Tongue Quest

A Change of Strategy: Reading, Ho!

I can’t understate the importance of breaks. I forced myself to take one last Sunday. It was hard.

So as it turns out, Glossika is pretty boring for a person in my situation. It’s not that it’s bad, in fact I’d say it’s a simple way to make daily progress without a ton of effort; it just isn’t a one-size-fits-all product. What makes or breaks progress in language learning is up to personal interests and motivations.

Boredom is a bane to learning. Avoid it at all costs. If something bores you, stay away. Don’t even so much as think about it. Escape while you still can. If you don’t, you’ll likely suffer burnout, killing your motivation and damaging your progress. This is my experience at least, and unfortunately I learned that lesson the hard way. That break I took was a direct reaction to sensing just that little spot of boredom.

I like to take a forced break one day a week. Not only does this help prevent burnout, but it builds excitement for the following day. This kind of segmentation also lets me easily work in weekly consolidation with reviews, flashcard creation, or the decision to try a new strategy/method/activity for the following week. Keep things fresh and exciting.

One could say that there are two parts to learning a language: content and methodology. Ideally, you want the content you consume to be as interesting as possible, and the methodology you use to be as fun as possible.

For my German, I’ve dropped Glossika and instead started reading a lot. It’s quite enjoyable. My new routine goes like this (rather, I aim for this):

Intensive reading (reading and translating):
- Read while translating unrecognized words as I go, each on a new line inside the translator (DeepL seems to work the best for this). Sometimes look them up in a dictionary and find sentence examples and such (time for another plug: Linguee! Great dictionary.)
- Throw all words and translations into 2 columns of a spreadsheet
- Save as “<YYYY-MM-DD> <book/chapter title>” — I can use those words any way I’d like later. Just good data to keep along the way, and I can easily measure my progress by the day, too. I know when I started and finished reading a book, and all the words by the day and in order that I translated. Keeping data is fun :^)
Extensive reading (reading without translating), perhaps with a separate book, perhaps with a book I read intensively from awhile back
Listening/watching podcasts/TV — Yay, cartoons!
Fiddle with mini projects like crafting some beautiful German spreadsheets for grammar stuff (I will defeat you yet, case/gender system!)

I do each item for anywhere from 15-30 minutes, with a minimum daily requirement of the intensive reading resulting in 50 translated words.

It’s a fairly simple process of reading and listening. Steven Kaufmann was right, it’s the best way to go. Simple, enjoyable, and effective. Those latter two go hand-in-hand, I think. I enjoy this new process much more than even using Lingq, and unlike Lingq, it’s free! Best of both worlds.

I might get into the subject of reading more deeply later — Olly Richards covers intensive vs extensive reading well on YouTube — but this update just needs to be thrown out there for the sake of recording the change on this’ere blog.

I keep saying that I’ll get into some subject or another in more detail later, and they’re starting to pile up now. That ain’t good.

Meanwhile, the challenge timer says there’s 16 days until I should have a B1 level in German. Can I do it? I think so. My grammar should be sufficient by then, too, as I’ve got some case-gender memorization cards in the making that should work beautifully.

Auf wieder…lesen? Gut genug.

Future Languages to Learn

I’ve heard before the prospect that a person can only actively switch between 6 or 7 languages at a time. Perhaps that’s the cap for multilingual fluency. But whether that’s true or not, it got me thinking: What are my priorities for language learning? Which ones matter to me the most? This is another excuse to compile a list, so let’s do it.

From this article:
“Hyperpolyglots must warm up or ‘prime’ their weaker languages, with a few hours’ or days’ practice, to use them comfortably. Switching quickly between more than around six or seven is near-impossible even for the most gifted.”

I might be tackling German at the moment, but that doesn’t mean it’s one of my most beloved of languages; nor do I expect it to be the most commonly used for my life now or in the future. It is, however, on my bucket list given its utility as a lingua franca at least. I only started learning it now in great part due to convenience and circumstance.

As a utility, I will probably only bring my German to lower/general fluency (B1.5~B2) and then stop active study and focus on other things instead, be it another language or other projects of mine. There are, however, some languages which I have felt the need to master for many years. Likewise, there are some I might learn to a lesser degree than even German.

Different languages will serve different purposes in my life, so I will learn them to different levels. There are four basic categories I put them in: Those to master (plans/hopes of living life long-term in the country of origin); those to achieve higher-end fluency in (possible plans of living in or visiting short-term); those to achieve lower-end/meaningful fluency in (utility languages to have available; no necessary plans/interest of visiting country of origin); and finally, uncategorizables (interested in to some degree or another, but unsure about what use or impact, if any, it would have on my life — these might be learned anywhere from nothing to fluency)

So here’s the list, roughly in descending order of interest per category (and keep in mind, this level of prediction is volatile; many of these could change):

Mastery (C1 ~ C2):

Japanese
Icelandic

Higher-end fluency (B2 ~ C1):

Italian
Polish

Lower-end/Meaningful fluency (B1.5 ~ B2):

German
French
Korean
Mandarin
Russian
Spanish

Uncategorized/Unknown:

Swedish/Norwegian/Danish (I mean, it’s basically a dialect continuum)
Finnish

…and many more which I’d like to dabble in, but are not important enough to mention.

Of course, I don’t know my future — anything could happen! But I suppose this is at least enough structure to keep my eyes forward and better understand what’s important and what my priorities should be. I could spend anywhere from a few years to a decade or longer in order to learn some or all of these languages.

Sometimes I wonder if I should learn so many at all, or just a few that are most important. Whatever the case may be, I have at least some semblance of order now.

So… if I happen to achieve everything on that list (other than the uncategorized ones), I’ll have mastered 2 languages, become proficient in another 2 languages, and become functional in 6 languages. That’s 10 languages overall, which isn’t bad compared to the 6 or 7 I would supposedly be able to switch between actively. And hey, if I can be as efficient as I think at learning, I could complete the list in as little as 6 years from now. Neat.

You have no idea how hard it was to figure out that list. Now that it’s done though, I feel I’ve gained important insight.

Nun… das ist das. Bis zum naechsten Mal.

Update on my German Study Routine

I’ve taken to the following process with Glossika:

I review the last day’s 100 sentences via the audios A or C
I read through the first 50 sentences (speaking aloud and visualizing as I go, very important)
Then I listen to audio A (English-German-German) for those 50 sentences, referencing the text occasionally when I miss word or sentence
I repeat steps 2 & 3 for the next 50 sentences
Finally, I listen to audio C (German) for all 100 sentences

Step 1 takes ~20 minutes, step 2 takes ~5*2 minutes, step 3 takes ~10*2 minutes, step 5 takes ~20 minutes, and we can add a 10 minute buffer in there for my lollygagging, too, making for a total of ~80 minutes.

That’s a bit longer than I had hoped it would be, — probably because I forgot to consider the last day’s reviews during my previous estimates — but keep in mind that I often play menial video games while the audio is going. You know, grindy games and the like. Nothing keeps the hands and eyes busy like classic ol’ World of Warcraft.

This is, in fact, my age-old strategy all the way back to my Swedish learning days: Play World of Warcraft and listen to audio lessons. This can have some funny effects, like my memory of the word “näsa” (nose) being tied directly to my memory of a specific instance that I was walking back up the Drag in Orgrimmar with my undead mage. …Alright, this is getting too nerdy. An interesting point is illustrated though: The game works for me like a weird form of memory palace. Not a terribly effective one, but one nonetheless.

Anyway, back to the subject at hand:

My daily German studies don’t stop there. Not because of flash cards (which I should really consider picking up again), but because of Learn German with Jenny. From what I’ve seen so far, that YouTube channel is a goldmine. The video lessons are well structured in and of themselves, and they’re ordered into playlists per CEFR level up to B2. There are so many videos covering probably every subject there is to learn! It’s like a complete curriculum. Her cadence is perfect too, and should be noted. Language learning is far easier when there are good online resources, and I’m quite thankful for her very professional-feeling videos. I’m considering working them into my daily schedule.

Thoughts on Levels of Fluency

When someone says “fluent”, they could mean a few things. The word “fluent” is ambiguously defined, and you could say there are a few types: There’s the “I can have an okay conversation” kind of fluent, the “I can have a detailed conversation about any (non-specialized) topic” kind of fluent, and then there’s full-on academic-level language mastery. Personally, I’d define fluency itself as encompassing the first two. Strictly by its etymology, “fluency” means “flowing-like.” The latter, mastery, is outside the scope of this post; so is the idea of grammatically perfect speech, so throw that one out too. Expressing yourself and understanding others doesn’t call for flawless grammar, just good enough grammar that you don’t cause confusion.

But you know me, I need to do some estimates here. How can we roughly quantify this idea of “fluency”? How can we tie it up in a neat little box? Well, my last post has given some indication — the prospect of learner independency. Once a person has learned enough to get by without the need of further study (by instead learning from raw experience with the language), they have probably too gained the ability to understand others and express any thought of their own with enough detail to manage day-to-day life without too much active thought, strain, or problem. According to online resources, this would be achieved around the area of the 3,000-5,000 most common words (root/uninflected forms, of course), which comprises over 95% of words used in everyday conversation. The B2 vocabulary requirement sits right in the middle of that range, and that is why I’d refer to B2 as the kind of fluency that really matters. More than just generic conversations, one could get by in any non-specialized context there is. Full expression.

As an aspiring polyglot, I aim right for that kind of fluency; it’s what I’d call “meaningful fluency.” The kind of fluency that allows you to live your life, understand people, express yourself, and talk about any general subject with ease. Anything past the ability to connect well with another human being and simply live life is just extra, I’d say.

But then again, who’s to say that you even need that many words to do so? As I said, it only matters that you can:

Connect well with another person
Simply live life

Given that, perhaps “meaningful fluency” is right in the middle of B1 and B2. It’s possible that you’d have to be skilled at reading context and filling in the blanks with only those ~3,000 words, but if it works, it works. Probably. Looking at Benny Lewis, I’m getting to think that this is fairly accurate.

For now anyway, I’ll define that whole “meaningful fluency” thing of mine as “B1.5” @~3,000 words with good communication skills, and B2 @~4,000 without.

At least now I have a good idea of the words to acquire for German, a language which I will surely become fluent in, but master? I’m not sure yet. If German plays a large enough part in my future, I’ll let it grow accordingly. Otherwise, it’ll sit on my brain’s B2-ish shelf and serve as one of several European lingua francas to pull out whenever needed.

Speaking of European lingua francas, I guess the other two would be… French and Russian? …Alright, according to this wiki page, I’m right! The list of languages by L1+L2 speakers in Europe (which I’d say is a good way of sorting Lingua Francas) goes in order:

English, Naturally
German
Russian — Russia might be huge, but this looks fair; there are 160 million L2 speakers thanks to the Iron Curtain no doubt
French
Italian — I’m a little surprised, but pleased, that Spanish is below this!

Conveniently, of my own volition, I planned to learn all of these! And so I will. Probably. This all reminds me that I should make a roadmap of my languages to learn… next post? We’ll see.

Ciriciao amici. (Aber mach dir keine Sorgen, ich bin am Deutsch lernen immer noch)

Language 1: German

Here we go — language #1. The adventure to true multilingualism begins.

You know what’s cool?

The German language.

You know what isn’t so cool?

Germany. Not nowadays, it isn’t.

Germany reminds me of a lot of numbers. 1914, 1933, 1984… yeah, not fun. Good luck, meine Brueder, but I don’t dream of spending much time within your borders any time soon — not too far from my thoughts on the USA, if I didn’t already live here. But hey, times change, I can only hope improvement is on its way for all nations and cultures.

So why would I learn German, then? Four reasons:

My sister wanted to, and I said “Why not?” Also, it seems everyone I know wants to or is currently learning it
Switzerland and Austria are pretty great. I’d love to visit them some day™, even live there for a time if fate would have it
The language itself is pretty great, bringing me images of fantastical castles and fairy tales and stuff :^D ! Oh yeah, and there’s a lot of history and literature that’s worth checking out, too
It’s the second most prominent international language of Europe — Very useful in the international space. I’ll run across many speakers, native or otherwise. I have already. They’re everywhere, I tells ya, everywhere!

I started learning German “seriously” some time in late January, but in recent times I’ve slowed down. But as of yesterday, I’m going at it again full force and hope to achieve fluency for the sheer sake of it in… how long? Let’s make a good estimate:

Currently, I know somewhere between 500-1000 words. We need to get this number to 3000-5000 in order to be in the realm of “learn by using” rather than “learn by studying.” This is where I want to be, naturally. I’ll get there mostly with sentence mining, and lots of it. (Details on why that is will come some other time)

To get to where I am now, I used a combination of self-made flash cards based on podcasts/books I would read and study a few times until I learned them, but in greatest part, with Lingvist. Not a bad program, that Lingvist. Perhaps I’ll review it someday. I quit using it for a reason, though. It’s too pricey, especially given it’s merciless to typos which has surely wasted too much of my time. But that’s fine, I have another method…

Glossika. Straight-to-the-point sentence mining with audio and book. Over the course of 3 levels, there are 3,000 sentences; If you learn them all, you’ll know, 2,000-3,000 words, I guesstimate. That’s close to the number of words needed to conceivably not have to consciously study any more. Each lesson covers 50 sentences, and 3 audio tracks that last under 10 minutes each. That is, one lesson only takes 30 minutes of time to read and listen to. I’ll be doing more reviews throughout the day (and following days), though.

Math time:

3,000 sentences / 30 days = 100 sentences per day
2 lessons (100 sentences) = 2 * 30 minutes = 1 hour per day

That’s approximately 2,000-3,000 words in a month — B1’s word count is ~2,000.

That’s pretty amazing and ridiculous, isn’t it? You could quite possibly learn a language to B1, not too far from fluency, in a single month. That is, if you’re consistent and smart enough about it.

This doesn’t take into account the little things like referencing grammar now and again, really setting in your vocabulary with books/audio/video, things like that. But that too could fit into another 30-minutes-to-1-hour throughout the day, really.

Now if we factor in getting past the dreaded B1-to-B2 plateau (bridging the gap from 2,000 to 4,000 words), we should add one or two more months. So… mostly-independent lower-end fluency in 2-3 months? Not as catchy as Benny Lewis’ book’s title, I’ll admit.

I have an advantage with my preexisting German progress which makes this even easier, so let’s finally put this to the test and see if my estimates are right. Here’s the plan:

I started yesterday, on March 15th, 2019
I should achieve B1 by April 15th
I should achieve B2 by May 15th

Fluent in 3 months indeed! Let’s see how this goes.

Bis morgen, meine Freunde. Ich wuensche euch Glueck (und mir auch, natuerlich. Es brauche ich wohl)

Oh, and I’d use diacritics instead of archaic German spelling, but Windows has buggy IME “functionality” and I can’t be bothered to mess with it. :^)