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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| nancydowns Senior Member United States Joined 3718 days ago 184 posts - 288 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written) | Message 137 of 196 03 May 2014 at 11:50pm | IP Logged | ||
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Wow, that's great, having some good people posting here is drawing more in! :-) I wish I were further along with Arabic so I had some kind of questions
to ask! Ha! Actually, I think when I post a sample of what I have written, people can see where I make mistakes, and that opens up an opportunity to ask questions to clarify things I am learning (or not!). Could you tell me what resources you are using? Or just what you used for beginning grammar? I am using "Mastering Arabic" by Wightwick and Gaafar. It is pretty good, easy to follow, but sometimes their grammar explanations are very light and just gloss over the point. I have found some websites to look into things more in depth, if I feel I need to. So I am just continuing with this book, and I hope it is giving me a good foundation. They have a second book, and I am thinking of trying that when I am finished with the first. Also, I found some graded Arabic readers online with the diacritical marks. That is too advanced for me right now, but maybe when I am finished with this first book, I can begin with those. If you have any suggestions, please feel free! I will probably post a picture of something I have written soon... well, as soon as I can find my camera! :-) I have misplaced it! Maybe I can take one with my phone that will be readable. Thanks for stopping in! :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Luso Hexaglot Senior Member Portugal Joined 5857 days ago 819 posts - 1812 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, French, EnglishC2, GermanB1, Italian, Spanish Studies: Sanskrit, Arabic (classical) | Message 138 of 196 04 May 2014 at 3:43am | IP Logged | ||
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I started replying here, but it was getting a bit long. To cut a long story short, I ended up posting it in my log.
Feel free to check it out over there. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| nancydowns Senior Member United States Joined 3718 days ago 184 posts - 288 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written) | Message 139 of 196 06 May 2014 at 5:04am | IP Logged | ||
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This is my first quick update for a couple of weeks. I hate to do this, but my mind is not super organized and analitical, and somehow keeping up with studying time
has not worked out! So I am going to delete that part of my log. I really have no idea how many hours I have put in, and just putting up random numbers doesn't seem to have any purpose at all! Also, I am giving Assimil a rest for now. I feel like the most benefit I have found is from FSI, so I'd like to just focus on that for now. I may pick up Assimil later. Also, I am no longer doing Scriptorium for Assimil or FSI because I am doing an error journal from Lang-8 and intensive reading of Wayne Drop for my Scriptorium. Sorry to be so wishy-washy, but language learning is new to me, so I am refining the process as I go. Thanks to everyone for their insights along the way! SPANISH Assimil: First Wave Lesson 55 FSI: Unit 27 Lang-8 5/100 Here is a link to my journal entries. Wayne Drop Page 1/12 Pimsleur III: Unit 27 Coffee Break Spanish: Lesson 42 Notes in Spanish: Lesson 9 Destinos: episode 37 ARABIC Mastering Arabic: Chapter 11 So it looks like all I am doing is taking things away from my studies, but I have also added some important things. :-) I am going to try to write two journal entries on Lang-8 per week, so far I have 5 of the 100 I want to get done. I have been trying to decide what to do with the corrections I receive, and after reading Bakunin's log, I think I am going to keep an error journal. For now, it is on paper, this is my new scriptorium exercise. I print out my original and then hand mark the corrections on that paper. Then I copy out the correct form. I think I will make a note of Grammar or Vocabulary that keeps popping up as a problem. I may keep it in Word, or just in a notebook. I am going to start WayneDrop, and I am going to use that also for a Scriptorium exercise. Igunamon suggested that I not look things up in English, except as a last resort. So I am going to copy out the page, noting any words I don't understand from context, then I'll look them up in Google images and see if that helps with comprehension. I am doing a lot of revision in my Arabic book and going through some Wikipedia sites with grammar explanations. I am writing out a lot of sentences to try to learn my vocab. I felt like I had to streamline things because my free time is so short these days. So my study time is spent on FSI, Lang-8 journals, WayneDrop, and Mastering Arabic. I am going to just keep a narrow focus for now and see how I do. If I get really tired of it, I will add Assimil back in. I am so anxious for when I can read books, so the WayneDrop will be a good exercise, and the Lang-8 journals keep me reaching! :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Crush Tetraglot Senior Member ChinaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5661 days ago 1622 posts - 2299 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Mandarin, Esperanto Studies: Basque | Message 140 of 196 06 May 2014 at 6:13pm | IP Logged | ||
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I honestly think you won't need Assimil after FSI, but if you find you have the time, of course feel free to fit it back in. I really enjoy the passive wave of Assimil and can generally find lots of holes in my day to fit it in. FSI and other courses tend to be a bit harder to squeeze in. I think the narrow focus will be nice, too. I often miss the days when i only focused on one thing at a time instead of being so spread out these days ;)
Once you make it through FSI, you won't be that far off from being able to read books. You've already made tons of progress, so don't get discouraged now! Edited by Crush on 06 May 2014 at 6:14pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| BOLIO Senior Member United States Joined 4454 days ago 253 posts - 366 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 141 of 196 07 May 2014 at 6:02pm | IP Logged | ||
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"I am going to start WayneDrop, and I am going to use that also for a Scriptorium exercise. Igunamon suggested that I
not look things up in English, except as a last resort. So I am going to copy out the page, noting any words I don't understand from context, then I'll look them up in Google images and see if that helps with comprehension. " That is a very interesting idea. I will continue to Scriptorium Assimil just because I have become a weee bit obsessed with completing it. However, I think your plan has a lot of merit and makes a ton of sense. The whole google images thing should work very well and I am going to see if it will work for me as well. Keep at it! 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| nancydowns Senior Member United States Joined 3718 days ago 184 posts - 288 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written) | Message 142 of 196 07 May 2014 at 6:17pm | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks, Bolio! I think I was needing a little change. I love Scriptorium! So I will be glad to apply it to a text like this. I think I will continue to
pick up passive Assimil lessons when I can, but not focused anymore on Assimil. Isn't it interesting how we kind of refine as we go along? We find things that work well for us individually. I am glad you are enjoying the Democracy Now. I tried listening to one of those, and I'm not quite ready for that level yet! I hope to get there one day!
You to! :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| BOLIO Senior Member United States Joined 4454 days ago 253 posts - 366 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 143 of 196 07 May 2014 at 6:33pm | IP Logged | ||
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Make no mistake, she could be speaking half of the news in Mandarin and I would not know the difference...but it is fun to pick out pieces here and there.
:) Edited by BOLIO on 07 May 2014 at 6:33pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| iguanamon Pentaglot Senior Member Virgin Islands Speaks: Ladino Joined 5058 days ago 2237 posts - 6731 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese, Haitian Creole, Creole (French) | Message 144 of 196 07 May 2014 at 7:32pm | IP Logged | ||
Democracy Now! is probably the fastest Spanish you'll ever hear. The pieces turn into phrases. The phrases turn into sentences. The sentences turn into paragraphs. The gibberish turns into communication- the more you listen, and read. Then, one day, you don't need to read anymore. Democracy Now! and Wayne Drop are just examples of creating your own learning program, which you can do with comprehensible native material. It can be hard though, to find your own comprehensible material, especially as a beginner. What makes the incomprehensible, comprehensible, is having a transcript and an English translation/original (though an English version is not absolutely necessary). Training listening takes daily listening over several weeks, even months (for me), and that's the issue for a lot of folks, but it works. Listening can be trained. You get used to the voice, the rhythms. Vocabulary repeats as stories continue. That's why TV series are a better option than films, in my experience. The slow audio of some courses, designed to gently break in the learner to listening, may make a learner "comfortable" but native speakers speak fast sometimes and may have accents, and for me, that's what I want to be comfortable with in a language. If that means I have to be "uncomfortable" for a while, I'd rather get that out of the way sooner rather than later, but it's a personal choice. There are easier native-speaker options, :), like audiobooks from librivox.org, songs, poems, and other podcasts with transcripts. Nothing beats daily listening to train listening. I recently watched "The Matrix" again. It was on TV. When "Neo" is rescued from the pod farm and his mind is freed from the virtual world created for him in order to serve his machine masters, he is shocked that he is having trouble moving his muscles. Morpheus tells him it's because he's never used them before. Neo has a quizzical look on his face because, to him, of course he's used them before, but that was in a virtual world, not the real world. That's why listening can be difficult for learners whose primary contact with a language is through a course. Edited by iguanamon on 07 May 2014 at 7:45pm 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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