sheilastudying - Tumblr blog

[sheilastudying]

I feel ya, best of luck to the both of us!

What up ladies and dudes, I have 6 days to learn a crazy amount of information... And worse, remember it all (cries)

[sheilastudying]

Asjduwbks!!!!!! I have polls! Now :

[sheilastudying]

What to do during lockdown

(and work on your French):

Work on your pronunciation

Read some classics

Read some fanfiction

Listen to podcasts

Listen to TED Talks

Listen to music

Listen to the radio

Watch french movies (detailed, by period and type)

Watch dubbed/subtitled movies: The Simpson, Cesar and Cleopatra, The Man Who Knew Too Much, The Red Shoes, La Vérité

Watch cartoons

Watch youtubers

Watch let’s plays: 1 2 3 4 5

Work on some MOOCs

Learn about black holes, Pompei, giant animals, gladiators, the Dreyfus affair, Charles Manson, ants, Leonardo da Vinci, Rome, smelly cheeses, Mozart, the Bermuda triangle, meditation…

Follow french subreddits

Search our social media

Visit the Louvre online

Check my practice tag

And make sure your priorities are in order!

[sheilastudying]

23/08/2021

A lot of stuff has happened. I'm in my second year of university. But I decided to start growing plants again and keeping myself accountable by keeping a gardening diary I sewed myself from scrap paper from my notebooks.

I'm trying to grow strawberries, and I'm not really rushing. I just want something to destress with.

[sheilastudying]

Creating a University Studyblr Group Chat

Studying in times of covid has been hard. At least for me it has been quite difficult! So maybe we can spice that up a little bit!

Let’s create a group chat on Whatsapp or iMessage and support each other, be there for one another! Stop the loneliness! Stop the procrastination!

I want to creat a space where everyone feels accepted and understood! <3

Tell us about your plans and dreams and let’s motivate each other!

Who’s in? ❤️ Send me a message and introduce yourself :)

[sheilastudying]

Do you have any advice for Japanese learners who struggle to overcome the intermediate plateau? You are so knowledgeable about Japanese, I'd love to hear your experiences on how you learn and keep improving! Thank you ^_^

Aww man you’re just too sweet. I’m still in the process of learning too. 💗

That intermediate plateau is the hardest thing to overcome. It’s something that was talked a lot about in some of the second language acquisition courses I took back in uni. Let’s delve further into it, because this is something that all language learners will struggle with, regardless of what language you’re learning.

What is the Intermediate Plateau?

👆 a visual representation of the plateau lol

When you first start learning a new language, most learners experience quick and satisfying progress. “Oh man, learning the “te” form was way easier than I thought it’d be!” or “Okay, I got this list of verbs down right away!” “Alright, I got this hiragana down!” 

But then you move on to the kanji. The whole kudasaru, yaru, kureru, ageru, sashiageru, morau, itadaku mess, and you start to struggle a bit. But you can still do it! You’re still learning the words and the grammar and it’s challenging, but you can feel your progress and success. 

But then you finish your textbooks (Probably Genki I, Genki II, and An Integrated Approach to Intermediate Japanese), and suddenly those bursts of success become less and less, until you can no longer feel any progress. 

You read manga and you see lots of words you know, but lots more words that you don’t know. You watch anime and you can catch some sentences, but there are still a lot that you wouldn’t have understood without the English subtitles to help you out. 

This feeling of a lack of progress, of a stagnation, is called the “intermediate plateau.”

My Experiences with the Intermediate Plateau

I tackled the Intermediate Plateau twice: with spoken Japanese and written Japanese. 

I’ve been lucky to have very good listening comprehension and an ability to “fill in the gaps.” After finishing Genki I, II, and An Integrated Approach to Intermediate Japanese, I could basically follow most spoken conversations. There were words I didn’t know, but through context I was able to make educated guesses at what they meant. However, I was stuck using simpler words when I spoke, and it was so frustrating to be able to understand the words, yet be unable to recall them and use them when I wanted to. 

Then I graduated and moved to Japan. Oh man, I thought I was such hot stuff. “I studied Japanese for 5 years, and I even studied Classical Japanese. I’m gonna have such an easy time of it here.”

…It took me about three days of living in Japan to realize that I was absolutely illiterate. I couldn’t understand any of the visa application forms or what they were telling me I needed to provide. Misunderstood the times I had to have the garbage put outside because I had never seen the kanji 迄（まで, “until, by”) before. Couldn’t read most billboards. 

Especially with that kanji for “made” 迄. That was what really made me realize that I was at the plateau kanji-wise. You learn the particle まで in your first year. It was something I could use perfectly. But I hadn’t even known that there was a kanji for it until I tried to take out my trash out and found out that I was supposed to have it in the bin BY 9:30, not AFTER 9:30, like I had guessed it meant. :(

To pour salt into the wound, I have been able to read in English since I was 3 years old. I literally cannot remember a time I could not read. It is one of my favorite pastimes and I also do creative writing. This made the fact that I couldn’t read all-the-more frustrating.

How I Overcame the Plateau

I took that frustration and I turned it into fuel. I vowed to learn ALL THE KANJI. I started using the website and app WaniKani obsessively. I’m here to tell you, that app is what made me literate. It is worth every single penny if you already have a good grasp on the language but your kanji is weak, like me. 

Basically, it teaches you 2,000 kanji and 6,000 reinforcing vocabulary across 60 levels. It doesn’t group the kanji necessarily by JLPT level. Rather, it groups them by radicals and frequency more or less. Each level will introduce 3-4 radicals, and then 10-15 kanji that use those radicals. It quizzes you on their on-yomi and kun-yomi, gives you mnemonics to remember them, and then once you’ve answered them all correctly enough times, it introduces vocabulary that uses those kanji, further reinforcing the readings and increasing your vocabulary. As a former language teacher and studier of second language acquisition, I am here to tell you that this method works. And it’s fun. It doesn’t feel like studying. 

I also started reading Rurouni Kenshin. Even today, it is a challenging read for me. Back then, it would take me days to read just one chapter. But I wrote down every new word in a notebook, and also saved them to my dictionary app, Akebi. 

To this day, this dictionary is my lifeline. You can make vocabulary lists in there, so I have a list for each book or series I’m reading, along with a list of words I find just everyday in conversation or news or something. It’s got a simple flashcard quiz feature for each list too! Seriously, if you’re an Android user, I highly recommend this app. It’s free!

Those were my two main study methods. The more kanji I learned how to read, obviously I was able to read better.

The really fascinating thing about kanji is that they’re like Legos. You can stick them together to make any word you want, really. So if you understand each kanji and remember its pronunciation, even if you see/hear a word for the first time, you can put together the meaning piece by piece.

Because I understood more kanji and could recall their readings, I could hear a new word in a conversation and think to myself, “Okay, we’re talking about how Hokkaido doesn’t get as much snow as it used to. This word ‘ondanka’ must be…温 (おん, heat) 暖 (だん, heat) 化 (か, change). Oh! ‘global warming!’” 

So when I overcame the kanji plateau, I simultaneously overcame the spoken plateau. Knowing the kanji gave me the power to hear a new word in a certain context and infer what kanji must be used for that word, and therefore what that word meant. 

My Advice to You

For me, the key to overcoming the plateau in Japanese was studying more kanji. So I recommend that you keep studying kanji and keep reading. But make sure that they are reading materials that you love!! If you’re not interested in what you’re reading, you’ll run out of steam. 

Another really important thing is to be cognizant of the progress you’ve made. For example, maybe you have a Japanese song you’ve been listening to for years, and for the first time today you picked out a new word–one that you just studied the other day. Pat yourself on the back at every victory, no matter how small it may seem! There’s proof of your progress.

Best of luck to you in your studies!

[sheilastudying]

yo there’s NO langblrs on my dash

pls interact if ur a langblr thank u

[sheilastudying]

I absolutely love bewildering people when I speak in english. "Oh, are you perhaps from western Europe?" "I think you sound arabic" SIKE! I'm from latin america

realistic language goal:

pronunciation so perfect that you pass as a native speaker polished enough to confuse natives because they just. can’t. tell. where you’re from

[sheilastudying]

I'm currently trying to learn two languages at once, and it hasn't been easy. But I've already started and it's better to maintain both of them based on the time I already spent on them, but learn only one at a time if you haven't started doing this, I'm already screwed.

Both of these languages make me happy, and I'm thrilled to learn, I love their culture. But it's going to take me two other years being really dedicated to go anywhere near fluent, and I already have three years behind me.

Another thing: English is my second language, I'm not so passionate about it, but I was so eager to have access to twice the content. Books, movies, series, social media, even fanfiction. It has become part of my life, and my job has to do with it. That's why I'm consistent in maintaining it.

Why I Don’t Want to Become a Polyglot

…and Why I Only Learn One Language at a Time

Disclaimer: These are my personal thoughts. If learning multiple languages at once makes you happy, go for it. Everyone has a right to spend their free time how they like.

Disclaimer #2: I do intend to learn multiple languages throughout my lifetime, not just one. What I mean by “not wanting to become a polyglot” is that I don’t want to just learn languages for the sake of learning a language; for the sake of being able to say I can speak 5 languages or something. I only want to learn a language if I truly adore it, not just so that it can be a number.

1. I spent an entire year preparing round-the-clock for my C1 German exam. It made me realise just how dedicated you have to be to a language in order to learn it to C1 level. I wanted to start learning Serbian at the time, but I physically couldn’t.

2. You can’t just abandon a language once you reach your goal. In order to maintain that level, you still need to be dedicating regular time to it. This means with each new language I pick up, it will become harder to maintain those I’ve already mastered, and I will have less time to put towards the new language. This also means I can’t just force myself to work extremely hard on a language I’m only semi-passionate about until I reach C1 level, and then abandon it. It doesn’t work like that. In my experience, you need to be extremely passionate about this language, all the time, for the rest of your life.

3. To reiterate points one and two: To reach and maintain an advanced level, it is not enough to simply like a language. You need to love it with all your heart and soul. German was the language of my ancestors. Some died shortly before I was born, some when I was very young. Learning their language made me feel so close to them; it helped me remember them. German is also a widely spoken language, with many great TV shows to watch, many movies, a lot of music and YouTubers. I have always been incredibly interested in modern German history. Despite having so many reasons to love and use German, I still often found it hard to stay motivated in German and have the dedication required to pass and maintain C1.

4. If you learn multiple languages at once, you will not just progress slower in both, but the total amount of time it takes you to master both languages will be lengthened greatly. Here is the video from Matt vs Japan I was talking about on another post. In it, he gives the example that if French takes 2 years to learn, and German takes 2 years to learn, learning them both simultaneously won’t take 4 years, it might take 5-7 years. This, to me, is extremely demotivating. I see a lot of langblrs setting yearly goals of going up one or two CEFR levels in a year. This is generally pretty achievable, depending on the language and your schedule. But then they apply this to three or four languages! I always see them disappointed at the end of the year, because of course this never happens. They rarely even go up one CEFR level in each of the languages they’re learning, because they’re spreading themselves so thin.

5. There’s nothing boring about learning one language at a time - actually, it’s a beautiful and admirable thing! Watching Matt vs Japan in various interviews on Youtube made me remember how passionate I was about German when I first started learning it, and I want to go back to that. I want German to be a part of me! Not just some random thing I do now and then. It’s fun to dedicate yourself to something, and in my opinion, it shows a deep amount of respect to native speakers of that language, their culture, their history. 

6. If I can’t tolerate, or find it too boring, to only focus on one TL for several years, that to me is a sign that I probably don’t love it enough (see points 1-3).

7. My values are different than those presented often in langblr/polyglot culture. It’s tempting to see someone who is learning 7 languages at once, and think they are impressive, but after realising this person is A0-A2 in most of those languages, and maybe B1 in two more languages, I’m no longer impressed nor jealous. I would rather truly experience the German language and culture in a deeply meaningful way, than just be able to order food and buy souvenirs in 10 different languages/countries. 

8. I have multiple decades ahead of me to learn languages. Let’s be honest, most of us reading this post will be in our teens, 20s, or maybe 30s. There’s no rush. I’m so excited to keep maintaining my German, spend the next two or three years completely immersed in Serbian and having that language become a part of me, and after that, spend another 5+ years dedicated to Japanese. When I look back on my German, it will remind me most of the time transitioning from my teens to my early 20s, when I discovered who I was! When I look back on my Serbian, it will remind me of settling into my young adulthood. I’ll probably be having babies around the time I learn Japanese, so it will probably remind me of that beautiful time in my life, when I look back on it.

Here are some YouTubers who are extremely dedicated to their TLs who inspire me to take on the same mindset. I’ll try to link a video where they specifically showcase why it’s great to learn one language at a time:

Matt vs Japan

Oriental Pearl

Days of French ‘n’ Swedish

Blondie in China

JJsays

[sheilastudying]

Welcome!

I am a native Spanish speaker, so feel free to ask me any questions you might have about the language or hit me up to practice conversation. I am making a list on Spanish resources and my target language is French too. People are friendly, so I hope you have a good experience here.

Hello everyone!

I decided to my my own langblr and wanted to introduce myself.

My name is V, I'm 22 years old and I'm a book- and media management apprentice. My mother tongue is German, but I think I'm nearly as fluent in English.

The first language I started learning before English was actually French, I studied it for a total of 6 years at school, but then ignored it for years, so I'm incredibly rusty now and have to get back on track.

I also had Italian at school for 3 years, but I will pick it up again later on when my French is fluent enough. I don't want too many language projects at the same time, because I'm learning two languages completely from scratch:

Korean and Spanish

My target languages for the future are: Latin, Japanese, Mandarin, Russian, Swedish and Arabic

So if you have a langblr for either of those languages (French, Korean, Spanish), I would love to follow you.

I will also post original content, mostly for German probably, so if there's any grammar or vocab topic you're interested in, please let me know and I'm happy to help. I'll also post about my language learning journey in general.

[sheilastudying]

Music in Spanish- Recs list part 1

Okay, I grew up in Mexico (a lot of these are going to be from there, if you want more variety feel free to add artists from other nationalities in the notes), so I'm going to put in my best effort to recommend stuff that isn't too common or that you haven’t heard about yet.

Buckle up, I'm about to divide the recs in at least 3 posts. The artist comes first, I mention their accent, and then a song by the artist previously mentioned (the link will be to the version of the song with lyrics, so you can better understand it).

Searching for ballads?

La oreja de Van Gogh

Their lyrics are kind of cheesy sometimes but also kind of catchy. This a group from Spain. 

Link to Playa.

Mon Laferte 

She has a powerful voice that you could come to like. She was born in Chile. Her songs include some instruments and arrangements you could call more typical in latin american music.

Link to Tu Falta de querer

Natalia Lafourcade

With a more tame vocal style when compared to Mon Laferte, she has more of a rock feel, with bossa nova influences. She was born in Mexico.

Link to Hasta la raíz.

Do you like the indie kind of feel? Yes I know it’s not a genre but it has some specific vibes.

Hello Seahorse

A mexican group with indie rock influences, along with pop. With a lead singer who is a soprane, their songs have been in my mind for days.

Link to Bestia

Zoe

This group is a bit more mainstream, they are a rock pop group, but it has the feel. They are mexican.

Link to Venus.

Camilo séptimo 

A mexican band, if you like a chill synth vibe that's more recent, I highly reccomend them.

Link to Miénteme

Los Bunkers

Chilean band, alternative rock pop.

Link to Bailando Solo.

Kchiporros

A band from Paraguay that uses more arrangements typical from Latin America, trumpets, they have rock, cumbia and ska related rhythms.

Link to El Metal.

Do you like trumpets and folkloric Ska?

Well, this post is already pretty big, so please wait until the second post, I will complete the recs soon, so please be patient :).

[sheilastudying]

To be honest, I do feel frustrated and want to bang my head against a wall whenever I don't recall a word that I supposedly memorized last week.

Repetition is key, but sometimes I feel like just the sheer amount of words make me feel overwhelmed, and hey, that's just me, you (the great person making vocabulary lists for free, thanks for making them) shouldn't feel obligated to suit my needs.

I like to learn languages through exposition (with the proper grammar knowledge behind it) so I get what the point is, it just doesn't work too much for me, maybe it works better for other people?

Anyone else see those massive compilations of target language vocabulary and just think thanks a bunch but this is useless?

[sheilastudying]

Since our lectures are going to be 99.9% online this year, she's the only study buddy I have left for now 🥰

(Featuring Phisiology which is crazy hard to understand. Helpppp)

[sheilastudying]

MASSIVE list of book recs

plays

death of a salesman, arthur miller

macbeth, shakespeare

a streetcar named desire, tennessee williams

hamlet, shakespeare

a raisin in the sun, lorraine hansberry

a midsummer night’s dream, shakespeare

antigone, sophocles

king lear, shakespeare

the glass menagerie, tennessee williams

othello, shakespeare

pygmalion, george bernard shaw

the tempest, shakespeare,

much ado about nothing, shakespeare

as you like it, shakespeare

the taming of the shrew, shakespeare

the merry wives of windsor, shakespeare

the merchant of venice, shakespeare

oedipus rex, sophocles

an ideal husband, oscar wilde

who’s afraid of virginia wolf, edward albee

our town, thornton wilder

waiting for godot, samuel beckett

fantasy/fairy tales

the ranger’s apprentice, john flanagan

harry potter series, j.k. rowling

inkheart by cornelia funke

throne of glass, sarah j. maas

the chronicles of narnia, c.s. louis

the lord of the rings, j.r.r. tolkien

the hobbit, j.r.r. tolkien

percy jackson and the olympions, rick riordan

eragon by christopher paolini

the bartimaeus trilogy, jonathan stroud

howl’s moving castle, dianna wynne jones

the wonderful wizard of oz, lyman frank baum

the books of bayern, shannon hale

ella enchanted, gail carson levine

the princess bride, william goldman

the raven cycle, maggie stiefvater

the sisters grimm, michael buckley

the spiderwick chronicles, tony diterlizzi and holly black

the alchemist, paulo coelho

forgive my fins, tera lynn childs

alice in wonderland, lewis carroll

the faerie path, allan jones frewin

the school for good and evil, soman chainani

the grimm legacy, polly shulman

the sweetest spell, suzanne selfors

the tales of the frog princess, e.d. baker

the wide-awake princess, e.d. baker

once a witch, carolyn maccullough

the silver bowl series, diane stanley

the emily windsnap series, liz kessler

fairest, gail carson levine

the fairy realm series, emily rodda

the water mirror, kai meyer

the two princesses of bamarre, gail carson levine

non-fiction

the seven habits of highly effective people, stephen covey

the seven habits of highly effective teens, sean covey

mencken’s chrestomathy, h.l. mencken

yes please, amy poehler

is everyone hanging out without me? (and other concerns), mindy kaling

audrey hepburn: an elegant spirit, sean hepburn ferrer

how to be lovely: the audrey hepburn way of life, melissa hellstern

how to win friends and influence people, dale carnegie

how to win friends and influence people for teen girls, donna dale carnegie

#girlboss by sophia amuroso

14,000 things to be happy about, barbara ann kipfer

choose to matter, julie foudy

the little book of skin care: korean beauty secrets for healthy, glowing skin, charlotte cho

where stylists shop: the fashion insider’s ultimate guide, booth moore

the girls’ book of glamour: a guide to being a goddess, jeffrie sally

the girls’ book: how to be the best at everything, juliana foster

the girls’ book of excellence: even more ways to be the best at everything, sally norton

the life-changing magic of not giving a f*ck: how to stop spending time you don’t have with people you don’t like doing things you don’t want to do (a no f*cks given guide), sarah knight

bossypants, tina fey

we should all be feminists by chimamanda ngozi adichie

behind the scenes: or, thirty years a slave, and four years in the white house, elizabeth keckley

the pillow book, sei shōnagon

eat pretty: nutrition for beauty, inside and out, jolene hart

eat pretty every day: 365 daily inspirations for nourishing beauty, inside and out, jolene hart

narrative of the life of frederick douglass, frederick douglass

narrative of sojourner truth, sojourner truth

12 years a slave, solomon northup

night, elie wiesel

poetry

the flowers of evil, charles baudelaire

a season in hell, arthur rimbaud

she walks in beauty, lord byron

shakespeare’s sonnets, shakespeare

we real cool, gwendolyn brooks

poems of emily dickinson

poems of robert frost

leaves of grass, walt whitman

the raven, edgar allen poe

poems of edgar allen poe

milk and honey by rupi kaur

the sun and her flowers, rupi kaur

the princess saves herself in this one, amanda lovelace

romance

romeo and juliet, shakespeare

emma, jane austen

ever, gail carson levine

pride and prejudice, jane austen

eleanor and park, rainbow rowell

sense and sensibility, jane austen

jane eyre, charlotte brontë

landline, rainbow rowell

madame bovary, gustave flaubert

to all the boys i’ve loved before, jenny han

love in the time of cholera, gabriel garcía márquez

the sun is also a star, nicola yoon

young adult

fangirl, rainbow rowell

great expectations, charles dickens

aristotle and dante discover the secrets of the universe, benjamin alire sáenz

when the moon was ours, anna-marie mclemore

the goldfinch, donna tartt

looking for alaska, john green

we were liars, e. lockhart

the wrath and the dawn, renée ahdieh

little women, louisa may alcott

palace of spies, sarah zettel

the clique series, lisi harrison

the finishing school series, gail carriger

eyes like stars, lisa mantchev

the ever after high series, shannon hale

along for the ride, sarah dessen

girl online, zoe sugg

keeping the castle, patrice kindl

stargirl, jerry spinelli

stir it up, ramin ganeshram

prom and prejudice, elizabeth eulberg

the summer i saved the world…in 65 days, michele weber hurwitz

pink and green series by lisa greenwald

six of crows, leigh bardugo

the catcher in the rye, j.d. salinger

the house on mango street, sandra cisneros

turtles all the way down, john green

under the lights, dahlia adler

geekerella, ashley poston

simon vs. the homo sapiens agenda, becky albertalli

it’s not like it’s a secret, misa sugiura

the idiot, elif batuman

the outsiders, s.e. hinton

everything leads to you, nina lacour

a wrinkle in time, madeleine l’engle

dumplin’, julie murphy

historical fiction

the great gatsby, f. scott fitzgerald

the scarlet letter, nathaniel hawthorne

a tale of two cities, charles dickens

the song of achilles, madeline miller

the last of the mohicans, james fenimore cooper

the constant princess, philippa gregory

the count of monte cristo, alexandre dumas

les misérables, victor hugo

war and peace, leo tolstoy

a mad, wicked folly, sharon biggs waller

manor of secrets, katherine longshore

to kill a mockingbird, harper lee

uncle tom’s cabin, harriet beecher stowe

atonement ian mcewan

the unbearable lightness of being, milan kundera

things fall apart, chinua achebe

ophelia, lisa m. klein

the god of small things, arundhati roy

gothic fiction

frankenstein, mary shelley

dracula, bram stoker

the picture of dorian gray, oscar wilde

wuthering heights, emily brontë

parody/satire

catch-22, joseph heller 

candide, voltaire

don quixote, miguel de cervantes

animal farm, george orwell

the importance of being earnest, oscar wilde

science fiction

the city of ember, jeanne duprau

1984, george orwell

the handmaid’s tale, margaret atwood

brave new world, aldous huxley

the lunar chronicles, marissa meyer

the time machine, h.g. wells

the fourteenth goldfish, jennifer l. holm

fahrenheit 451, ray bradbury

twenty thousand leagues under the sea, jules verne

the extraordinary voyages series, jules verne

epics

beowulf, author unknow

the odyssey, homer

the iliad, homer

the bhagavad gita, vyasa

the mahabharata, vyasa

inferno, dante alighieri

miscellaneous

the bell jar, sylvia plath

the secret history, donna tartt

swann’s way, marcel proust

the art of war, sun tzu

the awakening, kate chopin

moby dick, herman melville

anna karenina, leo tolstoy

the canterbury tales, geoffrey chaucer

the crucible, arthur miller

one flew over the cuckoo’s nest, ken kesey

the antichrist, friedrich nietzsche

sew zoey, nancy taylor and chloe zhang

the candymakers, wendy mass

my sister the vampire series, sienna mercer

eight hundred grapes, laura dave

their eyes were watching god, zora neale hurston

the adventures of huckleberry finn, mark twain

the adventures of tom sawyer, mark twain

a christmas carol, charles dickens

the old man and the sea, ernest hemingway

to the lighthouse, virginia woolf

utopia, thomas more

a spy in the house of love, anaïs nin

crime and punishment, fyodor dostoyevsky

the assistants, camille perri

a room of one’s own, virginia woolf

the joy luck club, amy tan

sputnik sweetheart, haruki murakami

the namesake, jhumpa lahiri

a thousand splendid suns, khaled hosseini

crazy rich asians, kevin kwan

save the date, morgan matson

neuromancer, william gibson

thanks for reading! i hope this helped some of you out. hugs, mel ✨✨✨

[sheilastudying]

To everyone learning a language, who is getting frustrated and impatient and maybe even thinking of quitting: remember how far you have come (not how far you have to go), remember why you started and remember how fantastic the end product will be. Learning a language is difficult and the journey can be long but it is rewarding and it opens so many doors. You are capable of doing this, you can do this… don’t quit now

[sheilastudying]

Bilingual Manga

I only recently discovered Bilingual Manga, a website where you can read Japanese manga for free. The text is all selectable, which means you can use it with addons like Rikaikun, or just copy/paste words or kanji into a dictionary. If you press the blue “Language Switcher” button, the text switches into English! It’s a really useful and fun tool to get used to reading in Japanese. Obviously, those learners who are more of an intermediate level, I’d recommend using this feature very sparingly, since you get more out of it if you use it as an “extra”, after trying to figure it out by yourself.

So far the website’s selection is really small and they’ve got only couple of chapters per manga, but I’d really recommend reading Yotsuba. So fat they have 14 chapters. It’s a really funny slice of life comic with useful vocabulary and variety of characters (and thus speech styles).

[sheilastudying]

I needed to hear this. I was sick all of this week and in general feeling awful while resting in bed. But I don't need to be productive 365 days a year to be happy

Making progress on your health and yourself will help your make progress on your dreams too! 🌟

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