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Nancy’s Language Learning

  Tags: Arabic | Spanish
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nancydowns
Senior Member
United States
Joined 3927 days ago

184 posts - 288 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written)

 
 Message 89 of 196
05 April 2014 at 2:14pm | IP Logged 
Tengo una pregunta. ¿Cuándo se debe decir 'creo que', 'me parece', y 'pienso'?   

Desafortunadamente, no tengo suficiente tiempo ahora para pensar de leer libros. Sólo estoy estudiando un poco cada día este semana. Espero
que pueda estudiar más la próxima semana.

Bolio, los libros que tengo son 'Charlie y la Fabrica de Chocolate', 'la telaraña de Carlota', 'Las aventuras de Alicia en el país de las
maravillas', y 'Despereaux'.

Creo que aprendiendo las lenguas es un buen pretexto a leer los libros para niños. :-)

Un día voy a leer libros escritos en español, especialmente 'Don Quixote.' He leido cuentos de Julio Cortazar tradujo al Inglés, y me gusta
los mucho.*** edited to say, should this be y los me gusta mucho.

Tú y yo nos somos en el mismo nivel. Tú vas a viajar a Mexíco pronto, y vas a aprendiendo mucho más que yo en el mismo tiempo. Pero cómo
Crush, James29, y otras personas, continuamos y aprendemos.

Edited by nancydowns on 05 April 2014 at 3:46pm

1 person has voted this message useful



Bakunin
Diglot
Senior Member
Switzerland
outerkhmer.blogspot.
Joined 5135 days ago

531 posts - 1126 votes 
Speaks: German*, Thai
Studies: Khmer

 
 Message 90 of 196
05 April 2014 at 7:03pm | IP Logged 
nancydowns wrote:
I would love to meet some Arab people, however for now, I am worried about talking to any Arabic people because I don't want to learn a dialect. I am trying to just stick with the Standard Arabic and learn the proper form and then go with a dialect after I get things under my belt... is that the best way? Who knows, but it's the way I am studying right now.


Oh, wow, I haven’t thought about that issue. I understand that you don’t want to limit your options by choosing one of the many dialects at such an early stage. But wouldn’t any educated Arab be able to speak Standard Arabic in addition to his native dialect?

nancydowns wrote:
I think the Wimmelbuch books are probably specifically German, but there may be other countries with similar books. I have seen books similar here, but I can't remember the names. However, I think a decent substitute (although not nearly as rich in pictures) are the Richard Scarry books. There are words in those, though. But the books that are about 'busy town' have all kinds of things going on in them with just a few little sentences per page. There's also "Where's Waldo," but I am not sure you can find the practical things like different seasons and things that those German books have.


Thanks for following up on this! Now I also know that the plural of Wimmelbuch in English is Wimmelbuch books and not Wimmelbücher :)) “Where’s Waldo” is clearly not suitable, but the Richard Scarry books might be a compromise. The cool thing about a proper Wimmelbuch is that it contains the same characters over and over again in different environments. It suits itself to story-telling and cross-referencing. I see that amazon.com for instance offers the excellent German-produced but free of words “Ein Jahr in Wimmelhausen” (a year in Wimmel-land) for only a few bucks here. Just in case :)
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Crush
Tetraglot
Senior Member
ChinaRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5870 days ago

1622 posts - 2299 votes 
Speaks: English*, Spanish, Mandarin, Esperanto
Studies: Basque

 
 Message 91 of 196
05 April 2014 at 9:49pm | IP Logged 
"Pienso que" and "creo que" are pretty similar in meaning and for all practical purposes i'd say they can be used interchangeably. In most situations where in English we say "I think that" you'll tend to hear "creo que" in Spanish. "Me parece" can be used in pretty much the same way, just like English's "it seems to me (that)".

También hay que tener en cuenta que en castellano "gustar" no es un verbo transitivo como en inglés. La cosa que te gusta es el sujeto del verbo así que el verbo concuerda con lo que te gusta:
-El libro me gusta
-Los libros me gustan
-Tú me gustas, aunque sé que no te gusto (yo a ti no te gusto, literalmente "I don't please you")
-Les gustamos mucho a los niños (The children like us a lot)

Otra cosita, en castellano decimos pensar EN algo. "Pensar de" es más para dar una opinión:
-¿Qué pensaste de mí cuando me viste por primera vez?
-Dime qué piensas de este color, ¿me da bien?
Pensar en:
-Estoy pensando en ti.
-¿En qué piensas? Estoy pensando en esa vez que robamos el banco.
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nancydowns
Senior Member
United States
Joined 3927 days ago

184 posts - 288 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written)

 
 Message 92 of 196
05 April 2014 at 11:27pm | IP Logged 
Bakunin wrote:

Oh, wow, I haven’t thought about that issue. I understand that you don’t want to limit your options by choosing one of the many dialects at such an early
stage. But wouldn’t any educated Arab be able to speak Standard Arabic in addition to his native dialect?


I suppose that is probably true, however from what I have seen just on this website with people learning Arabic, they want you to take shortcuts, and I am
sure a native would want you to drop endings that aren't used in every day speech. I'm not sure... However, at this point, I don't know any Arabs, so I'll
have to wait until I do, anyway... although I suppose it would somehow be possible to do it remotely if your teacher had the book. Might be kind of neat to
have them do videos that you could re-watch, anyway, right? It is an extremely interesting idea that you have, and it intrigues me very much! :-)

Bakunin wrote:
Now I also know that the plural of Wimmelbuch in English is Wimmelbuch books and not Wimmelbücher :))


Ha, ha, ha, ha!!! :-) I laughed out loud about that one! Sorry, I'm clueless about German, so I totally did my Germanglish variation there! :-) Actually,
I looked up Wimmelbuch, and it means "teeming book", which is a very, very good word because it is just "teeming" with pictures! And while Richard Scarry
books might be a substitute in an emergency, the Wimmelbücher (hee, hee) have real people. Richard Scarry is fun, but it's usually a tiger driving the bus,
or something silly like that. So I am definitely going to get some of those books!!! I haven't seen anything else as good as those. So again, thank you
for an excellent idea! I think you should get the gold star for innovation in language learning! If I meet an educated Arab, I will definitely listen to
them talk while pointing at the pictures! BTW, I am an introvert, so it wouldn't be hard for me to listen to someone else talk for two hours. :-)

Edited by nancydowns on 05 April 2014 at 11:29pm

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nancydowns
Senior Member
United States
Joined 3927 days ago

184 posts - 288 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written)

 
 Message 93 of 196
05 April 2014 at 11:47pm | IP Logged 
Muchas Gracias, Crush!!! Me ha ayudado en muchas cosas. Espero que pueda me acuerdo.
1 person has voted this message useful



Bakunin
Diglot
Senior Member
Switzerland
outerkhmer.blogspot.
Joined 5135 days ago

531 posts - 1126 votes 
Speaks: German*, Thai
Studies: Khmer

 
 Message 94 of 196
06 April 2014 at 6:59pm | IP Logged 
nancydowns wrote:
So I am definitely going to get some of those books!!! I haven't seen anything else as good as those. So again, thank you for an excellent idea! I think you should get the gold star for innovation in language learning! If I meet an educated Arab, I will definitely listen to them talk while pointing at the pictures! BTW, I am an introvert, so it wouldn't be hard for me to listen to someone else talk for two hours. :-)


Yeah, it would be really cool to see someone else try this. Who knows what variations and new ideas another person could generate :) But I now realize more clearly that it works for me for a good part because of my learning preferences, and that mileage may indeed vary.
2 persons have voted this message useful



nancydowns
Senior Member
United States
Joined 3927 days ago

184 posts - 288 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written)

 
 Message 95 of 196
07 April 2014 at 3:02pm | IP Logged 
This has been a crazy week with traveling and meetings, so my studying has fallen way off! I know I won't have a chance to post this later, so I am
going to go ahead and get my Monday update post up while I have a chance.

SPANISH Total Hours: 38 (last week 3)

Assimil: First Wave Lesson 31 - scriptorium Lesson 25
FSI: Unit 17 Scriptorium Unit 5
Pimsleur III: Unit 20
Coffee Break Spanish: Lesson 42
Notes in Spanish: Lesson 9
Destinos: episode 37

ARABIC Total Hours: 22.5 (last week 2)

Mastering Arabic: Chapter 9

It may have been a waste of time because I needed to spend any extra time this week on studying, but I sat down and made a list of weekly goals for
between now and August 1. During Aug and Sept, I will have conferences I will have to set up for. There will be about 6 weeks where I will be working
all of the time with very little extra time, so I want to try to get some of my programs wrapped up by then. I am hoping to complete Assimil, FSI, and
Mastering Arabic by August 1. Of course, things come up, and so if I don't make it, it's okay. After that, I am hoping that I will be ready for
reading the books I have lined up for Spanish (chapter books). During the six weeks, I may be able to listen to something on my mp3 player while I am
just doing set up stuff where I don't really have to think. So I'd like to find some good podcasts to listen to for that time.

Even with my traveling right now and some coming up later in June, it seems like if I have an idea of how much I need to accomplish each day, I am more
likely to take the time to work on something instead of just feeling overwhelmed. So I think having these weekly goals will help me a lot.

I am wondering what will be the next step in Arabic after finishing "Mastering Arabic." I know I won't be ready for native material at that point.
For anyone who has studied Arabic, what has been your progression? What resources have you used? Napoleon, what are you thinking about doing after
you are finished with Madinah? I saw a book that had parallel English and Arabic with recordings, so that seems good, but they don't use the vowels,
so I'm not sure if I will be ready for that yet even when I am through with this book. There is a "Mastering Arabic 2", so that may be my next step.
I'm not trying to get ahead of myself, but I do kind of like to look ahead a little so I have something to push for.

Well, everyone have a great week! Thanks for all of your great comments. It's wonderful to know there are others in my same situation, each day
fighting to find the time to pursue a passion! :-)
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BOLIO
Senior Member
United States
Joined 4663 days ago

253 posts - 366 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish

 
 Message 96 of 196
07 April 2014 at 3:19pm | IP Logged 
Great Job Nancy and the feeling is mutual concerning each other's logs. I feel as if this is my second log also. You are inspiring with your efforts. Keep it up!

How are the Scriptorium efforts with Assimil? I have really stepped away from Assimil. I have been spending so much time with my literature and Michel Thomas that I had put Assimil aside but vow to restart it in the next day or two. Michel Thomas was completed this week. It was good and I will review it again soon.

Thanks again for the log.


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