Ausmumof3 Posted January 21, 2020 Posted January 21, 2020 Anyone else aim to learn a foreign language purely to read books in that language. I’ve been diy Italian using apps and library resources etc. I’m probably never going to use it in conversation but I’m reading and making sense of some of the news and slowly working on a book (understanding only a percentage but hey) Is learning to read the language and using lit to keep it fresh a viable way to actually retain it. Obviously not going to help with pronunciation. Quote
maize Posted January 21, 2020 Posted January 21, 2020 (edited) Can you combine reading with listening to the book in audio format? That would help with pronunciation and with the rhythm of the language. Reading aloud to yourself also helps as it engages the speaking areas of your brain. There are free audio recordings for books in many languages--you can check librivox and even YouTube. Audible has many foreign language books as well--sometimes you can sign up for a regional audible account, such as audible.it for Italian https://www.audible.it/?ipRedirectOverride=true&overrideBaseCountry=true&pf_rd_p=c285d309-ae0b-47d8-ba0a-4148d0b40080&pf_rd_r=JS4CPZ0VV8M8S6E3X2BN I have found reading to be a good way to retain and improve languages; I like children's books that I am already familiar with in English if I am not strong in the language. Edited January 21, 2020 by maize 8 Quote
wintermom Posted January 21, 2020 Posted January 21, 2020 The most practical help my year of intensive Ukrainian study at uni was the ability to read the Cyrillic alphabet and the phonetic sounds of the letters. Then I could help my grandfather identify Russian stamps in his collection. 😁 1 Quote
SKL Posted January 21, 2020 Posted January 21, 2020 (edited) I don't know how well it works, but it had been my hobby for years before I had kids. Hopefully my eyes don't fail and I can get back to it someday. The way I built up to it was by reading children's books in foreign languages. Though nowadays there are probably great online options to get you to that point. I've read classics such as Heidi in German, The Count of Monte Cristo in French, and various books in Spanish. Also I have read the Bible's New Testament in 4 languages (going on 5) and the Old Testament in 2 (going on 3). (ETA I keep an English version alongside to help with / confirm meaning.) When I've traveled to countries that speak the languages I've studied (there are about 10 or 11 languages depending how you count), I can slowly read the signs etc. and understand some conversation, but only rarely do I feel confident to speak with the locals, even in Spanish, which is my best language by far. I have never tried an audiobook. That might be a great idea, not only for me, but for my kids. Edited January 21, 2020 by SKL 3 Quote
Lawyer&Mom Posted January 21, 2020 Posted January 21, 2020 There is nothing wrong with focusing on input rather than output. Lots of self-taught hobbyists enjoy learning languages but don’t feel the need to speak them. Italian is fairly transparent to an English speaker. You can skim a text and sorta mostly have an idea what it is about. With a transparent language it is totally an option to just start reading. The first 500 pages or so is the hardest. Keep at it and you will make leaps and bounds. I’m currently at about 3,500 pages of reading French, and I can easily read grown up novels. Maybe not literature taught at Universities, but definitely fancy book-club type books. I’m told when you get to 10,000 pages it’s almost as easy as reading English. I’ve only done the very basics of French grammar formally, I’ve just picked up everything from context. If you are concerned about pronunciation I would recommend watching a TV show. Pick something mindless that you are already familiar with and just start watching. Don’t worry if you don’t understand much. You will. Comprehension improves massively after about 50 hours. I know someone who watched That Seventies Show dubbed in Italian on Netflix. That’s a perfect choice. I watched all 15 seasons of ER dubbed in French and now I can mostly follow regular French TV. (In depth intellectual discussions? Not quite. A light comedy? Sure.) If you are interested in discussion with other language hobbyists I highly recommend: https://forum.language-learners.org 4 Quote
rdj2027 Posted January 21, 2020 Posted January 21, 2020 I am studying Japanese and Korean. My primary goal is reading but I am not opposed to mastering the conversational part as well 😉 My French and Ancient Greek are dusty but I have recently started to read and listen again and particularly the French is coming back rather quickly. I used to be fluent but have neither spoken nor listened nor read it for the last 35 years. 2 Quote
maize Posted January 21, 2020 Posted January 21, 2020 (edited) With audiobooks, there is sometimes an option to slow down playback speed. Audible's app does this well without distortion. It's a very helpful feature for foreign language study, whether you are reading along or just listening. Edited January 22, 2020 by maize 3 Quote
Miss Tick Posted January 21, 2020 Posted January 21, 2020 I've been doing this with Italian too. If you have time (and funds) you might like News In Slow Italian. I used to listen to the Spanish version when it was free. One of these days you will find some random opportunity to start speaking it. Surely! I had studied Spanish in high school and the grammar rules are super-duper similar, so when I had the opportunity to travel to Italy, after a year of Duolingo, I was able to transition into speaking fairly smoothly. 1 Quote
beezus Posted January 21, 2020 Posted January 21, 2020 I'm learning Esperanto. Not just to read, but hopefully to get to the point where I could correspond with someone in Esperanto one day. I'm a pretty extreme introvert, and I guess I'd rather write to people than actually talk to them! The grammar in Esperanto is relatively simple. I plod away at Spanish too, but not in any organized kind of way. I've definitely expanded my Spanish vocabulary and have read some kid-level books, but I would have a long way to go before I could say I really had any meaningful level of mastery in Spanish. 1 Quote
Ausmumof3 Posted January 22, 2020 Author Posted January 22, 2020 22 hours ago, maize said: Can you combine reading with listening to the book in audio format? That would help with pronunciation and with the rhythm of the language. Reading aloud to yourself also helps as it engages the speaking areas of your brain. There are free audio recordings for books in many languages--you can check librivox and even YouTube. Audible has many foreign language books as well--sometimes you can sign up for a regional audible account, such as audible.it for Italian https://www.audible.it/?ipRedirectOverride=true&overrideBaseCountry=true&pf_rd_p=c285d309-ae0b-47d8-ba0a-4148d0b40080&pf_rd_r=JS4CPZ0VV8M8S6E3X2BN I have found reading to be a good way to retain and improve languages; I like children's books that I am already familiar with in English if I am not strong in the language. Ahh good idea on the audiobooks! I hadn’t thought of that. 1 Quote
Ausmumof3 Posted January 22, 2020 Author Posted January 22, 2020 18 hours ago, Lawyer&Mom said: There is nothing wrong with focusing on input rather than output. Lots of self-taught hobbyists enjoy learning languages but don’t feel the need to speak them. Italian is fairly transparent to an English speaker. You can skim a text and sorta mostly have an idea what it is about. With a transparent language it is totally an option to just start reading. The first 500 pages or so is the hardest. Keep at it and you will make leaps and bounds. I’m currently at about 3,500 pages of reading French, and I can easily read grown up novels. Maybe not literature taught at Universities, but definitely fancy book-club type books. I’m told when you get to 10,000 pages it’s almost as easy as reading English. I’ve only done the very basics of French grammar formally, I’ve just picked up everything from context. If you are concerned about pronunciation I would recommend watching a TV show. Pick something mindless that you are already familiar with and just start watching. Don’t worry if you don’t understand much. You will. Comprehension improves massively after about 50 hours. I know someone who watched That Seventies Show dubbed in Italian on Netflix. That’s a perfect choice. I watched all 15 seasons of ER dubbed in French and now I can mostly follow regular French TV. (In depth intellectual discussions? Not quite. A light comedy? Sure.) If you are interested in discussion with other language hobbyists I highly recommend: https://forum.language-learners.org Bookmarked thank you! Glad I’m not the only one who likes to learn by reading. The news seems to be relatively easy. The book I’m on is a bit harder but getting easier as I go. Quote
Ausmumof3 Posted January 22, 2020 Author Posted January 22, 2020 16 hours ago, beezus said: I'm learning Esperanto. Not just to read, but hopefully to get to the point where I could correspond with someone in Esperanto one day. I'm a pretty extreme introvert, and I guess I'd rather write to people than actually talk to them! The grammar in Esperanto is relatively simple. I plod away at Spanish too, but not in any organized kind of way. I've definitely expanded my Spanish vocabulary and have read some kid-level books, but I would have a long way to go before I could say I really had any meaningful level of mastery in Spanish. Yes this is me. I don’t even really enjoy English conversations that much so I can’t imagine trying in Italian! Quote
Ausmumof3 Posted January 22, 2020 Author Posted January 22, 2020 (edited) 18 hours ago, rdj2027 said: I am studying Japanese and Korean. My primary goal is reading but I am not opposed to mastering the conversational part as well 😉 My French and Ancient Greek are dusty but I have recently started to read and listen again and particularly the French is coming back rather quickly. I used to be fluent but have neither spoken nor listened nor read it for the last 35 years. They seem so much harder. Latin based languages are definitely easier for an English speaker. i did Hebrew as a kid and went quite a way but couldn’t even pass the entry level duo lingo quiz. That’s partly why I’m wanting strategies for retention now. Edited January 22, 2020 by Ausmumof3 Quote
Monica_in_Switzerland Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 We're learning Latin purely to read it. Reading in French is the single best thing I can do as a fluent but non-native speaker to improve my French. 2 Quote
maize Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 19 hours ago, rdj2027 said: I am studying Japanese and Korean. My primary goal is reading but I am not opposed to mastering the conversational part as well 😉 My French and Ancient Greek are dusty but I have recently started to read and listen again and particularly the French is coming back rather quickly. I used to be fluent but have neither spoken nor listened nor read it for the last 35 years. Japanese is an exceptionally difficult language to read if you do not speak it, at least once you move past hiragana. Given multiple pronunciations for each kanji character you really need linguistic context to figure out which pronunciation to use. 1 Quote
madteaparty Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 (edited) 20 hours ago, Lawyer&Mom said: There is nothing wrong with focusing on input rather than output. Lots of self-taught hobbyists enjoy learning languages but don’t feel the need to speak them. Italian is fairly transparent to an English speaker. You can skim a text and sorta mostly have an idea what it is about. With a transparent language it is totally an option to just start reading. The first 500 pages or so is the hardest. Keep at it and you will make leaps and bounds. I’m currently at about 3,500 pages of reading French, and I can easily read grown up novels. Maybe not literature taught at Universities, but definitely fancy book-club type books. I’m told when you get to 10,000 pages it’s almost as easy as reading English. I’ve only done the very basics of French grammar formally, I’ve just picked up everything from context. If you are concerned about pronunciation I would recommend watching a TV show. Pick something mindless that you are already familiar with and just start watching. Don’t worry if you don’t understand much. You will. Comprehension improves massively after about 50 hours. I know someone who watched That Seventies Show dubbed in Italian on Netflix. That’s a perfect choice. I watched all 15 seasons of ER dubbed in French and now I can mostly follow regular French TV. (In depth intellectual discussions? Not quite. A light comedy? Sure.) If you are interested in discussion with other language hobbyists I highly recommend: https://forum.language-learners.org How do you track pages read? Do you keep a list of your books? Would love to see if it you’re up to sharing. I can watch French TV and get the news and understand news articles but lit books I still need the English translation near by. Never mind attending a lecture or something—I saw Piketty give a talk and all I understood was graphs (and even those😞). i love Italian and it’s stuck to my brain so much more than french. It’s also much easier to pronounce. I can carry a conversation in Italian which I absolutely cannot in French bc I’m so self conscious of spoken French. Anyway I started reading an Italian book which I was told was for beginners and...nope. So I very much admire the reading over the speaking! eta that I search audible in the target language and then find the paper book on amazon or someplace. Edited January 22, 2020 by madteaparty 1 Quote
Guest Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 On 1/21/2020 at 6:37 AM, Ausmumof3 said: Anyone else aim to learn a foreign language purely to read books in that language. I’ve been diy Italian using apps and library resources etc. I’m probably never going to use it in conversation but I’m reading and making sense of some of the news and slowly working on a book (understanding only a percentage but hey) Is learning to read the language and using lit to keep it fresh a viable way to actually retain it. Obviously not going to help with pronunciation. Pretty much every grad student I know of :). In many programs, you have to have reading proficiency in at least one other primary language used in the field. I'm fairly capable at learning to read a new language pretty quickly and accurately, but struggle to find words in speech (I'm dyspraxic, and sometimes this happens even in English), but if I don't keep it up, I have to pretty much relearn it the next time. My starting point is usually Reader's Digest in that language. I also like watching TV shows in other languages, especially ones designed for teens/kids (the pace is usually a little slower). I watched Moana in Maori on the way to NZ. Such a beautiful language... 2 Quote
Matryoshka Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 (edited) 46 minutes ago, madteaparty said: How do you track pages read? Do you keep a list of your books? Would love to see if it you’re up to sharing. I can watch French TV and get the news and understand news articles but lit books I still need the English translation near by. Never mind attending a lecture or something—I saw Piketty give a talk and all I understood was graphs (and even those😞). i love Italian and it’s stuck to my brain so much more than french. It’s also much easier to pronounce. I can carry a conversation in Italian which I absolutely cannot in French bc I’m so self conscious of spoken French. Anyway I started reading an Italian book which I was told was for beginners and...nope. So I very much admire the reading over the speaking! eta that I search audible in the target language and then find the paper book on amazon or someplace. It's interesting that you find it easier to speak than to read - I'd say most people have the complete opposite experience with foreign languages, which I think is one reason Latin stays popular - no need to hold a conversation, lol. I can read (or orally comprehend) in some languages where I have almost not output skills at all. Input is usually easier than output! I read a lot in Spanish and German, but at this point I've long been fluent in those. I can read basic text in most other Latin languages and Dutch, and can make a good guess on very basic Scandinavian. I've tried to improve my French reading comprehension by reading books; have to say it's fallen by the wayside a bit. So far, other then scads of computer manuals way back when, for literature I've only read a translation of Charlotte's Web and L'Etranger. I picked up a copy of La Peste, but got distracted by shinier reading projects - I've been meaning to pick it back up. Anyone have some other good suggestions for readable French lit that isn't 1000+ pages long? Those French are wordy! But speaking of output, other than a few simple sentences, I probably couldn't say much in French conversation. I am working on the French mostly for the lit - I've heard a lot of the 'great' French literature was badly translated or even heavily edited rewritten by Victorian prudes or hacks just wanting to get it sold, and not all of it has been comprehensively retranslated since then. I've read a bunch of Portuguese stuff in English and Spanish translation the past couple of years, and now you guys are making me feel guilty that I haven't even attempted the originals, since I really can get about 80% of Portuguese without even trying hard. Italian I can understand spoken fairly well, but actually have a bit of a harder time reading, I think because I just need to sit down and figure out the phonetics. I know it's written phonetically, as is Spanish, but for some reason the rules are different. I sat down and did that with French at one point and my reading comprehension went up a ton overnight. I can hold a basic conversation with someone speaking Italian or Portuguese, as long as I'm speaking Spanish, lol. I find reading to be a great way to increase vocabulary and comprehension. To the tracking pages question above, Goodreads is a great way to track your reading. I have a shelf for each foreign language. Edited January 22, 2020 by Matryoshka 2 Quote
SKL Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 Random funny story about the usefulness of different languages. My Indian friend and I were in Brazil being driven in a cab. Cab driver did not speak English, we did not speak Portuguese. I tried Spanish, thinking well, there was a good chance a cab driver would have had some exposure. He didn't understand Spanish. I turned to my friend and said something in Hindi. That he understood! Turns out his grandma was from India. We had a good conversation after that. 🙂 4 1 2 Quote
madteaparty Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 (edited) 2 hours ago, Matryoshka said: It's interesting that you find it easier to speak than to read - I'd say most people have the complete opposite experience with foreign languages, which I think is one reason Latin stays popular - no need to hold a conversation, lol. I can read (or orally comprehend) in some languages where I have almost not output skills at all. Input is usually easier than output! I read a lot in Spanish and German, but at this point I've long been fluent in those. I can read basic text in most other Latin languages and Dutch, and can make a good guess on very basic Scandinavian. I've tried to improve my French reading comprehension by reading books; have to say it's fallen by the wayside a bit. So far, other then scads of computer manuals way back when, for literature I've only read a translation of Charlotte's Web and L'Etranger. I picked up a copy of La Peste, but got distracted by shinier reading projects - I've been meaning to pick it back up. Anyone have some other good suggestions for readable French lit that isn't 1000+ pages long? Those French are wordy! But speaking of output, other than a few simple sentences, I probably couldn't say much in French conversation. I am working on the French mostly for the lit - I've heard a lot of the 'great' French literature was badly translated or even heavily edited rewritten by Victorian prudes or hacks just wanting to get it sold, and not all of it has been comprehensively retranslated since then. I've read a bunch of Portuguese stuff in English and Spanish translation the past couple of years, and now you guys are making me feel guilty that I haven't even attempted the originals, since I really can get about 80% of Portuguese without even trying hard. Italian I can understand spoken fairly well, but actually have a bit of a harder time reading, I think because I just need to sit down and figure out the phonetics. I know it's written phonetically, as is Spanish, but for some reason the rules are different. I sat down and did that with French at one point and my reading comprehension went up a ton overnight. I can hold a basic conversation with someone speaking Italian or Portuguese, as long as I'm speaking Spanish, lol. I find reading to be a great way to increase vocabulary and comprehension. To the tracking pages question above, Goodreads is a great way to track your reading. I have a shelf for each foreign language. Only Italian, which I learned fully conversationally. I will never be able to speak in French, for example. I feel mired by French novels too. So DS has an anthology of excerpts he is going through. I know there’s feelings about that 🤷♀️ Edited January 22, 2020 by madteaparty 2 Quote
Lawyer&Mom Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 3 hours ago, madteaparty said: How do you track pages read? Do you keep a list of your books? Would love to see if it you’re up to sharing. I can watch French TV and get the news and understand news articles but lit books I still need the English translation near by. Never mind attending a lecture or something—I saw Piketty give a talk and all I understood was graphs (and even those😞). My reading was a mix of YA Titles and Chick Lit, both French and in translation. (I’ve only just graduated to Fancy Book Club French: Les écrivements, Matthieu Simard. Yum!) Sophie Kinsella, Jennifer Wiener, whatever I could find at the library or Goodwill. Don’t aim high at first! Aim for accessible! It’s okay to read Diary of a Wimpy Kid to get started! I only add my pages to my list when I actually *finish* a book. Helps me power through sometimes! 1 1 Quote
Matryoshka Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 16 minutes ago, madteaparty said: Only Italian, which I learned fully conversationally. I will never be able to speak in French, for example. That makes more sense. I learned German mostly by immersion, and expanded my vocab mostly by reading. There's really only so far you can go with vocab with conversation only. Even in your native tongue. There are so many people who can't read complex texts in English. The great thing is that if you're already conversational, the added vocab can be accessed and used easily in conversation. 2 Quote
SKL Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 Just thought I'd add that I've read Harry Potter (book 1) in English, Spanish, and French so far. It is motivating if (a) the content is fun and (b) you know enough about the story to not get frustrated trying to figure it out. (Also, it's pretty easy to come by a copy of those books in various languages. I have a Hindi one too, but I never got very far in that before kids.) 4 Quote
rdj2027 Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 5 hours ago, maize said: Japanese is an exceptionally difficult language to read if you do not speak it, at least once you move past hiragana. Given multiple pronunciations for each kanji character you really need linguistic context to figure out which pronunciation to use. Tell me about it 🙂 We spent a couple of years in Japan and are planning to go back. I was tired of not being able to read signs in public spaces, ingredient lists or whatever because it would have made life much easier. I work with native speakers for both languages and took classes at the university because once I was past hiragana, katakana (Hangul characters) and basic grammar I did not trust myself to continue on my own. All our Japanese friends are fluent in English, French or German and love practicing their skills with me. Outside of that group I do not interact frequently enough with people to have conversations other than ordering food, asking for directions, items or something similarly basic. My Korean endeavor came out of watching Korean shows on TV and wondering how close the subtitles are to what is actually being said. As with Japanese, I would prefer to be able to read signs in public spaces myself rather than keep asking. I do acquire conversational skills but they are not my priority. 2 Quote
Lawyer&Mom Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 36 minutes ago, rdj2027 said: Tell me about it 🙂 We spent a couple of years in Japan and are planning to go back. I was tired of not being able to read signs in public spaces, ingredient lists or whatever because it would have made life much easier. I work with native speakers for both languages and took classes at the university because once I was past hiragana, katakana (Hangul characters) and basic grammar I did not trust myself to continue on my own. All our Japanese friends are fluent in English, French or German and love practicing their skills with me. Outside of that group I do not interact frequently enough with people to have conversations other than ordering food, asking for directions, items or something similarly basic. My Korean endeavor came out of watching Korean shows on TV and wondering how close the subtitles are to what is actually being said. As with Japanese, I would prefer to be able to read signs in public spaces myself rather than keep asking. I do acquire conversational skills but they are not my priority. Are you familiar with Tadoku? https://tadoku.org/japanese/en/what-is-tadoku-en/ It’s a series of graded readers with audio to teach Japanese through reading, but it’s also an approach to language learning through reading that can be used for any language. “Four Golden Rules At the initial stages, there are four important rules to follow in tadoku. Start from scratch. Choose easy books you can enjoy without translating. Look at the pictures carefully. They will help your understanding and make you want to read more. Don’t use a dictionary Looking up unknown words in a dictionary slows you down and kill the joy of reading. Rather, let the pictures tell the story and keep on reading. Skip over difficult words, phrases and passages. If the pictures don’t help, don’t hesitate to skip over difficult parts and keep on reading. If you enjoy the overall story, you don’t have to understand every minor detail! When the going gets tough, quit the book and pick up another. The going gets tough when the book is not suitable for your level or your interest. Simply throw the book away and start reading something else.” I focus on skip the hardest stuff and don’t hesitate to abandon a book that isn’t working. Reading should be fun! 3 1 Quote
SKL Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 1 minute ago, Lawyer&Mom said: Are you familiar with Tadoku? https://tadoku.org/japanese/en/what-is-tadoku-en/ It’s a series of graded readers with audio to teach Japanese through reading, but it’s also an approach to language learning through reading that can be used for any language. “Four Golden Rules At the initial stages, there are four important rules to follow in tadoku. Start from scratch. Choose easy books you can enjoy without translating. Look at the pictures carefully. They will help your understanding and make you want to read more. Don’t use a dictionary Looking up unknown words in a dictionary slows you down and kill the joy of reading. Rather, let the pictures tell the story and keep on reading. Skip over difficult words, phrases and passages. If the pictures don’t help, don’t hesitate to skip over difficult parts and keep on reading. If you enjoy the overall story, you don’t have to understand every minor detail! When the going gets tough, quit the book and pick up another. The going gets tough when the book is not suitable for your level or your interest. Simply throw the book away and start reading something else.” I focus on skip the hardest stuff and don’t hesitate to abandon a book that isn’t working. Reading should be fun! This sounds a bit like how I taught myself beginning Hindi. I got some copies of the earliest beginner readers they use in schools there. I also had a bit of info from Indian friends, mainly how to write my name and their names in Hindi (it uses a different script than English) and how to say a very short list of words (bear, bird, numbers 1-12...). I "read" through the easiest "stories" over and over and noticed patterns and built on that. I also listened to popular Hindi music and I would ask what the songs were about. Such a fun hobby. I miss it. 2 Quote
madteaparty Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 op it occurred to me there is a famous author that just fairly recently, in her adulthood i mean, learned Italian from scratch. She documented her process in a long New Yorker article a while back, and then, just recently, I think there is a book she translated from Italian... I think they may have moved there too. Right, here is the name: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/602664/the-penguin-book-of-italian-short-stories-by-edited-by-jhumpa-lahiri/ 2 Quote
rdj2027 Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 Lawyer&Mom Thank you for the link, I was not familiar with it. When I started hiragana and katakana, I read children's books that I knew in a different language and was going to start on those that also have kanji. I think I will do the readers first as they really do look like a lot of fun. I am okay with recognizing kanji if I can link them to a picture or see them in context so these readers will be very helpful. For some reason writing them is another story. 1 Quote
Quarter Note Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 You are all inspiring me! I have been trying to learn German and Italian for ages, but it has been slow going, mainly because I just haven't been able to give daily time to language acquisition. My reason for learning those two languages hasn't been mentioned yet. Those languages are very beautiful when they are sung! I would love to be more familiar with German for listening to Schubert lieder, and to Italian for listening to opera. 1 Quote
Kareni Posted January 23, 2020 Posted January 23, 2020 6 hours ago, SKL said: Just thought I'd add that I've read Harry Potter (book 1) in English, Spanish, and French so far. It is motivating if (a) the content is fun and (b) you know enough about the story to not get frustrated trying to figure it out. (Also, it's pretty easy to come by a copy of those books in various languages. I have a Hindi one too, but I never got very far in that before kids.) My daughter was a big Harry Potter fan growing up. We gave her copies of Harry Potter in Latin and ancient Greek when she studied those languages as a high schooler. She's been living and working in South Korea for some six years now. So, yes, we gave her a copy of Harry Potter in Korean. Regards, Kareni 1 Quote
maize Posted January 23, 2020 Posted January 23, 2020 5 hours ago, rdj2027 said: Tell me about it 🙂 We spent a couple of years in Japan and are planning to go back. I was tired of not being able to read signs in public spaces, ingredient lists or whatever because it would have made life much easier. I work with native speakers for both languages and took classes at the university because once I was past hiragana, katakana (Hangul characters) and basic grammar I did not trust myself to continue on my own. All our Japanese friends are fluent in English, French or German and love practicing their skills with me. Outside of that group I do not interact frequently enough with people to have conversations other than ordering food, asking for directions, items or something similarly basic. My Korean endeavor came out of watching Korean shows on TV and wondering how close the subtitles are to what is actually being said. As with Japanese, I would prefer to be able to read signs in public spaces myself rather than keep asking. I do acquire conversational skills but they are not my priority. I used to be fairly fluent in spoken Japanese--I lived in the country as a young adult in a full immersion environment, speaking the language all day every day and almost no English at all for a year and a half. I never got very fluent with reading kanji though, and that has made the language harder to maintain than others I speak. Until very recently there was almost nothing on Audible in Japanese; they recently added some of the Chronicles of Narnia so I am listening to those--I have the book for one of them as well. Audible.jp exists but you have to use a credit card from a Japanese bank to sign up and I don't have one. Quote
mathnerd Posted January 23, 2020 Posted January 23, 2020 47 minutes ago, Kareni said: My daughter was a big Harry Potter fan growing up. We gave her copies of Harry Potter in Latin and ancient Greek when she studied those languages as a high schooler. She's been living and working in South Korea for some six years now. So, yes, we gave her a copy of Harry Potter in Korean. Regards, Kareni I do the same thing as well. My son has Harry Potter (and Winnie the Pooh) in Latin and Spanish. He compares them to the corresponding english edition when he runs into trouble understanding something. So, that is always a fun way to "rapidly accelerate" language acquisition in foreign languages. 4 Quote
rdj2027 Posted January 23, 2020 Posted January 23, 2020 Maize, thank you, this is awesome, I love the Narnia books. Luckily my hubby has just talked me into subscribing to Audible again. 1 Quote
Kareni Posted January 23, 2020 Posted January 23, 2020 2 hours ago, mathnerd said: I do the same thing as well. My son has Harry Potter (and Winnie the Pooh) in Latin and Spanish. He compares them to the corresponding english edition when he runs into trouble understanding something. So, that is always a fun way to "rapidly accelerate" language acquisition in foreign languages. My daughter always liked/likes to start with reading the dialogue as she's says that easier than the prose. Are you aware that the Hobbit and Alice in Wonderland are/were also available in Latin? My daughter has those as well. Regards, Kareni Quote
mathnerd Posted January 23, 2020 Posted January 23, 2020 1 hour ago, Kareni said: My daughter always liked/likes to start with reading the dialogue as she's says that easier than the prose. Are you aware that the Hobbit and Alice in Wonderland are/were also available in Latin? My daughter has those as well. Regards, Kareni Thank you for that tip about reading the dialogues first! Off to look for Alice in Wonderland and Hobbit in Latin! 1 Quote
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.