500 hrs by May

[bombobuffoon]

More newspaper reading this morning. I think this is going to build vocabulary over time.

I have noticed something. This may be a thing.
I can read short articles provided they are about something easily visualized. E.g. a renovation project, a car accident.
However any opinion piece with abstraction or other complexities I cannot understand anything.

Today I read a couple articles without looking up any words.

Yep!


Yep!


Nope!


This is one downside of CI I feel. It seems to me that CI is very very poor when it comes to accuracy, but its great for broad ideas, feel, and visuals.

I need to push myself to understand abstract pieces where I have no visuals to work with. But I don't want to try too hard at this point also.

Otherwise BAU.

[Henkkles]

The theme for this month is active!

Focusing a lot more on active input and effort. Whilst I continue to do 1 hour of listening and reading, I am doing of speaking(reading out loud) and workbook exercises, and writing.



This really should be easy but I keep messing up, these sort of scores are what I am consistently getting.
I may redo the workbook.

Whilst I have no problem comprehending the book or creating basic sentences, part of the problem I think is too much focus on passive has meant I cannot deliver low error output. If I manage a low error rate on these work books I would feel that I could move onto the next stage which will be working on producing these kinds of spoken sentences (eventually at real time). And then conversations can happen. But that is some way off.

Despite the score what I see here is that if you are on the cusp but lack like three details to triple your score in this exercice. It doesn't usually help to redo things if you don't know why you make the errors, but in my eye most of these errors are quite easily fixed.

I am a native and I have previously taught Finnish part time so don't hesitate to ask if you need explanations, naïve natives are usually worthless at explaining how and why things work the way they do and are best used only as informants.

[bombobuffoon]

The theme for this month is active!

Focusing a lot more on active input and effort. Whilst I continue to do 1 hour of listening and reading, I am doing of speaking(reading out loud) and workbook exercises, and writing.



This really should be easy but I keep messing up, these sort of scores are what I am consistently getting.
I may redo the workbook.

Whilst I have no problem comprehending the book or creating basic sentences, part of the problem I think is too much focus on passive has meant I cannot deliver low error output. If I manage a low error rate on these work books I would feel that I could move onto the next stage which will be working on producing these kinds of spoken sentences (eventually at real time). And then conversations can happen. But that is some way off.

Despite the score what I see here is that if you are on the cusp but lack like three details to triple your score in this exercice. It doesn't usually help to redo things if you don't know why you make the errors, but in my eye most of these errors are quite easily fixed.

I am a native and I have previously taught Finnish part time so don't hesitate to ask if you need explanations, naïve natives are usually worthless at explaining how and why things work the way they do and are best used only as informants.

Thanks. I know what you mean. Natives generally don't understand how the English mind thinks either so what's very obvious to them never gets explained or glossed over. I didn't know for almost three years how to use, it or that properly because none of my teachers could ever adequately explain the concept. Only a short while ago did I find this book that actually explained the demonstrative pronouns (with literally 100s of examples) . Mostly good now.

How can I improve my score?

[Henkkles]

The theme for this month is active!

Focusing a lot more on active input and effort. Whilst I continue to do 1 hour of listening and reading, I am doing of speaking(reading out loud) and workbook exercises, and writing.



This really should be easy but I keep messing up, these sort of scores are what I am consistently getting.
I may redo the workbook.

Whilst I have no problem comprehending the book or creating basic sentences, part of the problem I think is too much focus on passive has meant I cannot deliver low error output. If I manage a low error rate on these work books I would feel that I could move onto the next stage which will be working on producing these kinds of spoken sentences (eventually at real time). And then conversations can happen. But that is some way off.

Despite the score what I see here is that if you are on the cusp but lack like three details to triple your score in this exercice. It doesn't usually help to redo things if you don't know why you make the errors, but in my eye most of these errors are quite easily fixed.

I am a native and I have previously taught Finnish part time so don't hesitate to ask if you need explanations, naïve natives are usually worthless at explaining how and why things work the way they do and are best used only as informants.

Thanks. I know what you mean. Natives generally don't understand how the English mind thinks either so what's very obvious to them never gets explained or glossed over. I didn't know for almost three years how to use, it or that properly because none of my teachers could ever adequately explain the concept. Only a short while ago did I find this book that actually explained the demonstrative pronouns (with literally 100s of examples) . Mostly good now.

How can I improve my score?

Try to commit these three rules to memory to begin with:

1. You are conflating the third person (he walks, she drives) form with the imperative (walk! drive!) in 1, 5 and 9. The (singular) imperative is always without exception the same as the "minä" form with the final -n removed; minä olen -> ole!, minä käännyn -> käänny!, minä kävelen -> kävele!
2. Finnish uses mainly postpositions rather than prepositions, this means that they come after the word, not before as in English, so "street across" instead of "across () street". There are only two important PREpositions that I can think of, "ilman" and "ennen". Prepositions assign partitive (-a, -ä, -ta, -tä, etc.) whereas postpositions usually assign genitive (-n). Some words can be used as either, but obey this rule; "lähellä kirjastoa - kirjaston lähellä".
3. English has a way to ask questions which is called the "do-support", but some common verbs don't require it to form questions. Compare "is he?" with "does he be?" ("to be" does not require do-support) and "turned he?" with "did he turn?" ("to turn" requires do-support). Finnish doesn't have anything like the do-support, so in 17 you would just take "turn I to the right?" instead of "do I turn to the right?".

These three things are very important to understand to generate correct Finnish. Try to observe these things in the texts you are reading as well, that should help in remembering them.

[tiia]

A late welcome to this forum.

Seeing Henkkles commenting this log, I have also found my way here. Works almost as well as putting "Finnish" in the log title.

First of all, I think it's nice to read that someone - after trying some kind of "natural method" - decided to concentrate on grammar instead. I personally think in case of Finnish, learning grammar is much more necessary as in most other commonly learned languages.

If you need to look up what verb goes with what case (the so called rektio), there's a book called "Tarkista tästä" with plenty of example sentences. You should find it in the library.

Personally I also don't think you will need puhekieli to converse with people. Understanding it is definitely useful, but speaking it can come later. It's fine if you don't use it from the beginning. Don't let that keep you away from trying to speak.

If you want to practise speaking, I would recommend you to search for a language cafe in your region. They may also run under their Finnish name kielikahvila or Cafe Lingua or so.
When I came as an exchange student, I knew most of the Finnish grammar, but my conversational skills were not so great. Attending a language cafe every week for that one year has helped me a lot to start speaking more fluently. In the beginning I introduced myself to a lot of people over and over again, but once I had been attending the language cafe more often I started to speak to the same people again and again, so also the topics developed over time into something more complex. And no, it is not a problem, that you may speak with other learners. They may even be more patient to listen to you stumbling your way through a sentence.
Language cafes seem to be pretty popular in the Nordics, so as long as you live in or close to a larger city, I suspect you should find one. They are usually free of charge and need no registration. Each language cafe is also a bit different, so if one didn't work out, feel free to try another one.

More newspaper reading this morning. I think this is going to build vocabulary over time.

I have noticed something. This may be a thing.
I can read short articles provided they are about something easily visualized. E.g. a renovation project, a car accident.
However any opinion piece with abstraction or other complexities I cannot understand anything.

The third text is definitely at a different level than the two before. Don't worry if you didn't understand that one.

[eido]

Hello, @bombo.

Welcome to the forum!

You seem to be taking a similar route to that which I took when I was learning Spanish. I didn't have access to as many natives as you, living in country, but I was teaching myself the language after my classes in high school left me wanting more. What I find similar here is your input focus and your "struggle" with output.

Obviously, Spanish is a bit easier for native English speakers than Finnish can be. (And forgive me for asking [you don't have to answer], but what is your native language? You list English as N/C1, so I'm curious. It might help others give you better advice if you so choose.) So let me rephrase, English speakers in general, but those which haven't attempted a language like Finnish before may perhaps usually find it difficult.

Anyway, as I was learning my first second language, I focused heavily on input because that's just how the American school system ran, although that seems to be changing in certain areas of the country. But what helped me was writing for corrections on the now defunct Lang-8 and talking to myself (either aloud or in my head) to improve pronunciation and @Sprachprofi's described chunking. Lang-8's successor appears to be Journaly, and it's pretty active as I write this. I see that you realize you're surrounded by natives who could help, but this might be an alternative which could provide many happy returns (just in case). It's merely a suggestion - don't feel pressed to take it.

I read through most of your log, but I forget; do you take your unknown vocabulary words and build your practice around those? Like, do you use words from your exploration of newspapers, comics, and Peppa Pig in new sentences, or do "sentence building drills"? Just a thought.

Anyway, your story is interesting and it intrigued me enough to drag me out of my relative silence to ask some questions, so thank you for your time. Have an excellent day, and above all, keep having fun studying Finnish!

[bombobuffoon]

Hello, @bombo.
I read through most of your log, but I forget; do you take your unknown vocabulary words and build your practice around those? Like, do you use words from your exploration of newspapers, comics, and Peppa Pig in new sentences, or do "sentence building drills"? Just a thought.

No I don't. I have tried that kind of thing and it isn't for me. I have work books and do those drills but that's kind of it. No flash cards or that kind of thing. I do quite a bit of audio related drills like transcribing and reading though. Those are the places where I put my grind effort. (Speaking of grind, with CI I thought some kind of magic moment would happen where I started understanding but no. Funny enough the only "magic moments" I've felt are a few light bulb moments when reading grammar books).

So I don't drill like that, I may make a note of a new word e.g. "aspirational". But to use in a sentence when I can't even form a sentence about how I need to change my tires this week seems unnatural, at this stage at least.

Chunking or phrasing its not really something you can do artificially either (just IMO). Because honestly I don't think you find the phrases, I think the phrases find you.

What I mean by that is that I feel its a matter of putting myself into the position of having a concrete need (e.g. to be entertained, to learn about local culture through newspapers, or eventually do tasks involving talking to people), and the words and phrases I need will find me. So what I really need to be seeking is more experiences. As I said before, the challenge is finding enjoyable material to experience.

[eido]

What I mean by that is that I feel its a matter of putting myself into the position of having a concrete need (e.g. to be entertained, to learn about local culture through newspapers, or eventually do tasks involving talking to people), and the words and phrases I need will find me. So what I really need to be seeking is more experiences. As I said before, the challenge is finding enjoyable material to experience.

That's a good way to look at it! Intrinsic motivation in language learning, I think, ultimately beats extrinsic - but I could be wrong. I also used to consume a lot of media to help me get up to a high level in Spanish.

Whatever works for you

Happy travels~!

[bombobuffoon]

I took a couple days off. I actually think I should take a long break at some point, maybe after 500 hrs to let things settle in. Anyways.

I say I took a couple days off but I was actually doing some RnD. Trying to find ways to work with these chatbots. I am not using them as teachers but they do give me the opportunity to do a lot of writing and speaking. I think they are not so great at just random chats, you need to use them to play games, so they have a sort of direction and script. Here I am trying a small talk game https://github.com/AdmTal/chat-gpt-game ... mulator.md



I don't know if any native can comment but I find the English Grammar at least from Bing Copilot to be pretty good. So I use it to check for any howlers. Its not any good for explaining concepts and such but its grammar system seems to be solid.

[Henkkles]

The grammar is fine for the most part but it doesn't have a consistent tone, at times it's super colloquial then all of a sudden entirely standard.