Matt Neilsen's Hebrew Log

[MattNeilsen]

Yesterday's activity:

Pimsleur (Level 2, Lesson 3) - 30 minutes
Clozemaster - 20 minutes
Anki - 10 minutes
Srugim (Season 1, Episode 11 & 12) - 60 minutes

Total study to date: ~121.5 hours

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I re-listened to lesson 3 in Pimsleur because I felt like I was missing too much. It introduced some important grammatical constructs (e.g. I was/had - הייתה לי) that clearly need a lot of drilling to get natural. I must say, though, overall I'm really liking Hebrew. I like the conjugations, both past and present - they feel logical to me. Though I must say I am struggling at times to remember when to use the article את, and the rules for its use aren't quite clear to me.

[Deinonysus]

Yesterday's activity:

Pimsleur (Level 2, Lesson 3) - 30 minutes
Clozemaster - 20 minutes
Anki - 10 minutes
Srugim (Season 1, Episode 11 & 12) - 60 minutes

Total study to date: ~121.5 hours

---------------------

I re-listened to lesson 3 in Pimsleur because I felt like I was missing too much. It introduced some important grammatical constructs (e.g. I was/had - הייתה לי) that clearly need a lot of drilling to get natural. I must say, though, overall I'm really liking Hebrew. I like the conjugations, both past and present - they feel logical to me. Though I must say I am struggling at times to remember when to use the article את, and the rules for its use aren't quite clear to me.

I believe "את" is used before a definite direct object.

So to insert it into a couple of English sample sentences (because I'm super rusty and don't feel like installing a Hebrew keyboard layout on this computer):

I'm walking a dog.
I'm walking את the dog.
A dog is walking me.
The dog is walking me.

As you can see, you only use "את" when it is the dog, not just a dog, and only when the dog is being walked, not when the dog does the walking.

As I said, I'm super rusty, but I'm pretty sure that's how it works.

[cjareck]

As you can see, you only use "את" when it is the dog, not just a dog, and only when the dog is being walked, not when the dog does the walking.

As I said, I'm super rusty, but I'm pretty sure that's how it works.

I also think that it works the way mentioned above.
If you want to read more about it, check the FSI Hebrew Basic Course:
https://archive.org/details/Fsi-HebrewB ... xt/page/n0 (pdf)
https://archive.org/details/FSIHebrewBasicCourseUnit14 (audio)
The topic is explained in Unit 2 (page 12) with some example drills. Maybe this will help you.

(edit)
You may get the whole course as one compressed file from here:
http://www.fsi-language-courses.net/fsi ... ic-course/

[MattNeilsen]

I believe "את" is used before a definite direct object.

So to insert it into a couple of English sample sentences (because I'm super rusty and don't feel like installing a Hebrew keyboard layout on this computer):

I'm walking a dog.
I'm walking את the dog.
A dog is walking me.
The dog is walking me.

As you can see, you only use "את" when it is the dog, not just a dog, and only when the dog is being walked, not when the dog does the walking.

As I said, I'm super rusty, but I'm pretty sure that's how it works.

As you can see, you only use "את" when it is the dog, not just a dog, and only when the dog is being walked, not when the dog does the walking.

As I said, I'm super rusty, but I'm pretty sure that's how it works.

I also think that it works the way mentioned above.
If you want to read more about it, check the FSI Hebrew Basic Course:
https://archive.org/details/Fsi-HebrewB ... xt/page/n0 (pdf)
https://archive.org/details/FSIHebrewBasicCourseUnit14 (audio)
The topic is explained in Unit 2 (page 12) with some example drills. Maybe this will help you.

(edit)
You may get the whole course as one compressed file from here:
http://www.fsi-language-courses.net/fsi ... ic-course/

Thanks, guys - that's super helpful. Cjareck, I downloaded the FSI course and went through Unit 2 and the explanation cleared some things up for me. I'll pay more attention to it now when I see it in Clozemaster so I can internalize the rules.

[MattNeilsen]

Yesterday's activity:

Pimsleur (Level 2, Lesson 4) - 30 minutes
Clozemaster - 10 minutes
Anki - 20 minutes
Srugim (Season 1, Episode 13 & 1) - 30 minutes

Total study to date: ~123 hours

----------------------

I found a website that has all of Srugim Season 1 & 2 available for download with Hebrew subtitles. Unfortunately, I can't seem to figure out how to strip the subtitles to try subs2srs. When I put the video into Handbrake, I don't see an option to select VOBSUB or SRT under the "Subtitles" tab. If anyone has technical wizardry and can figure it out, I would be deeply indebted!

Even if I can't get subs2srs to work, it's still nice having the Hebrews subs available for reference. I'm planning to do an intensive study of the first several episodes to see if it will help with my listening comprehension. I know that vocabulary is still a primary need at this stage in my learning, but I figure if I cater some of my vocab/grammar study to reflect Srugim's language use then I will 1) still be learning vocab, and 2) have more fun listening to Srugim. I'm beginning to fully realize that taking Hebrew to C1 is going to take several years, so I need to have fun along the way to get there!

[cjareck]

There is a way to extract embedded subtitles, but it is not easy. Nevertheless you may try it:
https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... =17&t=8748

[MattNeilsen]

There is a way to extract embedded subtitles, but it is not easy. Nevertheless you may try it:
https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... =17&t=8748

I'm running into the same problem that you experienced (Error:ConvertToRGB24). I'm using Windows so I don't think that's the problem. I'll keep playing around with it.

[cjareck]

I'll keep playing around with it.

I managed to run this on my Windows by installing video codecs:
https://codecguide.com/
Maybe this will solve your problem also.

[MattNeilsen]

Yesterday's activity:

Pimsleur (Level 2, Lesson 5 - twice) - 60 minutes
Srugim (Season 1, Episodes 14, 15 & 1) - 90 minutes
Clozemaster - 10 minutes

Total study to date: ~125.5 hours

----------------------

I mean, I couldn't watch the second-to-last episode of Srugim and then not just finish the season with Episode 15... My only regret with Srugim is that there are only three seasons! I also went back and watched the first episode again but with Hebrew subtitles on. It was...challenging, to say the least.

Also, I'm somewhat conflicted about Pimsleur. The speaking practice is good and I appreciate being able to work on my pronunciation, and I'm actually starting to more consistently distinguish various phonemes in the flow of speech. However, the lack of written material is driving me nuts. I really hate not being able to study a written transcript after-the-fact to help bake in the spelling and usage. Whenever I speak (and this happens in L1 as well), I very clearly see the word in my head before it comes out. However, when I'm doing Pimsleur, I'm seeing Romanized spellings of most of the words since I don't know what their Hebrew spelling looks like. Clozemaster has helped with this a lot, but I still wish there was a written transcript for Pimsleur (especially with opaque/non-latin alphabets).

[MattNeilsen]

Two other thoughts while I'm sitting here on a break (and being sucked into reading archived posts on LLORG and HTLAL... )

1) I took my Duolingo progress bar out of my signature. Frankly, I don't enjoy the course that much and found myself dreading doing it each day. Moving forward, I'll do it when I feel like it, but I'm not going to force myself to do something that I can get elsewhere in more enjoyable form.

2) Reading old forum posts CAN be useful! (Ok, I'm just trying to justify the inordinate amount of time I spend reading about learning rather than actually learning...) I believe it was @Finny who mentioned that he finds listening to tons of radio a really productive part of his learning process. I poked around on the interwebz a bit and came across an Israeli radio station called Galei Tzahal (Army Radio), or Galatz as it's known in Israel. So far, the voices have been crystal clear and the rate of speech has been surprisingly understandable. I don't really understand what they're saying, but I'm going to try listening to it a couple hours a day while I work. I have a nice pair of noise-canceling headphones and it feels like I'm sitting in the same room with the hosts - even though I can't understand most of the words, I'm surprised at how well I can hear the phonological distinctions.