Jeffers- SC 2022-23 - French, German, Hindi

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jeffers
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Jeffers- SC 2022-23 - French, German, Hindi

Postby jeffers » Fri Apr 29, 2022 11:25 am

New Super Challenge, new log. My old log was oriented towards the French B1 exam, which I won't be able to take this year anyway (due to the date of the exam). So, here we go... all about my Super Challenges in French, German and Hindi.

To kick it off, I'll quote my post on the SC discussion thread about my expectations and experience from the first Super Challenge, compared to the reality of how my progress feels to me now:

jeffers wrote:
Serpent wrote:Not to make anyone feel bad, but the first challenge was in 2012-2013 and this one will be the 6th :lol: You always did an impressive amount of reading even if you didn't complete 100 "books" per language :)


I know it's been that long, but "wow, has it been that long?!?"

I have mixed feelings, because every Super Challenge I feel like I have made super progress. On the other hand, over five challenges I wonder if my overall progress has gone up? It's the old problem of the hill being much higher than expected. If you have ever done any hiking in hills or mountains then you know what I mean. At the bottom of a slope you see what looks like the top, but two things happen: 1. the point you are looking at is often further away than it appears, and 2. you get to that point and realize that it's only a small ridge on the way up a much higher hill.

I think it was during the first Super Challenge that I worked my way through my first grown up novel in French: Les orpailleurs by Thierry Jonquet. It was a struggle, but I really enjoyed it. I also felt like a few more experiences like that and I would be some sort of "pro". It's not been the case, and now I still struggle with grown up literature in French. There's an feeling of discouragement in that it seems just as difficult now as it did during the first Super Challenge. In fact, this is an illusion, and my comprehenion is many orders of magnitude better than back then. In those days, I was happy if I understood the majority of the plot elements of a chapter, which sometimes meant I was looking up dozens of words per page (happily, it was quick with the keyboard version of Kindle in those days). Now, I get frusrated when I have to look up 5 words on a page, or I don't understand why a sentence is phrased the way it is. It is a very different type of difficulty, but the illusion is that both experiences feel much the same.

The original challenge came from Cristina saying "I won't be fluent until I've read 100 books and watched 100 films". Now I think that won't happen until I've done that at least 10 times! :lol: But honestly, that's not really a bad thing. I have enjoyed the process, and I believe I will continue to enjoy the process.

And I am sure that THIS TIME I will complete all 100 books of my French reading challenge. :lol:
18 x
Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien (roughly, the perfect is the enemy of the good)

French SC Books: 0 / 5000 (0/5000 pp)
French SC Films: 0 / 9000 (0/9000 mins)

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MorkTheFiddle
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Re: Jeffers- SC 2022-23 - French, German, Hindi

Postby MorkTheFiddle » Fri Apr 29, 2022 5:39 pm

Good luck, Jeffers. Your comments are always interesting.
1 x
Many things which are false are transmitted from book to book, and gain credit in the world. -- attributed to Samuel Johnson

jeffers
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Re: Jeffers- SC 2022-23 - French, German, Hindi

Postby jeffers » Tue May 03, 2022 10:59 am

The Super Challenge is underway, and I've made a bit of a start in French and in German. During previous Super Challenges I did too much in the beginning and I think that led to burnout. This time I'm trying to be more chilled about it, and I hope I can just work with keeping a regular weekly habit just ahead of the challenge needs for the week. Or, I'll still get tired of it at the usual time and will have completed less than otherwise. Who knows? :lol: I have found that sleeping well has been difficult in the past year; I've never been a good sleeper but since I had covid the exhaustion piles up more quickly than usual. However, I think reading a half hour before sleep will be good for calming the brain. Or maybe it will stimulate my brain too much! :lol: Time will tell.

French
On Saturday I started reading Le petit Nicolas again, on LingQ so I could conveniently listen while reading. For some reason the recorded audio has disappeared from the first chapeter, so that one is read by the machine. Fortunately, the remaining chapters all seem to have the wonderful recordings. I could count this as books OR as films, but I'm going with books.
On Sunday I listened to two episodes of Transfert while on a walk. In these sort of circumstances, I like to listen twice but count once. I really like Transfert because the stories are so varied and I usually find them quite interesting. In addition, it is ordinary people talking about something that happened to them, so I reckon the language and style are going to be more like ordinary conversational French than the news or a history podcast.
Sunday evening I started reading the second book in the Livres des étoiles series by Erik L'Homme. I had gotten up to chapter 8 last summer, but I decided it would probably be best to start from the beginning. It's a book for young teens, and as such the story is pretty shallow, but it's enjoyable enough to keep me going, and it's probably the correct level for me. I expect I'll go ahead and read the whole series over the course of the Super Challenge.

German
While out walking I began to listen to the German Easy Reader by Brian Smith. Dull, but worthwhile is how I would put it. Unfortunately, the Samsung Music Player app has begun to play everything in shuffle mode for me, and anything I tried to do to change this caused the app to quit. I'm using the Samsung app because my usual music player, Rocket Player, has quit working. I wonder if some other app on my phone is causing these two music apps to quit? It's something I need to investigate because I do rely on my phone for listening to downloaded audio, and I was planning to work through the downloaded audio from the Brian Smith series.

Hindi
Nothing as yet. I'm not sure if I'll start with an easy audiobook, such as one of the children's books I have on audio, or with a film. It just depends on the circumstances at the time. For reading, I'm thinking about trying Panther's Moon by Ruskin Bond.

During previous challenges I had made lists of books, films, audiobooks, podcasts, etc, well before the Super Challenge began. This time I have decided to just see what appeals to me at the time and go with my mood. Maybe that's because I'm less engaged this time, or maybe it's because overplanning didn't work well in the past. At some point, probably sooner than later, I'll probably take stock of my available resources, but not yet.

EDIT: I've deleted and reinstalled Rocket Player on my phone, and it's working now.
6 x
Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien (roughly, the perfect is the enemy of the good)

French SC Books: 0 / 5000 (0/5000 pp)
French SC Films: 0 / 9000 (0/9000 mins)

DaveAgain
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Re: Jeffers- SC 2022-23 - French, German, Hindi

Postby DaveAgain » Tue May 03, 2022 12:28 pm

jeffers wrote:
German
While out walking I began to listen to the German Easy Reader by Brian Smith. Dull, but worthwhile is how I would put it.
I've just started Rilke's Geschichten vom lieben Gott (text | audio), so far it's quite entertaining, and not too many unknown words.
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MorkTheFiddle
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Re: Jeffers- SC 2022-23 - French, German, Hindi

Postby MorkTheFiddle » Tue May 03, 2022 5:38 pm

What calms my mind for sleep is
either
45 minutes or more of classical music right before bedtime (I have no idea why this works)
or
a couple hours of utterly mindless entertainment on Youtube; my go-to are often repeats of the Graham Norton Show (none of the other talk shows work)
Reading works, too, but only when the book is a bit boring.
Anyway, happy zzzz's. :)
4 x
Many things which are false are transmitted from book to book, and gain credit in the world. -- attributed to Samuel Johnson

jeffers
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Re: Jeffers- SC 2022-23 - French, German, Hindi

Postby jeffers » Wed May 04, 2022 12:04 pm

I decided that it would probably be a good idea start to make lists of resources early in this log. Lists that I can edit as I proceed. And above all, resources that I actually really want to make use of. I think in previous tasks I often listed out too many things. I think here I will list things that I am considering picking up "sometime soon". When complete I can cross them out and add other things I think I may get to "sooner rather than later".

Right now... this post is just a holding place.

French books
  • Le Livre des Étoiles tome 2
  • Le Livre des Étoiles tome 3
  • Le petit Nicolas
  • Hexagone. Sur les routes de l'Histoire de France by Lorànt Deutsch
  • Métronome. L'Histoire de France au rythme du métro parisien by Lorànt Deutsch (re-read from last year)

French Films
  • Podcasts, podcasts and more podcasts (just so convenient, and interesting
  • Les Petits Meurtres d'Agatha Christie- series 4
  • Hexagone DVD (to watch in parallel to the book: finish a chapter, watch an episode)

German books
  • Easy German Reader by Brian Smith (easing back into German)
  • other easy readers by Brian Smith
  • Readers by André Klein

Hindi books
  • Panthers Moon पैन्थर्स मून by Ruskin Bond
  • A bunch of children's books
6 x
Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien (roughly, the perfect is the enemy of the good)

French SC Books: 0 / 5000 (0/5000 pp)
French SC Films: 0 / 9000 (0/9000 mins)

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Fortheo
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Re: Jeffers- SC 2022-23 - French, German, Hindi

Postby Fortheo » Wed May 04, 2022 4:47 pm

I've been going through the Brian smith graded readers, too. They're definitely not enthralling, yet they're simultaneously some of the most efficient graded readers I've ever used. I love the built in repetition, and the difficulty level increases at just the right pace for me.

Hopefully you can reach your language goals. Good luck!
4 x

jeffers
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Re: Jeffers- SC 2022-23 - French, German, Hindi

Postby jeffers » Fri Jun 10, 2022 2:42 pm

I meant to do a Super Challenge update at the end of the first month, but I didn't. I then thought about putting it off a bit, because my progress has slipped, but on reflection, I'm better off making a post now, and acknowledge that I'm behind in most area. :lol:

French
Most of my reading has been from Le Livre des Étoiles (Tome 2) - Le Seigneur Sha by Erik L'homme. Once I finished that I've dabbled in a few books but haven't settled on my next read, so now I'm a bit behind where I should be.
Watching has been a variety of things, including several episodes of Dix pour cent, and a bunch of episodes of 100 lieux qu'il faut voir from YouTube. One thing I really like about the 100 lieux series is the mix of consistency and variety: the narrator is the same but each episode uses different in-person hosts from the region and they talk to other locals during the episode. So the narration is clear and consistent, but the conversations can vary quite a bit. I like the mix of "easy narration" + "potentially tricky bits during conversations", which is good listening practice. However, I've come to the conclusion that most of the things they choose to do in the lovely places they visit are actually quite boring.
Another series I've watched quite a bit has been the A Toute Berzingue ! series by Laurent Deutsch (also on YouTube). The episodes are short, but quick, and often feature sped up shots of Laurent running from one place to another, presumably a toute berzingue. He also talks rather rapidly, which is a challenge, but his style is engaging. I find the content very interesting, with each episode dealing with the main periods of history in chronological order, rather than the more common method of moving from place to place and discussing whatever history ocurred at the place. So he obviously seeks out points of interest which are specific to the historical periods. The series does a better job at making me want to visit a place than 100 lieux qu'il faut voir.

German
So far all my reading and audio have been from Brian Smith's first 2 easy readers.

Hindi
So far I've done almost no reading, and I have listened to some children's audiobooks several times each.

Screenshot 2022-06-10 151829.png
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12 x
Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien (roughly, the perfect is the enemy of the good)

French SC Books: 0 / 5000 (0/5000 pp)
French SC Films: 0 / 9000 (0/9000 mins)

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frenchfish55
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Re: Jeffers- SC 2022-23 - French, German, Hindi

Postby frenchfish55 » Tue Aug 09, 2022 9:51 am

Hi jeffers? How is it going?Any update on your french?
Winter is coming...:)
2 x

jeffers
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Re: Jeffers- SC 2022-23 - French, German, Hindi

Postby jeffers » Mon Sep 05, 2022 6:10 am

frenchfish55 wrote:Hi jeffers? How is it going?Any update on your french?
Winter is coming...:)


I tend to come and go on the forums these days (maybe for the past 2 years or so), but I have been keeping going with French almost daily. One of my almost daily habits has been to listen to the news on Europe 1 when I walk the dog. When I go on longer walks I often just put the Europe 1 app on and listen to the radio.

One of my viewing highlights for the summer has been the YouTube series À Toute Berzingue ! by Laurent Deutsch (described in more detail above). He talks very fast, and I admit I usually make use of the auto-generated French subtitles.
atb.jpg


I was getting a bit bogged down in what I was reading, which is part of the reason I was behind on my French SC, so I picked up La sorcière de la rue Mouffetard et autres contes de la rue Broca by Pierre Gripari, and it was a delightful read. I would consider them "children's stories written for adults", but the introduction gives a more bizarre account (in brief, it says the author was a witch disguised as a man, who entertained children at a local cafe by creating stories with them). I have the audiobook of the same name on CD, read by the author, but it only has half of the stories.
9782070577071-uk.jpg
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7 x
Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien (roughly, the perfect is the enemy of the good)

French SC Books: 0 / 5000 (0/5000 pp)
French SC Films: 0 / 9000 (0/9000 mins)


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