¿El vaso está medio lleno o medio vacío?

europe-67396_960_720

Hi all,

So what have I been up to?

Well, the past two months have been a period of reflection for me.

In this time, I’ve asked myself the following question over and over again.

¿El vaso está medio lleno o medio vacío?

In other words, I’ve being analysing not only the way that I’ve be studying but also the reasons why I’ve decided to embark on such a crazy challenge.

The conclusion which I have reached is that before anyone decides to learn another language, they should think about creating a plan for their language attainment journey.

Just like the majority of people, I like to get stuck into something and, as I progress, learn by my mistakes.

I’m now one year behind schedule, so this was obviously the wrong approach to take.

In order to help me focus my mind and stop myself from using the ‘spray and pray’ method, I’m now basing my language learning on the Grow model.

What is the GROW Model?

The GROW model is a coaching method quite often used for helping a person find their true career path. The GROW model involves four stages (Goal, Reality, Options, Wrap-up).

The GROW model is used to generate the following:

  • Goals
  • Obstacles
  • Options

More about the GROW model stages and a diagram of the GROW model can be found here

In my opinion the GROW model has helped me to press the reset button and has forced me to work on my language attainment weaknesses.

It has also helped me identify that I need to work on my listening skills, otherwise my level of Spanish and Polish will never improve. After reaching this conclusion, I had to decide between two choices.

  1. A) Continue to focus mainly on reading, writing and speaking
  2. B) Force myself to undertake daily listening comprehensions

I chose the second option because my goal is to be able to communicate with speakers of my target languages.

If I had chosen option B, then I would have had to change my goal to being happy with having a passive understanding (the ability to read and write) of the target languages.

The answer to the question may seem straightforward but the GROW model really helped me to outline what I needed to do.

What have I incorporated into my language learning?

  • I’ve downloaded and now listen daily to the Radio TOK FM. There is a subscription cost but it’s worth it. Having said that, I wouldn’t advise a complete beginner to listen to it until their understanding improves

 

  • Every day, I listen to News in Slow Spanish. The good thing about this mobile app is that you pay the subscription on a monthly basis

 

  • I have only recently started listening to Learn Real Polish but I would still recommend it

 

Also, I force myself to listen to comprehensions from books, such as Polish Conversations and Easy Spanish Reader

In regard to listening comprehension, I would recommend that you follow the following steps

  • Listen to the text once
  • Listen and transcribe the text at the same time (you will need to pause it several times)
  • Listen to the text again and try to correct your mistakes
  • Check what you have written against the text in the book

 

This daily routine has helped me to correct parts of my spoken Polish. I used to say ‘Nie chcę’ with a pause between the ‘Nie’ and the ‘chcę’ but I’ve just discovered that both words should be spoken together…Anyway, you live and you learn, and in regard to my language learning, el vaso está medio lleno.

My Timetable for February

  • Visit Poland for 2 weeks and speak as much Polish as possible
  • Attend my weekly Spanish classes Daily Polish and Spanish listening comprehensions
  • Learn vocab

My Year Goals

  • Take and pass the Spanish B1 DELE Exam by 13th July
  • Take the Certificate Examination in Polish as a Foreign Language B2 by November
  • Start a German course in September
  • Start a French course in the summer and beg the French members of my family to help me to learn the language

Bye for now!

 

Onwards and Upwards i Nigdy się nie poddawaj

EU

Follow me: Twitter @NicEU23

2017 has been one of the hardest years of my life and during this year, I’ve done a lot of soul searching and in regard to my challenge, I came really close to throwing the towel in.

My biggest low was trying to take the Spanish B2 Dele exam whilst suffering from an eye infection. I crashed and burned but in hindsight I now see it as a learning curve which forced me to enrol on a Spanish language course and made me check out different language learning apps, such Linguasorb Spanish Verbs app (helps a learner to conjugate verbs).

The course has really helped me to improve my Spanish and has given me the strength to continue.

In addition to this, during November, I spent a bit of time in Barcelona and also visited Poznan in Poland.

My Polish trip really gave me a boost because I spent two day speaking only Polish.

I’ve uploaded a short video of me speaking Polish (below). It’s not scripted and I don’t really say much because I hate speaking in front of a camera. If you speak Polish, please let me know what you think.

Merry Christmas and please follow my progress in the new year.

Who Dares Wins and Nie od Razu Rzym zbudowano!

Flags
Hi all,
It has been a long time since I updated you on my language learning challenge.
The reason for my long break was due to an illness.  For six weeks, on and off, I was as sick as a dog y ahora mismo estoy hecho polvo.
This has been a massive setback for me and has slightly derailed my schedule.
I’m still going to take the Spanish B1 exam on the 12th and 13th May but as the first date approaches, I’m working against the clock.
I’ve still got five weeks to go, so I’m going to give it my all. The good thing is that I’m getting a large amount of support from my friend, Luis, and my language exchange partner, Raul.
Barcelona
Barcelona

Luis helped me with my Spanish pronunciation when I recently visited him Barcelona.

In addition to this, every day for 2 hours, I’m listening to a News in Slow Spanish podcast.
The podcasts are really forcing me to listen to Spanish (Castellano and Latin American).
My next step is to download some past  exam papers and work on them over Easter.
In regard to my Polish, I’m thinking about taking the B2 exam (Państwowe egzaminy certyfikatowe z języka polskiego jako obcego) in Poznan, as my Polish language exchange partner lives there, but I’m going to have to do some more research to see if this is feasible.
After I take my Spanish Exam, I’ll upload a video of me speaking Spanish, so you can judge my level of Spanish.
I’ll do the same with Polish in June.
Looking to the future, I have nearly made my mind up regarding the next two languages which I’m going to study.
In fact, last month I visited two countries to get a feel of both languages.
Can you guess from the pictures?
Un saludo
Cześć!

Hear No Polish, Speak No Spanish, See No Progress

Flags

Hi all,

It has been 2 months since I last updated my blog.

The reason for my absence has been down to the plain fact that I have been very busy.

My progress in regard to learning Polish and Spanish, is excelling in some areas, such as reading and speaking, but is grinding to a halt in other areas, such as writing and listening comprehension.

I thought by spending the Christmas period in Krakow, it would improve my level of Polish but I found it all most impossible for me to have a conversation with a Polish person without them switching to English.

Over and over again, I was given the reasons below:

1) My level of English is better than your Polish, so the conversation should be conducted in Polish

2) I want to improve my English

3) Polish isn’t an important language, so you don’t need to learn it

4) You will never be able to speak Polish

5) I don’t want to be rude, so I will speak to you in English

To combat this, I’m making the most of my language exchange with Darek, my Polish exchange partner, and watching Pierwsza Milosc on IPLA.

Pierwsza miłość (First Love) is a Polish soap opera set in Wrocław, Poland. It has been broadcast continually on television Polsat since November 4, 2004. It has over 3,200 episodes, so by the time I’ve watched every single one, I will either be speaking like Adam Mickiewicz or be dead.

Another thing which I believe has helped my listening comprehension is that my language exchange partners have been sending me audio files which contain a reading from a book, in each of my target languages. The audio doesn’t come with a text, so I’m forced to listen to it over and over again.

Finally, during one of my language exchanges, my Russian exchange partner told me about a website, Forvo, which helps language students to pronounce foreign words.

Well that’s all folks!

Bye for now!

Keep Calm and Don’t Panic!

Time, Tide and Language Learning wait for No Man

Flags

You can follow me on Twitter

Hi all,

It has nearly been 4 months since I started my challenge and the one thing which I’m still struggling with is not the lack of resources, finding language exchange partners, understanding the grammar, but old father time, Ojciec Czas, El Padre Tiempo, and these three international masters of time have now been joined by время Отец.

OK, I don’t know whether the Russian translation of Father Time is время Отец or if the anthropomorphised depiction of time exists in Russia, but I do know that I have invited время Отец to jump on his Велосипед, come over to my world of languages and to take part in my challenge.

So why have I made my life more complicated by forcing myself to have weekly Russian language exchanges?

Well the answer is quite simple, I just wanted to know what it would be like to try to maintain a language whilst trying to learn a new one.

To be honest, I thought that it would be like riding a Велосипед and that my Russian language exchange would be a walk in the park but although some days are great (it turns out that I speak Russian with either a Russian accent or no accent at all), other days are a nightmare.

The good thing is that after two weeks of absolute chaos, which included me saying ‘ano’ instead of ‘año’ to Raul my Spanish exchange partner, I have become more organised.

For those of you who are learning Slovak and Spanish at the same time, make sure that you don’t say ‘ano’ instead of ‘sí’ when you are speaking Spanish.

Another issue which I was faced with was trying to find the right language exchange partners.

Before I joined Italki and WeSpeke, I managed to do quite a lot of research in regard to finding the best exchange partners but I still made mistakes.

My Mistakes

1)      Being too nice and trying to be friends with everyone

2)      Wasting time, talking about too many topics

3)      Not being prepared for the exchange

4)      Having back to back exchanges in different languages

My Solutions

1)      Finding one language exchange partner per language and realising that I can’t talk to everyone, no matter how nice and interesting they seem.

2)      Each week, find an agreed topic to talk about.

3)      Send the vocabulary in advance

4)      Never have different language exchanges on the same day and try to have a day’s break in-between

Right, I’m going back to my language learning, so that’s all folks.

 

 

The Dreaded Language Exchange

Flags

Hi all,

In this month’s blog post, I’ve decided to talk about the dreaded language exchange.

Even the thought of conversing with someone in a foreign tongue brings me out in a cold sweat and takes me back to 1999, when, every week, I would meet up with Vladimir, my Russian language exchange partner. I recall that Vladimir’s one mission in life was to get his PhD, and improving his English would help him accomplish this, I, on the other hand was an undergraduate student who needed to learn Russian because if I didn’t, I knew that I would crash and burn during my compulsory study abroad in Moscow.

My time with Vladimir, or most probably now Dr Vladimir, may now be a distant memory but this week has made me realise that some language exchanges can make me feel like a UN interpreter and others can make me feel like I’m Dory from Finding Nemo.

 

So why am I putting myself through this?

Well, at the end of last week, following the advice of Benny Lewis, I not only joined WeSpeke but I also joined Italki.

Although Wespeke helped me to find two Polish language exchange partners, I was really impressed by Italki as I didn’t have to do too much searching and almost straight away I was inundated with language exchange offers. Nearly all of the people who contacted me seemed nice and it was a shame that I had to turn some of them down but the truth is, I just don’t have much free time.

In the end, I selected one Polish person, two native Spanish speakers and a Russian…Wait a minute! I hear you cry…Ok I know that my focus should only be on trying to learn Spanish and Polish but my love of languages got the better of me and just the thought of speaking Russian for a hour was too hard to turn down.

So how are my language exchanges going?

My short answer would be fantastic, as I have now managed to speak to all my Polish language exchange partners and my understanding is improving by every conversation and my confidence is growing.

Next week, I will speak with my two Spanish language exchange partners. This will be harder for me as I still speak Spanish like a robot and I’m still translating every word from English to Spanish.

I’ll let you know how I get on.

Finally, I was going to give you some advice about how to prepare for an online language exchange but as I’m still finding my feet, I think it would be best to point you in the direction of a few web pages (below) which have helped me to structure my exchanges.

How to Have a Successful Language Exchange

Ten ways to fix your language exchange

How to Use Skype to Learn Another Language

 

Learning Polish in Poland

Flags

Believe it or not, writing a blog, learning two languages at the same time and deciding to spend some time in the one of my target language countries can be a little bit challenging but I’m trying my best.
Ok, I bet you can’t guess where I am right now? Am I in Poland or am I in Spain?
Here’s a clue… dzisiaj, mówiłem po polsku. Ok, it’s not really a clue but a statement of what I’ve been doing today in Kraków, Poland.
Two weeks ago, I arrived in Poland to improve my Polish speaking and understanding. I spent one week in Krakow and then I spent a week in Jarosławiec, which is a seaside town in the north of Poland.

20160826_194109

Latarnia morska w Jarosławcu/Lighthouse in Jarosławiec
My trip to Jarosławiec didn’t quite go according to plan as I managed to get tonsillitis  (‘angina’ in Polish) and after visiting a doctor,  I was unable to speak English let alone Polish for the first three days.
So what have I learnt?
Firstly I’ve learnt that everyone who is decides to visit a foreign country should learn at least a little bit of language, just in case they become ill.
Secondly, I find it really hard to speak formal Polish.

20160827_151410
Singing Polish Trains

Thirdly, according to a sign on a train, the end of Polish trains sing ☺.

Finally, I realised that I need to have more one to one Polish conversations, so I decided to join Wespeke, a language exchange website. I’ve already started talking with a native Polish speaker, and I hope to continue speaking with him when I return to the UK.
The curse of being a native English speaker is that the majority of Polish people under 30 prefer to converse in English.
To spend more time on my language learning, I’ve decided to only upload a blog post once a month (the second Thursday of each month).

More ‘Language Acquisition’ and Less ‘Language Learning’

Flags

Hola, Cześć and Hi,

First of all, I would like to say a massive gracias to my friend Luis, who has been helping me with my Spanish pronunciation. Learning Spanish has been harder than I expected, so his ability explain Spanish grammar has helped me a lot.

My approach to learning a language has always been to learn as much vocabulary as possible, learn the linking words, translate a newspaper article every day and to study the grammar by conjugating verbs and memorising them.

On one hand, this approach has given me a passive understanding of a language, but on the other hand, it has also given me false confidence, and the downside to this is that my speaking can be very robotic (this has been pointed out to me).

The new approach, which I have taken over the past couple of weeks is to send Luis audio recordings of sentences, and he will either tell me it’s ok or get me to repeat it again. This has been time consuming but the end results have been amazing and it stops be from slipping back into the bad habit of mispronouncing certain words, and before anyone says anything, I’m now aware that the stress in ‘gustaría’  is on the accented syllable, not the second syllable.

In addition to this, part of my new approach is to listening to Spanish and Polish chat shows.

My trick is to record a radio chat show, then slow it down with Audacity.

 

Another person who I would like to thank is Benny Lewis AKA the Irish Polyglot. This month, Benny has name checked me twice on Twitter, so to return the favour, I’ve decided to buy his new book ‘Language Hacking Spanish’

After I’ve purchased and read, I’ll let you know what I think of it.

Finally, if you are struggling to find a good Spanish topical publication to read, I recommend giving Jot Down a try.

Every evening, I select an article and translate it into English.

 

Bye for now!