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Assimil’s Passive Wave Killing Motivation | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| fanatic Octoglot Senior Member Australia speedmathematics.com Joined 6945 days ago 1152 posts - 1818 votes  Speaks: English*, German, French, Afrikaans, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Dutch Studies: Swedish, Norwegian, Polish, Modern Hebrew, Malay, Mandarin, Esperanto | Message 9 of 13 07 August 2010 at 7:45am | IP Logged | |||||
I did learn German from scratch, I had no previous knowledge, with Assimil German Without Toil. I didn't do technical translations with no trouble at all. I bought two expensive technical dictionaries to help me and I visited the local library a lot. I also got a lot of help from a German technician who improved my poorly expressed German and turned it into much better German. I found I was drained at the end of each day by the high level of concentration. I did improve very quickly though. How many languages did I know before learning German? I learnt French in school and later with Assimil, I did a quick course of Italian For Travelers by Lewis Robbins and I was learning Russian. I don't know if any of that helped. I had a friend who spoke German so I met with him and his German friends and spoke as much German as I could - all learnt from Assimil. They were surprised to hear me read German fluently. They couldn't have realised I didn't understand everything I was reading. I didn't have the resources then to learn that are available now - especially on the Internet. You can read the daily news headlines in whichever language you choose. You can ask for an instant translation with Google. Even if they aren't accurate it will still usually give the hint you need for the meaning. I still look back with nostalgia and affection on the early lessons from Assimil. I can still repeat whole sentences and expressions I learnt from them. Der Gauner and Alter papagei, endlich ist er weggegangen. Otto Schmidt soll sein Grammophon bringen, und ich habe meine Flöte. I never had occasion to use them in Germany but it was part of the fun of learning the language. 5 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 5810 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 10 of 13 07 August 2010 at 11:57am | IP Logged | |||||
Thanks for posting. I'm not trying to say that Assimil isn't enough to learn a language on its own -- I'm just pointing out that it's rarely as clear cut as some people make out, and the biggest success stories are the least clear. The biggest problems for an English speaker learning German as their first "second" language are verb conjugations, noun declension and noun gender. Anyone starting German with a bit of French under their belt will understand the basics of conjugation (including the singular/plural "you" distinction). They will have a basic idea about noun gender (although French only has two genders). Add a little bit of Russian with its noun declension and neuter gender, and that's most of the difficulty of German dealt with. So while I really can't say what did or didn't help you, it's clear that you're not typical, so not really an accurate "advert" for the course. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| BartoG Diglot Senior Member United States confession Joined 5246 days ago 292 posts - 818 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Italian, Spanish, Latin, Uzbek | Message 11 of 13 07 August 2010 at 6:48pm | IP Logged | |||||
I think that Cainntear is quite right on two points: On the one hand, if the language is too easy it may be that there are things you're skipping over unconsciously. On the other hand, the division between the passive and active phases is pretty arbitrary. So why not find out where you really stand? Start the active phase now. If it comes easily and you get all the endings right with minimal effort, congratulations, you've got a natural affinity for German and are ready to engage it actively. If, on the other hand, there are a lot of mistakes in your active production of German, you should maybe start doing one new lesson a day and one old lesson a day, making sure you truly understand what is going on in the old lesson and that your boredom isn't the result of mentally tuning out on details that you're having trouble digesting. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| johntm93 Senior Member United States Joined 5126 days ago 587 posts - 746 votes 2 sounds Speaks: English* Studies: German, Spanish | Message 12 of 13 08 August 2010 at 7:14am | IP Logged | |||||
you make it to the active wave to try and measure your progress seriously. I actually like it, I am learning a lot. You could always try to use Michel Thomas and Pimsleur along with it, which I'm doing (well, starting to do). 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| frenkeld Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6742 days ago 2042 posts - 2719 votes Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: German | Message 13 of 13 08 August 2010 at 7:51am | IP Logged | |||||
This was directed at fanatic, and as I recall, quite aside from his prior language-learning experience, he was learning German while being immersed in it, which would be a big advantage with any language-learning method. As far as prior language-learning experience, it must be a common enough situation when an accomplished polyglot has learned his first one or two languages in a more traditional way and only drifted towards more intuitive language acquisition techniques after that, so it would be difficult for them to gauge whether using an intuitive approach with their very first language would have worked quite as well. Edited by frenkeld on 08 August 2010 at 9:33am 1 person has voted this message useful |
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