General Introductions Post

[viklikesfic]

Welcome to language_learning!

This is a general post where we can introduce ourselves and meet those who speak or are studying the languages we want to learn. As the community grows, I will add language-specific posts geared towards matching people up with conversation partners, but let's start here and find out who on DW is learning a language!

Suggested format (feel free to modify at will):

Name you prefer:
Location:
Home country:
Languages you speak/sign/read/understand:
Languages you have studied or are studying:
Current language learning goals:
Favorite language learning tool or resource:
Would you like others who are learning or speak your target languages to add/contact you?:

Comments

[marshtide]

Name you prefer: Liz
Location: Norrtälje, Sweden
Home country: England
Languages you speak/sign/read/understand: English, and basic Swedish.
Languages you have studied or are studying: I'm about to start formally learning Swedish through the government scheme for new immigrants, SFI. In the past I've studied French, German and ancient Greek, all of which are now long gone, although stray words sometimes wander in when I'm trying to find the right one in Swedish, just to be a nuisance.
Current language learning goals: Mostly to actually speak more. I think that my reading skills are coming along reasonably fast, and my listening skills are still wobbly but getting a lot better, but having the confidence to start using the language more myself is really important.
Favorite language learning tool or resource: I use three online dictionaries in combination to get a few different angles on tricky words:

- Tyda.se is my first stop in most cases, because it shows different forms of words together, which is helpful for me right now.
- Norstedts ord is better on phrases, and provides a lot of examples of words in context, though I use them cautiously.
- Lexin I use less, but sometimes throws up something the others miss.

And all of these in combination with a paper dictionary from prisma. Uh, yes, I do have a slight mistrust of dictionaries and like to cross-check as much as possible.

My favourite thing right now otherwise is to use children's picture books, though I think I'll move on to more text-heavy ones soon. But how it works is that I read them aloud to my partner to practice speaking without having to also think of the words at the same time, for pronunciation mostly, and then I try to translate them as we go as well. I'm particularly fond of the Pettson & Findus books by Sven Nordqvist.

Would you like others who are learning or speak your target languages to add/contact you?: Do feel free!