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LanguageSponge’s TAC 2013 Log

 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log Post Reply
92 messages over 12 pages: << Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ... 10 ... 11 12 Next >>
Toffeeliz
Diglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 5474 days ago

116 posts - 130 votes 
Speaks: English*, Mandarin
Studies: Russian

 
 Message 73 of 92
09 February 2013 at 10:27am | IP Logged 
Does this mean I can use Chinese to comment on your log now? ;) мой руский ешё плохо.
1 person has voted this message useful



Josquin
Heptaglot
Senior Member
Germany
Joined 4638 days ago

2266 posts - 3992 votes 
Speaks: German*, English, French, Latin, Italian, Russian, Swedish
Studies: Japanese, Irish, Portuguese, Persian

 
 Message 74 of 92
10 March 2013 at 1:39pm | IP Logged 
Hey Jack!

Still kicking? Haven't heard anything from you for a long time. I hope these problems you mentioned aren't too serious and you can get some studying done. Anyway, it would be great to hear from you again soon.

Best wishes, удачи, and успехов!

PS: Would you like me to correct your German?
1 person has voted this message useful



LanguageSponge
Triglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 5560 days ago

1197 posts - 1487 votes 
Speaks: English*, German, French
Studies: Welsh, Russian, Japanese, Slovenian, Greek, Italian

 
 Message 75 of 92
12 April 2013 at 8:44am | IP Logged 
Dear all,

I am back from a two month long break from language learning and the forum which was
mostly due to family problems. I find that my languages are some of the first things to
go when family problems rear their ugly heads. These problems may well crop up again
until I get my head around them properly, so I'm going to take my languages slowly from
now on.

I intend to carry on studying Russian and Modern Greek as well as German. I will
probably mess around with Chinese characters or Japanese kana as well. The rest of this
log will be written in German or Russian as usual.

Thanks for reading,

Jack

-----

@ Josquin -

Hi Josquin. I'm still kicking, yes, but with somewhat less enthusiasm for the moment
until things are sorted. I'd be very grateful if you would correct my German, I don't
get corrected very often anymore and it's made me think my German is better than it
probably is. Just because you're able to get your message across with ease doesn't mean
it's all right. Thanks for writing :)

@ Toffeeliz,

You can indeed write in Chinese from now on. I cannot promise that I'll do the same
though as my Chinese is abysmal, and I say that word in particular because I don't
agree with swearing when describing just how rubbish my Chinese is...

I will update again soon when I've done something worth writing about :)

Thanks again for reading,

Jack

Edited by LanguageSponge on 12 April 2013 at 8:48am

1 person has voted this message useful



Emme
Triglot
Senior Member
Italy
Joined 5141 days ago

980 posts - 1594 votes 
Speaks: Italian*, English, German
Studies: Russian, Swedish, French

 
 Message 76 of 92
15 April 2013 at 3:59pm | IP Logged 
Hi, Jack!

Nice to have you back on the forum!

It seems that 2013 has been quite difficult for several here on the forum and of course what gets sacrificed first when things becomes distressing IRL is our passion for languages.

I hope things will soon improve and settle back to normal for you and your family. I’m sure I can speak for the whole team Mir when I say that we’re all here rooting for you.

Emme

1 person has voted this message useful



LanguageSponge
Triglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 5560 days ago

1197 posts - 1487 votes 
Speaks: English*, German, French
Studies: Welsh, Russian, Japanese, Slovenian, Greek, Italian

 
 Message 77 of 92
19 April 2013 at 8:50am | IP Logged 
Thanks Emme. 2013 does indeed seem to be a difficult year for quite a few of us. I'm
going to ease back into it gently and see where I get. It is difficult to be consistent
in your study habits when something like this happens, but I'll get back to it soon
enough.

---

Letztes Wochenende habe ich eine Nachricht von der Tochter eines Familienfreundes
bekommen. Sie macht ein Schulprojekt zur Sowjetunion und hat einen fiktiven Brief
geschrieben, von einem Gefangenen in einem der sowjeten Zwangsarbeitslagern, an seine
Schwester. Sie wollte einen draufsetzen, somit hat sie mich darum gebeten, den
dreiseitigen Brief ins Russische zu übersetzen. Es war ziemlich einfach aber es war
eine gute Übung. Ich habe eine russische Freundin dazu gebracht, meine Übersetzung zu
prüfen.

Diese Woche habe ich einen kleinen Hinweis gelernt, der scheint, mir beim Schreiben der
chinesischen Schriftzeichen zu helfen. Mein Chinesischlehrer hat mir die Namen der
individuellen Striche beigebracht, und ich finde, es hilft beim Memorieren, die Namen
der Striche laut auszusprechen, während ich schreibe.

Last weekend I got a message from a friend of my dad's. This friend's daughter is doing
some kind of school project on a the Soviet Union, and wrote a ficticious letter from a
prisoner in one of the labour camps to his sister. She wanted to go the extra mile and
write it in Russian as well, so she asked me to translate it. I was happy to and it was
pretty easy to write, but it was good practice. I got a Russian friend of mine to check
it and there were only minor mistakes.

I've been shown a little trick to help me with writing the Chinese characters. I find
writing lots of fun but it's difficult, so my Chinese teacher, from Xuzhou in north-
western Jiangsu Province, taught me the names of the individual strokes. I find it
helps me to say the names of the strokes aloud while I'm writing the characters.

Oh, and I have a question. My teacher says that my writing is usually very clear, but
sometimes some of my strokes are too long or individual parts of a character are too
big in relation to the other parts. I can almost guaranteee this is a common problem
with learners, but my problem is made worse by a spatial awareness problem connected to
a medical condition. Does anyone have any useful tips for this, besides "practice makes
perfect"?

Thanks!
Jack

Edited by LanguageSponge on 19 April 2013 at 8:53am

1 person has voted this message useful



Emme
Triglot
Senior Member
Italy
Joined 5141 days ago

980 posts - 1594 votes 
Speaks: Italian*, English, German
Studies: Russian, Swedish, French

 
 Message 78 of 92
19 April 2013 at 11:23am | IP Logged 
I don’t know much about hanzi/kanji in general (I’m barely dipping my toes into Japanese right now) and you probably already know about these kind of sheets, but do you think practicing writing on sheets of paper with different grids might help?

Online you can find several, and maybe by experimenting a bit you might find one that works for you.

Some examples:

http://mandarinposter.com/wp-content/downloads/paper/drills_ a4.pdf
Quarters
Squares
Diagonals
Hex style

Edited by Emme on 19 April 2013 at 11:26am

1 person has voted this message useful



tarvos
Super Polyglot
Winner TAC 2012
Senior Member
China
likeapolyglot.wordpr
Joined 4501 days ago

5310 posts - 9399 votes 
Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans
Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish

 
 Message 79 of 92
19 April 2013 at 11:45am | IP Logged 
Spatial awareness being a lack of depth perception? If so, then your handwriting is going
to suck (so is mine). Practice makes perfect and 9/10 times, just type and don't write.
It's better for everyone.
1 person has voted this message useful



LanguageSponge
Triglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 5560 days ago

1197 posts - 1487 votes 
Speaks: English*, German, French
Studies: Welsh, Russian, Japanese, Slovenian, Greek, Italian

 
 Message 80 of 92
19 April 2013 at 1:29pm | IP Logged 
Emme, thank you for your links. I was obviously aware of these but I had momentarily
forgotten about them. I'll print myself off some of these and practise. I am finding
that saying the stroke names in Chinese really helps me to remember characters. I'm not
able to write very complex ones yet as I've been focusing on speaking. I can always
learn to write when I leave here, but right now I should be getting in as much speaking
practice as I can.

tarvos, yes, my spatial awareness is a lack of depth perception. You should see me when
I'm trying to get out of a car, I'm comical, and have been since I've been strong
enough to open doors for myself. In that way, yes, my handwriting is going to suck. Is
there any way to post files on here? I was thinking of uploading my (awful) Chinese
handwriting, as well as my Russian handwriting, which is almost as bad.

Am Dienstag fahre ich nach Hong Kong, um ein Problem mit dem Visum zu lösen. Für mich
beginnen die Ferien also dann. Diese Zeit nutze ich aus, um Chinesisch und Russisch zu
lernen. Russisch lerne ich, wenn ich die ganzen Reihen von chinesischen Schriftzeichen,
die ich noch nicht lesen kann, nicht mehr ausstehen kann.

On Tuesday I will be going to Hong Kong to sort out some stuff, so my May holiday
effectively begins then. I will use this time to study Chinese and Russian, putting
more emphasis on Chinese, reading Russian or watching Russian cartoons when I want a
break from the wall of Chinese I can't yet read.

Jack


1 person has voted this message useful



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