Arnaud's lazy log (Russian & co)
Posted: Wed Nov 04, 2015 9:54 pm
How I've been learning russian (I started on June 2011, about 1 or 2 hours a day).
I started with Michel Thomas Russian (the 3 levels), then I studied Assimil Russian (the lastest edition of 2005 by Victoria Melnikova, then the 1st edition of 1973, both with the audio), Russian in exercises by Khavronina (to practice the grammar, no audio) and Ruslan 1 and 2 (it's a british method, the audio is free on the author's website).
I read and listened to another dozen of textbooks and methods that were more or less useful, like Teach Yourself, Méthode 90, Le russe vite et bien, Le russe by Potapova, Russian for all, Russian Language by Ovsienko, etc..., but I recommand in priority Michel Thomas, Assimil and Ruslan 2 that were the most useful to me: of course, each person has to find what suits her the most.
When you start to learn Russian, always use a method with the audio and get acquainted with the reading rules, (no need to learn them, just notice what's going on and trust your ear). Whatever you read here and there on the Internet, the russian writing is not phonetic and you need to rely a lot on your ear (that's my personal opinion, I consider that having a decent accent early in the learning process is important and prevents the acquisition of fossilized mistakes that are extremely difficult to correct later.).
Then I tried to expand my vocabulary by reading graded readers and started to watch cartoons on YouTube: the readers that were useful to me are :
- Шкатулка пособие по чтению для иностранцев, начинающих изучать русский язык (accented)
- Удивительные истории. 116 текстов для чтения, изучения и развлечения (not accented)
The cartoon was Luntik, all the seasons and a few classical cartoons from the soviet era with english subtitles.
Then, I started to read my first real book : Крокодил Гена и его друзья (I had already watched the cartoon, so I knew more or less the story). It was very difficult but I finally read it entirely and was very happy. My first real book !! (dancing banana emoticon )
After that, it's long and slow process of watching russian series and reading transcripts or subtitles, of trying to read russian books and listening to the corresponding audiobooks...
A work still in progress, even if I can say it's not very efficient and that I'm rather disappointed by my progression now.
I still continue by inertia (a good language learner knows how to transform his initial motivation into a rooted habit) and because I like the russian language, but I'm more or less stuck : my passive level (reading, listening) is probably around C1 and my active level (speaking, writing) around B1 (obvious lack of practice).
If you decide to learn Russian, I wish you good luck, that's an interesting adventure.
I started with Michel Thomas Russian (the 3 levels), then I studied Assimil Russian (the lastest edition of 2005 by Victoria Melnikova, then the 1st edition of 1973, both with the audio), Russian in exercises by Khavronina (to practice the grammar, no audio) and Ruslan 1 and 2 (it's a british method, the audio is free on the author's website).
I read and listened to another dozen of textbooks and methods that were more or less useful, like Teach Yourself, Méthode 90, Le russe vite et bien, Le russe by Potapova, Russian for all, Russian Language by Ovsienko, etc..., but I recommand in priority Michel Thomas, Assimil and Ruslan 2 that were the most useful to me: of course, each person has to find what suits her the most.
When you start to learn Russian, always use a method with the audio and get acquainted with the reading rules, (no need to learn them, just notice what's going on and trust your ear). Whatever you read here and there on the Internet, the russian writing is not phonetic and you need to rely a lot on your ear (that's my personal opinion, I consider that having a decent accent early in the learning process is important and prevents the acquisition of fossilized mistakes that are extremely difficult to correct later.).
Then I tried to expand my vocabulary by reading graded readers and started to watch cartoons on YouTube: the readers that were useful to me are :
- Шкатулка пособие по чтению для иностранцев, начинающих изучать русский язык (accented)
- Удивительные истории. 116 текстов для чтения, изучения и развлечения (not accented)
The cartoon was Luntik, all the seasons and a few classical cartoons from the soviet era with english subtitles.
Then, I started to read my first real book : Крокодил Гена и его друзья (I had already watched the cartoon, so I knew more or less the story). It was very difficult but I finally read it entirely and was very happy. My first real book !! (dancing banana emoticon )
After that, it's long and slow process of watching russian series and reading transcripts or subtitles, of trying to read russian books and listening to the corresponding audiobooks...
A work still in progress, even if I can say it's not very efficient and that I'm rather disappointed by my progression now.
I still continue by inertia (a good language learner knows how to transform his initial motivation into a rooted habit) and because I like the russian language, but I'm more or less stuck : my passive level (reading, listening) is probably around C1 and my active level (speaking, writing) around B1 (obvious lack of practice).
If you decide to learn Russian, I wish you good luck, that's an interesting adventure.