|
 |
Hebrew and other flirtations | ||
Tags: Hebrew | ||
Share with:
| ||
 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Adi Newbie United States Joined 5818 days ago 33 posts - 33 votes Speaks: English* | Message 9 of 30 27 May 2009 at 8:15pm | IP Logged |
|
O.K. so I finished Pimsleur lesson 30, but I'd like to review it later tonight. Besides reviewing the one Pimsleur
lesson, I'm going to focus on understanding and reading Hebrew liturgy with eloquence. I will accomplish this by thoroughly reviewing "Prayerbook Hebrew the Easy Way" and completing the remaining chapters. Following that, I will purchase a new Siddur (hebrew prayerbook) because I've found a new one that is more intuitive. As far as speaking and understanding modern Hebrew, I will work on that after I'm thoroughly comfortable with my reading and comprehension of the Hebrew prayerbook. I don't think this will take too long provided I work 3 hours a day on this. I can already read voweled (I don't know how else to put it--annotated??) Hebrew and also a little bit without vowels, but I read like a kid. I know I can really make a drastic improvement in a matter of days! Oh and one of my other friends has returned from a trip and has agreed to speak only Hebrew to me! 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Adi Newbie United States Joined 5818 days ago 33 posts - 33 votes Speaks: English* | Message 10 of 30 31 May 2009 at 3:01am | IP Logged |
|
Today I finished "Prayerbook Hebrew the Easy Way" and it feels like a huge milestone. I wouldn't say that I read
with eloquence at this point, but I am a great deal better. I'm not sure where to go from here, reading-wise, besides attending the synagogue I've been going to and following along with the liturgy. I'm not at the point where I can read a Hebrew newspaper due to the lack of vowels, but this is a hurdle I can jump over by memorizing modern Hebrew vocabulary. I received a 30 minute Hebrew grammar lesson from a friend of mine. It was immensely helpful. I need to start studying grammar at some point. In the next couple of days it is my goal to start making flash cards of Hebrew words. My thought was to make the flash cards without vowels, but on the reverse side include the voweled word and the meaning so I can get used to reading without vowels. My problem with this is that I don't think I'll be able to sustain my enthusiasm studying just from flash cards. I don't think I'll be able to study for longer than 1 hour per day with flash cards. I still need to pre-order the 3rd installment of Pimsleur and subscribe to this Hebrew podcast thing, but I am a little low on cash so I must hold off for the time being. In other news I've decided to begin studying Russian. I have all three Pimsleur Russian courses and my goal is to complete one per day. I need to go through each pimsleur lesson at least twice to check my pronunciation, so this pace is great for me. I'd also like to acquire the Michel Thomas 8 CD russian set and the advanced one as well, but I'm having difficulty locating these at the library. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Adi Newbie United States Joined 5818 days ago 33 posts - 33 votes Speaks: English* | Message 11 of 30 31 May 2009 at 7:27pm | IP Logged |
|
I wanted to state my goals for this week more explicitly so I'm less likely to slack off.
Hebrew: Spend 1 hour per day making flash cards and reviewing them 2 hours of time reviewing grammar this week. I found all of my Hebrew-learning books and I'll basically be pulling vocabulary from there to memorize with flash cards. Russian: Get through 10 lessons of Pimsleur this week. I'm trying to focus on achieving beautiful pronunciation and I often have to repeat the lessons once or twice. I'm currently on lesson 12 of Pimsleur Russian. I need to repeat it tonight. If I receive extra money: order the Hebrew podcasts, Pimsleur Hebrew, and the Michel Thomas Russian courses as well as a good Russian dictionary and some sort of textbook for grammar study. I will also buy the new Hebrew prayerbook. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Adi Newbie United States Joined 5818 days ago 33 posts - 33 votes Speaks: English* | Message 12 of 30 01 June 2009 at 7:05pm | IP Logged |
|
I did not do any studying yesterday besides repeating PR 1 lesson 12. This morning I fumbled through lesson
13 but I'll have to repeat it twice today most likely. I did have an Israeli visitor and we spoke some Hebrew so I didn't leave language studies completely by the wayside. Learners of Hebrew seem to bemoan the lack of good study materials for this language. I agree that it has been difficult for me to find a decent Modern Hebrew textbook. A few years ago I tried learning with "Modern Hebrew for Beginners" by Esther Raizen and I found it to be awful, despite the good reviews from amazon. I even had a tutor going through the book with me and he thought the book was counter intuitive as well. However, I don't remember why I hated the Raizen book so much, but its here in my house so I'm going to review it and find out why this book was the object of so much disdain. I also have a copy of "Hebrew in 10 Minutes a day" and "Hebrew with Pleasure." There is a thread on this site about language studies in the past, basically what they did to successfully learn languages without ipods, pimsleur, michel thomas, assmil, and the Internet. I think that people who studied languages just had longer attention spans and were able to concentrate more effectively. I can't speak for every language learner of the past, but the older people I am acquainted with who have studied languages seem to have a higher ability of concentration, excellent time management, and less of a need to "have fun" and "be entertained" while learning. My goal is to develop my time management skills, increase my aptitude for concentration on sometimes boring tasks (ehm grammar...) and develop so much enthusiasm for the languages I'm learning that I'm not so dependent on finding learning methods that are fun 100% of the time. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Adi Newbie United States Joined 5818 days ago 33 posts - 33 votes Speaks: English* | Message 13 of 30 02 June 2009 at 6:25pm | IP Logged |
|
Hebrew friend still in town, which makes studying more difficult but he is happy to correct my crappy spoken
Hebrew. Getting through 10 lessons of Pimsleur this week is not going to happen. I feel as though it is important to repeat these lessons tons of times in order to get my pronunciation and accent to match the speakers. I repeated lesson 13 four times, which I've never done before with another Pimsleur lesson. I don't feel that this is a waste of time, although it bores me to tears. I got the extra money needed to purchase some new materials, provided that I eat rice and beans for three weeks and don't do any summer clothes shopping. I think it is definitely worth it--torturing myself for language learning...lol 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Adi Newbie United States Joined 5818 days ago 33 posts - 33 votes Speaks: English* | Message 14 of 30 05 June 2009 at 9:41pm | IP Logged |
|
So my visitor has left and I can return to studying wholeheartedly. I ordered a set of vocabulary cards in Modern
Hebrew, as well as a reader in Biblical Hebrew and its accompanying recording. I was able to find the "Teach Yourself" course for Modern Hebrew at the library so I'm going to begin working through that today. I'm still struggling with Russian pimsleur and I found two "Teach Yourself" Russian courses: One for teaching oneself Cyrillic and the other is a beginners course. Additionally I am studying English and Yiddish, but not as actively as Hebrew or even Russian. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Adi Newbie United States Joined 5818 days ago 33 posts - 33 votes Speaks: English* | Message 15 of 30 07 June 2009 at 2:07am | IP Logged |
|
I finished Chapter 6 of "Teach Yourself Hebrew". I like this course so far. I like that it switches quickly from vowels
and transliteration to non-voweled Hebrew script. I hope this course is going to help me begin to read non- voweled script and begin to memorize spelling of words I already know. My goal is to get through this course this week. I'm not progressing quickly with Pimsleur Russian. My goal this week is to complete 4 lessons and to begin on "Teach Yourself Russian Script". 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Adi Newbie United States Joined 5818 days ago 33 posts - 33 votes Speaks: English* | Message 16 of 30 11 June 2009 at 6:35pm | IP Logged |
|
I think I'm up to Chapter 9 or 10 of Teach Yourself Hebrew. This course has its pluses and minuses, like any
course. I'm using it as a grammar review, for reading practice, a little bit of vocabulary building, and I'm following along with the dialogues. I like that this course tries to switch quickly to non-voweled script; that is unbelievably helpful. I also love that it is accompanied by audio. I've discovered that I'm more of an aural learner. If I hear someone saying a word, it is much easier for me to remember the meaning and begin using the word than If I read it. This is surprising to me that it would be the case in Hebrew, because there is a root (shoresh) and building (binyan) system that makes identification easier when reading. I guess this is why I love Pimsleur so much. I'm only up to unit 16 of Pimsleur Russian 1. I've decided to recommit myself to doing one lesson a day for the next week. I find I have to repeat each lesson a couple of times and then I start to get annoyed, but I'm really aching to make some progress here. 1 person has voted this message useful |
|  | 
Printable version
|
| Copyright 2024 FX Micheloud - All rights reserved No part of this website may be copied by any means without my written authorization. |
