Writing this in native English because I don’t quite trust myself to outline my plan well in another language yet.
For the book club, I’m reading primarily in Spanish and German, but also French and Dutch later on, or if I find time. I have five books total, including the four languages above, and English, and I have audiobooks for all but Dutch.
I plan to mix and match reading styles and listening styles. As far as I can tell, there are 3 main styles of reading (target language first, support language first, or parallel) and four listening methods (read first, listen first, listen while reading target, listen while reading support). I’m planning to use all the methods.
I’ll start with Spanish, reading target first, followed by listening. Then I’ll proceed to German, but listen first, then read.
Next step will be to read the English (support) all the way through to prepare for the other two languages. I don’t expect to keep up with the book club with all four, so I don’t mind if the French and Dutch lag behind.
I’ll hit the audio hard for French, listening first, then listen again while reading English, then read the French, keeping English on parallel, then read one more time, listening to the French audio one more time. This is because my French audio comprehension kinda sucks, so I really need more input there.
I’m really excited about my plan for Dutch, which I unfortunately do not have audio for. I’ll be using both German and English as support texts, with German on parallel and English as just a standby.
For each chapter, I’d like to try to read straight through first, without looking anything up. I imagine I will end up with two lists of words: one that I don’t know well, but get from context, which I will copy out in a Goldlist style, and a list of words that I don’t get from context, which will get looked up and put in flashcards.
I am also considering trying to get some speaking practice by making short videos of me reading excerpts from the book, just to keep for my own reference.
It’s a lot to take on, but I’m pretty excited to start this project and being able to say one day that I have read a book in five languages.
Hi Elizabeth, That's quite a plan! And I thought mine was crazy by taking Romanian (an advanced language of mine) as a support language ;-) . As for the reading/listening techniques, I already tried reading first, listening first, reading while listening and reading in parallel the target and the support language. The most challenging is listening first, as the pace of the audio book is quite fast and sometimes it's hard to recognize some words which are easy when seeing them :) Good luck anyways with your adventure!
I’m not really expecting to pick out words well on my first listen through the audiobooks, I’m using them more to prime my ears to hear the language, especially with French.
Good luck with yours as well!
Wow Elizabeth! Your plan sounds doable but probably will take some time, especially since the book is quite pagy (is this a word? :D). Good luck with all your languages! I am curious to read some texts of yours in German.
Ah the Goldlist style! I used this for about 2 1/2 years with Italian. It has its detractors, but this method definitely helped me to expand my vocabulary, without a doubt.
For LInda: Is "pagy" a word? Well, it is now. But I would spell it "pagey", making the g a soft sound.
Wow, Elizabeth, you really have your strategies mapped out! I've been warming up a bit, seeing what I need to look up (reading & listening in Spanish only). I'm really looking forward to the discussions.