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Julie’s NL FR SV EN DE | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6392 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes  4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 113 of 140 30 October 2013 at 12:13am | IP Logged | ||
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*hugs*
Here's my favourite song in Swedish. I have no idea what kind of stuff you like though. I also love the comics about Nemi but again that's definitely about me, idk if that's about you :DDD One day I also want to read some Scandinavian novels... here's a great list :) I would also drop the class asap, before you started hating Swedish like most of Finland does. but that's just me ;) *more hugs* 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| montmorency Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4623 days ago 2371 posts - 3676 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Danish, Welsh | Message 114 of 140 30 October 2013 at 1:11am | IP Logged | ||
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I'm not part of this team, but nice to see you back Julie!
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Julie Heptaglot Senior Member PolandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6698 days ago 1251 posts - 1733 votes 5 sounds Speaks: Polish*, EnglishB2, GermanC2, SpanishB2, Dutch, Swedish, French | Message 115 of 140 30 October 2013 at 1:52am | IP Logged | ||
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Serpent, thank you for the support. The song is VERY different from what I would
usually listen to, and still I really, really like it! About the class: it did occur to me that dropping it might be the best solution. However, I am afraid I would not continue with learning Swedish then, at least not at that very moment where Dutch seems to have finally stolen my heart :). This might not be a bad thing, though... I have to think about it. It is definitely better to take a break and get back to a language later on than to get really discouraged. Still, the chances to speak and hear Swedish in my city are very limited (apart from the Internet, obviously) and it is a pity to give up on one of the few possibilities. Montmorency, everyone is more than welcome on my log, on team or not. And it is always nice to hear from you! And to the earlier posters: Cavesa, thank you for all your nice and encouraging words! It seems I may not that awesome after all ;) but I keep on trying! I do hope my log will still be inspiring. And the French breakthrough was definitely a wonderful experience, especially as I got to a similar level in English and German quite a long time ago and I was very much looking forward to experiencing this moment again! I forgot how great it is :). Emme, det är inte så bra men jag tror att jag ska forsätta mina svenska studier trots alla problem. Amerykanka, thank you so much for all your corrections! If you feel like getting back to our Polish-English language exchange, I would more than happy to go on with that. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Emme Triglot Senior Member Italy Joined 5142 days ago 980 posts - 1594 votes Speaks: Italian*, English, German Studies: Russian, Swedish, French | Message 116 of 140 30 October 2013 at 9:11pm | IP Logged | ||
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Welcome back to the forum! It’s so nice to hear from you again.
As for Swedish, it’s hard to give advice as we don’t know you so well. Honestly I believe that pursuing or dropping a language is a very personal choice: you may try to rationalize it as much as you want (is it useful for your studies?, for your job?, for travel? etc.) but at the end of the day you’d probably better follow your heart and let your gut feeling make that choice for you. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 4804 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 117 of 140 31 October 2013 at 8:45pm | IP Logged | ||
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Glad to see you back! Of course you are awesome. These are all hurdles that are normal. I
am now quite happy about my university medical French class because the teacher is really good and makes us speak as much as possible (even though the level of the class overall is a bit lower than I'd like to). But it is a lottery. At university, it is somehow similar to the highschool and earlier levels. You have very little choice concerning the syllabus or teacher. Perhaps joining the 6wc with Emme and me could reignite the spark? :-) Of course it is your personal choice whether to drop a language. But I think you have already went so far that it might a be a big loss. You are surely not far from the level of comfortable access to some native materials, to keep the process fun. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Julie Heptaglot Senior Member PolandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6698 days ago 1251 posts - 1733 votes 5 sounds Speaks: Polish*, EnglishB2, GermanC2, SpanishB2, Dutch, Swedish, French | Message 118 of 140 31 October 2013 at 10:52pm | IP Logged | ||
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Emme, Cavesa, nice to hear from you! I have to catch up with reading your logs :).
I know it is not easy to give advice someone whom you don't know well, but still, any Swedish content tips will be appreciated as they may make me go beyond my usual range of search. And you, Emme, gave me some great watching tips in the past :). The problem with Swedish is that I indeed have gone pretty far and a little breakthrough (the one between beginner and, let's say, B1 - an 'independent user') is not that far away. My grammar is probably well beyond B1 already (the grammar component of the language course is very comprehensive). Vocabulary and listening comprehension seem to be the biggest obstacles in my progress. Probably I have to find a good way to improve my vocabulary. My usual approach (SRS with ready-made vocab databases from my favorite Polish software maker) won't work, as Swedish is not covered. I did buy a beautiful visual dictionary in the summer but what I need to learn are verbs, adjectives, abstract words etc. and the dictionary covers only a very limited number of them. The listening comprehension worries me much less as I got used to the fact that my listening skills tend to lag behind in the beginning. It is frustrating but it does go away at some point. Anyway, it would probably be easier if I could rationalize learning Swedish in some way... but it seems that I don't really need it, at least not in the foreseeable future. I'll try to reignite the spark, though, and I'll wait with any final decisions at least a few months. And... I have just decided to join this 6WC :). Swedish won't be my target language this time but I will still try to log a significant number of hours spent on learning it. My target language will be... Dutch. I have finally started learning it seriously. It is the one language that has fascinated me for a long time but somehow got always unlucky in my learning choices. I dabbled in Dutch almost 6 years ago, and once again during my first 6WC (August-September 2012)... it lost to French and Swiss German in the first case (I was leaving for a year in Switzerland back at that time) and to French and Swedish last year. I hope this time it will get all the attention that it deserves. This might be once again tricky, though, as I am going to spend about 2,5 months in Luxembourg soon (an internship, starting in January), and my language learning plans for the stay include a lot of French (and I will probably speak English and German there, too, plus Polish). I also hope to get at least a glimpse of Luxembourgian... not really compatible with all my learning plans but how could I be there and not learn even a tiny little bit of it...? Edited by Julie on 31 October 2013 at 11:04pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Amerykanka Hexaglot Senior Member United States Joined 4966 days ago 657 posts - 890 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Polish, Latin, Ancient Greek, Russian | Message 119 of 140 01 November 2013 at 1:47am | IP Logged | ||
It's great to see you back, Julie! I've been a bit absent myself lately; I must remedy that. I'm all in favor of restarting our language exchange! My schedule is pretty busy over the weekend, but maybe sometime next week . . . ? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Julie Heptaglot Senior Member PolandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6698 days ago 1251 posts - 1733 votes 5 sounds Speaks: Polish*, EnglishB2, GermanC2, SpanishB2, Dutch, Swedish, French | Message 120 of 140 09 November 2013 at 5:42pm | IP Logged | ||
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Amerykanka, so let's restart our language exchange! My schedule was again pretty busy last week, and it won't get any better in the next few days but what do you think about a meeting after November 21st?
And here comes my update: Learning Dutch, searching after my Swedish motivation Swedish I am glad to say my motivation has improved a bit. Inspired by a friend of mine, I watched a few short films (10-20 min.) on YouTube (e.g. Cleaner, Sanning eller Död). Short films seem like a great option for not-so-motivated beginners - a regular 1,5 h movie is still too long for me, I either lose focus or generally struggle to follow a complex plot if no subtitles are available. In a short film, the number of characters and subplots is often very limited. Any recommendations for Swedish or Dutch? I also listened to some Swedish music on YouTube. Hökartorget - Även en Idiot was quite fun, and I was absolutely amazed by Garmarna - Herr Mannelig. And I watched two or three episodes of the Swedish Idol. Most importantly, I decided to take a couple of Swedish private lessons (conversations) as I badly need some speaking practice, and I won't get enough of it in the regular class. I'm looking forward to the first class (in two weeks). Plus, one of my Swedish teachers in the regular classes was replaced, so I hope for the better :). All of that doesn't sound like a lot but still, it is a step forward. Dutch I am seriously falling in love with this language! I started an intensive Dutch course at the university a month ago and enjoy it a lot. And I enjoy my own studies even more! So far, I have read quite a lot about the language (e.g. an interesting blog about Dutch and German, the list of English words of Dutch origin on Wikipedia, a list of German-Dutch false friends. I've also had a look at Taalunieversum,Taalschrift and several articles on linguistics. I've stumbled on a YouTube Channel TV.Klasse on educational matters. I love e.g. De Eerste Keer - a documentary series about a young teacher starting her professional career, the videos about preschoolers and "Het geheim van het Finse onderwijs". Some videos are available with Dutch subtitles. If you're into these topics, this is great stuff. I actually regret I can't share it with a friend of mine who has just started her work as a teacher. I also enjoy Dutch music a lot: I've just discovered BLØF which seems optimal for language learning because of the very clear pronunciation (e.g. Omarm me, Wat zou je doen?, Liefs uit Londen. I also listened to Vlieg met me mee, the title song from the Dutch movie Abeltje based on the book with the same title (pretty simple lyrics, by the way). I have also started watching the movie. For those who like interactive exercises, I can definitely recommend Oefenen.nl. There is a little Dutch comprehension test at the website - I got the level three, and I can generally handle level 1-4 exercises (haven't tried level 5 yet). I also found free learning materials for German speakers, pdf files + audio. The materials are designed for classroom use mostly, and the quality of some audio files is rather poor, but the comparative approach and the focus on intercomprehension are interesting. I was also thinking about getting Kontrastsprache Niederländisch or Deutsch-Niederländisches Lernwörterbuch - do you have any experience with these books? Building on my German knowledge seems the most reasonable thing to do. Despite having gotten a large Polish-Dutch-Polish dictionary from my university library, I still find the German-Dutch van Dale dictionary more convenient. I also browsed through various Dutch-language websites, e.g. a travelling website and thuisacademie.ntr.nl recommended here on HTLAL. My reading comprehension is getting clearly better: learning / brushing up little, yet extremely important words such as "maar" (but) sped up the process. I'm getting pretty good with Wikipedia articles about music bands, TV shows and such, and I read one issue of "Donald Duck Extra" (pictures helped :)). And the best of all, I attend a series of guest seminars on linguistics (language history / language policy) at my university, in Dutch! The first two hours were quite hard but then I got accustomed to the accent and the way of speaking of the lecturer, and I am able to understand ca. 85% of the content (with no handouts and slides!). Obviously, my comprehension is based on my other languages and the general linguistic knowledge to a large extent, but still, it feels so good to be able to listen to follow lectures in Dutch! I also learned quite a few interesting facts about dialectal differences and the development of the Dutch language (e.g. various theories about the 'ui' diphthongization). Other languages My other languages suffer, maybe with the exception of English (I read Babel No more and The Little Book of Talent currently. Next Friday I go to Germany for almost a week, so I will have at least German covered. I revised the declination of adjectives and nouns in Icelandic. I definitely have to make more time for French. If that's not enough, I have also tried a Luxembourgish course recommended by HTLAL users (available also in English). No time for this one now but I want to go through at least a few lessons before leaving for Luxembourg in mid-January. On top of that, I have decided it is high time I brushed up my Spanish a bit. The original idea was to read one article a day (+ exercises and audio) from practicaespanol.com for 30 days or so but I am not sure if I will find enough time for this. Still, it could be an interesting learning experiment. Edited by Julie on 09 November 2013 at 5:44pm 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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