The Road To TORFL 3 (Kyle's Russian Log)

[CittaKyle]

5/1/2016

* Two Duolingo Lessons
* Reviewed 20 Memrise words, 5 new Memrise words
* Glossika Day 20
* Bought a bunch of cardboard bilingual picture books (Russian-English) that arrived today. I spent about an hour marking the 'stress' marks. This is my dirty way of working on my Russian vocab while playing with my son

Spent a good amount of time (more than I should've) looking for another learning materials. I realized that I really prefer video content rather than pure audio, it engages me a lot more.

I found a cool Youtube channel that has real Question & Answer sessions on the street in Russian. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzlRC_r ... 42p8Ng0LLa

I think I'm going to take a break from the Lingq audio lessons for a while and try to slowly (very slowly) go through these videos instead and see if that's more enjoyable.

Also started trying out an online vocabulary tool called Morpheem to see if I prefer it to Memrise. I like the Memrise vocab I'm doing because it's forcing me to pay close attention to the spelling (you don't get credit if you mess up even one letter). I also like how I can have super quick vocab sessions of like 2 min or less. But... I'm finding that learning these words out of context.. I'm having a hard time incorporating them into usage. Morpheem takes an in-context approach by showing you new words as part of sentences.

I realize I should probably just stick with some tools for a while because "all roads lead to Rome" but alas I'm feeling bored with some of the tools I'm working with and hoping I can find a few things a little more "fun."

Tomorrow my first "Рассказ Сенсация" book arrives. I got the audio too. It wasn't cheap but looks like it will be a few hours of content, and based on the preview text I read, the story sounds fun and I can actually read much of it with my current vocab.
http://www.amazon.com/Rasskaz-Sensatsiy ... ge_o01_s00

[CittaKyle]

5/2/2016

Great day today, got lots done and feeling energized

* 3 Duolingo lessons, almost fully reviewed and ready to start on new content
* 20 words reviewed in Memrise, 5 new words
* Watched Easy Russian Episode 1 with lots of pausing, rewinding, and looking up words ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klj0cz4WHSg ) I really like watching real people saying real things and the full speed speech was good for attuning my ear. I listened to Glossika after and felt like I was hearing the individual sounds much more clearly.
* Listened to Glossika Day 21
* Listened to review of sentences 150-199 in Glossika
* Listened and read along to first chapter of Рассказ-Сенсация. I.Love.This.Book. The audio is clear, not too slow, and the vocabulary is exactly where it needs to be for me: ~90% comprehension before looking up words. It's also good to listen to a male voice for a change. When I repeat after the Glossika content, I frequently find myself speaking with a higher pitch, imitating it.

I find I'm avoiding my textbook and intended study of the Verbs of Motion... need to do that first in the day: take my medicine before I get to eat dessert

[CittaKyle]

5/3/2016

* 3 Duolingo lessons
* 20 Memrise words reviewed, 5 new words
* Glossika Day 21 (up to sentence 210)
* Рассказ-Сенсация Chapter 1 vocabulary research and then re-read and listened to it a few times. Learned some less common words that I can still see myself working into regular conversation (for example: рай / paradise ).
* Didn't study Verbs of Motion directly, but because I'm wanting to focus on them, I'm noticing them more in other content and absorbing them more than I would otherwise

I'm starting to be able to "absorb" (short) Russian sentences silently and then repeat them from working memory instead of having tunnel vision on only one word at a time.

[Arnaud]

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[CittaKyle]

For the verbs of motion, you can watch that channel, I think the explanations are really good.

Thanks, Arnaud. I'll check them out

[CittaKyle]

5/4/2016

* 2 Duolingo lessons
* 20 words reviewed in Memrise, 5 new words
* Listened to Glossika Day 22
* Reviewed sentences 150-199 in Glossika
* "Read" a Toddler book w/ my son on Russian colors - pretty pain-free way for me to learn all the major colors and a few other vocabulary words used as examples. He's too young to speak but he had fun looking at the pictures and trying to eat the book Plus, I figure it's good for his ear to hear some of these other sounds early and often.
* Listened to Chapter 1 "Рассказ Сенсация" again and then started working through Chapter 2. Still really loving this book. It's the best thing I've found so far for learning material.

[CittaKyle]

5/5/2016

* 2 Duolingo lessons
* 20 words reviewed in Memrise, 5 new words
* Listened to Glossika Day 23
* Reviewed sentences 200-250 and 150-199 in Glossika
* Listened ahead to a lesson from sentences 900-950 to see how much harder they are. The answer? A lot
* Finished reading Chapter 2 and looking up vocabulary, then listened to Chapter 2. I'm not writing down any of the definitions, forcing myself to remember them all as I go. It's working pretty well.

[CittaKyle]

5/6/2016


* 1 hr Skype lesson with Oksana, realized I'd been making some pronunciation errors with a few special characters like щ. I wish it was possible to know what you actually sound like to natives.
* 2 Duolingo lessons
* 20 Memrise word reviewed, 5 new words reviewed
* Watched 7 of the 10 Verbs of Motion videos recommended by Arnaud

I actually had a couple free hours today where I could have done a lot more, but I got lost surfing the web, watching random Russian videos, and in general reading about language learning instead of actually doing language learning

I want to give Russian 3 solid years of practice before moving on to other languages, but I've been given some more thought to what my 3rd language will be. My father decided he wanted to "learn Spanish" now that he's retired, so I figured if he took it seriously and actually started getting good at it, I'd revive my 4 years of high school Spanish and catch up to him. No surprise, really, but he took a Community College class, didn't do hardly any outside studying, and didn't sign up for the follow-on course because he didn't "feel ready." So I think it's highly unlikely Spanish will be next for me. I don't have a particularly strong desire to learn it if I won't have an opportunity to use it regularly with someone else.

If not Spanish, then I was interested in one of the following: Mandarin, Japanese, or Thai. Since my career and masters degree are related to Cyber Security, Mandarin has become a kinda obvious choice here for synergies with my career.

But then I've been thinking... I love the Russian language, but I hate the up front barrier that the grammar presents. Mandarin also has that initial barrier of the tones and the characters. So for my next language, I'm thinking I want something with low barriers to entry and a simple grammar. I'm contemplating Norwegian because it's one of the easiest languages for an English speaker, the grammar is pretty simplistic compared to other languages, and I'll be damned if Norway isn't one of the most beautiful countries I have ever seen. Hiking is one of my favorite things to do and based on the pictures I see online, I'm pretty sure I could spend the rest of my life hiking through Norway in total bliss.

So we'll see what wins out... I've still got 2.5 years to decide Or maybe I'll just stick with Russian and take it all the way up to C2 level. This will be my first time taking a language past ~A2 level, so maybe the B & C levels will totally change my outlook on everything.

[Arnaud]

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[CittaKyle]

5/7/2016

* 2 Duolingo lessons
* 20 memrise words reviewed, 5 new words
* Reviewed days of the week (sick of not knowing them well)
* Reviewed "Story Sensational" chapter 2 and worked through all the vocab for chapter 3. Listened to both.
* Listened to Glossika Day 24 while in the shower and getting ready, but think i'll need to listen again. Couldn't hear clearly enough