Fantastic Wanderlust and Where to Find It(alian)

[Seneca]

Anyone who recognizes my username knows I have bounced around a bit in my languages since joining this site. I was interested in Latin for about two posts before deciding I wanted to learn a living language, then I worked on Spanish for a bit over a month and a half before I got quite ill and wasn't doing much of anything in life for months until I was better, then I started studying some survival Portuguese for a trip to Lisbon that got canceled, then I dabbled a bit in German until I went to Germany and was told multiple times by Germans that they weren't French, so I did not need to try

I recently took a vacation to France, and had a lovely time. I basically just memorized some common verbs and phrases, and got along just fine. The only thing that actually tripped me up was not knowing how to say something like "That's all" when ordering things at a patisserie. While in France, I met up with some couch surfers from Rome. We all really hit it off, and I am going to be visiting Italy towards the end of this year to see it through the eyes of locals. I am pretty excited about this opportunity. One of the two lived in the US before and speaks English incredibly well. The other knows survival level English, but made a good effort of pantomimes and all to help me be sure I knew what was trying to be communicated. It was an odd thing to go to Paris and end up incredibly charmed by a couple of Italians, haha. Anyway, I decided I wish to learn as much Italian as I can before my trip. Both because it seems like the right thing to do anyway, and also because this timeline is a bit longer than my usual trips, so I have time to actually get somewhere in it.

What I Am Doing
Exposing myself to as much Italian as possible.

Whenever I am just hanging out at my place and not actively studying Italian, or doing something involving English (watching a movie, for example), I have Radio Italia's music video channel playing in the background.

I use EuroNews to listen to at least one article in Italian a day. Shout out to iguanamon, who I believe initially shared about this site. I have found that the English version is actually quite loose and different from the Italian, so I generally just copy-paste the Italian article into Google translate, which seems to do a good job. I don't love this site, but NHK does not offer Italian, and I don't know any alternatives for daily news with audio for Italian. I welcome any suggestions or alternatives.
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I got a copy of this on the cheap. But once I came across the pair of sentences, "Where is the pencil?" with the response being, "On your hat." I set it aside. That is stupid. Come on, Berlitz. You can do better.
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I also tried Paul Noble: Italian. This was worse than watching paint dry. At least if I am watching paint dry, I might get high off the fumes and daydream about something interesting. I made it two discs in and threw in the towel. I do wonder if it would still be worth reading through the pamphlet and trying to memorize the constructions that way and then using the review disc only. But that seems to defeat how the program says it should work, so perhaps not worth it....

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Then I started using Language Transfer: Introduction to Italian and did about the first hour. This one only runs about 6 hours total, but I think it would be more useful to me once I know a bit more vocabulary and all. I am not sure why, just a hunch that this would be better to use in about a month or so. I definitely will come back. It is odd to me that it seems to be the same basic concept as Paul Noble, yet it doesn't completely suck.
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My main daily driver is the latest Assimil:


I spent a good bit of time editing it before starting. I split out the audio so I have two playlists. One is just the lessons themselves, with the lesson number cut out. The second is just the exercises themselves, with the "esercizio 1 - traducete" cut out. I ran audacity on both to take out gaps. I did have to add in about half a second to the start of each track so that VLC didn't cut them off when it started playing. The full run-time for the lessons playlist is now one hour and five minutes total. I know talking about the different ways to use Assimil is one of the favorite pastimes of wannabe language learners, haha. here is what I do:

1) Listen with the book closed x5
2) Listen and silently read along with the Italian x3
3) Listen, pause after each line, and repeat out loud 3 times before moving into the next line
4) Compare translations and read the grammar notes at the bottom
5) Listen twice, first reading along silently with the English and second with the Italian
6) Listen and read out loud along with the Italian x3
7) Do the exercises and then read a cultural note.

With the audio shortened, the above doesn't take long.
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It is also nice to be able to hit up the italians on how to pronounce things and get a voice clip immediately. "gli" still gives me trouble, but it is coming along okay.

Basically my current schedule is a lesson of Assimil every day, at least one EuroNews article, and passively listening to Italian music whenever I am at home. The few times something has come up in grammar for Assimil that I didn't understand from context, I was able to google and find a solution. However, I decided I wanted to more explicitly focus on it as well. Unfortunately, about.com just retired a couple weeks ago, and the replacement website's Italian section seems brutal and pointless. So I ordered this book:

Here is a preview of what is inside. I don't know, perhaps it will be too boring, but I felt like I need to take a shot at getting in some formal grammar study in addition to Assimil.

I'd like to start doing more, but am unsure the best way. Speaking is not a priority now since my trip won't be until October. Italian seems quite phonetic, I am not so concerned about needing audio for everything I need beyond the news and Assimil I already use each day.

I found Liber Liber, which has free downloads of old books. Mods, let me know if this site does not seem on the up-and-up, and if I should delete the link! Anyway, I downloaded Robinson Crusoe in Italian on there since I don't know of anyplace with pre-made Italian bilingual texts. I still have a few months left on my old readlang subscription, so I converted this book to a .txt file and uploaded. I am thinking to just start reading. I am only a couple of weeks in, but.....I don't know, why not? I can get the translation right there in readlang if needed. What do you more experienced folks think? Is it worth trying to struggle through a novel at this point just for the vocabulary exposure? If not, what would you recommend instead?

Thanks for reading, everyone!

[iguanamon]

Anyone who recognizes my username knows I have bounced around a bit in my languages since joining this site. ... Is it worth trying to struggle through a novel at this point just for the vocabulary exposure? If not, what would you recommend instead?

Yes, I remember all of your previous learning attempts. Since you've asked for advice, I will give you mine for what it's worth. The key to learning a second language to a high level is consistency and persistence. In your previous attempts, you've seemed to lack these qualities. Without them, you won't learn a language.

My observation, and I may be wrong, is that you are looking more towards resources to do the heavy lifting for you. Your dismissal out of hand of the Berlitz Self-Teacher book is an example of this. I am not going to argue that this is a great resource, neither is it a bad resource. For it's time, it was a good resource. Even Professor Arguelles speaks highly of the series as learning resources. You're not just learning "The pencil is on the hat". You're learning the concept of something being on something. If you used that book you would learn a lot of Italian, and more importantly how to manipulate Italian.

Are there better resources, sure, but it isn't necessarily about the resources. You can learn even using a so-called "bad" resource (as long as its concepts are valid and there are no errors) as long as you stick with it- being consistent and persistent. If you choose the most wonderful, amazing, effective and efficient resources out there, they will do you little good if you don't use them consistently and if you are not persistent.

The successful learners here have these qualities of consistency and persistence. Desire is also a huge factor. All of these feed into and reinforce each other. Why do you want to learn Italian? Is it just for a two week holiday or do you want to make a more serious commitment? If you just want to be able to communicate while traveling, a good phrasebook (like the Lonely Planet series) is enough. If you want to really learn a language, to be able to converse with natives, read literature, watch and listen to media, then that takes a commitment to see the process through to this end and despite what course covers tell you, it takes more time.

The resources and technology won't do the job for you, your approach to using them will. Look at PeterMollenburg, he just reached B2 after a few years of studying French. I don't and wouldn't recommend his course-heavy approach, it's not my thing, but since he seriously decided to learn French he has been consistent and persistent with his approach. It paid off for him in spades with an official B2 certification. Consistency will win the game every time, persistence will keep you in the game until you can be consistent again. So, whatever resources you choose will work for you, provided that you are committed, consistent and persistent in using them.

As to your question about Robinson Crusoe. There is a free and legal parallel text available in Italian and English available at Farkas Translations. Scroll down to the Italian section. When downloading or reading you "x" out of the other languages until you are left with Italian and English. The site has nine parallel texts in Italian available. I wouldn't use "readlang". At a beginner level, you'll get more out of it by reading the parallel text a little bit everyday alongside doing a couple of complimentary courses- one text and audio and maybe another one like Pimsleur or MT.

[Seneca]

Anyone who recognizes my username knows I have bounced around a bit in my languages since joining this site. ... Is it worth trying to struggle through a novel at this point just for the vocabulary exposure? If not, what would you recommend instead?

Yes, I remember all of your previous learning attempts. Since you've asked for advice, I will give you mine for what it's worth. The key to learning a second language to a high level is consistency and persistence. In your previous attempts, you've seemed to lack these qualities. Without them, you won't learn a language.

My observation, and I may be wrong, is that you are looking more towards resources to do the heavy lifting for you. Your dismissal out of hand of the Berlitz Self-Teacher book is an example of this. I am not going to argue that this is a great resource, neither is it a bad resource. For it's time, it was a good resource. Even Professor Arguelles speaks highly of the series as learning resources. You're not just learning "The pencil is on the hat". You're learning the concept of something being on something. If you used that book you would learn a lot of Italian, and more importantly how to manipulate Italian.

As to your question about Robinson Crusoe. There is a free and legal parallel text available in Italian and English available at Farkas Translations. Scroll down to the Italian section. When downloading or reading you "x" out of the other languages until you are left with Italian and English. The site has nine parallel texts in Italian available. I wouldn't use "readlang". At a beginner level, you'll get more out of it by reading the parallel text a little bit everyday alongside doing a couple of complimentary courses- one text and audio and maybe another one like Pimsleur or MT.

Hey iguanamon, thanks for your feedback, as always!

I'd say I have no issues with consistency as I've not had any issues with working on a language daily. I'd assess overall persistence as the much larger problem for me. Hopefully Italian is the ticket to change that! I think it will be because I actually have friends already to speak it with, the trip is close enough to be a real motivating factor, but far enough away I think I can make real headway before getting there. So I think my consistency of daily effort, combined with having a real thing to work towards wanting the language for (using it during a long vacation for when I am not with my Italian friends who speak some English) will hopefully help things to stay on track longer this time.

If nothing else, I am quite certain I have never complained or whined to anyone for not making it to a high level in a language. That has to count for something, right?

Fair enough on the Berlitz book. But I will say I think your observation is off on me wanting courses to do the heavy lifting. The Berlitz, Paul Noble, and Language Transfer were successive dabblings aiming to fill the suggestion you have in the last line of your post about using a second course. Right now my daily exposure to Italian is an Assimil lesson, a couple hours of listening to Italian music (totally passive, but can't hurt I hope!), and looking at a EuroNews article. I definitely want to do more with the language outside of the course world. Which is why I was asking about the parallel texts and all. I think that seems like a good way to go. Thanks for the Farkas Translations link!

[iguanamon]

...I'd say I have no issues with consistency as I've not had any issues with working on a language daily. I'd assess overall persistence as the much larger problem for me. ...

Fair enough, on consistency, but you do need to work on your persistence. The only reason I thought you may have been fixated on course selection was seeing some of your previous posts. I seem to remember you were in to Linguaphone courses at one time? It doesn't matter. Assimil, Linguaphone, Language Transfer, Pimsleur, Michael Thomas, even Berlitz... all will help you to learn a language. If you really want to learn Italian this time, stick with it! My last piece of advice is to read successful learners' logs and participate in your TL language study group. There are several Italian learners here. Don't just study Italian, make it a part of your life. Talk to yourself in the language, listen to music, etc. Good luck this time.

[reineke]

Hello

I've used some of your Russian links in the "resources" forum. I tried to credit contributors where possible.

The Italian resources thread includes a link to LiberLiber (which is 100% legal) and other sites.

https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... =19&t=2912

You may consider reading and listening to a 20th century novel. RAI's Terzo Anello has some great audiobook versions of modern and classic literature. You can purchase the bilingual English - Italian edition of The Little Prince for 99c on Amazon and you should be able to find the free (legal) electronic versions online if you dig through the resources section.

I would disagree that you don't need the audio and I certainly hope you won't come back from Italy joking that people thought you were speaking German.

Finally, I think you should structure your approach around your immediate needs. In this case you should look into audio courses, phrase books etc.

[Seneca]

Hello

I've used some of your Russian links in the "resources" forum. I tried to credit contributors where possible.

The Italian resources thread includes a link to LiberLiber (which is 100% legal) and other sites.

https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... =19&t=2912

You may consider reading and listening to a 20th century novel. RAI's Terzo Anello has some great audiobook versions of modern and classic literature. You can purchase the bilingual English - Italian edition of The Little Prince for 99c on Amazon and you should be able to find the free (legal) electronic versions online if you dig through the resources section.

I would disagree that you don't need the audio and I certainly hope you won't come back from Italy joking that people thought you were speaking German.

Finally, I think you should structure your approach around your immediate needs. In this case you should look into audio courses, phrase books etc.

I think I explained poorly. It wasn't that I spoke poor German and they thought I was speaking French. It was that I met many Germans with a high-level of English who were happy to converse in it and were playing off the stereotype of the French as being snooty and not happy with monolingual English-speakers coming to Paris. They were meaning, "This isn't France, and you don't need to attempt to speak our language for us to be friendly with you."

Anyway, in terms of RAI's Terzo Anello, is this the site you are referring to? Is there a direct link to a list of the audiobooks? That'd be a very nice resource when choosing future books to read! I am just a bit unsure of the organization of the site.In that same vein, here is a list to some recordings on SoundCloud and Libro Audio, though one downside with anything in translation is not being sure if the audio lines up with a version of the translation you find.

[reineke]

I'm going to guess that you googled the name rather than actually take a look at Italian resources. The audiobook podcast "Ad Alta Voce" was once part of "Terzo anello." I use the two terms interchangeably.

L'ELENCO ALFABETICO DI TUTTI I ROMANZI

http://www.radio3.rai.it/dl/portali/sit ... e5d43.html

[Stelle]

Thanks for the Euronews link! I'll definitely be adding that to my list of resources.

I'm also learning Italian, using some of the same resources as you (Assimil and Language Transfer), along with a variety of other resources. If you stick to Italian and do something every day, you'll find that it gets more and more rewarding. If I were you I'd commit to Italian - and only Italian - for the next year and see where it takes you.

Good luck! I'll be following along with your log!

[jeff_lindqvist]

(...)how to manipulate Italian.

If you ever published a course under this name, I'd buy it at once.

[Seneca]

What a day.

I finish Lesson 17 of Assimil.

I read the first chapter of Le Avventure di Alice nel Paese delle Meraviglie and realized i've been approaching reading in a foreign language wrong all my life! I enjoyed going through this with the translation there to check way more than doing short news clips every day. I am going to try to read a chapter a day.

You can see a sample of how it renders below:


I like how it bolds some vocab in English and puts the corresponding word in italics. It makes it easy to keep track of where you are. Plus the built in dictionary is pretty good.

It was so cool to pick up words in context due to them coming up over and over:
coniglio = rabbit
basso=low

I had a few others to share, but I came to the site to find the horrifying message that I'd been banned and forgot everything in a fright