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German and I | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| TreoPaul Senior Member United States Joined 6273 days ago 121 posts - 118 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 1 of 16 26 September 2007 at 12:51pm | IP Logged | ||
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I've long been lucky to be able to learn things almost without effort.I seemed to absorb knowledge others struggled to learn.
Deciding to learn German has been my comeuppance. Perhaps it is my age -- knocking on the door to 50 -- or my health, or just that languages are not my forte. Thankfully I seem to have at least a modicum of motivation, and have been plugging away at it for nearly a year, spending at least an hour a day (often much more) in pursuit of this new skill. I'm not exactly sure why I've decided to start this log. I hope it does not grow into a procrastination outlet of time better spent studying. Better I hope that stopping in from time to time to post my goals, steps, and mis-steps for all to see will be an inspiration to plug away harder, or at least smarter, toward my goal of acquiring daily conversational skills in the German language. Edited by TreoPaul on 27 September 2007 at 9:21am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| TreoPaul Senior Member United States Joined 6273 days ago 121 posts - 118 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 2 of 16 27 September 2007 at 9:34am | IP Logged | ||
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This is about as close as I can pinpoint to being the one-year mark from my deciding to learn German. My motivation was both common an unique: a pretty girl. However this is not a romantic interest but a paternal. Last summer a German High School student came to stay with us for a month. She was very shy, and in fact we wondered if she might dislike us. However, upon her return to Germany she started to email daily. In the following months a bond between our family and her grew, and today I consider her to be my "German Daughter."
Back to the present-- yesterday's German studies -- I had to fit it in where I could since my wife went to see Paula Prentis in a local theater production. 20 mins: Drilled vocabulary with 200-words-a-day German 60 mins: Read aloud from German "Harry Potter" 100 mins: Listen/responded to "learn in your car German" Neglected: Supermemo(Twinkle) wordlist Assimil German Edited by TreoPaul on 27 September 2007 at 9:34am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| TreoPaul Senior Member United States Joined 6273 days ago 121 posts - 118 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 3 of 16 27 September 2007 at 1:30pm | IP Logged | ||
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Since this is my little place in the forums, I'd like to thank those member's who's posts I've most appreciated: FSI, Linguamor, Sprachprofi, and leosmith
It is to be noted that it is not the frequency of the posts, nor the length of a post that deems its value. An ego of any size adds no weight. Superiority of thought is demonstrated, not announced. Edited by TreoPaul on 27 September 2007 at 1:31pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| TreoPaul Senior Member United States Joined 6273 days ago 121 posts - 118 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 4 of 16 28 September 2007 at 8:02pm | IP Logged | ||
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After browsing a few active discussions I want to expand on my first post where I lament that learning German has been far more difficult than falling off a log. I'm not trying to make any sort of excuse regarding age or health. I'm sure I'm learning faster than some, and slower than others. What I perceive as possible hurdles are the things that make me determined to plug along.
Yesterday, though I did almost no studying, was an important day for my language learning. I went to the funeral of a dear old friend, some 30 years my senior. The remarkable thing about this fellow was his neverending thirst for learning. Yesterday I discovered that in his last year of life, after having been diagnosed with a fatal, degenerative brain disease, he decided to learn Chinese. Though he lost his battle against the disease, he studied Chinese. In the course of his last year of life he only learned to count to ten, such was the impact of the disease on his formerly brilliant mind. But he learned to count to 10. He gave it his all, he didn't say "I'm not going to study because ...' I'm not saying this terribly well, but he did more with his deteriorating mind at age 77 than some with the blessing of health in the prime of life. I found it profoundly inspirational. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| glossa.passion Triglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6264 days ago 267 posts - 349 votes 1 sounds Speaks: German*, EnglishC1, Danish Studies: Spanish, Dutch | Message 5 of 16 30 September 2007 at 4:59pm | IP Logged | ||
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What a nice reason to learn German ... welcome to my native tongue. And you just taught me a new English word "comeuppance"! I'm 47 and feel by far not too old to learn a language...
Writing a language learning log has helped me to think more about what I'm doing and why I do it. In one of my courses I read: "Reflecting & keeping a log – You don’t know what you mean before you say or write what you think. When you are learning something new, it is important for you to reflect on what you are doing. It enhances your learning." So good luck with your studies. Viel Glück und viel Vergnügen :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| TreoPaul Senior Member United States Joined 6273 days ago 121 posts - 118 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 6 of 16 05 October 2007 at 8:26pm | IP Logged | ||
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Glossa: Thank you for the words of encouragement.
Alas the last few days have been a bit of a language-acquisition vacation. I've been using Harry Potter as part of my progarm, and got a bit Potter-crazy and read the entire series in English this week. Now back to German!! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| TreoPaul Senior Member United States Joined 6273 days ago 121 posts - 118 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 7 of 16 17 October 2007 at 7:15pm | IP Logged | ||
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Today I was wondering how many visits to how-to-learn-any-language.com it will take before I can understand and speak excellent German.
After all, I am sure the time I spend here reading/writing English is far more productive than actually working with the target language. Of course I'm tongue-in-cheek, but I do have a bad habit of spending too much time looking for tips and tools when I should be working with what I already have. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| patuco Diglot Moderator Gibraltar Joined 6958 days ago 3795 posts - 4268 votes Speaks: Spanish, English* Personal Language Map | Message 8 of 16 18 October 2007 at 6:34am | IP Logged | ||
Don't worry, it happens to all of us! ;-) 1 person has voted this message useful |
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