I received a few comments directly after my last post (not sure why people are too shy to post comments here!) and I realise that its title and some of the content may have sounded unfair. That wasn't my intention really, and I've since read a follow-up post on Randy's Yearlyglot blog which just shows that I should probably have made my intention clearer.
Randy's post is a good one where he talks about the year not being a failure just because he won't reach his goal. I totally agree with him. In fact, I have to since I set myself the goal originally of passing the B2 exam in July of this year. I didn't hit that goal. I'm actually now considering just pushing on to do the C1 exam because that's where I would end my "academic" language goals, and I think that if I were to ever have a need for the qualification, the C1 level would be far more useful to me. In any case, I don't consider the time leading up to missing the goal a waste of time at all. Far from it! I've never been so confident and capable in a second language (not that I'm really good!) and that's all thanks to the goal I set myself. Even though the deadline has slipped, and I might move the goalposts on my self, the existence of the goal and the time spent heading towards it have all been very worthwhile. It really pushed me to do several things, mainly finding people to meet up with and chat to in German and I've made some great friends as a result. I didn't start having regular conversations (and I mean, just once a week) until about 4-6 weeks before I had originally planned to do the exam, and that wasn't anywhere near early enough. If I were to start again, I would get my shit together much earlier.
I still consider the method that was employed by Randy to have been less successful than it could have been, and as such the experiment, under the conditions it was done, was a sort of failure. The most important thing is that he had goals, and the goals pushed him to succeed. In terms of learning language (as opposed to experimenting with a method) he didn't fail and he didn't waste his time. It just reinforces to me the importance, above just about anything else, of having a goal.
As for an update for what I've been doing lately. Well, keeping up with my Anki, of course, and listening to German podcasts of course, and trying to find the time to read a German grammar book called "Modern German Grammar - A Practical Guide" (going cheap here for Aussies - maybe even cheaper than other people can get it from their local Amazon). I've borrowed it rather than bought it because I'm really trying to keep the costs of this exercise down (to as close to zero as possible!). It seems like a really good reference and is full of examples. I am actually reading it from cover-to-cover and that's far more enjoyable than it sounds! I don't expect to remember every little rule, or edge case, or even the big things. Right now I just want to get a sense for when there might be something to check or explore later. I'm currently up to about page 90 although I also read the 20 or so pages at the end entitled "Communication Strategies" which is really useful. So useful that I think I should review it on a semi-regular basis and do my best to absorb more of it all the time.
I'm still speaking German in person once a week, and last night I got the chance to watch an old favourite movie (Wargames) on a DVD that has a German language soundtrack and subtitles. I started off with both on, and then switched the subtitles off because they were just completely different. There was hardly even the smallest of exchanges that was the same in both the dubbing and the subtitles. Pretty funny :-) I hope to do some more of this. After looking through all my DVDs, I found about 15 in total that have at least German subtitles, and actually most of those also have German audio (it's not a common language to find in subtitles actually).
On a sort of language learning note, I've been chatting online with a french couple who've come to Australia for three months. One of them needs to pass the OET (an English language test for medical professionals) and so they're looking to meet up with people to practice English. In a sort of "pay it forward" sense, I've decided to return the kindness shown to me in my German studies (amongst other things!) by my new Austrian friends by doing the same favour for this new couple and helping to correct some English texts for them.
Bis zum nächsten Mal!
Thursday, December 15, 2011
Thursday, December 8, 2011
Language learning experiments that have failed...
I read something recently that made me think about how much advice there is floating from people on the internet and how often it is untested. Sometimes people put their results out there for you to assess yourself and make your own judgement. Benny the Irish Polyglot is generally one of these. I thought his results in Hungarian and Dutch were particularly impressive and demonstrated his point. Whether or not you choose to call what he achieved "fluency", he was interacting with people and using the language much, much better than most people who study languages more formally and stay forever at the "beginner" level, at least in speaking. I was one of those with French, but I think I read Benny's advice in time to stop my German getting stuck in the same rut.
On the other hand, Benny also puts up his results when they're not so good - Tagalog and Turkish being two examples I can think of.
There might be something about Turkish that drags these language learning experiments down, because it seems that Yearlyglot, who had a great year in 2010 learning Italian, has decided to call it quits in 2011 after having tried to learn Turkish. It's a shame because he was always good for a laugh - not usually intentionally, but still. His experiment for Turkish was to not use any language learning materials at all. None, that is, apart from normal content in Turkish. It was an interesting concept, but I have to admit to feeling that my Assimil "German With Ease" and Anki wordlists have given me a kickstart to comprehension and production that is hard to beat. Being presented with tonnes of content you don't understand at all can be a little useless to you. The experiment seemed to involve complicated contorsions to avoid just looking up words, or even basic concepts. The experiment never finished, so it's hard to draw conclusions, but Randy admitted to making slow progress even in the first six months before he started a new job. This really just bears out the way it felt to me - it was a very interesting idea, and I was keen to see the results, but I was glad I wasn't the one trying it! It felt like the kind of painstaking research a linguist does on an as-yet undescribed language. Sometimes it's just quicker to look up an answer!
And I think it's wrong to claim, as many do, that looking up the answers is useless or produces completely inferior results. I started my Anki studies with a wordlist I downloaded (I have since been creating my own and reviewing that every day as well). There have been problems with that wordlist - sometimes I've used a word incorrectly because the card I learnt off was wrong - but those problems were far outweighed by the number of times I learnt a word from a card, never having seen or heard it before, and then I've later been listening to a podcast and recognised the word and thereby unravelled the sentence. To my mind, we all say we're time poor (I have a full time job, a young family, a large and socially active extended family and circle of friends, and an old house which we're always doing something to) and the fact is that languages are made up of LOTS and LOTS of words. Sure, they're more than just words, but that's a big part of them. I say, learn words however you can. If you find you've been mistaken about a word, correct it in your memory however best works for you (I update my Anki list :-) ) and move on. You WILL be mistaken, about MANY words. The goal is to have a pretty solid command of most of the words in a decent sized vocabulary (you can see I'm no longer too hung up on perfectionism!). Perfect is not an option.
Which reminds me of another language learning experiment that I feel demonstrates a technique to avoid rather than emulate, but many people still want to believe in over on "Keith's Voice on Extreme Language Learning". This one was to not say a word of Chinese while just listening to it (and watching it) for 2,000 hours. People's opinion on the value of the progress made, as demonstrated in the test with Friedemann, has varied widely. To my mind it seems pretty much exactly like what I would expect from someone who studied Chinese with Ease up to level 64 and then did nothing with the language for several years... But then, I don't speak Chinese at all, so I have to admit that I don't have much basis to be objective :-)
And just to be clear, Keith seems like a nice guy, and he's given this experiment a solid shot. I say, good on him! I was interested to read some of what he had to say and to see some of the results. I'm not saying to avoid hearing the language at natural, full speed. No way! Don't avoid it - embrace it from day one! I'm just saying that you're not likely to make much progress if that's ALL you do. Anyway, it was another experiment I was glad I didn't have to do...
I think one of the things that let this experiment down was that it didn't really have any specific goals, which was not a problem for Randy at Yearlyglot with his Turkish challenge. As I looked through his goal list, I realised that I had reached many of them by the 1 year mark myself. I hadn't tried to watch too many movies in German without the subtitles, so I'm not sure how it would have gone. Then again, I hadn't started really speaking much German regularly until after 12 months of learning. It sounds crazy to me now when I think about it. I did have a conversation all in German for about an hour within the 12 month mark (maybe the 8 or 9 month mark?), and since I started having regular conversations (probably averaging roughly 1.5 hours per week over the last 5+ months) my comprehension, production and just general comfort with German has increased dramatically, and the one movie I watched without subtitles, I understood pretty well. Randy's goals are better than mine because there are several to tick off along the way. I only have one - to pass the B2 exam, and I never broke that down into smaller milestones. If I had, my goals might have been similar to Randy's, and I also might have come up with a more realistic deadline, given my available time...
What's my point in all this? Well, there's a lot of advice out there. You need to sort through it for yourself. Personally, I don't think there's any magic bullet. The biggest "secret" I've discovered so far is that you need to do something every day. The two things I always make sure I get done whenever physically possible (so, not when I've gone off for a 3 day camping trip) is to review my Anki lists and listen to German (general news, science news, reportage, whatever I can find that interests me). My Anki lists aren't massive like many people's. I don't focus on their size, or how many items I've added today, or really too many of the numbers, I haven't worked out how much I've spoken in conversations, or how many hours I've spent listening to it (though I'm sure it's lots by now, considering it's what I usually listen to while commuting), but I am certain that doing something every day (reviewing Anki lists in particular) has been great for my conversational confidence and speed.
I think anyone who's struggling to make progress needs to consider doing something similar... Along with, of course, having conversations in your target language on a regular basis!
On the other hand, Benny also puts up his results when they're not so good - Tagalog and Turkish being two examples I can think of.
There might be something about Turkish that drags these language learning experiments down, because it seems that Yearlyglot, who had a great year in 2010 learning Italian, has decided to call it quits in 2011 after having tried to learn Turkish. It's a shame because he was always good for a laugh - not usually intentionally, but still. His experiment for Turkish was to not use any language learning materials at all. None, that is, apart from normal content in Turkish. It was an interesting concept, but I have to admit to feeling that my Assimil "German With Ease" and Anki wordlists have given me a kickstart to comprehension and production that is hard to beat. Being presented with tonnes of content you don't understand at all can be a little useless to you. The experiment seemed to involve complicated contorsions to avoid just looking up words, or even basic concepts. The experiment never finished, so it's hard to draw conclusions, but Randy admitted to making slow progress even in the first six months before he started a new job. This really just bears out the way it felt to me - it was a very interesting idea, and I was keen to see the results, but I was glad I wasn't the one trying it! It felt like the kind of painstaking research a linguist does on an as-yet undescribed language. Sometimes it's just quicker to look up an answer!
And I think it's wrong to claim, as many do, that looking up the answers is useless or produces completely inferior results. I started my Anki studies with a wordlist I downloaded (I have since been creating my own and reviewing that every day as well). There have been problems with that wordlist - sometimes I've used a word incorrectly because the card I learnt off was wrong - but those problems were far outweighed by the number of times I learnt a word from a card, never having seen or heard it before, and then I've later been listening to a podcast and recognised the word and thereby unravelled the sentence. To my mind, we all say we're time poor (I have a full time job, a young family, a large and socially active extended family and circle of friends, and an old house which we're always doing something to) and the fact is that languages are made up of LOTS and LOTS of words. Sure, they're more than just words, but that's a big part of them. I say, learn words however you can. If you find you've been mistaken about a word, correct it in your memory however best works for you (I update my Anki list :-) ) and move on. You WILL be mistaken, about MANY words. The goal is to have a pretty solid command of most of the words in a decent sized vocabulary (you can see I'm no longer too hung up on perfectionism!). Perfect is not an option.
Which reminds me of another language learning experiment that I feel demonstrates a technique to avoid rather than emulate, but many people still want to believe in over on "Keith's Voice on Extreme Language Learning". This one was to not say a word of Chinese while just listening to it (and watching it) for 2,000 hours. People's opinion on the value of the progress made, as demonstrated in the test with Friedemann, has varied widely. To my mind it seems pretty much exactly like what I would expect from someone who studied Chinese with Ease up to level 64 and then did nothing with the language for several years... But then, I don't speak Chinese at all, so I have to admit that I don't have much basis to be objective :-)
And just to be clear, Keith seems like a nice guy, and he's given this experiment a solid shot. I say, good on him! I was interested to read some of what he had to say and to see some of the results. I'm not saying to avoid hearing the language at natural, full speed. No way! Don't avoid it - embrace it from day one! I'm just saying that you're not likely to make much progress if that's ALL you do. Anyway, it was another experiment I was glad I didn't have to do...
I think one of the things that let this experiment down was that it didn't really have any specific goals, which was not a problem for Randy at Yearlyglot with his Turkish challenge. As I looked through his goal list, I realised that I had reached many of them by the 1 year mark myself. I hadn't tried to watch too many movies in German without the subtitles, so I'm not sure how it would have gone. Then again, I hadn't started really speaking much German regularly until after 12 months of learning. It sounds crazy to me now when I think about it. I did have a conversation all in German for about an hour within the 12 month mark (maybe the 8 or 9 month mark?), and since I started having regular conversations (probably averaging roughly 1.5 hours per week over the last 5+ months) my comprehension, production and just general comfort with German has increased dramatically, and the one movie I watched without subtitles, I understood pretty well. Randy's goals are better than mine because there are several to tick off along the way. I only have one - to pass the B2 exam, and I never broke that down into smaller milestones. If I had, my goals might have been similar to Randy's, and I also might have come up with a more realistic deadline, given my available time...
What's my point in all this? Well, there's a lot of advice out there. You need to sort through it for yourself. Personally, I don't think there's any magic bullet. The biggest "secret" I've discovered so far is that you need to do something every day. The two things I always make sure I get done whenever physically possible (so, not when I've gone off for a 3 day camping trip) is to review my Anki lists and listen to German (general news, science news, reportage, whatever I can find that interests me). My Anki lists aren't massive like many people's. I don't focus on their size, or how many items I've added today, or really too many of the numbers, I haven't worked out how much I've spoken in conversations, or how many hours I've spent listening to it (though I'm sure it's lots by now, considering it's what I usually listen to while commuting), but I am certain that doing something every day (reviewing Anki lists in particular) has been great for my conversational confidence and speed.
I think anyone who's struggling to make progress needs to consider doing something similar... Along with, of course, having conversations in your target language on a regular basis!
Friday, December 2, 2011
Some business conversation and letter writing tips...
I just thought I would check out what the practice material for the Goethe exam ... looks like and I found this leaflet on their website:
http://www.goethe.de/lrn/prf/pro/hdb/Pruefungsziele_Testbeschreibung_PWD.pdf
I've only had a really quick scan through it, but I noticed that, starting on page 31, they have a bunch of mini tips for formal letter writing, making business presentations and conversational tips for agreeing and disagreeing. I'm sure they're all reasonably formal, but still, worth reading. Conversational strategies (Gesprächsstrategien) start on page 37 and have advice on what to say when you're not sure you've understood correctly, how to agree/disagree, etc.
Have fun!
http://www.goethe.de/lrn/prf/pro/hdb/Pruefungsziele_Testbeschreibung_PWD.pdf
I've only had a really quick scan through it, but I noticed that, starting on page 31, they have a bunch of mini tips for formal letter writing, making business presentations and conversational tips for agreeing and disagreeing. I'm sure they're all reasonably formal, but still, worth reading. Conversational strategies (Gesprächsstrategien) start on page 37 and have advice on what to say when you're not sure you've understood correctly, how to agree/disagree, etc.
Have fun!
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
German letter writing tips
Just found these when I was looking for help with writing a formal letter to cancel a phone contract in Germany. I plan on doing something I wouldn't have dreamed off while I actually lived there - I'm going to do the whole thing myself in German. Anyway, here's the resource which had a few good tips:
http://www.oxfordlanguagedictionaries.com/Public/PublicResources.html?direction=b-de-en&sp=S/oldo/resources/de/Writing_Letters_in_German.html
Looks like they've got one or two other German resources which I'll check out when I get some spare time. To their informal ways of signing a letter, I would add "(ganz) liebe Grüße" or just "Lg" as this is the way all my German speaking friends sign off in their letters. They are all Austrian, so perhaps this is a southern German thing.
Just one final note - today I did the online Goethe B2 test's written practice where you need to correct the mistakes in someone else's letter and got 8 out of 10. I plan on doing the writing practice questions in this section soon and asking my friends to make comments. Hopefully constructive ones!
Oh, and one really final thing - bad news on the speaking practice front. One of my Austrian friends will be too busy until mid-January to meet up so I'll need to keep up my practice with my workmate and also use the time to do more written type practice, which I also sorely need anyway...
I do think this should be the impetus for finding a new practice partner at my work - I'll reach out again and see what happens!
http://www.oxfordlanguagedictionaries.com/Public/PublicResources.html?direction=b-de-en&sp=S/oldo/resources/de/Writing_Letters_in_German.html
Looks like they've got one or two other German resources which I'll check out when I get some spare time. To their informal ways of signing a letter, I would add "(ganz) liebe Grüße" or just "Lg" as this is the way all my German speaking friends sign off in their letters. They are all Austrian, so perhaps this is a southern German thing.
Just one final note - today I did the online Goethe B2 test's written practice where you need to correct the mistakes in someone else's letter and got 8 out of 10. I plan on doing the writing practice questions in this section soon and asking my friends to make comments. Hopefully constructive ones!
Oh, and one really final thing - bad news on the speaking practice front. One of my Austrian friends will be too busy until mid-January to meet up so I'll need to keep up my practice with my workmate and also use the time to do more written type practice, which I also sorely need anyway...
I do think this should be the impetus for finding a new practice partner at my work - I'll reach out again and see what happens!
Friday, November 25, 2011
Goethe Zertifikat B2 Hörverstehen looking good!
In my last post I mentioned that I had tried Aufgabe 1 from the online Goethe Zertifikat B2 Hörverstehen test and I got 8 out of 10. I only listened to the audio once as per test conditions, so I was pretty happy. Today I did Aufgabe 2. I relistened to two of the segments. I understood them reasonably well, but I just wasn't able to figure out the right answer. I guess you could say that means I'm still not 100% there, and I would totally agree with that :-) Anyway, given that I listened twice to some segments (whereas in the real exam you would hear the whole thing once, and then each segment only once) I did at least get a good score: 13.5 out of 15 (that means 9 correct out of 10 questions). Ironically the only question I got wrong is one I changed after listening to the audio a second time. Let that be a lesson to me!
bis zum nächsten Mal!
bis zum nächsten Mal!
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Grüße aus Deutschland!
Just a small post which I've meant to do previously. The Goethe Institut did a series a while ago under this name. It is targetted at A2->B1 level but I often find the interviews hard to understand, and although it seems targetted at high school language learners, I find the tweeness amusing and the format quite useful. Anyway, you can find all the text and audio here:
http://www.goethe.de/lrn/prj/gad/deindex.htm?wt_sc=gad
However, since they are not producing any new episodes, the RSS feed is no longer advertised, but after writing to the person responsible I was told that the feed is still available, so I figured I'd pass it on in case anyone else ever wanted it. I personally find it easier to use the podcast version since it just means selecting a different podcast within the same application on my phone as I drive home, and I could grab the whole lot at once without any fuss. You can find the RSS feed at:
http://media.goethe.de/
On a sidenote, just for the record, I did the first audio exercise in the online B2 sample exam from the Goethe Institut just a short while ago and got 8 out of 10. I lost 2 points on a question which required me to listen to a name being spelled out. I heard the name and immediately wrote out the spelling I thought it would be and so didn't pay proper attention to the actual spelling given. The mistake I made was to write a "v" instead of a "w" which is the sort of mistake I could make under pressure even if I was paying attention, so I'm glad I did the practice test!
http://www.goethe.de/lrn/prj/gad/deindex.htm?wt_sc=gad
However, since they are not producing any new episodes, the RSS feed is no longer advertised, but after writing to the person responsible I was told that the feed is still available, so I figured I'd pass it on in case anyone else ever wanted it. I personally find it easier to use the podcast version since it just means selecting a different podcast within the same application on my phone as I drive home, and I could grab the whole lot at once without any fuss. You can find the RSS feed at:
http://media.goethe.de/
On a sidenote, just for the record, I did the first audio exercise in the online B2 sample exam from the Goethe Institut just a short while ago and got 8 out of 10. I lost 2 points on a question which required me to listen to a name being spelled out. I heard the name and immediately wrote out the spelling I thought it would be and so didn't pay proper attention to the actual spelling given. The mistake I made was to write a "v" instead of a "w" which is the sort of mistake I could make under pressure even if I was paying attention, so I'm glad I did the practice test!
Some movies, some fairy tales, and some grammar drills...
Sorry the updates have been slow. I've been busy with a whole bunch of things, including a new job and renovations to my house.
The title says it all... Well, some of it. I've watched some (well, three) movies in German recently. Two had subtitles (The Downfall and Das Boot) and one didn't (Nowhere in Africa). It was cool to finally see that famous scene with correct subtitles. It's a brillilantly acted movie and really well put together. "Nowhere in Africa" (Nirgendwo in Afrika) had no subtitles which actually worked great while they were speaking German, but a good, solid third of the movie is in Swahili. Not having subtitles made these sections somewhat tricky to follow :-|
That was all a while ago now - maybe more than a month. I really should find some more to watch and get back into it, since it's something I really enjoyed. I've come to the conclusion that watching the movies without (English) subtitles is the best way to go because I can't stop myself reading them if they're available and they make my thought process switch back to English which breaks my flow of understanding.
After watching these movies, I went through my collection of DVDs for movies and TV shows and discovered that several of them offer either German subtitles or German language soundtracks, or both (some classic Monty Python movies and Fawlty Towers being amongst them). I don't know why it took me so long to think of this as a source of German content, but now that I have found them, and when I move back into my house (in a few weeks - after the renovations) I will find the time to watch some of them.
I still listen to German every day - downloaded podcasts mainly of the general news, and lots science news as well. And when I don't feel like doing that, I listen to Rammstein or Unheilig of course! One important thing to note is that you really need to concentrate to make this time worthwhile. The audio must have your attention, otherwise it's doing nothing.
As for fairy tales, well, my daughter was given a beautiful German-language edition of the Grimm Brothers' fairy tales and I've been reading them to her every few nights. She really seems to enjoy it which is pretty cool. I've also had a sneaky read of a few on my own. By and large, I understand them very well, but there is some unusual and old-fashioned language in fairy tales which, coupled with my only intermediate German, means that I don't understand every word, but I always understand every story pretty well and sometimes pretty much perfectly. Reassuring, since they're targetted at little kids!
As for grammar drills, I've worked through a few more questions in Lesetraining B2 (in fact, I just finished Aufgabe 4, question 4 and got 10/10 during my lunch break today and added some new words to my Anki list) as well as grammar drills from "German Grammar Drills". I don't consider this necessary for speaking confidently in the language at an early stage, but it's certainly helpful for polishing off the (very) rough edges and pretty much vital in preparing for the exam itself. I actually feel like my speaking has become more flowing as a result, probably because I feel more confident that I have reduced my more obvious errors. If you're at an intermediate level and haven't done much in the way of grammar drills so far, I highly recommend doing so.
One important change in the last one or two weeks is that I've been adding vocabulary at least every few days to my Anki list. To increase my vocabulary I really need to be learning new words every day. Sounds obvious, but unless I'm making a conscious effort to add new words to my Anki list, I'm really only in a holding pattern. However, when I do make this effort and get the words into my Anki list, I only have to make sure that I do the list every day to make sure I'm learning the new words properly and maintaining old words. New words come from everywhere - Lesetraining B2, Deutsche Welle articles, Der Spiegel, from podcasts or the SBS radio program. Speaking of Der Spiegel, if you're an intermediate learner I highly recommend it. I've been finding that I understand most of the vocabulary in the articles and can figure out most of the rest fairly easily. For some reason, I don't find all Deutsche Welle articles as easy to understand as the one that was the subject of my last post, but most Der Spiegel articles present few problems. And, of course, when I have the opportunity, I add unknown words to my Anki list.
And no, I haven't yet decided on when I'll do the B2 exam *sigh*. I should finish my preparatory books first I think at a minimum before I fork out the $230!
The title says it all... Well, some of it. I've watched some (well, three) movies in German recently. Two had subtitles (The Downfall and Das Boot) and one didn't (Nowhere in Africa). It was cool to finally see that famous scene with correct subtitles. It's a brillilantly acted movie and really well put together. "Nowhere in Africa" (Nirgendwo in Afrika) had no subtitles which actually worked great while they were speaking German, but a good, solid third of the movie is in Swahili. Not having subtitles made these sections somewhat tricky to follow :-|
That was all a while ago now - maybe more than a month. I really should find some more to watch and get back into it, since it's something I really enjoyed. I've come to the conclusion that watching the movies without (English) subtitles is the best way to go because I can't stop myself reading them if they're available and they make my thought process switch back to English which breaks my flow of understanding.
After watching these movies, I went through my collection of DVDs for movies and TV shows and discovered that several of them offer either German subtitles or German language soundtracks, or both (some classic Monty Python movies and Fawlty Towers being amongst them). I don't know why it took me so long to think of this as a source of German content, but now that I have found them, and when I move back into my house (in a few weeks - after the renovations) I will find the time to watch some of them.
I still listen to German every day - downloaded podcasts mainly of the general news, and lots science news as well. And when I don't feel like doing that, I listen to Rammstein or Unheilig of course! One important thing to note is that you really need to concentrate to make this time worthwhile. The audio must have your attention, otherwise it's doing nothing.
As for fairy tales, well, my daughter was given a beautiful German-language edition of the Grimm Brothers' fairy tales and I've been reading them to her every few nights. She really seems to enjoy it which is pretty cool. I've also had a sneaky read of a few on my own. By and large, I understand them very well, but there is some unusual and old-fashioned language in fairy tales which, coupled with my only intermediate German, means that I don't understand every word, but I always understand every story pretty well and sometimes pretty much perfectly. Reassuring, since they're targetted at little kids!
As for grammar drills, I've worked through a few more questions in Lesetraining B2 (in fact, I just finished Aufgabe 4, question 4 and got 10/10 during my lunch break today and added some new words to my Anki list) as well as grammar drills from "German Grammar Drills". I don't consider this necessary for speaking confidently in the language at an early stage, but it's certainly helpful for polishing off the (very) rough edges and pretty much vital in preparing for the exam itself. I actually feel like my speaking has become more flowing as a result, probably because I feel more confident that I have reduced my more obvious errors. If you're at an intermediate level and haven't done much in the way of grammar drills so far, I highly recommend doing so.
One important change in the last one or two weeks is that I've been adding vocabulary at least every few days to my Anki list. To increase my vocabulary I really need to be learning new words every day. Sounds obvious, but unless I'm making a conscious effort to add new words to my Anki list, I'm really only in a holding pattern. However, when I do make this effort and get the words into my Anki list, I only have to make sure that I do the list every day to make sure I'm learning the new words properly and maintaining old words. New words come from everywhere - Lesetraining B2, Deutsche Welle articles, Der Spiegel, from podcasts or the SBS radio program. Speaking of Der Spiegel, if you're an intermediate learner I highly recommend it. I've been finding that I understand most of the vocabulary in the articles and can figure out most of the rest fairly easily. For some reason, I don't find all Deutsche Welle articles as easy to understand as the one that was the subject of my last post, but most Der Spiegel articles present few problems. And, of course, when I have the opportunity, I add unknown words to my Anki list.
And no, I haven't yet decided on when I'll do the B2 exam *sigh*. I should finish my preparatory books first I think at a minimum before I fork out the $230!
Friday, October 7, 2011
When to do the exam, and which to do?
Lately, I've been giving more thought to when to do the Goethe-Zertifikat B2. I originally said, quite boldly, that I would sit the exam in mid-July. That's almost 3 months ago.
So what happened?
Pretty simple really - I realised I just wasn't ready.
I didn't start regular speaking practice until just shortly before my target exam date. I did try to line up some speaking practice earlier which didn't pan out so well, but in recent times I've formed some good friendships which mean the practice is usually twice a week with two different groups of people (for 1 to 3 hours). Unfortunately, due to preparations for my daughter's 1st birthday on the weekend and a public holiday on Monday, I haven't had any speaking practice yet this week, though I expect to on Sunday to compensate a little. This has been really excellent preparation. In one of my weekly sessions, my language partner writes down words I don't know and some other useful information, which I later transfer into my Anki list. This is the same as what I do with words I don't know from Lesetraining B2. At the moment, I have a little catching up to do on both, but that's mainly because I've recently made faster progress than ever before in Lesetraining B2 (which isn't saying much) and I've finally finished Test 3 in the first part of the book (preparing for the exams). The main problem I have is still just vocab, vocab, vocab, and adding words that I didn't know pretty much straight away to my Anki list and really helped me hang on to those gains!
I've heard it said often that the jump between B1 and B2 is a really significant step in terms of understanding and vocabulary. For me, I still need to keep working on my vocab and recall (through regular use) and I'll hit this goal for certain.
I'll keep this policy of focusing on one type of study per week (not including listening to the news, science programs, etc as podcasts and meeting up with my German speaking friends) until I decide on a date for the exam at which time I'll probably mix it up more during the week. I'm focusing on Lesetraining B2 currently. I'll probably do that all of next week as well before just doing some grammar reading and drills for a few weeks.
One other reason I haven't decided exactly when I'll sit the exam is that I've got my fingers well and truly crossed in the hope of winning a competition being run by the Goethe Institut in Australia. The prize is a return flight to Berlin, a month's accomodation, and a month-long language course - winner's choice, of course! I am, obviously, not pinning all my hopes on this going my way, but I am hopeful :-) I'll make a sensible decision on timelines once the winner (hopefully me!) has been announced at the end of this month.
And sorry, entries are closed!
As for the second part of the title of this post, which exam to do, I am still planning on doing the Goethe-Zertifikat B2 because I think that's the level I can honestly achieve with the time and focus I can bring to the task. However, I just realised that the price for sitting the exam in Sydney is the same as sitting the Deutsch als Fremdsprache test, which gives a ranking (roughly speaking) from B2 to C1 level. It is also used, along with the result, as the basis for entry into numerous German University courses. Not that I have any use for that, and I also don't think I'll reach a level that far above B2 to make it worthwhile, but still... The price is the same, and the study would be pretty similar, so... Maybe...
Plenty to think about while I keep plugging away!
So what happened?
Pretty simple really - I realised I just wasn't ready.
I didn't start regular speaking practice until just shortly before my target exam date. I did try to line up some speaking practice earlier which didn't pan out so well, but in recent times I've formed some good friendships which mean the practice is usually twice a week with two different groups of people (for 1 to 3 hours). Unfortunately, due to preparations for my daughter's 1st birthday on the weekend and a public holiday on Monday, I haven't had any speaking practice yet this week, though I expect to on Sunday to compensate a little. This has been really excellent preparation. In one of my weekly sessions, my language partner writes down words I don't know and some other useful information, which I later transfer into my Anki list. This is the same as what I do with words I don't know from Lesetraining B2. At the moment, I have a little catching up to do on both, but that's mainly because I've recently made faster progress than ever before in Lesetraining B2 (which isn't saying much) and I've finally finished Test 3 in the first part of the book (preparing for the exams). The main problem I have is still just vocab, vocab, vocab, and adding words that I didn't know pretty much straight away to my Anki list and really helped me hang on to those gains!
I've heard it said often that the jump between B1 and B2 is a really significant step in terms of understanding and vocabulary. For me, I still need to keep working on my vocab and recall (through regular use) and I'll hit this goal for certain.
I'll keep this policy of focusing on one type of study per week (not including listening to the news, science programs, etc as podcasts and meeting up with my German speaking friends) until I decide on a date for the exam at which time I'll probably mix it up more during the week. I'm focusing on Lesetraining B2 currently. I'll probably do that all of next week as well before just doing some grammar reading and drills for a few weeks.
One other reason I haven't decided exactly when I'll sit the exam is that I've got my fingers well and truly crossed in the hope of winning a competition being run by the Goethe Institut in Australia. The prize is a return flight to Berlin, a month's accomodation, and a month-long language course - winner's choice, of course! I am, obviously, not pinning all my hopes on this going my way, but I am hopeful :-) I'll make a sensible decision on timelines once the winner (hopefully me!) has been announced at the end of this month.
And sorry, entries are closed!
As for the second part of the title of this post, which exam to do, I am still planning on doing the Goethe-Zertifikat B2 because I think that's the level I can honestly achieve with the time and focus I can bring to the task. However, I just realised that the price for sitting the exam in Sydney is the same as sitting the Deutsch als Fremdsprache test, which gives a ranking (roughly speaking) from B2 to C1 level. It is also used, along with the result, as the basis for entry into numerous German University courses. Not that I have any use for that, and I also don't think I'll reach a level that far above B2 to make it worthwhile, but still... The price is the same, and the study would be pretty similar, so... Maybe...
Plenty to think about while I keep plugging away!
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Back from a break in my German studies...
A couple of weeks ago I was feeling overwhelmed. I seemed to have tracked down all sorts of good sources for German learning and material, I was listening to it as I drove, I was keeping up with my Anki reviews, and meeting up with my German-speaking friends.
But one day I realised that I felt like I was just spinning my wheels.
So, I decided to stop studying, stop worrying about Anki, and for the first week I didn't even listen to German as I drove around. I still met up with my German-speaking friends, but I didn't study. In the second week, I started listening again to German radio and podcasts as I drove, but still no other study, and I allowed myself to feel happy with not listening to German in every available moment.
Now, I must say that I really enjoy my German study time, but the break felt great. I managed to get through three books that have been calling to me on my shelf for quite some time now, waiting to be read. And I still had fun speaking German with my friends.
It allowed me to realise that I was unfocused precisely because I had so much available to me. This is a part-time project. I'm not throwing every minute I have into, nor will I ever. There's a lot of other stuff I also want to keep doing, including reading English books, training for some more upcoming events, spending time with my family, and even relaxing on occasion. And besides, I was making little headway through my study options due to my lack of progress.
My new rules/goals for study are:
* keep up with Anki (I have to catch up first, of course!). This isn't too much of a commitment once I'm caught up
* one source of study per week
* keep up my German conversations
* listen to German radio, podcasts and watch German TV whenever I feel like it and have a chance
I feel better about it already - like perhaps soon I'll be able to see my way through to the original goal of sitting the B2 exam! :-)
In the spirit of these new rules, I did some book study this morning. I did exercise 2 of Aufgabe 4 in Lesetraining B2. It was one of the types of exercise I seem to struggle with a lot - filling in the blank words in an article. I got 6 out of 10, and it didn't take long, so I was reasonably happy, actually. Most of the vocabulary felt very familiar, which is a big improvement over when I started!
Heading off now to meet my Austrian friends for our Thursday evening catchup.
bis nächsten Mal!
But one day I realised that I felt like I was just spinning my wheels.
So, I decided to stop studying, stop worrying about Anki, and for the first week I didn't even listen to German as I drove around. I still met up with my German-speaking friends, but I didn't study. In the second week, I started listening again to German radio and podcasts as I drove, but still no other study, and I allowed myself to feel happy with not listening to German in every available moment.
Now, I must say that I really enjoy my German study time, but the break felt great. I managed to get through three books that have been calling to me on my shelf for quite some time now, waiting to be read. And I still had fun speaking German with my friends.
It allowed me to realise that I was unfocused precisely because I had so much available to me. This is a part-time project. I'm not throwing every minute I have into, nor will I ever. There's a lot of other stuff I also want to keep doing, including reading English books, training for some more upcoming events, spending time with my family, and even relaxing on occasion. And besides, I was making little headway through my study options due to my lack of progress.
My new rules/goals for study are:
* keep up with Anki (I have to catch up first, of course!). This isn't too much of a commitment once I'm caught up
* one source of study per week
* keep up my German conversations
* listen to German radio, podcasts and watch German TV whenever I feel like it and have a chance
I feel better about it already - like perhaps soon I'll be able to see my way through to the original goal of sitting the B2 exam! :-)
In the spirit of these new rules, I did some book study this morning. I did exercise 2 of Aufgabe 4 in Lesetraining B2. It was one of the types of exercise I seem to struggle with a lot - filling in the blank words in an article. I got 6 out of 10, and it didn't take long, so I was reasonably happy, actually. Most of the vocabulary felt very familiar, which is a big improvement over when I started!
Heading off now to meet my Austrian friends for our Thursday evening catchup.
bis nächsten Mal!
Friday, September 9, 2011
Podcast addiction...
I'm a bit of a latecomer to the podcast game, considering that I never saw the point in giving mp3's another name. Well, it's mp3 + RSS - how very Apple to name them i-something or pod-something.
Just recently, I discovered how useful RSS is for finding the latest episode in a series or the latest news. I used to like to listen to streaming radio, but I don't have access to it when I'm driving. Podcasts fix that problem Apart from a good selection on Deutsche Welle, I discovered dradio as well which has a good environment program and a really excellent science show (Wissenschaft in Brennpunkt). Links to their science show articles are here.
Of course, it's an addiction. There's only so much time available in a day to really focus on listening, after which it becomes background noise. I don't believe in passive listening, but I do leave it playing at times when I focused on other activities (especially at work) because I get a chance to focus every now and then, and I can take advantage of those little moments. I listen to good articles multiple times.
I did a little self-assessment recently, just on the basis of my own comfort level in certain activities, and I came up as B1 level for everything except speaking which was somehow B2. My speaking still feels pretty bad, so that doesn't leave much hope for everything else...
Just recently, I discovered how useful RSS is for finding the latest episode in a series or the latest news. I used to like to listen to streaming radio, but I don't have access to it when I'm driving. Podcasts fix that problem Apart from a good selection on Deutsche Welle, I discovered dradio as well which has a good environment program and a really excellent science show (Wissenschaft in Brennpunkt). Links to their science show articles are here.
Of course, it's an addiction. There's only so much time available in a day to really focus on listening, after which it becomes background noise. I don't believe in passive listening, but I do leave it playing at times when I focused on other activities (especially at work) because I get a chance to focus every now and then, and I can take advantage of those little moments. I listen to good articles multiple times.
I did a little self-assessment recently, just on the basis of my own comfort level in certain activities, and I came up as B1 level for everything except speaking which was somehow B2. My speaking still feels pretty bad, so that doesn't leave much hope for everything else...
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
German grammar puzzles...
I've been looking for a good website for German grammar puzzles. Not because I'm into that kind of thing, but because I'm looking to practice the sorts of problems that students who attend German classes would be given and hence, the sorts of problems that would appear in the B2 exam (without exhausting the limited supply of free test material from the Goethe Institute).
I found a few websites but none of them really did "it" for me. One good one full of free exercises is here, but these need to be printed out. Good for times without an internet connection I suppose, but somewhat limited for my purposes, especially since I would need to mark by hand.
However, I recently found the DaF practice site of Ralf Kinas and this has exactly the sorts of questions I really seem to struggle with in the practice papers. Brilliant! On the left hand side you can see a list of options under Online-Übungen, and I've been having a go at some from the first item in the list - grammar/vocab.
Of course, the marking is automatic. Some even come with a "Tipp" (hint) button. Brilliant. If you're looking to do the B2 exam or DaF exam anytime soon, this looks like a great place for some practice.
Let us all know if you have any personal favourite example exam problem websites!
I found a few websites but none of them really did "it" for me. One good one full of free exercises is here, but these need to be printed out. Good for times without an internet connection I suppose, but somewhat limited for my purposes, especially since I would need to mark by hand.
However, I recently found the DaF practice site of Ralf Kinas and this has exactly the sorts of questions I really seem to struggle with in the practice papers. Brilliant! On the left hand side you can see a list of options under Online-Übungen, and I've been having a go at some from the first item in the list - grammar/vocab.
Of course, the marking is automatic. Some even come with a "Tipp" (hint) button. Brilliant. If you're looking to do the B2 exam or DaF exam anytime soon, this looks like a great place for some practice.
Let us all know if you have any personal favourite example exam problem websites!
Monday, August 22, 2011
Quick update...
It's been quite a while since I've posted here at all, so it's time for a quick update. First things first - I completed the City2Surf with the flu and pushing my daugher in her pram, so now the training isn't such a high priority, though I'm going to try to keep up a good rhythm regardless so I'm better prepared the next time I want to start training for a specific event.
I still haven't decided on a new goal date for doing the B2 exam. I feel that lately I've really been getting some good speaking practice, and that I probably need to do that for several months along with other preparation in order to have a proper chance. Most weeks I still get my two changes for chatting in German - once with a couple of work colleagues, and once with a couple of friends outside of work. The actual average number of times for each has been about 3 times out of 4 weeks because, well, shit happens. People are volunteering their time to help me, so the sessions aren't fixed in stone, of course.
My friends outside of work also help me by writing down words I don't know and the translations. Later I take these words and add them to my Anki list, and just tonight I got fully up to date in this process which feels pretty good. In fact, any time I am near a computer and I learn a new word (for example, when translating something or reading email from German-speaking friends) I add that word to my Anki list, usually along with some close synonyms. Something else I always do for my own list, which I think is particularly important, is include the definite article (which shows gender - always learn German words with their gender!) AND their plural (since these are quite irregular in German). Since I've been doing this, I've been much more confident over the gender and plural of new words, which is very important.
I've been doing well in keeping up with my Anki practice lately - it helps that I've been able to access my work's guest network on my phone again! This has also allowed me to listen to a lot more Deutsche Welle throughout the day. And of course, I've been listening to the German programme on SBS radio every morning as I drive to work and its on, which is 3 times per week usually, but less on average because sometimes I miss it by going to work too early.
I've also done a little more from Lesetraining B2, mainly just adding words to my Anki list, but I'm currently halfway through Test 2, Aufgabe 3. This is something I intend to work back into my routine somehow. I also plan on working through as many of the problems as I can in the workbooks my Austrian friends bought to help me. This would mostly be grammatical exercises, but this would be great to help make my slightly nebulous knowledge clearer. I also think that, in the exam, there are a few question types which can be answered almost by just knowing textbook grammar answers off-by-heart, so if I can do this and get a few easy points, as well as shave off some of my many rough edges, then I'm all for it.
I haven't continued with Perfectionnement Allemand, mainly due to my current lesson being quite strange and boring. Make that - very strange, and not in a fun way. In the sort of way that makes you feel confused even when you understand it. I'm pretty close to just skipping it and not completing it in my usual way (of "shadowing" the speakers until I am word perfect at their pace) which would give me something extra to use while I'm driving to and from work. At the moment while I drive, I listen to a few articles I've downloaded and translated, or German music. Some more variety would do me good!
So, the plan now is to keep plodding on, making time to meet up with people for a good chat, and getting some more grammar-book style practice problems to start drilling these important details into my head!
When I figure out a good new target date for the exam, I'll update it here, of course...
I still haven't decided on a new goal date for doing the B2 exam. I feel that lately I've really been getting some good speaking practice, and that I probably need to do that for several months along with other preparation in order to have a proper chance. Most weeks I still get my two changes for chatting in German - once with a couple of work colleagues, and once with a couple of friends outside of work. The actual average number of times for each has been about 3 times out of 4 weeks because, well, shit happens. People are volunteering their time to help me, so the sessions aren't fixed in stone, of course.
My friends outside of work also help me by writing down words I don't know and the translations. Later I take these words and add them to my Anki list, and just tonight I got fully up to date in this process which feels pretty good. In fact, any time I am near a computer and I learn a new word (for example, when translating something or reading email from German-speaking friends) I add that word to my Anki list, usually along with some close synonyms. Something else I always do for my own list, which I think is particularly important, is include the definite article (which shows gender - always learn German words with their gender!) AND their plural (since these are quite irregular in German). Since I've been doing this, I've been much more confident over the gender and plural of new words, which is very important.
I've been doing well in keeping up with my Anki practice lately - it helps that I've been able to access my work's guest network on my phone again! This has also allowed me to listen to a lot more Deutsche Welle throughout the day. And of course, I've been listening to the German programme on SBS radio every morning as I drive to work and its on, which is 3 times per week usually, but less on average because sometimes I miss it by going to work too early.
I've also done a little more from Lesetraining B2, mainly just adding words to my Anki list, but I'm currently halfway through Test 2, Aufgabe 3. This is something I intend to work back into my routine somehow. I also plan on working through as many of the problems as I can in the workbooks my Austrian friends bought to help me. This would mostly be grammatical exercises, but this would be great to help make my slightly nebulous knowledge clearer. I also think that, in the exam, there are a few question types which can be answered almost by just knowing textbook grammar answers off-by-heart, so if I can do this and get a few easy points, as well as shave off some of my many rough edges, then I'm all for it.
I haven't continued with Perfectionnement Allemand, mainly due to my current lesson being quite strange and boring. Make that - very strange, and not in a fun way. In the sort of way that makes you feel confused even when you understand it. I'm pretty close to just skipping it and not completing it in my usual way (of "shadowing" the speakers until I am word perfect at their pace) which would give me something extra to use while I'm driving to and from work. At the moment while I drive, I listen to a few articles I've downloaded and translated, or German music. Some more variety would do me good!
So, the plan now is to keep plodding on, making time to meet up with people for a good chat, and getting some more grammar-book style practice problems to start drilling these important details into my head!
When I figure out a good new target date for the exam, I'll update it here, of course...
Monday, July 18, 2011
Update on Anki...
A long time ago I posted about how I use Anki. I never really updated that in detail, but I ended up doing much less with it. I currently just use two decks - one I downloaded from the public lists (German Intermediate to Advanced) and one I am making myself. For the latter, I originally intended it would just be words I didn't know in Lesetraining B2, but lately I have been using it for basically all new words - when I'm reading the news, or listening to German radio, or when after I've had a conversation with my German-speaking friends. I've found that the words that I add myself stick much better. The public list I downloaded has a lot more words than my own (currently) but I often find that they don't stick very well because they are context-free and sometimes vague or contradictory to what I already know. Still, I kept going with this big list and recently finally got to the stage where I have no more new words to learn - it's all revising from here and MAN, does it go faster now. I find it no problem to revise both my lists within just 15 or so minutes spread throughout the day.
So I've realised something... When learning an Anki list for the first time, don't try to learn too many lists at the same time if you're time poor. You'll just end up doing badly at all of them. However, now that I've finished the initial phase of learning the list, I can see that I could easily start learning another list without the first one being too much of a cost time-wise.
Not that I plan to add more lists. I will just keep expanding my own list as I do more from Lesetraining, and learn more from conversations, radio, etc.
I am now past my original deadline, and am still in the phase of deciding on how to reach my goal now that I should have a good idea of what's left to achieve. One idea I toyed with was completing Perfectionnement Allemand after all, aiming to be at a book-learning level of C1, which would help push me into a higher confidence level for the B2 test, hopefully...
I resumed my Stammtisch at work this week after a couple of weeks without it, and I'll also hopefully resume my in-person German conversation classes with my Austrian friends this Thursday. Fingers crossed. I am looking to ramp up my studies again now that I've got a bit of a rhythm with my training for the City2Surf in mid-August!
So I've realised something... When learning an Anki list for the first time, don't try to learn too many lists at the same time if you're time poor. You'll just end up doing badly at all of them. However, now that I've finished the initial phase of learning the list, I can see that I could easily start learning another list without the first one being too much of a cost time-wise.
Not that I plan to add more lists. I will just keep expanding my own list as I do more from Lesetraining, and learn more from conversations, radio, etc.
I am now past my original deadline, and am still in the phase of deciding on how to reach my goal now that I should have a good idea of what's left to achieve. One idea I toyed with was completing Perfectionnement Allemand after all, aiming to be at a book-learning level of C1, which would help push me into a higher confidence level for the B2 test, hopefully...
I resumed my Stammtisch at work this week after a couple of weeks without it, and I'll also hopefully resume my in-person German conversation classes with my Austrian friends this Thursday. Fingers crossed. I am looking to ramp up my studies again now that I've got a bit of a rhythm with my training for the City2Surf in mid-August!
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Ich will...
One of the best ever songs for revving up a crowd at the start of a concert just has to be Rammstein's "Ich will". But not only is it a great pumping song, it's also a veritable treasure trove of practice for your German grammar, viz:
Ich will eure Stimmen hören
Ich will die Ruhe stören
Ich will dass ihr mich gut seht
Ich will dass ihr mich versteht
You get to practice the less-used "ihr" forms of the verb and pronouns, as well as some honest-to-goodness word order practice. It just gets better and better too:
Seht ihr mich?
Versteht ihr mich?
Fühlt ihr mich?
Hört ihr mich?
Könnt ihr mich hören?
Wir hören dich
Könnt ihr mich sehen?
Wir sehen dich
Könnt ihr mich fühlen?
Wir fühlen dich
Ich versteh euch nicht
Fantastic! "Do you see me?" followed by "Can you see me?".
The song then finishes off with some practice for the "wir/uns" forms (we/us). I mean, what more could you ask for?
Seriously, if you haven't listened to Rammstein yet and you're learning German, it's time to get with the program. Start with "Ich will" and go from there :-)
Got any other favourite German music which you think is helpful for your German? Let us all know in the comments!
Ich will eure Stimmen hören
Ich will die Ruhe stören
Ich will dass ihr mich gut seht
Ich will dass ihr mich versteht
You get to practice the less-used "ihr" forms of the verb and pronouns, as well as some honest-to-goodness word order practice. It just gets better and better too:
Seht ihr mich?
Versteht ihr mich?
Fühlt ihr mich?
Hört ihr mich?
Könnt ihr mich hören?
Wir hören dich
Könnt ihr mich sehen?
Wir sehen dich
Könnt ihr mich fühlen?
Wir fühlen dich
Ich versteh euch nicht
Fantastic! "Do you see me?" followed by "Can you see me?".
The song then finishes off with some practice for the "wir/uns" forms (we/us). I mean, what more could you ask for?
Seriously, if you haven't listened to Rammstein yet and you're learning German, it's time to get with the program. Start with "Ich will" and go from there :-)
Got any other favourite German music which you think is helpful for your German? Let us all know in the comments!
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Free online tests to assess your German level
In the last couple of days I've tried a couple of online tests to guage my current level. The first one I present here is actually a test to assess for readiness for the Deutsch als Fremdsprache test, which is a B2 level exam, often taken as an entry requirement for German universities. The test can be found here. Here is my result:
![]()
The site says that the further you are into the blue section, the better your chances in the TestDaF. So... my chances would be low, but not terrible. Still, I'd much rather be hitting the top end of this scale before attempting the test!
The other test was from a pretty good website called Deutsch Perfekt. A fair bit of free stuff there, and practice exercises to suit three different levels. Their assessment test gives an indication of which level of material would be most suitable for you. For me it recommended the middle level and said I was somewhere around B1 level. As I wrote some time ago, I have already decided I would be able to pass the B1 exam. So either I'm going nowhere, or my progress has just been quite slow. I do definitely feel I've made progress, but it's not measurably at the next level up yet, unfortunately.
I really feel like B2 level is a significant step up from B1 in terms of fluency of speech and comprehension. Like I've mentioned before, you're supposed to understand most of what's going on in a German movie by B2, and I'm not there yet!
Ihr Ergebnis im Lückentest und Ihre Chancen beim TestDaF
Sie haben 19 Punkte erreicht.
The site says that the further you are into the blue section, the better your chances in the TestDaF. So... my chances would be low, but not terrible. Still, I'd much rather be hitting the top end of this scale before attempting the test!
The other test was from a pretty good website called Deutsch Perfekt. A fair bit of free stuff there, and practice exercises to suit three different levels. Their assessment test gives an indication of which level of material would be most suitable for you. For me it recommended the middle level and said I was somewhere around B1 level. As I wrote some time ago, I have already decided I would be able to pass the B1 exam. So either I'm going nowhere, or my progress has just been quite slow. I do definitely feel I've made progress, but it's not measurably at the next level up yet, unfortunately.
I really feel like B2 level is a significant step up from B1 in terms of fluency of speech and comprehension. Like I've mentioned before, you're supposed to understand most of what's going on in a German movie by B2, and I'm not there yet!
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
A chance encounter...
I recently had a chance encounter in a park which improved my confidence in German a little. I was playing with my daughter in our local park when a young girl came up and wanted to play on the see-saw too, so she climbed on board. Her dad came over and watched her and then a group of three women, busily chatting away loud enough for me to realise that it was obviously in German... Then the father also spoke a little German with his daughter.
Here was my chance...
When they went to the swings, after a little encouragement from my wife, my daughter and I went too, and as we were playing on the swings I decided to strike up a conversation with the father. I spoke to him in English first once, and then I said in German "So, you are all German, right?". He looked a little surprised, so it took him a second to switch to speaking German with me, but then we had a brief conversation about where he was from, where and when I started learning German, etc. He even made a comment about my German being good for the amount of time I had been learning it. All very brief and simple, and then his daughter was off to the next piece of play equipment :-)
The best part about it was just that I was very relaxed and starting speaking with him in German as though it's the most normal thing in the world. Which it is, of course, except that it has taken me a while to realise that! Even when I speak with my Austrian friends who are very friendly and supportive, before that meeting I was almost never relaxed and flowing, even when I was speaking about familiar things. The next evening I had another briliant class with Lene and I felt much more comfortable speaking in German, especially when it was about something familiar. I made more chit-chat and had less awkward moments where I stopped to think of what to say. It was a geniune step-change in my output. It hasn't become fluent at all, but I definitely have felt the change and it was a great feeling. It's hard to relax and let the words come out on their own, but I can feel that bit-by-bit my speaking is actually improving.
I'm sure I'll feel like I've gone backwards again sometime in the future, but hopefully I'll have had two steps forward by then!
Here was my chance...
When they went to the swings, after a little encouragement from my wife, my daughter and I went too, and as we were playing on the swings I decided to strike up a conversation with the father. I spoke to him in English first once, and then I said in German "So, you are all German, right?". He looked a little surprised, so it took him a second to switch to speaking German with me, but then we had a brief conversation about where he was from, where and when I started learning German, etc. He even made a comment about my German being good for the amount of time I had been learning it. All very brief and simple, and then his daughter was off to the next piece of play equipment :-)
The best part about it was just that I was very relaxed and starting speaking with him in German as though it's the most normal thing in the world. Which it is, of course, except that it has taken me a while to realise that! Even when I speak with my Austrian friends who are very friendly and supportive, before that meeting I was almost never relaxed and flowing, even when I was speaking about familiar things. The next evening I had another briliant class with Lene and I felt much more comfortable speaking in German, especially when it was about something familiar. I made more chit-chat and had less awkward moments where I stopped to think of what to say. It was a geniune step-change in my output. It hasn't become fluent at all, but I definitely have felt the change and it was a great feeling. It's hard to relax and let the words come out on their own, but I can feel that bit-by-bit my speaking is actually improving.
I'm sure I'll feel like I've gone backwards again sometime in the future, but hopefully I'll have had two steps forward by then!
Friday, July 1, 2011
The best language teacher I've ever had...
Given the current trend in language learning blogs, you might think this is one of those pap-psychology motivational posts that do the rounds. You might be expecting me to answer this question with "an iPad", "Book X", "blog X", "method X", or just "YOU".
Well... It's not.
The story of an ordinary person just learning language in a fairly ordinary way in his spare time as much as possible isn't really very interesting. At least, it's not particularly motivational.
No. This isn't a motivational.
Sometimes in life you just get lucky. In the case of my language learning, I was lucky enough that the first people I reached out to to practice German with were all lovely people and very helpful. In fact, the first 4 people. After that my luck started to wear thin.
As I mentioned earlier, I wrote to three people at my work to see if they would like to meet up for some German conversation at lunchtimes. One replied, and has been incredibly helpful and accomodating by meeting me once a week for the last few weeks. I got silence from the other two. I was never sure if they had received my email and decided not to reply, or just couldn't be bothered.
Well, a funny thing happened today while waiting for the lift. A co-worker started making idle conversation while we waited, and I asked him where his accent was from (just to be polite, and because it was quite weak). He said he was German, and I said "ahh, really, because I'm learning German at the moment". That was the point where we both realised that he was one of the silent Germans I wrote to! He made some funny excuse about being busy, etc, and I told him not to worry, it was totally optional anyway. I mean, I don't expect anything from other people. There is no obligation to help me, after all! Still, it was funny to watch him squirm a little :-)
After making his excuses for not replying, he then asked me rather pointedly "so why are you learning German?". I don't think he was particularly interested - more like he thought I was nuts. I asked him what was wrong with German to which he replied "oh nothing, I just find it strange." Fair enough :-)
I don't expect to be hearing back from him any time soon.
Anyway, on to my update. I haven't posted anything for a while, but I haven't done anything much either, so that's a nice balance. I did eventually finish lesson 16 in Perfectionnement Allemand and have now been on lesson 17 for a while. I listen to the audio for it along with a few other bits of German audio, but I haven't made much progress. I have in the back of my mind that I would like to add words from some previous lessons to my Anki review list, but that might just be an excuse. This week has been quite a poor weak for work most days due to my daughter being quite ill with the flu, with the intendent sleepless nights that caused for us.
HOWEVER, I did have my Stammtisch at work on Monday (which really felt like torture for her, and was therefore quite the confidence deflator for me), and then on Monday night I had my first structured lesson with my Austrian friends. No, I haven't decided to pay for lessons. It just so happens that one of the Austrian couple (Lene) offered to help me out during her university holidays, and I jumped at the chance!
So, I thought we would chat, maybe discuss some general preparation topics, etc. No. When I arrived at their apartment, Lene had prepared quite a lesson! She reviewed all of the email I had ever sent to her or her partner and marked up all of the mistakes. She had also bought a pair of textbooks for me, and printed out a bunch of grammatical notes for me. In addition, she had marked up the textbooks for the pages where my mistakes are explained.
To say I was shocked would be an understatement. A gross understatement. I WAS ASTOUNDED! And, I have to say it, I was a little ashamed because, of late, I have been in somewhat of a malaise and I haven't studied in a properly focused way. Certainly, in the time Lene put in to correct my emails and find references for the mistakes, I hadn't done much.
She also asked me when my exam was, and I had to explain, perhaps a little sheepishly, that I could organise it for any time, and my plan had been the middle of July (now THIS month), but that I felt too far from my goal. Lene and the Hof didn't judge me for my lack of commitment. Basically, this was one of those moments in life were you get lucky. I've had a few, but this is the best I've had in language learning.
So, I feel somewhat reinvigorated with my German. We invited our Austrian friends over for dinner last night, and I also had another lesson, and some chatting. So, this week I've had 3 lengthy conversations (+ 2 one-on-one tutoring sessions) in German. Pretty damn good!
Looking forward, I think I've realised that to hit my goal of the B2 exam I need to focus for a while on getting my grammatical knowledge really clear and formalised, and trying to apply that to better writing skills. My friends can tell me if this is getting better. From a definition of B2 level that I read recently, I should be able to understand German TV and movies to a reasonable extent to be at the required level. I don't get a lot of chances to practice this, but I will search out some German movies without subtitles and find some time for it. I should also be able to enjoy a novel in German, so perhaps this will replace some of my other learning activities. I'd like to make sure I always have something to listen to in during my commute to make use of this dead time, but perhaps that won't always include an Assimil lesson now.
I think in a couple more weeks I should be able to do an honest assessment of how much work I have left to achieve my goal, and so decide on a new timeframe. No point in sitting a test you know you will fail!
Well... It's not.
The story of an ordinary person just learning language in a fairly ordinary way in his spare time as much as possible isn't really very interesting. At least, it's not particularly motivational.
No. This isn't a motivational.
Sometimes in life you just get lucky. In the case of my language learning, I was lucky enough that the first people I reached out to to practice German with were all lovely people and very helpful. In fact, the first 4 people. After that my luck started to wear thin.
As I mentioned earlier, I wrote to three people at my work to see if they would like to meet up for some German conversation at lunchtimes. One replied, and has been incredibly helpful and accomodating by meeting me once a week for the last few weeks. I got silence from the other two. I was never sure if they had received my email and decided not to reply, or just couldn't be bothered.
Well, a funny thing happened today while waiting for the lift. A co-worker started making idle conversation while we waited, and I asked him where his accent was from (just to be polite, and because it was quite weak). He said he was German, and I said "ahh, really, because I'm learning German at the moment". That was the point where we both realised that he was one of the silent Germans I wrote to! He made some funny excuse about being busy, etc, and I told him not to worry, it was totally optional anyway. I mean, I don't expect anything from other people. There is no obligation to help me, after all! Still, it was funny to watch him squirm a little :-)
After making his excuses for not replying, he then asked me rather pointedly "so why are you learning German?". I don't think he was particularly interested - more like he thought I was nuts. I asked him what was wrong with German to which he replied "oh nothing, I just find it strange." Fair enough :-)
I don't expect to be hearing back from him any time soon.
Anyway, on to my update. I haven't posted anything for a while, but I haven't done anything much either, so that's a nice balance. I did eventually finish lesson 16 in Perfectionnement Allemand and have now been on lesson 17 for a while. I listen to the audio for it along with a few other bits of German audio, but I haven't made much progress. I have in the back of my mind that I would like to add words from some previous lessons to my Anki review list, but that might just be an excuse. This week has been quite a poor weak for work most days due to my daughter being quite ill with the flu, with the intendent sleepless nights that caused for us.
HOWEVER, I did have my Stammtisch at work on Monday (which really felt like torture for her, and was therefore quite the confidence deflator for me), and then on Monday night I had my first structured lesson with my Austrian friends. No, I haven't decided to pay for lessons. It just so happens that one of the Austrian couple (Lene) offered to help me out during her university holidays, and I jumped at the chance!
So, I thought we would chat, maybe discuss some general preparation topics, etc. No. When I arrived at their apartment, Lene had prepared quite a lesson! She reviewed all of the email I had ever sent to her or her partner and marked up all of the mistakes. She had also bought a pair of textbooks for me, and printed out a bunch of grammatical notes for me. In addition, she had marked up the textbooks for the pages where my mistakes are explained.
To say I was shocked would be an understatement. A gross understatement. I WAS ASTOUNDED! And, I have to say it, I was a little ashamed because, of late, I have been in somewhat of a malaise and I haven't studied in a properly focused way. Certainly, in the time Lene put in to correct my emails and find references for the mistakes, I hadn't done much.
She also asked me when my exam was, and I had to explain, perhaps a little sheepishly, that I could organise it for any time, and my plan had been the middle of July (now THIS month), but that I felt too far from my goal. Lene and the Hof didn't judge me for my lack of commitment. Basically, this was one of those moments in life were you get lucky. I've had a few, but this is the best I've had in language learning.
So, I feel somewhat reinvigorated with my German. We invited our Austrian friends over for dinner last night, and I also had another lesson, and some chatting. So, this week I've had 3 lengthy conversations (+ 2 one-on-one tutoring sessions) in German. Pretty damn good!
Looking forward, I think I've realised that to hit my goal of the B2 exam I need to focus for a while on getting my grammatical knowledge really clear and formalised, and trying to apply that to better writing skills. My friends can tell me if this is getting better. From a definition of B2 level that I read recently, I should be able to understand German TV and movies to a reasonable extent to be at the required level. I don't get a lot of chances to practice this, but I will search out some German movies without subtitles and find some time for it. I should also be able to enjoy a novel in German, so perhaps this will replace some of my other learning activities. I'd like to make sure I always have something to listen to in during my commute to make use of this dead time, but perhaps that won't always include an Assimil lesson now.
I think in a couple more weeks I should be able to do an honest assessment of how much work I have left to achieve my goal, and so decide on a new timeframe. No point in sitting a test you know you will fail!
Monday, June 20, 2011
Stammtisch...
I met up with my Austrian friend at work, along with the Australian co-worker who's married to an Austrian and speaks German reasonably well. It almost didn't happen because I lost track of time completely, but we got there in the end. My confidence hasn't improved at all, in fact, it might be worse than before. I'm even forgetting things I used to know. Not good. As you might be able to tell, I'm not feeling good about a mid-July target anymore, and I just really haven't found the time lately to make solid progress in my "sit-down" studies. As you may have noticed, I haven't had an Assimil update for a while because, well, I've been slack and I haven't really made any progress. I did a translation a couple of weeks ago of an article with audio, and I've listened to that a bit, and read it a bit too, but nothing really focused. I'm working on a new article at the moment from Deutsche Welle's "Alltagsdeutsch" which I'll hopefully have ready soon.
On the weekend I took "The Hof" along with some other mates on a rogaine. We didn't speak in German much because we spent most of the time as an English speaking group. At the end of a 6-hour rogaine, I tried to chat a little, but I was just shattered. I did learn a new word - "der Hügel" - which I was given as a translation for knoll. Now that I look at it on Linguee I see that perhaps ein Hügel is too big for a knoll. Apparently, the English word knoll is cognate with the German word "die Knolle" which means "tubers, bulbs, lumps". The dictionary.com definition is "a small, rounded hill or eminence; hillock". Linguee gives "die Kuppe, das Hügelchen, niedrieger Hügel". So, yeah, a small hill :-)
This week, the plan is to meet up with my Austrian friends for some more focused German-time, and also to get back into training for the 14km City2Surf here in Sydney. I've decided to count my 20.2km walk+jog on Sunday as my training for last week!
On the weekend I took "The Hof" along with some other mates on a rogaine. We didn't speak in German much because we spent most of the time as an English speaking group. At the end of a 6-hour rogaine, I tried to chat a little, but I was just shattered. I did learn a new word - "der Hügel" - which I was given as a translation for knoll. Now that I look at it on Linguee I see that perhaps ein Hügel is too big for a knoll. Apparently, the English word knoll is cognate with the German word "die Knolle" which means "tubers, bulbs, lumps". The dictionary.com definition is "a small, rounded hill or eminence; hillock". Linguee gives "die Kuppe, das Hügelchen, niedrieger Hügel". So, yeah, a small hill :-)
This week, the plan is to meet up with my Austrian friends for some more focused German-time, and also to get back into training for the 14km City2Surf here in Sydney. I've decided to count my 20.2km walk+jog on Sunday as my training for last week!
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
A brief, noisy mobile phone conversation...
Not much to report lately. I'd say I've been busy, but I've been lazy instead. I think it's hard to see my way through my time constraints to get to the level I need to be in 4 weeks time, which is only making me waste my time more.
I guess it's partially brought on by my lack of actual speaking practice and the feeling that it's just not frequent enough to improve. I'll try to think of some ways to improve this, but I think I was relying on my German co-workers wanting to speak to me. I still have my one Austrian friend, which is brilliant, but when my German co-workers didn't respond to my email, I died a little on the inside...
OK, that's an exaggeration, but I was, and still am, disappointed by this.
I am meeting up with another Austrian friend this Sunday for the whole day, but we will be with 3 non-German speakers, so I doubt we'll get much chance to speak German, though I'll try, even if it's a little rude. Anyway, this Austrian friend (aka "The Hof") rang me yesterday to confirm some of the details. I think he was calling from the train, and there was also a lot of noise on the line. On top of that, I was in the office at work and felt a little awkward speaking German. However, as usual, the Hof insisted on speaking German! I really appreciate this, and so pushed on. I got through most of it OK comprehension wise, but my speaking was awkward and stilted. Sigh. The only spot where he switched to English was when he mentioned a suburb name, but with the noise in the background, the bad line, and a little bit of an accent, I got lost on this whole phrase - I thought the suburb name was a German word I couldn't understand!
I told him as much and he had a good laugh and we switched back to German. After that, my speech was a little better, so I guess I should try to have a laugh at myself earlier on in our conversations :-)
As I walked out of work yesterday I did a little reflection. Perhaps my spoken German level's not so bad considering the actual amount of time I've spent speaking it. Apart from previous classes (which amount to very little actual conversation), I spoke on the tram to a work colleague in Germany for about 10 minutes, and had conversations with various other German people enough to add up to maybe 1 hour in total (I'm be generous here). Then I've met up with my Austrian friends here in Australia (in work and out of it) for a total of maybe 3 hours of actual German conversation. So, despite living in Germany for 6 months while I learnt German, I've spoken German for a total of about FOUR HOURS! No wonder I don't feel prepared for the B2 exam!
Just goes to show you, living in a country is no guarantee of conversing in its language! Another way to look at what I've done so far is that I've spoken 3 times as much German while living in Australia as I ever did while lving in Germany.
This does give me a little boost I suppose. I mean, perhaps I'm not so bad at speaking after all - just bad at practicing to speak!
I guess it's partially brought on by my lack of actual speaking practice and the feeling that it's just not frequent enough to improve. I'll try to think of some ways to improve this, but I think I was relying on my German co-workers wanting to speak to me. I still have my one Austrian friend, which is brilliant, but when my German co-workers didn't respond to my email, I died a little on the inside...
OK, that's an exaggeration, but I was, and still am, disappointed by this.
I am meeting up with another Austrian friend this Sunday for the whole day, but we will be with 3 non-German speakers, so I doubt we'll get much chance to speak German, though I'll try, even if it's a little rude. Anyway, this Austrian friend (aka "The Hof") rang me yesterday to confirm some of the details. I think he was calling from the train, and there was also a lot of noise on the line. On top of that, I was in the office at work and felt a little awkward speaking German. However, as usual, the Hof insisted on speaking German! I really appreciate this, and so pushed on. I got through most of it OK comprehension wise, but my speaking was awkward and stilted. Sigh. The only spot where he switched to English was when he mentioned a suburb name, but with the noise in the background, the bad line, and a little bit of an accent, I got lost on this whole phrase - I thought the suburb name was a German word I couldn't understand!
I told him as much and he had a good laugh and we switched back to German. After that, my speech was a little better, so I guess I should try to have a laugh at myself earlier on in our conversations :-)
As I walked out of work yesterday I did a little reflection. Perhaps my spoken German level's not so bad considering the actual amount of time I've spent speaking it. Apart from previous classes (which amount to very little actual conversation), I spoke on the tram to a work colleague in Germany for about 10 minutes, and had conversations with various other German people enough to add up to maybe 1 hour in total (I'm be generous here). Then I've met up with my Austrian friends here in Australia (in work and out of it) for a total of maybe 3 hours of actual German conversation. So, despite living in Germany for 6 months while I learnt German, I've spoken German for a total of about FOUR HOURS! No wonder I don't feel prepared for the B2 exam!
Just goes to show you, living in a country is no guarantee of conversing in its language! Another way to look at what I've done so far is that I've spoken 3 times as much German while living in Australia as I ever did while lving in Germany.
This does give me a little boost I suppose. I mean, perhaps I'm not so bad at speaking after all - just bad at practicing to speak!
Friday, June 10, 2011
Friday lunchtime Stammtisch...
Just a quick report on today's Stammtisch at my work. Well, it's kind of a Stammtisch. There's definitely a Tisch involved!
Today we were three - the native German speaker (an Austrian), me, and a native English speaker who's married to an Austrian (why are all my German contacts here Austrian? No idea!) and who lived in Austria for a year. The latter's level is somewhat similar to my own, probably, but definitely better. He has a somewhat larger vocabulary, he's more at ease with German, and understands a little more (or so it seems to me - this is all just my subjective assessment).
This time we sat at a table of 4 and started speaking German from the start, which reduced the chance of any interruptions in English. And thankfully that's exactly what happened. It was a pleasant conversation, and I really appreciated again the patience and helpfulness of people who give up their lunchtime to put up with my bad German.
Unfortunately, that last statement isn't an exaggeration. I felt halting, and heard myself making plenty of grammatical mistakes, and struggling for words at times. Not surprising considering that, although I haven't been counting exactly, I haven't spent that much time really speaking German. My comprehension was pretty good, though there were passages of speech that I couldn't get into the flow of. Perhaps partially because there was a 3rd person there who wasn't a native speaker, I think I also felt more awkward than usual.
I also read Deutsche Welle's description of B2 level. I have to say, I am definitely somewhere between B1 and B2 still, and probably not close enough to B2 by far to successfully pass the Goethe-Zertifikat-B2 exam in about 1 month's time. Suffice to say, I'm feeling a mixture of fear and depression.
The only thing I've done since yesterday is listen to "Entenvolk" from yesterday. Before I hit the road going home today I'll try to make sure I read through the parallel text that I made (see the above post) so that listening to it is more useful. I have to admit that I'm not super interested in the topic. I really should have made sure I would find it interesting and appropriate before I bothered to translate it! Today I made a bit of a search for some more interesting articles, so I'll find one soon to start a new translation :-)
Should I proceed with my mid-July plan and try to find a way to push harder to reach there? Or should I reassess and replan? I've come a LONG way since I started this process, and having B2 as a goal has been very helpful to me, forcing me to focus much more than I otherwise would have, and to find German-speakers to chat to. Now it's getting down to the last days, and to pass the actual exam I will need a more concerted and focused effort. I'm not going to spend $180 on an exam without being fairly certain of passing it!
Any readers out there already done the Goethe-Zertifikat-B2 or higher? How did you feel 1 month out? How had you prepared?
Any and all suggestions gratefully received :-)
Today we were three - the native German speaker (an Austrian), me, and a native English speaker who's married to an Austrian (why are all my German contacts here Austrian? No idea!) and who lived in Austria for a year. The latter's level is somewhat similar to my own, probably, but definitely better. He has a somewhat larger vocabulary, he's more at ease with German, and understands a little more (or so it seems to me - this is all just my subjective assessment).
This time we sat at a table of 4 and started speaking German from the start, which reduced the chance of any interruptions in English. And thankfully that's exactly what happened. It was a pleasant conversation, and I really appreciated again the patience and helpfulness of people who give up their lunchtime to put up with my bad German.
Unfortunately, that last statement isn't an exaggeration. I felt halting, and heard myself making plenty of grammatical mistakes, and struggling for words at times. Not surprising considering that, although I haven't been counting exactly, I haven't spent that much time really speaking German. My comprehension was pretty good, though there were passages of speech that I couldn't get into the flow of. Perhaps partially because there was a 3rd person there who wasn't a native speaker, I think I also felt more awkward than usual.
I also read Deutsche Welle's description of B2 level. I have to say, I am definitely somewhere between B1 and B2 still, and probably not close enough to B2 by far to successfully pass the Goethe-Zertifikat-B2 exam in about 1 month's time. Suffice to say, I'm feeling a mixture of fear and depression.
The only thing I've done since yesterday is listen to "Entenvolk" from yesterday. Before I hit the road going home today I'll try to make sure I read through the parallel text that I made (see the above post) so that listening to it is more useful. I have to admit that I'm not super interested in the topic. I really should have made sure I would find it interesting and appropriate before I bothered to translate it! Today I made a bit of a search for some more interesting articles, so I'll find one soon to start a new translation :-)
Should I proceed with my mid-July plan and try to find a way to push harder to reach there? Or should I reassess and replan? I've come a LONG way since I started this process, and having B2 as a goal has been very helpful to me, forcing me to focus much more than I otherwise would have, and to find German-speakers to chat to. Now it's getting down to the last days, and to pass the actual exam I will need a more concerted and focused effort. I'm not going to spend $180 on an exam without being fairly certain of passing it!
Any readers out there already done the Goethe-Zertifikat-B2 or higher? How did you feel 1 month out? How had you prepared?
Any and all suggestions gratefully received :-)
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Lang-8 language corrections tutorial...
I recently received a friend request on Lang-8. Now, I've never really used it, and my profile says almost nothing, so I can only guess it's a bit of a fishing attempt. Or maybe it's genuine. I don't know. Since I started trying to meet people (and succeeding!) in person who speak German (my current target language), the idea of random penpals, or people to chat with on Skype, has begun to appeal to me less and less. The problem, as I've mentioned before, is that if I don't have anything in common with the person I'm chatting to, it becomes much harder to sustain the conversation and just the overall effort. As it is, with a fulltime job, long commute and busy extended-family social life, I have little time to maintain frequent contact with my English-speaking friends, let alone anyone else, so I need to choose wisely :-) Contacts I can make at work are an exception, of course, because I can use lunchtime to socialise in another language. This is "free" time which I'm doing my best to put to use!
My current German-speaking contacts include: infrequent, but highly helpful, correspondance with my former German teacher, meeting up occasionally with an Austrian couple I found on CouchSurfing, and an Austrian woman at my work who I've had lunch with once so far, and which looks like being a regular weekly thing (hopefully I'll have a new update on this tomorrow). I would like to improve upon this both because the date upon which I plan to sit the Goethe-Zertifikat B2 rapidly draws ever nearer, but also because I find it refreshing to get a different worldview.
As my "diary" update for the day, I've kept up with my Anki decks, and they are getting easier and quicker to do the more frequently I do them, so that's a real bonus. I planned to do a new exercise from the book Lesetraining B2 this morning, but instead I looked at the last question I worked on (Aufgabe 4) and realised that I have a few words I need to add to my Anki deck. This is really an important part of making real progress on my reading comprehension. And finally, I listened to lesson 15 in Perfectionnement Allemand this morning during my commute, but again I couldn't find the enthusiasm to try to keep up with it. I have seriously contemplated skipping to lesson 16, but I probably really just need to knuckle down and get it over with.
Anyway, to the subject of the post. After getting the friend invitation on Lang-8, I looked at their tutorial on how to correct a post:
http://lang-8.com/help/correction_1
The incorrect sentence starts out as "I think to review the corrections is very important for language learning." The "corrected" sentence? "I think to reviewing the corrections is very important for language learning."
I think to reviewing??? What?
Oh man...
I seem to recall that this is what put me off Lang-8 the first time I looked at it after registering. Or should that be "I seem to recalling that this is what put me off Lang-8 the first time I looked at it after to registering".
Is that shallow of me? Yes, yes it is. So sue me - that's how I roll...
My current German-speaking contacts include: infrequent, but highly helpful, correspondance with my former German teacher, meeting up occasionally with an Austrian couple I found on CouchSurfing, and an Austrian woman at my work who I've had lunch with once so far, and which looks like being a regular weekly thing (hopefully I'll have a new update on this tomorrow). I would like to improve upon this both because the date upon which I plan to sit the Goethe-Zertifikat B2 rapidly draws ever nearer, but also because I find it refreshing to get a different worldview.
As my "diary" update for the day, I've kept up with my Anki decks, and they are getting easier and quicker to do the more frequently I do them, so that's a real bonus. I planned to do a new exercise from the book Lesetraining B2 this morning, but instead I looked at the last question I worked on (Aufgabe 4) and realised that I have a few words I need to add to my Anki deck. This is really an important part of making real progress on my reading comprehension. And finally, I listened to lesson 15 in Perfectionnement Allemand this morning during my commute, but again I couldn't find the enthusiasm to try to keep up with it. I have seriously contemplated skipping to lesson 16, but I probably really just need to knuckle down and get it over with.
Anyway, to the subject of the post. After getting the friend invitation on Lang-8, I looked at their tutorial on how to correct a post:
http://lang-8.com/help/correction_1
The incorrect sentence starts out as "I think to review the corrections is very important for language learning." The "corrected" sentence? "I think to reviewing the corrections is very important for language learning."
I think to reviewing??? What?
Oh man...
I seem to recall that this is what put me off Lang-8 the first time I looked at it after registering. Or should that be "I seem to recalling that this is what put me off Lang-8 the first time I looked at it after to registering".
Is that shallow of me? Yes, yes it is. So sue me - that's how I roll...
A few days of holiday...
Just finished up an extra long weekend. Despite my intention to power through a lot of German study, I only kept up with my Anki and worked on some of those crosswords I mentioned previously, but I didn't do much beyond that. I should have been able to at least finish lesson 15, but I'm finding it a bit boring. I also discovered this book in the small collection of books where we were staying and felt compelled to finish it before I left. I expect to be able to finish lesson 15 tomorrow... ish... Like I said, I find this one less interesting than previous ones - it's a series of postcards with no real continuous story. They are simply intended to show the different levels of formal address required in writing - actually quite an importatant topic! I just can't get into it :-)
As I mentioned before, I have put the word out with two more German-speakers at my office. It's been a week with no reply. I wonder if they never received the email, or perhaps their silence is my answer. Germans can be like that - if they think the answer is obvious, they won't write you anything to confirm details, etc. Now I'm not sure what to do - should I try them again and risk annoying them? I really need to find more German practice partners, and work seems like the perfect place to find them. I do have one already, and she has been incredibly helpful in just one lunch. I'll be having another lunch with her either tomorrow or the next day, but I did hope to find more. The search continues...
Which reminds me - I really must organise to meet up with my Austrian friends sometime soon and perhaps figure out something regular. I'll write more once I've got something sorted.
Anyone have any suggestions on how I could get my German co-workers to respond affirmatively to my request for occasional meetups? I lived in Germany for six months, but I never really managed to crack the German social code :-)
As I mentioned before, I have put the word out with two more German-speakers at my office. It's been a week with no reply. I wonder if they never received the email, or perhaps their silence is my answer. Germans can be like that - if they think the answer is obvious, they won't write you anything to confirm details, etc. Now I'm not sure what to do - should I try them again and risk annoying them? I really need to find more German practice partners, and work seems like the perfect place to find them. I do have one already, and she has been incredibly helpful in just one lunch. I'll be having another lunch with her either tomorrow or the next day, but I did hope to find more. The search continues...
Which reminds me - I really must organise to meet up with my Austrian friends sometime soon and perhaps figure out something regular. I'll write more once I've got something sorted.
Anyone have any suggestions on how I could get my German co-workers to respond affirmatively to my request for occasional meetups? I lived in Germany for six months, but I never really managed to crack the German social code :-)
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
Putting the word out...
Since my recent meeting with a German speaking co-worker went so well, I felt emboldened to write to two more German speakers here. A day has gone by without a reply, however, which doesn't feel like a good start. I suspect they will just ignore me and hope I don't ask again - and there I was with visions of having a German-speaking lunch 3 days a week! Damn :-)
In better news, I finished lesson 13 in Perfectionnement Allemand and since lesson 14 is a review lesson (which I'll read tonight with any luck) I'll be listening to lesson 15 during my trip home today.
I've almost finished another easy crossword (a bit harder than the previous ones this time!) which has been a good exercise. I plan to add a bunch of new words to my Anki list as a result. Speaking of Anki, I've been slack with this over the last few weeks, and have been trying to catch up again in the last few days. Doing it every day is the way to go, for sure, I just don't always get there, which is pretty lazy. And whenever I have a conversation, or try to read a text, and I'm missing useful words from my mental database, I'm reminded of my German classes (all 8 or 9 of them!) in Germany where the teacher would say "Words! You must learn words! Without words, you cannot speak!"
Too true... Damn words!
In better news, I finished lesson 13 in Perfectionnement Allemand and since lesson 14 is a review lesson (which I'll read tonight with any luck) I'll be listening to lesson 15 during my trip home today.
I've almost finished another easy crossword (a bit harder than the previous ones this time!) which has been a good exercise. I plan to add a bunch of new words to my Anki list as a result. Speaking of Anki, I've been slack with this over the last few weeks, and have been trying to catch up again in the last few days. Doing it every day is the way to go, for sure, I just don't always get there, which is pretty lazy. And whenever I have a conversation, or try to read a text, and I'm missing useful words from my mental database, I'm reminded of my German classes (all 8 or 9 of them!) in Germany where the teacher would say "Words! You must learn words! Without words, you cannot speak!"
Too true... Damn words!
Monday, May 23, 2011
Review of Perfectionnement Allemand
Now that I'm up to lesson 13 in Assimil's Perfectionnement Allemand (Advanced German), I feel that I have a good enough sample of the whole work to post a review over on Amazon.com. It hasn't appeared there yet, but in any case, it seems worth repeating here. I know I sound like an Assimil fanboy, but I don't think they are the be-all-and-end-all of language learning. I just really believe that their books have helped me immensely, more than any other language course I've tried (and I've tried a few!).
Before the review, my other bit of news for the day is that I met up with an Austrian woman from my work at lunch today for about an hour of chatting. Again, I felt a bit weak in lots of ways, but she never needed to dumb it down (too much) and we had a pretty flowing conversation overall. I tried to ask questions which would elicit long responses because I wanted to make sure that I wasn't dominating the conversation with my bad German, which wouldn't help me, and wouldn't make for a pleasant chat. It looks like we'll be able to meet up weekly, so that's another bit of face-to-face time that I really need. I'm going to try to meet up with another person from work on a different day. At this stage, it's obvious to me that I need all the help I can get!
Here's the review, reproduced from here:
It's sometimes hard to believe that Assimil language learning books are not more popular outside of Europe. They are just a brilliant, yet simple, way of progressing in a language, allowing the development of vocabulary, correct grammar (and phrasing) as well as pronunciation (albeit, you need to self-correct, which can be difficult), through a daily progression. Well, for me it's every few days on these advanced lesson, but still, it's constant exposure and progression in a way that really works. On top of that, you get so much more actual content in the target language than with other courses (2 hours 40 minutes in this course). And it's ALL in the target language. This means that when you're reviewing the lessons purely through the audio, you don't have any other language interrupting your focus on what you are trying to learn.
There are a few variations/interpretations on the Assimil method - I discuss the way I use the Assimil books on my blog (http://yetanotherlanguage.blogspot.com/2011/04/couple-of-new-arrivals.html) so I won't repeat it here.
I only have two small issues with this book (so far - I'm up to lesson 13/56) - one it the format which has changed in the latest iteration of Assimil's books. Previously they had a more robust cover (though it's still fairly hard wearing - which is great for a book that gets dragged everywhere!), and also the lack of a red cloth bookmark. Originally I thought I wouldn't care about that, but it is just the best way for quickly accessing the book in those spare moments. Even on public transport, I often have just a short gap in which to check what's being said, and the built-in red cloth bookmark was invaluable for this. Bring back the cloth bookmark please, Assimil!
The other "minor" problem depends on how good your French is :-) Unfortunately, the advanced German course is only available in French. My own French is not great, and so a lot of the explanation of more colloquial/metaphorical usage is a little lost on me, but overall I feel fairly confident I'm understanding most of the explanations. I just look up anything more complicated online. The great thing about the audio being purely in German is that once you've read the text and understood it (perhaps with a bit of looking up online) you can listen to the audio over and over without the influence of any other language. With other language courses, I imagine trying to do them in a language in which you are not very confident would be pretty much impossible.
When you use Assimil programs though, it is clear why they don't produce all their volumes in all languages - there is a lot of thought and care put into both the quality of the translations, and also in appropriate explanatory footnotes.
If French is not a barrier for you, then this is the book for the advanced German learner. The dialogs are clear and professional, the text is well written and genuinely funny (the same couldn't be said of the beginner's course in German :-) ) and they are worth every penny of their price. You will go past just about any modern "advanced" course in the first half of the beginner's Assimil book.
And one last point - although you definitely need to practice speaking with native speakers to improve your speaking abilities, you will actually develop good conversation abilities (good pronunciation and comprehension) without native speaker practice. However, it won't help you with gathering your thoughts and explaining yourself in your target language - only real-world practice can do that!
Before the review, my other bit of news for the day is that I met up with an Austrian woman from my work at lunch today for about an hour of chatting. Again, I felt a bit weak in lots of ways, but she never needed to dumb it down (too much) and we had a pretty flowing conversation overall. I tried to ask questions which would elicit long responses because I wanted to make sure that I wasn't dominating the conversation with my bad German, which wouldn't help me, and wouldn't make for a pleasant chat. It looks like we'll be able to meet up weekly, so that's another bit of face-to-face time that I really need. I'm going to try to meet up with another person from work on a different day. At this stage, it's obvious to me that I need all the help I can get!
Here's the review, reproduced from here:
It's sometimes hard to believe that Assimil language learning books are not more popular outside of Europe. They are just a brilliant, yet simple, way of progressing in a language, allowing the development of vocabulary, correct grammar (and phrasing) as well as pronunciation (albeit, you need to self-correct, which can be difficult), through a daily progression. Well, for me it's every few days on these advanced lesson, but still, it's constant exposure and progression in a way that really works. On top of that, you get so much more actual content in the target language than with other courses (2 hours 40 minutes in this course). And it's ALL in the target language. This means that when you're reviewing the lessons purely through the audio, you don't have any other language interrupting your focus on what you are trying to learn.
There are a few variations/interpretations on the Assimil method - I discuss the way I use the Assimil books on my blog (http://yetanotherlanguage.blogspot.com/2011/04/couple-of-new-arrivals.html) so I won't repeat it here.
I only have two small issues with this book (so far - I'm up to lesson 13/56) - one it the format which has changed in the latest iteration of Assimil's books. Previously they had a more robust cover (though it's still fairly hard wearing - which is great for a book that gets dragged everywhere!), and also the lack of a red cloth bookmark. Originally I thought I wouldn't care about that, but it is just the best way for quickly accessing the book in those spare moments. Even on public transport, I often have just a short gap in which to check what's being said, and the built-in red cloth bookmark was invaluable for this. Bring back the cloth bookmark please, Assimil!
The other "minor" problem depends on how good your French is :-) Unfortunately, the advanced German course is only available in French. My own French is not great, and so a lot of the explanation of more colloquial/metaphorical usage is a little lost on me, but overall I feel fairly confident I'm understanding most of the explanations. I just look up anything more complicated online. The great thing about the audio being purely in German is that once you've read the text and understood it (perhaps with a bit of looking up online) you can listen to the audio over and over without the influence of any other language. With other language courses, I imagine trying to do them in a language in which you are not very confident would be pretty much impossible.
When you use Assimil programs though, it is clear why they don't produce all their volumes in all languages - there is a lot of thought and care put into both the quality of the translations, and also in appropriate explanatory footnotes.
If French is not a barrier for you, then this is the book for the advanced German learner. The dialogs are clear and professional, the text is well written and genuinely funny (the same couldn't be said of the beginner's course in German :-) ) and they are worth every penny of their price. You will go past just about any modern "advanced" course in the first half of the beginner's Assimil book.
And one last point - although you definitely need to practice speaking with native speakers to improve your speaking abilities, you will actually develop good conversation abilities (good pronunciation and comprehension) without native speaker practice. However, it won't help you with gathering your thoughts and explaining yourself in your target language - only real-world practice can do that!
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Quick update...
This morning I managed to finish off lesson 12 in Perfectionnement Allemand and started listening to lesson 13. I haven't read through it yet, but I understood it fairly well, so I hope to progress through it as "fast" as I did for lessons 11 and 12.
Tomorrow I will be meeting up with an Austrian workmate who I hope will feel like meeting up with me once or twice a week for a chat in German, but I'll see how it goes. It really hit me tonight just how little time there is left. One of my other Austrian friends has, as I've mentioned before, offered to give me more directed and focused help than "just" talking, though I have to say that I learn a lot talking with them and it's really helped my confidence, even in just a few meetings. Having said that, she was talking about meeting up every couple of weeks, but I've yet to take her up on it. Every two weeks might be as few as four sessions chatting with her.
Man, I'm feeling the pressure all of a sudden!
Tomorrow I will be meeting up with an Austrian workmate who I hope will feel like meeting up with me once or twice a week for a chat in German, but I'll see how it goes. It really hit me tonight just how little time there is left. One of my other Austrian friends has, as I've mentioned before, offered to give me more directed and focused help than "just" talking, though I have to say that I learn a lot talking with them and it's really helped my confidence, even in just a few meetings. Having said that, she was talking about meeting up every couple of weeks, but I've yet to take her up on it. Every two weeks might be as few as four sessions chatting with her.
Man, I'm feeling the pressure all of a sudden!
Saturday, May 21, 2011
"The Enemy at Home" Exhibition in the Museum of Sydney
Today I visited the Enemy at Home exhibition in Sydney. Not a large exhibit, but it was included in the $10 entry price of the museum, and it was a really quality exhibit. Congratulations to curator Nadine Helmi et al for the great work! I visited it with my Austrian friends and my parents, so a mixed-language group, but this time, unlike with recent disappointing encounters with German speakers where I have just been basically too lazy (and inhibited perhaps?) to speak German, especially in a mixed group, I decided to do my best and did find some good time to just speak German.
I had originally intended to stay to listen to Nadine's lecture/readings in German, but due to time constraints on our group, I skipped it and we had afternoon tea together instead. A very pleasant way to spend the afternoon and I can really recommend it for those interested in Australian modern history or of Germans in Australia. I'm not sure if Nadine is planning on doing her lecture in German again - perhaps check out the Sydney German Group on Meetup and see if she posts again on the subject.
As for the conversation - it felt good at times, especially listening to my Austrian friends, even with noisy backgrounds. And, as ever, they taught me some interesting new words and phrases! On the other hand, I almost felt like my German was worse than the last time. Maybe I just had higher expectations, maybe it's because I didn't speak German all the time and so didn't develop such a good flow, but sometimes I would just listen to myself and cringe at my horrible mistakes. It can be hard to block those out, but I really have to, because today I really felt like I was torturing my friends. Not a great feeling...
Come this Monday I'll be meeting up with a native speaker at my workplace, so that should mean the start of a more regular use of German. My Austrian friends have also offered to help me more specifically with my preparation for the B2 exam, which I will definitely take advantage of, even outside of just meeting up for a chat or for the upcoming rogaine in NSW that I managed to rope one of them in to :-) The only problem with taking advantage of their offer of specific B2 exam preparation help is that I don't really know what I'll need to do for the exam! I have past exams, and I need to practice those, and there's probably a million things I don't do right. I was kind of hoping that just improving my German speaking would tie lots of other things together, and I think it's starting to do that. It's also, unsurprisingly, improving my confidence and comfort with speaking (despite my negative feelings at times today). But what I would need to do for specific preparation - well, that I still don't know. I'm probably just too used to studying on my own now, but then it wouldn't be study so much as help refining specific problems while I speak, which is always a good thing!
I had originally intended to stay to listen to Nadine's lecture/readings in German, but due to time constraints on our group, I skipped it and we had afternoon tea together instead. A very pleasant way to spend the afternoon and I can really recommend it for those interested in Australian modern history or of Germans in Australia. I'm not sure if Nadine is planning on doing her lecture in German again - perhaps check out the Sydney German Group on Meetup and see if she posts again on the subject.
As for the conversation - it felt good at times, especially listening to my Austrian friends, even with noisy backgrounds. And, as ever, they taught me some interesting new words and phrases! On the other hand, I almost felt like my German was worse than the last time. Maybe I just had higher expectations, maybe it's because I didn't speak German all the time and so didn't develop such a good flow, but sometimes I would just listen to myself and cringe at my horrible mistakes. It can be hard to block those out, but I really have to, because today I really felt like I was torturing my friends. Not a great feeling...
Come this Monday I'll be meeting up with a native speaker at my workplace, so that should mean the start of a more regular use of German. My Austrian friends have also offered to help me more specifically with my preparation for the B2 exam, which I will definitely take advantage of, even outside of just meeting up for a chat or for the upcoming rogaine in NSW that I managed to rope one of them in to :-) The only problem with taking advantage of their offer of specific B2 exam preparation help is that I don't really know what I'll need to do for the exam! I have past exams, and I need to practice those, and there's probably a million things I don't do right. I was kind of hoping that just improving my German speaking would tie lots of other things together, and I think it's starting to do that. It's also, unsurprisingly, improving my confidence and comfort with speaking (despite my negative feelings at times today). But what I would need to do for specific preparation - well, that I still don't know. I'm probably just too used to studying on my own now, but then it wouldn't be study so much as help refining specific problems while I speak, which is always a good thing!
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
Die Lore-Ley
"Ich glaube, die Wellen veschlingen
Am Ende Schiffer und Kahn,
Und das hat mit ihrem Singen
die Lore-Ley getan..."
Lesson 11 in Perfectionnement Allemand was basically just the poem of the Lore-Ley by Heinrich Heine and a few exercises (as usual), with the goal being to memorise the poem. Lucky for me, I don't find memorising poems to be a great chore. I still remember, after almost 20 years, some poems I memorised from an old Teach Yourself Serbo-Croat (back when they occasionally produced a content rich book instead of now where they mainly seem to be non-threatening, but pointlessly dumbed down to the point of being completely useless):
Mala kucha kamena,
sa tri mala prozora,
zheleni im kapci,
i krov sav od plamena,
a na krovu, vrapci.
(Apologies to any Serbian or Croatian readers for any mistakes - it was 20 years ago!)
I can also still remember mostly what it means. This isn't an accident, poems are designed to stick in your head. They have an internal rhythm (and often rhyming endings in european literature) that mean the memory of one phrase supports another. Well-written music is often like this, although probably more for ballads than other types of song, or at least, I've found ballads and poetic-style lyrics to be the easiest to remember. I know it sounds crazy, but I really feel like Rammstein's lyrics are quite poetic, even in their harshest songs. I guess you just have to find something you like!
I found the time yesterday to do a couple of the kiddie word puzzles I posted about yesterday. I built up my confidence with foods and animals puzzles first. I did pretty well - just one or two things that I didn't know or remember. The puzzles were incredibly easy though :-) I'm now working on a simple crossword of the more traditional style with across and down clues and no pre-filled letters. I would really like to find more simple/kids crosswords, ones without too many references to German actors and sportstars from the 70's and 80's :-)
If any readers know of any good, free sources for a variety of levels of crosswords, please let us all know in the comments!
Now on to lesson 12.
Am Ende Schiffer und Kahn,
Und das hat mit ihrem Singen
die Lore-Ley getan..."
Lesson 11 in Perfectionnement Allemand was basically just the poem of the Lore-Ley by Heinrich Heine and a few exercises (as usual), with the goal being to memorise the poem. Lucky for me, I don't find memorising poems to be a great chore. I still remember, after almost 20 years, some poems I memorised from an old Teach Yourself Serbo-Croat (back when they occasionally produced a content rich book instead of now where they mainly seem to be non-threatening, but pointlessly dumbed down to the point of being completely useless):
Mala kucha kamena,
sa tri mala prozora,
zheleni im kapci,
i krov sav od plamena,
a na krovu, vrapci.
(Apologies to any Serbian or Croatian readers for any mistakes - it was 20 years ago!)
I can also still remember mostly what it means. This isn't an accident, poems are designed to stick in your head. They have an internal rhythm (and often rhyming endings in european literature) that mean the memory of one phrase supports another. Well-written music is often like this, although probably more for ballads than other types of song, or at least, I've found ballads and poetic-style lyrics to be the easiest to remember. I know it sounds crazy, but I really feel like Rammstein's lyrics are quite poetic, even in their harshest songs. I guess you just have to find something you like!
I found the time yesterday to do a couple of the kiddie word puzzles I posted about yesterday. I built up my confidence with foods and animals puzzles first. I did pretty well - just one or two things that I didn't know or remember. The puzzles were incredibly easy though :-) I'm now working on a simple crossword of the more traditional style with across and down clues and no pre-filled letters. I would really like to find more simple/kids crosswords, ones without too many references to German actors and sportstars from the 70's and 80's :-)
If any readers know of any good, free sources for a variety of levels of crosswords, please let us all know in the comments!
Now on to lesson 12.
Kreuzworträtseln und so weiter...
Just when I should be accelerating, I see that all my posts talk about "slow progress". Well, I don't want to break the mold yet, so here's another one on the same theme :-)
I finished lesson 10 in Perfectionnement Allemand yesterday and started listening to lesson 11, which is Heinrich Heine's poem "Loreley". This is something that I've really been looking forward to - some original texts in German by famous authors. I've flicked through the advanced Assimil courses for Spanish and French and they both seem to have more samples of famous authors than I see on a flick through the advanced German course, but at least the lessons have been pretty funny so far. That's as opposed to "New German With Ease" which is a lot of good things, but funny it ain't ("Haben Sie den von der Erbsen, Mohren und Tomaten gehört?").
I have had a go at some more fill-in-the-blanks style B2 exam questions, and they haven't gone well. This probably shows a few things - that I rely a lot on context, for example, to understand what's happening, but there's also a problem that even when I understood all the vocabulary in the sentence, and I knew the word that was the answer, it just didn't come to me.
So, two problems. The first I will work on by continuing my vocabulary work, but perhaps also by working on more composition in German - after all, the problem is one of finding a word to fill a need, which is somewhat similar to some parts of composition. The second problem will be helped by more composition (i.e., writing in German :-) ) but to supplement this I've decided to do some word puzzles in German, specifically crosswords - Kreuzworträtsel. Here is a website that has a daily crossword as well as others by category and more. And if you're looking for some nice easy ones to build up your confidence first (as I am!), there are ones targeted at children here. This one seems to be a nice example!
I wasted my opportunity at the Eurovision party turned. I did talk to Germans, but they said (to another non-native German speaker) that they wouldn't speak German because we wouldn't understand them, and I let that put me off. Waste! Anyway, maybe I'll meet them again.
I have done more writing in German lately to my Austrian friends as well as to a new Austrian person at my work who I will meet up with for lunch next week. There is also another native German speaker in the office that I'll seek out soon and try to spread my poor German around so that no one person has to suffer to great a burden :-)
Anyone else who has done the B2 exam or later (or anyone else!) who has other suggestions for how to prepare for fill-in-the-blanks questions, please leave them in the comments!
I finished lesson 10 in Perfectionnement Allemand yesterday and started listening to lesson 11, which is Heinrich Heine's poem "Loreley". This is something that I've really been looking forward to - some original texts in German by famous authors. I've flicked through the advanced Assimil courses for Spanish and French and they both seem to have more samples of famous authors than I see on a flick through the advanced German course, but at least the lessons have been pretty funny so far. That's as opposed to "New German With Ease" which is a lot of good things, but funny it ain't ("Haben Sie den von der Erbsen, Mohren und Tomaten gehört?").
I have had a go at some more fill-in-the-blanks style B2 exam questions, and they haven't gone well. This probably shows a few things - that I rely a lot on context, for example, to understand what's happening, but there's also a problem that even when I understood all the vocabulary in the sentence, and I knew the word that was the answer, it just didn't come to me.
So, two problems. The first I will work on by continuing my vocabulary work, but perhaps also by working on more composition in German - after all, the problem is one of finding a word to fill a need, which is somewhat similar to some parts of composition. The second problem will be helped by more composition (i.e., writing in German :-) ) but to supplement this I've decided to do some word puzzles in German, specifically crosswords - Kreuzworträtsel. Here is a website that has a daily crossword as well as others by category and more. And if you're looking for some nice easy ones to build up your confidence first (as I am!), there are ones targeted at children here. This one seems to be a nice example!
I wasted my opportunity at the Eurovision party turned. I did talk to Germans, but they said (to another non-native German speaker) that they wouldn't speak German because we wouldn't understand them, and I let that put me off. Waste! Anyway, maybe I'll meet them again.
I have done more writing in German lately to my Austrian friends as well as to a new Austrian person at my work who I will meet up with for lunch next week. There is also another native German speaker in the office that I'll seek out soon and try to spread my poor German around so that no one person has to suffer to great a burden :-)
Anyone else who has done the B2 exam or later (or anyone else!) who has other suggestions for how to prepare for fill-in-the-blanks questions, please leave them in the comments!
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Tempis fugit...
and all that...
I do finally have some progress to report, but not much. Pretty bad considering what I need to be able to do in just over 2 months. Today I finished lesson 9 in Assimil's Perfectionnement Allemand. Pretty slow pace so far! I could blame Mother's Day, and all sorts of other things, but the fact is that I just need to get more done, and find the time for it.
I did have a short conversation in German yesterday with a work colleague whose wife is Austrian and so speaks German - not like a native speaker, but still pretty good to have at work! This weekend I'll be going to his house for a Eurovision party, so I'll get a chance to meet his wife and speak with a native speaker for a while. And no, no one is seriously going for the music - the purpose is, of course, to take the piss out of it :-)
I've also heard that my work has a list of speakers of different languages... I'll have to take advantage of that and see if I can't find some native speakers to sprechen mit a bit!
Enough babbling - got to do some study...
I do finally have some progress to report, but not much. Pretty bad considering what I need to be able to do in just over 2 months. Today I finished lesson 9 in Assimil's Perfectionnement Allemand. Pretty slow pace so far! I could blame Mother's Day, and all sorts of other things, but the fact is that I just need to get more done, and find the time for it.
I did have a short conversation in German yesterday with a work colleague whose wife is Austrian and so speaks German - not like a native speaker, but still pretty good to have at work! This weekend I'll be going to his house for a Eurovision party, so I'll get a chance to meet his wife and speak with a native speaker for a while. And no, no one is seriously going for the music - the purpose is, of course, to take the piss out of it :-)
I've also heard that my work has a list of speakers of different languages... I'll have to take advantage of that and see if I can't find some native speakers to sprechen mit a bit!
Enough babbling - got to do some study...
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
A brief summary of the "Fluent in 3 Months" method
I had been planning on writing up a brief summary of the key points in the method advocated over at Fluent in 3 Months. From what I've read on his website, Benny wouldn't like it to be called a method, nor does he say it's the only way to go, but just think of it as a convenient label for the little pearls of wisdom on display at his site.
In any case, here's a time where I'm glad I procrastinated, because he's just written a nice little summary himself. I highly recommend reading it, and the links therein. And if you have time, go through the whole site, especially the older stuff which I sort of prefer, for some reason.
I know a lot of what he writes is a bit cheesy but for some reason I can't help but like the guy :-) I think it's because he seems quite genuine, and, perhaps, because we are both engineers, I just get his worldview.
The advice of his that I've followed has been more about just finding people to chat with and keeping a blog. He also lists lots of different ways to find people who speak your target language no matter where you are. Some of the advice, like only speaking in your target language (excellent article, btw - very motivating!), is, like much of the advice out there on the net from polyglots, or aspiring polyglots, not so realistic for people in relationships. For instance, when I lived in Germany, I worked in an English-speaking office (plenty of Germans there though, so I did waste a LOT of practice opportunity), and then I went home to my pregnant wife. That was what I did all the weekdays. On the weekend, we went exploring together, or relaxed together at home. My wife worked with German children who spoke English to varying degrees, and she had to get around all day in German a lot of the time. She did really well, and she enjoyed that, but at the end of the day, and on the weekends, the idea of hanging out with people so I could struggle through some German conversation was less than appealing to her. Since we've got back to Australia I made an effort to find German-speakers here, although I'm very selective because we need to enjoy hanging out, and it has worked out very well for us - we've met up a couple of times, and I have invited them to join in on the sport of Rogaining, since it was invented in Australia, and they are coming to the next 6 hour event in NSW. I will have an English-speaking friend too, and the details of teams, etc, aren't yet finalised, but I do hope it will lead to quite some speaking practice, as well as just hanging out with some cool new friends (and an old one) doing something we can all enjoy. So I see now that we could have done the same sort of thing in Germany, and much more easily of course!
Live and learn...
As to Benny's advice of keeping a blog, I think it's helped push me along a bit, but sometimes I just look back and laugh at my slow progress. Sigh. Still, one foot in front of the other and all that!
Yesterday I finished Lesson 8 of Assimil's Perfectionnement Allemand (Advanced German). I have let my Anki slide a little over the last few days (just a little :-) ) and I find that not doing it for a few days does make it more frustrating. Certainly seems to be more useful when you're doing it every day (like the Assimil method). I started on one of the online sample B2 exams that I mentioned last time but I did it while I was at work and so have only managed to squeeze in 3 of the reading comprehension questions. My scores weren't great (4/5, 3/5 and 4/5) and the 10 mark question seems hard (though I think I'm just not used to the style of question) but my time for the first 3 questions seemed reasonable at least. Obviously still plenty more to do before mid-July!
In any case, here's a time where I'm glad I procrastinated, because he's just written a nice little summary himself. I highly recommend reading it, and the links therein. And if you have time, go through the whole site, especially the older stuff which I sort of prefer, for some reason.
I know a lot of what he writes is a bit cheesy but for some reason I can't help but like the guy :-) I think it's because he seems quite genuine, and, perhaps, because we are both engineers, I just get his worldview.
The advice of his that I've followed has been more about just finding people to chat with and keeping a blog. He also lists lots of different ways to find people who speak your target language no matter where you are. Some of the advice, like only speaking in your target language (excellent article, btw - very motivating!), is, like much of the advice out there on the net from polyglots, or aspiring polyglots, not so realistic for people in relationships. For instance, when I lived in Germany, I worked in an English-speaking office (plenty of Germans there though, so I did waste a LOT of practice opportunity), and then I went home to my pregnant wife. That was what I did all the weekdays. On the weekend, we went exploring together, or relaxed together at home. My wife worked with German children who spoke English to varying degrees, and she had to get around all day in German a lot of the time. She did really well, and she enjoyed that, but at the end of the day, and on the weekends, the idea of hanging out with people so I could struggle through some German conversation was less than appealing to her. Since we've got back to Australia I made an effort to find German-speakers here, although I'm very selective because we need to enjoy hanging out, and it has worked out very well for us - we've met up a couple of times, and I have invited them to join in on the sport of Rogaining, since it was invented in Australia, and they are coming to the next 6 hour event in NSW. I will have an English-speaking friend too, and the details of teams, etc, aren't yet finalised, but I do hope it will lead to quite some speaking practice, as well as just hanging out with some cool new friends (and an old one) doing something we can all enjoy. So I see now that we could have done the same sort of thing in Germany, and much more easily of course!
Live and learn...
As to Benny's advice of keeping a blog, I think it's helped push me along a bit, but sometimes I just look back and laugh at my slow progress. Sigh. Still, one foot in front of the other and all that!
Yesterday I finished Lesson 8 of Assimil's Perfectionnement Allemand (Advanced German). I have let my Anki slide a little over the last few days (just a little :-) ) and I find that not doing it for a few days does make it more frustrating. Certainly seems to be more useful when you're doing it every day (like the Assimil method). I started on one of the online sample B2 exams that I mentioned last time but I did it while I was at work and so have only managed to squeeze in 3 of the reading comprehension questions. My scores weren't great (4/5, 3/5 and 4/5) and the 10 mark question seems hard (though I think I'm just not used to the style of question) but my time for the first 3 questions seemed reasonable at least. Obviously still plenty more to do before mid-July!
Thursday, April 28, 2011
An Open Letter to Deutsche Welle Radio!
OK, so this isn't going to be anything so dramatic as an open letter... But still, what's up with all the hillbilly music on Deutsche Welle Radio these days? I started listening to them about 3 months ago, but as far as I can remember it didn't use to have so much filler music... Or is it my imagination? Perhaps in the early days I was glad to have a break from a stream of speech I was having difficulty understanding... Maybe I was listening to it at different times.
I'm not sure, but last night while listening to "Das Magazin" I swear about half of the time was dodgy music. Not even any lyrics to help me with my German. Just filler music. Very strange, and somewhat irritating...
Then again, I'm getting it for free, so how can I really complain? :-)
Speaking of free resources, here's a bunch I've been using, or have stumbled across, as I aim for my goal of passing the Goethe-Zertifikat-B2. I've been meaning to put together this list for a while, which adds to my earlier post of translation tools. These are in no particular order, and they haven't been selected for any particular reason, other than that I've read them sometime in the past and liked them:
* Deutsche Welle: Plenty of articles here. Especially good is the Learning German section, which has stories with glossaries, the slowly-spoken news, and the telenovela "Jojo sucht das Glück" in which the actors speak very fast and very abbreviated. Good listening practice for the "real-world".
* Goethe-Institut Exams Page: Click around here and you will find several example exam questions - for all levels of exams. Downloadable and online. Here is an online B2 sample exam, and here is the B2 samples download page. Of course, you can't practice your speaking online, and you have to try to check your own written composition, but it's better than nothing. Use real people to practice speaking and listening!
* Slow German: As mentioned before - short, clear texts with downloadable audio for free.
* Australien-Blogger: A German speaker living in Melbourne, Australia and blogging about Australia and its culture. It's aimed at German-speakers, but people familiar with the topics he's blogging about (I guess that would mainly be Australians :-) ) will find it an interesting resource for learning German.
* Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung: A very highbrow newspaper, but it's worth stretching for the quality of analysis available. On an unrelated rant, european newspapers like FAZ and Le Monde put to shame the poor level of analysis and bias that seems to characterise English-speaking media (and Australian media in particular). End of rant...
* The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy in German! "Die galaktische Geschichte ist ein bißchen durcheinandergeraten". It seems to be just as witty in German as it was in English. I have no idea about the copyright, etc, of the material, so caveat lector. RIP Douglas Adams...
I'm actually very lucky to be learning German. There is so much out there that's helpful. There's a lot of helpful information in a lot of languages, of course, but probably the best, and most easily accessible, is in the big languages. For comparison, a quick look into a much smaller european language, Maltese, reveals that learning it would be much harder. My Nokia Internet Radio app on my N97 doesn't find any maltese internet radio stations when I do a search (though I'm sure they exist) and, although Google Translate advertises that it can handle Maltese, I asked it to translated a pretty easy sentence - "I love you". The translation? "I love you." Hmmm... Suspicious. In this case I know what it should be ("inhobok", if you're curious), but this indicates to me that it might be generally a bit useless. It would seem that finding native speakers for smaller languages (which, in itself, would often be more difficult) might actually be even more essential.
****
My diary update - I'm just finishing up Lesson 7 (review lesson) in Perfectionnement Allemand, about 1 week after I planned to finish lesson 6. My rate is as slow as ever :-) I've been keeping up with the Anki reviews for the most part. I did manage to get all the words from Aufgabe 3 into my Anki list, but I didn't do Aufgabe 4. Today I am starting on this Goethe-Zertifikat-B2 sample to see how I'm travelling. Still a lot more work to do I would say, but I've got to get an idea.
As for the rained-out BBQ-turned-cafe lunch, it was a bit of a wash out in terms of German practice. There were 7 people there, 4 of whom only spoke English, a 5th was my daughter who doesn't speak anything at all yet :-), and then my two Austrian friends. Because of the setting of being around a table, the opportunity to start speaking in German really didn't present itself - it would have excluded most of the table. So, damn :-) As we were leaving one of my Austrian friends said "and next time we will have to practice German more". Absolutely!
On the plus side, it looks like I might be able to set up some more extended practice periods in German starting mid to late June with one of my Austrian friends. I think, considering that my exam should be booked in by around then, I will do whatever I can to take advantage of this offer. Once again I am struck by how generous and helpful people have been with my German learning...
Anyone with some more helpful sites for learning German - feel free to post them in the comments!
I'm not sure, but last night while listening to "Das Magazin" I swear about half of the time was dodgy music. Not even any lyrics to help me with my German. Just filler music. Very strange, and somewhat irritating...
Then again, I'm getting it for free, so how can I really complain? :-)
Speaking of free resources, here's a bunch I've been using, or have stumbled across, as I aim for my goal of passing the Goethe-Zertifikat-B2. I've been meaning to put together this list for a while, which adds to my earlier post of translation tools. These are in no particular order, and they haven't been selected for any particular reason, other than that I've read them sometime in the past and liked them:
* Deutsche Welle: Plenty of articles here. Especially good is the Learning German section, which has stories with glossaries, the slowly-spoken news, and the telenovela "Jojo sucht das Glück" in which the actors speak very fast and very abbreviated. Good listening practice for the "real-world".
* Goethe-Institut Exams Page: Click around here and you will find several example exam questions - for all levels of exams. Downloadable and online. Here is an online B2 sample exam, and here is the B2 samples download page. Of course, you can't practice your speaking online, and you have to try to check your own written composition, but it's better than nothing. Use real people to practice speaking and listening!
* Slow German: As mentioned before - short, clear texts with downloadable audio for free.
* Australien-Blogger: A German speaker living in Melbourne, Australia and blogging about Australia and its culture. It's aimed at German-speakers, but people familiar with the topics he's blogging about (I guess that would mainly be Australians :-) ) will find it an interesting resource for learning German.
* Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung: A very highbrow newspaper, but it's worth stretching for the quality of analysis available. On an unrelated rant, european newspapers like FAZ and Le Monde put to shame the poor level of analysis and bias that seems to characterise English-speaking media (and Australian media in particular). End of rant...
* The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy in German! "Die galaktische Geschichte ist ein bißchen durcheinandergeraten". It seems to be just as witty in German as it was in English. I have no idea about the copyright, etc, of the material, so caveat lector. RIP Douglas Adams...
I'm actually very lucky to be learning German. There is so much out there that's helpful. There's a lot of helpful information in a lot of languages, of course, but probably the best, and most easily accessible, is in the big languages. For comparison, a quick look into a much smaller european language, Maltese, reveals that learning it would be much harder. My Nokia Internet Radio app on my N97 doesn't find any maltese internet radio stations when I do a search (though I'm sure they exist) and, although Google Translate advertises that it can handle Maltese, I asked it to translated a pretty easy sentence - "I love you". The translation? "I love you." Hmmm... Suspicious. In this case I know what it should be ("inhobok", if you're curious), but this indicates to me that it might be generally a bit useless. It would seem that finding native speakers for smaller languages (which, in itself, would often be more difficult) might actually be even more essential.
****
My diary update - I'm just finishing up Lesson 7 (review lesson) in Perfectionnement Allemand, about 1 week after I planned to finish lesson 6. My rate is as slow as ever :-) I've been keeping up with the Anki reviews for the most part. I did manage to get all the words from Aufgabe 3 into my Anki list, but I didn't do Aufgabe 4. Today I am starting on this Goethe-Zertifikat-B2 sample to see how I'm travelling. Still a lot more work to do I would say, but I've got to get an idea.
As for the rained-out BBQ-turned-cafe lunch, it was a bit of a wash out in terms of German practice. There were 7 people there, 4 of whom only spoke English, a 5th was my daughter who doesn't speak anything at all yet :-), and then my two Austrian friends. Because of the setting of being around a table, the opportunity to start speaking in German really didn't present itself - it would have excluded most of the table. So, damn :-) As we were leaving one of my Austrian friends said "and next time we will have to practice German more". Absolutely!
On the plus side, it looks like I might be able to set up some more extended practice periods in German starting mid to late June with one of my Austrian friends. I think, considering that my exam should be booked in by around then, I will do whatever I can to take advantage of this offer. Once again I am struck by how generous and helpful people have been with my German learning...
Anyone with some more helpful sites for learning German - feel free to post them in the comments!
Friday, April 22, 2011
Rained out BBQ...
But we'll still be meeting up with our Austrian friends, and some of their friends, who are a mixed group of German and English speakers, so the opportunity will not be wasted!
Today has been a good day. I finally listened to and repeated Assimil's Perfectionnement Allemand lesson 4 enough to call it finished and then I ended up with enough time to do all of lesson 5 in one half hour session. I haven't had the chance to do that for so long! I can't even remember the last time I managed to finish a whole lesson in a day given a morning and an evening commute, and time over breakfast (which I used to have before my daughter was born :-) ). So, quite a buzz.
I've also been keeping up with my Anki reviews each day, which are very easy to slip in between other things. Learning lists of words has its problems, but because it fits in so well with other tasks in the day, in tiny little 20-30 seconds chunks sometimes, then it's a great way to use time that otherwise would not really be usable at all.
Since this "aspirational goal" thing worked so well last time, I'm going to do the same again. I'll aim to finish Perfectionnement Allemand lesson 6 by tomorrow night, and hopefully get all the words that bothered me from Aufgabe 3 in Lesetraining B2 into my Anki list. With other family events and going out today, that's probably good enough, but I'll squeeze in the "aspirational" goal of doing Aufgabe 4 as well. Why the hell not!
Now, off to speak some German :-)
Since my last post, I've also managed to do another lesson from Lesetraining B2 and I got the correct answers, although, again, I didn't go somewhere quiet to do it, and I was quite tired so it took more time than it has to if I'm going to pass the Goethe B2 exam! I really feel that the book is helping me to prepare for the "bookish" parts of the test, because I am learning the style of questions they will ask. It sometimes seems quite artificial to me - but that's because this time in learning a language, I've taken a different path. I did have formal courses, but I think I knew everything that the classes covered already because my workplace in Germany (who were, after all, paying for the course!) insisted that I do the beginner's class. People who have taken formal classes all the way up to B2 level will have had a lot more practice at the kinds of fill-in-the-blanks exercises that tend to make up a big part of formal exams.
The example from Aufgabe 3 in Lesetraining B2 was that there was a given question, and you had to state whether the young people who had written about "leaving childhood" saw it as positive, negative or mixed. The first part was a simple multiple choice between these three options. Then there were two columns labelled "+" and "-" in which you had to write the key phrases that they said that were positive or negative. I misunderstood and thought the people who had a bet both ways should be left out, although in hindsight it's obvious that I needed to split up their statements to find one positive and one negative. Still, in an exam situation, I probably would have stuffed that up, so it's definitely worth practicing, for both the vocabulary and exactly this sort of question-style issue.
Today has been a good day. I finally listened to and repeated Assimil's Perfectionnement Allemand lesson 4 enough to call it finished and then I ended up with enough time to do all of lesson 5 in one half hour session. I haven't had the chance to do that for so long! I can't even remember the last time I managed to finish a whole lesson in a day given a morning and an evening commute, and time over breakfast (which I used to have before my daughter was born :-) ). So, quite a buzz.
I've also been keeping up with my Anki reviews each day, which are very easy to slip in between other things. Learning lists of words has its problems, but because it fits in so well with other tasks in the day, in tiny little 20-30 seconds chunks sometimes, then it's a great way to use time that otherwise would not really be usable at all.
Since this "aspirational goal" thing worked so well last time, I'm going to do the same again. I'll aim to finish Perfectionnement Allemand lesson 6 by tomorrow night, and hopefully get all the words that bothered me from Aufgabe 3 in Lesetraining B2 into my Anki list. With other family events and going out today, that's probably good enough, but I'll squeeze in the "aspirational" goal of doing Aufgabe 4 as well. Why the hell not!
Now, off to speak some German :-)
Since my last post, I've also managed to do another lesson from Lesetraining B2 and I got the correct answers, although, again, I didn't go somewhere quiet to do it, and I was quite tired so it took more time than it has to if I'm going to pass the Goethe B2 exam! I really feel that the book is helping me to prepare for the "bookish" parts of the test, because I am learning the style of questions they will ask. It sometimes seems quite artificial to me - but that's because this time in learning a language, I've taken a different path. I did have formal courses, but I think I knew everything that the classes covered already because my workplace in Germany (who were, after all, paying for the course!) insisted that I do the beginner's class. People who have taken formal classes all the way up to B2 level will have had a lot more practice at the kinds of fill-in-the-blanks exercises that tend to make up a big part of formal exams.
The example from Aufgabe 3 in Lesetraining B2 was that there was a given question, and you had to state whether the young people who had written about "leaving childhood" saw it as positive, negative or mixed. The first part was a simple multiple choice between these three options. Then there were two columns labelled "+" and "-" in which you had to write the key phrases that they said that were positive or negative. I misunderstood and thought the people who had a bet both ways should be left out, although in hindsight it's obvious that I needed to split up their statements to find one positive and one negative. Still, in an exam situation, I probably would have stuffed that up, so it's definitely worth practicing, for both the vocabulary and exactly this sort of question-style issue.
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