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Spanish with a Lil’ Bit of Japanese | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| MmeFleiss Diglot Groupie United States Joined 5986 days ago 58 posts - 72 votes  Speaks: English*, Tagalog Studies: Japanese, French, Spanish | Message 1 of 20 10 July 2008 at 2:34pm | IP Logged |
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I suppose I should start this journal by giving a general idea of my current Spanish level. I took 2 years of Spanish in high school, can get the gist of what they say at my local Spanish station, and can guess enough words to follow along with the first Harry Potter book. I think Wikipedia states that 40% of Tagalog is made up of Spanish loanwords, and I happen to know a good amount of Latin-based English words, which I think really helps. Unfortunately, since I rely so much on guesswork, I have trouble actually saying anything in Spanish.
My goal is to be able to use Spanish in a business setting, so I've been studying it semi-seriously for the past few months. I started out with Pimsleur Spanish, which I completed up to volume II Lesson 16 before getting frustrated and giving up (I have a lot of trouble remembering vocabulary when I don't read them). I've also managed to work halfway through with the advanced level of Michel Thomas (which I adore, although I wish the foundation course was longer so that the last three CDs wouldn't be so rushed; I have the urge to constantly review those sections since I don't feel like I've retained them as well as I should have--perhaps I should do the review cds with a transcript?), am using My Spanish Coach on my DS during my train ride home, doing the occasional lesson on Rosetta Stone V3 on days that I don't feel like doing anything else (which thankfully stopped using the present progressive for everything in the first few lesson of the Spanish version, though it puzzles me why they continued using it for the Japanese when you're also more likely to use simple present), and I'm using Assimil Spanish with Ease for my main text. I'm currently on lesson 18 of that one, and I'm following the popular suggestion of shadowing the text (although only after I understand the meaning), typing the dialogue on an SRS, and using scriptorium when I do my daily SRS review. I've also decided to follow the directions of the old Assimil texts and am reviewing the previous 4 lessons before working on the current one. Rather than do a passive and an active wave, I've decided to do two active waves instead since I'm able to understand the text already on my own given enough time to think it through and maybe with a couple of peeks at the the English page for unfamiliar vocabulary. As the sentences have been getting longer and more complicated though, it's been getting harder and harder to read the English text and translate it in time to shadow along with the Spanish CD without having to pause the audio. I'm not quite sure if I'm just misunderstanding the advice I've read on this forum, or I simply need to get better at memorizing the text before moving on. I think I've read that some people shadow without looking at the book at all, but I need the text to remind me what the next line is about. My memory, unfortunately, is just not that good. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| MmeFleiss Diglot Groupie United States Joined 5986 days ago 58 posts - 72 votes Speaks: English*, Tagalog Studies: Japanese, French, Spanish | Message 2 of 20 12 July 2008 at 10:22pm | IP Logged |
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Today I haven't really been in the mood to study, so I decided to just do the second half of Rosetta Stone Spanish unit 1, play My Spanish Coach on the DS, and do today's stack on the SRS. I'm not quite sure why I haven't been in the mood to work more on Assimil (I've only managed to do two lessons this past week), because I've really been quite pleased with my progress--the few random times the dialogue popped into my head today, I had no trouble saying them smoothly and translating them in my head simultaneously.
I've even noticed that some of the new vocab I've learned from it has helped my Spanish comprehension to shoot up a bit when my mom and I went to a Spanish/Brazilian neighborhood for lunch today (Although I had some trouble understanding our waitress, but it could also be because she was most likely speaking to us in Portuguese; it was a bit too noisy for me to tell for sure). I've also decided to get some manga today in Spanish since it worked so well in helping me learn colloquial Japanese. I found a series that I helped scanlate from Japanese to English years ago, so it was pretty amusing seeing it in another language. I wish I could find more shoujo manga, though. The setting for those tend to be more realistic; I bet they'd be a lot more helpful for learning conversational Spanish. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| MmeFleiss Diglot Groupie United States Joined 5986 days ago 58 posts - 72 votes Speaks: English*, Tagalog Studies: Japanese, French, Spanish | Message 3 of 20 20 October 2008 at 9:39am | IP Logged |
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Unfortunately, school has been sucking up a lot of my free time, so language learning has been sort of put into the back burner. My interest in Japanese has also been higher than Spanish recently (probably from all the Japanese dramas I watched during August) and so I've been doing Japanese Rosetta Stone ver. 3 for the past month. I don't really have much time for much else at the moment, unfortunately.
I took six semesters of Japanese in college and lived there for a year, so I'm using RS mainly for vocab building since I seem to have forgotten quite a bit. I honestly can't imagine anyone without some background in Japanese (especially grammar) getting much out of it. Pros: Besides drilling the user on basic nouns and verb, I think it's really great that they spend quite a bit of time on Japanese counters and as of level 1 lesson 3 or so, began to slowly add days of the month. I've always found those two things to be quite tricky to remember, and I have yet to see a textbook that sufficiently drills a person on both. The drills on tha various ways to say "to wear" is also really nice. Cons: They use present progressive a lot for about the first half of level one, which--like Spanish--don't get used enough to be introduced first. Also, I think Japanese suffers a bit from the cookie cutter approach since you get to practice phrases like お元気ですか and さようなら a lot, even though you're not likely to say either one all that much in conversation. Edited by MmeFleiss on 20 October 2008 at 9:43am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| MmeFleiss Diglot Groupie United States Joined 5986 days ago 58 posts - 72 votes Speaks: English*, Tagalog Studies: Japanese, French, Spanish | Message 4 of 20 05 November 2008 at 1:56pm | IP Logged |
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I'm almost done with level one of Rosetta Stone, and I continue to be quite pleased with my progress. I attempted to use Livemocha for Japanese at the intermediate level, but I found it to be disappointingly easy, so I doubt I'll try it in that language again. I thought the writing exercises, at least, would be good practice; however, there doesn't seem to be any native speakers for that particular language to make corrections, so I find it kinda pointless as a way to improve. I hope I can get back to Spanish soon and try those writing exercises using that.
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| MmeFleiss Diglot Groupie United States Joined 5986 days ago 58 posts - 72 votes Speaks: English*, Tagalog Studies: Japanese, French, Spanish | Message 5 of 20 09 November 2008 at 9:49am | IP Logged |
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I've oficially finished level 1 of Rosetta stone and worked on the 1st core lesson of level 2 yesterday. I'm still a bit confused when to read/use 開いています as "hiraite imasu" or "aite imasu" since the program uses both, but when I check the furigana it is always "aite imasu" (which is the one I remember learning in my textbook years ago). I wonder if they're fully interchangeable.
Also, I got excited about halfway through level one when they started adding days of the month in the vocabulary, but they seem to have forgotten it since. I wonder if it'll remember to cover the other odd ones at some point. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Aquedita Triglot Senior Member Poland myspace.com/aqueda_v Joined 6018 days ago 154 posts - 164 votes Speaks: Polish*, English, Japanese Studies: Mandarin | Message 6 of 20 09 November 2008 at 12:34pm | IP Logged |
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The difference between "hiraite imasu" or "aite imasu":
-> 雨戸が開かない.(AKANAI) The shutters will not open. -> その店は午前8時に開きます. The store opens (starts) at 8 a.m. -> 公園の桜の花が開いた. (HIRAITA) The cherry blossoms in the park have come out. -> パーティーを開く give a party -> 会議 / コンサート / オリンピックを開く hold a meeting/concert/Olympics So AKU may be literal while HIRAKU can mean to hold/give some organized event. Hope this helps somehow, I'm not good in explaining grammar. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| MmeFleiss Diglot Groupie United States Joined 5986 days ago 58 posts - 72 votes Speaks: English*, Tagalog Studies: Japanese, French, Spanish | Message 7 of 20 21 November 2008 at 4:33pm | IP Logged |
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Thank you very much, Aquedita, for your help. I'm sorry for the late reply, but I didn't realize that someone had actually answered my question!
Anyway, this log in now officially misnamed, since I've decided to put aside Japanese and Spanish for the moment in favor of French. The language selection isn't all that arbitrary--I'm going to take a European cruise with my family next summer, and while I know I'll be able to get by just fine in Spanish and Italian, previous experience has taught me that French is a different matter entirely. I stayed for a month in Brittany a few years ago for my TEFL certification with only the traveler's edition of Pimsleur French under my belt (basically the first 16 lesson of level one). Although I mastered those lessons quite well, they really weren't enough for me to do much of anything unless I planned on ordering a lot of wine. So I started off with some Michel Thomas two weeks ago. I'm loving it, although I'm probably the only one who misses the "slow" male from the Spanish Foundation Course. I just found him so entertaining, and the lady in the French just does not compare. I'm taking my time with it since I don't think that grammar is something that should be rushed, so I do half a CD when I do work on it. I recieved my copy of Assimil French With Ease from Amazon two days ago, and was disappointed to have got the newest version rather than the sturdier 1990s incarnate (the binding and the packaging the new one came in just makes me cringe). However, the content is the same, so I guess it doesn't really matter. I'm continuing on with watching French in Action, though I skipped a couple of days due to my class schedule. I've also been listening on and off to French radio and even "read" the Slow Step manga, which has really consolidated certain words in my mind like "lunettes" and "l'andouille." Understandably, I didn't know enough vocab to actually get the ending and had to look up spoilers posted online. Still, it was a fun way to get some exposure to more casual conversation, and I plan on "reading" more manga in French in the future. I'm thinking of doing Gokusen next. Once I'm much farther with Assimil, I hope to do some listening-reading with Harry Potter et le prissonier d'Azkaban. I managed to buy a copy of it from my library's book sale for fifty cents way before I even planned on studying French, and I figure that there's no point in letting it go to waste, right? :) But that is still far, far off! Edited by MmeFleiss on 21 November 2008 at 4:51pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| MmeFleiss Diglot Groupie United States Joined 5986 days ago 58 posts - 72 votes Speaks: English*, Tagalog Studies: Japanese, French, Spanish | Message 8 of 20 27 November 2008 at 3:10pm | IP Logged |
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I finally got around to finishing CD4 of Michel Thomas French, and so far I'm pretty happy with my progress with that. I've also been pretty good about watching an episode of French in Action per day and have finally gotten to the parts where Mireille and Robert officially meet. I must admit I've developed a soft spot for her bratty little sister Marie-Laure and the Cassanova-wannabee Jean-Pierre, possibly more so than the main characters themselves! There are some parts, usually more during the segment in the episodes where the earlier scene get explained, that I'm amazed that I can follow along what the people are saying despite my extremely limited vocabulary. I must say that's a real confidence booster. On the other hand, I managed to find three graded readers online where I was totally lost on the very first page. Can't get too big of an ego with my progress after all, I guess. :)
I haven't progressed much with Assimil, only getting as far as lesson five (although I listen to those five lessons pretty often while driving); however, since I'm doing it in conjunction with the programs above and also Learn in Your Car French during my drive to school, I don't feel too bad about it. I think I'm still gaining vocabulary at a fairly decent pace. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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