Lilly's log - French, Russian, Spanish and Italian

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PeterMollenburg
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian, Spanish and Italian

Postby PeterMollenburg » Wed Jul 12, 2017 10:57 am

Ani wrote:There is a blog/website Six En Route of a Swiss family that drove from Switzerland down through Africa and up through South America. Interesting reading in French, always good for inspiring some daydreams.


Ooooh, this is trintresting <--- = hybrid of 'très' and 'interesting'. PM you don't use Frenglish, do you? .... do you? :o Noooo, just a trypo ;) Yes, très intéressant, Ani, I shall put this aside for later reading.
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian, Spanish and Italian

Postby blaurebell » Wed Jul 12, 2017 12:21 pm

smallwhite wrote:Do you know the ratios "LWT word form : dictionary form" or "LWT word form : word family" for Russian (not French)?


No, I don't know it yet. Russian is more inflected than french thanks to the declinations, so it would already end up with more word forms and then all the verbs are double or triple thanks to the perfective/imperfective verb aspect. I have read many different estimates for a good sized core vocabulary for reading in LWT or LingQ, anything 35,000 and 60,000 word forms. I'm going with the 35,000 word form goal for now so as not to discourage myself, but I suspect that it's substantially more. After 244 pages in Russian I already had 15880 total word forms in comparison to 9214 after 305 pages of French. If that ratio holds, 50,000 is a more likely value. It's hard to predict though, since I'm not reading the same books and the writing style might have a lot to do with it in the beginning. I can make comparisons once I hit a ratio of 87% known vs unknown word forms in the database though. That's a long way off, I'm at like 47% known with a lot less word forms so far.

Pages for French are paperback pages. Russian pages are calculated from the French paperback version of HP, because most of my first 5000 pages in French was HP. Should be directly comparable in the end.
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian, Spanish and Italian

Postby blaurebell » Thu Jul 13, 2017 10:29 am

The last two days were not really productive, because the neighbours had builders in the house and they were drilling all day. I can't possibly study with that kind of noise, so I didn't get any Russian done, meh! But then I still managed my daily episode of Star Trek in Italian and there was some La venganza será terrible too. Last night we also watched La reine Margot, which was interesting, although I have to say that I missed quite a bit of the dialogue this time. They were whispering half the time it seemed! Yesterday I also spoke to my doctor, who complimented me on my Spanish, which obviously resulted in me making a mistake in the very next sentence :roll: - one of those pesky fossilised mistakes that tumble out of my mouth thanks to early speaking without correction. Grrr! Still some way to go until those disappear entirely. In any case, we're happily chatting about all sorts of things, music, comedy and obviously my state of health. Last year we were still speaking all German and I was pretty scared of speaking Spanish in that kind of situation, but now it's pretty normal. I tend to listen to Spanish podcasts or radio on the way there now instead of French ones, because I noticed that I got French interference whenever I listened to French radio instead. Interesting, because I don't even try to speak French and it still causes interference!

I've made some good progress with GdUdE B in the last few days and I have now finally reached the subjunctive part. The first couple of pages of subjunctive exercises even went without a single mistake, but so far it's all just present tense subjunctive and it's pretty clear that I have to use subjunctive all the time. There are still about 12 lessons left for the subjunctive, so I still have plenty of opportunities to make mistakes! Also, my husband criticised a bunch of condicional exercises, because he would pretty much never use that construction himself to express doubt. No idea whether that's Latin America specific or whether it's simply too specific in general. Like learners being taught the Konjunktiv 2 in German which almost no native can use correctly. In any case, GdUdE is pretty thorough and that's probably something good. In any case, I'm pretty happy with my Spanish improvement so far. It's pretty obvious that my recent 62h of grammar drilling did something! 62h done, 300 to go or something like that ;) I'm still not sure how to continue after GdUdE B. Finish volume 2 of FSI? Go through the Argentinian pronunciation exercises I found the other day? Start on Macanudo? The Practice makes Perfect subjunctive book? All pretty good options. I guess I'll just wait to see what my mood is like when I reach the end of GdUdE B!
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: 100 / 116 GdUdE B
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian, Spanish and Italian

Postby blaurebell » Thu Jul 13, 2017 11:05 am

Ani wrote:I've heard of soylent made FROM lazy people, but not FOR lazy people :lol: I am not sure I'd ever be able to eat anything by that name :lol: but there are definitely times when not having to make food decisions is a wonderful thing. I was on SCD/GAPS for a few years, and a 15 food rotational diet, and both were actually a lot more limiting than now.


I'm actually on a mix of SCD and Paleo. Can't eat some things that are allowed on SCD and can't eat some things allowed on Paleo. It's all pretty similar though. Finding SCD was a revelation! Before I was pretty much a helpless victim of incompetent doctors and my stupid illness. SCD took care of like 90% of my health problems, it was magical!

Ani wrote:Have you ever tried floating? You seem like the perfect candidate to own your own float tank. The epsom salts push all the extra fluid/inflammation out of your body, and being weightless really helps relieve pain.


I actually once wrote an essay about sensory deprivation at uni - I studied lots of cognitive science stuff - and since then I always wanted a float tank! We live in a rented flat though, so that's not going to happen anytime soon. I do appreciate epsom salt baths though! I have to be a bit careful with magnesium though, it tends to improve some symptoms and make others worse. I tend to use dead sea salts now, which isn't quite as extreme, but also makes you float.

Ani wrote:All that stress is relieved by driving! I actually love living on the road with the kids. I can only imagine how much better it would be with just a significant other.


Well, I just need to get him to try it at some point. The last time I've gone on a proper road trip was more than 10 years ago. Since then I simply didn't have access to a car. Soon though! I actually can't wait to get started with that adventure, I already have a map of places to photograph in the surrounding area.

Ani wrote:You can travel with your RV but I am going to guess most people send their RV ahead or else it is a ~6 month round trip without much added for sight seeing. Probably a bit too much time to ask DH to take off work :lol: :lol:


Haha, DH had a sort of haunted look in his eyes when I even hinted at that possibility! "Where is she getting these crazy ideas from ...?!" was written in big bold letters on his face :lol: In any case, I think I have to start him off a little more slowly than that. South of France and over to the Mediterranean maybe. The other day we watched the movie La Lectrice and we both really liked the look of the place where it was filmed, it's over near Marseille, stopping at Biarritz and Toulouse on the way would be a good idea. A bit of Spain next - down to Granada or some such place. It's 12h from here by train, so not really an option, but I've been dying to see the architecture down there for years! And then there is still my pretty secret Italian Art History plan. DH would love that too probably. And after that a South America road trip probably wouldn't sound quite as scary :D

Ani wrote:There is a blog/website Six En Route of a Swiss family that drove from Switzerland down through Africa and up through South America. Interesting reading in French, always good for inspiring some daydreams.


That's awesome! I bookmarked it for later when our south of France plans get more concrete. Right now it would probably just make me restless because it'll still take a while until I can get the driver's licence and car stuff in order!
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: 20 / 100 Дэвид Эддингс - В поисках камня
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: 100 / 116 GdUdE B
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian, Spanish and Italian

Postby blaurebell » Thu Jul 13, 2017 4:11 pm

I actually used a subjunctive today *on purpose* and I knew that I used it correctly 8-) Normally I avoid them like the plague, but today the subjunctive exercises from GdUdE were fresh on my mind. Our discussion in another thread here the other day, reminded me that for English all the grammar study I did over the years definitely made a difference. In Spanish I've done too little grammar study in comparison. Only half of my lessons in the immersion school were related to grammar and usually they weren't overly focused. You don't torture paying customers, so it was all "fun" and not too strict. It amounts to about 150h of light grammar study, whereas in English it must have been north of 500h, only counting strict school classes with dragon like teachers! That's why I'm now aiming for about 350h of grammar/courses for Spanish. And of course PMs courses courses courses strategy got him to excellent production scores in his B2 exam too, which is another reason why I'm focusing more on grammar now.

I'm a big fan of input, but it can only get you so far on the production side of things. From all the hundreds and hundreds of hours of input in Spanish I can definitely hear when I make a mistake, but before the grammar study I often didn't know how to say it right. There are of course many things that are more automatic thanks to lots of input, but beyond set expressions this doesn't necessarily help much. Of course my French Dialang scores also show that massive input, especially reading, improves comprehension a lot. It's useful already for that. I still only got A2 in the production side of the test though - active vocabulary, structures -, despite a good 800h of input. I doubt that another 800h will change much in that respect. My French still needs some work on the listening comprehension front and I'm simply enjoying French content, so I don't mind more input, but if I wanted to "efficiently" improve my French, this would be the point where I would start grammar study followed by writing to develop my production skills. Due to my work on my Spanish this will have to wait for now, but I will definitely follow this strategy for all my languages where I want good active skills - massive input, followed by grammar over-learning and massive output.

French will be the first language where I put this strategy into practice from scratch, but I'm also using the strategy to improve my Spanish, which means that I'll have a bit of a test run with my Spanish C1 exam next year. Between now and the exam - probably next summer - I will try to read another 10,000 pages, 5000 of which intensively, I will listen to another 200h at least, probably more, I will try to clock about 300h of grammar / courses - or at least finish all the courses currently on my list -, write 50,000 words, 50h of recording myself speaking and spend at least two months speaking Spanish daily, one month in October, the other sometime closer to the exam. I will also use any other opportunity to speak Spanish, which includes doctor's appointments, driving lessons and possibly I'll look for a bunch of exchange partners too. I will also try to find a tutor to speak with me about Argentinian literature from January onwards which should be really interesting. And if I can possibly find the time I'll also try to make something like an Argentinian Glossika from Inés Efron movies, although this one is actually something that I might only tackle after the exam, who knows. I'm probably looking at another 1000h of Spanish at least before the exam and most of it will happen outside of my comfort zone. Right now I only feel comfortable with listening, so I pretty much need to work on everything else before I'm ready. I don't really need to take the exam, but I think it will be a good motivator to stay on track with my Spanish improvement.
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian, Spanish and Italian

Postby blaurebell » Fri Jul 14, 2017 11:36 am

Morgana wrote:Good luck Lilly, I know you're going to impress everybody with your results from this plan of attack, just as you have done with your comprehension!


Thank you Morgana :) To be honest, if that plan doesn't get me to C1, nothing will :lol:
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian, Spanish and Italian

Postby blaurebell » Fri Jul 14, 2017 12:03 pm

Spanish

I have now done almost two thirds of the GdUdE B book. Today the past subjunctive appeared and it's very noticeable that I'm less comfortable with it than with the present tense subjunctive. I definitely need to concentrate a little more to get those right. So, this is definitely one of the areas where I'll need extra work. Good that I already have the Spanish Subjunctive up close book to go through afterwards and there are also more subjunctive exercises in the GdUdE C book.

Russian

I managed another 5% of my book in Russian and I'm now up to 63%. After those horrific few pages with 19.4% unknown words it suddenly dropped down to 14.5% again and that was much more comfortable and fast. The erratic writing style is frankly getting on my nerves from a language learning perspective, but I think I'm still making progress, since I'm now down to about 12-13min per page. Not long now and I might drop below 10min! In any case, I think I will manage my first 500 pages before the end of the month as I had planned. And then the next 500 should go a lot faster still. By the way, I have now studied more than 400h of Russian. Still quite a bit to go I suppose, but it's a decent milestone nevertheless!

French

I'm still reading Irène Némirovsky's La proie and although it's another good book, I'm getting less and less patient with all the odious characters in Némirovskys books. I'll still read the last two of her novels I have left, but then I might move on to something else. I picked up a few French books in the second hand bookshop the other day: There was Camus' La peste, I'm looking forward to that one! It turns out my husband also has La chute in French, hidden in his overstuffed bookshelves I of course had no idea. I also picked a novel by Simone Signoret - strangely enough she's actually an actress but the novel has a good rating and she studied literature. Randomly it's a novel about exile too, so somewhat related to my PhD. I also picked a Maigret novel for some light beach reading - if summer ever reaches us - and a collection of essays by Baudelaire to challenge myself a little. I might already have my next 5000 pages all lined up! And yes, I better stay away from that bookshop for a while now or I'll never get started on Spanish reading :lol:
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian, Spanish and Italian

Postby smallwhite » Fri Jul 14, 2017 12:28 pm

blaurebell wrote:I have read many different estimates for a good sized core vocabulary for reading in LWT or LingQ, anything 35,000 and 60,000 word forms.

Thanks for pointing me to that. I read up on such discussions, and I now have better idea what levels such figures represent. Which is great as now I can understand your progress better (and others' as well).
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian, Spanish and Italian

Postby blaurebell » Sat Jul 15, 2017 9:20 am

Spanish

66% of GdUdE B done! So, today I did some more subjunctive exercises and I got into other tenses vs subjunctive territory. Well, I get the subjunctives right in the exercises, but then suddenly fail at deciding between present tense and simple future again when I'm paying attention to the subjunctives :roll: I guess, whenever I don't pay attention I fall back into my old mistake patterns which I haven't managed to change properly yet. How annoying! Stupid fossilised mistakes! I guess the only way to change it is to drill more :?

Russian

68% of my second book done, and I'm down to 11min per page. Not bad, not bad at all. And there is finally also some movement in the known vs unknown ration - I'm now at 50% rather than 47%. Not a huge improvement, but it's going in the right direction. My Russian journey definitely hasn't been easy, but well, it's a difficult language and I'm now definitely approaching that area where reading in Russian at least isn't a drag anymore. Not exactly fun yet, but not too much torture either.

My husband was joking that I'd be reading this fantasy series until 2020 at my current rate, but that's actually not true. if I'd continue at 1h a day I would be finished in 2019 at the latest even without additional improvement in reading speed :D That said, I will try to continue at 4h+ a day so that I'll finish this year for sure. One thing is true though: When I decided to learn Russian for my PhD a couple years back I really had no idea how hard it would be. I've already advanced a great deal, but it's been a huge struggle too. At least it's now only a matter of time rather than this unpredictable mess that generally is "learning Russian". 400h done. Some 400h more and I'll be almost there I suppose.

French

I finished La proie by Irène Némirovsky. I really appreciate her writing skills and her story telling techniques are first rate. She has a tendency to come up with the most disgusting people as her main characters who usually get what they deserve, so these aren't exactly happy books, but so far I haven't encountered even one mediocre book of hers. Kind of amazing! Doesn't mean that they're all "enjoyable", but they are definitely good. The next one I'll be reading is Deux. 10,488 pages in French read so far. At this rate I might actually hit 15,000 pages before the end of the year, especially if I get more time for French reading after getting all my Russian reading out of the way.

Italian

More Star Trek TNG in Italian.
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian, Spanish and Italian

Postby blaurebell » Sun Jul 16, 2017 11:23 am

Russian

Yesterday I hit 78% of the second book read, that's 10% in one day 8-) There was just a long chapter which was pretty decisive to the story, so I simply wanted to know how it turns out. Afterwards I felt super drained though, because reading for such a long time in Russian at about 14% new words, is actually quite straining still. I need to be more careful and try not to overdo it!

Russian hours: 6.48h

Spanish

I did my usual GdUdE, which went in the usual fashion. Steady progress, and I'm managing about an hour a day lately. We also listened to some La venganza será terrible which was a long meditation on the kind Midas and ... panchos i.e. hot dogs. We laughed an awful lot! Before bed I looked at my next Irène Némirovsky book and decided I needed something else. So I picked a Piglia book from the shelf and I'm now reading Respiración artificial. It makes me feel like one of these people who don't know anything about Latin American history - although I know quite a lot - so it's actually very interesting. I would probably enjoy it more if I had already done my Spanish LWT reading challenge, but well, I don't have the mind-space for that right now with all the Russian intensive reading. In any case, extensive reading is better than no reading at all!

Spanish hours: 3.46h

Italian

Some Star Trek TNG in Italian was exactly what my brain needed after all the strain of Russian reading. That said, there was Deanna Troi's mother in the episode. She speaks way too much way too fast and that was pretty much incomprehensible to me. I suppose my brain didn't have time to make all the Spanish connections in time. But well, she's also an extreme case of babbling in weird vocabulary, so maybe it was that. The rest of it I understood just fine though, as always. I'm definitely enjoying it. It's relaxing to do something that is just ever so slightly more taxing than Spanish but still almost fully transparent. And I don't feel like I'm wasting my time while re-watching TNG again although I pretty much know it by heart.

Italian hours: 0.75h

Total: 10.69h

General

Yesterday my husband said: "I don't know why you are so tired, you haven't really done anything all day!" What?! Well, you can imagine that I wasn't too pleased about that quick judgement. I had just read 6.5h in Russian and done an hour of Spanish grammar!!! I suppose when falsely assuming that Russian isn't any more difficult than French or Italian, one doesn't really realise how straining it is to learn a language that is so different. In any case, it didn't take long for him to say the exact opposite: "What?! 6.5h, that's way too long! And on a weekend no less!!" Clever boy knew how to save his neck :twisted: :lol:
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: 20 / 100 Дэвид Эддингс - В поисках камня
: 14325 / 35000 LWT Known

: 17 / 55 FSI Spanish Basic
: 100 / 116 GdUdE B
: 8 / 72 Duolingo reverse Spanish -> German


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