Russian Wordlists - Simple or Complex?

[Axon]

When I was learning Indonesian, I made a lot of wordlists. Just simple Indonesian on one column and English on the other column, usually with two or three words in English to cover the approximate meaning. This was a habit that worked well for me.

I have an empty notebook here and the desire to improve my Russian vocabulary, especially verbs. Usually when I have to ask my LEP to explain something, it's a verb. I was thinking that I'd revive the ol' wordlist idea, but I also wondered, maybe there's a better way than just listing infinitives?

I thought of three possible ways. 1. Only write infinitives. 2. Write out multiple conjugations for each verb per line. 3. Use a random conjugation for each verb. I know how to conjugate verbs but I think drilling conjugations will help me be more automatic with it and possibly help my comprehension.

Which of these is best? And should I try to memorize perfective/imperfective pairs at the same time? How have you made Russian wordlists work for you?

[IronMike]

Yes (or Да) on the imperfective/perfective.

If you have the space, might be worth listing the 1S, 2S and 3P of each conjugation.

[aszaderyaka]

When I was learning Indonesian, I made a lot of wordlists. Just simple Indonesian on one column and English on the other column, usually with two or three words in English to cover the approximate meaning. This was a habit that worked well for me.

I have an empty notebook here and the desire to improve my Russian vocabulary, especially verbs. Usually when I have to ask my LEP to explain something, it's a verb. I was thinking that I'd revive the ol' wordlist idea, but I also wondered, maybe there's a better way than just listing infinitives?

I thought of three possible ways. 1. Only write infinitives. 2. Write out multiple conjugations for each verb per line. 3. Use a random conjugation for each verb. I know how to conjugate verbs but I think drilling conjugations will help me be more automatic with it and possibly help my comprehension.

Which of these is best? And should I try to memorize perfective/imperfective pairs at the same time? How have you made Russian wordlists work for you?

I think you need a big notebook
Verb "работать":
заработать
разработать
подработать
наработать
отработать (это слово может использоваться как в обычной речи, так и в сленговой с криминальным оттенком)
выработать
сработать
уработать (разговорное)
проработать

If I can help you I'll be glad )

[Iversen]

When I make Russian wordlists (or wordlists in any other Slavic language) I always try to put the perfective and the imperfective verbs together, and most of my dictionaries do make the pairs in an adequate way. I don't mark stress patterns even though it might be relevant - but it would take too much time because the dictionaries don't give me the relevant inormation in a simple way. For instance my Russian-Danish dictionary very good at indicating pf/impf pairs, but the rest of the morphological information is indicated with numbers that refer to an appendix with inflection patterns. I could follow all the references, but then it would become a very cumbersome process to produce a wordlist.

There are a few other markings that may be relevant, like the gender of substantives that end in -ь, but I rarely indicate such things. As for the word families (cfr the preceding message) I have a few times compiled them by hand, but it is not part of my normal routine.

[Purangi]

If I had to go back in time, I would write three things in my Russian word list:

1. Both perfective and imperfective forms
2. the most common preposition (верить в acc., участвовать в prep., держать за acc., относиться к dat.)
3. the stress pattern (shifting or constant)

If you are aiming at actually using the verbs (and not just recognizing the verbs when written down) anything less than that is pretty much useless.

Edit: learning verbs by family, i.e. as suggested by aszaderyaka, is a very good way of both building vocabulary fast and learning how to express subtle nuances!