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Spanish Log (TAC 2014 Team Lobo) | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5157 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 137 of 271 24 July 2012 at 2:55am | IP Logged | ||
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Great post. You are spot on with everything. Stay motivated!
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| dbag Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4804 days ago 605 posts - 1046 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 138 of 271 07 August 2012 at 11:51pm | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks James!
I think my motivation is pretty much back! I think the main problem was that I couldn't listen to any native content while my tablet was being repaired, which really knocked me off my stride. I've decided to pretty much park the last few units of FSI for a bit. That may sound strange with me being so close to the end (unit 50) but I really need to keep things fresh, and more drills just isn't what I need right at the moment. Inspired by one of randomreview,s posts, I decided to start working with Assimil Using Spanish again, and start shadowing some of the dialogues in Spanish with Ease. Using Spanish is a beautiful course. I don't use it everyday like I did with ease though, because I think it would be to constrictive to have to use any one course at this kind of level. Believe it or not, I really feel like shadowing "with ease" is going to be of a lot of help, even after all I have done. There are some quite complex dialogues in that course really, some of them I would contend are actually more complex than any thing in FSI. I think the important thing with shadowing though is that it will allow me to improve my accent and intonation, at the same time as picking up on all those little details I missed before. I have started with CD 2. I still feel like I need to be working harder though, but I suppose its only natural to be on cruise control for a while. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5157 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 139 of 271 08 August 2012 at 12:26am | IP Logged | ||
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You are right that Assimil w/ Ease is a great course and the dialogues are packed with vocab, idioms and grammar. Fairly recently I started listening to the dialogues again and had "forgotten" much of it so it was kind of new again. Even after going over every lesson so many times I think you will still be able to pick things up... especially after doing so much FSI. Now that I am an intermediate I can just listen very carefully to the lessons and actually feel like I have time to "think" about everything they are saying... that helps me pick up nuances.
I can also relate to what you are experiencing with FSI. Those last bunch of lessons are a long tough slog. If I remember correctly I stopped for a while somewhere near the beginning of Unit IV. I highly recommend coming back to FSI when you are ready... Unit IV was the best unit of all. It really gets into the tough things. Some of the dialogue build ups in Unit IV are way too long, however. I forget if you have done Without Toil or not (I know you have it!). That book is absolutely packed with Spanish. It definitely has more Spanish than With Ease. I was not crazy about the audio in Without Toil (mainly because the first third was too slow for an intermediate and the recording of the last third was quite rough), but I have been thinking that spending some time with the book may be worth the effort. Using Spanish does indeed look like an awesome course. It seems daunting and I have often thought exactly what you said - that you must also use other resources at the same time. The problem (I think) is that that means it will take forever to get through the course if I don't work on it every day. We are at the intermediate "wall" and going on cruise control is certainly natural. I feel I am slacking right now doing all this LR. As long as you we still enjoying it and still progressing... that is what matters. Keep up the good work... you are keeping us motivated. Edited for typo. Edited by James29 on 08 August 2012 at 12:29am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| talkl Diglot Groupie Israel Joined 5018 days ago 51 posts - 61 votes Speaks: Modern Hebrew*, English Studies: Spanish | Message 140 of 271 09 August 2012 at 1:51pm | IP Logged | ||
This is one of your better posts lately. I have recently reached the B1 higher levels and am trying to think how can i move on to B2. When thinking about how i learned English as an adolescent it all come down to spending hours of reading books, watching tv, speaking etc. If the classic workbook programs do not help you so much as they did before, switch blatantly to native material. Read an Ebook, watch netflix latin america movies, talk every day to natives over skype. The progress will be felt if you invest hundereds of hours in it. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Random review Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5565 days ago 781 posts - 1310 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German | Message 141 of 271 10 August 2012 at 1:41am | IP Logged | ||
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At James29 and dbag: I'm actually going to miss reading your logs when I take my upcoming
break from Spanish. I was surfing the web reading about (English) prepositions and wishing I had the "energy" to practice my Spanish on a language exchange site; I just read this and somehow felt energized again! I'm off to get some practice... :-) 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| dbag Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4804 days ago 605 posts - 1046 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 142 of 271 20 August 2012 at 6:12pm | IP Logged | ||
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Before I reply to everyone, I have some exciting news!…......I have booked a ticket to
fly into Santiago, in Chile on September 11th, and will be flying out of Buenos Aires in Argentina at the end of October! I decided that it didn't make much sense to go to Asia, when I have invested so much time learning Spanish. I'll update properly later, I'm buzzing at the moment and can't quite think clearly! 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| sctroyenne Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5173 days ago 739 posts - 1312 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Spanish, Irish | Message 143 of 271 20 August 2012 at 9:07pm | IP Logged | ||
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How exciting! I'd love to plan for a Latin American trip but that will have to be for the
not so near future. Travel is a great motivator for language learning and I think you'll find that you'll have a much different, richer experience being able to speak the language than you would have had having to stick to English only. Bon voyage! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| tibbles Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4973 days ago 245 posts - 421 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Korean | Message 144 of 271 21 August 2012 at 8:58am | IP Logged | ||
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That's super news that you're going to Santiago. I was there in late May, and it was excellent. You will have a great time there.
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