Matt Neilsen's Hebrew Log

[cjareck]

Regardless, I downloaded Audacity yesterday so I could play around with some FSI/Pimsleur sentences. I think I'm going to try to pull one or two phrases from each FSI unit that strike me as generally useful conversational phrases and practice Kjellin's chorusing method with them. I'm planning to load them onto my phone so I can sneak them into hidden moments, particularly driving. Guess we'll see if it helps!

Perhaps you will find this tutorial

helpful. I learned how to make audio from there. I can send you my audio files for FSI (mp3 format) or even my flashcards (part of them is translated into Polish, part of them into English). Just let me know. I prepared all but dialogues from lessons 1-24 and 35-40.

[MattNeilsen]

Yesterday's activity:

Pimsleur (Level 2, Lesson 13) - 30 minutes
FSI (Unit 3) - 45 minutes
Clozemaster - 45 minutes

Total study to date: ~144.5 hours

Countdown: 74 days
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I'm super excited about the podcast I found yesterday. There are currently 254 episodes, and based on randomly selecting a few, it looks like the average run-time is around an hour (+/- 10 minutes). ~200-250 hours of interesting, transcripted audio awaits, calling my name...

I also realized this morning, in thinking about my goals, that just saying I want to be A2+/B1- by the New Year isn't specific enough. After all, there are 4 (or 5, if you add interaction) macro skills that comprise a CEFR score, and it's important that I know what my priorities are so that I end up with the skills that I want.

In order of importance, my personal goals for the 4 skills are:

1) Listening Comprehension
2) Reading Comprehension
3) Speaking Output
4) Writing Output

Based on that, I think my current path of Pimsleur/FSI/Clozemaster/Anki --> GLOSS --> Podcasts w/transcripts --> TV Series/Movies/Documentaries/etc. is probably a reasonable path.

Somewhere in there, I plan to start working with a tutor or do a language exchange/Lang-8 combo to activate speaking & writing. I do have a friend that teaches Hebrew at the DLI in Monterey, and while I certainly wouldn't want to impose on him (I don't imagine he wants to do more work outside of work), I'm sure he wouldn't mind doing a Skype session with me once a month or maybe every other month. Or I could drive down and bribe him with lunch/dinner...that might be better

[MattNeilsen]

Yesterday's activity:

Pimsleur (Level 2, Lesson 13 again) - 30 minutes
FSI (chorusing/Unit 3) - 45 minutes
Clozemaster - 40 minutes
Anki - 20 minutes
Srugim (Season 2, Episode 12) - 30 minutes

Total study to date: ~147 hours

Countdown: 73 days
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I used Audacity to chop up ~10 sentences from the first 5 FSI units and I'm using them to do my chorusing practice. I'll chop up another 10-20 sentences on Monday or Tuesday so I have more material to go through. I'm not sure how much difference it will make, but it certainly can't hurt me to be speaking more Hebrew (especially when I know it sounds reasonably close to native-like).

Other than that, not much to update - just putting in the daily work.

[cjareck]

Somewhere in there, I plan to start working with a tutor or do a language exchange/Lang-8 combo to activate speaking & writing. I do have a friend that teaches Hebrew at the DLI in Monterey, and while I certainly wouldn't want to impose on him (I don't imagine he wants to do more work outside of work), I'm sure he wouldn't mind doing a Skype session with me once a month or maybe every other month. Or I could drive down and bribe him with lunch/dinner...that might be better

For writing, you may also check an application called "Hello Talk". With English native finding an Israeli interested in chatting with you should be no problem.

[MattNeilsen]

Yesterday's activity:

Pimsleur (Level 2, Lesson 14) - 30 minutes
Clozemaster - 20 minutes
Anki - 20 minutes

Total study to date: ~148 hours

Countdown: 72 days
----------------------

Not much study yesterday - had to do a lot of wedding-related errands.

[MattNeilsen]

Yesterday's activity:

Pimsleur (Level 2, Lesson 15) - 30 minutes
Clozemaster - 20 minutes
Anki - 20 minutes

Total study to date: ~149 hours

Countdown: 71 days
---------------------

A slow weekend language-wise. My average study time is likely going to decrease over the next month while finishing preparations for the wedding, but as long as I can be consistent with an hour of study a day then I'll be okay with it.

For writing, you may also check an application called "Hello Talk". With English native finding an Israeli interested in chatting with you should be no problem.

Thanks for the suggestion - I hadn't looked into that one before. Adding it to the list.

[MattNeilsen]

Here's another podcast recommendation from a Jewish friend: Streetwise Hebrew. The host goes through slang, idioms, and other colloquial expressions to better understand Hebrew as it's currently spoken. I listened to a couple episodes today - it seems great.

[MattNeilsen]

Yesterday's activity:

Pimsleur (Level 2, Lesson 16) - 30 minutes
FSI (Unit 3) - 10 minutes
Clozemaster - 10 minutes
Anki - 10 minutes
Streetwise Hebrew - 15 minutes
Glossika - 20 minutes
Srugim (Season 2, Episode 13) - 30 minutes

Total study to date: ~151 hours

Countdown: 70 days
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I found out yesterday that Glossika offers Hebrew. I tried the free trial to see what it was like and I think I like the format. It kind of seems like an audio version of Clozemaster (i.e. massive input via sentences). The free trial is 7-days or 1,000 "reps" (each rep is essentially one sentence), so I'll play with it this week before making a decision.

There is surprisingly little feedback about the Hebrew course online - both out in the wilds of Google and within HTLAL/LLORG - so I'm flying a little blind as to the quality of the course. I'm not in a rush to add Glossika as I'm still working through Pimsleur and FSI, but maybe I'll sub out Pimsleur with Glossika once I finish Level 2.

######

ETA: I just did my Glossika review session for today and found two mistakes already - the translations were too literal. The adverb "very" (meod, מאוד) was being translated before the adjective, not after. For example, the statement "You are very sick" was translated as:

אתה מאוד חולה

Unless my Hebrew is worse than I think, I'm pretty sure it should be:

אתה חולה מאוד

Isn't the whole point of Glossika to mass expose yourself to correct syntax so that the patterns become ingrained in your mind? It doesn't give me a lot of confidence in the course if basic grammar structures are incorrect at the A1 level.

[Expugnator]

I was dreaming about a Glossika Hebrew when they had a normal single-release download business model. Now I'm unlikely to subscribe to Glossika just for a couple of languages. I've used it for most of my languages, but in a rather loose way. Its importance grows with the rarity of resources for a given language, so for Estonian for example it's a gem.

[MattNeilsen]

I came across @kanewai's brilliant charts recently and thought I'd re-post them here for easy reference (see below).

I know the numbers are rough and can't necessarily be extrapolated to an individual learner's journey. That being said, it still provides an interesting benchmark to compare my personal journey against. According to the chart, an approximate timeframe for a Cat IV language would look like:

A1 - 180 hours
A2 - 360 hours
B1 - 600 hours
B2 - 1,170 hours
C1 - 1,770 hours

So far, it seems to be fairly accurate for me. I just crossed 150 hours and I think it's fair to say I'm in the ~A1 range. My goal of being A2+ by the New Year seems a little aggressive in light of this, but we shall see.

Hours to CEFR Level - 1.jpg

Hours to CEFR Level - 2.jpg