I’m mentally preparing to complain to a pigeon feeder in my target language. Wish me luck.
(the pigeons are filling up my window sill with shit and have learned to wait for the feeder early in the morning, waking me up way before my actual alarm)
I have been able to motivate myself to study for the japanese official exam (JLPT) I have coming this next december Pretty hard to tell for now if I have the required level, I should try a sample test of the level I am aiming for. Might do it this week :)
Good luck! What level are you going for?
Going for N4 ! So approximately a low - mis A2 level I guess ?
Sounds about right. I always forget which CEFR level is which.
Hopefully shouldn’t be too bad. Definitely grind practice tests. I haven’t tried it, but something like https://www.jlptmatome.com/jlpt-simulation might be good? What have you been using for practice tests?
Also, are you doing anything else in particular to study and prep?
Still working primarily on Japanese. But also found out I’ll have a Spanish-speaking travel opportunity early next year, so trying to work on that.
I’m in such a weird place with my Spanish. It feels like I’m on the cusp of really being able to use it, but then my vocab is weak and I’m terrible at listening, so like what have I even got lol? At least I can read. Picking back up with El Tunél, a novel I’ve been meaning to finish for a long time.
That’s exciting! Trips are awesome motivators for me to put time into a language.
The listening must be hard since it’s such a fast phased language, but I really like the attitude of Spanish speakers, think you’ll have a nice environment to practice there :)
Since I also struggle with vocab I just learned some keywords to use like “thing” and “don’t know the word” lol.
Travel really does help a lot. I’m not big on travel, I mostly like learning languages for the fun of it, less as a communication tool… but going to the place and having conversations with people who don’t speak English really triggers somethings in my brain like ‘hey, this is important!’ that makes the learning process click.
The speed is really tough. I know I’ve read before that Spanish and Japanese both have higher speed (eg, in this infographic), but then when I went to look it up Wikipedia says it may be an illusion, so idk lol. I know for sure that it seems overwhelmingly fast when native speakers talk to each other, and in TV shows etc. But if you’re talking to a person irl at least they’ll slow it down for ya.
Yeah and it’s also super rewarding. I sometimes feel discouraged when I read something and I don’t understand, but talking to someone can fix that (when the person compensates for my lack of skill/vocabulary).
I was wondering about that awhile back. Spanish (and now that you mentioned, Japanese) sound insanely fast!
Had a solid week. The no-lookup reading is starting to feel almost cozy, and it’s giving me a ton of confidence. I feel like if I can just get on the other side of these intermediate grammar structures and boost my overall comprehension rate just a tick, I’m going to unlock so much content I want to read and listen to. Already the textbook is feeling so much easier than it did a couple months ago.
I can see vocab and speed being more the focus soon, and I can definitely handle that. Here’s hoping!
I also tried no-lookup reading recently and it was great for seeing progress! Probably didn’t understand everything I thought I understand but that’s secondary for now.
I’m about 1.5 months into my German studies, and I was able to just read the entire first Chapter of “Cafe in Berlin” (beginner story for German-learners, graded A1 and A2).
I think the biggest “leap forward” was multiple weeks of study in Anki, allowing me to reach a vocabulary of roughly 300+ words at the moment. Its not much, but its enough to get started reading these simplest of stories.
That’s really impressive, nicely done! And thanks for the tip. Think I’ll give that story a go as well.
I think that’s a nice way to go about it with learning enough to be able to read a story and seeing that as a goal. Way more motivating than “want to pass an exam”.
My actual long term goal is to be able to watch Peppe Wurtz and comprehend the episode.
I’ve also got Deutsche Walle A2 News (news graded at the A2 level) that I’m trying to read and watch, but that’s still far above my skill level. I’m better with news than German, so I watch (American) news in English the. Watch the A2 graded news and kinda learn new words lol.
https://learngerman.dw.com/de/kurz-und-leicht/s-69137519
The book was basically the first thing I was able to do (and indeed, level A1 level). Everything else is more like high A2 or low B1 level…
I wouldn’t say that it’s a goal to read Cafe in Berlin, because I’m actively doing it! It’s more of a true and proper exercise.
DW is such a nice resource, I started myself with Nico’s weg learning materials from them.
Wish you good time on your journey, keep us updated :)
