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Mike’s Italian Progression | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| gravityguy Groupie United Kingdom Joined 4529 days ago 56 posts - 77 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 1 of 25 25 June 2012 at 2:11pm | IP Logged | ||
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OK, so I have wanted to learn Italian for a while now but have never had the time to
actually go ahead and do it. I have now realised that I will never have any more time than I do at present so I am just going to have to make time for it. I started off using rosetta stone last week but after reading peoples views of it on here I have decided to stop using it and to use Michel Thomas followed by Assimil Italian with Ease. So far I have got to lesson 7 on the first CD of MT and I plan on doing lessons 7 through to 9 later on today with a review of lesson 6. One question, how long does the Assimil course usually take on average? I know everyone is different but I have no idea how long to allow for it. I really love the Italian language and my wife and I spend at least a week in Italy every year (Tropea, Calabria if anyone knows it?) so if that isn't enough reason and motivation to learn Italian, I don't know what is! lol I shall update this later once I have completed my lessons :) Ciao :) Edited by gravityguy on 25 June 2012 at 2:13pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| gravityguy Groupie United Kingdom Joined 4529 days ago 56 posts - 77 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 2 of 25 25 June 2012 at 4:43pm | IP Logged | ||
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I did a review of lesson 6 at lunchtime followed by lesson 7. I uploaded the files to my
smart phone and then played them through my car stereo in the car park at work. Must have looked amusing to anyone walking by. I found it a good way to listen though as I never utilise my lunch break with anything useful. Lessons 8 and 9 later 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| gravityguy Groupie United Kingdom Joined 4529 days ago 56 posts - 77 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 3 of 25 26 June 2012 at 3:39pm | IP Logged | ||
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Day 2 of my Italian log.
Yesterday I did 3 'tracks' from the MT taking up to track 10. Today I have finished CD 1 in my lunch break and then completed the first track on CD2. I had forgotten a couple of verbs but as MT says not to try to remember, I shall just see what happens later on and whether I remember them again or not. I've also bee trying to read some euronews in Italian but I am really not sure what I should be doing with it as I understamd pretty much nothing. I have tried guessing what is being said and then using google translate to see if I am correct. Sometimes I am close but mostly well out. i think the bigest problem at the minute is my lack of vocab and also my lack of understanding when it comes to past, present, future, tenses etc, as well as verb meanings. One example is the use of the verb avere, which I know means 'to have'. In the article I am reading it shows as di aver, which when I put it into google by itself, it comes back as having, but when in the context of the story, it comes back as you have, which I thought was 'ha'? Maybe I will just hold off on trying to read and interpret news stories and the like until I have a better basic understanding of the structure of the language, as I am sure that trying to read it now is just going to confuse the hell out of me. I shall do another 3 tracks from MT tonight which will take me to almost half way through CD 2. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| mikonai Diglot Senior Member United States weirdnamewriting.bloRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4921 days ago 178 posts - 281 votes Speaks: English*, Italian Studies: Swahili, German | Message 4 of 25 26 June 2012 at 4:42pm | IP Logged | ||
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Looks like you're making progress! Google translate is a good tool, particularly when
you're starting, but sometimes it'll spit something out that's not quite right. I don't fully trust it, myself. Anyway, "aver" is a shortened version of "avere," as you may have guessed, which means it's in the infinitive, which is probably because of the preposition "di" just before it. I might be able to tell you more if I had the story. You're correct, though: "you have" is typically rendered "ha" for formal situations, and "hai" for informal ones. "Ha" can also mean "he has," "she has," or "it has," depending. As for "di aver," who or what it's talking about depends entirely on what comes before "di." For example, a sentence I pulled from a random web search: Capisci di aver letto un buon libro quando giri l'ultima pagina e ti senti come se avessi perso un amico. You know you have read a good book when you turn the last page and you feel like you've lost a friend. "Capisci" is already changed from "capire" (to understand/know) to mean "you understand/know." While in English we just add another "you" and the verb would change accordingly, the sentence just puts in a "di aver" to mean the same thing. More literally you might translate it as "You know of having read..." "Avere" here acts as an auxiliary verb, required for the past tense. "Letto" is the past participle of "leggere," which isn't apparent with "to read" in English, since we spell "read" (present tense) and "read" (past tense) the same. But the Italian is sort of like "I walk" and "I walked." The usage of the construction isn't very easy, but before you know it you'll be able to piece it together at least enough to understand. If you'd rather abandon the news for now, though, your Assimil course works a lot like a graded reader, where things start simple and get more complex as you go. You can always return to the news when you feel a little more comfortable. It looks like your building up some good momentum! Keep up the good work, and sorry for the super-long posts I keep adding to your threads :) 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| gravityguy Groupie United Kingdom Joined 4529 days ago 56 posts - 77 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 5 of 25 26 June 2012 at 5:41pm | IP Logged | ||
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Mikonai, I very much enjoy reading your 'super long posts', especially as they contain so
much useful information. I am very grateful that you don't mind taking time out of your day to help me! :) I actually knew the verb leggere from RS. Nice to know that it has taught me something (I better say no more about RS though or I'll be shot for being a troll! haha). Just out of interest Mikonai, how long have you been speaking/learning Italian for? I can't wait until I know as much as yourself! :) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| mikonai Diglot Senior Member United States weirdnamewriting.bloRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4921 days ago 178 posts - 281 votes Speaks: English*, Italian Studies: Swahili, German | Message 6 of 25 26 June 2012 at 8:13pm | IP Logged | ||
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It's my pleasure! One of the best ways I learn and remember things is by trying to
teach it to someone else. If I can explain it so someone else understands it, then I know I understand it myself. I've been learning on and off for years now, but most of my real progress has come in my slightly more steady studying of the past two years, I'd say. I'm just a little bit of a grammar nut; I like learning the rules of stuff, but usage is what gets me. I'm just a little too nervous to start talking to people, and that's probably what holds me back the most. I could probably get by with my knowledge, but with a lot of errors, mostly due to lack of practice. I think the hardest part about learning a new language is learning how to learn. You should be sure to take some time and try every technique you can, and see what works for you. The most important things to have, in my opinion, are dedication and enthusiasm. Try and have some fun, but unfortunately not all of language learning is going to be fun for you. Keeping a language log is a great step to keep yourself on track :) 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| gravityguy Groupie United Kingdom Joined 4529 days ago 56 posts - 77 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 7 of 25 26 June 2012 at 8:13pm | IP Logged | ||
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...another 4 tracks completed. Now half way through CD 2.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| gravityguy Groupie United Kingdom Joined 4529 days ago 56 posts - 77 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 8 of 25 28 June 2012 at 11:03am | IP Logged | ||
I think your first point in the above quote is especially valid. There are so many good sites and ways of learning that it can be easy to get bogged down and end up spending more time looking at what to learn than learning itself. I'm also finding it difficult to know if what I am doing is actually correct or effective. I also think your point about the fact that not all of the learning is going to be fun is also very much correct. See paragraph below for this. One thing I am finding useful (even though I have only been learning for a few days) is this forum; people on here are so helpful. I've never been a really big user of forums previously but I can see myself spending more time on here than I do with my wife (well maybe not quite, but almost)! lol After my last post the other night where I had got half way through CD 2, I then actually carried on and finished off CD 2. I was actually quite impressed with myself for doing so much, although my brain felt pretty dead at the end of it! Last night I came to CD 3 and found that I was struggling with it. It wasn't so much the structure of the sentences I was supposed to be forming (although there were a few times when I couldn't remember the correct endings for things like ro ra and remo). The biggest problem was remembering the actual verbs themselves. You are given so many verbs in such a short space of time that I was really struggling to remember which was which. The people on the recordings seem to be doing far better than in remembering the verbs. I did 3 out of the 10 tracks on CD 3 but was getting really frustrated so I decided to stop for the night. I don't think it helped that I had a very stressful commercial meeting with a client yesterday afternoon which had already mentally destroyed me! I think that I will go back to the last 2 or 3 tracks on CD 2 and have another listen to them to try and instil it into my head a little better. This comes back to the point though about learning how to learn. Obviously MT says that you shouldn't try and remember what he teaches so does this mean that I shouldn't go back and revisit the tracks? Surely it can't hurt to listen to them again. Also, with regards to not trying to remember what he is teaching is actually really hard, especially when there are certain things that you can't remember when he asks how do you say 'I don't have it right now because it is not ready but you can have it this evening' (can't remember if that is one of the things he asks but it is certainly close). When he asks I end up sitting there thinking 'how do I say "you can have it..."'. Then I press play when I can't remember, hear them say it correctly and then kick myself. I then cannot help but start thinking of how to say different things after I have finished, even though I know he says not to do this. Anyway, yesterday was one of those days that wasn't fun and that I didn't enjoy. I suppose the thing to do now is just carry on and move forward (after I have re-visited the last couple of tracks from CD 2 that is). 1 person has voted this message useful |
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