Chove's Log

[chove]

I've not been studying much the past couple of weeks, still trying to get over a bit of a mental health wobble I had recently. I've done the minimum to keep my DuoLingo French streak more to encourage myself at some future date than to help myself at the moment. I'm trying to get into reading again, my plan is to make myself read at least one page in Spanish before I can go to sleep, and I'm slowly getting further into Easy French Reader which is getting more difficult so I'll need to catch up a bit with vocabulary and grammar.

One thing I did is started following some foreign-language people on Instagram, I'm into punk and related fashions and I found a few people who post in German or Spanish. Even one who posts in Polish, though I can rarely get much more than the vaguest of gists.

[chove]

Ah, the pleasures of studying with mental illness... Have become quite demotivated recently, and convinced I will never get anywhere useful with my languages. This makes me study less, which indeed means I will get nowhere. I need to sit myself down and remind myself that I know a lot more than I used to. I had a pause-filled conversation in Spanish last night, but at least I managed to express myself and understand most of what was being said to me. Couldn't have done that even a few years ago, so clearly I must have improved since then.

Also having some problems getting registered for next academic year -- the offices are mostly closed to due to The Plague and I couldn't get the online registration option to work. Have entered into an email correspondence about it, but they haven't got back to me in about a week. I really don't want to have to take another year out in my degree, it's taken me long enough as it is. Spanish results are due in a week or two as well.

I reckon I should aim to do at least a wee bit every day, because it does work as a distraction and entertainment. But it's hard to make myself get started.

[chove]

I searched for ''aprender idiomas'' on YouTube and subscribed to a few Spanish language-related channels, as it's a topic I'm interested in so I know some of the vocabulary and want to learn more.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCaNgjMBzKp4uVwJ2K117mxg/videos - Hackeando Idiomas
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCu_1BMAtWexWgDiJRTyd_ZA/videos - Mr Salas
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpOwrlKnpgfpqzr294zy-ow - El Jardín de Martín
https://www.youtube.com/c/IdiomasconLiza/videos - Idiomas Fácil con Liza

Anyone know of any similar Spanish (or German) channels? I end up procrastinating on YouTube a lot, so I might as well try to get some listening practice in. So I watched some videos and I could follow most of them, which made me feel a lot better about my abilities.

Still slowly doing Duolingo French, the owl seems like a very slow way to learn not very much but at least I'm doing something and I suppose it all adds up in the end. Am starting to pick up some patterns for how spelling correlates with gender, though I worry that I pronounce things wrong given that French only seems to pronounce about three letters per word. At most. Do French speakers not get confused between words that end up sounding the same? But I suppose that's sometimes true of English as well. (Though since I'm a native speaker of English I have no idea how I learned it.)

I've been meaning to ask -- what are your thoughts on Scots as a language/dialect? I feel like I speak a spiced-up English for the most part, and that modern Scots is not very similar to what Burns spoke. I'm never sure how I feel about ''spellin everythin lit ye say it'' I mean is that just playing up the differences? Couldn't various English regions do that and end up with something equally opaque to non-locals? If I tried to use more Scots words when I write/speak is that just affectation?

[DaveAgain]

Anyone know of any similar Spanish (or German) channels? I end up procrastinating on YouTube a lot, so I might as well try to get some listening practice in. So I watched some videos and I could follow most of them, which made me feel a lot better about my abilities.

There is a German-speaking-YouTubers-you-like thread, and a number of the Polyglot Gathering talks are in German too.

I'm never sure how I feel about ''spellin everythin lit ye say it'' I mean is that just playing up the differences? Couldn't various English regions do that and end up with something equally opaque to non-locals? If I tried to use more Scots words when I write/speak is that just affectation?

Non-standard spelling is I think a bad idea. Artistically it has value, but for everyday communication it's just annoying.

[chove]

There is a German-speaking-YouTubers-you-like thread, and a number of the Polyglot Gathering talks are in German too.

Thanks for the links

I'm never sure how I feel about ''spellin everythin lit ye say it'' I mean is that just playing up the differences? Couldn't various English regions do that and end up with something equally opaque to non-locals? If I tried to use more Scots words when I write/speak is that just affectation?

Non-standard spelling is I think a bad idea. Artistically it has value, but for everyday communication it's just annoying.

There's no standard spelling for Scots, which then turns into "is it just badly-spelled English with lots of mistakes in?" which is the sort of thing that starts fights in Glasgow on a Friday night.

[chove]

Got an email from the university saying I'm now enrolled for next year -- second-level German awaits!

[chove]

I'm bad at actually finishing books, have just started the Spanish translation of the first 'Series of Unfortunate Events' book. It has a lot more wordplay than Harry Potter so we'll see how it goes but at least I'm enjoying it a lot more thus far. Attempting one of the prequels in German but my vocabulary isn't quite up to it and it gets annoying having to check the dictionary all the time. Is it just a matter of fewer obvious cognates? It's the verbs I have most trouble with in German, there seem to be an endless number of them and they all look the same. But I suppose I can only improve if I keep going.

Made it to the second section of the Easy French Reader, which is about famous French historical figures. Probably couldn't pronounce it all correctly though. Might need to rethink my DuoLingo strategy, it's feeling very slow-going at the moment. I don't want to move too fast but equally I want to learn more words and etc.

Also realised I'm not sure where to go with Polish. I'm stuck at what's probably A1 leaning into A2 (as far as I can estimate) and I can't read anything significant but the very basics are too easy for me.

[chove]

Open University module results came out this evening, I have indeed passed Spanish A better grade than the previous year, so I'm very happy. Now I just need to somehow get good at German before October...

The thing that trips me up most in German is the compounds that don't seem to mean what the compounds suggest, especially all those verbs that look the same as each other but mean wildly different things.

[badger]

congratulations on your Spanish result.

[chove]

congratulations on your Spanish result.

Thanks!

My mood is improving a bit, possibly connected to starting a healthier diet and doing more (read "any") exercise. I feel a bit annoyed that exercise really does make me feel better, I always assumed that was just something people said. But the link also works in reverse, in that it's a lot harder to get motivated to exercise and to cook something healthy if I'm feeling low.

Anyway, I'm trying to get going on German now, so probably my only Spanish "studying" for a while will be reading and listening etc. Maybe the odd online conversation if I can find the Spanish people in Second Life? I met some there once, they said my accent was "cute" Not entirely sure what I'll be doing for German, maybe I should go over the first-year course to refresh whatever the university expects me to know at this point.

What's annoying me with French is the uses and variations of "de" and other prepositions. "En" for a feminine country but "dans le" for a masculine one? Ack, I'll have to learn all their genders! I keep getting confused on the prepositions, so I've been using my free Kwiziq tests to try and focus on that.