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TAC 2010: Sharp Knives | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Sprachjunge Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 7169 days ago 368 posts - 548 votes  Speaks: English*, GermanC2 Studies: Spanish, Russian | Message 121 of 146 22 February 2010 at 2:42pm | IP Logged | ||
I don't know about that! To wit: assuming that you work 8 hours a day and sleep 7 hours at night, you have 9 hours left over: you could listen to the language on the radio or on your iPod during your commute, have a program playing in the background while you cook, listen to music in that language when you work out or have physical activity (unless it's a group thing, like tennis)...and then the only time when you don't listen to it is when you're conversing with other people who don't speak the language, say during a meeting for a book club. If you have a hobby that takes up one hour a day and work out in a group for an hour a day, that still leaves ~7 hours of language exposure. I actually think it's more than doable--if you make it a priority. But admittedly, usually people don't want to make it a priority unless they have strong motivation for learning it in a short period of time--like for a job or a move to the country in question. That said, you guys are totally right; I'm a little embarrassed. I didn't mean to whine! The world is not going to stop if I only learn Russian halfway on the weekends. Or even if I skip a few weekends. To be honest--and again, I view this as a benefit of the TAC--the only reason I was feeling guilty is that I knew I would be accountable to you guys! Otherwise, I probably would have dropped it for a few months without a second thought. Sometimes a little positive outside pressure is good though, to help us remain consistent. Even if I only learn 300 Russian words by the end of the year, that's still 300 more than I knew at the beginning, right? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Sprachjunge Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 7169 days ago 368 posts - 548 votes Speaks: English*, GermanC2 Studies: Spanish, Russian | Message 122 of 146 22 February 2010 at 2:54pm | IP Logged | ||
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Dear Quabazza: Thank you for your message and encouragement! First, oh do I envy you your imminent exposure to Stromberg: that show is hilarious! Second, you are right: I need to suck it up and use my time more effectively. I’m sure I’m wasting at least an hour each day just doing nothing. The trick will be convincing myself to use that time on Russian.
You know, about those collocations/turns of phrase/conversational fillers: It doesn’t sound pretty, but I actually think it is much more effective to just memorize them outright, as part of a structured plan, rather than leave them to chance or natural exposure. Basically, for what I want with German and Spanish—near-native, academic fluency—I do not have enough exposure to either language naturally to give me enough time to pick up the phrases I need in a reasonable amount of time (that is, less than 20 years or so!). Ever since I started writing down structures that I wanted to use on flash cards (and then Anki when I switched), I’ve found that my writing and speech have improved noticeably. It’s just intimidating because you realize how much there is to learn, and how much has to be memorized precisely. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve taken a phrase from a published source, used it in a Lang-8 entry, and been told that it was wrong—because of the 1 or 2 words I had altered! “Better to keep progressing slowly than not at all, isn’t it…” Of course. Thank you so much for this common sense reassurance. I lose sight of things sometimes. It’s good to know there are friends to keep me on track! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Sprachjunge Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 7169 days ago 368 posts - 548 votes Speaks: English*, GermanC2 Studies: Spanish, Russian | Message 123 of 146 22 February 2010 at 3:07pm | IP Logged | ||
Thank you for this insightful post, which expressed my conflict much more cleanly than I was able to in my own post! This is precisely it. In mulling it over, my (up to this point, anyhow) natural tendency is to do things all the way or not at all. It has served me pretty well in life, I must say. On the other hand, I think a much more powerful tool would be developing the habit of long-term planning and incremental, but deadly consistent, progress. A quick google calculation shows me that if I just learned 5 Russian words a day for a year, I would have an active vocabulary of 1,825 words, which is just under half of the number of words I'm attempting to learn in Spanish this year. Taking it further, even if I learn a measly 10 Russian words each weekend, that's still 520 words, which is more than 0 words, isn't it? :) But again, you brought it right to the point: I will have to teach myself to enjoy this slower progress, because it is definitely to my benefit on all other fronts to continue with Russian. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Sprachjunge Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 7169 days ago 368 posts - 548 votes Speaks: English*, GermanC2 Studies: Spanish, Russian | Message 124 of 146 22 February 2010 at 7:31pm | IP Logged | ||
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21.02.10 was a Russian day.
Russian: -audio: Podcast from Russlandjournal: 001 “Begrüßen und sich vorstellen“ German: -audio/article: SIL 18.6 “Die Geschichte des Flughafens Tempelhof“ -writing samples on Lang-8: "Die Ermordung einer Butterblume: Teil 1," "Die Ermordung einer Butterblume: Teil 2" Spanish: -audio clip: Audiria #127: “Inscripción a un curso de fotografía” Tiny milestone: Finished Schau ins Land 18.6! Notes: First, again thanks to everyone who basically brought me back down to earth. I will continue with Russian and (try to) stop making a big deal about slower progress. It's called life, Sprachjunge, get used to it. To that end, since Pimsleur was boring me to tears, I found a German podcast that teaches Russian. Bingo! Shorter length (~15 minutes), slower pace than Pimsleur (if that's even possible), and best of all, no English! I'm not saying it's a panacea, but it seems to be a step in the right direction. Also, for the Audiria clips, continuing my "cobbled-together Assimil" comparison, I am now entering the "active wave." I'll still occasionally listen to new ones, but now I'm going to focus on one or two at a time and really attempt to internalize them. I'm sure that will keep me occupied for several months. I also reached the end of my Schau ins Land German audio magazines! That flew by. So, now I'm entering the "active phase" here as well, where the goal is to really internalize 90% of the structures in each article, which means entering them as sentences (we're still going for 10,000, baby!) and internalizing one or two articles per week. That should also keep me busy for a while. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Sprachjunge Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 7169 days ago 368 posts - 548 votes Speaks: English*, GermanC2 Studies: Spanish, Russian | Message 125 of 146 22 February 2010 at 7:35pm | IP Logged | ||
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22.01.10 was (and still is) a Spanish day. (Posting early today.)
Spanish: -audio clips: Audiria: #22 En la biblioteca, #169 Encuentro en la calle -article: “El carnaval de Cádiz” German: -audio clip/article: SIL 18.3: "Die Nachrichten" -study: Input sections 2.3, 2.4 into Anki of "Die Nachrichten" (It's the second article and there are 9 sections--it's the longest article of the edition. ~20 sentences) Russian: -audio clip: Podcast from Russlandjournal: 001 “Begrüßen und sich vorstellen“ 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| joanthemaid Triglot Senior Member France Joined 5474 days ago 483 posts - 559 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Russian, German | Message 126 of 146 22 February 2010 at 7:58pm | IP Logged | ||
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I meant you shouldn't feel bad, sorry
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| Sprachjunge Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 7169 days ago 368 posts - 548 votes Speaks: English*, GermanC2 Studies: Spanish, Russian | Message 127 of 146 25 February 2010 at 7:41am | IP Logged | ||
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Hallo alle zusammen,
später schreibe ich Euch einen schönen Beitrag. Da ich morgen ein Referat über Kafkas ,,Das Urteil'' halte, bin ich momentan damit beschäftigt. Viele Grüße, Sprachjunge Edited by Sprachjunge on 25 February 2010 at 7:42am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| joanthemaid Triglot Senior Member France Joined 5474 days ago 483 posts - 559 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Russian, German | Message 128 of 146 25 February 2010 at 7:46pm | IP Logged | ||
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Und Dir! (dative?)
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