How the masters learn

Open Forum in English
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ad Jay: (…) Thanks for the very detailed reply, Robert. :wink: (…)

You are welcome :wink:

ad Colin: I normally start out reading the words and the sample sentences aloud. Then I copy the sentences by hand in a little notebook. I also try to expand on the sample sentences. If the sentence is something like “His mother told him to do his homework” I’ll change a few words in the sentence to practise rephrasing things. I could say something along the lines of “My father told me to come home early”, “My brother told me to stay away from his stuff”.

I also try to connect sentences and turn them into a little story. I normally do this once I have gone through all the words at least once so I know enough words and phrases to start playing around.

I have never made or used any flashcards. Not because I think they are bad but I am just too lazy to make them :wink:

As for your question regarding picture dictionaries, I like them a lot. The Duden ones are great as for their content but don’t have a very appealing layout.

I have bought many picture dictionaries of the series called “Visuelles Wörterbuch”. They are cheap (they cost between 10 and 12 EUR) and contain about 6,000 - 10,000 words (depending on the language). You normally get them at Thalia, Libro or in any other bookstore. Here is a link where you can have a look at what the dictionary looks like: Visuelles Wörterbuch englisch-deutsch Buch jetzt online bei Weltbild.de bestellen

ad djvlbass: (…) Robert (if I may refer to you by your first name) (…)

Please, by all means call me Robert :slight_smile:

As for your question, I think it is vital that you make sure you are in the right group of learners. If you feel the material dealt with is too easy or too difficult for you, you should talk to the school staff and ask them to put you in another group. If they cannot find a suitable group for you, schools normally offer one-on-one classes for the same price but with a reduced number of lessons. Instead of 20 lessons per week in a group they might offer you 10 one-on-one classes per week.

You should use the time in class to ask questions. You’ll have enough opportunities to immerse yourself after school by talking to people in the street, in bars etc. but not all of them may be able or willing to answer questions you may have with regard to grammar. After all, these are just ordinary people who may want to have a coffee or beer after work and don’t feel like tutoring others. This does not mean that you should never ask people for help when you are stuck in a conversation but you need to realize that these people are not your private tutors. That is what a good language teacher is for.

I have always studied at least two to three hours every day after my classes and I made sure that I used newly learnt words and/or grammatical structures the following day in class. DON’T BE SHY. You are there to study and you pay for it, so ask, ask and ask. If you feel that others are not as interested in studying as you are (which happens quite often in the case of summer courses), don’t let their lack of interest get into your way.

Try to meet as many people as possible. I have heard many good things about the “polyglot clubs” in Paris and other cities of France. Check this out: http://polyglotclub.com/france/ile-de-france/paris/event/294

Good luck with your studies and I’m sure you’ll love France.

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@ Robert

Thanks for the reply. I’m going to try out some of the sentence stuff you spoke about.

“You’ll have enough opportunities to immerse yourself after school by talking to people in the street, in bars etc. but not all of them may be able or willing to answer questions you may have with regard to grammar.”

This made me laugh out loud. I could just imagine going up to an old man slumped over the bar and asking about the imparfait du subjunctif.

I’ll definetly look into the Polyglot Club. The classes I’m taking are not in Paris, but I will be visiting my grandmother for a couple weeks in Paris when the course is over and she lives near the same Metro station as it says the event is located near! I’m definetly not yet a polyglot, but it looks like I’ll be plenty enough welcome nonetheless.

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@ Robert - After writing my question yesterday, I went into a huge Thalia in the centre of Wien, and had another look at the Deutsch als Fremdsprache section again for picture dictionaries. The Duden one is probably the best for quality of pictures and for content, but it will be impossible to really use since I have to spend 20 seconds searching for each word in the large word lists next to each picture. This was the same for only other picture dictionary that I found. I am pretty sure that I did see the “Visuelles Wörterbuch englisch-deutsch” book that you linked to but I didn’t look in it because it was in the English learning section. Looking at the images on the website, I see no reason why it would not work in both directions just as well. and the layout looks perfect. I will go and check it out tomorrow.

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ad Robert (lovelanguagesII)

You wrote “As for your question regarding picture dictionaries, I like them a lot.”

The problem with most picture dictionaries, they contain mostly nouns, and only a few adjectives or verbs. It’s very difficult to show abstract things, feelings, or actions. So IMHO the value of picture dictionaries is limited.

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I have never found pictures useful for language learning. There are just too many words to learn. But TEHO. (To each his/her own.)

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My philosophy for learning vocabulary is simply to throw as many words at my brain as possible and hope that many of them stick. Browsing through picture dictionaries may be a good way to do that for nouns, but I don’t know since I have never tried it.

Every learning technique is limited. If picture dictionaries are a good way to learn nouns then great. One needs to learn a lot of nouns.

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ad u50623 (…) The problem with most picture dictionaries, they contain mostly nouns, and only a few adjectives or verbs. It’s very difficult to show abstract things, feelings, or actions. So IMHO the value of picture dictionaries is limited. (…)

That is why I do not use picture dictionaries as my sole source for studying vocabulary. However, the picture dictionary I referred to has a lot of abstract words in it like “to be sad, to cry, to be afraid, to wonder etc.”. You can show all these emotions by means of gestures, mimics etc. It is what actors (just think of mime artists) do on stage or in a movie all the time. We do it all the time in our daily lives as well. I do believe, however, that it is difficult to depict certain abstract concepts. That is where the limitation you mentioned may come into play and that is why I try to do many different things to learn new words.

I like those dictionaries because they are a nice way to complement my other methods of learning.

I would not use dictionaries, whether it is picture dictionaries or traditional ones, as my sole source to increase my vocabulary but I have found them to be an entertaining way to work with a language.

ad Steve: (…) I have never found pictures useful for language learning. There are just too many words to learn. But TEHO. (To each his/her own.) (…)

I think I find them useful because I seem to have some sort of photographic memory. I apparently also work with “images” in my head when I interpret. The important thing is to find a way of studying words that suits your own needs - I fully agree with you on that. There are words that I prefer learning with a picture in mind than just by reading a text. At the end of the day, a mix of methods will do the job I think.

ad Colin: (…) Every learning technique is limited. (…)

Exactly. It is always a bundle of techniques and practices that will get you closer to where you would like to be. I don’t believe in a one-size-fits-all approach nor do I believe that there is THE method that works for all of us equally well. Experimenting with different methods is fun - it provides for a nice change and helps me avoid boredom during my language journey.

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@ Robert - “I think I find them useful because I seem to have some sort of photographic memory.”

Is this actually what you mean when you say you have a photographic memory, or do you mean you are good at recalling pictures?

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ad Colin: (…) Is this actually what you mean when you say you have a photographic memory, or do you mean you are good at recalling pictures? (…)

Good question :wink:

I am very bad at remembering names for example but I will remember a face forever. I also immediately realize if somebody has changed anything in a room or in their hair-style, their way of dressing. So, I guess it is more like recalling pictures (and then comparing them to any changes which may have occurred in the meantime).

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I have known a few musicians with eidetic like memory, paired with perfect pitch. One, in partiular, amazed me. She was somehow able to watch a Japanese cartoon and repeat the sentences said after a single listen. She had no knowledge of Japanese.

I was always so jealous of these people - sometimes I have trouble remembering what even the most basic of intervals sound like. Having ability like that would be an amazing asset in learning languages

Something tells me Richard Simcott might have monster ears like that. His ability with accents is just phenomenal.

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@ Robert

Since we have been talking about how you learn on the LingQ forum, an interesting question I think is have you ever tried using the tools LingQ, and what do you think of them if you have?

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@ Robert - I picked up a copy of the picture dictionary that you linked to before from a local Thalia. Thanks for the recommendation. It looks really good (though is kind of a funny shape) and is exactly the kind of thing I was looking for.

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ad Colins: (…) Since we have been talking about how you learn on the LingQ forum, an interesting question I think is have you ever tried using the tools LingQ, and what do you think of them if you have? (…)

I am afraid I’m one of the most untalented people when it comes to technical things and I have to admit that I did not even manage to reply to some messages on my wall left by keke_eo. I clicked on reply, typed the message in, clicked on publish and it just never appeared :wink: I’m sure I made some very basic mistake. I’m very lucky, however, because my friend takes care of all computer related stuff for me (well, I can handle the software I use for my work but apart from that I’m just terrible with this kind of thing; I don’t even drive anymore - haven’t done so for more than 20 years and am very happy about it, and I guess so are all the other drivers ;-).

I have never really used any “complex” software to study languages and I’m afraid I’d need some private tutorial to find my way through the LingQ system. The basic idea behind it sounds interesting and obviously a lot of people have used it very successfully. The important thing is the quality of the input material you use and this is why I probably would only work with material I have uploaded myself or whose quality I am convinced of because I know the content provider. I have used other free sites and the quality of the material there was mediocre at best, most of the time full of mistakes.

Vera’s content for German is of excellent quality and I’m sure there are many other content providers that have helped make LingQ the success it is. Since I’ll be meeting some LingQ users at the Budapest conference I might ask one of them to give me a quick introduction into the system and show me on site what I have to do. I’m afraid I am the kind of person who needs this kind of “live instruction” ;-).

For the time being, I’d probably only use it for Russian.

As for the picture dictionary, I’m glad you like it. I have bought it for 8 languages or so and so far I have found it an enjoyable complement to my other study tools. The German version is mostly based on terms used in Germany but you will quickly realize what the differences are. I guess you know by now that we would never use “Tüte” for a bag. We call it “Sackerl” which most Germans find quite funny :wink:

While the Germans say “Grundschule”, we say “Volksschule” etc., but don’t worry the vast majority of the words used in that dictionary (I’d say 80 to 90 %) are also common in Austria.

By the way, my offer still stands: Whenever you come to Graz or to Southern Styria, let me know, I’d be pleased to meet you in person.

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@ Robert

"The important thing is the quality of the input material you use and this is why I probably would only work with material I have uploaded myself or whose quality I am convinced of because I know the content provider. I have used other free sites and the quality of the material there was mediocre at best, most of the time full of mistakes.

Vera’s content for German is of excellent quality and I’m sure there are many other content providers that have helped make LingQ the success it is. "

The quality of the material in the German library is really good. I did not use much of the beginners stuff when I started using the website since I was not a beginner, but I have used a lot of the intermediate stuff. The stuff I liked the most were the discussions between the various contributors (e.g. Vera,…) about random topics. These are generally relaxed discussions about interesting topics that are not so difficult to follow. I don’t know anywhere else where one can get large amounts of this kind of audio with transcripts. I tried using the stuff at Deutche Welle a few times, but other than Langsam gesprochene Nachrichten, I found it all very boring, and also very difficult to follow (it seemed to me to be artificially pumped full of idioms which made it almost incomprehensible to me, but I don’t really know; I am also amused by their ‘Alltagsdeutsch’ section which consists of articles about topics such as visits to concentration camps, speed dating, and ‘Im Filmmuseum’ and makes me wonder what kind of everyday lives these people live).

Now I just import news articles and read them here.

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Robert, LingQ is not “complex” technology. The Russian library at LingQ is outstanding and when you get through all of that material you can import limitless quantities from Echo Moskvi and elsewhere, including ebooks and audio books of the classics of Russian literature.

It all boils down to motivation and personal inclination, like everything connected with language learning.

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ad steve: (…) Robert, LingQ is not “complex” technology. The Russian library at LingQ is outstanding and when you get through all of that material you can import limitless quantities from Echo Moskvi and elsewhere, including ebooks and audio books of the classics of Russian literature. (…)

I’ll definitely give it a try. By putting “complex” in quotation marks I was trying to say that I (in most cases unjustly) consider any software complex :wink:

I have checked out some contents of the Russian library and really liked it. But I was just listening and reading, without making any lingqs. But as I said, I’ll make sure I get to the bottom of how the system works to see if I could use it as a complement to my learning strategies. Since I really like reading and listening, it should basically work fine for me. We’ll say how things go.

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The reading interface is definitely not simple. However, it must be complicated because it does a lot of things, and it does them in a very intuitive way, so when you get used to it, it is easy to use. I like reading using it, but it is not for everybody.

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BTW Robert, where are you located now. I will be in Vienna June 3 and 4 and 5 although it is primarily related to the wood business there could be some breakfast or coffee time. I am also going to be in Romania from the 6th to th 9th also on business. That is why I started on Romanian as soon as we launched here.

I will be back in the region around Christmas as well. So my question is, where do you hang out?

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ad steve: Right now, I am back home. But I’ll be at conferences next week again. So far, I have no conferences from June 3 to June 5 and since I only live a three-hour train ride from Vienna we might be able to meet if I’m not too busy with work. I could combine that with visiting some of my friends in Vienna. Around Christmas I’m usually at home, which is in the south of Austria.

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I just wanted to remark somewhere that in contrast to the usual refrain that the word count will be ‘too high’ owing to the inclusion of multiple forms of the same word, in some ways, the word count is actually an underestimate.

  1. A word may have substantially divergent definitions, yet count only once, not twice or thrice, etc.

  2. In German, and other languages with separable words, there are many times when the word count won’t measure one’s actual knowledge. For example,

“Julia findet sich mit diesem Wechsel zwischen zwei Familien ganz gut ab.”

I already have encountered “findet” and “ab” previously, but there is no way to include “abfindet” in the word count, although it has a special meaning (note that it doesn’t exactly exist, rather, the word would be “abfinden”). Same with “ausdenken”: I already have “denkt” etc in my word count, and “aus”, but “ausdenkt” is special–it wouldn’t occur, I don’t think, but conceptually it’s something I have to be familiar with.

It also occurs to me, generally, that the various forms of words are sometimes so unusual, so rare, or so different or specialized, that they really might as well be separate words. I am thinking particularly of the Spanish literary subjunctive or 2nd person plural forms, etc. You have to know them too. They are discrete items to know.

It also bears mention that one won’t encounter every theoretical possibility. So for example, one wouldn’t want to divide a word count by the theoretical average number of forms across words in that language. That would give an absurdly low number of words truly known.

I think the word count as practiced here is quite a splendid compromise of feasibility, and efficacy: the number really does reflect knowledge.