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100 Happy Days Langblr Challenge

Introducing a new langblr challenge! It can be difficult to focus on the positives in life sometimes (especially at times like this when many of us are overwhelmed by horrors in the news), so this challenge is all about appreciating the things that make you happy in your day-to-day life while also having the opportunity to practice your target language(s).

Here are the details:

Although it’s called 100 Happy Days after the old instagram challenge, you can choose how many days you want to do it for. You can try 7 days, 28 days, 30 days, 60 days and so on. You set your own target (if you want to go for longer than 100 days, you’re welcome to!)

Find something that makes you happy every day. It could be something small (like drinking from your favourite mug) or large (like graduating from college).

Write or speak about it in your target language.

(Optional: take a picture of it to share with everyone.)

Post with the tag #100happydayslangblr (even if you do a different number of days, using the same hashtag will help us find each other).

Make a note if you would like corrections or not so that native speakers/other learners know whether they should give you any.

You’re welcome to stick to one language, but you can mix it up if you want.

You can start any time! There’s no official start or end date for this challenge :) 

1. Choose a vocabulary list 

2. Copy & paste the words into Word, remove the translations

3. Print the vocabulary list

4. Write the translations of each word again (if you made the vocabulary list try to remember them without looking first)!

(As you maybe noticed, the original list was in Japanese-English but I have the list in Japanese-Finnish here.) 5. Quiz yourself by hiding the translation of the word with a post-it note or some other item. Move on to the next word when you get it right. Go back to the beginning of the list if you don’t remember the word right. When you get everything right, do it the other way - hide the word itself and try to recall it just looking at the translation.

7. Read through the list and quiz yourself again after a few days to test if you remember everything.

Additional steps:

• Write the word by hand on a separate (graph) paper, post-it note, or to the backside of the vocabulary sheet • Check how the word is pronounced on forvo.com • Look for example sentences that include the words on the list (for example on tatoeba.org) • Make your own sentences using the words on the list • Make handmade flashcards of the words or put them into Memory, Quizlet or other flashcard app 

Disclaimer

General Plan:

Weeks 1 and 2: Purpose:

Learn the fundamentals sentence construction

Learn how to spell and count

Start building a phrase stockpile with basic greetings

The Alphabet

Numbers 1 - 100

Subject Pronouns

Common Greetings

Conjugate the Two Most Important Verbs: to be and to have

Basic Definite and Indefinite Articles

Weeks 3 and 4: Purpose:

Learn essential vocabulary for the day-to-day

Start conjugating regular verbs

Days of the Week and Months of the Year

How to tell the time

How to talk about the weather

Family Vocabulary

Present Tense Conjugations Verbs

Weeks 5 and 6: Purpose:

Warm up with the last of the day-to-day vocabulary

Add more complex types of sentences to your grammar

Colours

House vocabulary

How to ask questions

Present Tense Conjugations Verbs

Forming negatives

Weeks 7 and 8: Purpose:

Learn how to navigate basic situations in a region of your target language country

Finish memorising regular conjugation rules

Food Vocabulary and Ordering at Restaurants

Money and Shopping Phrases

Present Tense Conjugations Verbs

Weeks 9 and 10: Purpose:

Start constructing descriptive and more complex sentences

Adjectives

Reflective verbs

Places vocabulary

Weeks 11 and 12: Purpose:

Add more complex descriptions to your sentences with adverbs

Wrap up vocabulary essentials

Adverbs

Parts of the body and medical vocabulary

Tips for Learning a Foreign Language:

Learning Vocabulary:

What vocabulary should I be learning?

There are hundreds of thousands of words in every language, and the large majority of them won’t be immediately relevant to you when you’re starting out.Typically, the most frequent 3000 words make up 90% of the language that a native speaker uses on any given day. Instead try to learn the most useful words in a language, and then expand outwards from there according to your needs and interests.

Choose the words you want/need to learn.

Relate them to what you already know.

Review them until they’ve reached your long-term memory.

Record them so learning is never lost.

Use them in meaningful human conversation and communication.

How should I record the vocabulary?

Learners need to see and/or hear a new word of phrase 6 to 17 times before they really know a piece of vocabulary.

Keep a careful record of new vocabulary.

Record the vocabulary in a way that is helpful to you and will ensure that you will practice the vocabulary, e.g. flashcards.

Vocabulary should be organised so that words are easier to find, e.g. alphabetically or according to topic.

Ideally when noting vocabulary you should write down not only the meaning, but the grammatical class, and example in a sentence, and where needed information about structure.

How should I practice using the vocabulary?

Look, Say, Cover, Write and Check - Use this method for learning and remembering vocabulary. This method is really good for learning spellings.

Make flashcards. Write the vocabulary on the front with the definition and examples on the back.

Draw mind maps or make visual representations of the new vocabulary groups.

Stick labels or post it notes on corresponding objects, e.g when learning kitchen vocabulary you could label items in your house.

How often should I be practising vocabulary?

A valuable technique is ‘the principle of expanding rehearsal’. This means reviewing vocabulary shortly after first learning them then at increasingly longer intervals.

Ideally, words should be reviewed:

5-10 minutes later

24 hours later

One week later

1-2 months later

6 months later

Knowing a vocabulary item well enough to use it productively means knowing:

Its written and spoken forms (spelling and pronunciation).

Its grammatical category and other grammatical information

Related words and word families, e.g. adjective, adverb, verb, noun.

Common collocations (Words that often come before or after it).

Receptive Skills: Listening and Reading

Reading is probably one of the most effective ways of building vocabulary knowledge.

Listening is also important because it occupies a big chunk of the time we spend communicating.

Tips for reading in a foreign language:

Start basic and small.  Children’s books are great practice for beginners. Don’t try to dive into a novel or newspaper too early, since it can be discouraging and time consuming if you have to look up every other word.

Read things you’ve already read in your native language. The fact that you at least know the gist of the story will help you to pick up context clues, learn new vocabulary and grammatical constructions.

Read books with their accompanying audio books. Reading a book while listening to the accompanying audio will improve your “ear training”. It will also help you to learn the pronunciation of words.

Tips for listening in a foreign language:

Watch films in your target language.

Read a book while also listening along to the audio book version.

Listen to the radio in your target language.

Watch videos online in your target language.

Activities to do to show that you’ve understood what you’ve been listening to:

Try drawing a picture of what was said.

Ask yourself some questions about it and try to answer them.

Provide a summary of what was said.

Suggest what might come next in the “story.”

Translate what was said into another language.

“Talk back” to the speaker to engage in imaginary conversation.

Productive Skills: Speaking and Writing

Tips for speaking in a foreign language:

If you can, try to speak the language every day either out loud to yourself or chat to another native speaker whether it is a colleague, a friend, a tutor or a language exchange partner. 

Write a list of topics and think about what you could say about each one. First you could write out your thoughts and then read them out loud. Look up the words you don’t know. You could also come up with questions at the end to ask someone else.

A really good way to improve your own speaking is to listen to how native speakers talk and imitate their accent, their rhythm of speech and tone of voice. Watch how their lips move and pay attention to the stressed sounds. You could watch interviews on YouTube or online news websites and pause every so often to copy what you have just heard. You could even sing along to songs sung in the target language.

Walk around the house and describe what you say. Say what you like or dislike about the room or the furniture or the decor. Talk about what you want to change.This gets you to practise every day vocabulary.

Tips for writing in a foreign language:

Practice writing in your target language. Keep it simple to start with. Beginner vocabulary and grammar concepts are generally very descriptive and concrete.

Practice writing by hand. Here are some things you can write out by hand:

Diary entries

Shopping lists

Reminders

What could I write about?

Write about your day, an interesting event, how you’re feeling, or what you’re thinking.

Make up a conversation between two people. 

Write a letter to a friend, yourself, or a celebrity. You don’t need to send it; just writing it will be helpful.

Translate a text you’ve written in your native language into your foreign language.

Write a review or a book you’ve recently read or a film you’ve recently watched.

Write Facebook statuses, Tweets or Tumblr posts (whether you post them or not will be up to you).

Write a short story or poem.

Writing is one of the hardest things to do well as a non-native speaker of a language, because there’s no room to hide. 

There are lots of ways to improve your writing ability, but they can be essentially boiled down to three key components:

Read a lot

Write a lot

moi, un idiot: 

A. Dis “Salut”

B. Dis “Bien”

-el castillo- castle       ex. Si vas a norte, verás el castillo.  -la maldición- curse (n)       ex. Mi maldición me hace graznar como un pato cada medianoche. -el dragón- dragon       ex. Este dragón no respira fuego. -encantado- enchanted       ex. Hay un arbol encantado en Rumania. -malvado- evil       ex. Evita los duendes malvados. -el hada- fairy       ex. Mi amiga, Marina, vio un hada cerca aquella casa vieja. -el bosque- forest       ex. El bosque es oscuro y peligroso. -el duende- goblin       ex. Los duendes probarán te engañar.   -el rey- king       ex. Ambos Samuel y el rey fueron atrapados por las circunstancias. -mágica - magic (adj.)       ex. Carlos tiene una bota mágica.  -el príncipe- prince       ex. El príncipe quiere viajar a Marruecos. -la princesa- princess       ex. La princesa del Reino de Conora es una caballista buena. -la reina- queen       ex. La reina tiene mucho poder. -el tesoro- treasure       ex. Él custodia su tesoro cuidadosamente. -la bruja- witch       ex. Quiero ser una bruja para Halloween.

hello!! as an online college student, i’ve been lucky enough to already have some experience with online schooling, so i’m here to offer all my advice for the students of quarantined schools! due to the covid-19 outbreak, it’s been very difficult for many who’ve had to switch to online school. however, there are many way to make it simpler and faster, and i’m here to give my best tips!!

firstly, make a list. whether you’re more comfortable with a physical to-do list or a virtual calendar to schedule things out (i’ve used google calendar almost my whole life but i just got the app elisi and it’s beautiful, minimalist, and easy to use! available on pretty much every device). planning out your work is the most efficient way to get it done.

don’t try to do everything at once. while it’s best to get things done soon, space out your work efficiently so you don’t feel overwhelmed!

create a simple, comfortable study space. it doesn’t have to be a perfectly organized desk or gorgeous setup at the kitchen table; i do all of my college work from my bed with a comfy throw blanket and fairy lights up. the most important thing is that you are in the right position to do work, you are comfortable, and that you are able to keep everything you need close to you.

work in chunks. to best knock out your work, take it an hour at a time with 10 to 15 minute breaks in between. make some tea, get a snack, stay energized.

drink lots of water. you are not immune to the coronavirus. it’s also easier to stay energized and focused when you’re hydrated.

MOST IMPORTANTLY: COMMUNICATE WITH YOUR INSTRUCTORS. at first i was very timid to communicate back and forth with my professors when something was wrong but i have learned that it is the most important thing to have good communication. if you don’t understand a concept, have trouble with the online system, or just need general help in your academics, sending them an email is the best way to solve the problem.

reward yourself!! once you’ve finished an assignment, give yourself a little treat (maybe a half hour of minecraft or your favorite snack to munch on!!)–it’s the best way to encourage your mind to work harder.

don’t work too late. you’re off from school. unless it’s the night of the due date, don’t push yourself until it’s done. the morning is just a sleep away.

these are some good playlists for background music.

another important tip! communicate with your classmates in case you don’t understand something. everybody learns differently and some pick up info different than others. 

make fancy notes!! get fancy with your stationery!! you have plenty of time now and can go bonkers with your beautiful notes.

continue to check your temperature and monitor symptoms. your school has closed for a reason. your safety and health are important.

retain a relatively normal sleep schedule, similar to the one you have when you normally go to school. slipping out of your regular sleep cycle can and will kick your ass when it’s time to go back.

lastly, eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner. take a nap when you’re tired. remember to go to the bathroom and keep your water filled. take care of yourself.

Please, please I’m begging you, use firefox.

PLEASE install firefox as a mobile browser and then run adblock on your mobile browser it’s so good I promise.

Look.

Look.

I know I’m a total grind about open source stuff but browsers are the PERFECT place to learn to love open source software and for so long FireFox was a major part of the browser market and sometimes if you want to see what kind of fuckery google is up to it helps to see the kinds of things they block in firefox and just

There’s an organization that makes free, excellent, safe software that doesn’t collect and market your data but for some reason two thirds of the world uses a google product and most of the leftover population uses apple and just

I promise, firefox is so good - the extensions are incredible look - I can use lightbeam to see what sites I use and how they connect to other sites (bottom right should give you an idea how much time I spend on tumblr)

or I can look at ublock origin and see that it’s blocked over 2 million requests since I installed it or I can run the facebook container extension and stop facebook from tracking me and you know what I bet you can do a lot of that on chrome too but you’re doing that while chrome itself is tracking you and gobbling up your activity for google and

firefox is so fuckin great and it’s such a great ambassador for other open source projects please be a big old fuckin nerd with me and use firefox and run a bunch of funky extensions and customize the fuck out of your web experience.

Wanna be a hacker? Firefox.

Wanna use instagram on desktop? Firefox.

Wanna be a killer researcher? Firefox.

Wanna properly credit artists? Firefox.

Wanna read a whole shitload of books? Firefox.

Wanna make video responses to shitlord youtubers?

Wanna shoot cat lasers at bugs?

Wanna use youtube as a music streaming service?

FIREFOX.

The built-in privacy settings are no joke either. Even the built-in ad blocker is great; it took me literal months to figure out what was blocking ads on duolingo after disabling all of my privacy extensions lmao

Uninstall chrome and replace it with firefox, I promise it’s worth it.

Mozilla (Firefox developer) has been at the forefront of data privacy and security. They even have a monitoring tool that tells you if your email is part of a data breach going back to the early 00s!!!

the word: [coincidentally starts showing up everywhere in the following days]

me: