I started to use this app to learn Spain. (So I am new here.) I am a bit lost how to use it. I recognise/understand a lot of words, I know that I will recognise them in other texts later as well, but I am not sure I would remember them if I should make a sentence using that word. Marking them familiar seems very slow, but I don’t dare to mark them known, because it might takes me to a higher level where I am not comfortable.
With Lingq can I proceed faster and not mind the active vocabulary level? Or should I wait until I am confidently know a word?
Thank you
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I think you should probably just go ahead with what feels right to you at first. The system is self-correcting to a great extent, so if you decide to be more “hands-off” and then you find you have not marked a word that you don’t know fully, it will soon reappear, and you can mark it at that point.
Doing this won’t take you to a level you’re uncomfortable with, because there are thousands of words at each level, and it’s very unlikely that you’ll mark them all as known.
On the other hand, you could take the opposite method and mark all words that you feel even a little uncomfortable with (I tend to do this), and if you do know them, they will very quickly filter through the review system and become known words, with the added benefit that now you REALLY know them.
So either way, the system will work things out for you. At a certain point, you will figure out the right balance that works best for you, and you will stop worrying about which words to mark and which words to leave.
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I’m also learning Spanish and I have a quite vague standard of marking words known. I find it enough if I know meaning well enough when reading that it doesn’t slow me, but I don’t have to know it intimately. I don’t think you can expect to learn words intimately before you decide you are ready to learn new words. I would rather just charge ahead and try to expose myself to as many words as possible. There might be some words that I have known longer that I still don’t know more than from the context, whereas some that I have learned later I’m much more familiar with. At first, it might seem that it’s hard to make sense of sentences when all words are new. For me after a while, after having enough repetitions with the most common vocabulary, I didn’t come across too often with words that wouldn’t make sense in the context. Some I have forgotten if they haven’t repeated or are in a context that isn’t helpful, but not that often that I would think my method is too loose. If words have multiple distinct meanings I usually mark them as lingqs to see for a while in what kind of contexts it comes, but I’m not waiting to learn every single meaning. I wouldn’t be too worried about making “a mistake” by marking them wrong. Just read and listen as much as you can and sooner or later those words will become known.
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I think about it pragmatically. I mark a word known when I am sure that I’m not going to need to look it up again.
That stage I usually reach when I read it so smoothly that I don’t need to think about the word, I almost read over it because I just “know” it.
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I don’t have to look them up for reading, only I am not sure, I could recall them when I would like to use them making a sentence.
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I go with “If in doubt, mark it”.
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