February 26th, 2021

Finding Continued Motivation for Russian – Language Learning Goals March 2021

Two months in, how’s it going learning Russian? What will I keep and what will I change with my Russian language learning goals for March 2021?

Two months in, how's it going learning Russian? What will I keep and what will I change with my Russian language learning goals for March 2021? ➔

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Language Review for February

From the start of January I’ve been measuring my “known” words on LingQ and Drops. Although this isn’t a great measure of actual language use and ability, it is handy to keep tabs on how much I’m sticking to my routines with these resources. Even if it doesn’t mean much, it is satisfying too to see the number go up each week!

I started using Tandem to give me chances to practise writing and speaking each day. I’ve not yet found the consistent nugget of time this fits in daily, but do manage to check in at least a couple of times a week. I unexpectedly had a 30 minute language exchange call with someone this month through Tandem too!

I also had my first live lesson in February! Woohoo! More on that in a moment.

LingQ

I’m going to keep going with LingQ*, but I think I’ve reached a point where I need to reassess how I’m using it. Really, I think it’s a matter every now and then of checking the vocab list and adjusting how well I know words. I’m not using the vocab/flashcard review feature much so am getting to a point with lots of yellow words (words I’ve seen before but haven’t marked as known) when I open something new!

Drops

Drops* is also working well and I’m still pretty much doing a topic a day and sometimes spreading one topic across the two days of a weekend.

Although it feels kinda random with some of the specifics of vocabulary, as I’d like to learn more Slavic languages down the line, I think this will be useful in the longterm.

Live lessons

I had my first Russian lesson! Yay!

After reaching out to a few teachers on Instagram, unfortunately it didn’t work out as I’m quite busy so my availability for lessons isn’t much right now. In the end, I found a teacher on italki from Kazakhstan.

As one of the reasons I’m learning Russian is for overland travel, I’m keen to learn more about countries that use Russian alongside their native languages too.

The lesson was 1 hour and went really well! I didn’t prepare much, but did sit with my notebook beside me and checked for maybe one or two words I knew I had in there. My teacher was very patient and understood lots of what I said with us using minimal English!

~~Three~~ Two old books on my shelf!

I finished the little ‘Teach Yourself Quick and Easy Russian’ that was made in the early 90s. Although the exercises were pretty much “Here’s a list of words. What’s the word for ___?”, it was a really interesting insight into that time of Russia’s history.

As for the other two (DK/Hugo Russian in Three Months and Berlitz Essential Russian), I’m at the (surprisingly early in the books!) chapters in each where they’ve gone, “Hey. So here’s cases. Enjoy”.

That’s led to lots of sidestepping from each of them to teach myself more about cases from the Internet!

Language Life Prompts

Did you hear about Language Life?

One part of Language Life is the weekly prompts. These can be used for writing or speaking, and work at any level – yes, even when you’re a complete beginner.

I’ve been using the Prompts to produce my first Russian sentences, which is very exciting!

Goals for March

Keep up LingQ, Drops, Tandem, two old books, Language Life Prompts

Everything I’m doing is working well, as proven by my happy face at the end of my first lesson in February.

Investigate Other Resources

I’m a huge fan of avoiding overwhelm with a language. It’s especially easy for a language like Russian where there’s lots out there to feel like you need to use ALL THE THINGS.

One of the best skills you can develop as a solo language learner is the skill of knowing when, how, and what to change when it comes to resources.

In March, I’ll be looking into some resources I haven’t used yet and deciding if these are right for me right now. So far on my list to try are:

– Decide if it’s worth adding in some Memrise.
– Look for LyricsTraining equivalent.
– Check out Live Lingua Project Russian resources.

Investigate The Fun Stuff!

I’ve already got a music playlist I’ve been working on for Russian but I’ve not yet looked much for something to watch, and I’d still like to pick a podcast or two.

Here’s my plan here…

– Set a deadline to publish my Russian playlist to encourage me to listen and discover more.
– Check options to watch Russian content on Netflix, All4, and Amazon Prime.
– Pick a few podcasts I can use when lockdown ends and I can walk multiple times a day again!!