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Accelerated Challenge (Feb) - Finnish

 Language Learning Forum : General discussion Post Reply
64 messages over 8 pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Next >>
Sprachprofi
Nonaglot
Senior Member
Germany
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2608 posts - 4866 votes 
Speaks: German*, English, French, Esperanto, Greek, Mandarin, Latin, Dutch, Italian
Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swahili, Indonesian, Japanese, Modern Hebrew, Portuguese

 
 Message 1 of 64
13 December 2011 at 9:54am | IP Logged 
Back to the roots! The first 6 Week Challenge was not about studying as much as
possible, but rather comparing what a similar amount of study time could achieve, if
people were all starting from scratch but using different methods. Well, the
participants of the 6 Week Challenge were too diverse, studying different languages
with different prior knowledge and different time commitment, so the 6 Week Challenge
adapted. Helping people find new ways to integrate their target language into their
lives, and spend more time on it, is a worthy cause; I am happy with the goal of the 6
Week Challenge as it is now and I have had nothing but good feedback for the addition
of Twitter and study graphs.

Anyway, recently I was talking with Arekkusu about the old idea, about how
awesome it would be to compare the effectiveness of passive-then-active Assimil
vs. speaking from day 1 vs. Listening-Reading vs. what-have-you, cramming vocabulary
with an SRS or letting it accumulate naturally... and we want to give it a go! I was
even able to drag 3 more language geeks into this madness: Volte, Doviende and
Ellasevia
.

The plan is to spend 30 days studying Finnish (nicely unrelated to our previous
studies) in & around February, that is, concurrently with the February 6 Week Challenge
but ending early. In contrast to the 6WC, this challenge has a set amount of hours: we
want to do 45 hours of study in that time (or, in the case of Ellasevia,
complete his 45 hours of Finnish then), not more and hopefully also not less. Every one
of us will use whatever method(s) he considers most effective. Then, at the end of the
challenge, we will do detailed testing - reading comprehension, listening
comprehension, writing, speaking - in order to see where the benefits of each approach
lie. For this, we hope to enlist the help of an experienced teacher of Finnish, ideally
someone who has experience testing people according to the CEFR. If you know anyone,
please let us know. We'd also welcome the help of any native speakers who wish to
assist us during the challenge.

So, crazy or awesome? You decide.

Edited by Sprachprofi on 17 December 2011 at 12:31am

12 persons have voted this message useful



mick33
Senior Member
United States
Joined 5706 days ago

1335 posts - 1632 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Finnish
Studies: Thai, Polish, Afrikaans, Hindi, Hungarian, Italian, Spanish, Swedish

 
 Message 2 of 64
13 December 2011 at 10:00am | IP Logged 
This sounds like a very good idea.
1 person has voted this message useful



a3
Triglot
Senior Member
Bulgaria
Joined 5038 days ago

273 posts - 370 votes 
Speaks: Bulgarian*, English, Russian
Studies: Portuguese, German, Italian, Spanish, Norwegian, Finnish

 
 Message 3 of 64
13 December 2011 at 10:42am | IP Logged 
The most effective method varies from person to person
Good idea anyway
1 person has voted this message useful



Cavesa
Triglot
Senior Member
Czech Republic
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3277 posts - 6779 votes 
Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1
Studies: Spanish, German, Italian

 
 Message 4 of 64
13 December 2011 at 11:18am | IP Logged 
It is a very good idea but I'm afraid too few people will join. I won't because Finnish is not on my hit list (even the extended one) and my plans are already too wide. But I'll wish you luck and hopefully you'll get enough people for the experiment.

But the truth is that it would be nice to have a "main" language or two for the challenge again. Perhaps there could be two languages so more people would join and it could still follow the original perpose?
1 person has voted this message useful



Brun Ugle
Diglot
Senior Member
Norway
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1292 posts - 1766 votes 
Speaks: English*, NorwegianC1
Studies: Japanese, Esperanto, Spanish, Finnish

 
 Message 5 of 64
13 December 2011 at 11:46am | IP Logged 
That sounds like so much fun! If February wasn't a terrible month for me, I might join, but February just isn't possible. I really like the idea though and think it would be nice if it could run several times a year -- with a different language each time. I like the idea of a set time frame and starting point, and then seeing who gets furthest in that time.


1 person has voted this message useful



SueK
Groupie
United States
Joined 4533 days ago

77 posts - 133 votes 
Studies: Mandarin

 
 Message 6 of 64
13 December 2011 at 3:08pm | IP Logged 
Awesome. As Diglot said, the best method will vary from person to person, but; I think this is a very interesting test nevertheless. It should provide meaningful learnings about the benefits and challenges of each method (which a person could use to better understand what will fit them best), give a true newbie like myself a idea of a starting point and where to turn if that path doesn't fit them (me), and be very telling about what methods to use if you want to teach or learn as a group.

I do hope you find more participants, it would be interesting with the few of you, but more telling with multiple individuals on each method to try to level set some of the person preference and capability concerns.

I look forward to watching to see how this goes!

Edited by SueK on 13 December 2011 at 3:09pm

1 person has voted this message useful



Isabliss_27
Diglot
Groupie
Brazil
Joined 4527 days ago

68 posts - 74 votes 
Speaks: Portuguese*, English
Studies: German, Russian, Latin, French

 
 Message 7 of 64
13 December 2011 at 3:27pm | IP Logged 
Very good idea. I wasn't very sure what language I will do in February, then I read this post. It's awesome.
1 person has voted this message useful



Arekkusu
Hexaglot
Senior Member
Canada
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3971 posts - 7747 votes 
Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto
Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian

 
 Message 8 of 64
13 December 2011 at 4:03pm | IP Logged 
SueK wrote:
As a3 said, the best method will vary from person to person, but; I think this is a very interesting test nevertheless.

There is no doubt that we will use different methods and will get different results. Our individual strengths likely lie with different skills and that's what's interesting! That's also why any testing will hopefully cover all skills. This is still a very limited amount of time and Finnish is a Level 2 language (should take twice as long to learn as cognate languages like French or Spanish).

Cavesa wrote:
... it would be nice to have a "main" language or two for the challenge again. Perhaps there could be two languages so more people would join and it could still follow the original perpose?

Others are welcome to start a similar experiment with another language. But if you are going to do so, I'd suggest waiting until after we are done so you can better evaluate what needs to be improved in the process.


1 person has voted this message useful



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