I found the three articles by Crystal to be very interesting. It explained the basics on how our brain functions to understand and process language. It’s amazing to see how the many different parts of the brain must work together in order to process a single word. One thing I learned in the chapter called, “How the brain handles language,” is that the left hemisphere is dominant for language in most right-handed people. I also agree with a point that Crystal makes; it is very important to examine different languages and not just our own. If we are restricted to our own language we will never understand the key distinction between sense and reference Crystal talks about. When we study foreign languages we become more open-minded and are able to see the world differently.
This week I had my first meeting with my language partner. I learned the alphabet and went over the sounds of each letter. It was a bit challenging at times because many of the letters sound similar to each other and only have a slight distinction between them. However, I am hopeful that I will perfect the sounds in the coming weeks. In our next session I will learn greetings and every day phrases.
I found two helpful websites on Diigo that I bookmarked. One of the websites does a word of the day. It is a completely random Hindi word accompanied with the spelling, audio, and a picture. Another website has lists of vocab words divided by category. This can be useful for studying with flashcards.
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