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James29’s Spanish Log | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 4818 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes  Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 649 of 668 07 June 2015 at 4:35pm | IP Logged | ||
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Well, based on my French experience, I suppose you could get to the C levels in the months/few years to come and ready to activate that jump quite easily. Even supposedly maintanance activities can be a slow path forward. I think this is the real base of feeling stuck around B2. You progress, just slowly. You don't notice it every day or every week. It cumulates over months.
All your ideas sound logical: The last grammar book of the series looks like a good piece of the puzzle (and it is great to have something easy to see a progress in). And you have lots of potential to progress in your reading from the teen aimed books towards various genres, styles and difficulty levels. Tv series are extremely efficient, from my experience, but there must be pure audio alternatives. Audiobooks are great but too much easier than the tv series, I'd say. Radio dramas and such things are great but harder to find.If you like non fiction, there seem to be some interesting radio programmes on the rtve.es The speaking practice meeting may help but it always depends on what people are there. If there are natives and advanced learners, it could be a great lift up. If you'd be the most advanced speaker there, it is not worth bothering probably. Just a thought. If I were you, if I may suggest, I would leave the reading comfort zone more and more as that is something you can easily fit into your routine and quite an uncomplicated thing to plan. The McGraw Hill version does include translations? Or what is different about it? It is significantly cheaper, it makes me wonder why. Would they just add English foreword, English cover and sell the same book? I wish there was a preview on the amazon. Well, no matter probably. The cheaper English version+ delivery fee sum is probably equal to just buying the more expensive version - faithful customer sale in my favourite store. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5016 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 650 of 668 08 June 2015 at 10:53am | IP Logged | ||
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Ah, another person suffering from the B2/C1 dilemmas - is it worth the effort to go from a quite good level to a really good level when that really good level is a desire rather than a need, so you're not in a situation that pushes you to develop it? And if so, how? I don't have an answer; just saying you're not alone in being unsure.
I know what you mean about TV. Some people here get great results from lots of series, but I just don't have the time and focus to watch them every day. But even a few minutes of YouTube videos is better than nothing. Anyway I've found that in order to keep making progress I need three things: input, practice, and study. If any is lacking I quickly stall. For the study part, I try to identify and focus on particular weak points, like grammar or pronunciation. Cavesa's advice seems good; I'd say you could push your comfort zone a bit more with your existing activities. I don't know about Spanish but in my languages news radio is generally very easy, so you could probably find other shows/podcasts that challenge you more. Language exchanges and meetups can be useful but again it can be easy to get into a comfort zone of having the same small-talk conversations. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| basica Senior Member Australia Joined 3345 days ago 157 posts - 269 votes Studies: Serbian | Message 651 of 668 08 June 2015 at 12:20pm | IP Logged | ||
Sorry to barge into your log here, but could you possibly tell me where you found this test? Thanks! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5184 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 652 of 668 12 June 2015 at 2:09pm | IP Logged | ||
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EMK posted a link to it in his log about two weeks ago or so. If you cannot find it let me know and I can go back and find it this weekend.
I'm updating my goals for 2015 because I finished the fourth Alex Rider book today. 1. Finish Gramatica de Uso del Espanol B1/B2. -> DONE. 2. Read novels totaling 1,000,000 words. -> Finished six novels totaling 574,000 words (En Llamas with 105,000; El Fiscal en el Candelero with 66,000; Diez Negritos with roughly 66,000; Los Litigantes with roughly 127,000; The Black Echo with 152,000; and Alex Rider #4 with 58,000 words). 3. Listen to Spanish every morning on the way to work. -> So far, so good (although I have listened to some French in this time period). 4. Watch any 100 30 minute TV episodes. -> So far have watched equivalent of roughly 14 episodes. No progress lately. 5. Write 12 letters or memos for correction. -> No progress. 6. Read the Spanish side of Assimil's New French With Ease (Spanish Base). -> DONE. Discussion: I'm only going to briefly comment on the Alex Rider book. It was a good break from the harder adult books I have been reading. The Rider series is definitely entertaining. This was typical of the series... a good, simple to read, page turner. The ending was by far the best of the series. The last two chapters left me wanting to start right in on book 5 immediately. The author weaves some things in from the previous books into an over arching storyline which is really cool. I have book 5 but will hold off on it for a while. I've got to decide what to read next. I'm not going to have as much time to read this summer so anything I do will end up taking me a long time to get through. Edited by James29 on 12 June 2015 at 2:17pm 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| BAnna Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 4431 days ago 409 posts - 616 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish Studies: Russian, Turkish | Message 653 of 668 13 June 2015 at 9:43pm | IP Logged | ||
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I think this may be the "test" you were referring to?
Self-assessment checklists ...and congratulations to you James29 on completing the grammar book! I'm afraid I got bored halfway through and it's now gathering dust. Perhaps I'll return to it someday. Your dedication is inspiring. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5184 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 654 of 668 14 June 2015 at 3:07pm | IP Logged | ||
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Yes, that is the self test. I found it pretty useful... but discouraging in some ways considering how much I still need to improve.
I appreciate the compliment, BAnna, but I don't know if it is dedication or more addiction. My Spanish is my way to keep sane. Without spending some time with Spanish every day I think I would have a breakdown of some sort. I'm going to very briefly update my log to get back on my Sunday routine. I have not done much since my last update other than select a telenovela to watch. I've started Los Miserables from Telemundo. I think I'll like it. I watched the first two episodes and then watched the first episode again. It says it is roughly based on the story of Les Miserables so at least I can trick my mind into thinking I am still working toward that elusive goal of someday starting to study French. One thing hits me whenever I watch TV in Spanish. I always have the feeling that if I were to spend the same amount of time studying grammar or reading a book I'd be better off. I really need to watch TV, but I wish there was a more efficient way to practice understanding native conversations. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Crush Tetraglot Senior Member ChinaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5674 days ago 1622 posts - 2299 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Mandarin, Esperanto Studies: Basque | Message 655 of 668 14 June 2015 at 6:28pm | IP Logged | ||
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I always had that feeling, too. It's a very passive thing and to notice an effect you really need to watch a lot. I'd say just watching 20-30 minutes a few times a week will help out over time, and it's generally easier to convince yourself to watch a TV episode than to sit down and study for that same amount of time. It's better for your Spanish than watching TV in English, at least.
And for that more efficient method to understanding native conversations, i really recommend you try the Subs2SRS stuff. It's helped out my Mandarin a ton and once you've got the deck prepared study sessions go by quickly. I feel like it'd be even more helpful for Spanish (it'd probably help my Spanish out a lot, too). A few weeks back i started looking for some Chilean movies with subtitles as i really like that accent/dialect, i didn't find many subtitles unfortunately. That tends to be the hardest part, finding something with decent subs. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5184 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 656 of 668 21 June 2015 at 1:55pm | IP Logged | ||
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Well, I've really gotten into "Los Miserables." It seems to be a great telenovela. So far I think I am going to like it MUCH better than La Reina del Sur and El Capo. The storyline is easy to understand, but there are about 20 different subplots growing. Every single scene develops one of the subplots. It is quite easy for me to understand. I rarely have a problem understanding anything and it feels as though it is almost as easy to watch/understand as if it were in English. There are some Mexican usages and slang that I've had to look up, but that is not really a problem.
One super cool thing about the telenovela is that it takes place in DF near where I stayed for a week... right near Bellas Artes. They have street scenes on the streets where I would walk. They show the largest building in that area quite often and I used to walk past that daily when I went to the subway. The star of the show lives right there in that area. They also have a few scenes in the Zocolo which is just down the street a few blocks... it all makes it seem so much more real to me. I can say... "I know what it feels to be right there." I watched the first two episodes twice and now I've finished episode 7. I'm going to update my goal to keep track of how much TV I'm watching. 2015 TV GOAL: watch any 100 30 minute TV episodes. -> So far have watched equivalent of roughly 32 episodes. I'm also continuing with listening to the news in Spanish every weekday morning. That's going great. That too is now very easy to understand. It is quite rare that I don't understand something. That being said, I do not always listen very carefully and sometimes I simply don't pay attention at all. I don't mind that because when I want to listen I can understand and it is good practice. One thing I have noticed, particularly when they do the investment/markets part of the news, is that I have a very hard time understanding large numbers. I can easily understand the numbers, but my brain does not do it fast enough to keep up. I can understand the stories fine, but the large numbers just go in and out of my head. I also had a few long drives and listened to a lot of Spanish. I'm working my way through the "Spanish Obsessed" advanced podcasts. They are pretty good. They basically just interview someone about some sort of topic... life in Colombia, how to dance salsa, South America's best places to visit, life of a South American immigrant in the UK, the Velezuela situation, etc. Just about all the people are from Latin America. One of the primary hosts is British and is still somewhat learning Spanish. he speaks at a quite advanced level and seems to have a nice accent. The other host is a woman from Colombia who lives in the UK. I probably listened to about 12 of their advanced podcasts this week. The podcasts seem to run from 10-15 minutes each. I'm doing the weekly meetup, but don't really count it for much other than having my mouth speak the words. I don't speak too much anymore so at least it is good to speak out loud once a week. I met a woman from Peru at a bank and got talking with her. I could tell she spoke Spanish when I heard her accent with the man in front of me so I simply said, "what the heck, I'm going to use my Spanish." It was fun... I don't do that very often. We had a very nice 5-10 conversation. It turns out that she is related to one of the people I know fairly well from the meetup. I seem to be taking some time off from reading as this telenovela has really grabbed me. Hopefully I'll pick up another book sometime soon. However, my business things are really becoming overwhelming to the point that I may force myself to take some time off from Spanish. Looking at the rest of the year and all the things that will be taking place I don't know how I'm going to get things done. I don't know where I'll find the time to get all the things done I need to get done. I'd hate to take time off from Spanish so maybe I'll just scale things down a bit and just listen to the news every morning or something like that. What makes matters worse (for my Spanish) is I have taken on a major personal commitment that is turning out to be WAY more of a commitment than I thought it would be when I started. I am committed and will get it done, but I'm starting to wonder if I should have done it. I am usually very careful about not biting off more than I can chew... I'd be concerned, but the work and personal things look like they will be temporary time sucks and I should be back to a more normal life by the beginning of 2016. So, for now, I'm going to bang out some more episodes of Los Miserables this week and keep up with the news every morning. I'll also keep doing the meetup. That's about it. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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