Category Archives: Language Learning

Have I learned anything?

Posted on August 1, 2011 by Josh

I recently had a rather frustrating experience: In the middle of July, I was in Florida with a couple of people to see the last shuttle launch. While we were in Florida, we also visited Universal Studies for two days. … Continue reading →

Posted in German, Language Learning, Languages | 13 Comments

Read more or die challenge

Posted on April 3, 2011 by Josh

If you’ve taken a look at my Twitter account, you might have noticed my tweets to @TadokuBot, which look something like this: @TadokuBot 15 #book #de. The tweets are my updates for the Read More or Die challenge. It’s a fairly … Continue reading →

Posted in All Entries, Language Learning, Reading | 1 Comment

How long will it take to become fluent?

Posted on May 11, 2010 by Josh

I saw this question show up at the HTLAL forums a few days ago, and have seen it appear elsewhere in the language learning community time and time again. The question is, unfortunately, very hard to answer. First of all, … Continue reading →

Posted in Language Learning, Learning Tips | 4 Comments

How much listening do you do?

Posted on February 9, 2010 by Josh

I’m curious as to how much listening others do, specifically, listening to material that you have no transcript for. For a while, I was listening to all sorts of stuff; I used Global Maverick’s guide to organizing foreign language listening … Continue reading →

Posted in All Entries, Language Learning, Learning Methods | Tagged , | 13 Comments

The “Lyrics” tab on iPods

Posted on August 9, 2009 by Josh

Geoff has a great post on making use of the Lyrics information, which iTunes lets you attach to any audio file in your library. Once you sync your iPod with your iTunes library, whatever you put in the Lyrics information … Continue reading →

Posted in Language Learning, Podcasts, Tools | Tagged | Leave a comment

Returning from a hiatus

Posted on July 22, 2009 by Josh

The past 3 or 4 weeks have been hectic for me, with “real life” (that is, not language stuff, alas) throwing some curve balls at me. I’d love to say that I’ve diligently carried on with my language learning endeavors, … Continue reading →

Posted in Language Journal, Language Learning | Tagged | 4 Comments

Language Juggling

Posted on June 24, 2009 by Josh

I’m going to have to change my methods a bit, specifically in how I approach dealing with all of my target languages. For the record, currently I’m studying: German French Russian Spanish Dutch German is still more or less a … Continue reading →

Posted in All Entries, Language Journal, Language Learning | Tagged , , , , | 7 Comments

First Steps with Dutch

Posted on June 7, 2009 by Josh

I’ve been working with Assimil’s Dutch with Ease course the past week and a half or so, and I’m now up to lesson 21. I’ve usually been able to do a few lessons each day instead of the recommended 1 … Continue reading →

Posted in dutch, Language Journal, Language Learning, Languages | 9 Comments

My Prisma Dutch-English Dictionary – Oops

Posted on May 26, 2009 by Josh

The two Dutch language learning books I ordered arrived today; one’s a success, the other, not so much. The success is Assimil’s Dutch with Ease; I’ve little to say about it at this point, other than it looks as good … Continue reading →

Posted in Dictionaries, dutch, Language Learning, Languages | 4 Comments

Global Understanding Vs. Individual Words

Posted on May 18, 2009 by Josh

In his detailed video on shadowing, Dr. Arguelles uses an Assimil course as his example. He says that at a certain point in one’s studies, using his shadowing technique, one will find that they have a global understanding of what’s … Continue reading →

Posted in All Entries, Language Learning | Tagged | 5 Comments