The following post is a re-post and an update of a post I made on slowmoon's log on August 12, 2020. This post is
not intended for those of us here who have IT/Programming skills. It's intended for those of us who, like me have computer skills ranging from "I can turn it on and click" to "I can do quite a bit but I can't program" and those who fall somewhere in between. Programmers, please start your own thread(s) outside of this log to to discuss what a programmer can do to customize their learning. The advantages of the "pdf toolkit" program have been explained and there's a lot that can be done with this. I have the official Adobe pdf software and can efficiently manipulate pdf's in this way.
Using Tecnology Without Programming Skills + Learning While Offlineslowmoon wrote:...This lost week has made me realize that I'm living in a relationship to my surroundings that is extremely infantile. I rely heavily on access to a tool that I can't build, maintain, repair, or control. I simply hope that someone out there will keep it functioning and give me access, like an infant blindly searching for a breast. A bit disturbing to think about. But we're not here to talk about that. ...
I live in the Caribbean. When Hurricane Maria struck, I was without electricity for almost three months... and I am a language-learner. How did I manage?
One of the good things about being alive in the 21st Century is all the amazing web based tools we have available with which we can learn languages. Online dictionaries are a great convenience. Learning apps sure make things easier. Yet one can still learn without them and still use electronics even when there is no web access.
DaveAgain wrote:I used to live on a farm; power and telephone/internet outages were a common thing. We used to have back ups to cope with that: candles, a clockwork radio, and internet access via a USB dongle that connected to a mobile phone network.
DaveAgain is describing my life here after Hurricane Maria. When I got electricity back around Thanksgiving 2017, my wired internet took another four months to return. Without electricity, I still had to work and my cell phone was my lifeline. I had upgraded to unlimited data and I tethered my phone to my laptop for internet. Bandwidth was limited so no streaming video, but it was enough to do my job.
Living in a condominium, we are not allowed to have generators no matter how "super quiet" they may be. So, I had two car batteries and an inverter plus a solar panel to charge the batteries and rotate them out. This allowed me to work, charge my tablet, and charge my phone. I even downloaded my daily language listening podcasts, though much more slowly, with my phone's data connection.
rdearman wrote:Seriously, how hard is it? Take the SD card out, put in PC, dump the PDF's on it, put it back in the tablet, read. (Or is this simple because I'm an IT guy?)
To a large extent, rdearman is right. Where people fall down is in
how they use the resources they have; their expectations; and their preconceptions.
Over the years here on the forum, I have seen all kinds of objections to using the advantages of some of the technology we have- people printing pdf's because they don't want to sit in front of a screen- I assume they are talking about a laptop or a desktop computer... and I'm sure, including a tablet. Me, I am kicked back on the sofa holding my tablet or kindle. I am not being distracted by email, messaging, social media, web surfing while studying. Eyestrain is reduced by utilizing "night mode" in the Adobe pdf app.
Having a tablet doesn't mean having to buy the latest, most expensive, technology. Using a tablet doesn't mean being constantly tethered to the web. Wifi can be turned off as easily as it's turned on. A tablet can be configured without notifications; without loading email; without a facebook app; without a messenger app.
Some learners have expectations about what they should be able to do with the technology they have. A Kindle e-reader has a built-in dictionary for many languages where a mere finger press on a word will give a pop-up definition. As a non-programmer, I can't do that with my pdf's on my tablets. Still, I manage to look up words, make notes and review them.
How I utilize this strategy in my learningWhat helped me more than anything was having content to hand and not depending on online tools. I do most of my learning through a tablet. I prefer an old school pdf, which I can edit and read in "night mode" on my tablet, to app based learning and even to hard copy learning. "Night mode" reading in pdf means reducing eyestrain. The background goes black. The text and images go white, and white scale for the images. Night mode takes away one of the issues people have with reading on screens.
If I am reading, I have several pdf dictionaries in all my languages which are searchable. Even if they are not searchable, provided they are around 300 pages, I can scroll through them quickly and save time over using the search feature. I can copy and paste a definition if I am feeling lazy. Then I can insert the definition into my highlighted text and it reduces to a little clickable balloon with the word highlighted. I almost always physically enter the definition as I find the act of doing so helps to reinforce it in my mind. After I've done my reading, say 10 pages or so, I can check out my "comments list" and see all my notes. I can touch them and it will take me right back to the word or phrase in context to reinforce my learning.
My Kindle has a pop-up dictionary for some of my languages. I can use the device on a full charge for several days. Kindle also has notation features. The e-ink feature makes for no eyestrain. I can read outdoors in bright sunlight. This is a huge advantage here in the tropics as we spend a lot of time outdoors.
A long time ago, I learned that while a Kindle e-reader can process pdf's, the screen's small size limits their usefulness and I can't take advantage of the features that I like to use within pdf reader software- available for free.
Before electronics, people used paper dictionaries in a device called "books". They took notes on paper too in something called a "notebook". This can still be done today. So, where there is a will, there's a way. App based and online based learning is a godsend until it goes away. Don't let that stop you. If I lose it all again... it is Hurricane season again and the National Hurricane Center is calling for a
record season this year, I can still make it happen. My tablet will charge in a couple of hours. On it I have books in various formats; pdf dictionaries; grammar resources; parallel texts; courses; audio; even video. In fact, I only sparingly use wifi with my tablet.
It is amazing what can be done with pdf- how texts can be annotated and made to be more useful. With full pdf writer software, I have many more options to customize my texts on my laptop and transfer the files to my tablets. Reading a parallel text on a tablet is so much better than in a physical book or, two books, or two side by side windows on a computer screen. I can open up the text and expand L2 to take up the whole screen. I can then scroll over, if I need to or want to, to check the original or the translation. You can
make your own parallel texts easily. Yeah, there's a little work involved.
These days, a cheap 10" android tablet can be had for under a hundred dollars US. I have a 10" one and a 7" one. My 10 inch android tablet, I bought two years ago, new on ebay for $95 US. The 7" tablet I bought used off of ebay for $25 US. It came with a scratched and pitted screen. I used automobile headlight restorer polisher on the glass and it's fine now. I learned this trick from having scratched up a tablet myself before.
I hardly ever connect to the internet with the 7 inch tablet. It is solely dedicated to Catalan learning. I can do my course in pdf and listen to the dialog at the same time by opening VLC player in the background. This is not a problem. I can repeat the dialog as many times as I want. If the internet goes down, the electricity goes off (frequently happens here) this is not a problem. As long as I can charge the little tablet, I am ok. I've got all I need to study.
Of course, I can't do everything with a tablet that I'd like to do in an ideal situation. The situation of doing my learning on this old 7 inch android tablet is acceptable to me. If I need to look up a word in a bilingual dictionary, I can go back to the "recent documents/home" section in the pdf reader app and open up my dictionary. I can then quickly scroll to find the word. Read the definition. Go back to the "recent documents/home" section. Click on the course or book. Highlight the word and add the note. It sounds like a lot, but it is simple to do. It's the electronic equivalent of writing in a book without the mess. The notes can be moved around anywhere on the page to avoid obscuring words. I can review the words by clicking "comment list". Sometimes I find just the act of writing the word and its definition is sufficient to make it sticky in my mind. That, and, I'm likely to see the word again while I am still in the learning phase.
I also have a kindle dedicated e-reader with e-ink*. To myself, I call them my 'language-learning machines". What I describe here does mean having multiple devices around the house, however; they take up little space. Buying used, as long as the android operating system is not too out of date, means that cost is not prohibitive. My Kindle 4th generation still works. I bought it for $25 US used on ebay. These devices are critical to my learning and with them I can be independent of the web to a large extent. You can too, you just have to break yourself from the app/web based mindset. Apps are easier and more convenient, yes, but they also mean a reliance and dependence on the web. Being connected to the internet while studying- emails, youtube, web surfing, social media, all of these can distract from the task at hand, but connecting is not necessary to study. Yeah, there's some work involved in going this route, again, but the payoff is worth it even if you don't lose electricity and the internet for months. What I have described, I do everyday. It's worked pretty well for me over the years.
Edit: Typos and see below
*E-ink is almost like reading paper and ink. You can read outside in bright sun. Eyestrain is not an issue. If you don't want to buy a kindle because you think it will tie you to Amazon, that's not true. You can use the free Calibre software to convert e-books to Kindle mobi format and easily load them onto your Kindle- which is what I do. You can copy and paste web text in your computer or print a selection to pdf and convert it to mobi (without images) and load it to your Kindle (using all the advantages of the pop-up dictionary). You can convert epubs (you can even remove drm) to Kindle format with Calibre and load them easily onto your Kindle.
You can download Moon Reader to read epubs and Kindle format books. Moon Reader is an e-reading app that can be used offline on a tablet. It also has a night reading mode to reduce eyestrain and many other features within the program for dictionaries, highlighting and note taking.
Caveats:
None of what I describe here will help you if you want to export to Anki. This goes back to "expectations". I don't use Anki srs, never have. Not using srs doesn't seem to have hurt me in my learning. You have to accept some limitations to utilize my method.
On pdf's that are not single page format, these are more difficult to read efficiently on a tablet. Pdf's that are not ocr'ed (optical character recognition- meaning the computer can recognize the writing as copy-able and manipulable text instead of just as an image) you cannot highlight words and attach notes to them. You can still make a note that will pop-up with a definition you create and enter. I do this with my texts in Ladino in Rashi text.
