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FSI - What do you do? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies |  | |
| msmamba Newbie United States wanderlustwhispers.wRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5124 days ago 18 posts - 20 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Spanish | Message 1 of 7 23 June 2010 at 12:43am | IP Logged |
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I've been working with FSI Spanish for a few weeks now and I'm a bit frustrated. I've given up on Programmatic as it's so dull it's unbearable for me. I'm continuing with Basic but find the drills incredibly boring and sometimes confusing(although I still do them). Lately I've been doing about a unit per week focusing on the vocabulary of each unit, replaying the dialogue over and over and making flashcards of the new words. Can someone please tell me the best way to approach this Basic Course? How much time should I spend per unit? How essential are the drills? Any input on this course is greatly appreciated..
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| Andy E Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6917 days ago 1651 posts - 1939 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish, French | Message 2 of 7 23 June 2010 at 8:33am | IP Logged |
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I think you need to decide if the FSI way of learning is actually for you...
A search on this site will find some polarised opinion on its effectiveness. Some find the drilling useless, boring and ineffective, others essential. Personally, I think it's down to learning style. I fall somewhere in the middle, so I have used FSI (in my case Platiqeumos) drills to improve areas of weakness and found them extremely effective. For the drills, I have one simple rule - when it's done, it's done. If I do a drill flawlessly without (apparent) thought or hesitation, I move on. I see no point in doing it 17 times, if I got it the first. You might want to take a look at Assimil. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| msmamba Newbie United States wanderlustwhispers.wRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5124 days ago 18 posts - 20 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Spanish | Message 3 of 7 23 June 2010 at 11:55am | IP Logged |
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Thank you! I haven't considered the issue of learning styles and now think my learning style may not "mesh" with FSI drills at all. I think I will try it once more while definitely taking a look at the Assimil program. Thanks again!
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| plaidchuck Diglot Groupie United States facebook.com/plaidchRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5119 days ago 71 posts - 93 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish | Message 4 of 7 24 June 2010 at 12:41am | IP Logged |
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I did most of FSI Basic in a straight forward way.. simply going through the drills and repeated them if I had trouble. Looking back I thought the tense and person-number substitution drills were very helpful as they seemed to drill conjugations and grammar into my head. The dialogue drills were okay as they helped your phrasing and pronunciation (although many of the speakers spoke too fast) although now I would approach the dialogues in an Assimil way. I did find the dialogue drills useful in the car as long as I knew what the material meant beforehand.
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| msmamba Newbie United States wanderlustwhispers.wRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5124 days ago 18 posts - 20 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Spanish | Message 5 of 7 24 June 2010 at 1:23am | IP Logged |
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Thank you for your response plaidchuck! Also can you explain what the "Assimil way" is. I have yet to purchase the Assimil course but I'm definitely interested.
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| plaidchuck Diglot Groupie United States facebook.com/plaidchRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5119 days ago 71 posts - 93 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish | Message 6 of 7 24 June 2010 at 3:03am | IP Logged |
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Basically for me it's reading the English translation, then listening to the dialogue while reading the English translation, and finally reading the dialogue in Spanish while listening. I do this as many times as necessary and also shadow sometimes for more difficult passages.
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| William Camden Hexaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6086 days ago 1936 posts - 2333 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Russian, Turkish, French | Message 7 of 7 30 June 2010 at 2:39pm | IP Logged |
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I copied out by hand the entire glossary of FSI Saudi Arabic into a notebook. It took a while, as it contains c. 950 entries. However, it is likely to come in handy in future for revision purposes.
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