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Language Learning Strategies | #clearthelist May 2017
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Language Learning Strategies | #clearthelist May 2017

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My name is Shannon Kennedy and I'm the language lover,…

Welcome to this year’s 5th (jeez!) #clearthelist. 

If you’re new around these parts, #clearthelist is a linkup where we share our monthly goals, and by we, I mean myself and Lindsay of Lindsay Does Languages.

We’d absolutely love for you to a part of our community. You can join us by adding a link to your own goal post below.


So let’s get started, sharing our goals and motivating one another to #clearthelist!

Please feel free to tag your posts or photos with either #clearthelist on your favorite social media channels!

Last Month’s Highlights on Instagram

Last Month’s Blog Highlights

Travel

A Tour of the Jameson Whiskey Distillery in Dublin, Ireland // I absolutely love doing this tours and learning about the history and process that goes into creating different products. Plus, when you do the tour in your target language, it’s a great learning hack!

The Royal Saltworks in France // This was a fascinating museum I had the chance to visit while in East France.

Language Learning

10 French Books, Songs, TV Shows & Films to Help You Learn the Language // An excellent guest post from French Affliction.

A Review of LingQ // One of my (now) favourite language learning resources.

Why Games are an Important Language Learning Tool // I teamed up with Clozemaster to share just how you can use games to learn a language.

Last Month’s Goals

Continue filling the gaps in my Mandarin vocabulary I’ve noticed since Little Linguist’s arrival. // I found a really cool way to do this using LingQ and Memrise. I shared how to do it in a video as a part of my review.

Read one more language related book. // I finished that Spanish Grammar book – yay! Getting through all the rules about the subjunctive, the difference between para and por, the differences between ser and estar, and verb use exceptions was brain melting.

Keep playing Zelda Ocarina of Time in Mandarin Chinese. // Nope.

Stay ahead reading my language reading challenge books. // Sort of. I kind of did that thing again where I am in the middle of 20+ books because I’m weird like that. 

Keep working through my YouTube Queue.  // Yes! For the record, since someone asked last month, my YouTube Queue are all the ‘watch later’ videos that I saved. They range from Steve Kaufman’s updates on his 90 day Korean challenge to lessons from RussianPod101 to the Easy Languages series for Spanish, Croatian, and Russian. I currently have more than 700 videos in this queue. At one point I had it down to 400, but everyone just keeps putting out such great language learning content!

Keep reading my other Pooh Bear book in Chinese // I did, but my pace slowed down quite a bit. I only got through a few pages per week. 

Add words from Chinese readings into my Memrise Chinese deck. // Yes! Now I just need to start studying the deck. Ha.

Have something I’m reading that’s in French or Spanish. // I am still working through the books from last month, so as long as I make sure I spend time reading, this is an easy one.

Do the last 15 Pimsleur Chinese V Lessons. // Yes! I’ve officially finished all five Pimsleur Chinese courses.

This Month’s Goals

Continue filling the gaps in my Mandarin vocabulary I’ve noticed since Little Linguist’s arrival. // As long as I’m still speaking to Little Linguist in Chinese, this one is here to stay. And it will always be a priority.

Read one more language related book. // I have some ideas what this might be, but haven’t firmly decided yet.

Transcribe the dialogues from Zelda Ocarina of Time in Mandarin Chinese that I currently have saved. // Since I probably won’t play this game this month, I can, at the very least, transcribe what I’ve already saved.

Once again get ahead reading my language reading challenge books. // Because I like being on top of things.

Keep working through my YouTube Queue.  // At least one video for every day of the month. Some are as short as 30 seconds. I can manage this.

Keep reading my other Pooh Bear book in Chinese // As much as I love Pooh Bear, I’m kind of tired of it and want to work on something different. I started reading Hunger Games in Chinese with LingQ and I’d like to focus my attention on this, but I can’t when I feel guilty for not having finished this book.

Keep adding words from Chinese readings into my Memrise Chinese deck AND THEN STUDY THEM. // It’s great that I’ve been making all these lovely flashcards in Memrise, but it’s kind of silly that I haven’t started studying them. So, there’s an obvious next step for me.

Have something I’m reading that’s in French or Spanish. // I am still working through the books from last month, so as long as I make sure I spend time reading, this is an easy one. For the record, The Name of the Wind is really long, so I hope you don’t get bored with the fact I’m probably going to take months to read it. 🙂

Start to work through all those podcasts taking space on my phone. // This includes Melnyk’s, ChineseClass101, Slow Chinese, and a few other podcasts that I’ve been waiting to get to while I work through Pimsleur.

Resources I Used This Month

A quick recap on the materials I am using.

What I Am Using to Learn Chinese

What I’m Using to Brush Up/Improve My French:

  • LingQ
  • Immersion (we speak franglais at home)
  • Reading books written by French authors
  • Listening to French radio/podcasts
  • Chatting with family
  • Watching movies and other videos in French

What I am Using to Learn Russian:

What I am Using to Learn Korean:

What I am Using to Learn Spanish:

What I’m Using for Little Linguist

The Biggest Lesson I Am Taking Away from This Month

Studying with a baby can be fun. I get to practice speaking by reading to him out loud in the different languages I’m learning. It’s interesting to see which languages he doesn’t like the sound of (or maybe just my accent) and which he does. 

The performance aspect of it also adds an interesting dynamic to when I just read aloud on my own. Finding the time to learn a language with a little one can be tough – they need attention (and deserve it!) so finding the time to focus for long periods has been pushed back to after bedtime (if I still have the energy for it). It’s forced me to be pretty creative with how I study and try out things that I wouldn’t have before he joined us. 

There are some things I miss about how I learned before, but I wouldn’t change any of it. Honestly. 

Don’t forget that I would love to hear all about your goals for this month! Please join us by adding your post to the linkup below! 

Clear The List Linkup Rules:

1. Share your goal post whether it includes your aspirations for the month or year. Submissions unrelated to the theme or links to your homepage will be deleted.

2. Link back to this post. You can use our button if you wish.

3. Follow the hosts: Lindsay from Lindsay Does Languages and Shannon from Eurolinguiste.

4. THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT RULE: Please visit the site of the person who linked up immediately before you and leave them an encouraging comment! By hosting this linkup, we’re hoping to create a positive community where we can all share our goals. If you do not do this, you will be removed from the linkup.

5. Share on social media using #ClearTheList

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My name is Shannon Kennedy and I'm the language lover, traveler, and foodie behind Eurolinguiste. I'm also the Resident Polyglot at Drops and the Head Coach of the Fluent in 3 Months Challenge.

© 2020 Shannon Kennedy & Eurolinguiste. All Rights Reserved.

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