Why
am i writing this blog post? Honestly, i am not sure about the answer. But i do
know that this is not a post of how to learn the German language. I think i
just wanted to make a note to future myself. I may kind of enjoy reading the
journey when i finally became an advanced speaker. But for now, i
suck at it.
Where
to begin? My first German learning period started in the second year of high
school, i guess. We had a wonderful teacher and this went for two years. For
the last year of high school, i learnt nothing like every student who is
preparing for the university entrance exam. But in a kind of funny way, when i
started university, all my German knowledge has gone. I think the reason behind
that is, high school language education is mostly based on grammar information
and i didn't support it with books and movies at all.
In
the second year of university, i bought a German grammar book and had a strict
routine which includes waking up at 6 every morning and study German. And for a
while, it went quite well. But in the university, i also had lots of law
lectures and it was pretty hard to allocate time to German studies alongside
the challenging exams. So i gave up at some point. During university
years, i also used some online applications called "Busuu",
"Duolingo" and "Memrise"; but these apps have not worked for me.
In
the third and last year of university, i attended some international
conferences related to law. And luckily, half of the speakers were German. We
all had an earphone which translates German to Turkish
simultaneously. But i do remember that i took off my earphones in the middle of
the conference and listened to pure German languages with huge enthusiasm. I
was understanding nothing back then. But i quite enjoyed what i listened.
On the coffee break, i talked a few German professors and that is the day i
have decided to study abroad. On those days, i was willing to study in Germany.
But when i graduated, my plans have changed and due to many reasons, i have
decided to study in the United Kingdom. But my desire to learn German remained
stable.
After
finishing my master and coming back to Turkey, i have had a few months free and
decided to spend these months for a useful purpose. While i was thinking, with
the help of one of my professors from the university, i found myself signing up
a German language course. For the last five months, i was attending that
course. Thereby my German adventure has resumed on. But i should say that these
months were quite challenging for me. It is due to two reasons. Firstly, i
was kinda beginner in German and the German language is excessively hard in the
beginning. The second reason is that the German course i was attending was for
those who are intermediate and beyond and i was trying to catch up with them.
So my struggle was exhausting for a while. I have decided to give up many times
but thanks to the supports of my classmates and teacher, i was able to keep going.
I
still find German rather challenging and yet, in my opinion, it is one of the most entertaining
languages to learn. In the very beginning, i had a love-hate relationship with
German. While one week i was adoring it, the other week it was making me
literally sick. I was buying a large black coffee to be able to stand the
lectures. Now i was feeling more or less stable to the language. But
as Einstein says, “The more i learn, the more i realize how much i don't know.”
And it is not getting any easier as well. However, as long as i enjoy, i love
being on the road.
I
received lots of texts during my language course, asking “Why are you learning
German?” especially when i had a master and upcoming PhD in the United Kingdom
which is entirely in English. First of all, i am learning it due to personal
interest and pleasure. This must be enough for learning any kind of stuff but i
have one more reason. In the law field, especially in the academic area, i
believe that i will need to follow up the German books and publications to
write an article given the fact that the codifications of Turkish law come from
the Germany and Switzerland. But mostly, i love the idea of listening and
speaking German smoothly.
I
am still just a beginner of the German language. But during these months, i did
some progress and apart from the language course, i made use of some websites
and youtube channels. I will be sharing these in below for those who want to
have an idea about my process.
The
first step was a grammar book for me. I am still using it from time to time. But you
need to give up merely grammatical information at some point and proceed more
interactive methods.
The
second resource is a youtube channel called "Lingoni German" which is
for those who want to start from the very beginning. It includes lectures from
A1 to B2 levels, with lots of listening and reading practices. I found it
surprisingly helpful to learn a language in another langue rather than my
mother language.
The
third one is a podcast channel called "Easy German" that basically
consists of street language conversations. But it is a bit difficult to
understand if you are a complete beginner. Although it is quite fun for
listening practice. And i believe the best way to learn a langue is listening,
listening and listening.
The
fourth one is a mobile app that i use for vocabulary learning. It has the same
name as the podcast channel as well. The best advantages of this kind of apps
are, you can easily use it while travelling and don't have to sit on the table
and take notes.
And
last but not least, this is a short German series called “Extra auf Deutch”
which basically produced for language learning. It is not as funny as regular
series obviously, but for the German learning, i think is it brilliant.
almost made me love german :P
ReplyDeletethis is more than enough for me :)
Delete