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First steps in polyglottery, 2 | ||
Tags: Polyglottery | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Lessons in Polyglottery |  | |
| matthieu Diglot Newbie France Joined 5882 days ago 5 posts - 6 votes Speaks: French*, EnglishC2 Studies: German, Korean | Message 1 of 5 01 April 2008 at 7:32pm | IP Logged |
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Dear Professor, dear all,
I discovered this forum not long ago and I want to thank you all for creating it and sharing your experiences, troubles and victories with everyone. A special thank also for professor Arguelles, who accept to use some time on his busy schedule to help us in the ways of polyglottery. I am a 21 year-old student (in physics, therefore I stopped learning languages at school a long time ago) and my mother tongue is French. I currently have an acceptable level of English and an intermediate level in German (which I have not practiced for years, though). I decided to write on this forum because, after reading of your messages, I felt that learning many languages is no longer impossible. I do not know why, but I always thought that it was impossible except for a few gifted people. I want to learn languages because I believe it is the key to really be part of this world ; being able to travel, talk, understand and live in other cultures. I have always been fascinated by other, completely different, cultures. This is where my questions arise. In the long run I would be interested in: ancient greek, latin, Italian (up to intermediate level) spanish, German (up to fluency) russian, arabic, korean and mandarin (up to where I can) But one of my main problem is to define these expectations and to make short-term objectives. I think I need them to keep myself organised and motivated. What would be a good start ? Here is what I am currently doing: * learning Spanish from the beginning using the FSI course ; I don't really like it but that is all I have. * trying to remember my knowledge of German using the FSI course again ; I prefer this one, especially the variation drills that help a lot with fluency. * discovering korean using Pimsleur audio course ; I am really enjoying this but I would also like to develop reading/writing skills. The short-term objectives (i.e. by the end of next august) I have are (using the ALTE framework) : * B2 in German * B2 in Spanish * A2 in Korean I can put aside around 4 hours a day for the next five month in order to fulfill the objectives. Does it look like a reasonnable plan ? Are some languages more appropriate to my background ? Should I acquire new work material ? Here are the reasons why I want to learn each language, it can be an important factor in the choice of the order of learning (and it can also be interesting for me to actually force myself to write them down). * ancient greek / latin : they are the classics and they play a tremendous role in european culture * Italian : travelling reasons and I would love to be able to read in Italian * Spanish : travelling reasons (I really hope I'll be able to travel around a lot in the next few years, and Spanish can only help with that) * German : I want to be able to read in German (Hoffmann, Goethe...) and I would like to study for some time in Germany * russian : I am in love with XIXth century Russian litterature ; therefore being able to read in Russian would be of great interest. * arabic : as a key to discover the culture * korean : I really like the way it looks/sounds and I would really like to discover the culture * mandarin : one of the most spoken language in the world, and I have a friend who speaks it On second thought, "travelling reasons" can be added to all the languages... That is all I wanted to ask for now. I hope that wasn't too long and thank you by advance for all the help you can bring. Sincerly, M. Laneuville 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| ProfArguelles Moderator United States foreignlanguageexper Joined 7056 days ago 609 posts - 2102 votes  | Message 2 of 5 06 April 2008 at 9:31pm | IP Logged |
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Mr. Laneuville,
I am gratified to hear that you, a budding physicist, have developed confidence in your own ability to learn multiple-languages as well. Indeed, defining your expectations and short-term objectives is a very wise and solid plan. With 4 hours a day over the next 5 months, you can certainly make a great deal of progress in the three languages you are currently studying. How much progress, e.g., to your B2/A2 goals, you make depends more than anything else a) upon your current level and b) upon how wisely you use your time. If it helps you to hold up specific goals like that, do so, but I think it might be more reasonable to simply set a goal of making as much regular and consistent progress as you can. I do think you need some new materials, especially for Spanish since you do not care for the course you are using, and for Korean, since Pimsleur will not give you anything more than the slimmest of introductions. There are a great many methods out there, and I recommend that you read around on this forum to look for advice for better ones. I wish you the best of luck, and invite you back for help in developing a better study regimen once you have chosen some more appropriate materials. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| matthieu Diglot Newbie France Joined 5882 days ago 5 posts - 6 votes Speaks: French*, EnglishC2 Studies: German, Korean | Message 3 of 5 12 April 2008 at 1:31pm | IP Logged |
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First of all I want to thank you for your support. I spent most of my first weeks of studies looking for new
material and the best way to use my time. I also realized what you meant by "Understand that you are committing yourself to a very difficult task and make that commitment seriously" when talking about Korean language. Therefore, as my main pleasure at the moment is to study Korean, I decided to focus only on its study. I read your ideal systematic approach to korean and I am know fully determined to follow it (i.e. I've just completed step 1). But here is my problem : I want to buy the books you advise, but their audio is only available on cassette... Do you, or anyone else actually, know where to find them on CD ? I am not trying to avoid the cost of the cassettes here, but there is simply no way for me to read them that way. If not, what would you advise to replace the introductory work of B.J. Jones ? Again, thank you for the time you devote to help us. M. Laneuville 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| ProfArguelles Moderator United States foreignlanguageexper Joined 7056 days ago 609 posts - 2102 votes | Message 4 of 5 13 April 2008 at 6:06pm | IP Logged |
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Mr. Laneuville,
I am very sorry that you have difficulty with cassettes. Actually, I face an enormous crisis in this regard myself. My massive collection is 98% on cassettes, and the powers that be suddenly and swiftly seem to have decided that these were to be phased out with great rapidity. So, I know that dual tape decks are now very hard to come by. I have read and heard that there are a number of simple and easy programs that one can use to play a tape and simultaneously make a digital recording of it. I MUST find out how to do this myself ASAP, but unfortunately I have not done so yet, so I cannot guide you further. At any rate, if it is as simple as they say, then I would encourage your to explore this option as well. If not, then although I am not personally acquainted with it, I recall that there was some discussion, all favorable, of a work with a title like The Sounds of Korean as a substitute for the Jones book. Good luck! 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| ChristopherB Triglot Senior Member New Zealand Joined 6116 days ago 851 posts - 1074 votes 2 sounds Speaks: English*, German, French | Message 5 of 5 13 April 2008 at 7:05pm | IP Logged |
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If you do manage to come across a tape-deck, which should be quite easy to find in a second-hand store of sorts, it is fortunately extremely easy to do. Thus, buying cassettes shouldn't be much of a problem, as all you have to do is connect the tape-deck to your PC, and let the tape run through while recording. Then you can export the file/s as a .wav or .mp3 and burn it to a CD.
This is how I do it: http://lifehacker.com/software/mp3/alpha-geek-how-to-digitiz e-cassette-tapes-222394.php The video here shows a slightly different approach, but works in more or less the same way and is more detailed: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UO-EdNXjkg&feature=related 1 person has voted this message useful |
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