From Steve in another thread: “This thread has gone on for 14 pages which shows the interest there is in what Benny is doing. That is a good thing. It is sort of a reality show of language learning. Maybe we at LingQ should do something similar, where a group of our learners start a new language and video their progress regularly.”
I would love to see learners of a foreign language do this, it would be very interesting. I would even be willing to share my progress.
Do you like the idea? Who would be willing to make videos? Any thoughts?
I am certainly willing to offer progress snapshots of my Czech. I have hade some conversations already which I recorded and could put up. I will get at this when I return.
Should this be video, or audio only, or should it include writing. Should we define this in any way in terms of what people are going to be asked to do. We certainly do not want this to be a competition as to who is doing better , but are there ideas about how to make it more interesting for others?
I would suggest both ‘video+audio’ and ‘audio only’ - so that people can choose which they want.
Take me for example: there is no way that I would ever consider going public on Youtube speaking Czech (or whatever.) But I might be up for doing audio only one day…
Of course, I’d have to actually START a new language first! :-0
I don’t know how many people new to a language would be willing to speak it. That is what I admire so much about his videos. However, if you’re not speaking in the language, what else is there to even make a video about?
“but are there ideas about how to make it more interesting for others?”
If you take your videos away from behind your desk and put them out into the world, then I find that they become more interesting for other viewers. I started doing this with my videos in Italian to make them more interesting to actual Italian speakers, and if I start making videos in other languages I will probably take this same approach after the first couple “introductory” videos.
I like you as Rank… I was just getting used to him : )
And on topic: yes, progress videos would of course be fun and interesting for members, as well as serving as a good advert for people who are interested in LingQ but unsure.
Well, y’know, Maths…the truth is I took a swing at a five star general, so they busted me right back down to private!
(Being serious now: My 6-month subscription was coming up for renewal, and I just found that I couldn’t really justify it. But if LingQ improves what it has to offer the learner, I may well come back in the future with a new paying membership - possibly at a higher level. The door is still open, we’ll just have to see what they can come up with…)
I really like the idea of videos where people have conversations with native speakers. Basically, any type of video could be a nice motivational boost for other learners. But I do realize that putting up a video or even an audio file on the Internet is not something everybody feels comfortable with. If anybody planning to take part in this project would like to talk to a native speaker of German, I would be more than happy to help them out.
