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James29’s Spanish Log | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5377 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 97 of 668 23 January 2012 at 1:43am | IP Logged |
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I did one new FSI/Platiquemos lesson this week. I had to take a work trip and I don't really feel like doing FSI on the road is too practical so I listened/read audio books.
In the car on a couple long drives I listened to about two hours of Cajas de Carton. I could follow the first hour or so very easily. There were a couple stories after the first hour that I got lost a few times. I then listened to the rest of the book while reading the English. I also listened to all of El Leon, La Bruja y El Ropero while reading the English. I did both full books this week and it felt great. I did have extra time so this is unusual. I feel like the books are getting better each time I read them. I will definitely be reading them more. I like following along in English. I find myself relying less and less on the English and just listening to the audio and occasionally checking a word or following just to keep my place in the text. The audio of Cajas de Carton is very nice pace and I like the Mexican accent. Eventually I might try shadowing it. The audio of El Leon is well done and a pleasure to listen to, but it is probably a little too animated to shadow. I hope this listening/reading effort I am making will help me with my listening ability. We will see. I did a very nice meetup at a restaurant. It was quite enjoyable. Once again, I was the least talented Spanish speaker so I felt like it was very good for me. I had two telephone calls in Spanish at work this week. They both went fairly well. With one of them, however, I had a problem asking for the person. Whoever answered the phone said some Spanish terms I had never heard and I could not understand that she was asking me something to the effect of "may I tell her who is calling?" It took me at least three or four tries to get past the person who answered the phone. Then, I wanted to use "usted" in the telephone call because that would be appropriate. I had some difficulty because I am so used to using "tu" now whenever I talk. This week made me feel very good. I am hoping I can get back to doing two FSI/Plati lessons over the next few weeks. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5377 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 98 of 668 29 January 2012 at 11:18pm | IP Logged |
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This week I managed to do four days of FSI/Platiquemos. Then I had the flu and missed a day. Then I managed to listen to all of Cajas de Carton while following the English.
The FSI lessons (36 and 37?) were both on the subjunctive. The lessons were not too challenging. I like the way they broke it down. It made the subjunctive seem easy. I did, however, have a very difficult time with the response drills. I simply cannot do them. On these two lessos I basically just read the responses from the text. This week I recalled my thoughts from about a year ago. I remember thinking about how far along I would be when I was done with FSI/Platiquemos. I recall thinking that if I worked through FSI that that would be all I really would need to do and I would be basically "done" with learning Spanish. Oh boy, was I wrong. Doing this reading/listening has made me realize how much more I will need to do in order to get to the level I want to be at. I also looked carefully at the language levels and looked at their definitions. I think of myself as B-1 still, but, when looking at the actual definitions I am probably getting close to B-2. My listening/understanding is still keeping me back. Also, I have never really worked at all on writing so that is lacking also. I can honestly say that this log has really motivated me the last couple weeks. Last week I would not have finished the Narnia book had it not been for my log. It just feels good to do my weekly update and to have finished something. Similarly, this week I would not have finished Cajas de Carton, but that little extra motivation caused me to find another hour and read the last two chapters. I feel I know Cajas de Carton well enough that the next time I go through it I should do it with the Spanish text. I won't do it again for a little while. I want to read something else. I ordered the first Harry Potter Spanish Audiobook from my library. If they get it to me this week I will do it next; otherwise, I will likely do the Narnia book again. I had to talk with someone in Spanish at work. It went fine. She had to be a little patient with me, but it was quite easy to accomplish what we needed to do. She had her daughter there who spoke both English and Spanish and she preferred to speak just in Spanish with me (rather than have her daughter translate things) even with the really important things. That made me feel good. I did a meetup, but I was not feeling too well and I mostly just listened. I also did a couple text chats mostly in English. I was not feeling well and figured I would just help my partners with their English because I did not feel like thinking in Spanish. Well, I am hoping to jump back into FSI and do two more lessons this coming week. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5377 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 99 of 668 06 February 2012 at 12:32am | IP Logged |
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I did two more FSI lessons this week. I will start with lesson 40 tomorrow. I looked ahead and the lessons look decent until they hit unit 4 (lesson 46). I looked at unit 4 and it looks like it will take a lot of extra time. I will continue doing each lesson twice until lesson 46 and then I will figure out what to do. Maybe I will do the lessons in unit 4 three times.
I also read quite a bit in my investing book... probably another 60+ pages or so. I also listened/read from Genesis for about two hours this week. The audio for the NVI is quite fast. Eventually I think it will be good, but right now I think it is a tad too fast for me. I can follow and understand it for the most part, but I would be doing much much better if it was the same speed as the DHH audio I have. I did a meetup. It was nice. I also did a couple skype talks and spoke quite a bit of Spanish. Well, that is it for this week. I am short on time. Edit: I forgot to mention that I also read two chapters of Breaking out of Beginner's Spanish. I think I am really going to like it. Edited by James29 on 06 February 2012 at 12:33am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5377 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 100 of 668 13 February 2012 at 1:42am | IP Logged |
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I did another two FSI lessons this week (two times each). They were kind of tricky. I am definitely getting into new material that I have not really encountered. There were various types of the subjunctive. It is starting to make more sense.
I also read the entire first Harry Potter book (listening to Spanish and following English text). I did not really know the story so it was interesting to follow the story. In fact, about a year ago I tried to read the English version, but could not finish it. I liked it better this time. The audio seemed much faster than most audio books. I could follow along, but I was really relying quite a bit on the English. I have confirmed something that I suspected. It is very much easier to simply listen/read in a foreign language. Today I had a lot of free time and I read the last five hours of the Harry Potter book. I would never be able to do five hours of FSI, Pimsleur or Assimil in one day. The flip side of that, of course, is that with L/R I don't feel like I am really "learning" as much. It is nice to just get immersed, however, in both the language and a story. It holds interest much better to simply read along with a book. This week I also read some more from my investing book. I have been doing it for about 15 minutes right after my FSI lessons and that makes it easier to learn because I am already thinking in Spanish. I read a little more of Breaking out of Beginner's Spanish. I also had a long drive for work and I listened to about an hour and a half of the abridged audio book for the Rich Dad, Poor Dad Spanish version book. I was extremely pleased. I feel like I could follow the story quite well. I have not read the English version so I really don't know... nevertheless, it was actually enjoyable to just listen and drive. I did a couple short skype talks, mostly in Spanish. I am noticing that I have recently been doing more than my typical one hour a day. I think doing LR type activities makes it much easier to spend time doing things in Spanish. Well, this coming week I will continue with FSI. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5377 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 101 of 668 21 February 2012 at 1:55am | IP Logged |
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O.K., I finished two more FSI lessons last week (lessons 42 and 43) and did my first run through lesson 44 today. 42 was tough, but 43 and 44 were not too bad. It is interesting how I find some lessons difficult and others seem almost easy.
I also have re-read the first 10 chapters of the first Harry Potter book while listening to the Spanish audio. It is much easier this second time through. I don't feel it is "too fast" anymore. I am also picking up many more little important details on this run through the book. I did a meetup, but it was not too great. Not bad, just not that great. I did two long skype talks mostly in Spanish. When I speak with people from Spain I find it almost effortless to have a conversation. If I don't understand something we just say things in other ways. It is nice. I have been speaking a bit of Spanish on the phone at work. I have been listening to Spanish radio a bit recently. This is something I stopped for a while. I am not sure why I stopped it. I also stopped listening to Spanish on my drives to work. For a while I was shadowing Assimil lessons and it was kind of nice. I have not done Spanish on the way to work for a few months. I am starting to see the end of FSI in sight. It is kind of exciting. At the same time I am reminding myself that this part of FSI (the last quarter) is really where I need to be working hard. I expect the last quarter will be mostly new material. My plan is to take a short break when I am done with lesson 45 to re-energize and re-motivate myself to push through the final part of the course. Well, that is it for this week. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5377 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 102 of 668 27 February 2012 at 3:18am | IP Logged |
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This week I finished FSI 3 / Platiquemos 6. It felt like a mini-milestone. I am going to take a break from FSI for a short while to re-energize my motivation for FSI. I am still quite fond of FSI and I am really looking forward to pushing through the last quarter of it. It is great for speaking ability, grammar and comfort with the language. I think it is not helping me on listening comprehension as much as I would like, but that, of course, is why I am doing LR with some books.
This week I also finished the first Harry Potter book (using the English text). I understood much better this second time through and enjoyed the book more than the first time through. The audio did not seem too hard to follow... probably because I knew the story this time. This is not my type of book so I cannot wait until I can start doing the kind of books that I really enjoy. I did two meetups this week. Both were pretty good. It is amazing how different the two meetup groups are. I did a couple long skype talks... I even got a tour of Madrid courtesy of my partner's iphone. That was really cool and motivated me to try to travel more. I watched the first episode of La Reina del Sur on the Telemundo website. I may try to watch that series. The first episode was quite gripping even though I had a very hard time understanding the Spanish. I had a long drive for work and listened to the rest of the Rich Dad audio book (probably almost two hours left). Having never read the book I think I understood it quite well. I spoke a little bit of Spanish at work on the phone. I have been pondering my Spanish journey recently. I don't even know what I am going to do tomorrow. I am really trying to have as much fun as possible and I really like having a primary learning method and then doing other things with my extra time. I have been thinking about French again, but I decided to stop thinking about it before I even got started thinking about it again. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5377 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 103 of 668 04 March 2012 at 11:03pm | IP Logged |
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I took a break from FSI this past week. This was my lightest Spanish week in a very long time. I did manage to do some Spanish every day.
I decided to review the economics lectures I have. I watched about 5 hours of those while following along with the Spanish transcript. It was much easier to understand the lectures since the last time I watched them. I will continue and complete the entire series... about 12 hours total. I also read quite a bit from my investing book. I finished the first of two sections of the book. In total there are about 600 pages and I am almost halfway through. It is a good stopping point for a while so I think I will set that book aside until I get caught up with some other things I am working on. I also picked up the da Vinci code audio book in Spanish. I tested it out and I could not stop. I listened to the entire first CD while following along with the English. I LOVE it. The narrator is awesome. What a great book for LR. I feel it is much better than any of the other books I have been working with... much more interesting too. I was not planning on doing it, but I think I am hooked and will continue with it in my spare time. This would be a good book to shadow eventually because the narration is slow, clear and about the same pace. I wanted to do Atlas Shrugged as my first "real" adult book. I think I will opt for the da Vinci code simply because I am already an hour into it and I love it (plus it is much much shorter). I went to a meetup. I really enjoyed it. I get a lot out of meetups if I am the worst Spanish speaker. I also did a half hour skype talk. My Spanish has been improving much more rapidly than my Madrid friend's English. It is encouraging. I also finished up Genesis in my NIV/NVI Biblia (probably about an hour). At this point, I think this is slightly too challenging for me and I will likely put this on hold for a little while. Eventually this will be a good resource, but the narrator just whizzes through things so fast it is tough. I don't know what I will do this coming week. I am tempted to start back in FSI. I really want to just press through it and finish it. I am motivated to get it done and just taking this one week off has motivated me to get back to it. Anyway, I really don't like the idea of starting the economics courses and then just leaving them hanging so I think I will probably finish those off before getting back to FSI. There was a post in one of the other sections talking about people's philosophies for learning languages. It really made me think. I also had a talk with some people at the meetup about my studies. I think learning Spanish as a way to have fun and also relax is why I am able to stick with it so long... and love it so much. Wow, that was more than I thought I would write this week. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5377 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 104 of 668 12 March 2012 at 1:40am | IP Logged |
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I got really discouraged this week. I did FSI lesson 46 and some of the exercises were so fast that I could not even read the answers with the text fast enough. I still moved on after two days of lesson 46. Then, when I got to lesson 47 I thought there was some cruel joke being played on me. The dialogue section alone was 32 minutes and some of the phrases I was supposed to repeat were several sentences long... impossible! I basically just read the words right off the text. I quit lesson 47 after the initial dialogue... I saw that the rest of the section was on the past subjunctive which I knew would be tough no matter what. It was demoralizing to quit the lesson right in the middle of it.
I have a lot I want to say about this experience (quitting lesson 47), but I have decided not to complain too much. Part of this was my lack of being prepared. I assumed unit 4 would just proceed as the previous three units. I think I will take it more seriously going forward... not that I did not take it seriously before, but that I was just not expecting to get beat over the head so hard. I will have to spend a few extra days on each lesson now. Anyway, other than one and a half FSI lessons I did a decent amount of Spanish this week. I watched several hours of economics courses. I only have two courses left to get through this twelve hour series. I find it enjoyable and I am glad I am going through this series again. I also have spent quite a bit of time listening to the da Vinci code in Spanish. I think I am now on chapter 24, or thereabouts. I find that the da Vinci code is so enjoyable that I can do it when I am tired or if I just want to do something relaxing. It is not the story (because I have read the book and seen the movie before), but the narrator is simply amazing. I cannot wait to listen/read it with the Spanish text. I also watched a couple episodes of CSI Miami with Spanish dubbing. It was somewhat discouraging because I did not understand it as well as I would like to. I could follow the basic storyline (I think), but I am certain I missed many details and subplots. I did a really long skype talk. It was nice. Some people are so easy and fun to talk with. I pulled out my old Assimil book to show my friend how Assimil works. When I read some of the lessons it really made me miss Assimil. I also did a long text chat with my friend from Madrid. We did it all in English because we usually talk in Spanish so I thought it would be nice to even things up a bit. In retrospect, I wish I had not gone back into FSI this past week. I was not "hungry" for it and then I got hit really hard with the difficulty of these first two lessons. I have also been somewhat discouraged by how many different things I am working on and I fell like I am not making too much progress. Right now, I am working on FSI, an investing book, Breaking out of Beginner's Spanish, The da Vinci Code, the economics courses and I am kind of working on the Bible. Going forward I am going to finish up the economics courses and then just stick with FSI and The da Vinci Code. I am not exactly sure what I will do tomorrow. We will just wait and see. Anyway, this post is not really meant to complain. I was really bummed out with Spanish when I quit lesson 47, but, then I spent a lot of time doing LR and it motivated me again. Edited by James29 on 12 March 2012 at 1:46am 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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