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The Complete Grammar of Everything!
McGraw-Hill's marketing kind of works on me.
Yesterday I ordered four books: Complete Italian Grammar, Complete French Grammar, Complete German Grammar, and Complete Spanish Grammar. These are all from McGraw-Hill’s Practice Makes Perfect series. Today they arrived.…
Studying As Fast As I Can
And the languages (French, Italian, German, and Spanish) are getting kind of mixed up.
One of the things that most appealed to me about this language review is the opportunity, for the first time, to study a bunch of different languages all in one day. I Went to Top of the Rock Today, with…
Grammar Travels Under and Above Ground
Zipping back and forth from one language's grammar to the next is insanely great fun.
In the book Complete German Grammar by Ed Swick, I read, “Sometimes the gender used in Germany is different from the gender used in Austria or Switzerland.” That I did not know, or at least I didn’…
How to Sound Foolish in Multiple Languages!
I bitch a lot about my grammar books, but I keep using them, while also making bizarre mistakes.
I tend to complain a lot about my grammar books. My Complete German Grammar by Ed Swick is now full of my irritable comments on grammar-exercise design and how it is not what it should be, but I…
A Language Friend Leaves Us
A language lover in my building has died.
The other day I observed to my husband, “I haven’t seen John for a while. I wonder if he’s sick.” I was referring to a longtime resident in my building, an elderly man I knew who had…
Food Teaches You Vocabulary
People tend to remember the names of things they like to eat.
When I look at a list of animal vocabulary in French, or Italian, the words I tend to remember and recognize the best are often animals likely to be found on menus.
I Need to Regrow Some Vocabulary
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Don’t Pretend Learning a Language Isn’t Hard
But the fact that something is difficult doesn't preclude pleasure.
A few days ago, in the introduction to the book Spanish Verb Tenses by Dorothy Richmond, I read the following reassurance: “…this careful study of the verbs need not be the drudge work so commonly associated with verbs,…
Language Confusion
I'm blending languages. I am largely untroubled by it.
This picture is of the trash area in a cafeteria at one of my corporate client’s locations. I taught an e-mail etiquette seminar to employees of the firm this morning, stopping by the cafeteria beforehand to get some breakfast. …
It’s Working!
The review is paying off.
Despite any doom or gloom that may have emanated from my last entry, I am pleased to report that this week, while volunteering at the Official NYC Information Center, I saw real results from my ongoing language review of French,…
Life With a Grammar Soundtrack
Grammar and vocabulary questions, musings, and observations.
Earlier this week I finished Level IV of Pimsleur for both French and German, and now I am almost done with Italian. I know it may sound mindbogglingly dull to redo so many lessons, but I don’t find that…