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15 Minutes a Day

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Teango
Triglot
Winner TAC 2010 & 2012
Senior Member
United States
teango.wordpress.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5554 days ago

2210 posts - 3734 votes 
Speaks: English*, German, Russian
Studies: Hawaiian, French, Toki Pona

 
 Message 65 of 78
02 September 2013 at 11:19am | IP Logged 
Merci beaucoup, Tsopivo! As it so happens, I do have a schedule printed out to juggle all these languages. I initially didn't, and just went with whatever language I fancied studying at the time, but quickly came to the realisation that grouping languages on the basis of the resources I'm currently using and the type of activity involved (e.g. course books, parallel texts, films, listening and reading, inductive reading, etc) was a more efficient use of time. Here's a more detailed breakdown of my current schedule for anyone who's interested...

I try to study Irish, Japanese, and Hawaiian before heading off to work (as I like to tackle beginner languages and course books first thing in the morning - this is like my morning espresso). Next up is Spanish and Swedish, with a couple of bite-sized portions of Harry Potter in my lunch break back at the office (if there aren't too many interruptions and I don't need to be at a meeting or elsewhere).

When I arrive home after work, I sneak in a plate of Lingua Latina biscuits and a cup of tea before preparing dinner together with my wife (or more often than not, before I don my marigold gloves to tackle the mountain of dishes that seems to magically accumulate each day, and tidy up the flat a little which seems to have been upended during the day by invisible gremlins and домовые, all whilst my better half cooks up something amazingly tasty for dinner).

Part of the evening is then reserved for film studies in Russian, French, and German (my non-beginner languages), and I think of these as my post-desert course, which is something I quite look forward to. Oh and finally, after hitting the hay for the night, I read some Ancient Egyptian in bed before falling sleep. И всё, et voilà! That's the plan at least. :)

Sometimes I swap languages around of course, so the schedule is tentative and largely depends on fitting my hours around many other commitments. For example, sometimes I find Latin and Ancient Egyptian much easier to do in my lunch break, as I can more easily deal with interruptions when I'm not using headphones (although I tend to listen to the audio anyway).

With regards to breaking study sessions into smaller parts throughout the week, the goal of this project is to try and study each language for at least 15 minutes. And to be fair, fitting even that in across all 10 languages takes a daily miracle given my current work and academic schedule. I hope it's something that I can eventually build momentum in and keep going.

Some days I try my best but fall flat on my face with the need to prioritise teaching at the university or submit a project paper or graded assignment; other days I hit my study targets head on, and who knows, maybe even score some bonus immersion time with a tv show I enjoy (e.g. watch a 24 minute episode of Кухня in Russian for fun in the evening perhaps).

Consistency is of course the key here, Tsopivo is quite right on this point. However as I'm not really a big fan of routine, it takes a great deal of persistence and resilience on my part to keep moving forward when things don't go quite to plan. Nevertheless I think it's all worth it in the end, because I feel a great sense of personal satisfaction and overall accomplishment when I can see a little progress in all 10 languages at the end of the day.

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Tsopivo
Diglot
Senior Member
Canada
Joined 4469 days ago

258 posts - 411 votes 
Speaks: French*, English
Studies: Esperanto

 
 Message 66 of 78
06 September 2013 at 6:48am | IP Logged 
Thanks for your very detailed answer.
1 person has voted this message useful



prz_
Tetraglot
Senior Member
Poland
last.fm/user/prz_rul
Joined 4857 days ago

890 posts - 1190 votes 
Speaks: Polish*, English, Bulgarian, Croatian
Studies: Slovenian, Macedonian, Persian, Russian, Turkish, Ukrainian, Dutch, Swedish, German, Italian, Armenian, Kurdish

 
 Message 67 of 78
06 September 2013 at 5:08pm | IP Logged 
Another crazy guy :D Same as me. Keep going, of course and good luck.
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montmorency
Diglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 4826 days ago

2371 posts - 3676 votes 
Speaks: English*, German
Studies: Danish, Welsh

 
 Message 68 of 78
06 September 2013 at 7:05pm | IP Logged 
So if I've got this right, you study every single one of the 10 each day?
I thought at first, you were only doing a subset each day, with some algorithm for
shuffling them around, but from the above, it looks like you've crammed them all in that
day.

Amazing.

I assume you are also taking notes for the research paper that will come out of this? :-)
1 person has voted this message useful



Teango
Triglot
Winner TAC 2010 & 2012
Senior Member
United States
teango.wordpress.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5554 days ago

2210 posts - 3734 votes 
Speaks: English*, German, Russian
Studies: Hawaiian, French, Toki Pona

 
 Message 69 of 78
09 September 2013 at 7:52am | IP Logged 
15 Minutes a Day (remastered): Week 3, "ad astra per alia porci"

Hours of study this week: 5.5
Total hours of study: 24.5


I watched Stargate with my wife this weekend, as she'd never seen the film before and was interested in watching the series. Not long into the movie, I jumped up and was compelled to hit the pause button. Hieroglyphics on the screen...and with incorrect translations just begging to be mended beneath them (which is actually part of the plot)...it was all too tempting! I found myself able to translate whole phrases of hieroglyphics and couldn't help but round off my eccentric performance with a "little Pharaoh" victory dance of delight (much to the bemusement of my Nefertiti). But hey, how often do I get to use my knowledge of Ancient Egyptian in this modern age! :D


Come on Danny boy, you overlooked the 3 lines on that first one…it’s plural!


Edited by Teango on 10 September 2013 at 7:13pm

4 persons have voted this message useful



Teango
Triglot
Winner TAC 2010 & 2012
Senior Member
United States
teango.wordpress.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5554 days ago

2210 posts - 3734 votes 
Speaks: English*, German, Russian
Studies: Hawaiian, French, Toki Pona

 
 Message 70 of 78
09 September 2013 at 8:03am | IP Logged 
@prz_
It's good to hear I'm not the only nut in the bag! :D I really like your list of study languages by the way, especially Tajik and Persian (and if I recall correctly, the added possibility of some Georgian and Armenian waiting in the wings).

@montmorency
Yes, that's 10 a day alright! I'm not quite hitting that target every day so far but I'm working hard towards it. Now if I can only get some additional funding and quit the day job...
1 person has voted this message useful



Jeffers
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 4907 days ago

2151 posts - 3960 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German

 
 Message 71 of 78
09 September 2013 at 6:03pm | IP Logged 
Teango wrote:
15 Minutes a Day (remastered): Week 2, "ad astra per alia porci"

Hours of study this week: 5.5
Total hours of study: 24.5


I watched Stargate with my wife this weekend, as she'd never seen the film before and was interested in watching the series. Not long into the movie, I jumped up and was compelled to hit the pause button. Hieroglyphics on the screen...and with incorrect translations just begging to be mended beneath them (which is actually part of the plot)...it was all too tempting! I found myself able to translate whole phrases of hieroglyphics and couldn't help but round off my eccentric performance with a "little Pharaoh" victory dance of delight (much to the bemusement of my Nefertiti). But hey, how often do I get to use my knowledge of Ancient Egyptian in this modern age! :D


Come on Danny boy, you overlooked the 3 lines on that first one…it’s plural!


I seem to remember there's another mistake when he translates. He erases the translation "forever" and replaces it with "for eternity"... never mind that they mean the same thing.
1 person has voted this message useful



Teango
Triglot
Winner TAC 2010 & 2012
Senior Member
United States
teango.wordpress.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5554 days ago

2210 posts - 3734 votes 
Speaks: English*, German, Russian
Studies: Hawaiian, French, Toki Pona

 
 Message 72 of 78
10 September 2013 at 10:54pm | IP Logged 
@Jeffers
I have nHH listed down as "éternité" in my Assimil too, although you're probably right, the difference between "forever" and "eternity" is just Danny splitting hairs here. I guess one subtle difference might be that "forever" is until the end of time (whenever that may be), whilst "eternity" signifies that time never ends and is infinite. I recall there's another common phrase (nHH-Dt) that means something along those lines, i.e. "forever and ever". I was just happy to recognise the funny squiggles this time round... :)

Edited by Teango on 10 September 2013 at 10:55pm



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