Blog

January 28, 2014 | Review Period

Lumosity Aversion

I don't want my brain trained!

When I am online, I am constantly greeted by ads for a website called Lumosity. It’s annoying. Lumosity supposedly trains your brain so you can function better. Brain Training? Ow. This is from their website: “At Lumos Labs,…

February 10, 2014 | Review Period

Studying on Snow Days

This winter has impinged on my outdoor Pimsleur running.

It has been so cold this winter. Snow, slush, sleet, bitter winds, falling icicles, etc. I have been feeling kind of wimpy about the great outdoors, which is where I get a lot of my pimsling (i.e., the doing…

February 26, 2014 | Review Period

I Write With My Feet!

On lifelong language habits I have had.

When I learned to type at 13, for a long, long time I used to fake-type sentences as I heard them, moving my fingers slightly as if I was sitting at a keyboard.  I would try to type as fast…

March 11, 2014 | Review Period

The Pimsleur Diet

A plan to tour some languages and lose the winter pounds.

I have gained about 12 pounds over the past year, the majority of them during this unusually cold, precipitation-filled winter. This is not an acceptable development for me, and I am running out of zippable pants. Leggings keep working because they…

March 31, 2014 | Review Period

Memrise Binge

What has (so far) befallen my Pimsleur Diet.

My grand intentions in my last blog entry have not quite been realized, and for that I blame Memrise, which continues to entice me late at night to binge on all kinds of languages. The situation is a bit out…

April 18, 2014 | Review Period

Field Trip: Schoenhof’s Foreign Books

In which I visit a language-learning giant in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

When I was a college student in the mid-1980s, I bought many of my coursebooks smack-dab in the middle of Harvard Square at the Harvard Coop, which was pronounced like the second half of “chicken coop” even though…

April 19, 2014 | Review Period

Lazy Language Days of Spring

My Pimsleur Diet was an utter failure. But only so far.

The Pimsleur Diet I announced in March did not go well for me. I did some Pimsleur, but not enough, and I did not lose a single pound. But I am not going to belabor this point, as there are…

April 19, 2014 | Review Period

I Want to Take the Hi-LAB Test!

Maybe it can predict my language future. Or explain my past!

Yesterday afternoon I became mildly obsessed with the Hi-LAB—or High Level Language Aptitude Battery test—which I just read about in an interesting new article from language writer Michael Erard. I want to take the Hi-LAB test.…

May 5, 2014 | Persian

Proceeding with Persian!

Enough of this review period. Time for another language.

I wasn’t expecting to begin a new language until maybe mid-June, as I have a backlog of products to review, but suddenly I just couldn’t take it anymore! I needed to try out another language. The short list…

May 11, 2014 | Persian

Memrise for Persian: A Wee Bit Frustrating

A Persian progress report.

I have previously been addicted to Memrise for Arabic. It was serious: I loved Memrise for Arabic. So far I do not love it for Persian. Hiking in Central Park: It’s Pimsleur Walking Season! In case you are unfamiliar…