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The intermediate plateau | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| clang Groupie United States Joined 5338 days ago 54 posts - 82 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Russian, Italian | Message 1 of 3 22 April 2010 at 10:44am | IP Logged |
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For your reference: I'm a Peace Corps Volunteer. Long story short, I was placed in a Russian speaking site and
therefore in the Russian language track. I knew nothing about the language, but being the language learning enthusiast I am, I jumped in head first. The PC language system, from what I've read, is amazing by American standards. After 8 weeks, I tested at Intermediate Low ACTFL (A2 equivalent) and after 8 months I tested at Advanced Low ACTFL (B1/B2). Anyway, I'm not sure those tests mean much, but I thought they would give anyone reading a little background. My problem now is that I'm not sure how to move up to the next level. I feel like I've been on a diet where it was easy to lose the first 5 lbs, but the next 15 are going to be a lot harder. Really, the workout analogy makes the most sense to me right now, like I need to shake things up, focus on muscle confusion or something. My concrete question: How do I take advantage of my full immersion situation to move from a solid intermediate level to a more advanced/professional level? I know and understand the case system and I have a decent vocabulary (which I spend most of my language time working to improve). One of my problems, however, is internalizing the case system so that it comes out more naturally and feels less like one big math problem. I always learn verbs in their aspectual pairs and make sure to memorize associated cases, i.e. видеть/увидеть кого/что. I spend my day talking to people at work and to the family I live with, so simply "talking more" won't exactly help. I feel that I've reached a plateau where it is going to take something new to bring it to the next level. I just don't know what that is. I would love any suggestions! Edited by clang on 22 April 2010 at 11:00am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| clang Groupie United States Joined 5338 days ago 54 posts - 82 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Russian, Italian | Message 2 of 3 22 April 2010 at 10:46am | IP Logged |
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Also, I cannot handle how it says I "speak Russian" in my profile. I study it, I study it!
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| Teango Triglot Winner TAC 2010 & 2012 Senior Member United States teango.wordpress.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5555 days ago 2210 posts - 3734 votes Speaks: English*, German, Russian Studies: Hawaiian, French, Toki Pona | Message 3 of 3 22 April 2010 at 3:24pm | IP Logged |
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I really like your workout analogy. Those first wonderful initial gains in language learning are indeed quite similar to the first few weeks down the gym. It's very motivating to see this at first, but what should you do when you hit the infamous plateau and on some weeks you even put on the odd pound or two?
Luckily I have an answer for this. One of many, as I'm sure other members much more experienced than I will have even better perspectives on this, but I'll try to still fit within this analogy all the same. When a lot of people I know hit the plateau in strength or fitness training, they do the following: 1. Find better ways to measure and record small improvements every week, often in a log or diary. This shows you that you ARE making progress, but at latter stages these little positive steps forward become almost unnoticeable at short range because language learning yields inversely exponential gains. 2. Aim to push a little bit harder once you start feeling too comfortable. If you just keep doing the same thing over and over again, you may progress a little over several years, but it's often more likely that you'll just maintain your core gains so far. Pushing just a little bit more every now and again (but not moving completely out of your comfort zone of course) ensures that you're optimising your workout to best benefit you. 3. You already mentioned this one...mix it up a little. This one again relates to comfort zones as you might have guessed. The brain is an amazing thing, able to quickly adapt to and automatise a whole library of initially incredibly difficult routines. You need to try and feed it lots of new and engaging and challenging activities, because if you don't, you'll find it quickly dulls and rusts like an old knife and loses all its wonderful sharpness. If the whole brain is in top shape, then you'll progress so much quicker. So on the basis of these three tips, I'd heartily recommend in language learning that you: 1) start a learning log here on the forum. When logs are public, it's much more motivational, and other members can provide some really useful advice and support along the way; 2) start reading as much as you can, beginning with easier books, and once you become comfortable with these, progressing up the scale to more demanding texts and literature; 3) make a long extensive list of all the possible passive, active and interactive pursuits you could try out to help advance you along your way in learning Russian. Try to keep these fun as much as possible, and when you finally have your pik 'n' mix bag ready, reach in and start playing and trying out new sweet activities on a more regular basis. Udachi! Edited by Teango on 22 April 2010 at 6:35pm 4 persons have voted this message useful |
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