czech Senior Member United States Joined 7110 days ago 395 posts - 378 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Studies: English*
| Message 33 of 68 10 August 2005 at 10:10pm | IP Logged |
In Basic Spanish it's very easy to know when you've mastered the grammatical discussion and exercises, but I think the hardest part is knowing when you've got the pattern sentences down. Any tips on this? I mean, you're giving 6 in the Replacement section and 6 structures (sometimes 2 phrases) in the Variation part. All of these varied into 7 more. So this is a total of 96 sentences. I always make the right response but you never know if you've overlearned it well enough for free conversation.
By the way Luke, did you purchase levels 3 and 4 from Platiquemos?
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czech Senior Member United States Joined 7110 days ago 395 posts - 378 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Studies: English*
| Message 34 of 68 11 August 2005 at 8:07pm | IP Logged |
I've just noticed another difference between Basic and
Programmatic. I looked through the course contents on Multilingual Books, and I see that Programmatic only introduces 4 intonation patterns? In Basic there are many, starting in Unit 12, and going up through lesson 20 or so. So what is in that phonology section of PS?
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luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7121 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French
| Message 35 of 68 12 August 2005 at 4:12am | IP Logged |
Quote:
what is in that phonology section of PS? |
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Pronunciation, vowel elision, syllabication, consonant
production, awareness of the Spanish phonetic writing
system, accent rules, vocal rhythm. I don't recall BS
distinguishing between formal and informal question
intonation. PS turns on that light. BS covers a lot
of intonation patterns that aren't in PS.
The PS dialogs are slowed down when they are
introduced. They are reviewed in the two following
lessons and the pace is faster. One can speed up the
tempo of the original dialog and some exercises by
13-25% with a tool like Audacity if a drill that was
probably slowed down in the first place gets boring.
czech wrote:
In the Variation part I always make the right response
but you never know if you've overlearned it well enough
for free conversation. |
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It sounds like you have the variations down. If I'm
having difficulty with a variation, I'll make up
several of my own sentences. For instance, if the
pattern is, "There's a restaurant up ahead", and my
natural instinct is to say the phrase in a different
word order than the recording - which is probably still
okay, but perhaps not the word order a native might
choose - I'll also make up phrases like "There are some
buildings up ahead", "cars", "people", etc.
I bought the digital download version of Platiquemos.
I use its books and conversation stimulus regularly,
in addition to the recordings from Barrons.
Edited by luke on 12 August 2005 at 4:15am
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czech Senior Member United States Joined 7110 days ago 395 posts - 378 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Studies: English*
| Message 36 of 68 18 August 2005 at 11:09am | IP Logged |
Luke, how have you found memorizing the dialogs from PS and BS at the same time?
Also, what tenses are covered in each volume? I can't seem to detect that in the contents section of Multilingual Books. I know starts with the preterit.
Edited by czech on 18 August 2005 at 11:13am
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luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7121 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French
| Message 37 of 68 18 August 2005 at 6:21pm | IP Logged |
The PS dialogs are shorter and I have the first 25 or
so pretty much memorized. That's about 7.5 minutes of
pure dialog (no pauses) for the first 1/2 of PS. I
haven't put as much effort into memorizing the BS
dialogs, though I'm starting to. The dialogs for the
first 1/2 of BS is closer to 22 minutes of pure dialog.
If one was to add in the Platiquemos conversational
stimulus dialogs, it would probably be close to an hour
of pure dialog.
PS covers most of the popular verb tenses. The table
of contents are at
http://multilingualbooks.com/fsi-progspan2.html
and
http://multilingualbooks.com/fsi-progspan3.html
If you make a list of all the tenses covered, post it.
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czech Senior Member United States Joined 7110 days ago 395 posts - 378 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Studies: English*
| Message 38 of 68 07 September 2005 at 4:12pm | IP Logged |
I figure I have to do each Variation/ Replacement drill 18 times, this will make it automatic.
At the FSI, they spend 11 hours per unit. That calculates out right if they spend the time equally spread out over dialogs, grammar, and pattern sentences.
This is a lot of work, I'll have to take my time, I want to be fluent by the last lesson.
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Andy E Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 7019 days ago 1651 posts - 1939 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: English*, Spanish, French
| Message 39 of 68 08 September 2005 at 3:12am | IP Logged |
czech wrote:
I figure I have to do each Variation/ Replacement drill 18 times, this will make it automatic.
At the FSI, they spend 11 hours per unit. That calculates out right if they spend the time equally spread out over dialogs, grammar, and pattern sentences.
This is a lot of work, I'll have to take my time, I want to be fluent by the last lesson. |
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I have a question for you. I note from your post on another thread here that you review previous lessons with the book (as do I) and that you consider yourself bored with it by the time you redo the audio.
Do you find when doing these drills so many times that you find the answer to the next drill question is in your head before the prompt?
My motive for the question is because I specifically stopped doing the Platiquemos drills a set number of times for this very reason.
My concern is that repetition for automaticity is an excellent method but that the point of the drills is to ensure that when you hear Prompt B you can quickly and accurately formulate Answer B and not to ensure that Answer B has automatically popped into your head because you know it follows the Prompt A / Answer A combination. In the latter case you are providing the answer without actually properly hearing the question at all because you've done it so many times.
I am now using this as a way of knowing when I'm "done" with a drill. If I find that I am starting to memorise the questions and answers in a particular order then I move on to the next drill. What do others who are doing FSI programs think?
Andy
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Dandy Newbie Joined 6458 days ago 6 posts - 8 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 40 of 68 19 February 2007 at 1:28pm | IP Logged |
If a person were to complete FSI Programmatic Spanish and also complete Vocabulearn or Penton's Spanish 24, would he be further along than completing FSI Basic Spanish. I'm trying to decide my course of action after Pimsleur. I already own Penton's Spanish 24. I now have access to programmatic and basic.
Dandy
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