In that post, I mentioned I was studying:
* Duolingo
But then since I wrote that post, I've added even more stuff.
* Drops
* Memrise
* Rosetta Stone
* Legentibus
So... I guess it's time for another update, to explain why I added all this stuff, and how I'm currently juggling it.
Using Youtube Videos to Study Spanish Conversation I already wrote about. I wanted to try to prioritize learning Spanish, since it's most useful for my current job. I had already decided that memorizing dialogues (as opposed to just random vocabulary) was the way forward in terms of my Vietnamese studies, so I decided to do the same thing for Spanish.
In terms of my Latin studies, I continue to be making slow but steady progress through the Wheelock's Latin suite of textbooks. It's going slow, but I do feel like I've mastered that chapters that I have completed.
And now that I've begun to get into it again, I have begun to wonder if I'll ever be able to work my way back up to the point where I'm able to read real Latin literature.
In my youth, after 3 years of high school Latin, I took a couple college Latin courses in which we were supposed to read the ancient Roman Latin--1 course on the Roman poets, one course on the Roman historians (which was just Caesar's Gallic Wars, if I remember correctly.) I didn't much care for either course, and that was one of the main reasons why I dropped Latin and changed from a Classics major to a general history major.
As I remember it, I would spend a long time working on my translation every night, only to come back to class the next day and find out that my translation was all wrong. The difficulty was a combination of having to remember so many rules and word endings at once in order to decode a sentence, plus all these secret rules that you didn't know about that were constantly tripping you up. (e.g. "Although ordinarily we would expect the accusative for the direct object, this particular verb uses the dative for its object, so that's why your translation is wrong.")
I began to wonder if I would have these frustrations if I were ever to return to Latin literature.
It occurred to me that if I were ever in that position again, I would put less emphasis on my ability to translate everything perfectly the first time, and more emphasis on rereading and memorizing Latin verses for which I already had the translation. That way I could maybe enjoy the poetry more, and maybe even begin to internalize some of the trickier aspects of the language.
What's more, websites like quizlet (which weren't available when I was in school) would make it very easy to memorize a poem word by word, and then line by line.
Eventually this thought began to morph from a conception of something that I would do someday once I was finally ready, to a project I could begin to start right now, at least a little bit. I might not know all the grammar yet, but with the aid of an online dictionary and publicly available translations, I could still start slowly memorizing bits of poems.
I decided to start with Catullus. For no particular reason, just because I got the impression that Latin students often studied Catullus. Initially I was going to just use online versions of his poems, but then I got the idea that if I was going to do this project, I might as well order a book. That way I at least get to add it to my book list, and have another book to talk about on this blog. So I ordered The Student's Catullus.
While I was looking for Latin books on Amazon, Amazon made me aware of an unofficial supplement to Wheelock's Latin: Thirty-Eight Latin Stories by Anne H. Gorton and James M. May (Designed to accompany the chapters of Wheelock's Latin). So, I thought, I might as well. If I'm going to do the Wheelock's Latin, I might as well get the complete course.
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Shortly after this, I began to notice some troubling changes in Duolingo.
They've gradually been making their free version less and less user friendly, with the intention, no doubt, of eventually making it necessary to join the paid version (Super Duolingo).
I've been stubbornly sticking with the free version. And I plan on sticking with the free version forever. I don't know--even though Super Duolingo isn't all that much, something just irks me about being forced to pay money for something that I used to get for free.
That, plus the main advantage of Duolingo, as far as I'm concerned, is that it's convenient and that it's free. It's not really that great for actually learning the language. (I've written numerous-times- on this blog about my frustrations with it for learning Vietnamese.) So, I thought, if I was ever to shell out real money for language learning software, I'd do it for something with a much better reputation--like Rosetta Stone.
And then, once that thought was implanted in my mind, I then began to think that if I was going to make a transition from Duolingo to Rosetta Stone, it might be better to do it sooner rather than later. If I waited until I had worked myself up to a higher Duolingo level on my languages, then it might be frustrating to try to restart everything on Rosetta Stone. Better to start learning on them both now, so that I'd be already well established on Rosetta Stone when and if the free version of Duolingo became unusable.
So, I bought myself a lifetime membership to Rosetta Stone. (I preferred to just do a lifetime membership rather than a monthly fee--that way I can just do it at my own pace, rather than stressing about whether or not I was doing enough each month to justify the fee.)
[Actually after I already made the purchase, I learned that I can get Rosetta Stone free from my local library. I'm not sure buying your own account has any advantages, but this may have been a waste of money on my part. I think it's too late for me to get my money back, but if you're reading this, and considering Rosetta Stone, check your local library first.]
Rosetta Stone had al four of my languages (Latin, Japanese, Vietnamese and Spanish) on it, so hopefully I can get my money's worth by working through all four languages.
Actually Rosetta Stone has two versions of Spanish--Latin American Spanish and the Spanish of Spain. For the time being, I've decided to study them both. It might be interesting to compare and contrast them as I go.
[When I first started to study Vietnamese, I was initially concerned about the regional variations, and trying to find materials that reflected the Southern dialect where I lived. But around the time I was reading Chomsky's Universal Grammar, I decided that differences in regional dialects could be an interesting thing for an aspiring linguist to study, rather than something to be avoided. I think I might take the same approach with Spanish--rather than trying to pick which version to study, I could study both versions and note the similarities and differences as I go.]
So, I'm now studying both Rosetta Stone and Duolingo.
It then occurred to me: as long as I've established that I'm no longer in a monogamous relationship with Duolingo, and willing to dally with other language learning websites, then maybe I should finally check out some of these other free language learning websites.
About a year ago, a colleague in Vietnam recommended the website Drops (or Language Drops) as an alternative to Duolingo--she claimed it was much better than Duolingo. I thanked her for the recommendation, but told her my study plan was to first finish Duolingo, and then maybe tackle other programs later. (I had a hard enough time remembering all the vocabulary for Duolingo, I didn't want to add the burden of vocabulary from another website.)
But I've now abandoned my policy of "only Duolingo" in favor of relying on a number of different study materials. So why not add in Drops as well?
Drops is a bit strange. Like all these language learning websites, there's a paid version and a free version. I'm only doing the free version. On the free version, you can only study for 5 minutes a day. Although in my case, since I'm juggling several websites, 5 minutes a day is about all I can spare on this website anyway. So it works out well. You can study multiple languages at a time. (You can only do one per day--but you can work through several of them over the course of a week.) They don't have Latin, but they do have Vietnamese, Japanese, and 2 versions of Spanish, so that's what I'm studying.
Memrise is another website that was recommended to me by a colleague in Vietnam. He recommended it to me a couple of years ago, but at that time, Memrise didn't have any Vietnamese. (My colleague had been using it to study Polish.) But, I decided to check it out again, and they do have a Vietnamese course now. And a Japanese course, and 2 versions of Spanish. But no Latin.
Memrise also has a paid version and a free version. The paid version has more courses, but I'm doing the free version.
So, Drops and Memrise both didn't have Latin. In fact, most of these language learning apps and websites don't appear to have Latin. (Duolingo and Rosetta Stone have Latin, but very few other websites do.) Just out of curiosity, I wondered what other language learning websites featured Latin. I did a search, and discovered Legentibus. (It has a website, but it's only functional as an app. The website is just instructions on how to install the app on your phone.) So, I tried out Legintibus, and it does appear to be quite useful. So I'm adding that one to my rotation as well. (Legintibus also has a paid version and a free version--I'm only going with the free version once again.)
There are, I'm sure, a hundred other apps and websites for language learning. I'm currently being bombarded by ads on Facebook for new language learning apps and websites. (Facebook must be tracking my web searches and Internet purchases--of course.) Each language learning website is advertising itself as the only way to effectively learn a language, and claiming all the other language learning websites out there don't work.
But I'm done. I've reached my limit of how many language learning sites I can juggle, and I'm not going to try any more until I've worked through the ones I'm currently using.
If I finish any of these course, I'll make a Youtube video reviewing them. (And if I decide to abandon any of these websites, I might make a video about that as well.)
I'm also trying to balance my book study with all these apps.
To that end, I decided to add a couple more books to my study rotation.
I've heard so many things about the Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata Series that I decided I finally wanted to check it out. (Much of Legintibus appears to be based on the Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata books.) So I ordered those books.
I also finally decided I should get myself a textbook for Japanese. I had textbooks for all my other languages (here, here and here), but I had avoided getting a textbook for Japanese because I figured I knew all the basic Japanese grammar already.
Well, maybe time to try to get back into the advanced grammar, in that case. So I ordered Read Real Japanese, a book I had actually started doing years and years ago when I lived in Japan, but had never finished. Okay, time to start it up again.
And, that's everything I'm currently trying to juggle now.
It's a bit ridiculous, I know.
Back when I lived in Japan, I used to always be tempted to buy new textbooks before I finished the ones I was working on. So that near the end of my time in Japan, I had a ridiculous amount of textbooks I was trying to juggle at once.
I fear that I seem to have relapsed into that same habit now.
So, here's my promise to myself. I will add no new materials to my language study plans. Until I finish some of the material I'm currently studying, I'm not going to add in any new material. I swear it.
There. It's in writing and it's publicly on this blog. So I have to hold myself to it now.
In case anyone is interested, here is my current schedule for trying to juggle all of this material.
6 comments:
The only relation my comment has to do with this post is that it for some reasons reminds me of how I came to learn English, and eventually, Japanese.
Even when I tell them, I doubt very few people (especially my countrymen) would believe I learned English significantly by playing Japanese video games, motivated to learn English thanks to Japanese culture.
Japanese culture was what really made a difference. Back then my English was mostly good enough to pass the classes, but not much special. But what really motivated me was my efforts to learn to read all those foreign language things. My own language has always had a very limited number of translated materials, people who want to watch anime, read manga or light novels, and even play any kind of Japanese games have no choice but learning English - to a kid, the choice of whether one should learn Japanese or not (which seems to be of lesser importance to English) isn't easy, learning English is like one stone two birds. I think I must have begun to learn the hiragana table on a camping occasion when I was in 8th or 9th grade, and it already felt like I had made too many excuses to myself that postponed learning the Japanese language, which is to say I could have learned Japanese even sooner by 1-2 years. It would be fun to tell the young me the meme of these days "Imagine still not knowing Japanese in 202x" - in the same vein of saying English is important these days, and if you don't know it you can be said to be uncultured. True, Japanese has never earned me a single buck, and may never do, but it has indirectly earned me so much including actual money, thanks to all the motivation and spiritual fulfilment it culture has given me. This is just to repeat many words ago, but if there wasn't Japanese culture, I may never be here to write these texts in English, simply because deep down I have never truly felt motivated enough to learn English out of my own volition.
I had to hide the fact I was learning Japanese (family caught out, but luckily I got away with it). Reason being that if they know I was trying to learn something, they would try to impose me to learn something in some certain ways that would just demotivate me to learn it. Really ironic that when you have something you truly want to learn in this culture, you have to hide it from the culture that claims of itself as studious. Anyway, Vietnamese culture whose very core values being absolute cruelty should be a topic to be talked somewhere else. I pretty much just keep my learning of Japanese low-profile. Given my shy personality and the unbearable cruel bullish Vietnamese culture back then, I didn't want to learn to speak eloquently even English let alone Japanese - yet my sister pressured me to learn to speak well foreign languages rather than just knowing how to read them. That's why I had to keep my Japanese learning low-profile, otherwise it wouldn't have gone well.
At some point I began to use some American website, since some of my fellow hobbyists shared it. I didn't have many clues of the West or America or even the English language. I chose to visit the site because they shared the link, and eventually it indeed contains so many precious materials for "weebs" like myself. I thought the site was cool and decided to diversify my interests. Vietnamese internet has always been impoverished, therefore I thought maybe this website would be able to make these areas cool. In many ways I have managed to learn a lot, about science and literature and many other things. That also led me to learn many things about the West, specifically the U.S. Turned out there were so many things so alien I didn't even know at all about the West in my own country. There were many shockers too, since Asians or at least Vietnamese tend to put Westerners on a very high plane - maybe Westerners are generally assumed to be nice, gentle, studious, respectful (there's a reason why the concept of racism doesn't translate well into Vietnamese culture, people just can't imagine black guys are hated in the West these days, nor people even know how low the view of Westerners toward the rest of world - and also, Vietnamese worldview seems to consider our own country as the only place the U.S has ever bombed, to name one among many other reasons why anti-Americanism isn't really a thing in this country, or maybe even Asia -- anyway it leads to the very logic that "the U.S did make _one_ mistake but they already apologized which is why we aren't supposed to hate them because they're really nice people"), and so many other nice words as well.
But I have pivoted too much out of what I want to tell.
Although, it does have a relation to it.
During Trump's first election and his presidency, people on the American website, and even my own Vietnamese weeb forum began to talk about him and U.S politics constantly.
I definitely was clueless about all that stuff, which made me really curious. Ironically, these days I just wish I had never known about any of that at all. I also hate how my fellow hobbyists no longer wanted to talk about Japanese games or manga or light novels or anime, but gacha and politics constantly. The American website I use is even worse, they even managed to bring politics to every single corner on that website, people then pointed fingers and blamed political people for ruining the site and many other things, as people can no longer talk fun stuff about anime.
Let me go back to the story. My internet access was already very limited before high school - and once I had to move far away from home for high school, I virtually had no internet. I didn't go to internet cafe since I have some social communication issue (being able to communicate and buy goods from a store was already a huge achievement for me) + Vietnamese culture really makes it hard to communicate if you don't already know things for granted (this is already getting astray, but foreigners who try to learn to speak to Vietnamese people shouldn't feel discouraged if you are ignored, as it's not necessarily your Vietnamese doesn't sound comprehensible - in fact it may be very clear - but Vietnamese people may just find what you want to say or do make no take-for-granted sense. Or to put in another way, it's just people being prickish and you are better off finding better people to practice the language with. There's a whole long topic here...)
Given that the internet is the only way I can gain any access to materials to learn the Japanese language, it felt like I had to put the learning of the language to a temporary stop.
But I just... didn't want that.
I didn't want to have my Japanese learning be postponed for another 3 years.
I tried to take advantage of whatever resources I had my hands on.
Even the translated 日本語文型辞典. It's not really a helpful book, given the amount of better and easier to search resources on the internet - unless you happen to be taking Japanese classes and want some reference book to help writing proper sentences for some tests.
I had Tae Kim's grammar guide photocopied into a book. My method of language learning has always been extensive reading - but I didn't have any choice, so I decided maybe I could do reading later in the future and might well learn some grammars first.
Those books also offered some limited number of vocabulary, I tried to learn them as much as I could.
Lucky for me, the library I tended to visit does allow people to borrow the computers for internet usage. There was not much I could learn at that stage, and I definitely cannot open Japanese materials like games and manga on public computers.
Thankfully, there is the NHK Easy News site.
I tried to make efforts to go to the library whenever possible, to learn Japanese by reading that site every single time, every week. I couldn't always come there a lot due to school schedule. Also, it was about maybe 15-20 minutes from my rent to the library.
Still, I tried to come whenever the library was open.
My father caught me doing that, and he made an issue that I didn't concentrate on studying instead of coming to the library constantly.
This is too meandering now. I guess it's not even hard to say the obvious moral of the lesson being that: if you truly want to learn something or have love for it, you would chase after it naturally, no matter what hinder you.
But it also prompts me to feel... some regrets as well.
When I read through this post again and wonder how would anybody learns Spanish well, I had some lame barely-a-joke which is only relevant to me: "Maybe the way to learn a foreign language well is to read manga in that language?" - which reminds me that I also tried to learn German by reading manga in German translations.
It was memorable, because it was how I finally determined I definitely didn't want to learn German at all - even though I thought the language was cool, and German culture should have a lot to offer.
But to read a manga in German is to see how that language itself lacks charms.
Learning a language isn't something you can just discipline your way into it - at least in my case.
Nor do I think it's that easy, even though it's straightforward: love isn't something everybody has. Many people just don't have it at all.
But why is there some regret? It's about how I used to spend too much time on the English language.
Well, now it's what I have to make money through cost undercutting and stealing jobs from American through through online cheap labor outsourcing anyway. It would be absolutely ridiculous to say knowing the English language doesn't give me the best opportunities out of any other language.
But I just wonder... maybe if back then I had some more confidence, that maybe I could speak Japanese well, and other things... maybe I could have had a better life? Maybe I would have learned it much better out of my inclination for it?
No culture is perfect of course, and even in Japan I would likely see the same kind of jackasses I abhor in my own country.
But to listen to the Japanese language, even in its mundane form, is to feel myself more at home than I do listen to the English language spoken by anybody, and my own language.
By the time I managed to get to process natural English, I already find listening to it insufferable. I do not like the human personalities that emitted through this language at all.
I still remember my young phase when I was enamored with American/Western culture. I thought English seems to sound pretty cool and when it concerns scientific stuff and other things, it sounds cool as well.
These days however, I find English to be and sound as insufferable as my own language.
Some say normal spoken Japanese isn't cute or charming or like anime - but I still do find the casual audio chat on Twitter or somewhere else to have some endearing essence in how they speak.
I once came across a group of Japanese girls in a grocery store in a mall in D1 HCMC, they were so bright and cheerful they didn't seem to match the Western media portrayal of how gloomy and depressed Japanese are. They said thanks to goodbye to the clerk, although in Japanese, but in a really endearing way. Their faces are typical, which is to mention Japanese girls aren't really known for having attractive faces - despite their fame that makes people make excited noises whenever "Japanese girls" are mentioned.
But what make Japanese girls in real life special have always been their 仕草. People always say how Japanese aren't like anime, but I have to say those adorable elements have to come from somewhere, and what I see seem to match. Their faces aren't beautiful, but their manners are (polar opposite to Vietnamese people).
Actually, my 2nd comment is very relevant to the story.
Deep down, I just never had a deep interest in Western culture, even though I thought I liked it. Maybe there have been some stuff that is entertaining from the West - but at some point, I can't imagine myself not getting tired of.
I thought I liked English because I was somewhat good at it in school. The three love theory comes to mind.
I learned it a lot because I was forced to learn it.
And then when I came to an English website about anime, politics and Western culture suddenly flooded me.
Of course, I did have some interests in the culture. Otherwise I wouldn't have gone out of my way to read those stuff.
But it says a lot, when these days I have reached the point of finding buying a Western novel is definite a waste of money, while buying a h*ntai book shipped from Japan is so that I can live my life without regrets.
Despite my destitute status - maybe for other countrymen of mine, they want to make money to take care of their beloved families, and neighbours, brothers (talking about those don't hate their own country to the point of wanting to leave).
I want to make money to buy Japanese stuff, that feels like an actual living purpose for me, one that could motivate me enough.
I'm not sure if I can psychoanalyze if deep down, those countrymen of mine actually don't like having to care for their own kinds as much as they claim - which is why they don't make money a lot (people who lack love don't do things well, I happen to believe).
So well... three reasons my fellow hobbyists should learn Japanese: access to untranslated stuff, it definitely pays off,..
...last but not least, you get to feel the actual things without another foreigner layer upon it. You get to feel the actual authentic Japanese.
This is like the three loves - if you eventually find yourself inclined to distance from the language, perhaps it's the 1st stage. But if after some quarrels, you find yourself still learning about it, perhaps you are gonna reach the 3rd stage soon.
...although, I personally may not have reached the final stage yet... but I can say with some certainty, English wouldn't be the language that will go to the 3rd stage with me - given that the more I speak and write it, the less natural do I feel with the "if" and "when" (to name some), like I lose touch more and more.
None of these self-reflecting comments is of any merit or usefulness, but at least I'm not letting out my kinks here. 😼
...not to mention the egregious issues like the English itself - I mistyped "bullish" when it should have been "bullyish".
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