Where I'm Going

Over the past few days, I've been trying to reacquaint myself with Swedish. To do that, I've been going over the Pimsleur course that I mentioned in the last post. Yes, even the creepy parts. Since this was the second time listening to it, I ignored the recommendation to do only one unit a day. With my rebellious attitude, I was able to breeze through the course in two days. Of course, it helped that I remembered more than I thought I would.

*A quick note: If you plan to take on the entire course at once, you'll need to take breaks. After a couple of hours, I lost my ability to actively listen. Whenever that happened, I would switch over to a Swedish news podcast, and listen passively. After a while, I was able to go back to the course.*

Like I've already mentioned, I don't like Pimsleur's listen and repeat style. There is nothing wrong with it. It's just not what works best for me. I have learned a lot from the Pimsleur course, however, and I feel like I understood some things better than the first time through. At this point, though, I'm only repeating specific phrases in specific situations. I have no idea why one verb ends in 'a' and later ends in 'ar'. I don't know how to convey any of my own thoughts in Swedish. Unless those thoughts have something to do with getting something to eat..... They usually do.

So this brings me to the first phase.


Learn some grammar.


I've chosen to start with verbs. The reason is simply personal preference. I like being able to say things are happening. You need verbs for that.
With verbs, of course, comes conjugation. I hate conjugating (especially if the rules aren't clearly defined), so all the more reason to figure it out and be done with it.

My plan of attack: I'm trying to keep my resources free if I can. Learning Swedish is not something I can sink a lot of money into. And shouldn't learning a language be free anyway?

With that being said, I'm starting on Wikipedia. Specifically, this page. I'll be reading through the section on verbs, probably a few times. Once I feel I've got a decent grasp on the subject, I'll try to put it into practice.

To do that, I'll be using this cool site. It's an interactive site to learn and practice over 600 Swedish verbs. I haven't tried it yet, but it looks promising.

*EDIT* There is a downloadable version to use offline, and a PDF file of grammar rules on the downloads page.

So that's my plan so far. In addition to keeping this blog updated with my progress, I'll also try to offer up explanations for any of the difficult parts I come across. That is, if I feel I understand it well enough.

So until next time.
Tack så mycket.
Dustin.

If you have any tips that I should know, feel free to leave a comment on this post, or email me at tillswedish[at]gmail[dot]com


Also. Here is this thing.