Five Golden Trees

[lavengro]

Octubre update

GENERAL

My language study hours roughly tracked my daily targets this past month for Spanish (one hour) and Japanese (15 minutes). Fell short with Russian.

I believe I am well on track re: the three year/five golden tree protocol. Increased my Memrise points to 2,992,906. I anticipate comfortably reaching 10 million points at some point within the three year window of this project, and am pretty sure the Memrise folks will throw me a huge ¡fiesta! or something once I do. I will try to stay humble when that occurs, but no promises.
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SPANISH

Attended three Spanish continuing education evening classes. The approach (due to logistical reasons I expect) became to divide the class into beginners and lower intermediates, and to slightly modify lesson plans between the two groups. I got put on la mesa para los chicos (the kiddies table, aka, the table for the more confused learners) early on (basically, all the other people who like me had not taken the predecessor course), but I believe la maestra has come to recognize my awesomeness and is keeping me at the kiddies table simply because she does not want to admit her initial grievous error.

Oh well, at least our table gets crayons and there was talk of giving our table juice boxes just to keep us distracted and quiet while the big kids at the intermediate table engage in the more challenging stuff.

With Duolingo, I am at level 10 of 25 and have completed the first 25 units, which are all so shiny gold right now that one best wear sunglasses when near them; I hope to finish by Navidad.

Finished Memrise Spanish (Mexico) 1 and am well into Spanish (Mexico) 2. My understanding is that for the official Memrise courses, levels 1-3 correspond to A1, levels 4-5 correspond to A2 and levels 6-7 correspond to B1. I am hopeful of finishing at least Level 5 before moving onto my next language (the giant Russian bear), which I anticipate doing no later than end of March.

Worked intermittently at Practice Makes Perfect: Basic Spanish text including all exercises, some intermittent active listening to Spanish learner podcasts, and also some Destinos videos. Recently got a copy of Michel Thomas, Beginner Spanish from la biblioteca; I have worked through the first couple discs.
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RUSSIAN

I poked around this past month at Russian via Memrise and Duolingo and referring occasionally to the Living Language materials. I have found Russian really challenging (from a phonetic rather than grammar perspective) and getting words memorized was going super-duper slowly without much real traction, but I was not overly-stressed as I was just splashing around a bit for fun.

Recently, I picked up some additional learning materials - Sputnik: an Introductory Russian Language Course . Developed by a Russian educator who currently teaches at a Canadian university. Lots of work (explanatory and audio drills) up front re: sound changes between stressed and unstressed syllables, which I have found very helpful. Really enjoying the спутник materials - far easier to start with than my Living Language Russian materials and felt like I was making some progress finally.

https://www.amazon.ca/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_6_7?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=sputnik+an+introductory+russian+language+course&sprefix=sputnik%2Caps%2C317&crid=3DQC6KQ2FCPB2

Nice audio companion materials available on-line
https://sputniktextbook.org/

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JAPANESE

Continued with the game plan, and poked around just for fun with Memrise Japanese 1 and the newly-released Duolingo Japanese course. Routinely error-free and speedy in kana recognition and production, but will probably keep the kana Memrise courses around for continuing periodic review, which does not take much time at all. I will not be engaging further with the Duolingo or the Memrise Japanese 1 course for the time being.

I am up to kanji #210 in my leisurely stroll through Heisig's Remembering the Kanji (five per day) together with a related RTK Memrise course, so 10% through.

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QUIZ on a recent sad occasion

Pregunta: ¿Dónde está el "100th meridian"?

Respuesta: Aquí, mis amigos. El "100th meridian" está aquí:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCFo0a8V-Ag

Gracias por todo, "La cadera trágica"* (The Tragically Hip), ha llegado el momento de despedirnos.

*sí, yo sé que no es corecto

[lavengro]

November update – lo que hice en noviembre

SPANISH

Kept at it pretty much daily, averaging a lean 65 minutes of quality study time per day.

Continued working through Duolingo and Memrise, finding both very effective for me. Worked through the 10 disc Michel Thomas, Spanish Beginners/Foundation course - each disc at least dos veces (on top of the times I went through them a few years before). Planning on taking up the MT Spanish Advanced course perhaps in January.

Found a library source for the Pimsleur Spanish Complete Course materials. Worked through the first 14 lessons. Should have library access to all 5 levels (so, 150 lessons). .

Continued to attend Spanish class once per week, though lord knows why. Was forced briefly to dance some odd sort of salsa dance at one of them. Will finish off the last class, mostly just because we will be having una fiesta during class con mucho vino.

RUSSIAN

Russian was getting in the way, so I dropped it mid-month. Well, put it on pause - I am planning for it being my next language, just to create a non-romance language buffer between Spanish and Italian. Definitely either Russian or German, but probably Russian. Or German.

JAPANESE

Still plugging daily through Heisig, Remembering the Kanji. Up to 355 out of 2042, so 17% of the way through. Daily review through Memrise, so these characters are getting set pretty deep in my noggin. Spent a daily average of 22 minutes on this in November between learning the character through Heisig and reviewing via Memrise. Essentially just getting my mis-en-place set out before getting down to actually working on that exotic dish down the road in earnest.

[lavengro]

I appear to have taken a brief siesta from Spanish, only to have returned to find those rascals at Duolingo have interferred with my golden tree scheme through its recent restructuring. No worries, I am back at studying Spanish on the basis of a six point plan of attack so cunning that, as Blackadder may agree, you could put a tail on it and call it a weasel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQk_832EAx4

[lavengro]

The mistake I made was actually committing to something (resumed Spanish) recently. Because that is when life changes course on me. Plans now to go to Italy for vacation beginning early June for two weeks, as work obligations for the summer have been diverted. So, resuming Italian from the couple of months of study from last year. Back to siesta for español for now.

[lavengro]

Just returned from two weeks in Italy, my first trip there. It was a fabulous experience. Got in a certain amount of very low-level exchanges in italiano throughout the vacation, as well as receiving a lesson in exactly one word ("parrucchiano") from the Napoletano language in Sorrento one day relating to the name of a restaurant.

I have decided to spend the next 52 weeks learning as much Italian as I can. I figure if I can throw a solid 1000 hours at it over the next year, I hopefully will be able to achieve approximately a B1 level ability.

[lavengro]

For the coming 52 weeks, I am dividing my approach to Italian roughly into two challenging parcels:

(a) an initial six month slog involving relatively traditional study across a few different learning platforms; and
(b) a subsequent six month period involving a massive input of Italian materials, likely starting with some bilingual/interlineal, audio-supported material and hopefully as soon as possible to direct engagement with Italian language written and video material.

I have not fleshed out much of the second period yet, but for the first six months I am planning on striving mightily to get through the following:

Duolingo – entire tree at least to the three crown level (currently, half of the tree completed to at least a one crown level)
Memrise official Italian courses I through VII (previously completed Memrise I, but have restarted from scratch)
Pimsleur levels 1-3 (unfortunately, the library only has the first three levels; working through Pimsleur 1 at present)
DLI Headstart (just started)
Michel Thomas, Foundation and Advanced discs (I have started the Foundation program)
Various McGraw-Hill “Practice Makes Perfect” volumes (currently working on Basic Italian; the local library also has the following: Complete Italian Grammar, Italian Verb Tenses and Italian Problem Solver)

Doomed to failure of course, but the depth of my still-current mourning over the loss of my “pizza-espresso-gelato-repeat as required” eating routine from my recent vacation may keep me motivated for at least a couple of months.

[lavengro]

For the coming 52 weeks, I am dividing my approach to Italian roughly into two challenging parcels:

(a) an initial six month slog involving relatively traditional study across a few different learning platforms; and
(b) a subsequent six month period involving a massive input of Italian materials, likely starting with some bilingual/interlineal, audio-supported material and hopefully as soon as possible to direct engagement with Italian language written and video material.

I have not fleshed out much of the second period yet, but for the first six months I am planning on striving mightily to get through the following:

Duolingo – entire tree at least to the three crown level (currently, half of the tree completed to at least a one crown level)
Memrise official Italian courses I through VII (previously completed Memrise I, but have restarted from scratch)
Pimsleur levels 1-3 (unfortunately, the library only has the first three levels; working through Pimsleur 1 at present)
DLI Headstart (just started)
Michel Thomas, Foundation and Advanced discs (I have started the Foundation program)
Various McGraw-Hill “Practice Makes Perfect” volumes (currently working on Basic Italian; the local library also has the following: Complete Italian Grammar, Italian Verb Tenses and Italian Problem Solver)

I have made the executive decision to extend my "initial six month slog" into a "more reasonable and leisurely seven month stroll" as I am continuing to work con piacere through the Duolingo, Memrise, Pimsleur and Michel Thomas materials, from which I feel I am continuing to derive considerable benefit in addition to enjoyment.

I have replaced the DLI course with the Cortina "Conversational Italian" course available through Eric's site, and I have trimmed my sails a bit with the McGraw-Hill Practice Makes Perfect books down to simply the more comprehensive "PMP: Complete Italian Grammar" volume.

I will be finishing my weekly Italian conversation course classes later this month run through the local Italian Chamber of Commerce which I took just for fun; it turned out to be super fun!

[lavengro]

I am still plugging away with enthusiasm at various Italian learning materials and I have also moved onto Italian language media, including very simple readers with audio, some fun Italian language fiction podcasts and (heaven help me) some Peppa Pig episodes – the latter on the strength of some recommendations on this forum.

I am also taking the next level (Beginner 2) of in-person Italian classes through the Dante Society (weekly two hour classes in the evening). At this point, the teacher is mostly speaking only Italian to us, relatively slowly and in a manner which allows her to gauge with disappointment how disoriented we appear from time to time, and with very little English only as needed to ensure that everyone (including a puzzled lavengro) understands a new grammatical issue or whatever. At one point in the last class, she appeared to have forgotten we were still confused students and unleashed the hounds with sixty seconds or so of blisteringly-fast Italian, resulting in all nine of us to spontaneously start laughing in a nervous or frightened manner.

I am still involved in the various challenges I signed up for (365 Day Challenge, the Short Stories Challenge and the Output Challenge – though I am super-slow to become much engaged with the latter challenge).

Also I am still involved with a small separate Turkish challenge I have posed myself, which I am documenting in a separate thread (well, “documenting” sort of overstates it – the separate log is anticipated to run only two or perhaps three posts over the course of the year).

[lavengro]

Italian

Still taking conversational Italian classes once a week (and still as bewildered as ever) and still engaged in regular deliberate learning activities. The greater portion of my Italian time, however, is now spent with Italian language media of a variety of different types involving a number of different approaches. I will report again in four months on my progress, and if I am not a deeply-bronzed, Italian-speaking Roman god by that point, I am planning on sulking in a very big, very public manner. I will decide at that point whether pursuing B1 certification in November is a reasonable goal.

Turkish

Like the fabled daily administration by bad parents of cod liver oil to their unhappy children decades ago, I am still taking a teaspoon of Turkish each morning. I am loving this very interesting language.

Five Golden Trees

Despite the reconfiguration of Duolingo into a crown-based system since I first launched this personal challenge, the “five golden trees” dream is still alive, but like some of my actual dreams, it is moving in slow motion. I’ve checked on duome.eu – there are currently 14 Duolingo users who have exactly 5 golden trees (as opposed to golden owls) at present. A golden owl is achieved by completing a language tree to at least Level 1, a significant achievement; a golden tree is achieved by completing a language tree to Level 5, a slightly insane achievement.

The users who currently have exactly 5 golden trees (which is my goal) have been put by me onto my Friends of Carlotta list – I hope to make it onto that list myself, and to learn the secret handshake and get a key to the clubhouse.

However, of the 300,000,000 Duolingo users, there are 49 users who have achieved more than 5 golden trees. These users have been placed onto my Enemies of Carlotta list….

Ci vediamo dopo

I am planning on submerging deeply in Italian for the next little while; back in four months.

[Querneus]

I know this is quite off topic but hopefully not too unwarranted, but every time you make a new post in this thread I get this feeling of needing to shout FIIIIIIIVE GOOOOLDEN TREEEEES with the same notes of the line "fiiiiive goooolden riiiings!" from the Twelve Days of Christmas song.

I hope all that shouting is being sent to you as good vibes, or whatever.