How I went about learning French and Spanish

[BLOCKEDbyPOM]

I are really patient to be able to finish the +500 dense pages of the shadow of the wind.

[saesuicide]

Reading about myths, superstitions in another language is AWESOME!! I borrowed a book from my french teacher about Quebecoise myths and superstitions called Créatures Fantastiques Du Québec and read the entire thing in a day.

[Jamiekimme0643]

what is the book? el bosque el origneo?

[Jamiekimme0643]

@Jamiekimme0643 excuse my spanish

[lingosteve]

@Jamiekimme0643 El Bosque Originario by Jon Juaristu

[Gsteezy171]

Possibly a combo vid for Japanese/Korean? =D

[eugrus]

Are you that much against role playing games in language learning? I mean, some output should be anyway!

[lingosteve]

@eugrus I only like output in real situations preferably with native speakers. I prefer input until I get the opporutnity.

[Ven0mB0Y]

How do you feel about the differences between French Canadian and European French? Do you understand both?

[lingosteve]

@Ven0mB0Y Of course I understand both and I don't think the difference is that great, at least in the cities.

[silent0watcher]

02:32 "As a teacher you only have one job - to turn on the students"

What if it's a Catholic boarding school for boys? :)

[Elekias]

...and why did I bother with Czech" Hmm.. ;) Ok, I will be more than happy to hear this one! As for your passion for myths / legends of the origin, I recommend the one about Forefather Cech and his brother Lech ;) Keep up the good work Steve!

Pavel - recently living in Strasbourg and struggling with French - I need that bike also!!

[lingosteve]

@Elekias Thanks and I am really enjoying learning Czech.

[V1RAL1NF3CTION]

I am from Scotland and you have to do 6 years minimum of French or German! But to be honest it was boring! The way the teachers had to teach it for our Standard Grades was terrible just exercises upon exercises and grammar all the time and I got a 4 which is a low grade. But now I want learn more languages and I have just started learning Dutch which I am finding really easy as its so close to English and also some of it to French which I can only remember the basics for.

[MelancholyInLove]

Reading is the most difficult part as I am concerned. I can tell that because of my experience. And there is where i am improving my second and third language now, can't wait to do it with my fourth, but I'll have to wait, or may not, maybe I will approach to the fourth one differently by starting reading right away instead of keep listening ans studying grammar.

[lingosteve]

@MelancholyInLove To improve in reading you just need to read more. I find it very difficult to absorb the grammar until I have had a lot of exposure to the language.

[MelancholyInLove]

@lingosteve that's exactly what I'm doing. Thank you for the advice :), I wll apply a different plan for my third language, I already know the basis at least

[MelancholyInLove]

You are an inspiration :). My dfficulty with French was the pronunciation, well still is, specially when i had to say "que" or "qui" I sometimes pronounce them very similar, but i had a bad teacher, or better a mean teacher, anyways, she didn't get to make me hate French!

[lingosteve]

@MelancholyInLove Que and Qui is not a pronunciation issue, I believe, but knowing which one to use.

[MelancholyInLove]

@lingosteve ahah my second teacher taught me well the difference, it was the first one who didn't know how to get to students, i used to call her the ugly nazist!, but the new one is very kind. When I do my second exam with her I will know the true!

[Arijana2010]

You're so inspirational. The life you have lived sounds amazing!

[erdal0]

i have to learn spanish for school but i easily get distracted because there is always more fun things to do.. did you have problems with this? what advice would you give me?

[lingosteve]

@erdal0 Give Spanish a chance. Read interesting things. Listen to songs in Spanish. The more you do it, the more you will enjoy it, maybe.

[barsorrro]

I have no much to say, really, other than that I find those stories of your life--and especially as viewed from the perspective of learning languages in order to learn about cultures and history, and so as to be able to communicate with the people of a country of interest--absolutely fascinating and just wonderful to listen to. I'm so glad for you and it's so good that all these superb life opportunities have befallen to such a nice and open-minded person. I really appreciate your sharing this.

[AnAmericanlinguist]

La sombra del viento es perfecto para los estudiantes de español. Yo lo leí hace dos años, y después leí "Cien años de soledad" que es un poco mas difícil, pero también lo recomiendo. Saludos.

[koolibrii]

@AnAmericanlinguist Sí. La sombra del viento es una novela lo suficientemente atractiva y fácil para que un no hispanohablante empiece a familiarizarse con el español. Eso no quiere decir que esté escrita en buen castellano, eso es harina de otro costal.

[koolibrii]

@AnAmericanlinguist Por otra parte, Cien años de soledad es un pilar de la literatura, no sólo en español sino de la literatura universal. Sinceramente, yo no se lo recomendaría a un "estudiante de español" como libro de lectura para mejorar el idioma. Antes de leer a Gabriel García Márquez hay que dominar, mejor dicho, tener una familiaridad con la lengua literaria como la de un hispanohablante nativo culto.

[AnAmericanlinguist]

@koolibrii Depende de tu nivel. Por mi fue una procesión natural. Viaje a Colombia, y antes de irme quería leer Marquez. Si fue un poco dificil, sobre todo al principio, pero el reto mejoró mi español y cuando estaba en el país, yo podía discutir el libro con la gente allá. Creo que es mas importante comprender la historia de Colombia y la Biblia, que tener un nivel de nativo-hablante en español para comprender este libro. Un saludo

[koolibrii]

@AnAmericanlinguist Me alegro mucho de que hayas podido enfrentarte a un texto tan complejo como "Cien años de soledad" y que hayas podido llegar hasta el final e incluso lo hayas disfrutado. La verdad es que has conseguido mucho más que muchos hispanohablantes, colombianos o no. Felicidades.

[lucasburguer]

How you went about learning Portuguese?

[learningczech]

"El bosque originario" de Jon Juaristi

[paraescucharrap]

man, you should write your biography !!! you have had quite an interesting life !!! I have a quiestion Steve, when you say that we should read complete books, is that from the very beginning??? when we have basically don't know the language???

[lingosteve]

@paraescucharrap I wrote a biography, The Linguist A Language Learning Odyssey. You can find it on Amazon. You cannot read a complete book until you have spent a lot of time reading and listening to shorter content , and learning words.

[Neuroneos]

Il est très intéressant de vous écouter parler de votre histoire, Steve. Vous êtes quelqu'un de très cultivé et vous semblez avoir beaucoup de vécu, et j'aime votre objectivité lorsque vous parlez de différents enjeux politiques et sociaux, ça dévoile une certaine sagesse. A l'époque, j'imagine que les choses étaient beaucoup plus captivantes qu'aujourd'hui, car maintenant la majorité de la population est branchée sur un ordinateur ....

[lingosteve]

@Neuroneos Merci pour ces gentils mots. Je continue de trouver le monde fascinant, et je dois dire que j'aime mon ordinateur.

[27069614]

@lingosteve Very insightful video, which language is the next one?

[yourheadtops]

you seem to have spent a lot of time in different places, it is so neat, but how did you find time to find your wife and or settle down? do you believe a world traveler should wait til he has travelled everywhere and then settle down or just do it at the same time? though i believe this might be hard because one is focused on doing so much things that it seems like a personal life would be ignored.

anyways thanks for the great video and polish would be great for lingq!!!

[lingosteve]

@yourheadtops I met my wife in Hong Kong and we lived together in there and in obviously for the rest of our lives. You don't know what will happen in life, it is best not to plan too much. We have Polish at LingQ.

[Imyirtshashem]

I don't mind watching some tv series. Documentaries are my favourite but I'll never say no to a little science fiction or fantasy. Still, reading is king.

[qzchris]

I read my first French book, in entirety, late last year. It was Madame Bovary, a realist novel of the 19th century. It wasn't the easiest read, but to my pleasant surprise, not as difficult as I had anticipated. I was able to remained engrossed in it throughout. I'm now reading Le Rouge et Le Noir and hoping it will be as good.

[DopeSpace9]

Great series. I love hearing the tales of your language learning adventures. You should do a video talking about how your family feels about your language "addiction" and if you've inspired any of them to start their own linguistic endeavors. Could be interesting.

[Mexicanpolyglot91]

Very interesting video, Steve!! Very nice stories of both languages!! Hopefully, I can live some things similar!! Btw, I love your videos & I admire you so much as a polyglot. One day (if God wants) I'll speak the same languages as you. Kind regards!! Saludos de México!! Un abrazo, Steve!! :-D

[lingosteve]

@Mexicanpolyglot91 Gracias y saludos y un abrazo a ti tambien.

[awfulguitarplucker]

you have been in

GRENOBLE?

i went there twice..O.o