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2 Questions (one on reading, one on FSI) | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies |  | |
| soclydeza85 Senior Member United States Joined 3702 days ago 357 posts - 502 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: German, French | Message 1 of 13 24 July 2014 at 4:35am | IP Logged | ||
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Instead of making 2 posts, I figured I'd ask both questions here.
READING: I find when I am reading, I get tripped up on unknown vocab and/or trying to really understand each sentence. This ends up slowing me down a great deal and eventually I give up. What do you all do when you read; do you stop and make note of each unknown vocab word, or do you just kind of move through at a steady rate, not worrying too much about the finer points as long as you have a basic gist of what is going on? FSI: First off, would FSI be beneficial after Pimsleur (German, all 4 levels) or does it end pretty much at the same level? If so, can it be used just with the audio (while commuting)? I haven't used it in a while, I forget if it is necessary to have the .pdf in front of me. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Via Diva Diglot Senior Member Russian Federation last.fm/user/viadivaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4029 days ago 1109 posts - 1427 votes Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: German, Italian, French, Swedish, Esperanto, Czech, Greek | Message 2 of 13 24 July 2014 at 5:24am | IP Logged | ||
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I move through, but if this happens too often and the book is boring I give up. If the book is interesting, I look up translations (I set up a connection between my reader app and a bunch of offline English dictionaries specifically for that). I have to mention that I read fast regardless of language (I remember swallowing Harry Potter and The Order of Phoenix (in Russian) in less than a day aka 12 hours), so it's not usual for me to try and understand each sentence.
I have tried to add words to Anki, maybe that will work for someone who actually like to deal with Anki. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| kanewai Triglot Senior Member United States justpaste.it/kanewai Joined 4684 days ago 1386 posts - 3054 votes Speaks: English*, French, Marshallese Studies: Italian, Spanish | Message 3 of 13 24 July 2014 at 5:52am | IP Logged | ||
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I try and keep a steady rate when I read. It's slow enough as it is; I think I would
drive myself crazy (or just quit) if I tried to write down each word I had to look up. I don't know FSI German, but what I found with Spanish, Turkish and French were similar general patterns: - First part of a lesson is a dialogue; you need the pdf to follow along - The next couple parts are simple drills; I could usually but not always do these with audio only. A lot of times I would listen to a segment twice. The first time audio only; then I'd review the pdf; then I'd try the audio again the next day. - Latter parts of each chapter have more complicated drills, and I would need to either have the pdf with me, or review it before I tried the audio. A full FSI course will take you light-years beyond anything that Pimsleur, or any other course I know, can. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6392 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 4 of 13 24 July 2014 at 6:44am | IP Logged | ||
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See reading strategies. I generally use either an audio or a parallel text if I read too slowly/think too much.
As for FSI, even for Finnish there are materials that cover pretty much all of it in a much more enjoyable way. For example, a German-based Langenscheidt textbook, btw. I never checked it out but I'm sure they have great materials for German too. So do Deutsche Welle, Duden etc. And if you've not used written sources for now, it's time to make up your mind about the old/new spelling issue. I can't write in either of them consistently tbh :( That's not necessarily a significant problem, but you should make a conscious decision imo. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| iguanamon Pentaglot Senior Member Virgin Islands Speaks: Ladino Joined 5057 days ago 2237 posts - 6731 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese, Haitian Creole, Creole (French) | Message 5 of 13 24 July 2014 at 1:04pm | IP Logged | ||
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Adding to the excellent advice given, if reading is too difficult at this stage, consider what you're trying to read. Different materials have radically different levels of difficulty. I would never advise a Spanish-learner to start reading Don Quixote or Cien años de soledad right off the bat. The language is too complicated and the amount of effort involved to make it comprehensible would be far more than the benefit gained.
Start off small and work your way up. Parallel texts are a good way to ease into reading. The English to your right makes reading the German easier. It can serve as a "check" on your comprehension or as a dictionary in itself. I know nothing about German or what's available out there for learners but I'm sure if you ask, someone here can help you. One of the sources I used for Portuguese when I was actively learning is Global Voices. The site is multilingual with almost all of the articles having English versions/translations. You can make your own parallel texts by opening a word/open office document and inserting a table with two columns and one row. Click the print version of the articles. Copy and paste TL on the left and English on the right. Or, online open two browser windows side by side. The advantage of GV is having accurate translations, varied subjects and short length. Reading, listening to native audio and speaking alongside doing a course is an effective way to learn. A good balance between course materials and real-world materials is the key. If this something that interests you, please have a look at my post on the Multi-track approach. FSI: Yes, it would be beneficial. I would have done it alongside Pimsleur so I could have had the benefit of synergy, but yes, it will be worth your time and effort. I don't know the German course, but it's the drills in FSI that help the most. Good luck with your studies! Edited by iguanamon on 24 July 2014 at 1:08pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6392 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 6 of 13 24 July 2014 at 1:32pm | IP Logged | ||
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speaking of that, try GLOSS and lyricstraining :) GLOSS has rather few German lessons, but they're worth doing.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| smallwhite Pentaglot Senior Member Australia Joined 5103 days ago 537 posts - 1045 votes Speaks: Cantonese*, English, Mandarin, French, Spanish | Message 7 of 13 24 July 2014 at 3:10pm | IP Logged | ||
When I want to practise reading smoothly, I pick easy things to read, and read non-stop. When I want to learn vocabulary in context, I pick harder things to read, and copy down every unknown word for later study. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5327 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map | Message 8 of 13 24 July 2014 at 4:52pm | IP Logged | ||
When it comes to improving my comprehension, I like to divide learning into two separate stages: 1. Turning incomprehensible text into something that I can decipher by making an effort. 2. Turning decipherable text into something that I understand effortlessly. The first stage is obvious: If you study a language, it starts out opaque, and you can only understand it by puzzling things out and making guesses, generally with help from parallel texts and explanations. But the second stage is just as important: Once you can decipher something, you still need to internalize it and make it fully automatic. So when you read, if you stop every 10 seconds to look something up, it helps more with (1). If you just plow ahead at full speed, it helps more with (2). And most intermediate students need a vast amount of (2), so it doesn't hurt to do lots of free reading without looking much up. Of course, other good strategies are to have some way to effortlessly look up words (using an ereader dictionary, or even using parallel texts at lower levels), or to simply mark words to look up later (using a faint pencil or the highlight function of an ereader). One problem with looking up every single word is that there's a huge number of words that are individually rare, but which taken all together turn up pretty frequently. So if you try to understand every unknown word, you'll waste a lot of time on words which you won't see again in the next 10 books you read. So one good strategy is to wait until you've seen a word several times before looking it up or trying to learn it. 4 persons have voted this message useful |
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