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New Super Challenge Discussion thread2014 | ||
Tags: Super Challenge | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| sctroyenne Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5177 days ago 739 posts - 1312 votes  Speaks: English*, French Studies: Spanish, Irish | Message 297 of 766 19 May 2014 at 9:36pm | IP Logged | ||
I can see how it can be problematic when students forget that you're primarily reading for the linguistic content rather than for the narritive content. I can imagine that in language classes where not all students are very motivated to put the time in to learn, there may be quite a few who'll just read the translation so they can participate in discussions/take a comprehension quiz and call it a day. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Emme Triglot Senior Member Italy Joined 5133 days ago 980 posts - 1594 votes Speaks: Italian*, English, German Studies: Russian, Swedish, French | Message 298 of 766 20 May 2014 at 4:07pm | IP Logged | ||
Last time round I did an unofficial challenge with German. As my opinions are based on my personal experience, keep in mind that I used to be C1 when I finished studying German at university (later I let it rust way too much), but I never felt quite at home with the language. Let’s say I was proficient but not fluent. For the audio part of the challenge I did mainly two things: I watched TV-movies on ARD and ZDF and I listened to radio drama podcasts from WDR. When you stream the movies there’s almost always the chance to use subtitles in German (they are thought for natives with hearing impairment, not for foreigners learning the language) and I usually opted to have them on. I find that watching the movies and listening to the podcasts were two different activities helping with two different - if correlated - skills: the subtitled movies were useful mainly for improving my vocabulary, helping me memorize everyday words and expressions which my formal education based principally on literature had seriously neglected. Listening to radio dramas, on the other hand, provided a more holistic approach to comprehension: with no visual clues, it forced me to work on pure listening, teaching me to tolerate imperfect comprehension, dealing with ambiguity, and filling in the gaps of what I didn’t understand as fully as I hoped for. By the way, podcasts were never “background noise”: when I was listening, I was paying attention to what was going on, otherwise I’m not sure I would have benefited from it as much as I did. So, I find that listening to podcasts can be as effective as watching films to improve your TL, even if the two seem to be complementary rather than equivalent activities. Edited by Emme on 20 May 2014 at 4:08pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| sfuqua Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 4551 days ago 581 posts - 977 votes Speaks: English*, Hawaiian, Tagalog Studies: Spanish | Message 299 of 766 20 May 2014 at 5:10pm | IP Logged | ||
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I made a bilingual text of the first 10 pages of a bunch of the books on my list to read. My idea was to get exposed to a bunch of different idiolects right away. Of course I got hooked by the first book, and have switched to reading through it first. I find myself getting bored doing the rereading I was doing in the beginning, trying to drive words into my memory.
Maybe I'm already learning something. :) Cien a`nos de soledad doesn't seem any easier yet :( :) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| hjordis Senior Member United States snapshotsoftheworld. Joined 4972 days ago 209 posts - 264 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Spanish, Japanese | Message 300 of 766 20 May 2014 at 7:36pm | IP Logged | ||
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I opened up the first French Harry Potter book to a random page and started reading.
It's so much easier than the first time I read it, way back at the beginning of the last super challenge, even though I dropped out of that one. I'm getting a little tired of Harry Potter, though, so I may read a couple of my shorter books once I finish the one that I'm on. Although the next one IS my favorite... Doctor Who is tiring me. Maybe sometime I'll get used to it and it won't take up so much mental energy, but I'm not there yet. Yesterday I decided I needed a break from it and watched a movie instead. In other news, I've started reading tiny amounts of Spanish. Thank you whoever mentioned Charlie and the Chocolate Factory as being super easy. It was on my list but I didn't realize how easy it really is. That said, I'll still be doing just a couple of pages at a time, because I'm focusing on French and Japanese reading at the moment. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Stelle Bilingual Triglot Senior Member Canada tobefluent.com Joined 3930 days ago 949 posts - 1686 votes Speaks: French*, English*, Spanish Studies: Tagalog | Message 301 of 766 21 May 2014 at 2:20am | IP Logged | ||
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was the first Spanish book I ever read. It was such a huge confidence booster! Harry Potter was way too hard for me until I'd made my way through four books at the same level as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I always find it funny how many language learners seem to choose HP as their very first book. They must have way more stamina than me! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| kanewai Triglot Senior Member United States justpaste.it/kanewai Joined 4675 days ago 1386 posts - 3054 votes Speaks: English*, French, Marshallese Studies: Italian, Spanish | Message 302 of 766 21 May 2014 at 8:00am | IP Logged | ||
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Harry Potter is totally exhausting when you're reading at a snail's pace! Especially the
later, longer books. But it's also available on kindle, free if you have an amazon account, and I'm not sure what other popular books are. I've seen Hunger Games on there in a lot of languages. I looked for Percy Jackson, but that only seems to be available in hard copy. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| kanewai Triglot Senior Member United States justpaste.it/kanewai Joined 4675 days ago 1386 posts - 3054 votes Speaks: English*, French, Marshallese Studies: Italian, Spanish | Message 303 of 766 21 May 2014 at 8:09am | IP Logged | ||
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Also: what an amazing start to the challenge! Two stars already, and sixteen people have
logged more 10 or more books. I thought I was doing well, but I've got scroll pretty far down to find my name : ) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Komma Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 3845 days ago 107 posts - 134 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish | Message 304 of 766 21 May 2014 at 10:44am | IP Logged | ||
Yeah.. That's true.. Congrats to those who have a star already. And for all: keep going. I just have so much stuff going on in RL :D But there's still one and a half year left (a bit more even) to read and watch :) I'm really happy, that the challenge motivated me to continue with my English novels I started and then instead of reading in my free time I only look around the internet and time passes too fast.. then it's time to go to bed and I won't read then... In Spanish I already realize some progress, however, I paused for a few days because of university. And I'm still slow. But Lola Lago is not really the story you want to read in one day because it's exciting.. It's not a bad story either.. I like it because it's the right level for me. After that I'm going to read some more graded readers.. Or at least I plan to.. If they are too boring I might even buy a book, so I can read it on my ereader (normally I only lend books from library because after reading them once I normally don't read them again... I'm just too slow and there are so many other books :D) My library, however, has few Spanish novels that interst me and because I like the dictionary function of my ereader, I want to buy the ebooks... Paperback books are nice to look at and to have the "book feeling", but especially for novels in foreign languages I prefer the reader. It would be cool to have a reader with anki and a function to add new words (i know that the kindle has a vocabulary trainer, but i don't have this one and I don'T know whether this trainer ist very useful... if someone does have a kindle PW, I'd be very thankful for a small statement/ review on the vocab tool..), but I just mark words after looking them up and put them into anki later on.. That results in not missing the "flow" (only a bit, while reading the translation of the word) and still being able to track the unknown words :D 1 person has voted this message useful |
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