Chove's Log

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jeff_lindqvist
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Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=2773
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Re: Chove's Log (Spanish, German, Polish, French)

Postby jeff_lindqvist » Sun Aug 09, 2020 9:13 am

chove wrote:I'm a bit stuck for how to proceed with German at the moment. I need to be at a sort of lower-intermediate level for the course I start in October, but how to get there? Most courses are too easy but native materials are still beyond me.


Maybe something like this Youtube channel?
Deutsch lernen mit der DW

This is just one example (and something which appeared in my Youtube feed yesterday):
Deutsch lernen (A1): Ganzer Film auf Deutsch - "Nicos Weg" (an entire film, 1 h 43 min)

Check out the channel for content suitable for your level.
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Finnish with extra pain : 100 / 100

Llorg Blog - Wiki - Discord

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chove
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Languages: English (N), Spanish (intermediate), German (intermediate), Polish (some).
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... =15&t=9355
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Re: Chove's Log (Spanish, German, Polish, French)

Postby chove » Sun Aug 09, 2020 4:04 pm

Thanks for the suggestions!
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chove
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Re: Chove's Log (Spanish, German, Polish, French)

Postby chove » Sat Aug 15, 2020 4:22 am

Did some thinking about how to focus my efforts a bit better.

Spanish: My big weakness is grammar, especially production of tenses and the subjunctive. Going to work with Complete Spanish Grammar and do the exercises in that. Should continue casual reading for picking up vocabulary but looking for more words is not what I need to focus on at the moment.

German: I need words and phrases mainly, I've done enough German in the distant past that I know how to form sentences I just don't know what to put in them. Not sure what to do. Maybe some intensive reading?

Polish: I need to get the cases down for a start, that's been holding me back for far too long. Going to continue working with the iTalki tutor for that.

French: This is not a "main" language so no pressure on myself, and I'm at an early enough stage that everything is worth learning. Really need to work on de/des/du/au/aux/en and that sort of thing, I can never remember when to use what.

That's the plan. Whether I'll manage to stick to it is another matter...
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chove
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Re: Chove's Log (Spanish, German, Polish, French)

Postby chove » Mon Aug 17, 2020 3:15 pm

I joined a Discord server for language students at my university, seems they've stopped offering Italian now. Maybe too few people wanted to study it?

Had a Polish lesson last night, half an hour on mostly verb conjugation and she said we'll move on to noun cases next time. Good revision/practice even if I didn't learn anything new as such. I am sticking to half-hour lessons so I don't get anxious or overwhelmed.

I dreamed that I was trying to express in Spanish the fact that I speak okay but inaccurate Spanish. No idea if it was correct Spanish at all but nice of my brain to try to encourage me a bit. In the dream I had to dissect El Ministerio del Tiempo episodes very slowly to find the subjunctive, which... might not be a bad idea actually?
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chove
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Re: Chove's Log (Spanish, German, Polish, French)

Postby chove » Tue Aug 25, 2020 7:23 pm

Thought this was interesting: https://www.reddit.com/r/Scotland/comme ... e_article/ ("I’ve discovered that almost every single article on the Scots version of Wikipedia is written by the same person - an American teenager who can’t speak Scots") Did make me wonder about the appropriation of dialects, which seems a bit of a thing whereas it's hard to appropriate a language (though obviously some people think you can). And I mean that in the "classic" definition of appopriation, where you take something and then try to tell the people you got it from that they're doing it wrong.
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chove
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Re: Chove's Log (Spanish, German, Polish, French)

Postby chove » Tue Aug 25, 2020 8:43 pm

Just did a 30 minute Polish lesson on Skype, we did the accusative case (biernik) which is the one I vaguely know so it wasn't too hard. Next up is the genitive case so I can answer questions negatively! I seem to know a lot more words than I realised, certainly for how little grammar I know.
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chove
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Re: Chove's Log (Spanish, German, Polish, French)

Postby chove » Sun Sep 06, 2020 11:02 pm

I've been lazy recently but I'm starting up again because my German course website opens this week and the books should be arriving in the next week or so. Though I haven't really done much German this week, oddly enough. I did a bit of talking to myself in it earlier and was pleasantly surprised by how much I could express. Then I did some more of Complete Spanish Grammar which I am slowly working through because my production lags far behind my reading ability in that I can recognise a variety of tenses that I can't form myself. I'm thinking of Spanish as "maintaining" now so mostly just reading things in it most days even if it's just a few Tweets or Instagram posts.

Had a Polish lessson at the weekend we did the genitive case/dopelniacz which I'll need to practice of course but I think I get the general idea. So now I can answer questions with a negative! :lol: I don't know if I'll continue the lessons, or if I do they'll be less often while I do German. Might have a look at the Instrumental next, I've seen it around but I can never remember the right endings for the words.
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chove
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Re: Chove's Log (Spanish, German, Polish, French)

Postby chove » Tue Sep 08, 2020 9:16 pm

Today my module's study materials arrived, in the form of a German grammar book. So I take it almost all of the work will be online. The website is due to open tomorrow afternoon. In the meantime I spent about half an hour reading the start of the grammar book, which was mostly defining terms and laying out the general "shape" of German. I may finally have worked out what a subordinate clause actually is! Though it is still a bit hard to recognise them, maybe I just have weird ideas about what a complete sentence should look like.

Typed up some words into Anki in various languages, had a bit of a backlog so it took ages. Then I was too worn-out to actually study them so I'll try to do that after a bit of a break to rest.
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chove
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Re: Chove's Log (Spanish, German, Polish, French)

Postby chove » Wed Sep 09, 2020 9:34 pm

Okay, I have identified a problem and I could use some advice. The thing is this: whenever something needs to be learned though rote memorisation I avoid the task and tell myself I'll learn it over time, but then I don't. Verb conjugations, case endings, etc. This is why I can't form half the Spanish tenses even though I can recognise them, why I never get any better at irregular verbs, why I still struggle with Polish declinations. It's been like this all my life, since primary school when I failed to learn the times tables like we were supposed to. It's that deadly combination of difficult and dull.

So does anyone have any tips? For making it easier or just for how to force myself to do the work?

I did at least do a fair chunk of German today, having started the course as soon as the website opened so I have a headstart for when I inevitably have to take time off for illness later on. I think I have indeed managed to get to the level required for starting this course, which is a relief.
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devilyoudont
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Re: Chove's Log (Spanish, German, Polish, French)

Postby devilyoudont » Thu Sep 10, 2020 12:20 pm

Rote memorization tasks are a constant annoyance for me in all languages. I find that there are 2 things I need to do in order to accomplish the task:

1) Using Anki, set my number of new cards a day to only a handful of cards. This keeps my time using the app below 30 minutes a day... Above 30 minutes a day, I am aware that I will get sick of using anki and quit it.
2) Focus on producing what I am memorizing, not recognizing what I am memorizing. Just me personally, I find that the memory is stickier if I do it this way.

Hope this is helpful
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