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Back in the game! German | ||
Tags: Self-Study | German | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Advice Center |  | |
| drp9341 Pentaglot Senior Member United States Joined 4858 days ago 115 posts - 217 votes  Speaks: Italian, English*, Spanish, Portuguese, French Studies: Japanese | Message 1 of 9 02 October 2013 at 12:57am | IP Logged | ||
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Hello HTLAL! I haven't posted here in a while, mainly because I've been getting pretty lazy with my language studies :P I haven't seriously studied a new language and gotten anywhere useful with it in quite some time, but recently, I have been working hard on learning German!
So, this summer I am going to be attending a wedding Germany for 5 days, then a month later, I will be taking a trip with my uncle and spending a week in Austria! I always had an interest in German, especially in high school, but there wasn't a German class, and so I opted for romance languages instead. So, I have been working hard on German, as of now, for about 10 days. I don't know how many hours I have put in so far, but if I had to guess I would guess about 8 so far, which is actually pretty good for me. I haven't been actually sitting down doing it, I have been doing it whenever I have a spare moment; walking to class, going to the bathroom, while my food is cooking, before I go to bed etc. I am definitely making lots of progress, a week ago I knew about 5 words, now I can figure out a lot of phrases when I really take my time. My goal: B1-B2 spoken German by the time June comes. Currently I am using the Android app Babbel, and trying to inundate myself with as much vocab as possible. I am also taking the sentences they give me, breaking them down, and trying to really figure out the semantic meaning of all the words (and morphemes!) in that sentence. Doing this has been great, as it is making me really think hard about German sentence syntax, verb morphology etc. My idea is the more I do this, the easier it will be to then explicitly learn these concepts when I am further along my studies. Now I am familiarizing myself with German, and getting used to "figuring it out," per se. As for grammar and cases, I will begin to study those once I feel like they are holding back my comprehension and production, (which will probably be soon! I want to at least have a lot of exposure to them before I start trying to explicitly learning them.) I have Teach Yourself's new German course, which I am using in conjunction with the Babbel application. I am also watching the Bookbox German videos on Youtube, and breaking down those sentences and figuring out the meaning using a dictionary and context. Within the next couple of weeks I will record myself and force myself to explain some basic things, as well as write some basic things. I will put the writing on lang-8.com and as far as someone correcting what I say in the videos is concerned, I am not really sure, but I am not overly worried, as those are mainly to help me start working on my spoken fluency. My only concern right now is the mass amount of vocabulary and different syntax I've been encountering. But the more I expose myself to it and begin to internalize the syntax and vocabulary, the more natural it will get :P Then once that's all said and done, I'll try to get a conversation partner/tutor and continue with German! This will be my first language with "hard" grammar, but the amount of cognates and abundance of materials should more than compensate for the few difficulties I'll encounter! Anyone who has self-studied German let me know any advice you have, anything you would recommend to me, and anything you think I should do! PS: It feels great to have a language challenge again! I've been trying to study languages without the motivator of an upcoming trip, but it seemes that once I get familiar with the new language and the "newphoria" wears off, my motivation, (purely driven by a love of languages) runs dry! 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| renaissancemedi Bilingual Triglot Senior Member Greece Joined 4304 days ago 941 posts - 1309 votes Speaks: Greek*, Ancient Greek*, EnglishC2 Studies: French, Russian, Turkish, Modern Hebrew | Message 2 of 9 02 October 2013 at 7:52am | IP Logged | ||
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I am in a similar situation with German, that I have put on hold because I want to lear some Italian by the end of the year. I will start studying German again though, and it's always in the back of my head, so I know how you feel.
Here are some thoughts, not advice. Try to read and watch videos on motivation, and maybe you'll find something that helps. Also try to learn more about how to form habits. Use German in a journal or something, and use all you know right from the start. Have a German channel or radio station playing all the time, and watch many German films. And stop thinking about the tons of words and grammar. I keep saying to myself: you are only learning a language, not going off to war! Think of the great time you'll have in Germany, and have fun learning the language :) 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4855 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German | Message 3 of 9 08 October 2013 at 8:22am | IP Logged | ||
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You mention a lot of good reasources, but the best source of German resources is Deutsche Welle. Everything there is arranged by level, and there is a wide variety of types of material.
Also, Slow German is a pretty good podcast series. My only concern about your post is the goal. "B1-B2 spoken German by the time June comes" is probably attainable, but not realistic. Focusing on a big goal can lead to frustration. Instead, focus on mastering the material you are currently working on. Short term goals are actually better for long term progress. Oh, and the help with keeping up motivation: join in on 6 week challenges! Edited by Jeffers on 08 October 2013 at 8:33am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| bela_lugosi Hexaglot Senior Member Finland Joined 6400 days ago 272 posts - 376 votes Speaks: English, Finnish*, Italian, Spanish, German, Swedish Studies: Russian, Estonian, Sámi, Latin | Message 4 of 9 08 October 2013 at 5:15pm | IP Logged | ||
Wise words, mate. Exposure and usage are the key words here. Don't take this as a 100% sure method (whatever works for you is obviously the best method in any case) but I personally like to skim through the whole grammar first, so that I know what to expect. Then I proceed from studying the most basic expressions and vocabulary to learning massive amounts of sentences and phrases. I prefer ready made sentences for two reasons: 1) I can be sure that they are grammatically correct and make sense, 2) they contain most if not all of the basic grammar you will need in any further studies. Hope this helps. :) 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| drp9341 Pentaglot Senior Member United States Joined 4858 days ago 115 posts - 217 votes Speaks: Italian, English*, Spanish, Portuguese, French Studies: Japanese | Message 5 of 9 17 October 2013 at 12:11am | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks all for the feedback! Today is officially my 21day mark learning German and I have made loads of progress. I torrented Assimil and have been using Assimil as my main resource, as in my opinion, Teach Yourself has too many explanations and uses way to much English.
I also am a HUGE Assimil fan, and think it is the best resource out there for anyone with prior experience with Lamguage Learning. I haven't checked out Deutsch Welle yet, but I will be sure to check it out in the future, but as of now I have all the resources I need :). My biggest problem is trying to wrap my head around the large amounts of new vocab, but constant exposure and Anki is helping me keep it all in check. I started Assimil last Wednesday and I'm on lesson 12 so far. I also have been using Bookbox, and can understand most of the stories with the help of a dictionary. It's amazing how much the "polylgot edge" (as I've heard it referred to before) really exists, I feel my progress is going smoothly, although I always looking to speed it up! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Alamo Joe Newbie United States Joined 4006 days ago 17 posts - 31 votes | Message 6 of 9 18 October 2013 at 11:46pm | IP Logged | ||
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I'm glad to hear that you're progressing so much in the language. You have a lot of good resources to help you along. If you want a nice introductory German video course to work with, you should try the Fokus Deutsch video course. It's similar to the French in Action and Destinos video series, but probably not as comprehensive. It used to be available on the Annenberg website before it was discontinued. You can download the torrent with all the videos. Some of the videos are on Youtube if you want to sample them first before downloading the entire series.
This is the intro to the telecourse: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3OefZzCf_s 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| aspiringplyglot Triglot Groupie United Kingdom aspiringpolyglot.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4523 days ago 40 posts - 62 votes Speaks: English*, GermanB2, Spanish Studies: Dutch, Esperanto, Polish, Scottish Gaelic, French | Message 7 of 9 27 October 2013 at 10:43pm | IP Logged | ||
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I studied German by myself for about 2 years and tried out LOADS of different materials. Firstly, let me
recommend something very basic... Don't try jumping ahead too much, it will only demotivate you - something that can be applied to all languages. I started to try reading Harry Potter book about 2 months after starting because I thought to myself, "it can't be that difficult, it's a kids book!" Definitely the wrong move. The German version of Assimil is definitely a great place to start! I would suggest starting supplementing that with some easy readers after about lesson 40 in Assimil, that way you can go over the same points again to reinforce what you've been learning in Assimil. If you're looking for a decent conversational level, I'd suggest you find some music you like. I've learned many commonly used expressions through songs. A useful thing to know when you want to speak 'on the streets', as I'm sure you'll know :-) Last little tip I'd give is not to become stressed about the grammar. Of course, do try to learn it if you can as you move along but most of the people I've spoken to haven't batted an eyelid when I've said 'das' instead of 'der' or whatever. I also found that the Michel Thomas method actually explained the basic grammar and declinations pretty clearly so you might wanna check that out too (if you can...acquire it somehow *cough*. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| montmorency Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4774 days ago 2371 posts - 3676 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Danish, Welsh | Message 8 of 9 27 October 2013 at 11:30pm | IP Logged | ||
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Start speaking as soon as possible and don't worry about grammar and don't worry about
making mistakes. Michel Thomas, Assimil and http://youspeakgerman.com for speaking. Deutsche Welle and slow German for listening. When you get a bit more advanced at listening, you might try dradio.de and wdr podcasts. Edited by montmorency on 27 October 2013 at 11:31pm 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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