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Assimil lesson becomes Sisyphean task | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| apache güero Diglot Newbie United States Joined 4388 days ago 12 posts - 18 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Russian, German | Message 1 of 14 17 July 2014 at 4:20am | IP Logged | |||||
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I have been working my way through Assimil Russian and have enjoyed it. Then I got to Lesson 22. Dear lord... no matter how hard I try, I cannot wrap my mouth around the consonant clusters in that lesson. Anyone else have lessons in the Assimil books that seem like a Sisyphean task?
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| fanatic Octoglot Senior Member Australia speedmathematics.com Joined 7147 days ago 1152 posts - 1818 votes  Speaks: English*, German, French, Afrikaans, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Dutch Studies: Swedish, Norwegian, Polish, Modern Hebrew, Malay, Mandarin, Esperanto | Message 2 of 14 17 July 2014 at 7:14am | IP Logged | |||||
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I have had similar problems with My First Russian Book and with Assimil Russian. I followed the advice given by Assimil after getting stuck with no progress with MFRB and simply went on to the next lesson, marking the page where I had difficulty some few lessons further on. After reaching the page with the note I either found the problem resolved or I tried again to resolve the difficulty. If I still couldn't fix the problem I noted the page again some lessons ahead.
I also did this with my Assimil German book and found the method worked well. If the problem is simply getting your mouth around difficult words and phrases I would suggest breaking the sentence up into chunks of words or even syllables as they advocate in Pimsleur. I used to get a sore mouth when I was learning to speak German. I simply persevered. 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Arnaud25 Diglot Senior Member France Joined 3843 days ago 129 posts - 235 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Russian | Message 3 of 14 17 July 2014 at 7:56am | IP Logged | |||||
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Yeap, the russian pronunciation is difficult. While studying the Assimil Russian, I also read and listened to books on the russian phonetic.
Perhaps you have problems with consonant clusters because you don't "devoice" them correctly: before the letter п the "v" sound becomes a "f" sound, etc... Whatever the language, I have problems with the numbers: how to count, how to say what time it is, etc. As I know it, I don't panic and I move on: I will come back on it later and will do specific exercises. Edited by Arnaud25 on 17 July 2014 at 8:00am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| apache güero Diglot Newbie United States Joined 4388 days ago 12 posts - 18 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Russian, German | Message 4 of 14 18 July 2014 at 1:06am | IP Logged | |||||
Thanks for the advice. I think I will just skip the lesson and come back.
Even devoicing them makes it difficult to put a f sound in front of a p sound. It't not a natural sound for an English speaker. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4910 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German | Message 5 of 14 19 July 2014 at 2:14am | IP Logged | |||||
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Have you tried FSI Russian? Some times when I get hung up on a lesson in one coursebook, I switch to another course for a little while. Upon returning, the issue is usually fixed. (I am not studying Russian, nor have I tried FSI Russian. This is just based on my own study habits).
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| hrhenry Octoglot Senior Member United States languagehopper.blogs Joined 5131 days ago 1871 posts - 3642 votes Speaks: English*, SpanishC2, ItalianC2, Norwegian, Catalan, Galician, Turkish, Portuguese Studies: Polish, Indonesian, Ojibwe | Message 6 of 14 19 July 2014 at 2:22am | IP Logged | |||||
I know, it's off-putting, isn't it? Seriously, while I haven't studied Russian, when I've come across difficult consonant clusters in Polish, for example, I try to find an English word or expression that approximates the cluster in question and go from there. It may not be an exact reproduction of the consonant cluster, but it's a good place to start. R. == Edited by hrhenry on 19 July 2014 at 2:23am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5335 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 7 of 14 19 July 2014 at 6:31am | IP Logged | |||||
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I have been stuck around lesson 50 of Assimil Russian for the last three years, so yes, I know exactly what
you mean :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Arnaud25 Diglot Senior Member France Joined 3843 days ago 129 posts - 235 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Russian | Message 8 of 14 19 July 2014 at 8:09am | IP Logged | |||||
Really ? Perhaps we're not talking about the same version of the Assimil Russian. I'm talking of the latest by Victoria Suchet: I've found it really progressive. I had also tried the previous version by Dronov and it was too difficult: the progression was too steep. For the pronunciation, I have used 2 books (that you can find on UZ) - First volume of "Le russe à votre rythme" (50 pages are dedicated to the pronunciation: a little boring but interesting in the long run) - "La phonétique du russe": a little book with audio. - I also stumbled by chance on that video on Youtube where the teacher shows the children all the sounds of russian (you can read them from the 9th minute): That video helped me a lot understand certain things about the russian pronunciation: how certains clusters are pronunced and how the russian sounds are placed in the mouth (completly different from the french even if there are very similar) Edited by Arnaud25 on 19 July 2014 at 8:18am 1 person has voted this message useful |
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