This week we had our first quiz! It covered the alphabet (more specifically vowels), colors, numbers up to 100, animals, and greetings. I think it really helped me to begin to realize how much easier it is to know speak (mostly to pronounce) another language when you know what the vowels and consonants sound like. Swedish vowels especially were tricky to get down (and it's still a process!) because they have three extra vowels, use the letter y as a vowel only, and quite frankly to my untrained ears I think a lot of their vowels sound the same. And, like in any other language, all the vowels have both short and long sounds! Eek!
In addition to our quiz, we have also started incorporating some grammar into our lessons. It's really hard for my language partner to be able to teach us grammar rules on the spot (nor is she expected to) so it's been a good experience to go out and research/teach myself these rules on my own. Then coming back to my sessions and putting these rules in the context of sentences is making the process make much more sense! On Wednesday, for instance, Louise taught us how to say members of our family. We were then asked to go out on our own and come up with sentences about our family, questions we would want to ask others about their families, and how to introduce our family to others. This experience, I think, is a really comprehensive way to learn vocabulary and grammar at the same time.
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