Comments on: Starting to learn a language with the right attitude

By: Benny the language hacker

Benny the language hacker — Wed, 15 Dec 2010 03:46:00 +0000

Please do! Thanks for reading

By: Benny the language hacker

Benny the language hacker — Wed, 15 Dec 2010 03:46:00 +0000

Please do! Thanks for reading

By: Vix

Vix — Tue, 14 Dec 2010 23:33:00 +0000

Very inspiring! I am off to Austria to teach English, and have always wanted to learn another language. My story of learning German is SO similar to yours! I learned it for five years in school and could only manage a few basic phrases and random words – WITHOUT the genders! I started studying it again for Austria and felt so depressed over how ‘hard’ it is, and after reading your stories about how you have forced yourself to speak it I thought I would give it a shot! This article really hits the nail on the head though. The right attitude is half the battle. Thanks for the advice, I’ll let you know how I get on!

By: Daniel N.

Daniel N. — Mon, 03 May 2010 16:17:12 +0000

“Conjugation that is oddly similar to Spanish/Italian”

Actually there are more grammar similarities between Slavic and “Latin” (actually, Romance) languages. Use of reflexive se, word order, clitics, dative…

By: Benny the Irish polyglot

Benny the Irish polyglot — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 13:51:26 +0000

Thanks Jonny – glad you agree!

By: jonny

jonny — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 10:14:27 +0000

excellent post. after moving to korea i found that many expats who live here fail to pick up the language, many for lack of trying. they always have an excuse handy; usually “it's too hard!” it is hard not to fall into that trap. but i find your advice is spot-on. looking for the positives in any language (or situation!) is setting yourself up for success.

By: Alvin

Alvin — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 10:53:45 +0000

I am starting to study Mandarin, and I have to say I agree with this. I have studied Latin, German and Spanish previously (sadly forgotten most of all of them). I have to say what I find EASY so far about Mandarin is the lack of verb conjugations and adjective/adverb declensions. I was going through some old college notebooks recently, and found an entire spiral dedicated to just repeatedly writing out Latin adjectives over and over. Now THAT was boring work! OTOH, it gave me quite a basis that I can build on to learn pretty much any language I want.

By: Miguel

Miguel — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 19:51:15 +0000

I hope to join you on this goal , I’m also egar to move to Praha soon and I expect that with your help I can improve very mushmy Czech..

Miguel

By: Miguel

Miguel — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 19:51:00 +0000

I hope to join you on this goal , I’m also egar to move to Praha soon and I expect that with your help I can improve very mushmy Czech..

Miguel

By: benny

benny — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 20:18:48 +0000

I am using “Czech, an essential grammar – by James Naughton“. I chose it based on reviews from several websites and I am extremely pleased with it!! It is very in-depth and yet is straightforward. I’d highly recommend it to anyone who has already learned languages and is familiar with the basic grammatical terminology. It may not be so interesting to those who need daily examples and basic phrases though. (That’s why I combine it with my phrase book).
I’ll be using a lot of methods, including music All will be shared on the blog!

By: benny

benny — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 20:18:00 +0000

By: benny

benny — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 20:15:11 +0000

Deal!

By: benny

benny — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 20:15:00 +0000

Deal!

By: cestina

cestina — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 08:15:36 +0000

Instead of “Have a nice day/evening/etc” you could try “Hezky vikend!” from Thurs onwards:-)

By: cestina

cestina — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 08:15:00 +0000

Instead of “Have a nice day/evening/etc” you could try “Hezky vikend!” from Thurs onwards:-)

By: Rene

Rene — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 22:02:23 +0000

Jen,
TEN, TA, TO are actually “demonstrative pronouns” (ukazovací pronomina).
Ten stůl = this table, to auto = this car
They are used mostly:
1. to point [ta kniha je moje: this book is mine (pointing)]
2. to tell one object apart from another. [tohle auto je modré, tamto je černý = this car is blue, that one is black]

Sometimes they are translated into English as THE, and this creates the misconception that Czech has definite articles…

In English we usually go through these stages: indefinite, demonstrative, definite. Ex: I have a book (indefinite). This is my book (demonstrative), from now on we can say “the book” to refer to this specific book.

Czech is simpler: mám kniha; ta kniha je moje (demonstrative to identify it), but now that the book has been identified, you say “kniha je dobrá” (no definite article used here).

By: Rene

Rene — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 22:02:00 +0000

Sometimes they are translated into English as THE, and this creates the misconception that Czech has definite articles…

Czech is simpler: mám kniha; ta kniha je moje (demonstrative to identify it), but now that the book has been identified, you say “kniha je dobrá” (no definite article used here).

By: sylva

sylva — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 06:35:12 +0000

well, if you do come to Brno, you’ll definitely have to speak Czech if I’m around!

By: sylva

sylva — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 06:35:00 +0000

well, if you do come to Brno, you’ll definitely have to speak Czech if I’m around!

By: maxime

maxime — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 11:41:33 +0000

Benny, could who tell us more about the book you use and why you chose it ? Do you plan to also use other methods as movies or music to get used to the language ?