It’s probably 3 years since I started learning Latin, but it’s usually days of intense activity followed by weeks or months of literally nothing. I don’t intend on giving up though, it takes a long time to forget what one learns.
In my previous two sessions, the start of which was in summer, I began to do structured composition exercises other than passively reading the LLPSI and the other related books. Hence I was able to get a feel for how a sentence could be structured, at least in Indicative.
In my current session I learned
- more conjunctions and suffixes
- more ablative phrases (a lot of them)
- time expressions
- verbs related to likes, dislikes and emotions
- verbs related to secrecy and stealth
- verbs related to thinking and recalling
- verbs related to carrying things, weirdly enough
- mihi sunt other than habeo, eis sunt other than habent, and others of the same.
Back when I learned English in elementary, we had an activity where we would underline phrases of connected words. I applied it to my Latin composition exercises, and it seems to have helped because back then Latin sentences seemed amorphous to me.
I saw a comment that said grammar lessons should happen after exposure, not before. It should give a lightbulb moment. I agree. Analysing with our limited short term memory what conjugation family a given verb is in, is less efficient than having already known it through a sort of muscle memory.
My next steps would probably be reading my compositions out loud into an audio journal and reviewing it. I think my Latin pronounciation is decent aside from some r-rolling difficulties. Then I will learn Subjunctive and the other moods.
- By session I mean not just an hourly session within a day, it’s more like the days of when I’m dedicated to studying, separated by weeks or months of inactivity. Yesterday I did 8 straight hours of study, the day before that was like 4 hours. My previous session was recorded to be at 1st, 2nd and 4th week of June.
Er Kampf ist echt.
Back to german classes, B2.2, and the struggle is real. It’s only Monday though, so check in at the end of the week, maybe things improve.
Might as well fess up: I haven’t done my Anki vocab in about two weeks. Just lost the thrill of it and trying to work on another stuff. Still listen to the occasional media in my languages, tho.
Sehr schwer. Bist normal.
It’s tough, but making ground. I haven’t caught one of these weekly updates in at least a month, so it’s been a while:
- I started a German B2.1 course last week - it’s kicking my arschloch
- I took the Leben in Deutschland test for my residency documents. Crushed it. Learned a ton of government and legal terminology while studying.
- Finished book 10 of Dragonball collected books (just heading into the Cell Arc)
- Started reading a full on murder mystery novel I found in a zu verschenken box on the street. It’s going okay.
- My interactions at stores and ordering are starting to get notably more comfortable and I’m asking “please repeat” fewer times. :-)
- More Germans are voluntarily offering to help with my language because I’m hearing and speaking more often in German. The checkout ladies at Kaufland find me hilarious.
- I came down with a nasty cold this weekend so I spent today on the couch trying to not die. Nicht Spass.
- My German teacher has figured out I’m more than happy to take feedback and correction (she was worried because I’m nearly her age and you don’t know how fellow academics will respond to feedback. I’m really good at being wrong and trying to learn.)
- I’m able to pick out more words during conversations on the U-Bahn around me and I’m almost able to keep up with the TV signs as they change between ads/news.
Uberall: sehr gut, aber schwer.
Doing min 60 mins Japanese, 30 mins Spanish, but today I’m have a really major off day so only managed 30 mins of JP today. Not touching my Irish, and my maths streak is still alive and well. Managed to do some immersion during the week, but not consistent, so that’s something I need to work on.
Depression is kicking hard lately for no reason. Still somehow managing to continue. Hope it gets easier sooner than later.
Ohhh didn’t knwo this community existed! Have been on a 204 day streak in Hanly and currently averaging ~250-300 reviews a day. Have only done 5 new cards a day for the last week, but I only got 10 levels (~150 cards) until I finished the main campaign. Really want to finish that before doing a 6-month language course starting at the beginning of December in China.
Wasn’t planning on taking another mock exam a second week in a row but I’d heard from someone that Migii’s exams were difficult and I decided I was up for the challenge.
I got my butt kicked 😅
Good practice, I guess. I’m just hoping exam day isn’t as tough.
Going to start an in-sentence verb conjugation drill and see if that helps me pick up my reading speed. Speed is still the target!
Additionally–I just discovered Magic: the Gathering rules text in Japanese. I’ve been playing the game on and off since 1995, so I’m very familiar with the rules, but seeing it in a different language has been incredible for reinforcing my grammar discrimination ability.
For anyone unfamiliar, Magic is extremely precise with its rules language, almost like legal documents. When you’ve got thousands and thousands of cards and they all have to interact together in an agreed upon way, all sorts of edge cases and specificity of basics have to be covered. Because I know almost all the details of the rules in English, it’s been a little like reading a book I know well or seeing a movie dubbed in Japanese, just with more specific language.
