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Cordelia’s RUSSIAN | ||
Tags: Russian | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
 Jiwon Triglot Moderator Korea, South Joined 6438 days ago 1417 posts - 1500 votes  Speaks: EnglishC2, Korean*, GermanC1 Studies: Hindi, Spanish Personal Language Map | Message 9 of 19 07 August 2009 at 8:30pm | IP Logged | ||
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Mmm.. seeing your log and your situation, maybe it's better to comletely abandon German and Esperanto for now, rather than stress yourself over it. You'll feel much more productive that way as you only focus on one language.
It's what I found out myself too... but I found it out the hard way.. when I could have just taken the wise words of the administrator... :) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| lloydkirk Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6415 days ago 429 posts - 452 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Russian | Message 10 of 19 07 August 2009 at 11:44pm | IP Logged | ||
Hey cordelia, I'm studying Russian too. It's a lovely language, isn't it? I don't know what methods would be best for you(as only you can know that), but initiating the study of new language with vocabulary memorization and word lists seems terribly inefficient, needless to say boring. If you would like to start off with a solely audio course, michel thomas russian is far superior to pimsleur and moves rather quickly. Assimil 1951 Russian Without Toil would be a good followup course. Really, doing those two would build a good enough foundation to venture off into native russian materials. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| krog Diglot Senior Member Austria Joined 6051 days ago 146 posts - 152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Latin | Message 11 of 19 08 August 2009 at 8:45am | IP Logged | ||
Some grammar books for German:
'English Grammar for Students of German' is fairly basic grammar explained explicitly in terms of English i.e. if you don't quite understand English grammar, or rather, struggle with the jargon, this book is very helpful in that it makes it very clear how something works in English. 'Schaum's Outlines German Grammar' involves filling in scores of exercises, which may or may not be your cup of tea, but which I think has really helped me a lot (I did about one-third of it in April when I was in England and I felt that I could speak more fluently afterwards, because I wasn't grasping for the correct case quite so much). 'Essential German Grammar' is very well laid-out and explains things very clearly. If only I'd bought it about five years ago... ... As for doing three languages at once - you don't want to bite off more than you can chew. One of my mates always used to try to get me into poker, but I always refused, because I knew that if I got into it and wanted to be any good at it, it would eat up all my time, and if it turned out not to be that interesting then it wouldn't be worth doing. I don't think Esperanto is a problem, because, theoretically, you don't need to spend much time on it. Say, half-an-hour a day? Then maybe you could choose which out of German and Russian is the most important, concentrate on one of them, and just spend some time each day listening to the other to keep your hand in. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Tupiniquim Senior Member Brazil Joined 6085 days ago 184 posts - 217 votes Speaks: Portuguese* Studies: English, Russian | Message 12 of 19 08 August 2009 at 2:38pm | IP Logged | ||
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Lycka till med loggen. Jag ska följa den för jag hoppas att börja med tyska så snart som möjligt.
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| tricoteuse Pentaglot Senior Member Norway littlang.blogspot.co Joined 6680 days ago 745 posts - 845 votes Speaks: Swedish*, Norwegian, EnglishC1, Russian, French Studies: Ukrainian, Bulgarian | Message 13 of 19 09 August 2009 at 3:00pm | IP Logged | ||
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Hello! Thanks for the mention :-) Russian spelling is harder than people pretend it is, but I always thought the hardest part was understanding spoken Russian. Speaking of mind maps there are some interesting patterns in this book, http://gigapedia.com/items/44008/the-evelyn-wood-seven-day-s peed-reading-and-learning-program
I would also recommend focusing on Russian, or else you may spend your whole life on it :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| cordelia0507 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5840 days ago 1473 posts - 2176 votes Speaks: Swedish* Studies: German, Russian | Message 14 of 19 12 August 2009 at 2:09am | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks for the comments Tricoteuse and also the advice from Jiwon, Krog, Lloyd and Tupiniquim. I've been really busy hence the gap in updating... I will comment and follow up on other logs later on.
´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´ ´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´´ ´´´´´´´´ I am making pretty fast progress with Russian at the moment, trying to use spare time to cram Russian vocabulary and grammar. Today I listened to Sofia Rotaro (Russian Madonna...) on my iPod and I was able to understand without trouble what the songs were about, and some sentences in full here and there. This is because she uses very simple words, predictable lyrics and sings very clearly. 
One of the benefits of having learnt a few languages before, and of being older and wiser is that you know what your weak-spots and potential pitfalls are. I tend to be distracted and start lagging if something seems very illogical and makes no sense. This makes me angry and frustrated.. Unfortunately a lot of grammar and spelling is illogical to some degree, so this disposition is a problem in a language learner. Being aware of this weakness I am making a deliberate effort not to worry about the grammar and spelling that makes no sense to me. I just memorize it anyway, and hope that it will start making sense further on. This has happened some of the grammar already. Since I am *very* easily bored (has always been a problem for me) I try to vary my material and methods as much as I can. Another concrete language weakness of mine is that I never learn the numbers properly. In several languages that I can understand reasonably and speak a bit too, I still seriously struggle with the large numbers. This is very obvious in French. (like Lizz I suffer from school paranoia relating to my tsecond foreign language, which was French) 
But now, LIKE A MIRACLE (or due to my strategy, rather!) I can read out ANY Russian number with complete confidence and I can listen to readings of long lists of numbers like 3,256,892; 98,254 and get them down without any mistakes. Hurrah for me! No waitress or sales assistant in Russia is going to have a laugh or sigh in frustration on account of me! I still haven't settled on a learning methodology and I haven't had time to read up on the information from Iversen's log. But my current "no-method" method is bearing fruit already, so there is no immediate urgency. I don't believe in miracle strategies anyway. Cramming and persistence is what will really get you there, topped with plenty of exposure via music, films and travel. Ideally interaction with native speakers, if possible. After testing them, I have nothing against Michel Thomas and Pimsleur, but the knowledge you get from those are a drop in the ocean... Mainly I am following the Swedish course (Ryska för gymnasieskolan) and cramming verbs and nouns in Anki. Oh and I bought a UK course called "Ruslan", just because someone I know knows the author of the book. More on that later. As soon as it feels meaningful I'll start reading easy books. I am already going to start watching some films, with or without subtitles depending on availability. 
This evening I've visited a certain Russian media site and.... acquired.... some old Russian comedies from the 60s-70s, like Russian Three musketeers and the Sjurik films etc). I vaguely remember seeing those on TV in Sweden and elsewhere. It will be fun to watch them again. Supposedly Russian comedies are the best films for learners since the vocabulary is easy and there is plenty of very slow talking. I am also downloading some Russian Sci-fi films, the old version of War and Peace, Master and Margarita, Brother 1 and 2 and some war films. If you know of any good Russian films, particularly recent ones, please let me know! Edited by cordelia0507 on 12 August 2009 at 2:49am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| krog Diglot Senior Member Austria Joined 6051 days ago 146 posts - 152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Latin | Message 15 of 19 12 August 2009 at 8:09am | IP Logged | ||
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'Stalker'.
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| tricoteuse Pentaglot Senior Member Norway littlang.blogspot.co Joined 6680 days ago 745 posts - 845 votes Speaks: Swedish*, Norwegian, EnglishC1, Russian, French Studies: Ukrainian, Bulgarian | Message 16 of 19 12 August 2009 at 9:18am | IP Logged | ||
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What Russian site was that? ;) I'm also interested in some movies!
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