out Paulo Coelho's stuff. It's pretty accessible. I read El alquimista and Once minutos early on, i didn't really enjoy any of their other books as they started to get pretty weird and mistical and didn't really talk about anything i found interesting. I also read Momo by Michael Ende (author of the Neverending Story) in Spanish, and highly recommend it (whether in Spanish or any other language). But don't be afraid to work your way into non-translated literature, either :)
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| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5373 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 59 of 104 13 May 2014 at 2:18am | IP Logged | ||
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I really like the Theodore Boone/Kid Lawyer series by John Grisham. It is easier than Harry Potter. It is for kids, but much more realistic. It is about a 13 year old who has two lawyer parents... and he ends up mixed up in his own cases. Easy read and good. If you like Grisham and/or legal thrillers I highly recommend it.
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| AmyinBrooklyn Senior Member United States Joined 4049 days ago 87 posts - 122 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 60 of 104 17 May 2014 at 4:25am | IP Logged | ||
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OK, first of all, thank you guys so much for your cheerleading. I feel so lucky to have you all. And thank you Stelle for listing your books. I bought Charlie and Chocolate Factory. I read that book many times as child, but my boyfriend has never heard it. Now it has a couple of months of listening to me stumble through it and then we can watch the movie! (Note: I watched the Despereaux movie but was quite disappointed!) But thank you for the full list. I'm going to work my way through it! James29, that you for your book suggestion. I am excited to add it to the list. I follow your progress so closely and you are such an inspiration that it's always so nice to hear from you. Crush, thank you so much for your book suggestions! I love ideas for what to read in any language. EMK, thank you so much for your continued support. I will definitely check out some DVDs and see how I do.
I’m still plugging away at my studies. I’ve been making myself work through Assimil. I am determined to finish that book. I also discovered a new podcast “Spanish Obsessed”, which is great because I’m pretty much done with Notes in Spanish. Unfortunately my computer died last week, which meant that amongst other things, I completely lost all of my Anki flashcards (I didn’t have anything synced). But in a way, I’m excited to start fresh and today I started making some new cards after my podcasts. BUT the big news for the week is that I’ve started a language exchange with my boyfriend’s mother. We spend 30 minutes in Spanish and then 30 minutes in English. She is trying to get better with English so it’s great. I’m going to aim for three times a week with her - which would be pretty fantastic because that would be five days a week speaking Spanish (I'm still doing two days a week with an italki teacher). I was super nervous for our first session but it went really well and she actually said that my construction was very good! I’m not sure if she was serious, but I was so happy! Progress! ____________ Edited by AmyinBrooklyn on 17 May 2014 at 2:28pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| AmyinBrooklyn Senior Member United States Joined 4049 days ago 87 posts - 122 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 61 of 104 06 July 2014 at 4:30am | IP Logged | ||
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So, once I got back from Peru, I was working at a much slower pace. Only working about 10 hours a week on Spanish. But then folks here suggested I find a telenovela - and I did! I've been watching Que Pobres Tan Ricos (which is streaming on Hulu) and I'm hooked. Sometimes I watch as many as three episodes per day (all in the name of Spanish study, right?). I'm really having so much fun with that show.
But then I also realized that I'm rounding the corner of my first year of Spanish study and I decided to crank it up as I head toward that anniversary. I've been keeping track of the hours that I do study and I decided that I want to hit 600 hours before that first year, which means that I need to hit about 15 hours a week for the rest of the summer. I also started working with FSI. I tried it before -while I was doing Assimil and it was just too many audio courses at once, but since I'm giving Assimil break, I've decided to try FSI. For these early units, I've been listening to the course three times. I'm thinking that I might need to spend more time on the later courses, but we'll see. I've also been working again with Anki and I'm nearly finished with Duolingo. I don't think it was that helpful, but I just want to check it off the list. And of course, I'm also speaking with my italki teacher two or three times a week. And on the days that I don't speak with her, I try to read to my boyfriend so that I do get pronunciation practice every day. I think that I must have needed that little break this spring (10 hours per week vs 14/15) because I am really ready to ramp things up! _ 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Warp3 Senior Member United States forum_posts.asp?TID= Joined 5533 days ago 1419 posts - 1766 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Korean, Japanese | Message 62 of 104 06 July 2014 at 4:09pm | IP Logged | ||
Hmm...I've been seeing ads for that show on Univision, so I may have to give it a try. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Stelle Bilingual Triglot Senior Member Canada tobefluent.com Joined 4142 days ago 949 posts - 1686 votes Speaks: French*, English*, Spanish Studies: Tagalog | Message 63 of 104 06 July 2014 at 9:52pm | IP Logged | ||
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Great update! Glad to keep following your progress.
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| AmyinBrooklyn Senior Member United States Joined 4049 days ago 87 posts - 122 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 64 of 104 07 July 2014 at 5:43am | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks, Stelle!
Warp3, give it a go. I don't have much telenovela experience but I love the humor in this one. I feel like it's pretty fantastic - I also like the fact that it airs in other Latin American countries currently since it's a pretty recent show so my teacher in Peru was familiar with it. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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