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When are you done with an Assimil lesson? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| hf Tetraglot Newbie United States Joined 4709 days ago 9 posts - 11 votes Speaks: Bengali, Urdu, English, Hindi Studies: Spanish, Arabic (classical) | Message 1 of 14 25 August 2011 at 7:42pm | IP Logged | ||
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Hi, I recently started Assimil Spanish with Ease and finished about 30 lessons. While I am enjoying the format and content of the course, I am struggling to figure out when I am done with a lesson and when I can move on to , the next lesson.
There's been so much written about Assimil in this forum that I am actually a little confused about the exact strategy for the passive phase. The most cited example is that of Prof. Arguelles, who suggests internalizing each lesson thoroughly until one can repeat some of the more advanced lessons "while taking a shower" (which almost seems like memorizing to me). On the other hand, Fanatic seems to suggest that one should move on as soon as he or she has a basic understanding of the lessons - Fanatic also discussed how his brother was able to converse in German after doing the first few weeks of German Assimil using this approach. Having followed both Prof. Arguelles's and Fanatic's approach to Assimil, I say that I like Fanatic's laid back approach better since it takes less time to complete each lesson but my retention is far better when I work on Assimil as hard as Prof. Arguelles does. My question is specifically intended for those who FINISHED the program. When you look back at what you did with Assimil (specifically with the passive phase), when did you know you were ready to move on? What do you think YOU DID RIGHT? What do you think you DID NOT DO RIGHT or what would you have DONE DIFFERENTLY? Given the countless threads on Assimil, I suppose these questions have been addressed in some shape or form before, but I am specifically looking for the perspective of those who have completed the program. Also, just to clarify - I am not looking for step-by-step recipes such as "read L2 3 times while listening to the audio and so on." Thanks. Edited by hf on 26 August 2011 at 3:28pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Michael K. Senior Member United States Joined 5540 days ago 568 posts - 886 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Esperanto | Message 2 of 14 25 August 2011 at 8:34pm | IP Logged | ||
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Personally, I think that once you can listen to the audio without looking at the transcript in the book, you're ready to move on . . . for at least that day. I'd review the lesson from time to time myself. It's pretty subjective as to when you're done with a lesson, so keep listening, reading, and studying the annotations until you can comfortably understand it.
Once I reached the active stage, I started writing down the new vocabulary & constructions and tried to use some of them in a form of a sentence. I'm around lesson 60-70 in Assimil Spanish, but at this time I've lost interest in learning languages, so I'll try to start up again. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5192 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 3 of 14 25 August 2011 at 9:07pm | IP Logged | ||
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Although I've never finished an Assimil program per se, I've finished many similar programs and I personally deal with several lessons at once. I allow myself to move on to the next lesson really quickly, but I'll come back to that initial lesson every time I restart a study session until I feel I have nothing else to gain from it. Only then is it completely finished. Since lessons build on the previous ones, being first introduced to something, then moving on to the next lesson which expands on the same issue is quite useful.
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| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4720 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German | Message 4 of 14 25 August 2011 at 11:39pm | IP Logged | ||
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I'd like to know the same sort of thing. I've done 5 chapters of French with Ease. I
have considered going back to the beginning, to improve my understanding of what I've covered (and I realize the first 5 chapters are pretty simple). On the other hand, if I keep pressing on, the most important features of the language will continue to be used, so I won't be missing anything as such. Still, my instinct is to do about 5-6 chapters, and then redo the same chapters before moving on. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Elexi Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5376 days ago 938 posts - 1839 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 5 of 14 26 August 2011 at 12:34am | IP Logged | ||
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I have finished a few Assimil courses - and in my opinion finishing is just the start - you really have to review the book for at least a year after the end of the second wave to get the best out of it. Many people on this board write about whether it is possible to do the whole of an Assimil book in 2 months, or whatever, but to me the 5 months recommendation is a minimum. And what's the rush? There's no exam. The books are nicely portable and dipping into a lesson is an enjoyable experience.
As to Jeffers' point about going back a doing the previous five lessons or so. This is important - the old French Without Toil contained 6 lessons per side of a vinyl record and the book specifically tells you to listen to each previous lesson per side before moving on - so when you are on day 6 of each week, you review all the lessons of the week. I personally review all previous lessons on day 7 (so that as time progresses my day 7s get very long indeed - up to a week). Edited by Elexi on 26 August 2011 at 12:35am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5186 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 6 of 14 26 August 2011 at 2:14am | IP Logged | ||
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I strongly second the suggestion to continue working with the book after "completing" the book. A second active wave seems necessary to me. I did a second active wave and I feel that was definitely something I did "right."
I felt that I was definitely "done" with a lesson on the passive stage when I could shadow it with the book closed and know/understand what I was saying... but, even if I couldn't, I would still move on if I felt moderately comfortable. I never did the suggested exercises where you are supposed to read the line and then look away and say it from memory... or listen to the audio and then hit pause and say the line from memory. Now I wish I had done those. I really benefited from Fanatic's suggestions and think his guidance was great. Doing a little every day and not taking it too seriously is the key in my book. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6720 days ago 4250 posts - 5710 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 7 of 14 26 August 2011 at 8:13am | IP Logged | ||
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I've "finished" Assimil in four languages, but no language totally from scratch (so it's hard to say what Assimil "did" except adding extra layers of competence). As James29 said, it's good to go through the material now and then.
I've worked with the material at least twice, I've used the audio for listening comprehension and shadowing, I've read aloud... Think of Assimil as a program that's pretty well thought out. At the first stage, I followed the schedule (as) exactly (as I could). When I have gone through the material again I have studied the new lesson, reviewed the previous lesson(s), then the new lesson again (~20 minutes). I've usually reviewed the week's lessons on the seventh day. The frequency of reviews and the order is up to you. Edited by jeff_lindqvist on 26 August 2011 at 1:23pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 5822 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 8 of 14 26 August 2011 at 10:15am | IP Logged | ||
I never did the active wave when I did Assimil Catalan, so a lot of the specifics in speaking passed me by. But I agree with you that committing dialogues to memory seems like a bad idea. In principle, you should be able to recreate the passages independently, based on what you learned in the passive phase, so you shouldn't have to rely on memorisation. In fact, if you've memorised the dialogues, there is no active wave, because you are merely "parroting" language, not "producing" it. 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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