While I love rapid progress and an (effective) quick fix as much as the next person, my history with Basque reflects my belief in the power of slow and steady language learning.

Playing a long game is far more realistic for most adults who are fitting a language alongside holding down a full-time job, bringing up a family (or, often, both).

I started learning Basque in September 2013.

In January 2014 I started I started Howtogetfluent and learning Basque has been the focus of several projects here on the site.

I’ve done several Fluent in Three Months Challenges with Basque. I spent a month on an immersion course at Lazkao (Spanish Basque Country).

For a month in summer 2018, I ramped up my focussed study (“Basque Boost August”). I did the same last summer with my “Two language tango” (Basque/Japanese). The end of the “Tango” was my last full Basque update…until now .

My Basque study log

I find language logging a useful motivational tool and I’ve been keeping a track on my “active” work on Basque for most of my journey with the language.

By “active” work, I mean focussed study slots (usually working with one of my course books) and one-to-one conversation practice with a teacher via Skype (arranged through italki.com).

My focussed study slot is usually lasts thirty minutes (sometimes more, not often less).

Unlike with my basic Japanese project, I haven’t had any “minimum” targets for Basque since last August.

It’s been a question of fitting my Basque sessions in around my Japanese.

As a minimum, though, I like to book one thirty-minute one-to-one conversation practice session a week.

Here’s the time I’ve put in this year to the end of June (all the Skype lessons were 30 minutes each).

January 2020: 30 mins study; three Skype lessons = 2 hours
February 2020: 15 min study: five Skype lessons = 2 hours, 45 min
March 2020: 30 mins study; six Skype lessons = 4 hours
April 2020: 9 hours study; 11 Skype lessons = 14 hours, 30 min
May 2020: 8 hours, 20 mins study; 6 Skype lessons = 10 hours, 50 mins
June 2020: 4 hours, 50 mins study; 4 Skype lessons = 5 hours, 50 mins

Total for first half of 2020: 49 hours, 44 mins (excludes informal listening and reading practice, on which there’s more below).

Due to the COVID-19 crisis, I’ve been working from home since mid March.

Losing my commute means I’ve gained two hours a day and a whole lot of energy. As a result, in these figures you’ll see a marked increase the time I’ve been putting in at the Basque.

Vlogging in Basque in Asia

I was on the road in Asia for all of October last year and, en route, I took the impromptu decision to do some vlogs on the trip in Russian, German, Welsh and Basque.

There were nine vlogs in Basque in all.

I short the first one on humid sunny day in Singapore.:

The last one, after a week in Hong Kong, was shot in Tokyo’s famous Ueno park, where I was caught by a torrential downpour:

My Basque is pretty ropey in the vids, but I found the project a helpful way to keep me using the language.

At the same time, I was making a video record of a trip that it gives me great pleasure to look back on.

How about keeping some sort of diary of your life in your language? It could be in writing, short audio recordings on your phone or making a video. You don’t have to post to social media….

The power of community in my Basque learning

I’ve been in London’s Basque Society since 2013.

It’s provided a good way to meet native speakers and to use the language naturally several times a year.

Since I got back from Japan, I’ve only attended one London Basque Society Event. That was the Christmas meal (with dancing).

I’ve been in the Society since I started learning. I spoke a lot of Basque at the event and noticed some improvement in my fluency since I’d last met up with other members, several months earlier.

Are you using the power of community in your language learning? It could be physical meetups with native speakers or other learners, participation in an online forum or using the language with neighbours, relatives or friends.

One-to-one online conversation and my intermediate Basque learning materials

There are never many Basque teachers on italki. They were down to two at one point, but currently there are four.

I’ve been working with Irati since January 2019.

Very often, the whole of our lessons together end up as free conversation.

Other days, there’s time to work with the materials (pdfs) created by the HABE Institute for the teaching of Basque and Basque Language Literacy to Adults.

I have these from my days attending group face-to-face language classes arranged by the London Basque Society. This year, we’ve worked on Units 39 to 41.

Bakarka is a pretty traditional grammar/ exercises/ reading/ translation – based self-study course. I worked through Book 1 several years ago to consolidate the work with the HABE materials. I haven’t used Books 2 and 3.

In September 2018 I started on Bakarka Book 4. There’s no audio at this level but the grammar explanations, practice exercises and reading are very helpful for controlled practice of Basque’s rather complex verb forms and the extensive tense system.

At the end of last year I’d nearly finished Unit 5 (of nine) and by the end of this June is was halfway through Unit 7 (of nine).

I’ve mostly used the course for extra practice during my self-study sessions.

Also, I sometimes used to do Bakarka 4 exercises verbally with one of my former teachers, Eider.

It wasn’t a particularly effective use of time with a teacher but she wasn’t very talkative and conversation would often dry up after fifteen minutes or so.

When Eider dropped off italki in the middle of August 2019, I started with a new teacher who’d appeared: Gari.

It was very enjoyable to have lessons with him between summer last year and early June.

In addition to free conversation, I sometimes sent him copies of earlier units of the HABE course to provide some conversation topics (and consolidation for me: I’d already covered these units with Irati or one of my earlier teachers).

Gari is now available much less on the platform but several new teachers have appeared. In the middle of June I had my first session with Rodrigo in early July and I’ve had another since.

He only offers one hour slots. I used to have one-hour slots when I was working intensively on my advanced German and Russian but I felt a bit daunted about a full hour in my lower-intermediate Basque.

I’ve found, though, that the time with Rodrigo has passed quickly both tines.

In the first session, it helped that he was very chatty and we had Russia in common. We’ve both lived there and learned the language.

In the second lesson we did more free conversation and I .pdf-ed a couple of pages of Arian B2.1 over to him too, to provide some additional material to discuss.

Arian is one of the best-known courses published in the Basque Country.

There are two course books for each CEFRL level, along with work books and CDs for each level. The only level I have is B2.1, which I started Sept 18. I haven’t previously used it with any of my teachers.

I’m working through the course book in order and enjoying the reading material and associated exercises (the topics are genuinely engaging).I’m using the audio for dictation practice again.

By the end of June, I’d finished Unit 4 of 12 in the course book. This year, I’ve also started the workbook. I’m still in the first of the four (quite long) units.

Don’t reinvent the wheel! Make full use of a few key learner courses at YOUR level, whether in textbook or on-line course format.

Get lots of one-to-one conversation practice with a teacher. Online wins for convenience. Use several teachers. It makes for variety and means you’re not left high and dry if one of them isn’t available any more.

Listening practice

Since the beginning of the lockdown, I’ve been disciplined about scheduling in regular exercise. I’ve done a thirty minute run or a fifty minute walk round the local park most days.

Before the lockdown, I’d do that run two or three times a week and walk to the underground and back during the three days a week I was in the office (2 x 12 minute walk).

I was using that time to listen to my Pimsleur Japanese audio course. During the lockdown, I’ve been listening to native Basque radio news programmes instead. So I’ve been getting at least thirty-minutes a day listening practice.

While there’s still a lot I can’t understand, I can now follow enough of the content to have a sense of the substance of a report or discussion.

I also often have enough knowledge of the language to work out the meaning of words and “acquire” some of them naturally from native content of this type.

In addition to a daily does of high-quality audio, I watched twenty minutes or so of the evening Basque TV news two or three times a week. That’s one of the three news broadcasts a day available on the Basque TV web player.

In some ways, “news vocabulary” is easier because it’s very standard and can get repetitive.

Luckily, there’s a host of other TV material on the EITB site and it’s important to listen to different linguistic registers.

I’ve also started to watch a thriller series from the 90s called “Balbemendi”. There are 27 one-hour episodes. I’m still on episode two but have been enjoying it so far. It’s conversational dialogue.

I’ve also recently discovered a one-hour daily current affairs programme called “Eztabaidan” (In conversation) which includes reports and panel discussion all on one current topic. It gives me exposure to a wider range of registers than the pure news programmes.

Get lots and lots of listening practice. “Comprehensible input” is best: just at or above your current level, to consolidate what you already know and to help you “acquire” the language sub-consciously from context.

Reading Harry Potter

I’ve had a Basque copy of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone on my shelves for a couple of years (as you may know if you’re a long-term viewer of my vids on YouTube):

I only started reading the book this spring. I’m now over half way through.

Though I know a lot about the story I haven’t read the book or watched the film in any other language.

There’s a lot I don’t understand, but I can get enough to follow the general course of the story and build a mental picture of Hogwarts and events unfolding. I’d say it feels a bit like looking through an un-evenly tinted window (more opaque in some places than others!).

Reading is a great way to reinforce your knowledge of language patterns and to expand your vocab. Presssed for time? A paragraph a day is much better than nothing. What are you reading at the moment in your target language?

Reaping the rewards of long-term language learning

This spring and summer I’ve really felt a shift in gear with my intermediate Basque. I have a sense of things coming together at last. It’s getting easier to understand native speech and to read native materials. My spoken language, though still limited, feels more fluent. I can say quite a lot of what I want and I”m now at a stage where I can usually talk round bits I can’t say.

The moral: Keep at it with focussed study, speaking and listening practice. It may not all be dramatic but you WILL see results, even if it takes longer than you might have hoped!

Are you learning Basque? How’s it going? Are your experiences similar to mine? Are you doing things differently? Let me know in the comments below!

The post Intermediate Basque: learner update appeared first on How to get fluent, with Dr Popkins.

Throughout the series, I’ve drawn heavily on my own experience as a learner of Welsh and Basque but I’m talking to you, dear minority language learner or would-be learner, whatever the lingo!

In the first post, Minority language resources: a guide, I introduced the term “minoritised language”. That conveys the sense of a language deliberately pushed to the margins by a more powerful group. We looked at the range of materials that might be available to help you learn (and what to do if there aren’t very many).

Article two was all about how to find minority language native speakers.

Next came the question of how to cope with dialect differences in less standardised languages.

In the most recent post in this series, we saw that native-speaker attitudes towards their language and learners can be rather complex.

Some native speakers may be initially puzzled as to why you’re learning their language. True, members of some language groups may not be used to dealing with learners. Yet most will be very encouraging of your efforts if they see that you’re sincere and committed in your desire to learn and use their language.

After all, learning their language is a huge compliment to pay your hosts.

A unique connection with the people

The power of that compliment is a great start in the process of connecting with speakers or any language.

Human connection, after all, is a powerful driver and reward for learning any language.

When there are fewer obvious utilitarian benefits, your investment may be seen as even more of a sincere compliment. That can get you off on a very good footing in your new community of speakers.

By the way, it would be a mistake to think that smaller language communities are necessarily more closed to outsiders than larger ones.

Au contraire!

If a community of speakers have been labelled as different and have experienced marginalisation, they can be more tolerant of diversity and appreciative of the complexities and fluidity of identity.

Is it an accident that many of the more Welsh-speaking parts of Wales voted against Brexit while many areas where the language is much weaker voted remain?

The Basque even have a concept: “Euskaldun” which means Basque speaking, whether or not you’re a native. It’s an inclusive identity, open to you too, if you learn the language, wherever you’re from.

In Wales at the moment, the British state provides financial support to refugees migrants who arrive in Wales to learn English. It refuses to offer Welsh lessons on the same terms. Nevertheless, some migrants have been learning the language and feel that this is helping them integrate. For many Welsh people, their efforts are something to celebrate.

Wales’s home grown anti-Welsh dinosaurs often decry Welsh as a useless dead language while at the same time moaning that Wales is controlled by a privileged elite of Welsh speakers who grab all the best jobs. They’d do better to stop complaining and get learning. If this is an exclusive club, it’s one that’s open to all who make the effort.

The chance to make a cultural contribution

Once you get fluent in a minoritised language, you might well find that it’s “all hands on deck” to help protect and revive use of the language. Whether a language community feels under siege or is in the middle of a vibrant process of revitalisation, every contribution to the culture is likely to be really appreciated and there will be a chance for you to get involved directly.

In Wales, a surprising number of teachers of the language to adults are themselves former learners.

When I was a beginner Welsh learner, I did an intensive summer course that had been established and was run by Chris Rees, a Welsh learner who’d become an innovative teacher.

He taught our group for a week. Another week, our teacher was Helen Prosser, another learner from Wales who, thirty years later, is still in the field is the Strategic Director of the National Centre for Learning Welsh.

Learners often go on to play a significant role in culture, too. In Wales, Professor Bobi Jones was a Welsh learner who became Professor of Welsh in Aberystwyth and was leading novelist, poet and literary critic. Later leading Welsh writers include Tony Bianchi, a learner from north-east England. Others are the cultural critic Jerry Hunter (an American), the historian Marion Löffler (a German) or the art historian Peter Lord (English).

Unexpected career benefits

Minority languages will often open more career doors than you might expect.

Whatever language you learn, your chances will be increased if you combine it with another marketable skill. When I was looking for my first post as university lecturer (assistant professor) in Russian history, the stars aligned and I netted a job to teach the subject through the medium of Welsh in Aberystwyth.

There were only a handful of people in Wales who were fluent Welsh speakers and Russia specialists and I soon found that this combination of skills brought side opportunities commentating on current events in Russia on Welsh radio and television. I was even flown to Latvia to translate from Russian to Welsh for a BBC current affairs show crew and was interviewed myself on their programme.

Linking up with the landscape

The extra connection you get from learning the language may not just be with the people but with the geography.

In Wales and the Basque Country, most names of natural features such as hills, rivers and field and place names are in Welsh or Basque (sometimes there are two names: English or Spanish as well). In Ireland or much of Scotland, many places have an Irish or Scottish Gaelic names.

At the most basic level, as a learner of the minority language you’ll be able to have a good shot at pronouncing the names correctly and understand where the often now more widely-known heavily Anglicised versions come from.

When I was on an intensive Basque course a few summers ago, one of the other students explained to me that the beauty of Basque place names had been one of his reasons for learning the language.

In Wales, place names often turn out to be rather prosaic geographical descriptions but they can also be colourful and evocative. Open that book with the language and you’ll have an immediate connection to the landscape.

Power play insights….and passion for the cause?

Learning any additional language opens your eyes to a new dimension of human culture. That’s just as true when you learn one of the Celtic languages of Britain and Ireland or one of the minority language of the Russian Federation as when you learn English or Russian. You discover a world that the majority media is probably misrepresenting at best, ignoring at worst (or is that the other way round?).

It’s not just the a new culture you’ll learn about. You’ll get insights into the dynamics of political, social and economic power as played out through language.

You’ll see how the playing field is anything but level when one language is constantly pushed by the state as the main language of serious affairs and communities and individuals who prefer to speak the other language, still tax-payers all, are “othered”. They’re supposed to feel grateful for crumbs of subsidy or even just for being tolerated (“I’ve nothing against people speaking Welsh but I object to [fill in any practical attempts to make a real difference]”).

You’ll feel the forces working to subordinate and marginalise, to keep speakers of your new language firmly in second place.

You might suffer consequences if you try to challenge norms around when it’s conventional to use the language. It still happens in Wales that people who try to use Welsh in work are subject to attempts by employers to ban it, here, for example, or here or here….

You’ll start to notice relentless narratives of ridicule from the dominant group (including supposedly progressive, internationalist public figures such as the fashionable lefties who routinely have a go at Welsh speakers).

How, you may wonder, is this a “benefit” of learning a minoritised language?

For one thing, the insights will increase your empathy with other marginalised social groups. You’ll maybe become a more enlightened individual.

You may even find yourself feeling ever more strongly about the “cause” of your language, which might just give a new drive to your life.

Just as many learners wind up as teachers, learners often end up getting involved in wider language campaigns to “save” the language.

Whether you feel that and take action…or not…the individual act of learning helps maintain diversity in a small way.

There may be a ripple effect too from your individual example. You’re saying “Yes! This is worth learning and it can be done!”. Who knows whom that might inspire.

Recover your heritage

Learning any language broadens your view on life but it you’re relearning the language of your ancestors, it’s also about a very personal identity.

Maybe your forebears didn’t pass on their minoritised language because of fear of persecution. Had the language had become a mark of lower social status that they thought would hold their children back?

If the language has been been lost as part of such a sad picture of marginalisation recovering it can become even more of a mission than ever.

I think for example of inspiring learners I’ve met such as Jonty Yamisha from the USA. He hasn’t stopped at learning Circassian, the language of his ancestors from the north west Caucasus. He’s gone on to create the Optilingo language learning app. The platform offers Circassian on a level with much more widely spoken languages. It’s not only a practical contribution to language revival but a great boost to the international visibility and, therefore, self-image of the Circassian people.

I first met Àdhamh Ó Broin at a language meet up in Edinburgh. He has not only learned his ancestral Scottish Gaelic to an advanced level. He focussed first on the barely surviving Argyll dialect. By day, he’s a Gaelic teacher and translator and a consultant on Gaelic in TV and film dramas. By night, he’s researched and “reawakened” lost Caithness dialects of the language that was once spoken by another branch of his family.

Your recovery of your family heritage may not take you to such heights, yet very many of us “rank and file” learners of our lost family heritage still experience the recovery as a very fulfilling and quite emotional transformation.

____________________________

Why learn a minority language? What’s your motivation?

If you haven’t yet started learning a minority language but are thinking of having a go, I hope that this series has helped to prepare you for the journey ahead. If you still have questions, drop them in the comments below.

Learning any language is hugely enriching. There’s no doubt, though, that if learning a minority language you’ll have an extra special experience with additional rewards. That, at least, is how it’s been for me. What about you? Have you started learning a minority language or already got fluent? What’s been your motivation? If you’ve learned majority languages as well, how did the experience….and the rewards differ? Let us all know!

Related posts

Minority language recourses: a guide

How to find minority language native speakers

Minority language dialects: a challenge for learners?

Learning minority languages: overcoming negative attitudes

The post Why learn a minority language? appeared first on How to get fluent, with Dr Popkins.

What is linguistic standardisation?

A language, they say, is a dialect with an army and a navy. In other words, at some point in history, the guy with the biggest stick has often imposed and promoted his dialect and everybody within a territory accepts that as the “standard” form of the language.

The standardisation process often takes place in stages over several centuries.

The dialect of a particular area may become regarded as the most desirable in a relatively informal way, as, from the fifteenth, with the English spoken in the Oxford-Cambridge-London triangle. In the seventeenth century the Académie Française started publishing its famous French dictionary which contributed so much to the standardisation of French. Luther’s German bible helped to cement a standard literary form. Pushkin’s language is often said to have done something similar for Russian.

In many states, the process really got going big time among the wider population in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries with the advent of universal compulsory education which aggressively promoted a standard form of the “national language” to whole populations. Mass literacy enabled the development of a popular mass print media and people got used to understanding the standard form to discuss a wide range of fields. In the twentieth century broadcasting intensified the spread of standard forms.

These changes were often intertwined with linguistic modernisation, for example introducing new terms to cover areas such as science and technology. There were sometimes thoroughgoing official drives to “purify” the language of foreign influences (as seen for example Czech or Turkish where German or Arabic words were replaced with new “native” coinages).

Standardisation is never complete. In Germany or Italy, for example, local dialects such as Swabian or Saxon, Neapolitan or Venetian have often remained strong. In China as well there is still huge dialectical diversity within Mandarin (plus completely different Chinese languages, often – confusingly – referred to as “dialects”).

Even if local varieties decline, new varieties can emerge, such forms of English that have developed among ethnic minority communities. Many modern societies have youth subcultures with their own slang or non-standard forms.

Still, regardless of such diversity, as a potential German, Italian, Mandarin or English learner, you have a clear steer as to what, exactly, you’re trying to learn. With Portuguese for example, the only question you’ll face will be whether to focus on Brazilian or European “standard” versions of Portuguese (or both).

With majority languages, learner materials will usually be in the standard form, even if they try to reflect different registers.

You can expect knowledge of the form to be widespread and its use expected.

If you’re learning a less standardised “lesser used” minority or indigenous language, though, things could be a bit more complicated.

Different degrees of standardisation

In the case of lesser used or endangered languages, this standardisation may have happened only partially or not at all. After all, by definition, the language has not managed to become established as the dominant official language of a state, with all the advantages for its use that this implies.

Let’s look at a few examples of what you might find along what we could call the spectrum of standardisation.

Welsh has been a written literary language. Standard form captured in the 1588 translation of the Bible and explosion in Welsh publishing in the eighteenth and nineteenth century. Towards the end of the eighteenth century, Wales had (in Welsh) the highest levels of popular literacy anywhere in the world at that time, thanks to the work of the non-conformist Christian sects. Secular use of the standard literary language widened in the nineteenth century and twentieth century with a mass print media. In the twentieth century (especially in the second half) some use of the language in radio and television also helped as did some use of the language in the education system, especially the growth of Welsh-medium schooling.

In Brittany, in contrast, there were never such standardising forces and the language remained more an expression of local, village identity. Standardisation was a more marginal project of intellectuals and the French state was (and remains) pretty hostile.

In contrast to Welsh or, still more, Breton, other European standardisation attempts had spectacular success because the political stars aligned for a push to introduce mass education in the language before linguistic shift in favour the previously dominant language. Czech became the dominant language in the Czech lands despite German’s previously more privileged position. In Finland, Finnish triumphed over Swedish, Icelandic managed the same over Danish, Slovaks did it despite Hungarian and German and standard forms of Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian triumphed in the Baltic states despite Russian’s previous superior status.

In Ireland, Wales, Brittany, most speakers have have already mastered the official lingua franca before the “native” languages made much headway in the education system and English or French which opens wider doors and were hugely prestigious and powerful, conferring social status, economic advantage and, later, access to new mass entertainment, including very attractive youth subcultures.

Irish standardisation was promoted by the Irish Free State beginning in the 1920s but, again, only after English was firmly established as the main spoken language of the mass of the population.

Standardisation has also come late to Basque. There are five historic dialects but in the “Euskara Batua” (Unified Basque) was developed in the 1970s. Basque was still strong on the ground in some areas but a wide knowledge of Spanish or French was already firmly established.

In the Basque Autonomous Region, the standardised form has been much more energetically promoted than Welsh in Wales or Irish in the Republic of Ireland (in Northern Ireland, the Irish language is still dramatically discriminated against and current attempt to change that are vigorously resisted by some Unionist knuckle-draggers).

In comparison with Welsh or Irish, standard Basque is much more used in administration, education (at all levels) within the Basque Autonomous Region and the language is also more used in the press and broadcasting (both accessible throughout the Basque Country). There’s wide popular acceptance of the new standard for but it has not displaced local spoken in daily use (outside official contexts)

Some languages may not have a standard form at all but clearly demarcated dialects, for example Dakota.

As you inform yourself, it may turn out that your new language is actually several. Sámi (Lapp), for example, spoken in an arc across northern Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia is often referred to as one language but is actually (depending on classification) at least ten related languages. Apache is another example of a blanket name for several separate (though closely related languages). In New Zealand, Maori has dialects but the differences are not great and they are easily mutually-intelligible.

It’s best find out the story of the standardisation of your language early, before you start acquiring materials or even learning a version that for your needs, turns out to be the wrong one!

Inform yourself about variety within your language

How do you find out? Read up about the situation regarding your target language.

Talk to teachers and other learners as much as you can.

In any case, you’re going to want to get talking to native speakers as much as you can but remember that native speakers aren’t always reliable witnesses. The extent of the differences between dialects can become exaggerated in their imaginations because they are not used to using the language with people from other parts of the country. Their subjective beliefs are themselves an important element of the picture, of course, but they could probably often make themselves understood from context or by paraphrasing if they really had to. The point is, though, that English (or French or whatever the dominant lingo is) is an available, more prestigious and more appropriate for use with strangers even from their own linguistic group.

Be aware too that those out to denigrate minority languages often take great delight in stressing (or exaggerating) dialectical differences within the minority community, in order to promote the majority language. They may even be unaware that their own dominant language has gone through a standardisation process itself and just assume that it is inherently superior.

Availability and choice of materials and different versions of your minority language

The materials available may influence your choice of what form to learn.

You certainly need to be aware of the range that there may be out there before you choose a textbook.

In my experience of Welsh, it’s only older textbooks (1950s or before) that teach “high” standard literary Welsh. Modern courses (print, online, classes) teach a more colloquial register. There was even an attempt to promote a simplified new standard for learners more closely modelled on the spoken language, though this is now

Teaching materials also try to teach the differences between regions of Wales.

The Welsh Joint Education Committee produces a “South Wales” and a “North Wales” version of its standard textbook series (Cwrs Mynediad, Cwrs Sylfaen and Cwrs Canolradd), for example. This north/south division is somewhat arbitrary (as it ignores varieties within “the North” and “the South”. In the Welsh case, to repeat, the differences aren’t that great in any case.

In Basque, the Bakarka textbook series that I use is available with Spanish or French as the language of instruction and there are orthographic and vocabulary differences to reflect some usage differences between the northern Basque Country (the provinces in the French state) and the south (the provinces within the Spanish state). The grammar is Batua, though. The Assimil Basque course teaches Batua but has some detail of common alternatives found in the French provinces.

Alan King’s The Basque Language and Alan King and Begotxu Olaizola Elordi’s Colloquial Basque both introduce some of the dialectical varieties of the language).

When I attended a Basque residential course at the Maizpide school in Lazkao, Batua was taught but they did include the second person singular forms ( known as “hika”). These exist in standard Batua but are not commonly used in the standard language and in many dialects. They are however used in the language as it’s spoken by the large native-speaker population in the area where the school is situated.

Why are you learning? Who do you want to speak with?

As yourself why you are learning a minority, lessor-used or indigenous language.

In particular, if you already know people you want to use the language with, it makes a lot of sense to learn their version of the language. In areas where Basque is strong, learners often learn the official standard form but try get used the more colloquial spoken version (often called the “street” version) used in their locality in less official contexts, as well.

Enjoy the diversity….enriching not frustrating!

If your materials, classes are only available in a different form from the one you want to learn, don’t panic. Talk to your teacher and other learners.

Dialectical differences notwithstanding, there will still probably be a very great deal of overlap.

Ask native speakers whether they’d say something as presented in your textbook.

Rather than regarding varieties of the language as a frustrating complication, you can ask them to point out the differences and use such interactions as a talking point, a way to get active with the language and start noticing its richness and variety.

In short: learn about the differences and be aware of what forms are presented in potential materials be aware of what form of languages materials. Think about what you are learning the language for.

If you want to speak, make sure you are learning as much as possible what’s spoken by the people you actually want to speak.

It doesn’t mean you can learn other registers as well…and you’ll probably find the minority language dialects and other differences aren’t as insurmountable as you might be led to believe.

Related posts

Minority language recourses: a guide

How to find minority language native speakers

Learning minority languages: overcoming negative attitudes

Why learn a minority language?

The post Minority language dialects: a challenge for learners? appeared first on How to get fluent, with Dr Popkins.

If you’re a regular reader, you’ll know that I’m nearly seven months into a project to learn basic Japanese in advance of my first visit to the country in the second half of October.

I’ve been aiming to study 30 minutes a day seven days a week. When I last reported back at the end of month six, I’d clocked up 115 hours 30 minutes.

I began learning Basque in 2013 and have continued ever since at varying levels of intensity. My most intense period was summer 2016, when I spent a month at the Maizpide residential school in the Spanish Basque Country and blogged and vlogged the experience. I last increased my efforts with Basque in August last year, in preparation for an appearance on a Basque TV show.

Summer language sprint study schedule

My plan is to modify my Japanese schedule for the next four weeks, beginning tomorrow. My target is 60 minutes a day of Japanese Monday to Friday (a total of five hours a week instead of three and a half ). That’s a new minimum. I’ll do more when I can.

In addition, I’m aiming to put in an hour of Basque on weekdays, too. I’ve been learning Basque for several years and am now at a solid intermediate level.

I’ll be taking a complete break from active study on the weekends (though may well do get some audio exposure and sometimes I may catch up on the weekend if I’ve fallen behind during the week).

I can change up a gear because I’ve just started my annual one-month sabbatical from the office. I’ll be dividing the time between my own language learning (mornings) and creating content for you here on Howtogetfluent and the channel (afternoons).

Japanese study plan

With Japanese, I’ll be continuing to organise my studies round the Japanese from Zero textbook series.

As well as continuing to press ahead, I’ll be giving over a lot of time to flash-carding words and phrases that I’ve covered so far in the first two volumes.

I’ll also continue to use the Pimsleur audio course and dip in and out of the Assimil textbook that’s my secondary back up.

The other thing I’d like to do with Japanese is to start to get more passive audio input, at least fifteen minutes a day on weekdays (over and above the ninety minute active study target).

That could be a podcast or YouTube video. I’ve found one or two native-level vlogs which look fun. Of course, I can’t understand much, but it helps tune my ear and get used to native-level speeds. If you have suggestions of good things to listen to, please let me know. Either things aimed at learners or short, native level material (vlog format is good because the pictures and action help).

At the end of the summer spring, we’ll be in the middle of August and there will be just two months left to my trip.

My aim is to get myself as much into form as possible to start speaking at the end of the four weeks. After the end of the sprint (19th August), I’ll try having one-to-one conversation sessions with a teacher on Skype. I will record myself in action with a teacher at the end of the month.

This interim goal is why I’m putting effort on deliberate spaced recall practice (flashcarding) and listening practice (it’s easy to forget that listening skills are half of any conversation).

As I see things now, one-to-one conversation practice will be an integral part of the final stage of my linguistic preparations for the trip. In that stage, I’ll revert to my normal thirty minutes a day, seven days-a-week Japanese schedule.

Basque January to June 2019 update

My last update on Basque was way back in December.

Since then, I’ve continued to keep my active work on the language ticking over “one the side” while I focus on Japanese. I’ve been taking thirty-minute one-to-one Basque lessons with teachers.

Most of the self-study I’ve done has been preparation for those lessons.

As always, I log the focussed work I put in to my language learning. I find it helps with motivation and a feeling of achievement (or at least, it helps me to remember that no, I haven’t just been fritting away time).

Here, then, is a Basque update:

January: self-study – six hours 10 minutes. Three lessons with Irati, three with Eider. Total: 9 hours
February: self-study – five hours, 35 minutes. Three lessons with Irati, thiree with Eider. Total: 8 hours, thirty-five minutes.
March: self-study – thirty minutes. Two lessons with Irati, two lessons with Eider. Total: 2 hours 30 minutes.
April: self-study – two hours, thirty minutes. One lesson with Irati, three lessons with Eider. Total: 4 hours, thirty minutes.
May: self-study – three hours. One lesson with Irati and two lessons with Eider. Total: 4 hours, thirty minutes.
June: self-study – thirty minutes. Two lessons with Irati, two lessons with Eider. Total: 2 hours thirty minutes.

Total for first half of 2019: nineteen hours, 35 minutes

July to date: self-study – one hour thirty minutes, Two lessons with Irati, two lessons with Eider.

I have only attended one event with the London Basque Society so far this year. That was their mini version of the “korrika”.

The korrika is run every two years (round the clock) over ten days. Each time, it snakes through the towns and villages of the Basque country by a different route. I’ve taken part myself twice (before I started learning the language).

I vlogged the London event (and it was a chance to practice the language once again).

In addition to the lessons and study, I continue to listen to native level Basque talk radio.

I listen to at least fifteen minutes while I’m getting up and showering. This happens nearly every morning, including when I’m away from home.

I used to listen to the Basque radio during my twice or thrice-weekly thirty minute jogs round the park as well. Since the spring, though, I’ve been listening to Pimsleur Japanese on the runs. Trade-offs, trade-offs.

At this point there’s lots to celebrate with my Basque. I’m understanding more and more. I can follow the gist of native level radio and follow the plot in novels, even if there are quite a few words I still won’t get. Lessons tend to go well.

However, I still haven’t covered all the complex forms of the Basque verb (conditionals still weak and I haven’t looked at the subjunctive at all). I can’t use all the short forms I’ve learned, even though I may recognise them passively. Yet my main weakness, I’d say, is my limited vocab.

Basque study plan

For Basque I’ll be doing three things:

Continuing to work with my current textbook Bakarka 4 with Eider (this is course that puts a lot of emphasis on practising grammatical structures. It uses a limited vocabulary and is not at all “conversational”. A dialogue free zone.

Working with Irati on the Habe materials. These materials – lessons in .pdf form – are a bit quirky but cover a wide range of situational topics (and vocab).

For next week, I’m also trialling an additional teacher on italki (as Irati’s availability is limited). With him, I’ll probably work on a Habe unit that I haven’t done with Irati.

I’ll be working on my own with the excellent Arian B2.1 course as well.

To tackle the vocab problem I’ll be doing deliberate vocabulary building using the Gold List Method. I’ll extract the phrases for gold listing from Habe and from the Arian B2.1 book.

My expectation is that the vocab work will feedback into a positive loop with my conversational and listening/reading practice (I read a few pages of native-level novels now and again).

Weekly updates

I’ll be keeping a diary of my efforts, which will appear weekly here on the site. There’ll also be a weekly catch-up vlog on my progress with some Basque (and, who knows, maybe a bit of Japanese…).

A wasted opportunity to travel?

You have a month off work and you’re staying at home?

With a whole free month ahead, some readers may wonder why I haven’t headed off for the Basque country or gone travelling elsewhere.

I did toy with the idea of finding an Airbnb for a month’s relocation to Moscow, Berlin or Vienna.

My answer is first, London’s great in summer.

Second, if you have serious work to do, travel can be a massive disruption and drain on energy. More efficient to stay here. Plus, and this ties in with the first point, I’ll have more time to catch up with friends and relatives here at home.

That brings me to the third point. I’ve already done quite a lot travelling this year. There’s a big trip coming up in the autumn (a full month away, beginning only five weeks after the end of the sabbatical).

Don’t get me wrong, I love travel. That said, aside from the environmental impact and cost, I do find the manic travel schedules of some of my millennial language learning friends excessive. They’re exhausting just to read about. Maybe it’s an age thing.

Over to you?

The timing may not be right for you, but if you’d like to start a mini project along with me, head over to the Howtogetfluent Facebook group and let us know what it is.

The post Two language tango: a new four-week learning sprint (Basque/Japanese update) appeared first on How to get fluent, with Dr Popkins.

Regular readers will know that I’ve been learning Basque for several years and am a lower intermediate level speaker. It’s unique langauge – an “isolate” related to no other (rather like Japanese or Korean).

It’s spoken by 700,000 people in the Basque Country which straddles the western end of the Pyrenees and the adjacent coastline.

The Basque Country isn’t independent (yet). Four of the seven historic provinces are in the Spanish state and have limited self-government (three form the Basque Autonomous Region (centred on Bilboa, Donosia or San Sebastián and Gasteiz or Vittoria, the fourth is Navarre (Iruña/Pamplona). The “northern” three are the western half of the French “Pyrénées-Atlantiques” department (well-known locations include Miarritz/Biarritz and Baiona/Bayonne).

Getting ready in the morning and some last-minute nerves

The morning started with a run in the park, with Basque Radio playing through the headphones.

I’d deliberately not booked a lesson on Skype. The intention was to leave things to “settle” and to let my head clear, rather in the way I do before an exam. In the end, though, I rehearsed my anticipated topics a couple of times in the morning.

I was also checking I had all the ingredients ready to make Welsh cakes.

Then I tidying the place up a bit.

I have to admit I was not feeling enthusiastic about the upcoming afternoon. I just didn’t feel that my Basque was good enough. Maybe I’d have pulled out if I could.

This is quite a typical pattern for me. I am getting better at standing “outside myself” and recognising how I fee for what it is.

Over to the Tower of London to meet the presenter and crew

I left the house at shortly after three in the afternoon, armed with my vlogging camera and phone. I’d decided to vlog the afternoon. No surprises there.

I met presenter Pello Reparaz and the film crew by Tower Pier on the north bank of the Thames, in the shadow of the Tower of London .

Pello is a musician from the northern (most Basque) part of Navarre province (one of the seven traditional Basque provinces and a semi-autonomous region within the Spanish state. He has a group called Vendetta.

With Pello were a crew of four. The director (who also did some filming), two cameramen and Joseba, the producer.

They were all very friendly and explained more about the programme, “Euskalonski”, while mic-ing me up.

Passing the Palace of Westminster by boat (with Pello Reparaz, musician and presenter of “Euskalonski”

Filming on the river bank and atop a riverboat

Filming started with brief exchange between Pello and me on the river bank. I explained where we were, pointing out the Tower, Tower Bridge (telling the audience that it was fifty years old, when I meant one-hundred and fifty) and the ovoid City Hall on the South Bank. I pointed out Westminster and the “London Eye” big wheel in the in the distance and explained that London, historically, was two separate cities.

Pello asked some questions about my background, my mixed English/Welsh identity and how I came to learn Welsh.

We then got on a tourist cruise boat and filmed a bit more conversation on the open top deck.

It had been my suggestion to film from the boat and it certainly provided some great footage of the sights. It was a pity it was a very overcast day, but at least it wasn’t raining.

I felt quite tense and nervous. In part, that’s my default setting. Added to that there was also a bit of performance anxiety about the language and uncertainty about the finer details of what they wanted me to do. Also, it turned out that we weren’t supposed to be filming on the boat, as an officious employee delighted in telling us.

I was more relaxed once we got off the boat on the north bank at Westminster by the Boudica statue.

We filmed Pello singing the Sex Pistols’ “God save the Queen” (!) by the steps with me standing by listning (they had wanted me to sing but I drew the line there).

There’s a musical theme to the whole series with several of the other interviewees whom Pello met singing or playing instruments and Pello himself paying a synth at various points around the town.

An anthem at the foot of the statue of the ancient British (i.e. Welsh) Queen Boudica, Westminster

Down to Brixton

It was about 7.30 when we arrived in Brixton by tube, after a bit more filming underground en route (none of which made it into the programme).

It was interesting for them to see a bit Brixton on the walk from the tube to my house. It’s not a touristy place but very full on with lots of sights, sounds and smells (buskers, incense sellers, various market stalls,lots and lots of people).

Given the musical strand to the programme, I missed a trick in not taking them to see (and film) the David Bowie mural just over the road from the underground station exit (Bowie was born in Brixton). Also, I should have explained better about the connection between Eddie Grant’s song Electric Avenue and the run-down market street by the same name in the centre of Brixton (the first market street in Britain to be lit by electric light).

End of the line: Brixton tube station

In the dining room at my place, they filmed Pello and me talking a bit more. On my mantelpiece I have a chip of wood I picked up from the ground as a souvenir in Pamplona in 2013 when I was there for the San Fermin festival and also watched a traditional Basque aizolariak (wood cutters) competition. That was a talking point (didn’t make the cut) Another topic of conversation was my reproduction Soviet poster (which did). My interest in Russian and languages provided a way into talking briefly about language blogging and vlogging to camera a little about my language learning and the vlog.

Interviews for Dr Popkins’ Howtogetfluent YouTube channel

Then the crew got set up in the garden and filmed me filming an interview with Pello for the vlog.

We did a two-and-a-half minute piece in Basque, an extract of which appeared in the show. In that we’re talking about Pello’s linguistic background as a native Basque speaker and whether it’s worth us foreigners learning the language. A short clip of this appeared in the show (and in my own vlog of the afternoon and evening). If you’d like to hear some more Basque, look out for it on the YouTube channel on Tuesday.

Then we recorded a nine-minute conversation in English specially for my YouTube channel (not used in the TV programme). This was the first and only part of the day where we weren’t speaking Basque. I covered some of the same ground as in the Basque interview, but I also wanted to find out more about Pello’s experience as an English learner and learn about his music and TV projects. The interview will be out on the channel on Thursday.

Making Welsh cakes

Next, I set to making the Welsh cakes with one of the cameramen in attendance. My kitchen gets is a bit small for more than two people, especially two guys wielding cameras. We decided that Pello should watching through the window.

In the week before the shoot, I’d practised backing the cakes twice, the second time up in Yorkshire under my father’s expert eye. They turned out ok (though a couple were rather burnt, some people like them that way)

We had the Welsh cakes, tea and Welsh whisky at my garden table. First Pello and I (for the shoot), then the rest of the team as well.

They left at about 9.45. I was pretty tired and so were the crew. It was their second full day of filming (of three) here in London. It sounded like they’re working in all the cities on the show in short succession. The Paris show went out as the first episode (with London as episode two). Berlin is coming up next. Then there are programmes from Warsaw, Rome, New York….

Welsh cakes in the making

Gero arte! With the crew at the end of the evening

Watching the show: my impressions of the show

Exactly two weeks on from filming day, I settled down in the living room here at Howtogetfluent Towers to watch the London episode live on the EITB website.

The whole show was very enjoyable, with a range of guests. These included a ballet dancer who works at the Royal Ballet, a Basque chef, a Pakistani family whose younger members spoke native-level Basque. The other learner was Daffyd, a US citizen with Welsh/Indian/Australian roots whom I met a few years ago at a London Basque event. Like me, he talked about his linguistic identity and learning Basque and (in his case) his father’s native Hindi. He also played the drums with Pello.

I really liked the way they split my contribution in two. After the introduction, our shoot at Tower and on the boat, was the first segment of the show, about two minutes in. Then, forty-nine minutes in, footage from here in Brixton was the penultimate section.

The weirdest thing for me watching was knowing that the crew were with us just off camera all the time and, of course, knowing that a lot of the polished version is far less spontaneous than it seems.

You’ll get an inside view if you check out the short vlog I’ve done of the afternoon and evening (link at the end of this piece).

The view from my living room. Watching the show in real time

How was my Basque?

Looking back following the shoot and the broadcast, my spoken Basque still feels very limited but it’s streets ahead of where it was, say, six months ago. Thanks to the clear short-term goal of “Euskalonski”, I’ve done a lot more work at it in the last month than would otherwise have been the case.

This was the first time for ages I’d actually used the language outside a class situation. I sometimes had to ask for a second time what people were saying to me and I made my share of mistakes on air.

All the same, the glass is half full: we did stay in Basque all the time, as we had done at the preparation stage over Skype and in emails.

Eskerrik asko, Euskalonski!

There’s nothing like showing visitors around London to remind me how wonderful this historic city is, with its majestic river and architecture and its cultural and linguistic diversity.

My participation in the filming of the London episode of Euskalonski made for a memorable afternoon and evening to bring my month’s Basque Boost project to an end. The month may be over but my Basque learning most certainly isn’t.

I can hardly imagine such an opportunity having sought me out through learning a “bigger” language. Never forget that learning a “lesser used” language can sometimes more readily open doors.

Here’s my vlog:

The full London episode is on the EITB website, here.

They also made a compilation of my contributions, here.

Other posts in this series:

Kick off diary and video

First week diary and video

Second week diary and video

Third week diary and video

Final week diary and video

The post “Euskalonski”: on a Basque TV shoot (with vlog) appeared first on How to get fluent, with Dr Popkins.

Monday 20th August  (one hour self-study)

One week exactly till I have to speak Basque on TV (well, take part in the recording).

Last night, Uñai cancelled this morning’s lesson. The day kicked-off with a 40 minute walk round the park, listening to Basque talk radio.

Decided to work with the Arian B2.1 textbook again for a change. So, thirty minutes this morning listening and reading about the experiences of four Basque students, their reasons for learning and methods. Took dictations of the short conversations from the audio recording and then checked them.

Then I went out to shoot more pieces to camera in my “Dr Popkins Method?” video series.

I’ve run out of “locations” in the house, so I decided to split each of the next three vids into three and shot a third of each in a different café. I had my morning espresso in one of my local cafés and short the first section of each three.

Quick lunch then a Skype call with the Basque TV researcher and director. More discussion of the content and when we’re meeting next Monday. They want me to make “Welsh cakes”….So I’ll have to practice

Then out to another café to film the middle third of the next three “Dr Popkins” videos.

In Britxon Blend Café, with the Bowie mural visible outside

A problem with vlogging from cafés – erm, a problem with cafés in general – is that they often have music blaring out. I was reduced to sitting outside Café Stir where then enemy then became the traffic noise on Brixton Hill, especially the frequent sirens. Ambulances are worse offenders than police cars. They all sound like wannabe extras from a US cop series circa 1975. Bring back 1950s Ealing comedy police car bells.

Then I went down the hill to the centre of Brixton to shee to shoot the final third. I did this in the Brixton Blend Café which is just opposite the David Bowie mosaic and hung out there a bit longer to do some more editing of tomorrow’s Eisteddfod vlog, part two.

Espresso overdose alert!

Arian B2.1 textbook

This evening, a further thirty minutes from Arian, instead of preparing for the session with Iñigo tomorrow. It’s refreshing to be working with a different book. The Habe lesson sheets are rather quirky (and at a lower level). Bakaraka is very thorough and great for practising structures, but rather dry and distant from real life (the texts are rarely conversations or on contemporary subjects, for example).

Tuesday 21st August (45 minute one-to-one lessons, 30 minutes self-study)

Kicked off with an early run in the park: 25 mins passive Basque radio exposure.

45 minute lesson with Iñigo. We continued to work with “Habe” unit 34. Some more practice of reported speech. Then a reading exercise, with questions, about two bizarre couples. Finally, some extracts from newspaper dating small ads.

Half an hour this evening preparing vocab to do with cooking. I’m going to be doing some for the show. I’d already covered most of the vocab but can’t recall it actively.

Wednesday 22nd August (one hour self-study)

I wasn’t sure whether the lesson with Uñai was still on, given that he cancelled due to illness on Monday.  Although I showed up at 8.30 this morning, he didn’t. That threw me rather.  I should have mailed to ask him last night but for some reason hadn’t. Actually, for two reasons: (1) I thought I shouldn’t fuss; (2) I kinda think the person who’s deviated from the plan should take the lead in checking what happens next.

Went for a 25 min run in the park instead, with Basque radio playing in the earphones.

Late afternoon I was back in the centre of Brixton.

I found two cafés more in to film the intros and “outros” for “Dr Popkins” videos five and six. One is quite a cool place off Coldharbour Lane, spoiled only by more loud music (it touts itself as a shared workspace, with desks for hire at the back. Not sure intrusive music goes with that).

Tonight I did two half-hour sessions doing more prep for the television shoot. Tried to make up phrases related to cooking.

I think they’ll probably ask me about how I learn languages as well, so I’ve been working on vocab around that too.

Uñai mailed tonight to confirm that he’s back in action tomorrow. I have a lesson with him and another with Iñigo tomorrow. During both, my plan is to check the phrases and practise them.

Thursday 23rd August (30 minute one-to-one lesson)

Iñigo failed to show for our 2pm lesson. A mix-up over what we’d agreed.

Uñai is now back in action and at 18:00 I had a session with him. Quick general chat and then we worked on the vocab and phrases I prepared yesterday around making Welsh cakes, my approach to language learning and my life in London.

No more Basque today, apart from some passive radio exposure.

Tonight I made Welsh cakes for the first time.  They were a bit burned because I hadn’t rolled the mixture thickly enough.

Friday 24th August (40 minutes light self-study)

Morning run with Basque on the radio. Discussion included the removal of Franco’s body from the Valley of the Fallen.

Then train up to my father’s in Yorkshire for the weekend. During the journey I spent about 40 minutes reviewing several chapters in Assimil Basque.

At my dad’s I also went over the vocab and phrases I’d worked up with Uñai yesterday, but that was it on Basque today.

Dad also gave me a lesson in making Welsh cakes as a result of which I discovered a couple of tricks (beat the egg before you add it to the mixture; coat the rolling-pin with flour so that the mixture doesn’t stick to it).

Saturday 25th August (30 minutes light self-study)

Relaxing at my dad’s in Malton. Did about thirty minutes working on Assimil in Costa Coffee, my regular coffee shop there. I don’t normally like hanging in chains and the espresso at Costa Malton is not very good.  The problem is, most of the other coffee shops there are a bit too flowery china and doily for me. There is a new hipster roastery but it’s too cool to have proper tables and closed more than it’s open.

Sunday 26th August (45 minute one-to-one lesson, 30 minute one-to-one lesson and about 50 minutes light self-study)

Lesson with Eider, ten minutes general chat. I explained the journey up to my father’s and what I’ve been doing here. Then we went on to practise the conversation topics for tomorrow’s TV recording.

Eider had heard of the “Vendetta” group that the presenter of “my” programme, Pello Reparez, sings in and she seemed quite excited by the prospect.

Train back south in mid afternoon. Read Basque novel on train for about 20 minutes but spent a lot of the time editing video (both easier and more fun….).

Tonight: the final pre-shoot lesson with Iñigo.

He was telling me that he had been pickpocketed in Donostia, but got his cards back. Then I once again practised my conversation topics in advance of the shoot.

Not really feeling nervous but not really sure what to expect tomorrow either. It’s a good opportunity, though.

End of month round-up

Here’s how it went:

Week One: three Basque lessons (plus one aborted after ten minutes due to computer failure) and seven  hours’ study over six days.

Week Two: five Basque lessons and two hours’ study over two days.

Week Three: eight Basque lessons and two-and-a-half hours’ study over six days.

Week Four (includes the final Sunday, technically the “fifth week”): four Basque lessons and three hours 10 minutes of study.

My original target for the project was to have a thirty or forty-five minute Basque lesson five days a week and do at least thirty minutes self-study five times a week.

Over the four weeks, that would have meant twenty lessons and ten hours of self-study.

My actual total was twenty lessons and a little over fourteen hours of self-study.

In addition to that, I had several “real” Skype calls with the programme makers and passive exposure to Basque radio. I was listening daily, either when running or while at home doing chores/eating.

So, I made the target for lessons and overshot nicely with the self-study.

The lessons were not distributed as evenly as I’d have liked due to teacher availability and cancellations.  It was looking particularly bleak on the Thursday of week one, when I’d only clocked one thirty minute lesson (plus the abortive ten-minutes on Wednesday). Here it really helped that I have three teachers. As I pointed out in a recent “Quick Tip Tuesday” vlog, it’s a good to make sure you don’t rely on just one teacher or conversation partner.

The weakest week was the second. That was entirely due to my decision to travel to Wales to attend the National Eisteddfod. That was a great trip but it did resulted in my cancelling a Thursday and Friday lesson and not doing anything Thursday to Saturday.

As usual, I found that having made a public commitment to a certain amount of study really helped to keep me focussed.  Without this accountability, my Basque would still have been motoring along but at a lower pace.

How about my substantive achievement? I’m not sure I feel any shift in my speaking over the month, which, with these relatively low practice figures is no surprise. As regular readers will know, I normally prefer three-month projects, because there’s more time for a shift to register.  If anything, it’s my radio listening comprehension that seems to be moving most in Basque at the moment.

There’s no doubt, though, that I was a lot better prepared for the television experience than I would have been without this little project. Again: having such goal a month ahead really gave me something to work towards.

The Euskalonski page on the EITB website

What of Monday’s shoot itself?  I was nervous but it all went well.   I was spluttering and making mistakes but also really speaking.  We stayed in Basque all the time as we filmed (which took from three fifteen in the afternoon to nine thirty in the evening).

The programme is called Euskalonski. The presenter, Pello Reparaz, is travelling to major capitals with his guitar, seeking out Basque speakers and learners.

The first episode is on Monday (from Paris). I’m not sure yet when “London” airs. I’ll let you know via twitter, the Howtogetfluent Facebook page and group. I’m on Instagram as well now (and loving “Instagram stories”.

You won’t be surprised to hear that I was also shooting for a vlog of my own.  I’ve decided to hold back with the completing and publishing that until the programme itself has aired. That way I can add a coda of me watching the programme and form a view of the finished product.  Look out for a post all about the day itself with the vlog.

Other posts in this series:

Kick off diary and video

First week diary and video

Second week diary and video

Third week diary and video

The post One month Basque boost: final week diary appeared first on How to get fluent, with Dr Popkins.

Monday 13th August (45 minute one-to-one lesson)

The week kicked off with 45 minutes on Skype with Uñai. We did the last exercise in unit 30 of my “Habe” course (which we had missed out last week by mistake). We then resumed with unit 31 and redid one of the benefactive (“norentzat”) case exercises we’d already worked through together last week.

This was all after thirty minutes general discussion. In that, we covered Uñai’s on-going accommodation problems in The Hague. I also gave him a round-up about my time at the Welsh National Eisteddfod, the annual Welsh cultural and social festival that I attended at on Thursday and Friday last week. What I said was very similar to what I told Iñigo in my most recent lesson with him. Good to practise the vocab again!

No further study today….Naughty, I know. I was prioritising working on the site and working my upcoming language learning methods course…..

Tuesday 14th August (45 minute one-to-one lesson, 30 minute one-to-one lesson, no self-study)

Started with a 45 minute lesson with Iñigo, the first fifteen minutes of which were, however, lost to Skype problems.

We switched to Google Hangouts which we’ll use going forward. Sound and image quality not quite as good but at least we could both see and hear each other.

Continued to work on “Habe” unit 34. The topic is “advertising”. The grammatical focus is on the still on the “norentzat” case.

Breakfast, shower, then ten mins prep before a thirty minute lesson with Eider (she had postponed from Sunday, making today a two-lesson day). Once again, I explained all about the Eisteddfod and showed off my footage of Geraint Thomas. This was low tech sharing, that’s to say, me holding my vlogging camera screen up to the Skype camera.

We then got on with Bakarka 4 chapter 3, working further on the past tense short forms of esan (to say, tell) and doing the text “Egin kopiak bada ezpada ere”.

The texts in this book – like in Assimil courses- tend to have an amusing turn at the end.

This time it was about an office worker’s boss telling him to throw out all the old letter and bills as they were getting drowned in paper. The following day the worker reported the work done and added that he’d also photocopied each paper he threw out, for the archives. I did “get” the joke this time, though sometimes it takes several reads through.

No more Basque study today. I was flat-out working on the site and then for quite a few hours into the night finishing the Tuesday vlog, the first of two from the Eisteddfod. It was a question of priorities and Basque was only in second place.

Wednesday 15th August (45 minute one-to-one lesson, 30 minutes self-study)

Woke at about 6.30 after only about four and a half hours’ sleep after publishing the Welsh vlog at about one o’clock in the morning. Felt exhausted and unrested… Did my usual trick of rolling around in bed for an hour or more trying to get back to sleep, then gave up and made a cup of tea and returned to the sheets and listened to a bit of Basque radio.

At 8.30 it was my lesson with Uñai. A prime example of how pre-booking lessons helps keep you on track. I certainly didn’t feel in the mood for a lesson but, by the end, though still tired, it feels like it was very productive.

We worked further on “Habe” unit 34. More “norentzat” case exercises, reading short texts about celebrities, then translating some short conditional sentences into English. Next, exercises putting the correctly conjugated form of “jakin” (to know – facts, not people). I gave the verbs in the past was well as the present, as I’ve been practising the past forms with Eider in Bakarka 4.

Now for a run before breakfast. I put it off yesterday because if my too late start then. Unsurprisingly, it then never happened.

Half an hour’s self-study in the evening. Finished working checking I know all the vocab in the last sections of “Habe” unit 31 that I may well finish with Uñai tomorrow.

Listened through to the first audio recording to unit 32 and then took it down as a line-by-line dictation.

A “wall of text”, Habe style

Thursday 16th August (45 minute one-to-one lesson; 30 minutes self-study)

7.15-7.45: Thirty minutes focussed pre-prep on “Habe” unit 32 – reading the texts and pulling out the vocab. The topic of this chapter is “work and vocation” – always a good topic to stimulate thought and conversation, so I look forward to going through the discussion exercises with Uñai.

8.15-9.00: Just come off quite a good lesson with Uñai. We got straight started with exercises – little general catching-up chat at the beginning, given that we “met” yesterday.

We finished “Habe” unit 31 with more sentence translation (from English into Basque) and the final gap-filling exercises from the unit on “norentzat”. Then an exercise filling in the gaps with conjugated forms of “jakin” in the present.

We then got straight into unit 32, so I was glad I’d done some prep on it. The grammatical focus in this unit is reported speech. In Basque reported verbs take a special ending – “la” (with stem changes sometimes). It’s very simple in theory but quite different from anything I’ve come across in an other languages so far.

I should add that all the work I’m doing in the Habe units is revision. I covered these units about a year or more ago in the physical Basque classes I used to attend.

Friday 17th August (45 minute one-to-one lesson, 30 minutes self-study)

Just come straight off my 45 minute lesson with Iñigo. Ten minutes in, Skype disconnected and I switched from the Mac to the iPhone. He was also giving the lesson by phone. I’m really a laptop guy (never use my tablet) but no problem doing the lesson by iPhone.

To most of you it will be no revelation that you can have a language lesson on your phone, but it reminds ME how portable and flexible the location of an online lesson can be these days.

We finished “Habe” unit 34 with some final “complete the gaps” exercises and moved on to unit 35. It’s title is “Love, where?” and we began working through a “wall of text” – short explanations by young people from Donostia (San Sebastián) about how they meet (or fail to meet) potential partners. I read out three of the six texts and understood the thrust of each, though there was some new vocab. I hadn’t prepared the text in advance and will try to review – and prepare the rest – before tomorrow’s lesson.

I’m afraid I didn’t fee particularly fluent today. It’s very much up and down from lesson to lesson with how the language flows. I just hope I feel “the flow” when I’m with the television crew taking part in the Basque TV programme a week on Monday.

Finished my day this evening with thirty minutes preparing the next pages of unit 34 for tomorrow’s class with Iñigo.

Saturday 18 August (45 minute lesson with Iñigo, 30 minutes self-study)

Day kicked off with a 45 minute lesson with Iñigo.

Well, I’d set aside thirty minutes for study before hand but that was lost to me trying to work out how to install Skype and access my existing account on my iPad (which I don’t use very often). Finally sorted that out and it worked very well with Iñigo’s account (which my Mac for some reason doesn’t).

Like yesterday, I felt pretty useless during the lesson. We were working on the subject of dating, with a certain amount of slang or idiomatic vocab. The preparation I did yesterday evening stopped things feeling even worse, I guess.

The grammar is reported speech: indirect statements and questions which are simple but very different in Basque and the forms take a bit of practice.

Finished the evening with 30 mins prep of Bakarka 4 ch. 3 for the lesson with Eider tomorrow (going through two quite long reading texts and checking the vocab).

Arian B2.1 – Basque students talk about how they learn

Sunday 19th August (30 minute lesson, 30 minutes self-study)

Kicked off with a 30 minute run in the park, with Basque radio playing in my ears. An interview with a guy making maps of Iruñea (Pamplona) after the news bulletin.

Just come off a 30 minute Skype call with Eider. She’s got the market cornered for Basque on italki.com at the moment. I use this platform to arrange most of my language teaching and exchanges. When you complete your first ever lesson using this link you’ll get USD10 in credit (and so will I) :).

For the first fifteen minutes we were chatting. I was trying to explain that I called the police yesterday as some neighbours (actually a block away) were playing loud reggae music for several hours. Some of the music was actually quite good and I Shazam-ed it, but that’s not the point. It annoys me when people are inconsiderate of others. The older I get, the less inclined I am to put up with it.

Back to the lesson: we continued to work with Bakarka 4 chapter 3. I did an exercise which involved adding “izenlaguna” (adjectiviser (!)) endings. That’s “-tazko” from “-tzat”, “-ganako” from “-gana”, ” -kiko” from “-kin” and “-rako” from “-ra”.

I found this quite difficult because I didn’t understand all the sentences (despite have supposedly “prepared” them yesteday).

In the last couple of minutes I read the text “Egin Kopiak Bada Ezpada Ere” outloud. We had worked on last week. This time noticed several examples of the adjectivisers we’d just been practising.

Did the lesson standing up, like yesterday with Iñigo. I spend far too much time at my desk. For a few months now I’ve had a small frame that raises up my laptop but can also be used to convert the table into a standing desk. I find standing helps me focus and keeps me feeling more energised.

For my thirty minutes self-study today, I worked from chapter one of the Arian B2.1 book. It’s a bit above my level but it’s got short audio pieces with transcripts. That’s great for dictation, which I find a great way to force me to focus and “notice” the differences between what I think I hear and the written language and language I simply don’t know well enough yet.

Call coming up with Meritxell from Basque TV tomorrow morning to discuss the filming again.

Week four report and general update

I’m with the crew a week tomorrow (Monday 27 August). For that reason, think I’m going to hold off publishing the diary and video next Sunday and wait till the first Sunday in September. That way I can roll in a report on how the filming went.

So, look out for a post on a more general language learning topic next week.

It’s now the end of the third week of my four-week sabbatical from work. I’ve been working hard behind the scenes on the site and on my first product.

Also, as I mentioned above, last Tuesday I published the first of two vlogs from the National Eisteddfod in Wales. The second one will be out on Tuesday.

Last week, too, I brought out the third in the Dr Popkins Method? video series. This time I told the story of how I learned Russian at the time of the collapse of the Soviet Union and German as the country was reunified.  I wonder whether Basque (or Welsh) independence could be the next thing to be sparked by language learning efforts

Here’s the Basque video diary for week three…..Me, still struggling…Still making tons of mistakes. Still not feeling as fluent as I think I should be by this stage….But, still in business….

Other posts in this series:

Kick off diary and video

First week diary and video

Second week diary and video

Final week diary and video

The post One month Basque boost: third week diary appeared first on How to get fluent, with Dr Popkins.

Monday 6th August (45 minutes one-to-one lesson, 20 minute “real” conversation, 30 minutes self-study)

This is the start of the second week of my month’s sabbatical from my day job at the law firm and I’m determined to keep up the momentum with me Basque….among other projects.

The London heatwave continues, for now. This means I had to be early with my morning run. Went out today at half past seven. Half and hour jogging round the park with Basque radio playing through the headphones.

Back with five or six minutes to spare before my 45 minute lesson over the net with Iñigo. I generally use italki.com for language teachers and tandem partners (that link will give you – and me – USD10 credit when you complete your first ever lesson with them).

The lesson went well, once we got connected. My Mac doesn’t like Skype. The materials were unit 34 of my “Habe” course. We were working more on revising telling the time and then on an exercise on “Oharrak” (warnings), which involved matching up those daft packaging warnings you sometimes get with the relevant household objects (sleeping pills (“can cause drowsiness”), an iron (“beware – can get hot”) and so on).

2pm twenty-minute call with Meritxell from Basque TV, all in Basque. We discussed more about the upcoming programme. Lasted 20 mins. We’d already earmarked the last Monday of August. Filming with me will be during the afternoon. Discussed three locations, timing, which order to film.

I learned more about the programme. They are also filming at a Basque restaurant in London and other interviewees are Basque singer who lives here and an American who has learned the language (a guy I’ve met a couple of times through the London Basque Society). They will be also filming one of those Catalan human towers (a “castell”). That’s because there’s a group who do castells her that’s run by Basques.

Evening: thirty minutes self-study. Reviewing some of what I did with Iñigo from unit 34. Then went ahead in the unit to prepare some of the vocab. Listened to the first audio clip to this unit: “Mercedes Vio Berria” radio ad twice through. Then tried to write down what I could hear. Then corrected against the transcript.

Tuesday 7th August (45 minute one-to-one lesson, 1 hour self-study)

Got an early start at 6.30 am. Spent an hour working with the “Habe” materials. Did vocab prep work on “Azkarrak direla publiziastak” (Ad men are crafty) text in unit 34. Then moved to unit 33 (which I will be working on with Uñai before too long (I’m currently doing unit 31 with him).

Unit 33 is about migration and immigrants. Lots of topical and relevant social and political vocabulary. I worked through several of the reading texts, looking up vocab.

45 minute afternoon session on Skype with Uñai. First half spent in general catch-up conversation. More than enough to talk about: he has now been reunited with his missing suitcase but has problems with his new flat, I was explaining more about my upcoming participation in the television programme.

I’ve decided to go to the Welsh National Eisteddfod, so tomorrow I’ll be travelling to Cardiff, the capital city of Wales.

The Eisteddfod is the main Welsh-language cultural festival. It takes place entirely through the medium of Welsh. It’s always the first week in August. It’s held in a different part of Wales every year, alternating between the northern and the southern parts of the country.

I told Uñai a bit about that too during the lesson.

We then did some more of the unit 34 written exercises but verbally, on the hoof.

Then I had to retell the story of Txano gorritxo by weaving in six modern items: “helikopteroa” (helicopter), “sakelako telefonoa” (mobile phone), “igerilari bat” (a swimmer), “ezpainak margotzekoa” (lipstick), “telepizza” (a telephone-ordered pizza) and “pinrtze urdina” (a blue prince (?!)). More you do no want to know Finally there was quite a long reading comprehension about Pernando Amezkettara (a jokey Basque historical character).

Tomorrow’s lesson brought forward to an earlier time as I’ll be on the train in the afternoon, Wales bound.

Wednesday 8 August (two 45 minute one-to-one lessons)

Another early start, including a run in the park listening to Basque radio before lesson with Iñigo.

Temperature in the low twenties this morning. Looks like the heatwave may be over, for now.

Good general discussion first about different types of cuisine and different attitudes to eating animals (which, and which parts). Conversation then turned to the fishing industry and I was trying to explain attitude around that in the UK in the context of Brexit. That proved a bit of a stretch at my current level.

We then continued with “Habe” unit 34. There was a complete the gaps exercise about a Basque TV advert featuring a young man receiving a traditional Basque txapela for his 18th birthday and wearing it the wrong way round like a rapper. Then there was a reframe the sentences as reported speech exercise.

Just time for breakfast then straight on at 9.30 with the day’s lesson with Uñai (originally scheduled for this afternoon).

We started “Habe” unit 31 which is about the “red press” (prentsa arrosa), that’s to say media celebrity and gossip magazines. Practising the “norentzat” case (who for) with some useful exercises. Then read three short pieces about celebrities. I discovered that Elton John where red-tinted specs because of a medical problem with his eyes. It’s not just fashion.

Early afternoon I headed to the station to catch a train to Cardiff.

Although there have been periods when I’ve attended the Eisteddfod year after year, the last time I was there was in 2014.

One problem often is getting to the “Maes” literally “the Field” the main location of the Eisteddfod. This year, though “y Maes” is in the “Cardiff Bay” area of central Cardiff: Rohl Dahl Place, the Wales Millennium Centre (concert hall) and the Senedd, the home of Wales’ National Assembly (parliament).

Tonight, back in the AirBnB after my first Eisteddfod evening, I decided to postpone the lessons I had booked with Iñigo tomorrow and Uñai early tomorrow and Friday morning. So there will be a pause in my Basque focus until Sunday.

Outside the Eisteddfod “Maes”

Thursday 9 August (no Basque)

I spent all day on “y Maes”.

I’ve been looking at the various stalls there (book and craft stalls, stalls held by charities, educational institutions, various official and corporate bodies, voluntary organisations). Then I was in famous, brick Pierhead building, where all the activities for learners were focussed.

I also attended more formal events in “y Pafiliwn”, the Pavilion. The Pavilion usually a (very) large tent but, this year, the main concert hall in the Wales Millennium Centre. I was glad to catch the presentation of the prize to Mat Spry, winner of the Welsh Learner of the Year competition. I also saw some “Cerdd Dant” (Welsh poetry set to harp music).

Another highlight today was the triumphal reception for Geraint Thomas, the Cardiff boy who’s just won the Tour de France. I was just in the right place at the right time (inside the Senedd) to see the First Minister of Wales and the Speaker of the National Assembly lead him out to the steps to meet the crowd.

I was shooting footage all day and there’ll be a couple of “Eisteddfod” vlogs up on the YouTube channel before too long.

Geraint “Tour” Thomas (first on right) on the steps of the Senedd (Welsh parliament)

Friday 10 August (no Basque)

Again I spent the whole day at the Eisteddfod.  Once the heavy morning rain had cleared.

I attended a couple of interesting meetings. One was on the Welsh legal system (I’m a lawyer by day). The other, hosted by the language pressure group Dyfodol was about the government’s policy of creating one million new Welsh speakers by 2050. The special guest was Eluned Morgan, the Minister for the Welsh language.

The concert hall was packed for the main ceremony of the day, the announcement of who had won the “Chair”. With That’s the competition for the best cynghanedd (Welsh strict metre poem) on a set theme with a length limit. Poets have to submit work under a pen name “chairing” of the bard”. So, unable to get a ticket, I had to watch the ceremony on a TV screen.

Saturday 11 August (no Basque)

Had breakfast at a cafe in the imposing Art Deco hall of Cardiff Station before getting on the train for London.

It’s a two-hour journey.

I admit I could have used this for reading Basque.

Instead, I was editing some of the video for the first of the (likely) two eisteddfod vlogs.

Back in Brixton, I’ve been re-jigging my lessons over the weekend. Iñigo was originally available this afternoon, but we are now having a lesson tomorrow. That’s in place of the one I should have had with Eider, who has to go to her café job but will rescheduled (not yet sure when).

I should have done at least thirty minutes Basque tonight. Instead, I did more work on the Eisteddfod vlogs. Addictive, this video production business.

Sunday 12 August (45 minute one-to-one lesson, 30 minutes self-study)

First thing: half an hour’s prep of “Habe” materials. Then: a run in the park listening to Basque radio on the headphones.

Next: a lesson with Iñigo. We never got to the “Habe” materials as we were just chatting all the time.

I told him what I’d been doing in Cardiff and he was telling me about his upcoming interview for a seven month internship in London. Who knows, we may well get to meet in the autumn.

Early afternoon, I recorded this week’s video (see below).

General update

This week I’ve been busy working behind the scenes on the site (I’m developing some courses for language learners – more details soon).

I was also productive over on YouTube.  This week’s Quick Tip Tuesday vlog was called “Conversations first”. I shot it in Hoxton, currently one of the hipster captials of London.

I also shot the second and third in my “Dr Popkins Method?” video series. Number Two I published on Thursday. It’s my own story of how I got fluent in French and Welsh. Next week, I’ll publish the next episode: how I learned German and Russian.

What about you? As we hit the more-or-less half way mark in August, is your language learning going as you’d planned it? If not, how come? If so, what’s your secret? Share with us all in the comments below!

Now, without further ado, here’s this week’s Basque practice video:

Other posts in this series: 

Kick off diary and video

First week diary and video

Third week diary and video

Final week diary and video

The post One Month Basque Boost: second week diary appeared first on How to get fluent, with Dr Popkins.

The time is right

The timing of this TV project is perfect as I’ll have more time and energy than usual to focus on Basque this month. That’s because last night I “broke up” to start my annual one-month sabbatical from the law firm.

Out of the blue a couple of weeks ago, I got a Facebook message from one of the television production team. I’m still not sure how they came across me (no evidence that they were Howtogetfluenters… Maybe the London Basque Society tipped them off).

There was a form to fill in with some background info about my and my interest. I delayed doing this as I “couldn’t face” having to write in Basque. I finally got it sent in and had a preliminary Skype call on Wednesday morning. They had tried to phone me, but I thought Skype would be better than trying to understand a phone call. I was worried that my level would not be good enough and that I wouldn’t be able to understand them.

The call went really well, though. I only had to ask Meritxell to repeat herself a couple of times. We discussed filming ideas and locations and fixed the date.

Me and Basque: the background

If you’re a regular reader, you’ll know that I’ve been learning Basque for five years now.  The language – spoken in the Basque Country on both sides of the western Pyrenees and along the adjacent coastlines in the French and Spanish states – is quite a challenge. That’s because it’s a “language isolate”, unrelated to any other language.  It’s different, exotic.

I’ve generally been learning at a stately pace.  It’s been low intensity, working with self-study materials.  If you’re a Basque learner, check out my Basque text-book review.

Until last year, I was attending a weekly group class at the London Basque Society.

Throughout, though, the mainstay of my learning has been study on my own and working with teachers via Skype. That’s my language learning philosophy: self-study and one to one, with group classes as an add-on. Useful at times but not central.

I’ve mainly found the teachers through italki.

There have been breaks for business travel and vacations. I’ve also put the Basque to one side or into “maintenance mode” when I’ve been focussed other language projects (such as my advanced German and Russian exam preparation and my beginner Indonesian and Icelandic projects).

These breaks aside, the Skype lessons have constant in my life over the past few years.  I aim for two or three a week.  It’s an ongoing language habit that I don’t think about that much.

I’ve also deliberately ramped up several times in the past. I used the framework of the 90-day Add1Challenge three times (check out reports here, here and here).

In summer 2016, I spent one month on an intensive residential course in the Basque Country and made a round-up vlog of life in the Maizpide Barnetegia and travel vlogs about my journey to the Basque Country and the sights and sounds of the Basque Country.

I attend London Basque Society events when I can.

Learner’s update

Here’s a recap of my study/practice totals for December to April (ignoring passive media exposure): December 2017 – 7.5 hours; January 2018 – 12 hours; February 2018 – 6 hours 45 mins; March 2018 – 10 hours 45 mins; April 2018 – 4 hours 30 mins. For a breakdown and more detail, see my last general “Language Learner’s Update”.

Here, hot off my calculator, are the latest totals from language learning log:

May 2018 – total: 5 hours, 15 mins
5 x 45 minute lessons with Unái
1 x 30 minute lesson with Eider
1 hour of additional study (2 x 30 min sessions)

June 2018  – total: 9 hours, 45 mins
3 x 45 minute lessons with Unái
3 x 30 minute lessons with Eider
5 hours of additional study (10 x 30 min sessions)

July 2018 – total: 7 hours, 20 mins
4 x 45 minute lessons with Unái
4 x 30 minute lessons with Eider
2 hrs 20 minutes of additional study (4 x 30 min, 1 x 20 min)

How is the work paying off?

It’s difficult to get an objective handle on your own progress, which is why recording yourself at intervals is a useful tool for seeing whether you’re making progress.

I’ve just been looking back at some of the videos I’ve posted in the past.

I’m clearly a long way on from this video (April 2015):

My best “performance” so far has been this one from a couple of weeks after my return from Maizpide (September 2016):

That’s nearly two years ago but ‘ve certainly felt some improvement in recent months.

I can now have proper conversations. I’m forgetting the most frequent words much less often. I’m still coming up against my limited vocab but I’m finding it easier to remember new words when I do focus on doing that.

I’m developing a feel for Basques unique verb system. It’s different and quite complex, though it is very regular.

The auxiliaries and the small number of (high frequency) synthetic verbs still cause me problems at times.  At other times, though, I’m able to apply the system “on the wing” to get the right form with a verb I haven’t used so much.

That said, when I look at the video I recorded earlier today (below), I still feel a bit embarrassed at my level and feel I should be at a higher level now…..And that’s just when I watch my performance in the intro in English No, seriously, I’m still making a lot of mistakes but, as I said, I’m feeling the progress all the same.

The plan

My aim is to be able to do a thirty or forty-five minute conversation session with a teacher five days a week.

I also aim to do at least one additional thirty-minute session five days a week.

I’ll continue to work with the Habe materials with Unai and Bakarka 4 with Eider. With the other teachers I plan to use other chapters of the same courses. I’ll also review things I’ve done already.

This week I started to look a new text-book as well, the Arian B2.1 book.  It’s above my current level but well make for a change and a stretch.

I’ve worked Assimil Le Basque unifié (initiation)  to death, but I may review some of that.

l’ll be dipping in and out of Colloquial Basque too because it’s packed with very useful vocab, phrases and cultural background and using Alan King’s The Basque Language again.

Aside from the constant need to practice the alien structures of the language, my main challenge is vocab building.

I will also be listening to Basque radio when I’m eating, showering and doing household chores. This passive exposure is something I’ve been doing from the start and I understand more and more (though still less than half, I’d say). This year, I’ve also started watching the news online.

That’s it.

I’ll be posting a short study log with a short progress video each week…..starting with this post and vid. The vlogs will generally be quick updates to camera about my Basque learning and general life that week.  At the end, I also hope to enlist some help to record a proper conversation as well.

I think the programme’s due to go out in September. I’ll let you know.

If you’re a Basque learner, do let me know about your experiences in the comments below.  Likewise if you are studying another language and can relate, or just have questions, it’d be great to hear from you.

Other posts in this series:

First week diary and video

Second week diary and video

Third week diary and video

Final week diary and video

The post One Month Basque Boost: kick off appeared first on How to get fluent, with Dr Popkins.

My big announcement is that in under two week’s time, I’m off to the Basque country in northern Spain for a four-week intensive Basque course.   I’m excited about this opportunity and it’s given my studies a real focus. More about the trip at the end.

Are you logging your language learning efforts?  

As regular readers of the blog would expect, I’ve been following my own advice and logging my language learning efforts. Recording what you’ve done helps build up a track record that you won’t want to break, especially if it’s shared with your tutor, a language mentor or another accountability group such as the Add1Challenge.

In my last up-date, I reported 59 hours of study between the beginning of September and the end of March.  Including, altogether, 48 half hour Skype speaking sessions.  This averaged out very roughly at 15 minutes a day up to the end of February and half an hour a day in March.

Here are the figures for April to July:

Over the last three years, I’ve put in at least 260 hours studying Basque: 150 hours in three “Add1Challenges”, the 59 hours from September to March and now another 50 hours.  The first year and a half of study – apart from the Add1Challenge – I wasn’t logging so the time beyond the Challenge is not counted.

The weekly classes organised by the London Basque Society finished for the summer in the middle of June. Once again, my attendance has not been particularly good. I find ninety minute sessions at the elementary level a bit much after a day at work. My enthusiasm was not helped by a change in the time to half an hour later. The location further out than my office from home so it’s an effort to get there and to get back home afterwards.

To put a positive gloss on this, I’ve been  just about keeping up the contact with the class, using it to reinforce my studies when I can and to maintain and enjoyable social dimension to my learning.  For me, though, the steady progress I feel I’m making has been driven by self-study and practice on Skype.

You’ll see from the log how I consciously wound down my study efforts in May and June in particular. This was because preparation for my advanced Russian exam at the beginning of June was ramping up as my absolute main focus. In my own defence, the reason I missed the last three Basque lessons was because I was working on my Russian.

My aim was just to keep up some Basque speaking practice during those two months, to keep the language “simmering” on the back burner. I was doing hardly any active study.

But to keep the language going a little was really important.

I’ve been able to return to my advanced languages after pauses of years. With elementary languages, though, the roots a much shallower (if they are there at all!). To mix the metaphor:

> if you’re still at an elementary or lower intermediate stage with your language, you do all you can to keep going. Don’t try to turn off the thrust before the rocket is in orbit or you’ll have to work hard again to get back off the ground.

For the last two months, the situation has reversed. Russian is “in maintenance” and Basque has moved to the fore (plus some French).

In July and August, Basque has become my main focus, with a very specific short-term goal and treat: the trip to Euskal Herria (the Basque Country).

I’ve had the idea in mind for quite a while and it gave me additional motivation to keep practising in the hectic pre-exam days, when I could otherwise easily have put my Basque to one side.

> use specific intermediate goals imaginatively. Three to six months is a good period to look forward.

The closer the end, the harder it is to justify skipping or slacking (provided the end is not so near that there seems no time to save the situation and point in making an effort). Knowing that my Basque trip was five, four, three months ahead provided an incentive to keep it simmering while my attention was mainly focussed on Russian. After the Russian exam, I’ve had two months to go. It feels worth focussing because you can do a lot in that time.

For me the motivation is to be able to “hit the ground running” in my upcoming summer course in the Basque country and secure a place in the highest group possible (so I’m surrounded by people better than me).

Teacher shortage!

This summer, I’ve been trying to ramp up my lessons only to find difficulty getting hold of my teachers. It’s holiday season, of course and my regular italki teacher Joseba has been away for most of July and August.

As flagged up in previous post finding teachers or exchange partners can be a challenge with smaller languages (although on the other hand, there may be fewer learners chasing their services and your interest may inspire people to help you – every speaker counts and the effort you’re making can win sympathies).

I approached Elene,  my London class teacher, and she saved me by agreeing to give me some additional tuition over Skype and was very available.

My long-term informal conversation partner Irantzu is also around this summer, which is a huge help.

> Have several teachers lined up if you can.

> Be proactive – find people who can help you either as paid teachers or conversation partners or as part of a language exchange.

I could have been even more proactive. I have not spoken to Oriol, my partner in the Basque online Mintzanet pairing scheme, for months. I haven’t been energetic enough about chasing him up….but I’ve only got so much energy, and I’ve done a lot with my other partners nonetheless.

Study materials and methods

I’ve mainly been revising as much as I can of the materials we use in my London class and I use these to provide exercises and material for discussion for my Skype sessions. I try to work though them in advance of the Skype lessons too, although all too often I find myself frantically pulling them out of a pile of papers just before the lesson beings.  A lot of the Skype lessons goes on general “catching up” chit-chat too.

My other goal for July and August has been to work through as much as I can of Alan King’s The Basque Language (University of Nevada Press, 1994). This is by far the most comprehensive textbook available in English and has a wealth of explanation, reading material and exercises with correction. I had not used the book before and I have started at unit 1. The idea is to have a complete revision of what I’ve done so far in class and to get a bit further.

I’ve had Basque radio on a lot since early July when I could take a break from Russian broadcasts.

The soundtrack to my twice or thrice weekly half-hour runs has been the audio to the Assimil Basque course for many, many months now.

Both give me some passive exposure, helping to tune my ear to the music of the language and it’s good when I suddenly “get” snippets of the Assimil I’ve been stuck on or understand snippets from the radio.

Remember you’ll never learn from passive exposure alone, though. It only makes sense if you’re actively interacting with the language and trying to speak.

Living Basque!

I took part in three Basque social events here in London this summer which provided a great chance to practise the language a bit and build up my Basque network.

“Baskfest” was a three-day Basque festival which took place over the first weekend in June. It was organised as part of the Donostia (San Sebastian) European Capital of Culture celebrations.

I was in the thick of my Russian studies then but I set aside the Friday night to zip up from my office in the “City” (financial district) to Dalston to join in the opening evening.

The location was a warehouse-type exhibition space called The Hive. There was a display of contemporary artwork by Basque artists, Basque wine and pintxos (Basque tapas) and a live performance on the txalaparta (a Basque percussion instrument).

Sticking it to us: txalaparta players in action at Baskfest

I spoke quite a lot of Basque at the event. My teacher Elene was there and I met an old gentleman who lives on the same street in Leytonstone (east London) where I lived when I first moved to the city 12 years ago. Hau kasualitate! (What a coincidence!). He who was very taken with a foreigner wanting to learn the language.

On the third Friday in June a Basque Food evening organised by Imanol, a guy who runs a Basque food import/catering business here in London and whom I vaguely know as he used to be the barman at the London Welsh Centre. His wife is Welsh. Some members of the Basque society were also there.

The things I do for you, dear reader….here an, erm, traditional Basque hamburger at the Food Evening

On the second Saturday in July the Basque Society organised its own version of the famous San Fermin bull run in Iruñea (Pamplona). Attending the real thing in 2013 was the last time I went to the Basque Country. The London version involved a slightly less dangerous “bull” (involving a papier mâché bull’s head) and food and traditional games (tug-of-war, sack race…) in a park afterwards.

> If you’re aiming to speak the language and don’t have an obvious need for the language (work, family, existing relationships), it’s really important to build up your own network.

I’m really lucky to live in a city with so much going on.  If you’re not living in the thick of it, creating a social context for your language is a challenge to work on over time. It won’t happen over night. The whole social side a strong reason why I’ve kept going with the classes, which are in other ways – for a relative introvert like me who enjoys self-study – an inefficient use of my time.

No bull here.  Rednecks at the London San Fermin celebration

Off to the Basque country

My intensive course runs Monday 5 to Friday 30th September. I’m actually doing two two-week courses one after the other.

It’s at the “Maizpide” barnetegia in the village of Laskao. A barnetegia is a residential school where only Basque is studied. There are quite a number of them dotted around the Basque Country. They typically offer “extensive” courses (a hour or two once or twice a week) and also “intensive” (full-time) courses.  A text about Maizpide actually features in one of the lessons in the materials we’re using in class here in London.

Laskao is a village in Gipuzkoa.  Gipuzkoa is one of the six, historical Basque provinces.  Together with Bizkaia and Araba it forms the Basque Autonomous region in the Spanish state.  The proportion of speakers in a community can be an important consideration when you’re learning a minority language and Gipuzkoa is one of the provinces where the language is strongest.  I’ve heard that Laskao is a particularly “Basque” place.

The village seems to be very small, with two slightly larger settlements nearby all set in beautiful, green hills.

There will be eight hours of classes a day, including, it seems on the middle weekend of each two-week course. So it’s going to be quite intensive. Otherwise, I don’t know much about what’s coming. The website is spectacularly taciturn and my email communication direct with the organisers has been limited. The phrase “getting blood out of a stone” comes to mind (I’m sure there’ll be an equally vivid way of saying that in Basque).

I had to do a pre-course on-line assessment which revealed me to be about A2 level (elementary)(a heady 1+ on the ILR scale often used in the USA).

A work in progress: my written Basque assessment test and corrections

It’s going to be interesting to see where I am after a month’s intensive study.  I’m hoping that month will be one of more-or-less total immersion. That’s the barnetegia ethos and it should help that I don’t speak a word of Spanish (well, besides gracias!).

As well as the hoped-for progress, I’m also looking forward to finding out about the methods used and to seeing how I cope speaking Basque out and about. The area has a very high percentage of Basque speakers.

I hope there’ll be time to explore the surrounding area too. There’s a cheese festival at nearby Ordizia in September. I love cheese, so hope to be able to visit that, if we’re let out at all

There will be students there from across the ability level. I’ve no idea how many, though. I guess there’ll be one or two other foreigners, though perhaps not many. I hope new friendships will be forged around our common goal.

Could see yourself doing an intensive residential course in your language? Have you done one already? Let me know in the comments below or write and tell me about your experiences and hopes by email!

I’m intending to blog and vlog what happens to me at Maizpide and I hope you’ll stay tuned with me along the way.

The Basque flag or ikurriña, to those in the know (or who’d like to be)

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