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Two languages - same time or separately | ||
Tags: Simultaneous study | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies |  | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6409 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 9 of 23 26 April 2013 at 12:04am | IP Logged | ||
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does Arabic actually require all of your free time? is it even efficient to try so hard? there's a point where progress will be quite slow no matter how much time you spend... and it won't necessarily be even more slow if you cut down on it.
basically, instead of looking for time for Arabic, look for language learning time. decide individually which language needs that time, and try to find a productive combination of time+language+materials. like, instead of a lecture it should be okay to listen to something more simple in a different language, even music. no offence meant but it really seems like you have some optimization to do. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Talib Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6473 days ago 171 posts - 205 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (classical) Studies: Arabic (Egyptian) | Message 10 of 23 26 April 2013 at 1:23am | IP Logged | ||
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no offense taken... In terms of optimizing language learning, I could obviously do a lot better. I agree that doing a lot of Arabic may not be the optimal way to get more fluent in many languages, but I am studying subjects in it that are inaccessible in my native language. For me, using Arabic as a tool to access that knowledge is what counts even if it is less efficient in terms of maxing out linguistic capabilities. As for learning an additional language, it is useful for the study of knowledge that I am interested in, but it is less useful, so its gets less time accordingly. I think its a matter of priorities and goals. Edited by Talib on 26 April 2013 at 1:25am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6409 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 11 of 23 26 April 2013 at 2:00am | IP Logged | ||
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the thing is, in the long run you won't miss out much. if you are willing to sacrifice even 2 hours a week in addition to the 30 mins a day you've already decided to set aside, at least while you are still a beginner, the results will be more noticeable. as of now you're giving the extra languages so little time that their limited usefulness changes to nothing.
do you still *study* Arabic, btw, or do you just study those secret things through it? sounds like it might be the time to reduce the time spent on Arabic itself and not the fascinating (or dangerous?) stuff. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Cabaire Senior Member Germany Joined 5411 days ago 725 posts - 1352 votes | Message 12 of 23 26 April 2013 at 2:18am | IP Logged | ||
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I found it tactful that Talib only alluded to the knowledge which is only available in Arabic, seeing that this is a internet community with very different worldviews, so I don't think anyone should press the point ("dangerous...").
3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6409 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 13 of 23 26 April 2013 at 2:42am | IP Logged | ||
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I'm not pressing the point, sorry. Just got a frightening thought that dangerous people can be reading this forum too. (which now reminds me on that scene in LOTR when Gandalf reappears. "Dangerous? Chung is dangerous. Cristina is dangerous. You're surrounded by dangers, Serpent!" :o) )
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6409 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 23 26 April 2013 at 12:55pm | IP Logged | ||
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Also, to some extent your situation reminds me on kujichagulia's. He's now happily learning Portuguese in Japan, while continuing to improve his Japanese:)
2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| montmorency Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4640 days ago 2371 posts - 3676 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Danish, Welsh | Message 15 of 23 26 April 2013 at 3:02pm | IP Logged | ||
I'm not a moderator, but if I may try to make a suggestion here: Do you mean when using the link icon at the top of the reply box? You might try typing in the url and /url BBCode directly. Since I'm not sure I can type in an example here that you will be able to see, I will rather point you to a Wikipedia page about BBCode: BBCode Wikipedia page It should also help, if the URL is long, which they always are if pointing to forum posts, if you stretch out the reply box. You can do this by dragging the bottom right- hand corner of the inner rectangle within the reply box. (It is slightly hatched). Try to make it big enough such that the entire URL fits on one line. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Julie Heptaglot Senior Member PolandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6715 days ago 1251 posts - 1733 votes 5 sounds Speaks: Polish*, EnglishB2, GermanC2, SpanishB2, Dutch, Swedish, French | Message 16 of 23 27 April 2013 at 12:21am | IP Logged | ||
If you were all about language wanderlust, trying new languages as a hobby etc., I wouldn't even strongly discourage you from tackling both French and German in the limited time you've got. I dabbled in lots of languages for fun / because of linguistic interests, while being usually focused on one-two "main" target languages at the same time. However, it seems like you have very practical motivation for the study of French and German. You want to get decent reading comprehension to tackle materials in these languages. At the moment, it might not seem reasonable to "lose" time on learning French or German, devoting more than your assigned 3,5 hours per week, but really, this seems like a reasonable choice in the long run. If you decide to make a bit more time for French or German by cutting on other activities (not necessarily those related to Arabic, it's all up to you), you'll get much sooner to the level where you'll be able to use the language as a tool, and it won't feel like such a waste of time anymore. On the other hand, if you don't find enough time for French/German, you may totally waste the little time you will find, making only little progress and not getting the skills you could make use of, at least not in any foreseeable future. (Again, I'm assuming your reasons for learning languages are purely/mostly practical, and you're not all about "enjoying the linguistic journey" ;)). 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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