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Work & Study | ||
Tags: Time to learn | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Advice Center |  | |
| patuco Diglot Moderator Gibraltar Joined 6826 days ago 3795 posts - 4268 votes  Speaks: Spanish, English* Personal Language Map | Message 9 of 19 25 October 2012 at 9:37pm | IP Logged | |||||
I often wonder how I could ever have thought that I had no time to do anything in university. If I had as much free time now as I did then, I'm sure that I'd be well on my way into my twentieth language. Nowaday, the most I can "study" in one go is the 50 minutes (in two lots of 25 minutes) it takes to walk to my dojo. 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| rolf Senior Member United Kingdom improvingmydutch.blo Joined 5818 days ago 107 posts - 134 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Dutch | Message 10 of 19 25 October 2012 at 10:35pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I am usually self-employed and can have long periods of free time but I still don't
utilise the time fully (I'm a natural procrastinator). I recently worked full-time and will again shortly. When I did, I found that my time was limited like you. However, I listened to TL music for a month and my listening comprehension took a massive step up. If you have any downtime at work, I suggest using Anki web and doing flashcard drills. This is what I am planning to do. If you can read in your target language already, you might want to consider reading the epub at work. I use magicscroll.net to read epubs. Alternatively you can convert to text using a number of free online tools and paste into Word or some other program. I start work again this Monday, I am really hoping that it does not derail my learning. I am quite determined that it won't do. I am currently B1 I think and I want to make it to C1 within two months time. 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| vermillon Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4489 days ago 602 posts - 1042 votes Speaks: French*, EnglishC2, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, German | Message 11 of 19 25 October 2012 at 11:06pm | IP Logged | |||||
Ah,a UoE student! :) Their free courses are merely tasters however, and Arabic was far from fantastic... But the Tandem association was great however (and free wine!). 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6408 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 12 of 19 26 October 2012 at 12:30am | IP Logged | |||||
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This thread was supposed to be for that:-) Sadly nobody has participated yet, although who wouldn't want to hear how exactly, for example, Cristina manages to squeeze in those hours :)
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| NickJS Senior Member United Kingdom flickr.com/photos/sg Joined 4770 days ago 264 posts - 334 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Russian, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese | Message 13 of 19 26 October 2012 at 12:49am | IP Logged | |||||
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Thank you for all the answers! Some really motivating ones here knowing that others are
in the same position. Today I managed to read a couple of these answers on my dinner break. I also found a little way to pop in about 15 minutes of study between my work over 9 hours or so by just keeping a page full of vocab up behind my current work & flicking back & saying a couple of them to myself then carrying on with what I was doing. Sadly I cannot carry & resources around with me nor use my mobile phone as I sit in front of my manager & wireless internet for my phone is non-existent in my works for some reason (no idea why) - so a sneak peak on my phone isn't really an option until my 30 minute break which usually involves me walking across the road for a sandwich - if only it was an hour!!! Also listening isn't an option as the nature of my job requires me to communicate a lot with others. As others mentioned about walking to work, I would but I found if I do that it means waking up much earlier which tends to have a dramatic effect on my motivation. I'm going to find a way to fit in more study somewhere somehow. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6408 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 14 of 19 26 October 2012 at 2:16am | IP Logged | |||||
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A couple of specific suggestions for you:
-use a foreign interface if possible. if you have a full control over your computer you can use Vistalizator to change the Windows language. -use the polyglot (or polyglop) add-on if possible. the firefox version doesn't work for me:( -do you colleagues check email or twitter while at work? do that too :) you can register a new mailbox and redirect what is sent to your old one. or change the language if you use gmail. -listen to music or podcasts during your 30 min break. -practice mentally when nothing else is possible. I've registered almost 1000 minutes of mental practice during the previous 6 week challenge. try listening to some catchy TL songs in the morning (like Ai Se Eu Te Pego :D). of course you won't learn new things this way but this will keep the language buzzing in your head:) 6 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| cheerbelle7 Triglot Newbie United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4235 days ago 8 posts - 12 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Levantine), French | Message 15 of 19 03 November 2012 at 11:39pm | IP Logged | |||||
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One thing that I am experimenting with right now is polyphasic sleep (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyphasic_sleep) . Its basically a way to sleep more strategically so that you get the rest that your body needs while maximizing your time awake to get more done. I've been getting up about two hours earlier and have had time to fit in a 3-4 hour study ssession in the morning and still work out before lunch.
If you google it along with language acquisition, you will find that quite a lot of people have played around with it. Plus there are different options on how long/often to sleep based on your lifestyle. 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| patuco Diglot Moderator Gibraltar Joined 6826 days ago 3795 posts - 4268 votes Speaks: Spanish, English* Personal Language Map | Message 16 of 19 04 November 2012 at 11:15pm | IP Logged | |||||
This has always fascinated me. A couple of questions: 1. How are you splitting up your sleep? 2. Do you know how long you're planning on doing this for? 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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