Amanda's 2020 Log: Spanish, French, and Occasionally Ancient Greek

[philomath]

Last week I was burnt out, but now I want to make goals for myself again. This weekend is a long weekend because of President's Day on Monday, so here are my goals for the next three days:

Spanish
[ ] Continue reading Harry Potter y el prisionero de Azkaban.
[X] Write another journal entry.

French
[X] Listen to another episode of the InnerFrench podcast.
[X] Do Lessons 18-19 of Pimsleur French I.
[ ] Do Colloquial French Chapter 5.
[X] Review iTalki notebook entries and write down common errors that I've made.
[X] Write two more notebook entries.

Saturday
- Reviewed Anki flashcards.

Sunday
- Reviewed Anki flashcards.
- Wrote a very short journal entry in Spanish.
- Did Pimsleur French I Lesson 18.
- Typed up both dialogues in Colloquial French Chapter 5 so I can make flashcards.
- Wrote 104 words in French about how I'm studying the language.

Monday
- Reviewed my iTalki notebook entries and wrote down some of the errors that I made--mostly spelling errors.
- Wrote 89 words in French about my day so far.
- Did Pimsleur French I Lesson 19.
- Listened to Episode 3 of the innerFrench podcast.

I won't post everything that I write in French here, but I want to post some of it so I can keep a record of my progress. So here's what I wrote today:

Cette journée a été amusant. Je ne dois pas travailler aujourd’hui parce que c’est un jour férié. C’est la journée des presidents. Je me suis réveillée plus tard et je suis allée dans un café. Là j’ai pris un cappuccino et j’ai commencé à lire le livre Little Women. Ensuite j’ai fait du français. Maintenant j’ecris ce paragraphe pendant que j’attends mon copain. Il doit aller au travail aujourd’hui, donc on se va recontrer pour manger. Après le déjeuner, je vais rentrer chez moi et étudier plus le français.

Sometimes I feel like learning French is "cheating" since I've already studied Spanish, Italian, and Latin. There are so many cognates and the grammar is so similar that it's possible for me to jump right into intermediate material like the innerFrench podcast. The next language I learn ought to be something more difficult. This weekend my friends and I watched the movie Parasite and I kept thinking how fun it would be to learn Korean. I really like Korean food, would love to visit South Korea sometime, and there seem to be a lot of interesting movies and TV shows in Korean. It's also a language isolate which makes it interesting from a linguistic perspective. So perhaps later this year I'll make some plans to start learning Korean!

[philomath]

Goals for Tuesday–Friday

Spanish
[ ] Continue reading Harry Potter y el prisionero de Azkaban.
[ ] Write another journal entry.

French
[ ] Listen to Episode 3 of the innerFrench podcast while reading the transcript.
[ ] Do Colloquial French Chapter 5.
[ ] Do speaking practice two times to prepare for iTalki lesson on Saturday.
[ ] Write one more notebook entry.

[philomath]

Goals for Tuesday–Friday

Spanish
[X] Continue reading Harry Potter y el prisionero de Azkaban.
[X] Write another journal entry.

French
[ ] Listen to Episode 3 of the innerFrench podcast while reading the transcript.
[ ] Do Colloquial French Chapter 5.
[ ] Do speaking practice two times to prepare for iTalki lesson on Saturday.
[ ] Write one more notebook entry.

Despite not completing any of my French goals this week, I did study it a little bit. I did Clozemaster during my commute and practiced speaking once. I had a very busy week at work though, so overall I wasn't very productive afterwards.

This morning I had another iTalki lesson with my French tutor. It was a good lesson; I didn't have as much trouble speaking as I did last time, and my tutor gave me some speaking prompts to help me think of things to say. For example we made up a story about something that happened at work, and then I practiced telling it to him as if he was a friend.

For the upcoming week I want to work on making my French studies more of a habit. During my commute I should do Clozemaster or listen to the innerFrench podcast, and after work I'll review my Anki flashcards and practice speaking or writing. I don't want to make specific goals for next week because I've been so busy with work that I don't want to stress myself out more. But I will try to study French when I can and will post updates here to motivate myself.

[philomath]

Ce matin, j’ai eu une autre leçon avec mon prof de français. J’aime nos leçons parce que j'apprends beaucoup, mais nous aussi parlons de comment etudier une langue et nous parlons de la culture française.

I had another French lesson this morning. This lesson was really good! My iTalki tutor really knows how to keep our conversation flowing, and I think now that I know more French it's easier for me to keep talking. In this lesson, he had me start by introducing myself, and then he asked me questions about my French studies, where I work, etc. Then I told him a story about something that happened at work and we talked about traveling during the coronavirus outbreak. Before we knew it, the 45 minutes of our lesson were over!

At the beginning of every lesson my French tutor asks me how much I have studied during the week. This week I had to admit that I had not studied much. One reason is that I have too many Anki flashcards now, and it makes studying less fun. So we both agreed that today I will delete a lot of flashcards and leave only the important ones.

I really need to develop some sort of French routine. I know there is so much I could be doing to improve my French every day. This week was so busy at work though. Last night I stayed at work until 9pm so when I got home I was too tired to study. Oh well.

[philomath]

Did some more French this weekend:
- After my iTalki lesson, I deleted a lot of Anki flashcards and reviewed the ones remaining.
- Did part of Pimsleur French I Lesson 20. (I would've finished it, but I was interrupted.)
- Did the first half of Colloquial French Chapter 5. I've decided to stop making Anki flashcards for each dialogue. Instead I listened to the dialogue twice while reading the French transcript, and then I read each sentence in French followed by the English translation.
- Learned more sentences on Clozemaster.
- Listened to the third episode of the InnerFrench podcast again while reading the transcript.
- Listened to some French music, which is unusual for me because I'm not a huge music person. I like L'escalier by The Pirouettes, so I listened to their song radio on Spotify.

So, 'twas a productive weekend for French! Now I have to continue this during the week. Tomorrow maybe I will finish Colloquial French Chapter 5 and do some speaking or writing practice.

I want to plan a trip to Montreal in a few months. It's a very short plane ride away, and it'll give me a good chance to practice my French again! I already know a lot more French than I did when I went to Quebec City.

[jeffers]

I'm following your log since I also study French (although I'm focusing on German for the next two months). I really like your use of a task list for the week, so I hope you take it as a compliment if I steal the idea!

[philomath]

I'm following your log since I also study French (although I'm focusing on German for the next two months). I really like your use of a task list for the week, so I hope you take it as a compliment if I steal the idea!

I’m glad you like it! I would love to learn German some time but haven’t had the chance yet.

[jeffers]

I'm following your log since I also study French (although I'm focusing on German for the next two months). I really like your use of a task list for the week, so I hope you take it as a compliment if I steal the idea!

I’m glad you like it! I would love to learn German some time but haven’t had the chance yet.

The trick to wanderlust is to make sure your French is at a high enough level that you can use French based Assimil texts to learn any other language you choose. That will add motivation to your French studies for sure! When I was dabbling with Sanskrit I even made Sanskrit --> French Anki cards of the Assimil chapters as I was working on them.

[philomath]

I ended up being really stressed about my career plan this week, which prevented me from studying French a lot. The most I did was review my Anki flashcards and start listening to episode 4 of the innerFrench podcast. However, I did use my Spanish more than expected: on Tuesday night, I had a 20-minute Lyft ride with a driver who only spoke Spanish. Usually I'm too shy to start speaking Spanish with native speakers, but he initiated the conversation and was very nice about my intermediate level. We chatted about my experience learning Spanish, good Cuban restaurants, and my fear of driving in the city. It was a fun conversation and it made me look forward to working on my Spanish more seriously again! But for now I should focus on French.

Last night I flew to Florida for a weekend trip. I'm terrible at sleeping on flights so I spent the whole time reading Harry Potter y el prisionero de Azkaban. I'm about halfway through the book now. I'm having fun reading the Harry Potter series in Spanish, but once I'm done I should probably look for a different kind of reading material. I think I could learn a lot of useful conversational phrases from reading blog posts, for example. I used to read the news in Spanish a lot and it would be nice to start doing that again too.

[philomath]

Monday
- Reviewed my Anki flashcards during my commute and after work. There were 241 cards to review because I was lazy over the weekend.
- Finished Colloquial French Chapter 5. Instead of making Anki flashcards for new words, I wrote them down in my French notebook. I'll try to review it every other night or so.