couragepiece93 Groupie United States Joined 5772 days ago 77 posts - 78 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Norwegian, Latin
| Message 1 of 3 27 February 2010 at 3:27am | IP Logged |
I originally started a TAC log in December, but I'm way too unreliable to keep up with that or follow through with my goals, so I deleted it and made this =P.
NORWEGIAN: I've studied Norwegian for a year rather slowly, but over the last few months I've picked up speed, and I'm on Unit 12 of TY Norwegian, only four more to go! I'm spending a year or a semester in Norway either my Junior year in high school (2010-2011) or my Senior year (2011-2012), still haven't decided which, but I have to soon. I feel very confident with the language and can open up some of the Norwegian books I have, such as Kristin Lavransdatter, and understand a lot of it! I'd say I just reached intermediate or so. This is the language I'm most passionate about and the one I spend the most time with.
LATIN: I'm in Latin II now, and started studying it in school this year. I love it, but my only problem is that, unlike Norwegian, I can't read something from my textbook in Latin at a regular pace and understand all of it, I have to go slow and think about it. I need to order some books to supplement my class textbook. Right now I'm around high beginner maybe.
FINNISH: I started this a couple months ago, then didn't do much with it until a few weeks ago. I've been working on mastering the sounds and what not, and I started my TY Finnish book a couple days ago once I felt confident enough with my pronunciation. I love the language! It's so fun to speak.
GERMAN: I wrestled between going with Finnish or German, and Finnish eventually won. However, recent turns of events in my life have prompted me to learn German. The sounds have been harder to learn than the Finnish sounds, but for the most part I think I have them down. The "r" in German is giving me the most trouble. I think I can pronounce it fine, but I'm confused about when to use it as a consonant and when to use it as a vowel. I have a German Dictionary with the IPA for each word, but it sometimes conflicts with what I hear on the audio. For instance, the word "kurz" is said to be pronounced /kʊʁts/ but to me it sounds like /kʊɐts/, same with Schwarz: /ʃvaʁts/ vs. /ʃvaɐts/. If someone could clarify I'd appreciate it! For German I'm currently using the website German-Online.com, and once I'm a few lessons in I'm also going to be using my TY German book.
Wish me luck!
God Natt! Gute Nacht!
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Sprachprofi Nonaglot Senior Member Germany learnlangs.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6474 days ago 2608 posts - 4866 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Esperanto, Greek, Mandarin, Latin, Dutch, Italian Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swahili, Indonesian, Japanese, Modern Hebrew, Portuguese
| Message 2 of 3 27 February 2010 at 9:58am | IP Logged |
Good luck!
What you describe is a common problem with Latin; I'd say at least 90% of students (and
some teachers) have it. Part of it is of course that almost everything we read in Latin
is highly-stylized literature, which has to be savoured a bit more slowly in order to get
all the nuances and stylistic devices. However, part of it is definitely also that
teachers focus too much on grammar and translation technique. The "Lingua Latina" series
of books is a great antidote, as it consists almost exclusively of understandable Latin
text. Check it out! It's hard to find at a book store, but online you can see several
samples and mail-order it. It's definitely worthwhile.
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ellasevia Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2011 Senior Member Germany Joined 6146 days ago 2150 posts - 3229 votes Speaks: English*, German, Croatian, Greek, French, Spanish, Russian, Swedish, Portuguese, Turkish, Italian Studies: Catalan, Persian, Mandarin, Japanese, Romanian, Ukrainian
| Message 3 of 3 28 February 2010 at 9:22pm | IP Logged |
Judging by those dates you gave, we are the same age approximately (15-ish?) and both sophomores in high school, am I correct? Well, I am interested to see how you go about your language studies. Good luck!
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