The Year of Changes

[Cavesa]

Inspired by Spoonary, I've decided to start my 2019 log early too. There is a good reason for it. It will be a year of changes and the transformation has already started. No matter what the result turns out to be, what I will end up doing, what country will I live in, the change is absolutely certain. And it has started. I am no longer going to school, so I can study full time. I know it sounds weird. But it is the reality. I have also started rebuilding my study habits, thanks to a discord group focused on studying. And to a lot of advice gathered over the years in this community.

My main learning related apps are gonna be Forest (a pomodoro timer keeping me from procrastination on a phone) and Discord (to throw pomodoros at other people).

My learning methods will be nothing new. Lots of input (I need to find much more time for reading, at the expense of less valuable fun), courses and grammar books, some apps and websites, hopefully more writing.

My main challenge will be consistency. I won't have much time for this hobby of mine, but I need to make it count.

My goals:

MY GOALS FOR DECEMBER:
1:finally getting ready for my last two exams. Both are in January
2:the same goal as for the first 1/2 of 2019
3:translating at least a part of Assimil English as a Christmas present
4.Finish Kwiziq Spanish till the 5th, when my inscription is over.

THE PRIMARY GOAL FOR THE FIRST HALF OF 2019
1.preparing my ECN, the medical exam that might be the gateway to all that has been motivating me for almost two years. That means studying in the language. The language is not the problem, medicine is. But perhaps I have a chance

Other languages: relaxing, having fun, slow progress to give me back some hope, drained by the medicine studies.

AFTER THAT: (=goals achievable alongside other challenges, all dependent on the outcome of the ECN and eventual plan B)
1.refresh of my non medical French, especially writing
2.completing at least some of my Spanish coursebooks, returning to regular input in Spanish, and SIELE
3.exhumation of my German and improving it. This language is important to me but resists me the most
4.real studying of Italian. I am improving thanks to those tons of tv series watched. But I need to do other stuff in it too.
5.not to start any other language in 2019, unless I manage to get either a C1 SIELE result (no idea how likely or unlikely that will be by the end of 2019) or safely move German or Italian to B1 in the weakest skill.

Btw, I have signed up for some SC, I should probably have a look at that

[Cavesa]

placeholder: stuff I use nd complete. The goal: make this list cover the rest of page 1 of this log

The 365 days challenge:starting 2.1.
January: 2., 3.,


Books:


Tv series and movies:
grading from *worst to *****best.

It: Lucifer ****
I am watching season 3 and it is great, in some ways better than season 2. The dubbing is extraordinary too, I hope to find some time to transcript a few episodes. and I love the sense of humour in this series, exactly what I need these days.

Es: Midnight, Texas **
This series is so much worse than True Blood. Season 1 was ok, season 2 was trash. And the Italian dubbing is much better, but I wanted something in Spanish My tired brain just used it to turn off for a while. The Italian dubbing would probably get one more star.

Fr: Profilage ****
Original, not dubbing, but not too hard (significantly easier than the famous Engrenages). It's got a few more seasons, since I finished it the last time on a horrible cliffhanger. I usually have an extraordinarily good memory for tv series (a useless talent I've got) but I seem to remember very little from the episodes I am most probably rewatching right now. I have just restarted season 3.


Coursebooks and similar resources:
Němčina nejen pro samouky: units: 1 / 30
an excellent coursebook in the classical style, supposed to lead from 0 to B1, with lots of exercises.

The Pomodoro (25min) counter:
German: 2

[DaveAgain]

AFTER THAT: (=goals achievable alongside other challenges, all dependent on the outcome of the ECN and eventual plan B)
1.refresh of my non medical French, especially writing

Flicking through an evening course catalogue, I came across a one-day "french creative writing: writing and translating creatively course".

The recommended reading includes Atelier d'écriture by Laure Astragal.

[Cavesa]

Thank you, DaveAgain. The book looks good, I may throw it in the basket on amazon some time soon.

My plans for the first half of December were altered by my grandma's death. The situation has been requiring my time for the practical things, it is also harder (impossible) to learn at my family's house, and I've been devoting a lot of time to baking the traditional Christmas sweets as a healthy part of grieving. Some of my fondest memories with my grandma include baking these. And we've got her baking molds and her notebook with the recipes used in our family, so it's been a bit like baking together again. Given the fact we had the opportunity to say good bye and a few other important things, I am grateful.

But you can imagine my medicine exams (nor my language learning goals) won't include the intricacies of when exactly to empty the coconut cookies moulds taken out of the oven, the methodology of recovery of a lost piece of information in one of the recipes, the analysis of what went wrong with the first attempt on the vanilla crescents this year, or the lab kitchen safety guidelines during my younger sister's experiments.

Also, it is not healthy but awesome to bake/study in the night. No one and nothing bothers you at 3 am. I should have been born a bat. Or a bear, those get to hibernate without anyone mocking them.

So, I am returning to my studies now. A bit desperate about the time loss and my procrastination and lack of abilities, but decided to just stick to the Forest and Pomodoros and see what happens.

And I need to pick up a book from a shop today. There is a 50% sale on Cronometro B1, I need to use this opportunity. It is a low level, sure, but I think it may still be valuable for covering my gaps and helping me develop my active skills. I think it was NoManches and a few more people, who have spoken very highly of this series and about the fact the books tend to be a bit above the advertised level (which is an exception in the language course publishing industry)

I have even contacted two potential tutors on Italki, with the intention of getting French writing feedback. I need some human contact in French and not medicine related, and I am not gonna bother with the 100th futile attempt to find an exchange partner. I could afford a writing assignment per 2 weeks (both time and money wise. I am not going to school anymore, so my take away coffee expenses are dropping by 95%). The high level language atrophy is an unpleasant process. Also, let's not forget French is psychologically a bit harder for me, due to all those years in my youth, during which I was set back by the school system all the time. The imposter syndrome is not nice. I do not have much hope the tutors agree to what I want, they are likely to prefer the conversation practice, but asking costs nothing and I might be pleasantly surprised. One of them has got some experience with native teaching on her CV and education in the matter, that has really caught my attention (despite her being rather weird in her video. I think it may have been the "help, I need to post a video of myself for the first time" stress). The other one seems to be a nice and intelligent person with French education (bilingual French and Maghrebi Arabic native).

There are a few things that really drive me off an Italki teacher's profile though. I dislike the price marketing manipulations, those "prices from X dollars per hour. I don't mind people's work costing a lot, if they are good. If enough customers are willing to pay that much for their services, they are pricing themselves right and I am not judging them just because I cannot afford them. But I do mind a person asking 42 dollars per hour being offered in the 0-20 dollar price range, because of their classes for teachers are offered for 9 dollars (how many teachers are likely to take teaching lessons on italki anyways? this really looks like just a marketing trick). The lack of the information I need about the teacher is not good marketing either. Or a teacher claiming themselves "near native" ESL speaker making basic mistakes in their written presentation. How attentive can such a person be to the mistakes of their students? And I also think the videos should be made better in some cases, perhaps Italki should give some guidelines to the teachers. Videos not showing the person speaking their native language they teach, or looking much more like an animated advertisement "why should you learn languageX" are bad. And there are still no tags "advanced" or "writing", that is impractical

But I have noticed a mistake of mine and that is subconscious prejudice. I've noticed I skip men almost completely. Why? I have tried a male online tutor before, I have had male teachers or homosexual women teachers in 1 on 1 setting (languages, music, gym) and never had any bad experience (which many other girls have got, especially at university or online). This precaution makes absolute sense on the conversation exchange sites unfortunately. But it is illogical on Italki. Also, I think I may have been looking more on the profiles of the young teachers. It might be partially due to the more experienced older ones asking more than I set the price range for and therefore being less numerous in my search results. It may also be due to my experience with the more experienced teachers (usually still not that experienced with advanced learners but unaware of this weakness) being less flexible, when it comes to adapting their methods to my needs. But I think the marketing in the language industry full of smiling photos of young and beautiful people may have gotten under my skin and I don't feel good about that. So, I am opening up and gonna try someone not close to my age too.

If anyone wonders what do I need writing for at C2 (and having already passed the exam): It feels wrong to be worse at it than in English, which is a language I don't love. I've always been interested in creative writing and never had the time for it. And it is a challenge. And a part of the "C3 level learning" we've been joking about with some people. And hopefully a way to get more confidence in myself in times of dire need

[rdearman]

You might want to also look at Verbling (https://www.verbling.com/). I've found the people there often have lower prices than the tutors on iTalki and many due free trials.

Also sorry to hear about your Grandmother. It is always difficult to lose someone, but it sounds as if you have great memories.

[Cavesa]

Thank you, Rick.

I am thinking of implementing CarlyD's idea of a 365 challenge. Current idea: one language pomodoro a day, switching languages like 3 Es, 3 De, and 1 It per week minimum. Just an idea.

The writing tutor search saga:

I have written to four Italki tutors (good looking profiles showing experience, mentioning advanced students, not talking just about conversation and conversation). All supposedly active on the site, with high response rate. I wrote the messages today (1), yesterday(1), and on Wednesday(2). I am curious, whether there will be any answer at all.

I have looked at Verbling. There are people claiming to do writing corrections, great! There are several people in my desired price range, great! The profile include much more useful information than those on Italki, awesome! (awesome assuming everything is true).

Let's have a look at the list: One is inactive (has taught one class, has no planned schedule, and unfortunately it is the best one by the profile), other two or three are native speakers but it looks like they've been educated elsewhere. Sometimes, it may be an advantage to get a traveller and a person without much of roots as a teacher. But I want someone with French education because I want to write like an educated French person, I want to write like myself (remember the tv series scene "Do you have any idea how clever I am in Spanish?" That sort of thing). A person with british or other education won't do (this is no prejudice, this is based on personal experience of a friend of mine with three education systems. The writing is simply taught differently in each of them.). So, these facts left just four or five teachers for me.

I am likely to choose someone for a sample lesson, even more if no one from Italki replies. But I really dislike marketing manipulations. All of them were offering free sample lessons. Until the moment I signed up. Then, a 30 minute lesson suddenly costed half a 60 min lesson. It is still a good price and logical. I wouldn't mind, had I been told right from the beginning. But I hate being manipulated, I dislike lies in advertisements (especially in education. For example the PR materials by my faculty are full of creative half-truths). This is somehow making me much less excited about Verbling. You know, like waiting what will the next surprise be.

The next step, if both platforms fail me, is Superprof. I am not sure I can get to my price range there, I may have to invest a bit more. But if I get the results, 3-5 euros of difference won't destroy me. I was going to cook at home much more now anyways. Not going to school brings a lot of opportunity to fix my life.

I've tried looking in Prague. There is an email based translation focused course. I would love that, but it starts only in September. An email based courses starts just once per year! L'Institut Français has a writing course. For people B1/B2, at most C1, not for me, and it doesn't even open most trimesters either. And all the rest is a tragedy, as I had already found out during my previous attempts.

[Cavesa]

I'll try a "demo version" of the future 365 challenge.

One language Pomodoro a day, tv series don't count. Books count, as I haven't been reading much lately. Coursebook based or similar learning activities count. SRS counts. Procrastination like Duolingo/Lingodeer/any other app or gamified website doesn't count.
Monday Spanish
Tuesday German
Wednesday Spanish
Thursday German
Friday Spanish
Saturday German
Sunday Italian

[zjones]

I'm excited to see your new log and I look forward to following your progress!

I'm sorry to hear that you lost your grandma. I'm glad to hear you are able to get together with family and bake some of her recipes, that sounds sweet. (And delicious.) I hope it's okay if I urge you to be kind to yourself no matter what you feel or how your grief is moving along -- it can be a long process.

[Cavesa]

1.The "demo version" of the 365 challenge is starting today. With German.

2.While I am all for multitracked approach and have great eperience with it, I should choose the one main resource per language track for this, as the minimum of one pomodoro per day isn't much.
Let's see what I have here... (imagine me reorganising piles of books in other piles of books, rereading the titles in my crowded bookshelves for the millionth time etc.)... I think the best choices to start with will be:

German: Němčina nejen pro samouky: a dense book, I am restarting it, have already covered parts. It will be a challenge. I don't expect to master all the content, but I know I will return to it in my other resources later, when I'll have finished this.

Spanish: Método 3, an easy going book with very few bits of completelynew content but very nice exercises.

Italian: I already chose Nuovo Espresso 1 ages ago. Too easy as input, but should cover my gaps in output.

3.Still no answer from even one of the Italki teachers. Ok. I'll try Verbling next year, I need the money now for presents anyways.

A funny fact: my dad has recently gotten a new job. He is awesome, a true example of how honest and good work, logic, and excellent communicative skills (and lots and lots of time invested) can bring you success . His only weakness:he cannot speak English. So, I want to make a Czech based version of the Assimil for him. I've been planning it for years but now is a good time. At least the first part needs to be done before Christmas. I think Assimil could be ideal for him (considering his goals, his "free time" being mostly while driving, and also all the methods, coursebooks, and teachers that had been failing him for over a decade of learning attempts).

But what reminded me of it yesterday: I was in his office, which he had inherited from his precedesors. And they had chosen to put a poster with quotes about leadership on the door. In English.

Knowing a bit about the people the office had belonged to before, I found the quotes funny. The people were in some ways good directors but not leaders. And I don't know, whether they were realising how funny the quotes were in that context. And how funny it was to present themselves to people entering their office like that. And how stupid do many people find the motivational quotes in general, so it is definitely not a safe choice for making the first impression at all.

As Tywin Lannister said: ""Any man who must say, 'I am the king' is no true king."

So, I am gonna find a moment to translate the quotes. I think my dad and I will share a good laugh.

The Assimil translating could also help me with some Christmas mood. I don't feel like celebrating anything, and it is not just because of one death in the family, I am used to worse grieving. But I want to try, and above all not spoil anything for others. Preparing the presents could help.

[Cavesa]

Another failed week. No wonder the words weak and week are so similar

I don't feel like christmasing. At all. But my family has got a new puppy! Our dog died approximately two months ago. We had hoped to get a new puppy while she was still alive, she loved company and could have participated in raising it, but we didn't have the time. This new puppy is beautiful and small (still under 10 kg), and is still in the phase of learning the basic habits (which is not easy). But it is so awesome! The best therapy against depression. Too bad that going home also means visiting the people, which is much more demanding. I love them but my idea of the best possible winter 18/19 would be hibernation.

I have no clue how to progress, when I am unable to do even one pomodoro a day. My experiment is failing. And there is the usual question. Is it depression or laziness? Who knows. But one supports the other.

Btw, I still haven't got any answer from the four teachers on Italki. Well, it is Christmas now, but it wasn't a week ago and they are supposedly online regularly. Why can't they answer a simple "non"? Or a more precise "va te faire foutre"? That would be much more polite and useful than just ignoring me.

Also, I have looked into some anki advice. Got new packs for my medical exam (I have to use premade ones, I am so slow creating them).
Basically, I found two important bits of advice on the anki and medical anki subreddits.
1.Learn at most 100 new cards a day, 6 days a week. That is the against too unmanageable reviews.
2.If you want to break the rule number 1, do new cards 7 days a week, don't go about 100.

So, let's see. I have like 10000 cards, which should partially overlap. I don't like the maths.

Given how much behind the schedule I am, I am losing hope. Perhaps I should just learn German instead and do what everyone does, and stop fighting and swimming against the current. Get a second rate doctor job in Germany. The better ones are for better students, just like other countries. Perhaps it's time I understood my failure.

But if I do that, I will be able to have much more free time for languages. Or if I leave medicine. I may have found a perfect language related job for me. I bet the place is still vacant. But it won't pay enough at the beginning, even if I get it. But it is a good plan B.