Kelvin's RU, JP, ESP log <- In this order

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kelvin921019
Green Belt
Posts: 388
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2020 12:11 pm
Location: Hong Kong
Languages: Cantonese (N)
Chinese Mandarin (Semi-Native)
English (C1-2)
Spanish (B2)
Japanese (N1)
Russian (B1)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16306
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Re: Kelvin's RU, JP, ESP log <- In this order

Postby kelvin921019 » Fri Apr 07, 2023 7:19 am

Russian: resources update
After V Puti, I'm now working in the listening-reading-comprehension stage. Like what I did with Spanish and Japanese, I listen to podcast with transcript again and again until I can understand 90%+ of the conversation or until I start to hate myself.

I recently found one more useful channel for this exercise
In Russian from Afar (it has "graded" listening material and I'm now working on B1)
https://www.youtube.com/@InRussianFromAfar

For reading, I started an intermediate reader "Short Stories Olly Richards". It says that it is targeted at B1-B2 level, so as expected my comprehension rate is about 90%+. Just like when I started Harry Potter in Spanish, I had a very bad time with the "human expression" type of verbs (like utter, grind, smile, with-doubt, secretly) and this is probably because I prefer listening to dialogues / reports and reading non-fiction much much much more than fiction.

I'm still slowly going through the "minimal list" for B1 before I test on my skill by a mock exam.
6 x

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stell
Orange Belt
Posts: 178
Joined: Sat Jan 15, 2022 11:25 pm
Location: Canada
Languages: English (N1), French (N2), Spanish (advanced), Tagalog (perpetual toddler), Russian (beginner)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=17696
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Re: Kelvin's RU, JP, ESP log <- In this order

Postby stell » Sat Apr 08, 2023 1:25 am

I really like In Russian From Afar - although I’m working on the videos for beginners. The sound is high quality, and I appreciate that you can switch on accurate Russian subtitles.
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kelvin921019
Green Belt
Posts: 388
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2020 12:11 pm
Location: Hong Kong
Languages: Cantonese (N)
Chinese Mandarin (Semi-Native)
English (C1-2)
Spanish (B2)
Japanese (N1)
Russian (B1)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16306
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Re: Kelvin's RU, JP, ESP log <- In this order

Postby kelvin921019 » Sun Apr 09, 2023 12:32 pm

Japanese Update
I finally finished sou matome series for Grammar. The next book I will proceed before I started the real exma prep will be the 500Qs N1. Juding from my experience working with the N2 book, it will be a very light weight training for me to go throug 2 days of material. In the same time I will also include some reading time or listening time. (I think listening time will be more realistic as reading has been more manageable for me).

According to the schedule I will finish the book by the end of this month, leaving me 2 months to work on exam preparation. I hope this will go well.

Fitness Goal
Since I entered the "podcast" stage, I left my study chair and started doing some sports. This year I also have a few "fitness" goal to meet, including losing some weight, and more importantly, do my first half marathon by the end of this year. As an intermediate goal (which took much shorter time than expected and that's why I was too afraid to set the main goal in the first place), I finally completed my first sub-1 hour 10 km (while listening to Russian podcast).

A good, long marginally comprehensible podcast did a very good job in distracting my attention and I managed to complete quite some distance without realising it. My mind was too busy understanding the dialog :lol:
5 x

kelvin921019
Green Belt
Posts: 388
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2020 12:11 pm
Location: Hong Kong
Languages: Cantonese (N)
Chinese Mandarin (Semi-Native)
English (C1-2)
Spanish (B2)
Japanese (N1)
Russian (B1)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16306
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Re: Kelvin's RU, JP, ESP log <- In this order

Postby kelvin921019 » Wed Apr 19, 2023 4:36 pm

Russian: Ah....here we go again
I finally finished one B1 30-min podcast. In terms of finish, I finally finished one cycle of repetitive listening until I can grasp like 80% of the conversation without resorting to the transcript / translation again. This process is quite tourturing and it took me about 2 weeks to finally complete the process of
- listening with subtitles in English
- listening with subtitles in Russian
- repeatedly listening to segments and referring back to subtitles until I can catch most of the words

I still vividly remember the exactly same struggle I had when I started doing native speed dialogue in Spanish. I expect it will take much more time (due to the more complex grammar and lack of cognates) to complete this stage. I hope that by the time I start doing speaking lesson my listening skill will reach a decent level.
4 x

kelvin921019
Green Belt
Posts: 388
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2020 12:11 pm
Location: Hong Kong
Languages: Cantonese (N)
Chinese Mandarin (Semi-Native)
English (C1-2)
Spanish (B2)
Japanese (N1)
Russian (B1)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16306
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Re: Kelvin's RU, JP, ESP log <- In this order

Postby kelvin921019 » Tue Apr 25, 2023 3:00 am

Russian: Ah....here we go again (2)
I have finally finished the "minimum" B1 list and aim to do 2 sets of mock B1 tests by the end of this month or mid next month. Since there's no longer a "textbook" source of vocabulary list for me to work on, I revert back to my post-textbook routine. I also take this chance to further polish by post-textbook routine so that I don't need to spend time to once again figure out what should I do.

My post-textbook routine:
Step 1: listening to audio (usually a portion of a long podcast) and reading the transcript on LingQ, refer to English version (if any) for comprehension; If it is too difficult, listen to the audio and read the English subtitles and try to pick the TL words
Step 2 (skippable): add some of the new words into Anki for later review
Step 3: re-listen to the audio while reading the transcript
Step 4: listen to the audio only
Step 5: re-listen to the audio the next day (usually while doing workout), usually start with the previous portion
Step 6: after finishing the entire podcast, re-listen to the entire podcast (usually while doing workout)

I need to formalise the method as I have spent way too much time (like 2 weeks) aimlessly repeating a podcast without doing anything too productive.

After adopting this routine I can feel my comprehension rate start to go up, spoken Russian (in youtube) no longer become 100% mumble jumble. I hope that with 3 months of work I can significantly improve my listening skills, so that I can carry out a conversation on italki.

Next log I will likely start complaining how B1 is far from sufficient to carry out meaningful dialog.
3 x

kelvin921019
Green Belt
Posts: 388
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2020 12:11 pm
Location: Hong Kong
Languages: Cantonese (N)
Chinese Mandarin (Semi-Native)
English (C1-2)
Spanish (B2)
Japanese (N1)
Russian (B1)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16306
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Re: Kelvin's RU, JP, ESP log <- In this order

Postby kelvin921019 » Mon May 01, 2023 8:38 am

Listening Comprehension Rate
While I'm struggling with Russian at this moment, I have conducted a test on my listening comprehension rate. Using Cantonese and English as a bench marks, I test my comprehension rate on every language I am studying. It is not scientific at all but I adopted 2 criteria
- the amount of unknown words / structure (in terms of percentage)
- the amount of concentration needed
no concentration needed i.e. I can understand the matter while focusing on other tasks or just little attention is needed to follow the audio,
some concentration needed i.e. I need to concentrate on the audio to understand the audio
focus needed i.e. I need to clear my mind and focus mainly on the audio in order to comprehend
subtitles needed i.e. I need further cues (subtitles, contextual) to understand

and here's a good representation of my listening comprehension
Cantonese: 100% comprehension + no concentration needed
English: 98-100% comprehension + no concentration needed to some concentration needed (depending on accent)
Mandarin: 99-100% comprehension + some concentration needed (depending on accent)
Japanese: 95-98% comprehension + some concentration needed to focus needed (depending on clarity, accent and complexity of the matter)
Spanish: 90-95% comprehension + some concentration needed to focus needed (depending on clarity, accent and complexity of the matter), sometimes subtitles needed (for collouqial and some accents)
Russian: 80-85% comprehension + focus needed to subtitles needed (or even English subtitles)


Other plans
I have been tempted to do a CPE (or IELTS if CPE turned out to be impracticable) exam recently. I prefer CPE as its result is valid forever (as opposed to the 2-year validity of IELTS). What stops me from going right away would be my lack of diversity in active and passive vocabulary.

However, I am very very reluctant in doing Anki for English so the halfway house I am trying right now is to use LingQ and perhaps it's the only time I find it appropriate to use the review mechanism of LingQ (as I have to review and learn every new words I may come across).

The next langage is now very likely to be French, but my goal is to complete Assimil (with ease and using) without Anki and SRS at all. It would be a new challenge. I am not too keen on making it one of my more proficienct ones as my ultimate goal of learning French is to use it to study other TLs using Assimil. This would also be a valuable test on how much I can learn with SRS, but only with massive input (via LingQ as well).
4 x

kelvin921019
Green Belt
Posts: 388
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2020 12:11 pm
Location: Hong Kong
Languages: Cantonese (N)
Chinese Mandarin (Semi-Native)
English (C1-2)
Spanish (B2)
Japanese (N1)
Russian (B1)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16306
x 1228

Re: Kelvin's RU, JP, ESP log <- In this order

Postby kelvin921019 » Mon May 15, 2023 2:54 am

Russian: the struggle
I have so far done only a handful of podcasts and the process is agonizingly frustrating. I have go through the audio million times but still cannot grasp the meaning of the dialogue without subtitles. I think the podcasts I'm doing right now is above my level and too "natural" in terms of speed and clarity and I'm pushing myself too hard.

My current plan is to resort to more "artificial" podcasts, namely "Russian with Max" and the monologues in "In Russian from Afar" (I did the interviews labelled "B1" previously, people speak too fast). The first podcast I am doing right now is much more easier . Every single words is pronounced clearly in a relatively slow speed. I will do a few of them before once again ramping up the difficulty.

JLPT N1 preparation
I have finished all the textbooks I have for N1 preparation and move on to working on practice papers. My performance has been quite consistently average. After all the drills in vocabulary and grammar, the vocabulary and grammar part is still the worst part. I got on average 15-21 out of 25 for vocabulary and 13-14 out of 19 for Grammar.

However, all those textbooks are surprisingly helpful for listening part, I only lose 3-4 points in all listening paper I have so far tried. Reading, on the other hand, is more of a test on logic and ability to understand difficult concept than a test on language ability. On average lose 3-4 points.

So the plan is that I will go through a few more practice papers, and put all the new words into Anki in order to get myself prepared for the actual exam on July.
7 x

kelvin921019
Green Belt
Posts: 388
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2020 12:11 pm
Location: Hong Kong
Languages: Cantonese (N)
Chinese Mandarin (Semi-Native)
English (C1-2)
Spanish (B2)
Japanese (N1)
Russian (B1)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16306
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Re: Kelvin's RU, JP, ESP log <- In this order

Postby kelvin921019 » Wed Jun 07, 2023 2:51 pm

Short update
It's one month from JLPT exam. I'm not particularly nervous. I have been doing exam papers and I think I will complete 10+ papers before the exam. The papers don't really help me get any further but just a way to make sure my performance won't dip. The results are quite stable. As long as I can keep my composure and focus, and the paper isn't exceptionally difficult I think a pass would be rather likely.

As to Russian....urgh
I have finished 3 podcasts and the gap between my comprehension in reading and listening has been quite alarming. 2 of the latest In Russian from Afar podcast I understand 90%+ of the words in transcript but I only understand 50% of the dialogue. I think the word order and declension is still a big stumble block for me to comprehend spoken Russian, not to mention the time for me to process every single word in my mind. I think this kind of exercise will continue for the rest of this year. Hopefully I can get to a more comfortable with the language by the end of this year.

For some personal reason, I need to take up a new language X (will be revealed). This is the first time since my language learning journey to learn a language for practical reason but not for pure interest. I also need to depart from the Pimsleur -> Assimil routine as this language is not available in English Assimil. One thing I need to do is to look for good resources that can bring me to High A2 by the end of this year.
5 x

kelvin921019
Green Belt
Posts: 388
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2020 12:11 pm
Location: Hong Kong
Languages: Cantonese (N)
Chinese Mandarin (Semi-Native)
English (C1-2)
Spanish (B2)
Japanese (N1)
Russian (B1)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16306
x 1228

Re: Kelvin's RU, JP, ESP log <- In this order

Postby kelvin921019 » Mon Jul 03, 2023 6:27 am

Japanese JLPT N1
I finally had my N1 exam last Sunday.

Before the exam I have done about 10 practice papers to get a good feeling of the exam format and to device the appropriate strategy. The performance in all 10 practice papers were fairly consistent.

In terms of feeling it was indeed a pretty difficult paper and I struggled to get definite answers quick and often resorted to get the answer by elimination. Fortunately, the preparation for 1.5 years did pay off and I think it's likely that I will get a bare pass.

For the time being, I have stopped doing Anki cards for Japanese (since N1 vocabularies and grammar items are mostly archiac or very formal) and marked it as an end for my Japanese studying journey. From now on I will keep reading Japanese books and watch Japanese shows but won't be too bothered by the language learning aspect (in other words, I will watch whatever I like)

Plan for July
The plan now is to work on Russian only for the coming month. It will be a rest month and I will keep things easy. Probably I will start my study of language X from August. Since Assimil is not available for language X in English, I will start with Pimsleur together with a popular resources for language X. This month I will do more research on what's the best resources out there for self studying.

I may also start doing speaking lesson for Russian.
5 x

kelvin921019
Green Belt
Posts: 388
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2020 12:11 pm
Location: Hong Kong
Languages: Cantonese (N)
Chinese Mandarin (Semi-Native)
English (C1-2)
Spanish (B2)
Japanese (N1)
Russian (B1)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16306
x 1228

Re: Kelvin's RU, JP, ESP log <- In this order

Postby kelvin921019 » Thu Aug 10, 2023 3:23 am

Small update
I have been quite occupied by personal matters and can only do some occassion reading, listening and anki on Russian.

I finally completed one listening mock test for B1 Russian. I got 24/30 but honestly for some parts I cheated by listening to the audio again. I will continue my "stage test" by completing reading and grammar mock test for B1 level. Hopefully if I have time I could start doing some speaking.

As for language X, I still couldn't find the appropriate time to start it as I have been unexpectedly busy with life. And for some reason it may no longer be necessary for me to do this language X. I am thinking about starting French or even Korean again. Anyway I can take my time to think it through when I try to squeeze time to do the Russian B1 tests this month.
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