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Assimil... 15 minutes a day. | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| nebojats Triglot Groupie United States Joined 5195 days ago 89 posts - 120 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish, Thai Studies: French, Arabic (Written), Mandarin, Italian | Message 1 of 8 28 July 2011 at 9:28pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Just got Chinese with Ease... very excited! After glimpsing through the book and quickly
checking out some of the tracks, I am totally convinced that this is a great resource. I have languages I study hard (attend actual classes with homework and/or go abroad for immersion), and I have languages that are just sort of habits. I'm trying to turn Chinese into a "habit" language. I don't really want to spend more than 15 minutes a day sitting down with a book for a "habit" language. Any suggestions from those who have used Assimil on how to efficiently use those 15 minutes of book time? (I fit time for audio into my morning run with the iPod). 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Hampie Diglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 6658 days ago 625 posts - 1009 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: Latin, German, Mandarin | Message 2 of 8 28 July 2011 at 10:14pm | IP Logged | |||||
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If I recall Assimil themselves thin one should spend 20-30 minutes a day per lesson, then, why don’t you do one
lessons every other day instead of one every day? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| The Stephen Diglot Groupie United States Joined 5051 days ago 65 posts - 77 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Czech, Hungarian | Message 3 of 8 29 July 2011 at 12:12am | IP Logged | |||||
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Well, it's pretty open-ended, as you no doubt have found out. There are many, many ways to use this program and you'll have to do some experimentation on your own to find what works best. I'm working on Assimil Hungarian right now and keeping it to one lesson a day. I'm not very scientific about how I do it, but it usually looks something like this:
1. Listen to the audio once or twice without the book. This is to try and recognize some words that I may already know, as well as to learn to parse out ones I don't know. I always do this before looking at the dialog. 2. Listen to the audio once while reading the dialog (Hungarian side). Same reason as no. 1, except a little easier since I have it written out in front of me. This way I can check how well I'm doing with step 1. 3. Read both sides, word for word so I get it all, and also read the notes when prompted. This is the real meat of the lesson and takes the longest to do. 4. Read the Hungarian side again, being careful to make sure I know what each word means without having to look at the English translation. 5. Listen to the audio without the book again, concentrating and trying to hear each syllable. This step can be repeated throughout the day if you have the audio on your iPod, but it should be noted that you don't have to memorize the dialog for it to be effective. (and I haven't reached the "Active Wave" yet so I don't have a set method for that, but it would have to include translating the English into Hungarian without looking at the Hungarian) As I said, I'm not very scientific about it and am not sure exactly how long this takes, but I would guess around twenty minutes. The dialogs are carefully planned out so that the important stuff will reappear in subsequent lessons so as to be implanted in your long-term memory, so I wouldn't worry about forgetting or about doing more than one lesson a day, as long as you do a little every single day. The only thing I'm not too sure about here is how Assimil handles teaching other non-latin writing systems, so you're on your own there. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| datsunking1 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5584 days ago 1014 posts - 1533 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: German, Russian, Dutch, French | Message 4 of 8 29 July 2011 at 3:16am | IP Logged | |||||
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It depends where you are with a language, I can go through 4 lessons of Spanish with Ease in under an hour (I'm reviewing because I haven't spoken it in awhile for school in the fall) However one German lesson takes about 45 minutes to an hour for me.
I've heard the Chinese program is pretty good :) The Arabic one (I think) had hand written script? I'm not sure however. Stephen, how would you rate the Hungarian program? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| The Stephen Diglot Groupie United States Joined 5051 days ago 65 posts - 77 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Czech, Hungarian | Message 5 of 8 29 July 2011 at 4:01am | IP Logged | |||||
Yeah, the twenty minutes was just a guess. Maybe time flies a lot faster than I perceive it when I really get into it. And I remember doing a pretty half-assed job with Assimil German when I went through it a year or so ago. Sometimes I could spend an hour or two doing as many lessons as I felt like doing, sometimes I didn't do any for a few days. It was a mess, but I still somehow got quite a bit out of it. The more I think about it the more I think the OP, if they are serious about the fifteen minute thing, would have to take Hampie's advice and stretch one lesson over two days. Especially with a language like Chinese. Like I said though, experiment!
My main problem with it is with the notes. There seem to be two types: really, really long ones that take up literally half the page presenting a rule and then all the exceptions to it, as well as examples, and the ones that are just references to previous notes, which I view as unnecessary and annoying. I don't like learning exceptions to rules while I'm learning the rule. I'd rather wait till I have the rule down and deal with the exceptions as they present themselves later, especially when Hungarian is so logical and consistent, with relatively few exceptions anyway. All the exceptions and examples just confuse me. That said, the rest is fine. The lessons have that unique Assimil sense of humor and the voice actors aren't annoying or anything and speak really clearly. And the pace is fast enough that you don't get bored. So overall I like it quite a bit so far, I just had to get used to skimming the notes rather than hanging on to every word in them. Edited by The Stephen on 29 July 2011 at 4:02am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| watupboy101 Diglot Groupie United States Joined 4902 days ago 65 posts - 81 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 6 of 8 29 July 2011 at 4:14am | IP Logged | |||||
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I personally spend about 20-30 min. on Assimil in a day... and to me thats the minimum.
1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
 newyorkeric Diglot Moderator Singapore Joined 6378 days ago 1598 posts - 2174 votes Speaks: English*, Italian Studies: Mandarin, Malay Personal Language Map | Message 7 of 8 29 July 2011 at 4:39am | IP Logged | |||||
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I don't want to rain on your parade, but if you plan to spend 15 minutes a day on Chinese With Ease I wouldn't expect you to finish it for several years at least. It's one of the longer Assimil courses and it's not easy.
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| jasoninchina Senior Member China Joined 5230 days ago 221 posts - 306 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin, Italian | Message 8 of 8 29 July 2011 at 7:00am | IP Logged | |||||
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newyorkeric is right.
Chinese is not a "habit" language('casual' may be a better word). Chinese requires consistant, focused study. If I'm not spending an hour with Chinese a day, I'm not improving. I am doing Italian Assimil right now and spending about 30 minutes a day. That really feels like the mininum for that sort of course. p.s. I'm also not trying to rain on your parade. Edited by jasoninchina on 29 July 2011 at 7:02am 1 person has voted this message useful |
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