A boyhood with Hebrew.
Since I was a young man I have been exposed to Hebrew. My parents sent me to a Hebrew school for many years during my pre-teen and teen years. I would finish public school and then go to this school which was held in a local synagogue two to three…
The book sickness. Part Two.
The first part of The book sickness was published on this blog in February, 2007. http://learnetarium.com/2007/02/05/the-book-sickness/ ====== Mr. Turetz had a daughter. She would appear occasionally. They didn’t get along at all. The daughter wore a cotton print dress, had dark hair, a small moustache, a face adorned with glasses…
Learn foreign languages by having fun reading. Part 2
I once asked Michel Thomas about studying on my own. He urged me to read in the language I was studying. “Read what you enjoy and don’t look up words in a dictionary. Just keep on reading,” he told me. His advice was built on the fact that when we…
Reading Chinese the easy way.
One of the major hurdles for anyone wanting to read real Chinese, Chinese written for Chinese natives, is the simple fact that Chinese has no alphabet. The characters in which it is written can appear overwhelming to the neophyte. This in itself discourages many from plunging into reading as would…
Learn foreign languages by having fun reading. ( 1)
One of the many pieces of advice Michel Thomas gave me was to read. I am the first of five kids. Born in NYC I was alone for many years. Sure I had a brother and three sisters but we were never close friends. To this day, I am only…
John Rechy and City of Night.
In the early 1970’s I picked up a copy of the book City of Night by John Rechy. The other day, in a funk, I came across the book again in my library. I wanted something different than Russian verbs of motion to read. I immediately went to a favorite…
What do I do after the Michel Thomas course?
I received a query asking what does one do after using the Michel Thomas course if one wishes to continue on. First a little background information. Hodder is the publisher of the Michel Thomas courses. I am the author of the Mandarin Chinese course; I do not publish them. Hodder…
Another lesson, another lightbulb goes off.
There are times when, because of being tired, wanting a little time off from Russian, or just pure laziness, that I think, I hope Boris cancels class today. It would be so nice to just sleep in. Then I get up, shower, eat a bite, jump in my car and…
My first talk in Russian.
I recently wrote a post on how I was scheduled to give a short talk in Russian before an audience of native-speakers. Well, it happened and here is what transpired. Since I had to speak for 15 minutes or so I made a short mind map of what I wanted…
Following 129 hours with Boris Shekhtman.
About one year ago I began to study Russian with Boris Shekhtman. To date I have spent a total of 129 hours one on one with him learning according to his method. When I began I knew next to no Russian. I had previously spent a semester at the University…
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