Thomas's TAC 2016 Spanish Log

[Tomás]

MY SPANISH HISTORY:
One semester college Spanish a quarter century ago, long since forgotten. Rebooted in Sept/Oct 2015. In the past four months since rebooting:

COURSE LESSONS FINISHED

First 30 lessons in Pimsleur.
61 lessons in Assimil “Spanish without Toil” passive wave; through lesson 5 in the active wave.
7 lessons in Assimil “Spanish with Ease” passive wave.
5 lessons in the old Linguaphone course (1950s/60s era).
Language Transfer through lesson 36.

VIDEO

Watched through Episode 7 in “Extras en Espanol”
Watched through Episode 17 in Destinos. Have had enough of Raquel and Arturo’s romance, but will try to press on.
Nuevos Destinos, Episodio Uno
Watched through Episode 4 of Aventuras Vascas. Skimmed the transcript of Ep. 5, but it looked so boring I couldn’t bring myself to watch it. Episodes 2-4 were okay though.
Five stories from BookBox.com
Sampled a few other Spanish courses on Youtube, but haven’t found anything else that stuck. I did find one with the same actress who played Lola in Extras, though. I may return to that one if I can find it again.

BOOKS FINISHED

Historias de España
Historias de Mexico
Los Carros Vacíos
About halfway through the other two “Historias…” volumes, plus “First Spanish Reader” by Angel Flores.
First four chapters of “Spanish for Reading”.
Started a few other books, but nothing worth recording here.

COMICS/GRAPHIC NOVELS

Conquistador, Libros 1 & 2
La Guerra de los Mundos (Marvel Classic Comics version of HG Wells)
Tintin, La Isla Negra
Blacksad 1
Aldebaran 1
Asterix el Galo
Now reading Tintin “El Loto Azul”.

SHORT STORIES FINISHED

Hemingway "Los Asasinatos"
LR "Una noche de verano - One summer night" by Ambrose Bierce
LR "La mujer del boticario" de Anton Chejov
LR "Poquita Cosa" by Chejov
LR "Una Vendetta" by Maupassant
LR "El Silencio De Las Sirenas" de Kafka.
Read three stories in Historias Breves
LR "El Arte De Leer Y El Arte De Hacer El Amor"
LR "El Crimen De La Calle De La Perseguida"
LR Ch1 of "Si Yo Tuviera Cien Millones", halfway through Ch2 then gave up
LR "El verdadero amo del mundo"
LR Galdos "El Don Juan"
LR Aesop's "Los Ratones y El Gato"
LR Aesop's "La zorra y las uvas"

[Tomás]

A post on my video watching:

“Extras en Espanol”
This is a sitcom for Spanish learners made for BBC. The actors speak slowly and clearly, and the language is simple. The plots and the comedy are so simple and broad that I can easily understand what's going on. There is a summary of plot points after each act, so it's very hard to get lost.

You can find transcripts on the BBC web site. I keep thinking that I should study the transcript, learn any words I don't know, and then watch the episode again. In other words, treat it as a video Assimil lesson. Truth is, they don't hold my interest enough to watch twice. But it's cute and diverting enough to watch once while I'm exercising.

"Destinos" and "Nuevos Destinos"
I have the Destinos textbook and read the first two chapters, but probably won't go back to it. For formal coursework I much prefer Assimil and the old Linguaphone courses.

I am on Episode 17. I have had enough of Raquel and Arturo’s romance, but will try to press on. Also, it's starting to get a little more difficult to understand. I watch the Spanish videos on my laptop while exercising. The laptop speakers aren't very loud. Occasionally I have to stop working out and concentrate more to understand what Arturo and Rachel are saying to each other. Once I figure out what they're saying, it usually turns out to have been pretty boring. I'm rooting for them to break up.

"Aventuras Vascas"
Watched through Episode 4 of Aventuras Vascas. Skimmed the transcript of Ep. 5, but it looked so boring I couldn’t bring myself to watch it. Episodes 2-4 were okay though. This one is by the same author who wrote Extras. It's not comedic, more naturalistic. Teenagers in Basque country is the plot. It's okay for a beginner show. About as diverting as Extras or Destinos.

"BookBox.com"
These are children's stories, animated with Spanish narration and Spanish subtitles. Again, good for beginners, but not something I'd watch if it were in English.

Bottom line: I am not yet good enough to follow a "real" show, so I am stuck with Extras and Destinos for a while longer. They are good for beginners. The challenge of trying to understand the language makes it interesting enough to watch while exercising. If they were in English I could not bear to watch them though. It will be a lot more fun once my skills get to the point where I can start watching shows that I actually like.

[Tomás]

Goals for 2016:

* By end of March, finish "Spanish without Toil", "Spanish with Ease", and the Linguaphone course. At least have done a passive wave through them all. This should be very doable at the rate I'm going now, unless these courses start getting a lot more difficult than they have been so far.

* By end of August, have finished "Using Spanish" and the advanced Linguaphone course. I doubt I can do the lesson-a-day pace through these like I have been doing with the beginner courses, since these advanced lessons are longer. So I am giving myself more time. But ideally I would like to complete them by June.

* Start FSI Basic no later than May after school is out, and hit it every day during the summer.

* Try some conversation exchange in the summer to activate my productive skills.

* Start working through some grammar books.

* Keep up with my reading and other passive input activities at the same rate as I have been.

I am happy with my progress so far. My reading skills are progressing very well. However, I am lagging behind on productive skills (speaking and writing). Also, I really need to learn some more grammar. I have not been keeping up with even the Assimil grammar acquisition pace, because I can already understand the stuff I'm reading and have not really felt the need to study more grammar. Probably if I were working more on speaking that would motivate me to learn the grammar.

[Tomás]

Were that every week had nine days. I could get so much more done:

Spanish without Toil, Lessons 57-66 passive, only did 3-6 active.
Spanish with Ease, Lessons 1-9
Linguaphone 1960s Curso de Español, Lessons 1-11
Language Transfer, Lessons 35-36
FSI, Unit 1; Unit 3, first eight minutes
Watched Extras episodes 6-8; Destinos episode 17
Finished reading Tintin, "El Loto Azul"
Plus a whole lot of Anki.

Falling down on much active work, not even keeping up with the Assimil active wave on a daily basis. I think the Assimil format in part encourages passivity. Also, I usually study it while lying on my back, which also encourages passivity.

I started FSI last night to try to get some more active production practice into my study routine. The first couple of units are very easy for me, and so I was watching basketball on tv with the sound turned down while parroting back the tape. I don't know if this is good practice or not. I will probably need to pay more attention as the lessons begin to challenge me more.

I can only understand 50-75% of the Extras dialogue, but of course 100% of the plotline and jokes, because it is so broad and simple. I would like to find another sitcom in Spanish that I can follow as well as I can this one, once I finish off the 13 episode of Extras. Any recs would be much appreciated.

I checked out Aquí No Hay Quien Viva but it's beyond my skills right now. I don't even understand how the title is translated into "No one can live here". I would have thought it was "No one lives here".

[reineke]

Hi Thomas

An impressive start. I like the mix of resources including comic books. If you keep it up your log will look great! More importantly, you'll make a substantial headway in the language.

[Spoonary]

I checked out Aquí No Hay Quien Viva but it's beyond my skills right now. I don't even understand how the title is translated into "No one can live here". I would have thought it was "No one lives here".

Heh, I had the same problem, until I started noticing the same construction 'no hay quien + subjunctive' being used in other situations. It's purely idiomatic and simply means 'no one can + verb'/'there is nobody who can + verb'. Another example would be "Juan es muy desagradable. No hay quien lo aguante." - Juan is really unpleasant. Nobody can stand him." It has the idea that it is impossible to put up with Juan, in this case, or in the case of Aquí no hay quien viva, nobody could possibly live here.

I hope I have cleared it up a bit for you. Keep up the great work!

[Tomás]

I checked out Aquí No Hay Quien Viva but it's beyond my skills right now. I don't even understand how the title is translated into "No one can live here". I would have thought it was "No one lives here".

Heh, I had the same problem, until I started noticing the same construction 'no hay quien + subjunctive' being used in other situations. It's purely idiomatic and simply means 'no one can + verb'/'there is nobody who can + verb'. Another example would be "Juan es muy desagradable. No hay quien lo aguante." - Juan is really unpleasant. Nobody can stand him." It has the idea that it is impossible to put up with Juan, in this case, or in the case of Aquí no hay quien viva, nobody could possibly live here.

I hope I have cleared it up a bit for you. Keep up the great work!

Thanks very much. I love idioms. Although learning idioms is currently taking up two thirds or more of my Anki time, I feel like these are very worthwhile things to focus on.

Laurie's log led me to a TV show I can understand that is not aimed at students of the language: "Los Backyardigans". It's a children's show with lots of repetition. If I don't get something the first five times they say it, odds are I'll get it by the end of the episode. It will be nice when I can graduate to more adult programming.

[Tomás]

Lessons:
Studied 65-70 in Spanish without Toil
Studied 11-15 in 1960s Linguaphone

TV:
Five episodes of Backyardigans
Four episodes of Guillermina y Candelaria
Destinos 18

Reading--finished the following:
"First Spanish Reader" by Angel Flores
Watchmen 1
El Conde de Montecristo, Classic Comics version

Pretty good week. Did not keep up with my lesson/day schedule in SwT. Did not do any active lessons.

On the positive side, I discovered two TV shows that I can understand without subtitles. I don't know if Backyardigans counts as "native material" though. Probably not, since it's translated from the original Canadian. But Guillermina y Candelaria certainly counts.

In Destinos 18, we are finally in Puerto Rico and free of the deadly boring romance with Arturo. I'm glad Raquel was able to ditch him. He seemed excessively needy, the kind of guy that would wind up stalking someone. He was giving Raquel expensive gifts and proclaiming his feelings before they'd even slept together. I know they hadn't done it yet because Raquel would surely have reported it in her end-of-episode recap, and given viewers a multiple-choice question on the event.

In Week Three, I will read the first book of "Liga de hombres extraordinarios". And watch some more children's tv. I will be very happy when I can graduate to an adult show.

[Cavesa]

Hi Thomas, great log, impressive start, I am looking forward to following you!

Do you use comic books in paper or ebooks? Do you buy them or have you got a good library nearby? Or do you sail under the black-and-bones flag? My favourite Spanish library doesn't have too many, as far as I've checked, unfortunately.

About gratuating to adult series: perhaps you might like to use a good step: dubbed shows. As you are obviously not a purist, in the sense of using only original content made in the language, you might like some. Once upon a Time (Erase una vez) and Grimm have good dubbing, I had watched them before diving into the original series. Dubbings tend to be a bit easier to understand.

[Tomás]

Hi Thomas, great log, impressive start, I am looking forward to following you!

Do you use comic books in paper or ebooks? Do you buy them or have you got a good library nearby? Or do you sail under the black-and-bones flag? My favourite Spanish library doesn't have too many, as far as I've checked, unfortunately.

About gratuating to adult series: perhaps you might like to use a good step: dubbed shows. As you are obviously not a purist, in the sense of using only original content made in the language, you might like some. Once upon a Time (Erase una vez) and Grimm have good dubbing, I had watched them before diving into the original series. Dubbings tend to be a bit easier to understand.

When I discovered that comic books are such a great language learning tool, I went out and bought a 12.2" tablet for the sole purpose of reading comics. I have been able to buy a few books at amazon, but most are not available in Spanish in the US. I have gone to order them at amazon.es, but when I click the purchase button it sends me back to the US site and the English version. Apparently Amazon.es doesn't want my money.

Fortunately Spain appears to have very liberal copyright laws. And this is a great site for learning about what comics are available in Spanish: [url]howtoarsenio.blogspot.com[/url]

Thank you for the tv suggestions. I would like to find some shows with good subtitle transcripts available online. That way I could read the transcript before watching the show, and thus bootstrap my listening comprehension.