dEhiN's Language Log

Continue or start your personal language log here, including logs for challenge participants
User avatar
dEhiN
Yellow Belt
Posts: 95
Joined: Sat Mar 12, 2016 1:44 am
Location: Toronto
Languages: English (N); French (B2); Spanish / Brazilian Portuguese (A1-A2); Tamil (A1); Albanian / Tagalog / Maori (A0 - some words)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 21&t=17669
x 253
Contact:

Re: dEhiN's Language Log

Postby dEhiN » Wed May 10, 2023 6:23 am

Update to my stats:

I'm going to add the "mini-project" of converting my non-French review cards to use French as the fluent language. I didn't make it a full-blown project by creating a new deck and tags, like I did with the restructuring project, but I'd still like to track my progress. I also have some "leeched" cards which I've left like that for now. I created a separate deck for them, suspended them and tagged them. Since it's been a while, I'm not going to include the previous numbers but consider this time a clean slate, though I decided to add percentages. Lastly, to make this easier to read, rather than use the "Restructured Active", etc. categories, which are probably confusing, I'm going to use the 4 card state tags I created:

study - same as Restructured Active; cards that have all the gloss and syntax information and are in review status
learn - same as Restructured New; cards that have all the gloss and syntax information but are in new status
inactive - same as To Refactor; cards that still need to have the gloss and syntax information added
leeched - see above

Updated: 02:23 2023-05-10

français (French)
Study: 660 ~ 46%
Learn: 275 ~ 19%
Inactive: 514 ~ 35%
Leeched: 3 ~ 0%
Total: 1452

español (Spanish)
Study: 297 ~ 37%
*converted to French: 151 ~ 59%
Learn: 363 ~ 46%
Inactive: 134 ~ 17%
Leeched: 4 ~ 1%
Total: 798

português (Portuguese)
Study: 221 ~ 40%
*converted to French: 102 ~ 46%
Learn: 86 ~ 15%
Inactive: 251 ~ 45%
Leeched: 2 ~ 0%
Total: 560

தமிழ் (Tamil)
Study: 148 ~ 23%
*converted to French: 46 ~ 31%
Learn: 44 ~ 7%
Inactive: 456 ~ 70%
Leeched: 2 ~ 0%
Total: 650

Shqip (Albanian)
Study: 12 ~ 16%
*converted to Spanish: 12 ~ 100%
Learn: 54 ~ 74%
Inactive: 7 ~ 10%
Total: 73

Wikang Tagalog (Tagalog/Filipino)
Study: 13 ~ 35%
*converted to French: 6 ~ 46%
Learn: 24 ~ 65%
Inactive:
Total: 37

Te reo Māori (Maori)
Study: 19 ~ 95%
*converted to French: 2 ~ 11%
*converted to Spanish: 1 ~ 5%
Learn: 1 ~ 5%
Inactive:
Total: 20
4 x
Anki
fr : 658 / 1473
es : 199 / 799
ta : 59 / 649
pt : 118 / 556
mi : 10 / 22
tl : 5 / 37
sq : 12 / 73

Study resources
¡Adelante! Uno : 11 / 218

ISO 639-1 Language Codes

User avatar
dEhiN
Yellow Belt
Posts: 95
Joined: Sat Mar 12, 2016 1:44 am
Location: Toronto
Languages: English (N); French (B2); Spanish / Brazilian Portuguese (A1-A2); Tamil (A1); Albanian / Tagalog / Maori (A0 - some words)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 21&t=17669
x 253
Contact:

Re: dEhiN's Language Log

Postby dEhiN » Fri Jun 09, 2023 5:54 am

Time for an update:

I decided to create a tag for my "mini-project" and I also decided to use Spanish for the translated or definition field for my current Tagalog and Maori cards. I also started a Google spreadsheet to keep track of the following information - total cards; cards count for each status (or state) of study, learn, inactive, and leeched; and cards count for each project of refactor and translation (this is what I'm calling the mini-project).

As I shared before, for the translation project, I'm not moving cards to a special deck or anything. Instead, as I come across a learn card that has the translated word in English and has a translation project tag, I edit the note to change the translated word to either French or Spanish, remove the project tag and hit Again for the card. For most of my deck study options, I set the again time to 10 min and then 1 h, so this means the newish card will show again in 10 min and then 1 h, assuming when I see it in 10 min, I recall the French/Spanish translation. When the card shows up again after 1 h, rather than selecting one of the buttons, I reschedule the card for between 1-15 days, depending on how well I remember the actual word I'm trying to learn as well as how well I know the French/Spanish translation.

I do it this way because I have learned some new French or Spanish words just from this translation project alone. For example, I have a Portuguese card for a alfândega which is the customs section in an airport. When I changed the translated field from customs to the French translation, I had to look up that it's la douane. In this specific instance, I had seen the Portuguese card enough times that I think choose Good would have given an interval of close to a year or so, so when I rescheduled, it was really based on the fact that the French translation was a new word for me. I briefly thought of creating a new card for the French deck for la douane but I decided to stick with having the Portuguese card a alfândega show la douane as the translated word. As a result, not only am I improving my French by using it more and more to learn Portuguese, Spanish and Tamil via Anki, I also now know and remember la douane.

Going back to the spreadsheet, one thing to note is that because of the way I've set up my tags and decks, and the way I went about the refactoring project, my inactive card and refactor card counts are the exact same for each language. Finally, the updated numbers are as of June 8 because it took me a few days to create the spreadsheet and also because I initially started writing this post on June 5, then got busy with work and am only now finishing it. I decided to add a bit of colour and change my formatting. I hope it's pretty self-explanatory but if not, let me know and I can elaborate. I also split up this post so the actual stats are in the next post.
Last edited by dEhiN on Fri Jun 09, 2023 5:56 am, edited 1 time in total.
2 x
Anki
fr : 658 / 1473
es : 199 / 799
ta : 59 / 649
pt : 118 / 556
mi : 10 / 22
tl : 5 / 37
sq : 12 / 73

Study resources
¡Adelante! Uno : 11 / 218

ISO 639-1 Language Codes

User avatar
dEhiN
Yellow Belt
Posts: 95
Joined: Sat Mar 12, 2016 1:44 am
Location: Toronto
Languages: English (N); French (B2); Spanish / Brazilian Portuguese (A1-A2); Tamil (A1); Albanian / Tagalog / Maori (A0 - some words)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 21&t=17669
x 253
Contact:

Re: dEhiN's Language Log

Postby dEhiN » Fri Jun 09, 2023 5:56 am

Anki stats as of: June 8, 2023

français (French)
Total Cards: from: 1452 > to: 1475
State-Study: from: 660/45.5% > to: 661/44.8%
State-Learn: from: 275/18.9% > to: 299/20.3%
State-Leeched: from: 3/0.2% > to: (no change)
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 514/35.4% > to: 512/34.7%

español (Spanish)
Total Cards: from: 798 > to: (no change)
State-Study: from: 297/37.2% > to: 312/39.1%
State-Learn: from: 363/45.5% > to: 348/43.6%
State-Leeched: from: 4/0.5% > to: (no change)
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 134/16.8% > to: (no change)
Project-Translation--French: from: 647/81.1% > to: 613/76.8%

தமிழ் (Tamil)
Total Cards: from: 650 > to: 651
State-Study: from: 148/22.8% > to: 148/22.7%
State-Learn: from: 44/6.8% > to: 45/6.9%
State-Leeched: from: 2/0.3% > to: (no change)
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 456/70.2% > to: 456/70.0%
Project-Translation--French: from: 604/92.9% > to: 589/90.5%

português (Portuguese)
Total Cards: from: 560 > to: 559
State-Study: from: 221/39.5% > to: 220/39.4%
State-Learn: from: 86/15.4% > to: 84/15.0%
State-Leeched: from: 2/0.4% > to: 4/0.7%
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 251/44.8% > to: 251/44.9%
Project-Translation--French: from: 458/81.8% > to: 446/79.8%

Te reo Māori (Maori)
Total Cards: from: 20 > to: 22
State-Study: from: 19/95.0% > to: 21/95.5%
State-Learn: from: 1/5.0% > to: 1/4.5%
State-Leeched: from: 0/0% > to: (no change)
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 0/0% > to: (no change)
Project-Translation--Spanish: from: 19/95.0% > to: 14/63.6%

Wikang Tagalog (Tagalog/Filipino)
Total Cards: from: 37 > to: (no change)
State-Study: from: 13/35.1% > to: (no change)
State-Learn: from: 24/64.9% > to: (no change)
State-Leeched: from: 0/0% > to: (no change)
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 0/0% > to: (no change)
Project-Translation--Spanish: from: 37/100% > to: (no change)

Shqip (Albanian)
Total Cards: from: 73 > to: (no change)
State-Study: from: 12/16.4% > to: (no change)
State-Learn: from: 54/74.0% > to: (no change)
State-Leeched: from: 0/0% > to: (no change)
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 7/9.6% > to: (no change)
Project-Translation--Spanish: from: 7/9.6% > to: (no change)
3 x
Anki
fr : 658 / 1473
es : 199 / 799
ta : 59 / 649
pt : 118 / 556
mi : 10 / 22
tl : 5 / 37
sq : 12 / 73

Study resources
¡Adelante! Uno : 11 / 218

ISO 639-1 Language Codes

User avatar
dEhiN
Yellow Belt
Posts: 95
Joined: Sat Mar 12, 2016 1:44 am
Location: Toronto
Languages: English (N); French (B2); Spanish / Brazilian Portuguese (A1-A2); Tamil (A1); Albanian / Tagalog / Maori (A0 - some words)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 21&t=17669
x 253
Contact:

Re: dEhiN's Language Log

Postby dEhiN » Sun Jun 11, 2023 4:36 am

Quick update:

After reading księżycowy's update, I'm thinking to take back up the idea of weekly study goals. I've used this method in years past, particularly prior to 2018 when I was both doing Anki and attempting to go through textbooks I have. I say attempting to because even with weekly study goals, I think the most consistency I managed to achieve was about 2 or 3 weeks in a row.

I think I've already shared on this log, but as an example of the inconsistency I tend to exhibit with the studying of any language resource, a few weeks ago, I decided to start on a Spanish textbook I have. It's called ¡Adelante! Uno and it's the one used by the same college where I took a French spoken language course last summer and got my French Language Skills certificate. Back in 2016 I took my first French course at this college and at the time, although I wasn't able to do any of their Spanish courses, I bought a used copy of the textbook they use. Last year in the fall, I did a Spanish language skills assessment with the intent to finally take one of their courses, and I was assessed for their second beginner course (i.e., '102'). Apparently, the textbook I have isn't used from 102 onward, but is still used in the first beginner course.

Getting back to a few weeks ago, so I decided to go through this textbook to both refresh my existing Spanish knowledge and to learn anything new from the text. I went through part of the first chapter the day I decided on this course of action and have done nothing since. I just took a look and the text also contains a workbook at the end of each lesson or chapter, so the first lesson goes from 1 to 38 with chapter one of the workbook going from 39 to 60. While I'm sure the workbook can be helpful, for now I'm going to skip it. It also looks like I read up to page 11 but I recall there being a handful of new terms that I don't believe I wrote down or added to Anki.

Therefore, my goal for this week will be to reread the first 11 pages. I'm going to add 2 items for French because I came across a Youtube video and an online article regarding the use of il/elle vs ce/ça when referring to people. I wasn't able to go through the video and article, so I'll try to go through them this week.

I also want to track my progress in my signature but because after each lesson, there's a workbook section I'm going to skip, I'll have to exclude the pages I'm going to skip. From the table of contents, it looks like each lesson will contain the following amount of pages for me to work through.

Lesson 1: 2-38 = 37
Lesson 2: 62-98 = 37
Lesson 3: 124-160 = 37
Lesson 4: 186-220 = 35
Lesson 5: 246-282 = 37
Lesson 6: 306-340 = 35

When I add up those totals, I get 218. The book also breaks up each lesson into 5 sections - contextos, fotonovela, cultura, estructura, and adelante. So, with all that said, here are my weekly goals.

Weekly goals (due June 17):
2 x
Anki
fr : 658 / 1473
es : 199 / 799
ta : 59 / 649
pt : 118 / 556
mi : 10 / 22
tl : 5 / 37
sq : 12 / 73

Study resources
¡Adelante! Uno : 11 / 218

ISO 639-1 Language Codes

User avatar
dEhiN
Yellow Belt
Posts: 95
Joined: Sat Mar 12, 2016 1:44 am
Location: Toronto
Languages: English (N); French (B2); Spanish / Brazilian Portuguese (A1-A2); Tamil (A1); Albanian / Tagalog / Maori (A0 - some words)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 21&t=17669
x 253
Contact:

Re: dEhiN's Language Log

Postby dEhiN » Sun Jun 11, 2023 5:26 am

Another quick update:

As part of the translation project I'm working on for my Anki cards, I recently came across a Tamil card that I was converting from English to French. I had to use WordReference to confirm all the possible French translations of the Tamil, but I'd also like to share it on here to confirm.

So, in Tamil, when it comes to the pronominal system, there's a separate nominative case (or subject) form and then there's an oblique form. The oblique form is used for all other cases because Tamil is agglutinative and has suffixes that are used to denote the gentive, dative, accusative, locative, sociative, instrumental, ablative, and vocative cases. With respect to PNG (person-number-gender) breakdown, Tamil uses the following:

  • 1s - first person, singular
  • 1p.inc - first person, plural, inclusive (i.e., inclusive 'we')
  • 1p.exc - first person, plural, exclusive (i.e., exclusive 'we')
  • 2s(npol) - second person, singular (non-polite) (think tu in French)
  • 2s.pol / 2p - second person, singular, polite / second person, plural (think vous in French)
  • 3s.m.npol.anim - third person, singular, masculine, non-polite, animate (i.e., "he")
  • 3s.f.npol.anim - third person, singular, feminine, non-polite, animate (i.e., "she")
  • 3s.pol.anim - third person, singular, polite, animate (i.e., "he" or "she" with respect)
  • 3s.inanim - third person, singular, inanimate
  • 3p.anim - third person, plural, animate (i.e., "they")
  • 3p.inanim - third person, plural, inanimate
As you can see, Tamil differentiates between inclusive and exclusive we, although this is only in the nominative case. The same oblique form is used for both versions of first person, plural. Tamil also distinguishes between animate (i.e., persons and deities) and inanimate (which include animals) for third person. Within animate, singular, a further distinction is made between polite and non-polite (or casual), with the non-polite breaking down even more to distinguish male vs female. Finally, there is actually one more separation made with deixis also known as here vs there, close to speaker vs close to listener. This separation is only made in the third person but does happen for all 6 PNG categories I listed above, and consists of the first vowel changing from /a/ for close to listener to /i/ for close to speaker with the rest of the nominative form being the same.

With all that said, in regard to the Tamil card I had to change, I want to confirm all the French forms/words for what Tamil would consider 3s.inanim and 3p.inanim. One caveat with these 2 (4 with deixis) third person, inanimate forms are that they are used in Tamil as both a nominative pronoun and a demonstrative pronoun. Also, while I was only working with the 3s.inanim card, since I'm confirming, I might as well add the 3p.inanim card. So, in Tamil, the 4 third person, inanimate forms are:

அது /ad̪ɯ/ - it, that (one)
இது /id̪ɯ/ - it, this (one)
அவை /aʋe͡i/ - those (ones)
இவை /iʋe͡i/ - these (ones)

Because of this double context usage, I had a hard time trying to correctly add all the French equivalents. I should note that I have a single Anki note/card for அது/இது and another for அவை/இவை since deixis is the only distinguishing factor here. So, currently this is what I have for each card:

அது/இது:
  • il
  • elle
  • ce
  • ça
  • cela/ceci
  • celui-là/celui-ci
  • celle-là/celle-ci

அவை/இவை:
  • ils
  • elles
  • ces
  • ceux-là/ceux-ci
  • celles-là/celles-ci

For anyone who's still with me to this point and who knows French, do you think I accurately captured all the ways French expresses a third neuter or inanimate nominative pronoun as well as a third neuter or inanimate demonstrative pronoun? Did I get any of them wrong?
4 x
Anki
fr : 658 / 1473
es : 199 / 799
ta : 59 / 649
pt : 118 / 556
mi : 10 / 22
tl : 5 / 37
sq : 12 / 73

Study resources
¡Adelante! Uno : 11 / 218

ISO 639-1 Language Codes

User avatar
dEhiN
Yellow Belt
Posts: 95
Joined: Sat Mar 12, 2016 1:44 am
Location: Toronto
Languages: English (N); French (B2); Spanish / Brazilian Portuguese (A1-A2); Tamil (A1); Albanian / Tagalog / Maori (A0 - some words)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 21&t=17669
x 253
Contact:

Re: dEhiN's Language Log

Postby dEhiN » Sun Jul 23, 2023 5:57 am

Time for an update:

So, I might as well start with the weekly goals I set for myself due June 17, even though it's July 23!
Weekly goals (due June 17):
In these past two months, my plans of going through language study resources didn't materialize. I even tried picking up Practice Makes Perfect: Complete Spanish Grammar as well as a Tamil textbook I have but they didn't stick either. :(

My daily study of Anki also suffered a little. I have an add-on to postpone all cards - it lets you do both positive and negative numbers - and there were possibly 3 or 4 times these past 2 months that I used it. On a good note, though, I very recently started culling my cards. As I'm going through them, if I feel they're way too easy, I'm archiving them. Finally, I decided to create a separate deck for all the study cards that still need the back of the card translated to either Spanish or French. I don't recall if I already mentioned this, but I had created tags to track them. However, I realized that my approach of hitting again on a card that I had to edit from English to French/Spanish was messing up my stats. It was causing my mature cards stats to show a much higher again count than it actually should be. The downside though to my choice is that I reset the progress on all the cards to be translated when I moved them to their own deck. This means that I now have more than half of my previously learned (or review) cards back in new status and I need to relearn them. :(

I also came across a new YouTube channel that is a Sri Lankan woman in the UK teaching Tamil. She has been doing it for some years from what I can see, and she also has classes that she hosts. You can sign up for them through her site. However, she also puts out YouTube videos teaching things about Tamil. The things for me that make me excited to use this new resource are that she uses the Tamil script to teach and that she's Sri Lankan. So, her pronunciation matches more with what I'm used to.

This has both phonological and morphological consequences. I had written up a whole explanation but I feel it'll make this post too long, so I'm going to split it up.
2 x
Anki
fr : 658 / 1473
es : 199 / 799
ta : 59 / 649
pt : 118 / 556
mi : 10 / 22
tl : 5 / 37
sq : 12 / 73

Study resources
¡Adelante! Uno : 11 / 218

ISO 639-1 Language Codes

User avatar
dEhiN
Yellow Belt
Posts: 95
Joined: Sat Mar 12, 2016 1:44 am
Location: Toronto
Languages: English (N); French (B2); Spanish / Brazilian Portuguese (A1-A2); Tamil (A1); Albanian / Tagalog / Maori (A0 - some words)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 21&t=17669
x 253
Contact:

Re: dEhiN's Language Log

Postby dEhiN » Sun Jul 23, 2023 6:08 am

Following on the heels of my last post, here's a breakdown of the phonological and morphological differences in Indian Tamil and Sri Lankan Tamil:

Tamil has a letter ழ் which is usually written in IPA as /ɻ/ because that's the pronunciation of that letter in Indian Tamil. However, as far as I know, all Sri Lankan dialects pronounce that letter similar to /ɭ/ but further back. Rather than the underside tip of the tongue touching the alveolar ridge, it touches around the middle of the soft palate on the roof of the mouth.

A morphological (or maybe, more technically, a morphophonological) difference is that in Indian Tamil, the vowels இ /i/ and எ /e/ at the beginning of a word are pronounced as /ji/ and /je/ respectively. That is, Indian Tamil adds a palatal glide before those two vowels. I don't believe all Indian Tamil dialects add the glide for both vowels, so some might just do it for the one, for the other, or for both. In Sri Lankan Tamil, we don't have that glide addition for either letter.

This can make a big difference because Tamil has what I believe is called a 3-way deixis split. Well, more like a 2-way and interrogative. So அ- is the distal vowel, இ- is the proximal vowel, and எ- is the interrogative vowel. Some examples of this:

அது /ad̪ɯ/ -- இது /(j)id̪ɯ/ -- எது /(j)ed̪ɯ/
that (one) -- this (one) -- which (one)
These three are used pronominally

அந்த /an̯d̯ɯ/ -- இந்த /(j)in̯d̯ɯ/ -- எந்த /(j)en̯d̯ɯ/
that (thing) -- this (thing) -- which (thing)
These three are used adjectivally

அவை /aʋe͡i/ -- இவை /(j)iʋe͡i/ -- எவை /(j)eʋe͡i/
those (ones) -- these (ones) -- which (ones)
These three are also used pronominally

அங்கே /aŋge͡i/ -- இங்கே /(j)iŋge͡i/ -- எங்கே /(j)eaŋge͡i/
there -- here -- where

என்ன /(j)enː ə/
what
There are equivalents with the distal and proximal vowel but I've never used them or heard them used. So, I'm not too sure of the best equivalents in English.

அப்பொழுது /apː oɻɯd̪ɯ/ -- இப்பொழுது /(j)ipː oɻɯd̪ɯ/ -- எப்பொழுது /(j)epː oɻɯd̪ɯ/
then -- now -- when

அப்படி /apː əɖi/ -- இப்படி /(j)ipː əɖi/ -- எப்படி /(j)epː əɖi/
that way / like that -- this way / like this -- which way / how

This even applies to pronouns in the third person although only the distal and proximal vowels are used:

அவன் /aʋən/ -- இவன் /(j)iʋən/
that man -- this man

அவள் /aʋəɭ/ -- இவள் /(j)iʋəɭ/
that woman -- this woman

அவர்கள் /aʋəɾ(h|ɣ)əɭ/ -- இவர்கள் /(j)iʋəɾ(h|ɣ)əɭ/
those people -- these people

For the six above, each pair is also used for he, she, and they respectively. In my experience, the distal is used more often particularly in a general sense. For example, in a chart of the nominative PNG pronouns, the first in each pair, with the distal vowel, is used for he, she and they. Also, for the last pair, I wrote (h|ɣ) because there's a phonosyntactic rule governing the consonant க் /k/. Specifically, in this case, when it's word-medially and not preceded by ங் /ŋ/, it gets pronounced more like a /h/ in Sri Lankan Tamil and /ɣ/ in Indian Tamil.

If you're still with me, the reason why this makes a difference for me is because even though I'm still a beginner in Tamil, I grew up hearing Tamil spoken by my parents and relatives of that generation. I also, from living growing up in Toronto, heard Tamil spoken at many Tamil shops. For those who don't know, due to the civil war in Sri Lanka that started in the 80s and went for about 20 years, there's a big Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora in many western cities, including Toronto. I also didn't grow up watching Tamil movies, which has relevance because the majority of the Tamil film industry is located in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and uses Indian Tamil in the dialogue.

The result of all this is that, while now I'm more used to this glide addition, it throws me off. The first time I ever heard it was when an ex-roommate of mine started going out with an Indian woman who knew some Tamil. When he introduced her and told her I'm from Sri Lanka, she asked me how I was in Tamil, which threw me off since I had never heard the word for how with the glide attached.
3 x
Anki
fr : 658 / 1473
es : 199 / 799
ta : 59 / 649
pt : 118 / 556
mi : 10 / 22
tl : 5 / 37
sq : 12 / 73

Study resources
¡Adelante! Uno : 11 / 218

ISO 639-1 Language Codes

User avatar
dEhiN
Yellow Belt
Posts: 95
Joined: Sat Mar 12, 2016 1:44 am
Location: Toronto
Languages: English (N); French (B2); Spanish / Brazilian Portuguese (A1-A2); Tamil (A1); Albanian / Tagalog / Maori (A0 - some words)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 21&t=17669
x 253
Contact:

Re: dEhiN's Language Log

Postby dEhiN » Sun Jul 23, 2023 7:16 am

Anki stats as of: July 23 2023

français (French)
Total Cards: from: 1475 > to: 1473
State-Study: from: 661/44.8% > to: 658/44.7%
State-Learn: from: 299/20.3% > to: 300/20.4%
State-Leeched: from: 3/0.2% > to: 4/0.3%
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 512/34.7% > to: 511/34.7%

español (Spanish)
Total Cards: from: 798 > to: 799
State-Study: from: 312/39.1% > to: 199/24.9%
State-Learn: from: 348/43.6% > to: 463/57.9%
State-Leeched: from: 4/0.5% > to: (no change)
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 134/16.8% > to: 133/16.6%
Project-Translation--French: from: 613/76.8% > to: 592/74.1%

தமிழ் (Tamil)
Total Cards: from: 651 > to: 649
State-Study: from: 148/22.7% > to: 59/9.1%
State-Learn: from: 45/6.9% > to: 135/20.8%
State-Leeched: from: 2/0.3% > to: (no change)
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 456/70.0% > to: 451/69.5%
Project-Translation--French: from: 598/90.5% > to: 545/84.0%

português (Portuguese)
Total Cards: from: 559 > to: 556
State-Study: from: 220/39.4% > to: 118/21.2%
State-Learn: from: 84/15.0% > to: 184/33.1%
State-Leeched: from: 4/0.7% > to: 3/0.5%
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 251/44.9% > to: (no change)
Project-Translation--French: from: 446/79.8% > to: 433/77.9%

Te reo Māori (Maori)
Total Cards: from: 22 > to: (no change)
State-Study: from: 21/95.5% > to: 10/45.5%
State-Learn: from: 1/4.5% > to: 12/54.5%
State-Leeched: from: 0/0% > to: (no change)
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 0/0% > to: (no change)
Project-Translation--Spanish: from: 14/63.6% > to: 12/54.5%

Wikang Tagalog (Tagalog/Filipino)
Total Cards: from: 37 > to: (no change)
State-Study: from: 13/35.1% > to: 5/13.5%
State-Learn: from: 24/64.9% > to: 12/54.5%
State-Leeched: from: 0/0% > to: (no change)
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 0/0% > to: (no change)
Project-Translation--Spanish: from: 37/100% > to: 32/86.5

Shqip (Albanian)
Total Cards: from: 73 > to: (no change)
State-Study: from: 12/16.4% > to: (no change)
State-Learn: from: 54/74.0% > to: (no change)
State-Leeched: from: 0/0% > to: (no change)
Project-Refactor/State-Inactive: from: 7/9.6% > to: (no change)
Project-Translation--Spanish: from: 7/9.6% > to: (no change)

Because of my decision to reset all the Project-Translation cards to learn status, my study/learn amounts for all the languages except French and Albanian significantly changed. It's a little discouraging but hopefully with some persistence and patience, I'll get back to where I was before. As a way to track that, I've written down the differences of cards that were in study status last time and now are in learn status:

Spanish - 113
Tamil - 89
Portuguese - 102
Maori - 11
Tagalog - 8
4 x
Anki
fr : 658 / 1473
es : 199 / 799
ta : 59 / 649
pt : 118 / 556
mi : 10 / 22
tl : 5 / 37
sq : 12 / 73

Study resources
¡Adelante! Uno : 11 / 218

ISO 639-1 Language Codes

User avatar
dEhiN
Yellow Belt
Posts: 95
Joined: Sat Mar 12, 2016 1:44 am
Location: Toronto
Languages: English (N); French (B2); Spanish / Brazilian Portuguese (A1-A2); Tamil (A1); Albanian / Tagalog / Maori (A0 - some words)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 21&t=17669
x 253
Contact:

Re: dEhiN's Language Log

Postby dEhiN » Sun Jul 23, 2023 9:47 pm

I forgot to add last night when updating this log that since the beginning of June, I've started taking French lessons on italki. I've never used italki before, although I have definitely heard of it. I also considered being an English teacher on there once, back when I was still doing English tutoring.

Anyway, the reason I started taking lessons is to improve my French speaking and listening skills. I may have shared this already, but my current job (which I started at the end of May) is as a client support rep for a software company. The software is aimed at automotive dealerships, specifically OEM or manufacturer ones. The company's clientele spans Canada, the USA, and Puerto Rico.

When I was hired, they had me do a French assessment and it was deemed my level wasn't good enough to be a bilingual French/English rep. However, I can do a reassessment in 6 months. It's already been 2 months now and while overall my French is improving, I realized that taking private lessons would be a great way to really practice my speaking and listening skills.

The thing is that my writing and reading skills are better because I've always focused more on them since I started (re)learning French back in 2011. Initially, for the first few years, I went to various language exchange Meetups but once I discovered online forums, I basically stuck with those. The difference is significant enough that even in my previous job, which was providing remote IT help desk support to employees of various companies across Canada, I could interact with and respond to tickets in French. However, whenever I had to speak to the employee on the phone, I frequently had to switch to English or use a mix. Thankfully, most of them were ok with that.

That's not to say my writing and reading is perfect or even advanced, necessarily. I estimate my French level in both skills to be low B2 at best. But, most of that is due to a lack of general vocabulary and grammar knowledge. Meaning, my grammar and general vocab knowledge is probably at about a low B2 level.

However, with speaking and listening, it's a different story. I estimate my level to be mid-B1 or possibly high-B1. The big reason for this is lack of practice and therefore confidence when speaking. When I'm writing or even thinking internally, words come to me much quicker than when I need to speak out loud. In regard to listening, I think that's really just practice. As I've practiced, I have noticed myself being able to pick out more and more words. I think I'm at the point where at least 50% of the time when listening to any uttered phrase (be it via speaking with someone, watching a show, a commercial, etc.) I can grasp the main content words being used. Actually, probably about 40% of the time, I catch the content word as its uttered and about 10% of the time, I have to think back to process what was said. However, even during those moments, I have a hard time grasping the various linking type words, such as pronouns, prepositions, etc.
7 x
Anki
fr : 658 / 1473
es : 199 / 799
ta : 59 / 649
pt : 118 / 556
mi : 10 / 22
tl : 5 / 37
sq : 12 / 73

Study resources
¡Adelante! Uno : 11 / 218

ISO 639-1 Language Codes


Return to “Language logs”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 3 guests