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Overcoming the plateau | ||
Tags: Learning Experience | Spanish | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Advice Center |  | |
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5153 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes  Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 17 of 25 31 January 2014 at 11:08am | IP Logged | |||||
I'm not sure whether I wasn't clear and you misunderstood my message or you're just trolling and attacking a straw-man idea that studying means burying oneself in theoretical books that have little connection with the real language. My point was just that at that particular moment in my studies I was doing too much passive stuff like watching films, reading, and conversing, and not enough active stuff like more intensive reading/watching or pushing myself to expand my active knowledge. I suppose it would have been clearer and perhaps more accurate if I had contrasted extensive versus intensive as opposed to usage versus study, since there isn't always a clear distinction between using the language and studying it: reading with a dictionary or conversing with a tutor for example could easily count as both. I certainly don't even have two hours to study most days, so I realise that you have to prioritise and focus on some things over others rather than trying to fit in everything. But at the same time, I think that every so often you need to re-evaluate your current priorities and ask yourself if you're still focusing on the right things, especially if progress has slowed down.
Started using Anki again in order to try to retain and activate more vocabulary and making some of my reading/listening more intensive in order to find sentences to put into it, and did some grammar work to "tidy up" my usage of the language and fix some consistent mistakes. Needless to say it was a very practical grammar book focusing on real-life usage of the language and when to use various propositions, tenses, expressions etc. with lots of examples that wouldn't be out of place in an everyday conversation; no "meta-theoretical-descriptions" to be found! Edited by garyb on 31 January 2014 at 11:19am 6 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 4955 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 18 of 25 31 January 2014 at 11:33am | IP Logged | |||||
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I agree Anki is awesome for helping with active vocabulary, especially the words you want to know but you don't see them that often or the words that just don't stick.
Grammar tidying up is a needed thing. I have as well noticed to develop certain small mistakes over time of daily use of a language without grammar reviews. Small things. You make mistake once and you don't notice it. And perhaps once or twice later, when you are tired. And it slowly gets engraved into your brain. So grammar reviews of some parts are a good thing to do occassionaly. It is important to get a good resource, that is true. You will surely find a lot of tips on which grammars are good on the forum and in the logs (the G-search function of te forum looks scary at first but it works better than browsing through years of htlal history). 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| theoanderson3 Diglot Newbie United States Joined 3898 days ago 13 posts - 15 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish | Message 19 of 25 31 January 2014 at 12:13pm | IP Logged | |||||
which grammar book and monolingual dictionary do you use for Spanish?
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| iguanamon Pentaglot Senior Member Virgin Islands Speaks: Ladino Joined 5208 days ago 2241 posts - 6731 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese, Haitian Creole, Creole (French) | Message 20 of 25 31 January 2014 at 12:40pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I use several monolingual dictionaries. On my pc I use the Diccionario de la lengua española from the Real Academia Española. On my kindle, I use La Petite Larousse Diccionario Essencial de la Lengua Española . For Spanish grammar I like Nueva Gramática de la Lengua Española from the RAE. The price is steep but it will serve you for a lifetime. I also like The Big Red Book of Spanish Grammar. This book is economically priced and will serve you well.
I also highly recommend that you look into a skype tutor. Nulengua.com and Proyecto Linguistico Qetzalteco del Español PLQE in Guatemala offer Skype instruction. Cost is about $10 an hour. Even one, one hour session a week or every two weeks, working with a tutor will do wonders for your Spanish. There's nothing like going over an assignment, say read a book or watch a film and then review it for your tutor speaking about it. It's scary but that's what will help you improve- using the language. I like a professional tutor because they know how best to help you overcome your weaknesses. A good, free, language exchange partner is hard to find but worth their weight in gold if you can. Lastly, look into the exercises at the Centro Virtual Cervantes Aveteca. They are multimedia and graded by CEFR levels. We get into lots of debates here about language-learning styles and methods. Many of us hold strong opinions based on personal experience about what works best for us. Ultimately, we all just want to help. It's up to you to decide what's best for you. Edited by iguanamon on 31 January 2014 at 1:11pm 6 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 4955 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 21 of 25 31 January 2014 at 5:32pm | IP Logged | |||||
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It depends how far into Spanish you have reached the plateau. I'm using Gramática by Anaya for levels A1+A2 and B1 and there is B2 as well. It's quite good, there are exercises and the key. And it fits into smaller bags :-) But I plan to get a better one, I've had my eye on Gramatice de Uso del Espanol, which covers the grammar for all levels in three volumes and is probably inspired by the awesome English Grammar in Use. I tried a few samples I found online and really liked the approach. I like exercises as a part of my learning process and there are many examples. However, if you are really advanced, than going those recommended by iguanamnon.
And one point I forgot: wikipedia is a great resource for tematic vocabulary in context. And there are usually links to awesome related sites. It's one of the best starting points to use, especially when it comes to non fiction texts. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| 1e4e6 Octoglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4236 days ago 1013 posts - 1588 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Norwegian, Dutch, Swedish, Italian Studies: German, Danish, Russian, Catalan | Message 22 of 25 02 February 2014 at 7:00am | IP Logged | |||||
Grammar is extremely important, and honestly, almost impossible wherewithout to use the language in a correct manner. Having a good speech but messing up tenses and noun declensions every second sentence shall at the very least cause the interlocutor to feel questionable about the ability of the speaker. I remember in university having conversations with non-native speakers and their speech seemed good, but then in one instance they might have said, "And then he throwed the ball...", "Why come is he so late?" which almost ruined all of the good work beforehand. So it is important to perfect the grammar of the language if possible. Writing an essay with grammar errors declines the quality therein itself, even if the material is good. I remember in secondary school and even primary school how just one grammar mistake in one essay might make it look from a 90% to a 65%. This might sound strange, but I read most of Lengua-Espanola-Spanish-Edition/dp/8467032812/ref=pd_sim_b_2 ">Nueva Gramática de la Lengua Española: Manual at one point. Perhaps I am a strange person, but reading a grammar book whose entirety is 1048 pages was not boring, but it seriously enriched and helped to internalise precisely correct grammar for all situations. Were I a professor or teacher, I would recommend something like this for B2 and C1, and mandatory for C2. Edited by 1e4e6 on 02 February 2014 at 7:05am 6 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 4955 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 23 of 25 02 February 2014 at 1:34pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I think such a grammar is an awesome tool, even though I use them differently. I choose topics relevant to what I've just seen somewhere (as a beginner in a textbook, later in native materials) and read the relevant part. And anything related that looks useful. Over time, I cover the whole books. And the last session or two, that's just discovery of what I've been skipping.
And I think there are various approaches needed for the internalization. Some people love to drill the exemple sentences, some, like me, need to get harder and harder exercises leading to my own sentences. Others just need to make their own overviews (like Iversen's green sheets) and some have it all internalized by reading. I think it's worth it to explore several options and find the optimum. I totally agree what an effect do grammar mistakes have. Two people presenting the same speech with various level of grammar accuracy won't be seen as speakers at the same level. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| semajh18 Newbie United States livefluently.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 3880 days ago 1 posts - 3 votes | Message 24 of 25 16 February 2014 at 11:26pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I see that a lot of people are suggesting immersion into the language and I completely agree. I think that when you hit a plateau, that's a sign for you to do something more challenging. So my advice would be do something that will require you to be able to speak Spanish at a higher level. An example would be to apply to some jobs that require you to be bilingual in Spanish and English. I'm sure that if you could get a job like that, then you would have no choice but to advance your level of understanding.
Another thing that I like to do is read books (Always out loud, because it helps you get more practice saying the words) intended for native Spanish speakers, and then try to explain to a native Spanish speaker what the book was about. This has been a really good exercise for me 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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