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Assimil Spanish with Ease - Techniques? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| idiomasaur Diglot Groupie United Kingdom youtube.com/user/idi Joined 5311 days ago 45 posts - 50 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Spanish, Mandarin | Message 1 of 13 22 November 2009 at 10:17am | IP Logged | ||
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I've recently bought Assimil Spanish with Ease, and I'm struggling. Does anyone know any
techniques for using the course. I listen and repeat until I'm comfortable with the dialogues, then I do the exercises, but I find myself unable to produce any of the phrases when tested by another person. However if I read it, I know immediately what it means. Maybe there is something I'm missing? Because I bought TY German, and I'm progressing much faster in that than I am in Assimil Spnanish. Any techniques, hints, or tips would be much appreciated! Thank you, Idiomasaur 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
 emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5342 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes  Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 13 22 November 2009 at 2:02pm | IP Logged | ||
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Assimil is good if you want to learn a few thousand words and internalize most of a language's grammar. At the end of Assimil's second wave, most people will be able to hold simple conversations with native speakers. (The linguist John McWhorter said, "You will be talking like, roughly, an unusually cosmopolitan three-year-old.") And this should not be underrated: the material I learned from Assimil French is "natural" to me, and quite deeply internalized.
But Assimil is designed to work in two "waves": In the first wave, you soak up input passively. In the second wave, you try to turn that passive knowledge into active knowledge. So if you're following the instructions, you're not getting any experience with output before day 50. This was perfectly fine for me (I needed a lot of time to adjust to French phonology and orthography), but it might not be what you want. Note that there are other, non-standard ways to use Assimil, some of which appear to be very good. Search these forums for "shadowing", and you will find lots of instructions on how to start producing output on day 1 of Assimil. It's also possible that your learning style is well-suited to TY, and poorly suited to Assimil. Some people need different things: grammar charts right at the beginning, lots of question-response drills, or immediate output. And one method can't meet all of these needs. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| draoicht Groupie Ireland Joined 6123 days ago 89 posts - 146 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 3 of 13 22 November 2009 at 3:33pm | IP Logged | ||
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Here’s how I use Assimil (it’s based on some methods I’ve read other people on these forums are using)
I’ve edited the audio using Audacity to remove the pauses between sentences, this reduces each lessons audio to about a minute. 1 Listen to the audio, without the book, to see what I can understand, 3 times. 2 Listen to the audio while reading the target language, 3 times. 3 Listen to the audio while reading the English translation, 3 times. 4 Listen to the audio, without the book, 3 times 5 Read the notes Each lesson takes approx. 15 minutes to complete. When I have completed 6 lessons, I have a review session where I listen to them again making sure I understand everything that is being said. (I don’t use the book during this.) If I find I don’t understand a sentence or a phrase, I open the book and review that part. I’m working my way through French With Ease and I have decided to work through the whole book like this and then I will decide if I want to go back and do the active phase. The reason for this is that I’m also doing French in Action and I think that the active phase mightn’t be as necessary. Edit: I have to add that I have completed Michel Thomas so I'm not using Assimil as a complete beginner. Edited by draoicht on 22 November 2009 at 3:45pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Grosse Affe Newbie United States Joined 6646 days ago 32 posts - 47 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 4 of 13 22 November 2009 at 6:29pm | IP Logged | ||
It sounds like you are not using it as intended in waves. If you understand the dialog reading and/or audio, then move on. And don't get stuck if you don't have 100% understanding. Do enough and then move on. You'll be coming back to this stuff again in the second wave. I used to get hung up on trying to understand everything. But it wasn't fun and I didn't progress. Now I move on and try to keep it interesting. I don't get 100% understanding, but volume-wise I'm learning much more this way than before. Everyone seems to have a different opinion of this, so this is must my 2 cents. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| maaku Senior Member United States Joined 5384 days ago 359 posts - 562 votes Speaks: English* | Message 5 of 13 22 November 2009 at 6:55pm | IP Logged | ||
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As others mentioned, you're missing the second wave, that's all. Presumably you haven't gotten to it yet. Don't worry about it as that is exactly the level of understanding you are supposed to have at this stage.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| zenmonkey Bilingual Tetraglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6362 days ago 803 posts - 1119 votes 1 sounds Speaks: EnglishC2*, Spanish*, French, German Studies: Italian, Modern Hebrew | Message 6 of 13 22 November 2009 at 8:28pm | IP Logged | ||
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During the second pass, you can also add SRS and create cards with sentences.
This will help immensely on remembering the learnt lessons over a longer period of time. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| idiomasaur Diglot Groupie United Kingdom youtube.com/user/idi Joined 5311 days ago 45 posts - 50 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Spanish, Mandarin | Message 7 of 13 22 November 2009 at 8:48pm | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks everyone for the advice.
I think I'll try the method mentioned by draoicht. It sounds like a good way for me to progress, learning as much as possible. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Hashimi Senior Member Oman Joined 6069 days ago 362 posts - 529 votes Speaks: Arabic (Written)* Studies: English, Japanese | Message 8 of 13 23 November 2009 at 8:58pm | IP Logged | ||
I totally agree with this. SRS should be in the production model. i.e. the question is a sentence in your native language (or English), the answer in Spanish. When you see the question you try to translate the sentence (mentally or aloud) to Spanish then compare it with the answer. Assimil + SRS + Shadowing = guaranteed ability to produce phrases in your target language. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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