General language log

Continue or start your personal language log here, including logs for challenge participants
User avatar
sporedandroid
Blue Belt
Posts: 656
Joined: Mon Jan 07, 2019 6:54 am
Languages: English (N), Spanish (heritage/intermediate), Hebrew (A2-B1)
x 1371

Re: General language log

Postby sporedandroid » Mon Sep 09, 2019 4:58 am

I’m way too thin skinned about my interests. I’m embarrassed about learning Hebrew, so I just told people I’m learning German. I was actually trying to learn German at one point to get into Yiddish. But then I realized how much trial, error and commitment it takes to start learning a new language. It look me forever to get a regular Hebrew routine.
So I just found the German resources I used boring and frustrating. German has far more resources than Hebrew, but since I haven’t troubleshooted them I just didn’t like them. I also noticed that when I was studying German I wanted to be studying Hebrew instead. I’m sure I’d love German if my heart was fully into it. They seem to have good movies, literature and possibly good music. I haven’t really gotten into any German music yet.

A conversation with my mom hurt my feelings more than it should have. She doesn’t know I’m learning Hebrew. I just told her I’m learning German instead. She said that in her opinion it’s not useful to learn a language unless you’re moving to a country that speaks it. But she said it’s fine to learn a language if it makes you happy. I don’t like the idea of people thinking Hebrew is an easy leisurely activity for me. It’s not an easy language. I like how productive it makes me feel. So I like keeping it a secret. It’s kind of fun keeping it a secret. It seems like hearing people’s opinions whether they’re “positive” or “negative” demotivates me most of the time. People disliking Hebrew for antisemitic or anti Israel reason strangely motivates them. Feels like I’m pissing them off every moment I study.
2 x

User avatar
sporedandroid
Blue Belt
Posts: 656
Joined: Mon Jan 07, 2019 6:54 am
Languages: English (N), Spanish (heritage/intermediate), Hebrew (A2-B1)
x 1371

Re: General language log

Postby sporedandroid » Fri Sep 13, 2019 7:30 am

I’ve been continuing to keep my streak on clozemaster. I just noticed that on fluency fast track I’m not really reading the Hebrew text. It’s more like a puzzle. Sentences that were confusing for me in the past I can now understand after thinking about it for a second or just understand them normally. I think I’ll just do the lower levels on clozemaster to improve my reading level like I intended to.

I’ll try to focus more on cards that I’ll actually read. I’ll vary the difficulty between things that aren’t too challenging and things that push me a bit more. I obviously want to increase my level, but I also want to strengthen the skills I already have. I think I’ll also increase my reading speed by doing simpler cards.

My subs2srs decks are running out, so I created a new one. I’m having issues with cards being too long. I can’t really seem to fix that issue, so maybe I’ll just find a way to study those while watching with bilingual subtitles. I’ve been debating whether I should put on Hebrew podcasts in the background or not. I don’t quite understand them, but my comprehension is nowhere near zero either. Maybe I’ll see if it at least helps me fall asleep at night. I could use extra sleep even if I don’t improve my Hebrew skills.
0 x

User avatar
sporedandroid
Blue Belt
Posts: 656
Joined: Mon Jan 07, 2019 6:54 am
Languages: English (N), Spanish (heritage/intermediate), Hebrew (A2-B1)
x 1371

Re: General language log

Postby sporedandroid » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:26 pm

I tried listening to some Hebrew podcasts. Like I’ve experienced a lot I find my comprehension varies a lot. I usually know what the podcast is about, but I kind of feel like that’s because of the loan words I know. I haven’t done it enough to see if it improves my listening comprehension. I did notice I relied a lot of mental translation. That tends to happen when there’s a lot of unknown words. It did eventually wear me out a bit and I noticed my comprehension dropped. I think I’ll listen to podcasts when I want something to listen to, but I don’t really feel like listening to any music in particular. I’ll try doing this during tedious commutes. Maybe it’s not the best time. I’m just trying to see if I’ll subconsciously acquire some language or at least make the vocabulary I already feel more natural. When I’m able to actually study I’ll stick to consciously learning vocabulary.
1 x

User avatar
sporedandroid
Blue Belt
Posts: 656
Joined: Mon Jan 07, 2019 6:54 am
Languages: English (N), Spanish (heritage/intermediate), Hebrew (A2-B1)
x 1371

Re: General language log

Postby sporedandroid » Sat Sep 14, 2019 6:48 am

Ugh, it’s kind of annoying that my anki decks are running out just as school is starting. I didn’t really get a chance to study much on anki today. Mainly did clozemaster and my little listening experiment. I hope listening to podcasts didn’t burn out any energy I have for my regular studying routine. I don’t want passive listening to replace learning vocabulary. I pretty much have no mental energy left over for Hebrew today. I’ve been watching some language learning videos. It might give me ideas on how to continue studying, but I know it’s not studying. I’m so frustrated with subs2srs joining subtitles so much. Subtitle edit is being pretty annoying as well. It keeps telling me the subtitles are fine and split up, but when I go to subs2srs it’s all joined. There’s some dense parts of a movie I really want to study, but it’s unusable when it’s over ten seconds long and full of new vocabulary. One thing that’s starting to frustrate me with subs2srs is that since I’m starting to understand more and more sentences naturally the ones that are left over truly stump me. Even when I know the dictionary definitions of all the words and see the English translation I feel like I haven’t truly acquired the sentence.
0 x

User avatar
sporedandroid
Blue Belt
Posts: 656
Joined: Mon Jan 07, 2019 6:54 am
Languages: English (N), Spanish (heritage/intermediate), Hebrew (A2-B1)
x 1371

Re: General language log

Postby sporedandroid » Sun Sep 15, 2019 6:13 am

A bit unrelated to my usual language log, but I’m traveling to Iceland. I was thinking of posting a whole thread about it, but I decided it belonged more on my own language log. I bet it will be a completely different experience compared to the last time I went. Last time I went I was teaching myself Icelandic, so it was very intense for me. It was a rollercoaster of emotion as my ability to understand things wildly fluctuated. I thought it was something wrong with me. Now I know it’s a regular part of the language learning process. I’d say my Hebrew abilities surpassed whatever my Icelandic got to. One crazy idea I have is to see how much I can revive whatever Icelandic knowledge I had. I seem to do fine on the Icelandic clozemaster, but I generally do well on Scandinavian languages. I seem to do better on Icelandic compared to German. I wonder if I’ll be able to do subs2srs for Icelandic as well. This will probably not go so well since I can’t really study two languages at once. Maybe I’ll try my magic listening comprehension method on Icelandic. Even though my vocabulary seems to still somewhat exist I know my listening comprehension has taken a hit.
2 x

User avatar
sporedandroid
Blue Belt
Posts: 656
Joined: Mon Jan 07, 2019 6:54 am
Languages: English (N), Spanish (heritage/intermediate), Hebrew (A2-B1)
x 1371

Re: General language log

Postby sporedandroid » Tue Sep 17, 2019 2:33 am

I don’t know where to post this, but I have to rant. I fucking hate the word phase! I got to the topic of when I studied Icelandic. Most people would call it a phase. I don’t like thinking of it as a phase. Makes me feel like I wasted my time with Icelandic. I think I learned a lot of things from learning Icelandic. I learned that I need to really find sustainable study methods. It was nice having a decent free online course. I just didn’t feel I was learning enough vocabulary or getting enough exposure of things at my level. I kind of felt like the online course was moving too quickly in some ways. Trying to read a newspaper article and look up all the unknown words wasn’t a sustainable study method. I knew newspaper articles were way above my level. I had no idea about anki. You know what else was a phase? Hebrew. I attempted to learn it four or five years ago. I was mainly learning it too kill off my weird obsession with Jewish things. Hebrew was harder than I thought it would be, but I think I quit about a month of not even trying. I was super obsessed and suddenly I had no interest. Text book phase, right? Until I got interested again. Didn’t even know that would happen. For personal reasons I desperately needed something to be interested in. It’s hard, but I try to keep the fact that I’m studying Hebrew to myself. It’s embarrassing to me and people can be extremely demotivated. I think my dad suspects I’m studying Hebrew. It’s still harder for him to demotivate me when I don’t tell him. People suck.
1 x

User avatar
sporedandroid
Blue Belt
Posts: 656
Joined: Mon Jan 07, 2019 6:54 am
Languages: English (N), Spanish (heritage/intermediate), Hebrew (A2-B1)
x 1371

Re: General language log

Postby sporedandroid » Wed Sep 18, 2019 11:39 pm

I’ve been thinking more of just passively listening to Hebrew as a study method. I’m still not sure it will work yet. At the moment my comprehension is too low. Right now I passively listen to Hebrew when I need some background noise, can’t sit down and actively study, but I’ve lost any enjoyment I get out of music. I don’t think I get those moments regularly enough for it to be a regular study method. I did listen to some random sports podcast for twelve minutes today while commuting home. I didn’t know it would be about sports until I started listening to it. I didn’t understand very much of it. To be fair I wouldn’t understand very much of it if it was in English either. I don’t find sports interesting and if I was fluent I probably would have never listened to that podcast in the first place.
0 x

User avatar
sporedandroid
Blue Belt
Posts: 656
Joined: Mon Jan 07, 2019 6:54 am
Languages: English (N), Spanish (heritage/intermediate), Hebrew (A2-B1)
x 1371

Re: General language log

Postby sporedandroid » Sat Sep 21, 2019 6:17 am

I’ve been thinking about how much of a role the subconscious mind plays in language learning. I can’t just put on some Hebrew and magically expect to understand it. I definitely notice the role of my subconscious mind when I do subs2srs. A lot of the time across dialogue that seems too dense or confusing for me to understand even with the dictionary. Or it just seems too fast or unclear. A lot of times a few days to a week later I’ll understand it. I usually give myself time before I decide if a sentence is too hard to study. Sometimes it might take a few months, but that’s pretty rare.

I kind of use anki ratings backwards. I just like anki to schedule when I’ll see something. So I’ll often mark something as Good when I’ve determined I’ve studied all I can at the moment. So for something dense and confusing that means looking up unknown words in the dictionary and I’ll just let it go even if I don’t understand. I might mark an old card as Again if I notice some nuance I didn’t catch before.

I don’t know how much my music listening helps with the subconscious learning process. I’ve now started to look up lyrics and look up words that stand out to me in the dictionary. My goal isn’t exactly to understand 100%, just words that jump out at me. Listening to podcasts is still pretty questionable at my current level. I’m at the level where I seem to know most words people use when I check on things like subs2srs, but I still don’t feel like I understand most of the things people say. I’ve been at this stage for a while. Maybe my mind will magically piece together the words I do know into something more meaningful and learn some new words from context if I listen enough. I still don’t know if my level is high enough. It does seem like clozemaster speeds up this process.

I found this podcast called ספק סביר which seems to have a lot of English phrases and quite a bit of swearing in English as well. Pretty amusing to me. Don’t know how often I’ll listen. Most of the time when I feel like studying I spend that time consciously learning words. When I want to relax I listen to music.
1 x

User avatar
sporedandroid
Blue Belt
Posts: 656
Joined: Mon Jan 07, 2019 6:54 am
Languages: English (N), Spanish (heritage/intermediate), Hebrew (A2-B1)
x 1371

Re: General language log

Postby sporedandroid » Sun Sep 22, 2019 8:41 am

I was just down about being in the honeymoon period. I posted some stupid reddit post about it. I ended up deleting it because it just wasn’t a constructive post. But when I think of it I worked fucking hard to be in the honeymoon period. I didn’t enjoy Hebrew when I first tried it out. When I returned to it I still didn’t really enjoy it, but I kept trying to push through it. I made sure to find music I enjoyed in Hebrew since that’s one easy way for me to stay in the honeymoon period. I still actively work at finding more music in Hebrew once in a while. I also work on having good study methods which also helps me stay in the honeymoon period. I think the particular way I study can make it easy for me to see progress. One example is being able to understand something that seemed way above my level a few days ago. I guess I just feel that having a honeymoon period is a sign I’m immature and being immature is why everything has gone wrong in my life.
0 x

User avatar
sporedandroid
Blue Belt
Posts: 656
Joined: Mon Jan 07, 2019 6:54 am
Languages: English (N), Spanish (heritage/intermediate), Hebrew (A2-B1)
x 1371

Re: General language log

Postby sporedandroid » Sun Oct 06, 2019 5:24 am

Just did a 72 day streak on clozemaster. I’m noticing unique sentences are getting easier and easier. So something about the grammar is getting more intuitive. I’m thinking I should get started on a more structured course, but I’ve been kind of lazy about getting started. Getting started on a new method is the hardest part for me. I also read a bit of a simple Wikipedia article. It was pushing me a bit and I got some help from the dictionary, but I didn’t feel like I had to look up every word. The issue I have with reading is that I like to hear how a word sounds as I’m learning the word. Trying to read stuff introduces a lot of words I didn’t learn before, since I’m getting more vocabulary from movies and tv shows where it’s easy to get audio. I still don’t feel like I can truly read Hebrew. I just recognize the words I know. But when I was listening to a podcast in Hebrew I could hear some native speakers being unable to read a name correctly. That’s just what happens when there’s no vowels. Even native speakers don’t read like the way I’m used to.
1 x


Return to “Language logs”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: wynnsam and 3 guests