All Posts (9261)
Sort by
My experience as a language learner up to this point has consisted of taking academic Spanish classes since I was 13. This involved memorizing basic vocab, learning how to conjugate verbs, and eventually learning about Spanish and Latin American culture. I spent my fall 2017 semester studying in Madrid, my first immersion experience with the language. Despite all this time and effort, I'm still not fluent in the language. I did enjoy the grammatical breakdown of the language, it has served me very well in being able to write and read Spanish. I enjoyed learning about the culture throughout high school and college, and then seeing the Spanish aspects in motion while living in Madrid. I didn't like not having access to native speakers from the start of my language learning because I didn't learn how to speak with an accent or understand one. My Spanish learning process was very based on translations and the grammatical rules of the language, which are both useful, but I found when I got to college and had to take non-language classes taught in Spanish, I had difficulty understanding my professors even though I had taken Spanish courses for five years.
In terms of the FIRE Model, I don't fit perfectly in one category, but I think I'm most similar to the Insightful section; I enjoy problem solving, I like having logical structure, but not in the same way as the Factual column, and feel my work is done when I can demonstrate competence and reasoning ability. In one of the surveys, my top three intelligences were Self, Logic/Math, and Social, respectively. As for Self, I do like to reflect on my own and I do have a good sense of self, however some of the activities that the website suggests for me, especially journaling, are not how I typically operate. I'm bad at setting aside time specifically for reflection, brainstorming, or meditation. Even though I know these are healthy and productive practices, in my mind, I'm always thinking to myself, whether reflecting on myself or about the world around me, and I don't find myself needing extra time set aside for these activities. I do agree with the other two, however. I am a logical person at heart and love solving puzzles, finding patterns, and analyzing what I see. I have always thought it's important to exercise this part of my brain, but not let it take over the way I learn everything. I don't believe that everything comes down to an exact science and that it's important to be open-minded about different teaching styles and topics. I think it is fitting that I got both Self and Social, because I need a mix of time with just myself and time with others. It depends on the topic and style of the assignment for whether I'd rather do the work independently or with a group. In general, I do think I learn more in a collaborative setting, and with what I learn there, I can reflect on my own later. The other survey told me I was a Visual learner with 45% of my score being in this category. From there, I was 30% Tactile and 25% Auditory. I think this is true, I do like to see something written out to be able to imagine it in my head, but, as my score indicates, it's not imperative to my learning that everything be visual, but rather a variety of learning styles combined in order to understand and remember content effectively.
I think learning basic vocabulary and grammatical structures are important activities for me to do when beginning a language. These will give me the base to expand my language activities after that. Learning from my mistakes with Spanish, I think it will be important for me to start conversing out loud in Korean right away and learning how to pronounce the words without an "American accent." Also, because I'm very interested in culture, I think I should immerse myself in the culture of the language I'm learning before I've been learning the language for three years, like I did with Spanish. This expands my learning activities from just textbooks to children's books, TV shows, movies, and more. I believe these activities will help me learn a more colloquial, rather than textbook, version of the language, and since being able to converse fluidly is my goal in learning a new language, it's important to learn how people of that native language actually speak, not just the proper way.
Learning Journal #1
Noun declension has been a really hard part of learning Sanskrit. English doesn’t have this concept, and it’s been really hard to have to memorize so many different noun endings. In English, we just have nouns that are coded for number: the boy or the boys. In Sanskrit, the word “boy” is also coded (declension) for gender, case, and number. So you have to determine is a noun is female, male, or neuter; what case it’s in (you’re probably familiar with subject or object, but Sanskrit also includes concepts like “with” “for” “of” in the noun ending); and the number. Sanskrit accounts for more noun number than English as well: a noun has a different ending if it is singular (the boy) dual (the two boys) or plural (the boys). I still have trouble with cases and have to look back at my declension charts pretty often. For just one noun, there are dozens of options of suffixes that carry so much meaning!
To answer the questions in order, I have learned a lot about myself as a language learner this last semester. In all of my language-learning activities and reflection upon previous experience, I have discovered two broad areas that I will need to reinforce and come back to repeatedly when learning Persian (and other languages in the future): accountability and repetition. If I lack a strong incentive to learn the language aside from my own interest, it can fall by the sidelines in my priorities and my schedule. Similarly, even when I have the time and drive to work on learning Persian, I find that I have forgotten the last lessons I learned. Neither of these is unique to me as a language learner; repetition and accountability are the backbone of virtually every academic endeavor, but they become especially apparent when learning a language, where, unlike bicycles, all progress can be reset by failing to follow through and letting the learning habit slip for a few weeks.
In the future, I hope I will be able to better implement a system to reinforce this. When I get my language partner next semester, I hope to work with them to create a specific plan and accountability structure that force me to frequently practice and learn Persian. In many ways, I am flying blind here without taking SDLC 110 concurrently, but I hope to get a partner soon and get in touch with them over break to figure out a plan. I am making plans to talk with Persian-specific faculty at colleges near me or that I will visit and I hope to be able to pick their brains for advice on specific textbooks and websites that I should be using. It can be heard, as a non-Persian speaker using only the Internet, to sift good materials from the resources available. Despite a lot of work, I do not feel entirely comfortable for next semester when I will be enrolled in SDLC 110 and will be a bit more “on my own” so to speak.
Since it was pointed out to me just now that it might come across this way, I do not mean to make it sound like the class (SDLC 105) was a waste of time or anything of the sort. Besides giving me a much broader approach to tackling language learning than just looking up words and cursing the fact that Duolingo has yet to add Persian, it has driven my interest in linguistics and language in general to the point where I am taking more classes specifically for that area. Phonetics, especially the pronunciation of certain sounds non-native to English and other European languages, tend to be difficult for me and I would love to focus on this area over the long term. One topic that we never explored in the class, and that I wish I did one of my presentations on in retrospect, was poetry. Most every language has a poetry corpus, as far as I know, and the tradition can run far back, and it ties heavily in with the phonetic structure of a particular language.
https://vocaroo.com/i/s16ReJ8SNWYX
I recorded a conversation with my mom talking about general things in life, making sure that I incorporated some of the vocab words that I learned. In addition, I worked on my pronunciation and my oral communication. I believe that this artifact is a good example of the progress I made in my language throughout this semester.
우리 가족.
엄마: 열심히 일하는 아줌마. 시골에서 나왔던 여자가 열심히 공부해서 대학교를 졸업했다.
아빠: 대한민국 육군 특수전사령부 나와서 Ecuador 으로 갔다. 거기에서 이십년동안 있었습니다. 가방을 팔고, Casa Choi 해서 돈을 많이 벌었어요. 미국에서 비디오 가게 일하고 많이 노력했습니다.
큰누나: Ecuador에서 태어나서 열두 살 때 미국으로 왔어요. 지금은 Seattle 에서 초등학교 선생님 입니다.
작은누나: 미술을 공부 하고 나서 좋은 회사에서 일하고있습니다. 우리 엄마 철험 열심히 일하고 열심히 싸운다.
This semester, my study into the Korean language and Korean culture offered me a different perspective into what I was accustomed to my entire life. I was able to read up more on the history behind why Korean cultures act in a certain way, as I could relate to it in my own life experiences with Korean people.
Learning my language in depth and being able to constantly practice with it outside of my family members was a rewarding challenge for me. By being able to speak with native speakers, I had to constantly ask what certain words, or use my contextual skills to find the meaning of a word within a sentence. In addition, by exposing myself to large amounts of Korean media to enhance my Korean, I found myself picking up my pronunciation to be better as well as using phrases that I hadn’t used before.
I found it difficult to spell Korean. It still is a problem for me, especially since there are a variety of ways one could go about spelling a word and sounding the same. I did enjoy this experience in learning more about the language and the history behind it. I knew about Korean being linked to Hanja, the Chinese written form of Korean, but I did not know that Koreans did not actually use their own alphabet until the late 19th century, despite the language being created around the 1400s, nearly 450 years prior to its creation. I am impressed that it survived that long.
In addition to that, presenting about Korean hip hop, a topic that I am extremely interested in, especially since that was one of my resources to expanding my vocabulary, helped me understand more about the contrasts of Korean pop culture and its traditional culture.
The readings that I found the most useful were the bilingual articles. Growing up as a bilingual, I had constantly heard that bilinguals’ brains were wired differently than those who grew up with just one language in their household. But to actually read an article that confirmed that the way bilinguals brains were actually focused on different areas on the brain was a very interesting read. It was also useful to know that the brain patterns could mimic bilinguals even later in life, which gives me hope for when I want to learn another language later down the line. I would love to be able to become more fluent in other languages.
I would love to be able to learn more about etymology and the origin of languages. I always found that aspect extremely interesting. It was one of the main topics of the semester that I was genuinely interested in.
Luckily, being Korean and surrounded in Korean culture, I always have opportunities to continue my learning. During my winter break, I plan on continuing to learn the Korean language, since I have a lot more time, by using my Mango resource and hopefully picking up a Korean textbook. I also want to look for jobs in Korea, so that I can become fully immersed into the language and my language capabilities would expand dramatically.
First Artifact: Greetings, farewell, and introductions.
안녕하세요. 권오환 이라고합니다. 저는 스물한살 이에요. 사학년 대학생입니다. 제 전공은 경제학 하고 국제연구 입니다.
당신은 이름이 무엇입니까? 몇 살이에요? 남자 친구 있어요 없어요? 없으면 저랑 커피 한번 마셔 주세요.
좋아! 그러면 인제 붙어 반말으로 하자.
안녕! 다음에 보자.
- the task(s) you are working on; I had a conversation with Turkish student named Arda. My language partner brought him to the class and we asked him questions. I prepared several questions ahead like "How old are you?", "What's your job?", and "How many family members do you have?".
- a statement of what you hoped to accomplish; I was aiming to review what I have learned in the class and by myself. Because most of the learnings are based on conversation, I had lots of topics to talk about with him.
- the strategies (activities and resources) you used to work on your task(s); We began conversation with asking our identities, how we were feeling, and our hobbies. My language partner helped me when I had some questions that I haven't learned yet.
- an evaluation of the effectiveness of your strategies; I think it was really effective that I was able to practice speaking and listening face to face with a person other than my language partner. Because every individuals have different tones and way of speaking, it is necessary to experience conversations with many people. This practice expanded my boundary of speaking and listening in Turkish. It was different from simply listening to records, because I was talking while I am watching his facial emotions and gestures.
- how you will build on what you have learned about the language; I wrote down some new topics that we talked about, so that I can review them in my personal time. I will spend my own time to answer questions that he asked in different ways.
- how you will build on what you have learned about your strategies. I will try to have more meetings with Turkish native speakers and have conversations with them.
Self-assessment of My Learning Plan
I accomplished most of my learning plan. I learned how to order food and read menu in a restaurant, and listened Turkish pop-songs to improve my listening. I could not do prayer in Turkish, but I will learn how to in next semester. I enjoyed lots of different activities I had by myself and other people like my classmates and my language partner. I think group works are the most effective because I can be generous on myself evaluating sometimes. But with other people, I can compare and contrast the pronunciation and the speed of speaking.
- the task(s) you are working on; I worked on frequency adverbs like often, never, seldom, and once a week. They are essential to build sentences and talk about daily routines.
- a statement of what you hoped to accomplish; I planed to apply those adverbs to my daily routine.
- the strategies (activities and resources) you used to work on your task(s); I learned frequency adverbs from my language partner, and I reviewed those on Quizlet. I made some sentences by choosing frequency adverbs, verbs, and subjects on word cards. My classmates and I took turns and spoke the sentences aloud.
- an evaluation of the effectiveness of your strategies; I think it was really effective that we had to be quick making sentences and it allowed us to be more prepared for the casual conversation with Turkish natives. I improved conjugating words according to subjects and the purpose of the sentences (questions).
- how you will build on what you have learned about the language;
- how you will build on what you have learned about your strategies. I will keep practicing to make sentences by using the frequency adverbs. I will review them on Quizlet.
What did you do well? This is the transcript and a record about family. I practice with my language partner's family tree and the sentences that he made at first. I filled out the blankets pretty well. I reviewed vocabularies on family on Quizlet and it helped me to remember the words when I was listening to my language partner talking about his family. I applied what I learned to build sentences about my own family. I built several sentences and they were almost perfect in grammar so I was proud of myself.
What do you need to improve? I think I need to be able to make more variations. I want to talk about deeper things like what is my sister's dream and how much time she studies a day. I will study more vocabularies for that. I also need to speak more fluently by repeating what I recorded. It will help me to increase my speed of speaking.
How do you plan to make the necessary improvements? I will repeat the transcripts and do exercise with my classmates to introduce my family. I will be practicing listening as well by listening about their family.
- the task(s) you are working on; I focused learning about Aİle (family). I learned vocabularies of family members, how to talk about their relationships, ages and their jobs.
- a statement of what you hoped to accomplish; I aimed to be able to talk fluently about my family and relatives.
- the strategies (activities and resources) you used to work on your task(s); I used a family tree to study vocabularies like aunt, uncle, and nephew, and adapted my own family to make sentences. I practiced speaking with my classmates and my language partner.
- an evaluation of the effectiveness of your strategies; I think listening to other students' families and talking about my own family helped me a lot to improve my speaking and listening. I feel confident to talk about my family after the practice.
- how you will build on what you have learned about the language; I will review the vocabularies through Quizlet so that I can remember them. I will listen to the pronunciation on the application and correct mine.
- how you will build on what you have learned about your strategies. I will build on what I have learned by writing down new sentences and speaking them aloud. I will record my artifact on this topic.
What did you do well? These are the lyrics of the Turkish pop-song, Parçalandım, that I listened to increase my listening skill. I found this activity really interesting that I can study not only listening, but also reading and writing. I did pretty well filling the blanks at the first round, and I could fill most of the blanks after I listened to the song for the second time. It is such an improvement from last semester that I had to listen more than three times to do the similar practice.
What do you need to improve? I think I still need to work more on the vocabulary part. I did not know the most of the meanings of the vocabularies in the lyrics. And I need to practice differentiating ü and u sound, which are the most confusing to me. I also need to practice pronouncing them.
How do you plan to make the necessary improvements? I will improve my listening skill by listening to more Turkish pop music and study the lyrics. This activity is fun for me and less stressful, so I will enjoy continuing to study in this way. I will watch some pop music videos as well to see how they move their mouth when they sing, and study the other cultural sides including their clothes and gesture.
- the task(s) you are working on; I listened to a Turkish pop-song named "Parçalandım" by Candan Erçetin to practice listening. I listened to the song several times and filled some words in the blanks on the lyric sheet.
- a statement of what you hoped to accomplish; I wanted to be able to differentiate the pronunciation and figure out which words fit in the sentences. I also wanted to study more vocabularies in the lyrics.
- the strategies (activities and resources) you used to work on your task(s); I used Youtube, and the lyrics of the song online.
- an evaluation of the effectiveness of your strategies; I've studied English listening by listening to pop-songs in English, and found it is effective, because pop-songs represent the recent language culture and use a lots of essential vocabularies and slangs that helped me to speak more like native speakers. I think I did a good job filling the blanks. It helped me to test my listening skill. Because the songs are in pretty fast beats, it was closer to the casual Turkish speaking speed. Thanks to that, I was able to practice listening fast speakers.
- how you will build on what you have learned about the language; I will review the vocabularies that I learned to day and find more songs online and their lyrics to study listening and the vocabularies.
- how you will build on what you have learned about your strategies. I will keep listening different Turkish songs so that I can be used to the speed.
Reading Persian is a lot easier for me than most people I suspect because I can read and write Arabic. What is interesting is that in Arabic, certain sounds that are common in English and other European languages (p, v, g), are absent, so I have actually been using Persian specific letters for a while now. I have few issues reading and writing Persian, but I do not have a solid enough vocabulary currently to compose much on my own.
Now I wish I actually put in the time when I was younger. My mom wanted me to learn Spanish or French, which my extended family speaks, but I refused to learn either. Only learning Latin until college means that I struggle with my ability to speak and recall words in a language that is not my own, even though I have a good grasp of Arabic when writing and reading it. I hope I can practice both Arabic and Persian more and get to a passable level, but I am unlikely to ever be truly fluent in them outside.
At this point, I am a bit ashamed that I have only learned less than a hundred words or so. I will blame the lack of language partner and not being enrolled in SDLC 110 for that. I mainly learn words through the Chai and Conversation podcast I have been listening to and through looking up concepts in Persian when I learn them in Arabic. When I get a language partner, I will work with them to focus on learning words first from a frequency list of the most common words, then in particular themes, such as transportation, nature, etc.
I always get a bit bummed out when I think about the idea of a language, or any other large human endeavor like that, dying out. It is a little strange to think that something that had developed over thousands of years could just die out. In truth, many languages, like Latin or Sanskrit, do not really die, but rather are relegated to academic and religious contexts. Similarly, many small tribal groups (like those in the articles) are attempting to preserve and document their languages, so I think that the rate of language extinction might slow down, even as the world becomes more globalized and larger languages become the norm. But, I am afraid that these languages might become museum pieces, only preserved for the academic and cultural significance.
Abstractly speaking, history and language are nearly inseparable. Knowledge of a language’s history tells you a bit about its language family and similar languages, but also the grammatical features. Languages might simplify over time because of inter-language contact and conglomeration of various dialects and vernaculars, but they may also gain grammar and vocabulary from other languages. Somewhat obscure and arcane grammatical rules in English, Latin, and Arabic all hail from prior iterations of the language.
I will admit my language learning so far has been minimal. The lack of language partner has made the aspects of learning Persian that require frequent routine, practice, or demonstration somewhat more difficult. That being said, where I have been focusing on with Persian is looking at the language from, essentially, an Arabic-focused perspective, seeing where the similarities occur and what I can learn from them. Perhaps the most revealing thing about the relationship between Persian and Arabic is the case of words that mean one thing in Arabic but denote something similar in Persian.
Let me talk about a case study that has been in the back of my mind for the last few days: love. The Persian word for love is ešq, which comes from an Arabic trilateral root related to the way that ivy clings to objects by way of the word `išq which likewise means love, but is used predominantly in a Sufi context. The (usual) Arabic word for love is Hubb (H capitalized to distinguish a phonetic difference between the Arabic letters that we transliterate as h), which means seed and is found in the Qur’an, unlike `išq. The botanical origin of both words is worthy of its own analysis, but the specific different usage reflects a rather interesting religious history.
`išq is largely used by Sufis to explain a more passionate sort of love, not unlike the English term lust if it did not have any sexual connotations. Instead, it is the intense love between God and creation. For reasons unknown to me, `išq is absent from the Qur’an, which uses Hubb instead as a general word meaning love. Traditionally, after the Mongol invasions, as the Persian Empire was reborn under the Safavids, they spread a Sufi form of Shiite Islam to their empire (perhaps forcibly), and the concept of `išq with it. In Arabia, where orthodox Islam remained more dominant, the use of Hubb continued. I do not have any scholarly documentation supporting the assertion that the use of ešq in Persian is due to the early Sufi influences in the Safavid Empire, but it seems to fit the known information. Additional research must be done, but it seems highly plausible that this might be the origin of the relative frequency between the two words in each language.
I would love to be able to find more examples of words like this, which reflect a shared, yet distinct history between Arabs and Persians and can be use to establish to what degree and in what realms the Arabic language has influenced Persian. For a long time, during the Islamic Golden Age, Persians philosophers, scientists, and mathematicians wrote in Arabic primarily, which makes me think that those language areas in particular would be most heavily influenced by Arabic, similarly Arabic is used as a liturgical language in most Persia-speaking countries, so it will likely influence the religious language. As for the practical affects that this has on my language learning, if my speculation is correct, I can spend less time learning the vocabulary in these areas, and can use my current knowledge of Arabic to learn Persian.
