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Having a hard time improving my Danish | ||
Tags: Learning Experience | Danish | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Advice Center |  | |
| tuuli Tetraglot Newbie Germany Joined 3658 days ago 5 posts - 6 votes Speaks: German*, English, FrenchB1, Latin Studies: Japanese, Danish, Icelandic, Basque Studies: Turkish | Message 1 of 3 23 June 2014 at 6:20pm | IP Logged |
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Hello everyone,
I was wondering whether you could give me some advice. This is my fifth year studying Danish at university and I've been on a plateau for quite some time now and can't seem to make any real progress anymore. The biggest issue is Danish class itself and my Danish teacher (native speaker). For some reason, I am more or less intimidated by her. Whenever I try to say something or whenever I'm spoken to in Danish in class, I regularly draw a complete blank and just can't remember basic vocabulary and grammar, which leaves me feeling like a fool. I have never really gotten along well with my teacher and I have a gut feeling that she really cannot stand me. Also, whenever she talks in Danish, I hardly ever understand her (unfortunately, there are no other Danish teachers around, so her classes are the only choice I have, apart from switching to a different language altogether), giving me the impression that my listening comprehension has to be the worst. Another one of my problems probably has to do with my mother tongue, German. I have a good passive understanding of Danish when reading Danish texts because it's fairly easy to deduce the meaning of the words. I have, however, a hard time actively using the language because I often find myself lacking the vocabulary. Because of all this and because I'm just too scared of making mistakes in front of anyone, I hardly dare to speak Danish of my own accord, which I find really sad :-( Since I was so frustrated with the situation, I decided to pro-actively work against it and therefore started listening to Danmarks Radio over the internet some weeks ago to see whether/how my listening skills would improve. And wow, was this a revelation! I never knew it could be so easy to understand spoken Danish. I assume this is because of the special situation the speakers are in (no distracting background noises, clear pronunciation etc.), or because I find myself in a relaxed environment where my skills are not being tested and/or judged by someone else. Still, I do not know how to get out of this vicious cycle of being afraid of speaking Danish in front of other (Danish) people and being unable to improve my skills because I do not dare to use them. This seemingly irrational fear that strikes me in Danish classes each and every time has really been getting to me in the last few weeks and is ruining all the fun for me :-( I'm sorry that there's no real question to this post, I'm just basically looking for some kind of advice how to deal with this difficult situation and/or the plateau problem. Thank you very much in advance for reading. Edit: Umm, is it okay that I posted this here? The description of the subforum says, "Where people of all levels can ask for advice regarding their personal language learning strategy, priorities, difficulties, goals, practical problems, etc...", whereas the "READ BEFORE POSTING HERE" states, "This room was created for people who are learning their first foreign language", which appears a little contradictory to me. Can somebody clear things up for me? Edited by tuuli on 23 June 2014 at 7:09pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| daegga Tetraglot Senior Member Austria lang-8.com/553301 Joined 4316 days ago 1076 posts - 1792 votes  Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Swedish, Norwegian Studies: Danish, French, Finnish, Icelandic | Message 2 of 3 23 June 2014 at 11:09pm | IP Logged |
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You did the first step already. Get more exposure and do the hard lifting outside the
course/curriculum. This will also make the course easier and will eliminate some pressure. Here is what helped me improving listening comprehension and getting the Danish buzz in my head: a) listen to lots of Danish audio books b) once that feels so easy that you don't have to concentrate on the audio and still understand a lot, take the next step: watching TV series using headphones. No subtitles, but headphones, that's the key. The headphones eliminate the background noise, and without subtitles you are forced to listen very carefully. I found several hours in a row very helpful to get me thinking in Danish. (dr.dk/bonanza will keep you occupied for a while) c) like b, but watch it on the TV without headphones. You can use (Danish) subtitles for the first few episodes of a TV series to ease you in, to make you familiar with the actors and the recurring vocabulary. Oh, and don't drop the audiobooks completely after a) librivox.org has some of HC Andersons fairy tales as Danish audiobooks by the way. Sometimes you also find some on dr.dk for free. mibook.dk sells Danish audiobooks at a good price and then there are other ways of getting them... Btw. do you have a "Skandinavistik" department at your university? The language courses there are more useful than those in your average "Sprachenzentrum". Edited by daegga on 24 June 2014 at 12:20am 6 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 4804 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 3 of 3 24 June 2014 at 2:07am | IP Logged |
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Hmm, despite not having any experience with Danish, I dare to add my two cents about getting out of such plateau with the nice class-teacher twist, I hope it helps:
1.I totally agree with daegga about the tv series. Large doses of listening help with so many things! The other advice concerning getting more resources etc is great as well. 2.I understand you have limited wiggle room when it comes to class or teacher changes for whatever reason given by your university. But you need to solve the situation somehow or it will keep having negative impact on your learning. I used to have an English teacher I hated who was shouting at students every class (I was the target most often) and people felt totally uneasy about speaking since she often interupted them in the middle of sentence etc. So, I suppose a teacher at university isn't THAT horrible but still. Are you the only one having difficulty with the teacher or are others suffering similarily? Either way, you surely need to minimize the damage for the sake of your learning. Noone learns well under such stress, no matter whether the source of the stress is a "real" reason or just a personal dislike for someone. Some ideas: -change the approach as you have already started. A class should be just one of your tools and resources since this class is unable to be the core of your learning. Take it that way. It is a good practice opportunity but you need to progress on your own. You are not learning for your teacher, who cares whether she likes you or what she thinks about your skills. As long as you get the credits, you are ok as far as the class goes. -Focus on the trouble spots (not only) from classes. Get an SRS for vocabulary, a few exercise books with key, if such are available, to deal with the grammar. Lots of input. By the way, SRS has been working really fine for me to active the large passive vocabulary, so it might help you with the similar trouble as well. -Get more pleasant speaking opportunities. If you can, go to Denmark for a few days, it's not that far from Germany after all :-). Even the simple interactions like asking for directions and shopping could break through the initial stage of fear of speaking. -Look around your class. Perhaps you could find a practice partner among your classmates? Someone to sit with at lunch and speak in Danish. :-) 3. Get used to speaking Danish. There is more to it than just finding conversation partners. -Do your exercises of whatever kind out loud. Thinking or whispering won't do. Get your ears used to hearing your mouth producing Danish. Make your brain understand it is a normal situation and there is no need to panic :-) -Think in Danish. It is the best to use your immersion as a starting point. Usually, when I spend an hour or so (or ideally much more) reading or listening to another language, I naturally keep thinking in the language to the full extent of my (limited) abilities for a while. At first, it lasts just a few moments. But it keeps lenghtening with practice. Perhaps, such post immersion times could be helpful to you as well to use. All you need is not to force yourself to leave the immersion zone (like going to speak with someone in German a few seconds after the video stops). -Try formulating your own ideas in Danish and make notes concerning gaps you need to cover. Write a diary, speak to yourself about what you need to buy for dinner, make a review of a Danish movie, sum up the article you've been reading. Anything. The point is to identify the real gaps, to write them down so that you don't forget about them, and to cover them as soon as time allows :-) You might find out you've been getting stuck at the same obstacles for a long time and just a few study sessions focused on those might get you over those. I hope you'll find some of this helpful. Even if not, at least have my sympathy. I wish you good luck with getting out of the plateau so that you can enjoy Danish. Five years, that is a huge investment after all. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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