Well, what with summer holidays and the like it's been a while since my last post, so I'm just writing this as a quick update as to what's going on.
I've got a lot of topics that I want to blog about language learning lined up, it's just that I've come to the conclusion that I'm spending too much time blogging about it and not enough time studying, so I've decided to concentrate on the study a bit for the time being.
I'm using the Oxford Chinese site that I mentioned before, and I'm really beginning to appreciate the benefit of grammar exercises. I think I had been lulled into thinking it was not necessary by some quarters of the language learning world, and this has been detrimental to my progress. Looking back at this blog, I am not sure I would support everything I wrote here or here anymore (although think balance is probably the best way forward, and certainly there is room for both techniques).
It is an atractive proposal not to have to bother with grammar, but I'm finding that studying the grammar really gives you a better understanding of the language and helps to give you a firm foundation from where to build your sentences, and this in turn helps to raise confidence.
Anyway, I'm going to try to make my way through all these exercises over the next month or two, and then perhaps scout around for some new material.
In the meantime, I'll try to find some time for a blog post or two. If you have any thoughts on the benefits of grammar study please let me know in the comments below, or of course if you have any comments on my blog or language learning in general, feel free to drop me a line...
