BOLIO's Spanish log

[BOLIO]

I got the audio book from my local library on inter-library loan. There are tons of copies out there and it should not be hard to get. Angels & Demons (and several other Dan Brown books) is on ivoox.com so I'd assume the da vinci code is too. One thing to be aware of is that there are two Spanish translations of the da vinci code in Spanish. The one with the red cover matches the audio book.

That is great news because it looks like the red one is the one I have ordered. Thanks again.

[Montmorency]

Hola!
I listen to everything I can. Radio/ music is the least helpful to me because of the manipulation of sounds to match the music but I do some of it. Audiobooks, movies, tv shows from Spain and news sites account for three hours of my day now.
BOLIO

Not all radio is music-oriented, of course. Have you tried http://www.rtve.es/radio ?

There seems to be a whole range of broadcast material in podcast form (or live if you want it), that is mostly speech (although of course they also have music-oriented channels). There is often a musical introduction to the speech-oriented broadcasts, but it then usually becomes speech-only.

Here is a timely one about the UK EU referendum (more relevant to me than to you, of course ):
http://www.rtve.es/radio/20160621/reino ... 1260.shtml

A list of podcasts, categorised either by subject or by the channel which produced them:

http://www.rtve.es/radio/podcast

[BOLIO]

Not all radio is music-oriented, of course. Have you tried http://www.rtve.es/radio ?

There seems to be a whole range of broadcast material in podcast form (or live if you want it), that is mostly speech (although of course they also have music-oriented channels). There is often a musical introduction to the speech-oriented broadcasts, but it then usually becomes speech-only.

Here is a timely one about the UK EU referendum (more relevant to me than to you, of course ):
http://www.rtve.es/radio/20160621/reino ... 1260.shtml

A list of podcasts, categorised either by subject or by the channel which produced them:

http://www.rtve.es/radio/podcast

Thank you for the links. I watch the majority of my shows thru rtve.es. However, I had never the clicked the radio tab.

Thank you

[BOLIO]

Chugging along...enjoying the ride.

That is the short summary of my studies. I have listened every single day. Can't remember a day that I failed to listen for at least 30 minutes. For my efforts, my listening is very much improving.

I have been watching Spanish movies with my wife via Netflix. One movie was scary easy to understand. I do not feel as if I missed anything of importance. When they would speak incredibly fast or while they were extremely angry or sad then it was difficult. My only complaint is the English subtitles on many of the movies. I started covering them up with paper to avoid looking at them.

I am reading the Davinci Code in Spanish. It is getting noticeably easier. Dialogue between characters is very easy. When the author is being very descriptive then it can pose a few problems. I just completed a word proficiency check on an entire chapter. 98.074% known words. I can enjoy this book! My CDs for the audio reading that James suggested arrived yesterday. I will incorporate them into my studies starting tonight. I am really excited about it.

I have The Portrait of Dorien Gray and The Great Gatsby audio on my phones but neither match up very well with the books I have. This Listening while Reading is GREAT in my opinion but finding matching audio and print is being a little more difficult than I had imagined. Having said that, my experience with the Dorien Gray book is very interesting. I notice the different structures for example, different verbs or even the use of the preterite in one and imperfect in the other with different verbs to describe the same occurrence. Very interesting.

Not a huge amount of output. Same old daily small talk with employees at various eateries. I have several very helpful coworkers who are speaking with me and I did have one client experience this week in a 50/50 English Spanish mix. I am having a huge amount of self talk everyday and all day. Hope it is helpful and not harmful.
Hope your studies are going well,

BOLIO

[BOLIO]

Hey everyone. Hope all is well.

My listening is improving because I ...wait for it...listen EVERYDAY. It is funny as I used to complain on and on about it and someone (Iguanamon ) would say "Listen more. Listen everyday and it will work out. ".

I wanted to share a website that I found somewhere, but I think some may have interest in.

http://grammar.spanishintexas.org

I hope some of you may like it.

[BOLIO]

Finished The Davinci Code. The audiobook matches PERFECTLY with the book. It was a very nice experience and would recommend it.

I have been watching an old novela on Netflix. It has English subtitles but I cover them up. It really distracts me especially when they have some crazy translation that is confounding. I am 50 episodes in and I am making strides in this area.

It is bleeding over into real life. I hear coworkers conducting business in Spanish with clients and I am understanding more and more. Feels good.

A resource I Wish I would have used early on is one everyone knows about but for some reason I never really used...GLOSS. The DLI site. After clicking the language and the level, the different articles will pop up. After choosing one, click the source tab at the top. Then, the pop up window comes up. The bottom has a tab "Translation". After clicking it you have a short dual text article with native audio...that is a good thing for beginners. Very valuable.


Another listening resource that uses different native speakers and short articles. I may have posted it before but here it is again.

http://www.coerll.utexas.edu/spintx/

Hope all is well,

BOLIO

[James29]

Wow, you have been busy. I'm doing Angels and Demons right now and absolutely love the audio book. It is the same narrator as The da Vinci Code. It is just such a pleasure to listen to him.

[BOLIO]

James, I will do that one next. The only portrayal I did not like by the reader was that of Sophie. He made her sound like a 90 year old woman. But it was very good. I have decided to keep it going as an audio only for my travel time to and from work.

As an aside, I played around with French in Action last night. Watched the first three. There are some things that I like about it. All French for one. Also, it feels more like immersion than Destinos did to me. People have referred to French as two different languages...spoken and written. I see what they mean. I'll play with it but have never really had a desire to learn French. Very interesting.

BOLIO

[BOLIO]

Hello one and all.

I have decided to take on a project. I have done one month self challenges before such as watching 60 hours of television or read X amount of pages. I am going to have a 30 day grammar blitz.

Sounds fun, huh? Ok, the plan is to go and work through weak points by using certain Units of FSI and the various grammar books and websites I have.

When we changed from HTLAL to here there was a poster from Houston who had broken down the different areas of FSI. I will dig it up.

My thirty day goal is 45 hours of intensive grammar study in addition to my 30 plus hours of listening.

Resources:

FSI Basic Spanish
Practice Makes Perfect Verbs
". " ". Conversational
" " ". Prepositions
Berlitz Grammar Handbook
The Ultimate Spanish Review and Practice
The University of Texas Language site.

I would say it will be fun but I don't know if that is true. I should learn / cement quite a lot.

All the Best,

BOLIO

[James29]

Great. I think doing grammar is quite important... especially for speaking well. 45 hours would be just about right to entirely go through one of the Gramatica de uso del espanol grammar books. I thoroughly enjoyed the B level one and am hoping to do the C level one next year. The resources you are planning on look good too. As you point out... just keep moving forward. Keep up the good work.