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Necronos’s Spanish Journal | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Necronos Newbie United States Joined 4478 days ago 37 posts - 41 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 25 of 31 06 May 2012 at 8:00am | IP Logged |
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Feliz Cinco de Mayo!
Yesterday I managed to wade through 1.5 hours of Rosetta Stone and complete Level 1/Unit 1 of Latin America Spanish. It wasn't very pleasant. I find the whole thing boring and non-engaging. I've finally decided to skip some of the exercises that I found the most tedious. Regardless, I wanted to move my progression forward and I did. I finished episode 3 of Destinos. I need to make more time for the show since I'm finding the story enjoyable. I've had some technical difficulties on my tablet so I sucked it up and sat at the computer desk tonight. I did an initial read through of Un pez, dos peces, pez rojo, pez azul by Dr. Suess and I didn't manage to understand anything over 10% of the text. That is pretty frustrating. I'm not whether to continue on with the book and try to understand more or to find an easier text to understand at my level. I do have a few Star Wars comics in Spanish... I'm not sure if I want to quit with Dr. Seuss though. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Necronos Newbie United States Joined 4478 days ago 37 posts - 41 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 26 of 31 09 May 2012 at 4:12pm | IP Logged |
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In the last hectic few days I only managed to watch 4 episodes of Destinos, so I'm
completed through episode 7. The story is really kicking off now and I find myself watching it more for what is happening rather than what I'm learning. Not that it was a chore before, I'm just glad that it is now firmly in the 'I actually enjoy this show' category. My daughter took my tablet to bed a few nights ago, so instead of trying to find it in the dark and not wake her, I just started Paul Noble's Spanish. I finished CD 1. I'll hold off making comparisons between Paul Noble and Michel Thomas until I'm finished with the course. I really should be doing the MT review CD's, but I found an Anki deck that reviews the material so I'm happy with that so far. It feels like a chore so I'm avoiding it until I'm more motivated to challenge it. I reread the Super Challenge rules and it seems that I misunderstood the rules about children's books (my main fare currently). Each book only counts as 1/5 of a book for the challenge, so I need to reread Huevos Verde con Jamon twice more. That isn't a problem at all. I've abandoned Un pez, dos peces, pez rojo, pez azulsince it is beyond me at the moment, and instead I've been reading Star Wars comics in Spanish. 5 count as a book, I'm only 2, so I'll finish my current one and read the next one and then repeat. The most interesting will get a 3rd read through. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Necronos Newbie United States Joined 4478 days ago 37 posts - 41 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 27 of 31 14 May 2012 at 1:33am | IP Logged |
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The last few days didn't really contain any Spanish in a program, except for an episode
of Destinos. I spent some time compiling vocabulary from a frequency dictionary and I've begun to start learning that material and transferring it into Anki. Speaking of Anki, I've come to realize that I should be translating from English to Spanish rather than the other way around. I've found that it doesn't do me much good when I can instantly know mismo to mean same but stumble when I'm searching for the meaning of same to Spanish. Does that make sense? I'm trying hard to not mentally translate the English word into the Spanish word, but rather just arrive at the Spanish word and bypass the English translation. When I look at a tree I'm trying not to think tree, which is árbol in Spanish, but just think árbol. Oh, I've been reading. I had some bilingual texts from the library and so went through a few pages of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by first reading the English and then the Spanish. That got a bit tedious so I switched to Los 500 sombreros de Bartolome Cubbins. It's right at my skill level. I know enough to get the gist and I can figure out the meanings of other words from the context. I think I've been spending too much time with texts that were completely beyond my level. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Necronos Newbie United States Joined 4478 days ago 37 posts - 41 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 28 of 31 19 May 2012 at 7:47am | IP Logged |
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I guess it is time that I do a proper update rather than just updating the first post
with my stats and all. Well, I've started to do Platiquemos. It seemed a bit daunting at first but I think something more intense that what I've been doing is called for. I've finished Unit 1 and I'm working through Unit 2. I've read the text for the Unit and I've listened to some of the audio so far. Oh, and I've added the vocabulary from Unit 1 to my Anki decks and will do the same with the future units. I finished CD 3 of Paul Noble's Spanish tonight. It had been over a week since I listened to the last CD and I didn't want to slack off too much. I think Paul Noble is overtaking Michel Thomas as my preferred audio course so far. Regardless of preference though, I'll make sure to write up a comparison when I get done. My Anki decks are still being hotly used. I actually get a little disappointed when I don't see any reviews waiting for me. Maybe that should drive me towards creating bigger decks! I rented Pan's Labyrinth tonight and I'll watch it tomorrow sometime. I got to move forward in the Super Challenge, Destinos is great but I want to watch something that isn't educational. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| sctroyenne Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5240 days ago 739 posts - 1312 votes  Speaks: English*, French Studies: Spanish, Irish | Message 29 of 31 19 May 2012 at 8:07pm | IP Logged |
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Nice to see another Spanish beginner! Thanks for the tip about the Michel Thomas Anki deck - I was
going to look for a transcript but that will save me a step :) And don't feel bad about Un pez.. I started reading it to my friend's baby when he started getting fussy and that book is harder than I remember. Lots of nonsense words that are hard to pronounce and really long for a child's book (of that reading level at least). I've done Easy Spanish Reader and a dual language collection of stories which I' ve enjoyed. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Necronos Newbie United States Joined 4478 days ago 37 posts - 41 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 30 of 31 20 May 2012 at 5:05am | IP Logged |
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@sctroyenne I think I'll end up getting Easy Spanish Reader at some stage soon. I went to
the library and got the English version of Un pez thinking that it would help, but it turns out it isn't a direct translation. I don't know why I expected otherwise. I did get some Scooby-Doo mysteries that should be a little easier though! In other news, I watched El laberinto del fauno (Pan's Labyrinth) tonight and enjoyed the hell out of it. I had watched it when it came out but this time I was armed with some knowledge of Spanish. Not enough to grasp the fullness of the story without subtitles, but someday I won't even need those. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Necronos Newbie United States Joined 4478 days ago 37 posts - 41 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 31 of 31 26 May 2012 at 6:39pm | IP Logged |
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I've been bouncing around lately and I think I need to start working on formalizing a
specific goal for my Spanish learning and start focusing my work towards it. I should probably start a schedule so I can keep working on all the different programs that I have started. I think I might have spread myself too thin with everything that I started so I want to start reigning in my scatteredness. In my crazy fit of starting new stuff, I have started listening to Coffee Break Spanish. I really like the program even though it isn't presenting anything that is a challenge to me, it is nice to go over some of the basics that I mightn't have gotten as solid a foundation as I would have liked to. While the likes of Pimsleur and Michel Thomas do start you right off speaking Spanish, they don't have much of a focus on the generalities that I feel as expected from any language learner, such as - introductions, family, greetings, likes/dislikes, etc. I'm also moving forward with Platiquemos. It is quite intense but it really is helping to drill some of the material that really should be second nature. I like that. Ok, time to get focused. I'll post my schedule and plan when I get it finalized. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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