I've decided to keep a log here in order to track my progress and to keep myself accountable! I've never kept record of my study before so it will be interesting for me to see what effect it has on motivation and progress. My languages:
Italian
I'd describe myself as somewhat of a false beginner in Italian in that I studied the basics a few years ago. Having studied French at school, I found it fairly straightforward but lacked the will to continue with it seriously. I can read French well but have no real desire to speak it. To me, Italian is more appealing in it's sound (very important for me!) and I also have a real interest in Italy's history and culture. It's time for me to knuckle down and acquire fluency in a Romance language!
Today I completed lesson 10 of Assimil Italian. It's been really enjoyable so far. I listen to the whole lesson a few times before repeating each sentence aloud. I then read both the translation and original text while listening to the audio. Once that's done I listen again and write each sentence by ear into my notebook. Then, using wordreference.com, I check the IPA of any word I'm not sure about, especially those with Es and Os in stressed syllables (pesky little devils), and write them under the Italian words.
German
Ah German, it's been a while. I began studying it by myself a few years ago and was very diligent. I achieved a solid intermediate level but haven't studied it (or any other languages for that matter) in more than a year and a half!!! Now that I have time again I want to get back to where I was. It's a language that I used with native speakers. I had a good accent (or so I was told!). I like the grammar. I like the literature. In short, it's a great language. I will begin by going through Assimil and Linguaphone again while also using interesting native content to bolster my progress.
That's enough for now...to study!
Suairc - DE, IT
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- White Belt
- Posts: 13
- Joined: Mon Jul 02, 2018 1:49 pm
- Location: Ireland
- Languages: English, Irish
Learning: German, Italian - Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... =15&t=8920
- x 28
Suairc - DE, IT
11 x
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- White Belt
- Posts: 13
- Joined: Mon Jul 02, 2018 1:49 pm
- Location: Ireland
- Languages: English, Irish
Learning: German, Italian - Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... =15&t=8920
- x 28
Re: Suairc - DE, IT
Italian
Lessons 11 and 12 of Assimil completed today. The level of challenge is still low but I'm happy to just ease myself back into the language gradually. Tomorrow morning I'm going to begin shadowing the first few lessons in an effort to get a feel for the intonation and to improve my "flow".
The IPA I've written in my notebook will help me with the pronunciation of individual words. However, I have noticed some interesting things happening with vowels merging over word boundaries...sometimes it's as if a vowel in an unstressed final syllable gets cut off by an initial vowel in a following word. I probably shouldn't worry about this just yet, but hey, it's good to be curious!
From memory, some words:
assaggiare - to taste, to try (food)
fino a __ - until when... (i.e. how long...)
un misto - a mix (of something)
*fortissimo - very strong
* forte has an open O/ˈfɔrte/. Does fortissimo have a closed O /o/ because it's no longer a stressed syllable?
German
First day back at German. First I decided to watch a few videos on YouTube. Then I worked on my pronunciation using the following videos:
See the site for videos 2 and 3.
I then came across this excellent overview:
Unlike the Fluent Forever videos it draws attention to the pronunciation of final -R as a diphthong ending in /ɐ/, which of course I knew, but was glad to see clarified. There's also a related video on a related channel which seems great!:
Tomorrow I'll begin revision of Assimil German.
That's all for now.
Lessons 11 and 12 of Assimil completed today. The level of challenge is still low but I'm happy to just ease myself back into the language gradually. Tomorrow morning I'm going to begin shadowing the first few lessons in an effort to get a feel for the intonation and to improve my "flow".
The IPA I've written in my notebook will help me with the pronunciation of individual words. However, I have noticed some interesting things happening with vowels merging over word boundaries...sometimes it's as if a vowel in an unstressed final syllable gets cut off by an initial vowel in a following word. I probably shouldn't worry about this just yet, but hey, it's good to be curious!
From memory, some words:
assaggiare - to taste, to try (food)
fino a __ - until when... (i.e. how long...)
un misto - a mix (of something)
*fortissimo - very strong
* forte has an open O/ˈfɔrte/. Does fortissimo have a closed O /o/ because it's no longer a stressed syllable?
German
First day back at German. First I decided to watch a few videos on YouTube. Then I worked on my pronunciation using the following videos:
See the site for videos 2 and 3.
I then came across this excellent overview:
Unlike the Fluent Forever videos it draws attention to the pronunciation of final -R as a diphthong ending in /ɐ/, which of course I knew, but was glad to see clarified. There's also a related video on a related channel which seems great!:
Tomorrow I'll begin revision of Assimil German.
That's all for now.
Last edited by Suairc on Tue Sep 04, 2018 8:12 pm, edited 3 times in total.
1 x
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- White Belt
- Posts: 13
- Joined: Mon Jul 02, 2018 1:49 pm
- Location: Ireland
- Languages: English, Irish
Learning: German, Italian - Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... =15&t=8920
- x 28
Re: Suairc - DE, IT
How do I embed those videos?
Edit: fixed them.
Thanks, Deinonysus!
Edit: fixed them.
Thanks, Deinonysus!
Last edited by Suairc on Tue Sep 04, 2018 8:03 pm, edited 1 time in total.
1 x
- Deinonysus
- Brown Belt
- Posts: 1221
- Joined: Tue Sep 13, 2016 6:06 pm
- Location: MA, USA
- Languages:
• Native: English
• Advanced: French
• Intermediate: German,
Spanish, Hebrew
• Beginner: Italian,
Arabic - x 4635
Re: Suairc - DE, IT
Suairc wrote:How do I embed those videos?
Welcome to the forum!
You only want the letter code right after "?v=", and you stop if you hit another non-alphanumeric symbol (such as an "&"). So for your first video, the code would be:
Code: Select all
[youtube]mzrLZi6fipA[/youtube]
3 x
/daɪ.nə.ˈnaɪ.səs/
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- Orange Belt
- Posts: 198
- Joined: Wed Mar 14, 2018 6:41 am
- Location: Athens, Greece
- Languages: Greek (N), English (C2), French (B2), Italian (A2), German (beginner)
- Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 25#p100832
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Re: Suairc - DE, IT
We are learning the same languages, but of course you are way more advanced in German. I'll be following your log with great interest!
1 x
I use Assimil right now as a starting point, but at the same time I am building the foundation for further studies of German.
Assimil German with ease:
Assimil German with ease:
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