Michelle's 2020 Log (Spanish, French, Korean, German, Italian)

[brokenrecord]

Spanish
-Pedro Páramo: pages 49-69
-Spanish newspapers: 1 article
-Demystifying the Spanish Subjunctive: 3 exercises
-Nailed It: Mexico (season 2): episodes 1-4
-No: 1h58

French
-Ensemble, c'est tout: chapters 75-78
-French newspapers: 2 articles
-Practice Makes Perfect French Verbs: 11.36-11.37
-Call My Agent/Dix pour cent: episode 13

Korean
-Talk to Me in Korean: level 4.27
-Talk to Me in Korean Level 4 Memrise: 7/7 days (163/163 items)
-Integrated Korean Beginning 2: chapter 17
-Anki: my sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Anki: Evita's sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Anki: Evita's vocab deck: 7/7 days
-Itaewon Class (webtoon) (이태원 클라쓰): nothing
-Mystic Pop-Up Bar (쌍갑포차): episodes 5-6
-Today's Korean by Naver: 7/7 days

German
-German newspapers: 2 articles
-Dark (Season 3): episode 2
-Grammatik aktiv A1-B1: lesson 35
-A-Grammatik: nothing
-Glennkill: Ein Schafskrimi: started chapter 2

Italian
-Italian newspapers: 1 article
-Duolingo: 147 -> 150 crowns (7/7 days)
-Practice Makes Perfect Italian Verbs: 1.18-1.19
-Nuova Grammatica Pratica Della Lingua Italiana: nothing
-Harry Potter e i doni della morte: nothing

So I did manage to get a bit more done this week, including more reading and some grammar, although it dropped off a bit at the end of the week since I had a couple busy and stressful days of work, and I also ended up with a mild case of food poisoning yesterday, which didn't help.

Spanish:
I finished Alta mar last week, so I decided to watch Nailed It: Mexico season 2 this week since I didn't feel like committing to anything that would take too much time/attention. I should finish that this week, and I'm not sure what I'll jump to next. I also watched the Chilean film No this week. It was interesting and well-done, but I definitely found comprehension more challenging than most Spanish things I've watched recently. I haven't had much exposure to Chilean accents before (I've watched one other Chilean film, but it was with English subtitles), so that was probably a large part of it.

Korean:
I finally finished the last chapter of Integrated Korean, although there are two review sections at the end of the workbook for me to finish before I can say I'm completely done. Once I've gotten through them, I'm planning on taking a break from the Integrated Korean series and finally take a shot at Korean Grammar in Use.

German:
I noticed just a week or so after I finished the Duolingo German tree, they restructured the tree and added a bunch of new exercises. I'm debating whether to pick it back up again or not. On one hand, when I finished the Spanish and French trees, I decided if they made any additions to those trees I wouldn't bother trying to complete them, and I had been planning the same thing with German. However, both of those trees were much longer than the German tree, and I was also at more advanced levels in those languages when I finished those trees. Plus, when I finished Spanish, I had the French and German trees, and when I finished French, I had the German and Italian trees, but all I have now is the Italian tree. And I feel like I could still do with the extra practice Duolingo provides with German (whereas by the end of the Spanish tree, in particular, I felt like I had gotten as much out of it as I was going to). So for those reasons I don't think it would be too unreasonable to add it back. But it was really satisfying to be done with it. So I'm not sure! I'll see how I feel in the coming weeks.

[addylad]

That's impressive!

[brokenrecord]

Spanish
-Pedro Páramo: pages 75-106 (done!)
-Spanish newspapers: 2 articles
-Demystifying the Spanish Subjunctive: 6 exercises
-Someone Has to Die/Alguien tiene que morir: episode 1 (2x, w/ & w/o ES subs)

French
-Ensemble, c'est tout: chapters 80-88
-French newspapers: 2 articles
-Practice Makes Perfect French Verbs: 11.40-11.42, 12.01-12.02
-Call My Agent/Dix pour cent: episode 15 (2x, w/ & w/o FR subs)
-Hors de prix/Priceless: 1h44 (no subs)

Korean
-Talk to Me in Korean: levels 4.29-4.30
-Talk to Me in Korean Level 4 Memrise: 7/7 days (163/163 items)
-Integrated Korean Beginning 2: Workbook Review 2 (done!)
-Korean Grammer In Use Beginner: units 0.1-0.5
-Anki: my sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Anki: Evita's sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Mystic Pop-Up Bar (쌍갑포차): episode 9 (EN subs)
-Today's Korean by Naver: 7/7 days

German
-German newspapers: 2 articles
-Duolingo: 616 -> 637 crowns (7/7 days)
-Dark (Season 3): episode 4 (2x, w/ and w/o DE subs)
-Grammatik aktiv A1-B1: lessons 37-38
-A-Grammatik: lessons 3.4.2-3.5
-Glennkill: Ein Schafskrimi: chapters 2-3

Italian
-Italian newspapers: 2 articles
-Duolingo: 157 -> 161 crowns (7/7 days)
-Practice Makes Perfect Italian Verbs: 1.20-1.25
-Nuova Grammatica Pratica Della Lingua Italiana: test di controllo 6-10, exercises 2-5
-Harry Potter e i doni della morte: pages 23-24

So I ended up taking another break. I had returned to language learning in late August/early September after a 2 month break over the summer, and usually when I return after a long break, I feel more motivated and ready to get back to my normal language-learning routine, but this time my heart just didn't really feel in it. Beyond everything that's going on in the world, I was stressed out about a few things at work (all of which turned out fine, but at the time, they were stressful), and everything just seemed like a chore. During the break, I would do one lesson of Duolingo Italian per day, and that's about it. I even accidentally missed a day of that, but had a streak freeze I wasn't aware of, so technically my Duolingo streak remains at 600+ days, although that feels a bit like cheating. But I started feeling a bit listless and unproductive, and usually a good solution to that is getting back to studying languages, so I tried to pick things back up again (the above is what I did this past week), and I feel more ready now to get back to things than I did in September. Given how crazy this year has been, I can't promise my motivation won't evaporate again in a few weeks, but I'm going to try to stay consistent for a little while at least.

Spanish:
I started the new Netflix miniseries Alguien tiene que morir this week. I decided to start specifying what I watch with and without subs (and in what language), since watching a bunch of kdrama episodes with English subs isn't going to have the same results as watching a bunch of Spanish episodes without any subs for my listening comprehension, and I want to be as transparent as possible about what I do in each language. Normally I don't rewatch episodes in Spanish with subs, I'll only rewatch certain scenes if I feel it's necessary, but I was feeling a bit rusty, starting a brand new show, and there are only three episodes total, so it made sense to me to rewatch the whole episode with subs. I found upon rewatch that I did follow the general plot well but missed what was going on in one of the subplots. How well I follow the second episode without subs will determine whether I rewatch it (and the third) with subs or not.

I also finished Pedro Páramo this week! I started it in June and it's only a little over 100 pages, so that's evidence of how much I've been struggling with reading the past few months. The way I read it, which was a chunk of pages at a time and then weeks of nothing before returning, was definitely not ideal, especially since there are no chapters, and it's so short that it's not like you're getting a ton of plot regurgitation. I honestly did not follow the plot at all in the end. It's not that the language was especially challenging for me, but just that the way I read it made it difficult to process the plot. In the end I was essentially just using it as a method of encountering random unfamiliar vocab to look up. I don't think that has anything to do with the quality of the book as much as me just not being in the right headspace to be able to concentrate for long enough stretches to follow it. In any case, it was short enough that I think I'll plan on trying to read it again at some point when I'm in a better frame of mind. For now, I think the next book I choose will need to be something a bit lighter and simpler for me to follow.

The only other thing to mention is that during my break, I watched the film Julieta, which I hadn't seen before, but thought was pretty good. I don't remember finding it too challenging to follow, although the plot was fairly simple and straight-forward.

Korean:
I finally finished Integrated Korean Beginning 2! I generally like the Integrated Korean books, but I get tired using the same resources after awhile, so I was excited to move on and finally get a chance to start Korean Grammar In Use Beginning, which I had bought over a year ago. I've flipped through it a bit, and at this point I've been exposed to most of the grammar points, so I'm mostly going to be using it for review. The downside is KGIU has very few exercises for practice, and I tend to prefer a lot of practice to get grammar points to stick. I had been planning on adding example sentences to my Anki sentence deck, but a lot of the sentences look familiar and I'm pretty sure are included in Evita's sentence deck, so I'm not sure I can use it for that. I'm still planning on going through KGIU (I know it's not really intended to be used like a textbook from beginning to end, but I don't like jumping around and feel better just working through it as if it were a textbook), but I may try to speed through it a bit.

I started thinking about what I want to do after finishing KGIU (which is still many, many months away, I'm sure, but I like being prepared and planning ahead). I had originally thought I'd go back to Integrated Korean, but I discovered recently that for some reason the answers to listening exercises in the workbook aren't provided in the intermediate books (which isn't the case in the beginner books), and since there are also a number of exercises with open-ended answers, you end up only really getting to check about 1/3 of the answers, which is a little annoying, especially since you have to pay extra for the answers (although you do get the answer keys for the beginner and intermediate books together, so I already have them). On the other hand, there are still more exercises for practice than most other Korean workbooks I've found, so maybe that evens it out a bit. Ideally I'd like an intermediate textbook and/or workbook that included a bunch of exercises for practice and had answers for all or almost all of them, which doesn't seem like it should be difficult to find, but I've been struggling. If anyone has recommendations that fit that criteria, I'd be glad to hear them!

In all this reflection of my Korean study, I've also made a couple small changes to what I've been doing. I decided to drop Evita's vocab deck for now. I'm already doing plenty of SRS for Korean, and it's gotten to be too much. It's also just too hard to get Korean vocab to stick out of context when I'm not seeing the words reinforced elsewhere. I think my own sentence deck (which I add to so infrequently that I usually only have a couple reviews per day), Evita's grammar deck (which I'm less than three months away from completing), and the Memrise courses for TTMIK vocab are enough for now. After I finish Evita's grammar deck, I may pick the vocab course back up. I also welcome recommendations for any workbooks or textbooks aimed at vocab building (I've looked at a few but haven't found any convincing so far).

The other thing is that I decided to put the webcomic I was reading on hold. It was fun to work through when I was feeling really motivated, but it got to be too much work, especially since I'd have to retype whole sentences to translate them. If I only had to look up the occasional word, or if I could just copy and paste sentences to translate them, or if there was an English translation available, it would've been less of an issue, but that's not the case. I plan on picking it back up once my vocab and grammar have progressed further. I have been thinking of replacing it with some other reading that's more appropriate for my level, especially since I won't be getting new vocab through either Integrated Korean (it doesn't look like KGIU introduces much new vocab) or Evita's vocab deck. Newspaper articles or any kind of native content is probably still too advanced for me, but I'm thinking parallel texts of short stories might work. I downloaded this book of Korean short stories for beginners and intermediate learners awhile back since it was free from Amazon for a short period, so I might start working from that. I also found this book of Korean folk tales for learners which looks promising and might be closer to my level to start with, so I may end up buying that as well.

The last thing for Korean is that I'm considering dropping kdramas from my weekly schedule. I don't know that I get enough out of them to really be that useful, especially if I'm watching them solely with English subs. I think they're most helpful when I find shows I really love since that increases my motivation, but ones that I don't love start feeling like more of a chore and can have the opposite effect. At minimum I think I need to focus on choosing shows that either have both Korean and English subs on Netflix, so I can use the Language Learning with Netflix extension, or ones on Viki with both so I can use Viki's learn mode. I am planning on finishing Mystic Pop-Up Bar, since there are only three episodes left, and I like it enough to want to know how things end, but after that I'll either choose to just watch kdramas from time to time rather than as part of my learning process, or at minimum make sure to watch things with dual subs.

French/German:
Lumping these together because they're kind of in the same place right now. I've decided right now my priority is going to be to improve both French and German. Normally I plan on one day per week devoted to each language and then weekends are for whatever else I can get done, and I still plan on following that schedule, but if there are some weeks where some days I don't feel like doing anything and others I'm more up to doing work, I plan on prioritizing making progress with French and German above anything else.

In French I think my issue at the moment is that when I watch TV with French subs, I'm able to understand it pretty well and don't have to look up a ton of words, but without subs I struggle more to identify words. In German, I have the opposite issue — there's more unknown vocab, but I'm able to pick out words I do know just fine. For German, I think the solution is probably more reading and vocab acquisition. I've been thinking of doing a sentence deck like my Korean one, except I'd be pulling sentences from books I'm reading rather than textbooks/workbooks, to help with recognition. I might even do that for French and Spanish as well (although I'm thinking just one deck where I limit myself to adding just a few sentences each day, so as to not get too overwhelming). I have been trying to cut back on SRS/Anki, though, so haven't decided for sure yet. For French, I think the best way to help my listening comprehension would be something like subs2srs or working intensively with TV episodes. I think both these ideas will be things I consider in the coming months, and then in 2021 I'll make the decision about whether I want to do both or neither. At the moment, I'm not inclined to add a bunch more tasks when I'm just getting back into things.

The only other updates for either language are that I watched three films over my break: Deux jours, une nuit/Two Days, One Night; Hors de prix/Priceless; and Das Leben der Anderen/The Lives of Others. All of them I had previously seen, although 5-10+ years ago, so none super recent. Deux jours, une nuit was probably the easiest for me to understand (and also the one I had watched most recently of the three). It mostly consists of a bunch of conversations and there isn't a ton of plot otherwise, so I was worried that would make it more challenging, but the conversations are all about the same thing, so I think that helped. During my break, I also watched Deutschland 83 and 86, but it's on Hulu, which means English subtitles which can't be removed, so I don't count it as listening practice (and I was just watching them because I was interested in the show, not for language purposes). I did really like it, though, so there's a good chance I could buy the DVDs in the future so I can watch the show without subtitles and use it for listening practice.

Italian:
Italian is still my lowest priority, but even though all I did for the past month was one lesson of Duolingo per day, I do feel like my Italian has improved a bit. I even had some interference from Italian when I was working on some Spanish grammar exercises earlier this past week, which is a first (the other direction is much more typical for me). In any case, I feel perfectly happy to focus on Duolingo, grammar workbooks, and small amounts of reading for my Italian learning for the foreseeable future.

[brokenrecord]

Spanish
-El orgullo del dragón: chapters 1-10
-Spanish newspapers: 3 articles
-Demystifying the Spanish Subjunctive: 3 exercises
-Someone Has to Die/Alguien tiene que morir: episode 2 (2x, w/ & w/o ES subs)
Total: 3.6 hours

French
-Ensemble, c'est tout: chapters 89-100
-French newspapers: 3 articles
-Practice Makes Perfect French Verbs: 12.03-12.07
-Call My Agent/Dix pour cent: episode 16 (2x, w/ & w/o FR subs)
Total: 3.3 hours

Korean
-Talk to Me in Korean: level 5.01
-Talk to Me in Korean Level 5 Memrise: 7/7 days (14/147 items)
-Korean Grammer In Use Beginning: units 1.1-1.3
-Anki: my sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Anki: Evita's sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Mystic Pop-Up Bar (쌍갑포차): episodes 10-12 (EN subs) (done!)
-Flower of Evil (악의 꽃): episode 1 (EN subs)
-Today's Korean by Naver: 7/7 days
-Korean Stories for Language Learners: 2 stories
Total: 5.9 hours including kdramas, 1.6 hours without

German
-German newspapers: 3 articles
-Duolingo: 637 -> 658 crowns (7/7 days)
-Dark (Season 3): episode 5 (2x, w/ and w/o DE subs)
-Grammatik aktiv A1-B1: lessons 39-40
-A-Grammatik: lessons 3.6-3.7
-Glennkill: Ein Schafskrimi: chapters 4-5
Total: 4.3 hours

Italian
-Italian newspapers: 3 articles
-Duolingo: 161 -> 170 crowns (7/7 days)
-Practice Makes Perfect Italian Verbs: 1.26-1.27
-Nuova Grammatica Pratica Della Lingua Italiana: nothing
-Harry Potter e i doni della morte: pages 25-28
Total: 1.7 hours


Pretty good week! One thing I started doing this week was to track the hours I spend on language learning. I've seen other posters here with cumulative area charts of time spent on languages, and I was curious about what my studying looked like, so I decided to set up a spreadsheet to track it for a month. I have a sheet for each language which tracks by type of study (listening, reading, grammar, Duolingo for Italian and German, and SRS for Korean), and then one for overall hours by language. I'm a data analyst, so obviously I enjoy working with numbers, and it's fun to find different ways to visualize data. I'm hoping it'll help me determine if my perceptions of where I'm spending my time are accurate, and if there are changes I can make that would make my learning more efficient. There were also a couple times this week I wasn't feeling super motivated to do language stuff, but then I remembered I could add the time I spent to my spreadsheet and see how the graphs would change. I'm not sure if I'll keep it up forever — I already have two separate spreadsheets I use to track my learning (one is jeffers' Super Challenge spreadsheet, which I'm still tracking even though I didn't sign up for it and am behind a fair amount in some areas, and the other is one I set up so I can log what I do each week to help me put together these weekly posts and which also has sheets for total pages read and hours of listening for each language), so a third might be overkill. There's probably a way to consolidate them so I'm not having to log the same tasks 2-3 times, but I haven't felt like figuring out the best way to do that. If I end up wanting to continue logging the time I spend on language learning, maybe I'll try to put something together, perhaps for 2021.

Spanish:
I started El orgullón del dragon by Iria G. Parente and Selene M. Pascual this week, which is a YA steampunk novel. I've read previous books by these authors before and enjoyed them well enough, and I figured it would match my criteria of something easier and lighter to read. I do still have to look up a word or two every page or so, so I don't think it's too easy for me to benefit from, and I like reading easier material sometimes to try to work on my reading speed.

I ended up deciding to continue with rewatching episodes of Alguien tiene que morir with and without Spanish subtitles, although I found upon rewatch of the second episode that I had correctly understood what was going on in all the plotlines, even if I had missed individual words or lines of dialogue. I'll probably still watch the third and final episode with and without subs, though.

Korean:
So despite talking about dropping kdramas for awhile, I ended up getting sucked in to the end of Mystic Pop-Up Bar and binged the final three episodes in one night. I had said if I was going to continue counting kdramas as language practice that I'd at least choose a show I could watch with dual English and Korean subs, but I had heard good things about Flower of Evil and wanted to check it out, so I watched the first episode, even though it only has English subs on Viki. I'm intrigued enough to continue with it for now, but if I start feeling like it's a chore to watch, then I'll drop it. I am trying to really focus on connecting what's being said with the English subtitles so I'm getting some Korean practice out of it.

I also decided to get the book of Korean folktales for language learners I mentioned last week and work through it. The first two stories, which I read this week, are very basic, but they get progressively more challenging, so I'm looking forward to making my way through it.

German:
It apparently now costs 10 lingots if you want to test out of an entire level on Duolingo (this may have been the case before on the app, but I always use the website version, which usually seems to have fewer drawbacks than the app), which is annoying, since I've just been using Duolingo German for review and don't really need to go through each individual lesson (for Italian, it's not a problem, since I rarely attempt to test out of entire levels and typically just work through the lessons). On the plus side, I've been using Duolingo for so long that I have over 4000 lingots, which is more than enough to make it through the rest of the German tree, especially since I'm still earning them as my streak increases and I make my way through the German and Italian trees. It does make me less inclined to want to use Duolingo with future languages, although I guess it would still be okay for dabbling.

I was planning on watching a film in German this week, but my library request didn't become available in time, so it'll have to wait until this week instead!

[brokenrecord]

Spanish
-El orgullo del dragón: chapters 11-20
-Spanish newspapers: 2 articles
-Demystifying the Spanish Subjunctive: 4 exercises
-Someone Has to Die/Alguien tiene que morir: episode 3 (2x, w/ & w/o ES subs) (done!)
-La trinchera infinita/The Endless Trench: 2h28 (no subs)
Total: 6.3 hours

French
-Ensemble, c'est tout: chapters 101-106 (done!)
-Les oubliés du dimanche: chapters 1-11
-French newspapers: 3 articles
-Practice Makes Perfect French Verbs: 12.08-12.10
-Call My Agent/Dix pour cent: episode 17 (2x, w/ & w/o FR subs)
Total: 3.1 hours

Korean
-Talk to Me in Korean: levels 5.02-5.03
-Talk to Me in Korean Level 5 Memrise: 7/7 days (25/147 items)
-Korean Grammer In Use Beginning: units 1.4-1.6
-Anki: my sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Anki: Evita's sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Flower of Evil (악의 꽃): episodes 2-11 (EN subs)
-Today's Korean by Naver: 7/7 days
-Korean Stories for Language Learners: 2 stories
Total: 14.2 hours including kdramas, 2.7 hours without

German
-German newspapers: 3 articles
-Duolingo: 658 -> 679 crowns (7/7 days)
-Dark (Season 3): episode 6 (2x, w/ and w/o DE subs)
-Grammatik aktiv A1-B1: lessons 41-42
-A-Grammatik: lesson 4.1
-Glennkill: Ein Schafskrimi: chapters 6-8
-Bella Martha/Mostly Martha: 1h46 (no subs)
Total: 6.3 hours

Italian
-Italian newspapers: 2 articles
-Duolingo: 170 -> 175 crowns (7/7 days)
-Practice Makes Perfect Italian Verbs: 1.28-1.30
-Nuova Grammatica Pratica Della Lingua Italiana: nothing
-Harry Potter e i doni della morte: pages 29-32
Total: 1.5 hours

So far, I'm still enjoying tracking how many hours I spend on language learning each week. I felt like I didn't get as much done a couple days this week as compared to last week, but when I actually compared the numbers, I found that I spent 5 hours more this week (excluding kdrama-watching — if you include that, then it's like 13 hours more). It's also nice to track tasks that only take a few minutes because I can see how they do add up in the end. Anyways, it's only week 2 of this, so I could very well lose interest in tracking hours in the future, but for now I'm still finding it useful.

Spanish:
Finished Alguien tiene que morir this week. I wouldn't say it was particularly great, but it was entertaining enough, and it was only three episodes. There were a ton of actors in it I recognized from other things I've watched, so that was fun, at least. My comprehension had definitely improved by the last episode — upon rewatch with ES subs, I found that while I missed some dialogue, I had followed the plot just fine. So I think I'll return to watching Spanish TV without subs, only rewatching scenes that I struggle with rather than entire episodes. I also watched La trinchera infinita this week, which is a new movie on Netflix set during and after the Spanish Civil War about a man hiding out from the government. It was a bit slow, but I found it interesting. The accents were a bit challenging for me at times (I believe they were Andalusian), but I was able to follow the plot.

I've been spending a lot of my time the past couple weeks on reading in Spanish. Even though I'm not officially doing the Super Challenge, I've been tracking my reading/listening, and right now I'm roughly 700 pages behind where I should be (I'm way ahead for films), which sounds like a lot, but it's doable. The spreadsheet says I have roughly 10 pages/day remaining, so I've been attempting 70 pages per week, broken across two days typically. That's a little more than I'd typically aim for (usually I try about 40-50 pages per week) but it's manageable, and I've been enjoying the book I'm reading so far, so that helps. We'll see if I can keep up this pace or if I get burnt out, I suppose!

French:
I finished Ensemble, c'est tout this week! I liked it overall, although I felt like it was longer than it needed to be. I did feel like my reading comprehension improved over the course of the book. After that, I started Les oubliés du dimanche by Valerie Perrin. It looks like I read a lot, but most of the chapters are incredibly short (the 11 chapters I read this week cover just under 30 pages). I'm also behind on the half challenge I'm tracking for French, although not nearly as behind as with Spanish — under 200 pages. My goal with French is roughly 40 pages/week, which shouldn't be too difficult, especially since so far Les oubliés du dimanche has been a quick read.

Korean:
I swear every time I start thinking maybe I should drop kdramas from my Korean-learning routine, I find a kdrama that's super addictive and which I end up bingeing, which is what has happened with Flower of Evil. I'm still not sure if I want to keep kdramas as part of my language learning (I definitely want to use them when I'm advanced enough to be able to watch them with Korean subtitles, or start weaning off subtitles entirely, but that still feels a year away at minimum), but as long as I've found one I'm enjoying, I might as well keep watching it. I think it's best just to keep them as my lowest priority for now. If I find one I'm enjoying, then great, but if not, it's fine to go weeks without watching anything until I come across one that piques my interest.

German:
I watched Bella Martha this week, which I had planned on watching last week, but my library took longer than anticipated, so it got pushed to this week. I'd watched it before, but I can't remember exactly when — probably 4-5 years ago at least. My comprehension was pretty good. I definitely missed bits of dialogue, but overall I felt like I was able to follow it pretty well. German is the only language I'm tracking for the Super Challenge that I'm actually on track for in both books and films (although, to be fair, if I were only tracking a half-challenge in Spanish, I'd be ahead of pace for books and already completed a half-challenge in films). I'm still trying to focus on keeping up my reading, though, since I feel like that's the area that needs the most attention for German right now.

[brokenrecord]

Spanish
-El orgullo del dragón: chapters 21-44
-Spanish newspapers: 2 articles
-Demystifying the Spanish Subjunctive: 3 exercises
-La valla/The Barrier: episodes 1-11 (no subs)
Total: 14.4 hours

French
-Les oubliés du dimanche: chapters 12-22
-French newspapers: 3 articles
-Practice Makes Perfect French Verbs: 12.11-12.13
-Call My Agent/Dix pour cent: episode 18 (2x, w/ & w/o FR subs) (done!)
-Un long dimanche de fiançailles/A Very Long Engagement: 2h07 (no subs)
Total: 5.6 hours

Korean
-Talk to Me in Korean: levels 5.04-5.05
-Talk to Me in Korean Level 5 Memrise: 7/7 days (40/147 items)
-Korean Grammer In Use Beginning: units 2.1-2.3, 3.1-3.2
-Anki: my sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Anki: Evita's sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Flower of Evil (악의 꽃): episodes 12-15 (EN subs)
-Today's Korean by Naver: 7/7 days
-Korean Stories for Language Learners: 2 stories
Total: 7.5 hours including kdramas, 2.7 hours without

German
-German newspapers: 2 articles
-Duolingo: 679 -> 700 crowns (7/7 days)
-Dark (Season 3): episode 7 (2x, w/ and w/o DE subs)
-Grammatik aktiv A1-B1: lessons 43-44
-A-Grammatik: lesson 4.2
-Glennkill: Ein Schafskrimi: chapters 9-11
Total: 4.8 hours

Italian
-Italian newspapers: 1 article
-Duolingo: 175 -> 178 crowns (7/7 days)
-Practice Makes Perfect Italian Verbs: 1.31-1.37
-Nuova Grammatica Pratica Della Lingua Italiana: part of Test di controllo Unità 6-10
-Harry Potter e i doni della morte: pages 33-36
Total: 1.7 hours


Another week where I feel like I didn't do enough and then when I actually look at the numbers, I realize I did more than last week! I think it's just that I keep not getting as much accomplished as I intend to, which results in me feeling disappointed and discounting everything I was able to accomplish, which is still a good amount. Plus, a lot of it was time spent on Spanish, which just never feels like as much effort as my other languages.

Spanish:
This ended up being a pretty heavy Spanish week, which was not intentional. I mentioned last week I was trying to up my reading in Spanish to get back on track for the unofficial Super Challenge I'm doing. I have some issues with the book I'm reading, but in general it's a quick and entertaining read, so it's been easy to make my way through it and read beyond what my typical reading goals would be. Last week I believe I was around 700 pages behind Super Challenge pace, and this week I managed to cut it to just over 500, so that's pretty good progress.

I also started a new series, La valla, which I believe aired in Spain earlier this year, but episodes have been released weekly this fall on Netflix. I ended up getting completely sucked into the show and watched all available episodes (there are two more that haven't been released yet). I'm not even sure that I got sucked in because the show is great — I think it might've been more just that my comprehension felt like it had returned to what it normally would be for Spanish TV. When I returned from my break a few weeks ago and started Alguien tiene que morir, I was able to follow the plot overall, but I felt like I was missing more than I normally would; my comprehension was probably around 75-80%. I'm not sure if I just needed a couple weeks to warm my Spanish up again or if there was something about Alguien tiene que morir that made it more challenging to understand, but when I started La valla, I felt like my comprehension had jumped back up to around 90-95%, which is where I'm accustomed to it being. I think I just enjoyed being able to watch a show in Spanish without subtitles and with very little effort again, and there was nothing else I really was in the mood to watch, so it was easy to speed through it.

French:
After many months, I've finally finished Dix pour cent! I enjoyed it quite a bit overall. I think my comprehension improved gradually over the course of the show, although it's hard to tell. I think a fourth season has already aired in France, so hopefully those episodes will get to Netflix soon. I also watched Un long dimanche de fiançailles this week. I had watched it before, but it was so long ago that I can't remember exactly when (at least 10 years ago), so I had forgotten most of the plot, and my comprehension ended up being pretty poor. I could pick out isolated sentences and words, but I know I missed a ton.


Not much of note going on with any of my other languages. I have this week off from work, and I'm not traveling anywhere because of Covid, so I should have a little extra time to devote to languages, if I feel like it.

[brokenrecord]

Spanish
-El orgullo del dragón: chapters 45-50 (done!)
-Spanish newspapers: 2 articles
-Demystifying the Spanish Subjunctive: nothing
-La valla/The Barrier: episode 12 (no subs)
-Los favoritos de Midas/The Minions of Midas: episodes 1-2 (no subs)
Total: 4.1 hours

French
-Les oubliés du dimanche: chapters 23-35
-French newspapers: 2 articles
-Practice Makes Perfect French Verbs: nothing
-La Révolution: episode 1 (w/ and w/o FR subs)
Total: 2.4 hours

Korean
-Talk to Me in Korean: levels 5.06-5.07
-Talk to Me in Korean Level 5 Memrise: 7/7 days (55/147 items)
-Korean Grammer In Use Beginning: units 3.03-3.08
-Anki: my sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Anki: Evita's sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Flower of Evil (악의 꽃): episode 16 (EN subs) (done!)
-Today's Korean by Naver: 7/7 days
-Korean Stories for Language Learners: 2 stories
Total: 3.8 hours including kdramas, 2.5 hours without

German
-German newspapers: 2 articles
-Duolingo: 700 -> 721 crowns (7/7 days)
-Dark (Season 3): episode 8 (2x, w/ and w/o DE subs) (done!)
-Grammatik aktiv A1-B1: lessons 45-46
-A-Grammatik: lesson 4.3
-Glennkill: Ein Schafskrimi: chapters 12-13
-Barbara: 1h45
Total: 6.5 hours

Italian
-Italian newspapers: 2 articles
-Duolingo: 178 -> 181 crowns (7/7 days)
-Practice Makes Perfect Italian Verbs: 1.38-1.39
-Nuova Grammatica Pratica Della Lingua Italiana: finished test di controllo Unità 6-10
-Harry Potter e i doni della morte: pages 37-39
Total: 1.7 hours


So despite having more free time this week, I ended up spending less time on languages than the past few weeks. I wasn't bingeing any TV show, so that's part of it, but I also was just focused on other things and didn't make as much time for language-learning as I'd normally try to.

Spanish:
Finished the book I was reading and am getting closer to being back on track for the Super Challenge I'm unofficially doing (I'm now only 370 pages behind). The book was a pretty easy read for me, but I still had to look up words, so I think I still got something out of it. I will probably end up moving on to the sequel next. I also started Los favoritos de Midas, which is a limited series on Netflix. So far I'm finding it pretty entertaining. My comprehension has been a bit worse than it was of La valla for some reason, but I don't think I'm missing too much.

French:
I started La Révolution, which is another Netflix series, this week. I'm not sure how I feel about the show yet since I've only watched one episode so far, but my comprehension definitely felt a bit weaker than Dix pour cent. I'd like to move on from rewatching entire episodes with subtitles in the near future, but I don't feel quite ready to do so yet (although I may just need to take the leap). That might be a goal for 2021.

Korean:
I finished the kdrama I was watching and haven't started another yet, although I did watch The Host this week, which I didn't list above or include it in my hours of Korean this week. I don't have another kdrama picked out yet, but I may actually stick to what I said a couple weeks ago and only watch kdramas when I'm in the mood rather than including them as a weekly part of my Korean study, and maybe only if I can watch them with simultaneous Korean and English subs. I just don't feel like I get enough out of watching Korean TV/movies with English subs to count it as part of my language-learning.

German:
I finished season 3 of Dark this week. I did feel like my German comprehension of the third season was better than the first 2, which I watched at the end of last year into the beginning of this year, and also better than Charité, which was the last German show I watched prior to this one. My comprehension of the actual plot is a different matter, although I think I would have similar issues even if I had watched season 3 in English. At some point in the future I'll probably rewatch the entire show for extra practice and to see if I can make more sense of the plot. I also watched Barbara this week. I've been trying to select French and German films I've previously watched, and most are ones I haven't seen in a number of years, but I actually watched Barbara for the first time earlier this year (with English subs, since it wasn't for language-learning purposes), so the plot was pretty fresh in my mind. Overall my comprehension wasn't too bad, although probably worse than Dark.

[brokenrecord]

Spanish
-Jaulas de seda: chapters 1-15
-Spanish newspapers: nothing
-Demystifying the Spanish Subjunctive: nothing
-La valla/The Barrier: episode 13 (no subs) (done!)
-Los favoritos de Midas/The Minions of Midas: episode 3 (no subs)
Total: 3.0 hours

French
-Les oubliés du dimanche: chapters 36-45
-French newspapers: nothing
-Practice Makes Perfect French Verbs: nothing
-La Révolution: episode 2 (2x, w/ and w/o FR subs)
Total: 2.6 hours

Korean
-Talk to Me in Korean: levels 5.08-5.09
-Talk to Me in Korean Level 5 Memrise: 7/7 days (69/147 items)
-Korean Grammer In Use Beginning: units 3.09-3.12
-Anki: my sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Anki: Evita's sentence deck: 7/7 days
-Today's Korean by Naver: 7/7 days
-Korean Stories for Language Learners: 2 stories
Total: 2.5 hours

German
-German newspapers: nothing
-Duolingo: 721 -> 742 crowns (7/7 days)
-Charité at War: episode 1 (2x, w/ and w/o DE subs)
-Grammatik aktiv A1-B1: lesson 47
-A-Grammatik: nothing
-Glennkill: Ein Schafskrimi: chapters 14-15
Total: 3.3 hours

Italian
-Italian newspapers: nothing
-Duolingo: 181 -> 183 crowns (7/7 days)
-Practice Makes Perfect Italian Verbs: 2.01-2.05
-Nuova Grammatica Pratica Della Lingua Italiana: nothing
-Harry Potter e i doni della morte: pages 40-43
Total: 1.4 hours


Definitely a much lighter week than the past few. I still wasn't feeling as motivated to do much language learning, but I tried to just focus on what I felt was most important for each language, which means reading and TV for Spanish, French, and German, and grammar and reading for Korean and Italian. I've been thinking about taking a semi-break for the rest of this year and just focusing on my daily tasks of Anki/Memrise and Duolingo, but I've also made a lot of progress on getting caught up on my Spanish and French reading, and I don't want to get behind again, so we'll see if I can continue at this level at least.

[brokenrecord]

So I mentioned in my last post or two feeling the need for a break, and I did end up taking off a couple weeks from posting updates. I continued with my normal language routine during that time, although similar to what I was doing before with focusing on reading and listening in Spanish, French, and German. I think I'm ready to get back to devoting a bit more time to languages, and I plan on creating a new log for the new year, but I figured I'd do a belated wrap-up on 2020 and this log first.

First off, here's what I accomplished in each language this year (some things started prior to 2020, but all completed in 2020):

Spanish:
-148 hours of TV/movies without subtitles (all-time total: 633 hours)
-2534 pages (all-time total: 9832 pages)
-Practice Makes Perfect Spanish Subjunctive Up Close
-FSI Basic Spanish

French:
-70 hours of TV/movies without subtitles (all-time total: 145 hours)
-1416 pages (all-time total: 3428 pages)
-Duolingo French tree

German:
-57 hours of TV/movies without subtitles (all-time total: 65 hours)
-1511 pages (all-time total: 1708 pages)
-Duolingo German tree

Korean:
-TTMIK levels 3-4, 5.01-5.12
-Integrated Korean Beginning 2

Italian:
-161 crowns in the Duolingo Italian tree
-38 pages of Harry Potter 7

I don't think I got quite as much done in 2020 as in 2019, although it ended up being more than I was expecting. It was fun putting this together because I completely forgot that not only did I finish FSI Spanish this year, but that I didn't finish it until May — it feels like I completed it much longer ago. Same goes for the French Duolingo tree. The German tree I actually technically completed twice, since right after I completed it, they added more crowns; my second completion of the tree came in right under the wire, before the end of 2020. I did slightly more listening and reading in Spanish than in 2019 and slightly less listening and reading in French (although this isn't counting things I watched with French subtitles — if I counted that, then I'd have at least 100 hours of listening, if not more). I definitely ended up with less time spent on Korean this year; I had a harder time focusing on grammar this year in general, which is the basis of my Korean study right now. I ended up with much more German listening and reading, which is not a surprise since I only really started spending more time on German at the end of 2019. And I also spent more time on Italian, although it was still pretty minimal overall. I guess on balance I spent a similar amount of time on languages in 2020 compared to 2019, but it was definitely more focused on reading and listening in Spanish, French, and German, and less time on grammar overall, which mostly impacted Korean.

I didn't make any specific goals in 2020, but I did list some general things I hoped to get done in my first post of this log (summarized here):

Spanish:
-Watch Spanish movies without subtitles
-Start GdUdE C1-C2
-Finish FSI Basic Spanish

French:
-Finish Buffy season 5
-Start native French TV/movies
-Finish the Duolingo tree

Korean:
-Start and finish Integrated Korean Beginning 2
-Start KGIU Beginning
-Work intensively with a kdrama

German:
-Finish Dark
-Finish Harry Potter 6
-Start reading native German books

Italian:
-Start Harry Potter 7

Nearly all of that was completed. The only things I didn't get to were GdUdE C1-C2 and working intensively with a kdrama, but even in my original post I mentioned I wasn't sure how likely either of those things would be in 2020, so they remain long-term goals. Overall, considering what a weird year 2020 was, I'm pretty happy with the progress I made. In general I don't think language learning is as big of a priority for me as it was just a couple years ago, but it's still important to me, and every few months I get in a phase where all I want to do is work with languages, so I can't imagine ever giving it up entirely, even if my updates end up becoming more sporadic. Basically, I'm not sure how frequently I'll be around in 2021, but even if I take extended breaks, I don't intend on any becoming permanent. Anyways, happy belated New Year to everyone, and hopefully 2021 will go better than 2020!