Estonian Language Resource List and Language Learning Tips

A friend of mine is moving to Estonia for her husband's work. This list is for her, I won't be learning to verify and edit this list but if you know of more resources, add them in the comments. Also these tips are specific to my friend Lisa, but I think they will help you will all of your language learning endeavor

1. Plan your strategy

2. Get some flash cards -

Grab 5 - 10 flash cards and put phrases on them. Decide to practice one card a day for the first 5 days.

Then have a series of flash cards with sentences and fill in the blanks. Practice one set per day.
I like ______. Apples cake. To run. Running. Reading. 
I am in Estonia for my husband's work. I am here because it is ______. Pretty. Exciting. Beacuase I love music history. 

Have another series of Conversational Connectors such as "that is a good idea, I actually think that, by the way, I don't think it's true that, between you and me, can I tell you more about it," and more.

I would suggest having 15 or 30 cards and going over them several times. Long term memory is used when we allow ourselves to forget and relearn. Don't worry if you didn't learn everything one each card the first time through. You practice a card each day. That does not mean you are perfect at that card

3. Start a note pad document in your phone for phrases you hear on the street, in the store, on the bus, at the park, everywhere. Take notes. What you hear over and over will be more important than what you learn in a class. 

Basics and Phrases 
This is where you will get the informations for your first section of not cards.

Video about Estonian 

About and Alphabet

Phrases on YouTube 

Another Phrase Video 

300 Phrase Video

Humorous List - PG+ Has some good cognates in it and swearing 

Conversation and Phrases 

EstonianPod101 now 101Languages  

Omniglot Estonian 

Live Lingua - Course Files Via the Peace Corps

Listening 

Jesus Story on You Tube 

The Sound of Estonian - You Tube Channel 

Have fun

How to have an Estonian accent - If you can have fun you can trick your brain into learning. Take a break! 

Never-Ending Chinese Resource List

Keep in mind, I just began learning Chinese in April (and technically, I'm still in what I call the preparation stage, I'm just learning how I want to learn Chinese).

YoYo Chinese - Boost confidence (best intro series I've found)
Ms. Lin on YouTube - Lists in Description
Yi Zhao on YouTube - Use to make flash cards
Smart Mandarin - Katrina Lee on YouTube - Great to listen and speak along to

Duolingo 
Doulingo World List

Pimsleur - Often available at your local library or on audio
Mango -
ChinseseClass101 (used to be ChinesePod101)

General 
Read the Bible in Chinese - I'm not at this level yet (obviously)
Flashcards
Read Poems
Read children's stories

Apps
The aap Beelingual is great for reading
Chineasy - simple vocabulary builder and familiarizes you with Chinese characters
Chinese Skill - Panda - I'm really enjoying this app
Chinese Grammar (I have not used this one as much)
TaoTie - A new way to learn languages! If you are a native English speaker and want in on creators message me on Facebook (I'm just using my name) for how to make a little extra cast recording SHORT videos and I'll give you a code. Offer only lasts a couple months.

Lingo Bus - Is like VIPKid but for children who want to learn Chinese.

If you want to apply for VIPKid feel free to use my link and message me if you have any questions <3

Hindi Resource List for Teachers

I also have a never ending resource list with more thoughts, resources, and updates. These are simply the ones I think would work well for teaching the Hindi language (I teach English to adult learners)

Conversational
Pimsleur helps a lot with sentence order but only for a small portion of sentences 
Chatting and texting are my favorite methods!! 

Grammar
Learning-Hindi.com
Anil Mahato on YouTube 

Vocabularay
I would encourage sentence mining and use vocab from other lessons.

Speaking 
Spending time with Hindi speaking friends
Creating YouTube videos in Hindi

listening 
Hindi U on YouTube  
Bollywood Movies and Songs
Guli Guli Sim Sim - Sesamie Street
Shaka Laka Boom Boom - Kids show

Writing 
Flashcards

Reading 
TenguGo Hindi
Hindi Bible
Learning-Hindi.com has some great reading lessons
Beelingual - this app allows you to select texts and has some great tools for studying a variety of reading topics

Thinking 
Pimsleur Lessons
HindiPod101 helps with all areas
Doulingo it's out!! I just finished the tree and am writing a review!

I hope this list is helpful and I do encourage you to check out my "Never Ending Resource List" for more and future updates

Duolingo Hindi

I finished!!!

I am excited to announce that I just finished the Hindi tree on Duolingo.

Overall, I love Duolingo and think it's a great app for supplemental language study. I have been very out of language practice so this was really good to go back to.

How did it go?

The tree is very short. I tested out of the alphabet but a lot of my basic vocab skills were lacking, so I didn't make it very far passed the first checkpoint (the awful alphabet section that I will discuss later on). I use Hinglish (along with the Indians I know in the US). So my vocabulary for American foods and numbers and family was severely lacking.

But I was able to test out of moat levels individually, because the context and topic helped me remember and it was fairly easy to tell when I didn't know one or two vocab words in context.

I did have to complete one or two lessons from about 5 levels and then was typically able to test out. The biggest exception was the last two. I really struggled with those grammar concepts and even gave up a couple times because I was making so many mistakes.

But I made it and I am excited for the content to get more challenging and I think I will do several review lessons (the dumbbell in the bottom right corner).

My thoughts on the course.

Though it is officially out of Beta , I noticed a handful of errors or frustrating things.

'ne' is lacking an explanation.

It over and over expects uses to use Indian English, rather than American, which was quite frustrating for me. "You people do that thing," and leaving off articles were common. I've heard similar frustrations about other trees from bilingual speakers living in the US as well. Either way, the Hindi tree does feel like it was designed for Indian Hindi learners, which in the long run is great and I hope it will help with communication issues between states and help unify North and South Indians. So though frustrating, it could actually be good.

I also wish that there were grammar explanations for the more challenging concepts and more complete explanations for others. This will come.

A huge frustration is the Alphabet levels. They seem to be terrible. I have only passed one or two. I don't think I could have stuck with it if I had not tested out. I don't understand how they work or what is going on. I would highly recommend an app such as TenuguGo Hindi or even just making flashcards and memorizing before trying to use Duolingo before you know the alphabet. It took me two weeks (if I remember correctly) on TenguGo.

But my biggest complaint is that it's too short!!! I want more!!!

Conclusion

Overall, this is has been a great course and I will continue to use it. Being on my phone makes it so much more accessible than the other resources out there. Ans most of my frustrations will work themselves out, I'm sure...And if not, chalta hai, na?

Thanks to the volunteers! And good enjoy your studies!!!

Hindi Vocabulary Lists

Assorted art from the #TheLilyPadProject

Why recreate the wheel...here are 13 great Hindi word lists to take a look at.

These lists can be used in several ways. You can memorize them or take each word and write a sentence (which I find quite helpful).

1. My First Phrases from Hindi for Christmas

2. Anything Anil Mohato is great! This is one of his vocabulary videos (video below).

3. Common verb list (short but could be learned in a week)

4. Days of the week and directions from linguanaut.com

5. Numbers  from linguanaut.com

6. Adjectives from linguanaut.com

7. Vocabulary from linguanaut.com

8. Survival Terms from linguanaut.com

9. Grammar Tense Practice from Hindi for Christmas

10. Urdu lists from linguanaut.com

11. Hindi Words that come from Arabic from Namaste-America

12. Yet another list of Arabic words in Hindi from Baheyeldin

13. A third Arabic, Urdu/Hindi, Punjabi word list from PakPassion.net

Hindi Phrases: Speak Hindi Phrase App

My first phrase list has been your favorite blog post of mine so far, so I figured you would enjoy a round two with some more phrases that I learned from a phrase app on my phone. It is called "Speak Hindi."

I give this app at 4 out of 5 starts. It has both spoken and text for each of the phrases and is organized well into categories that make sense. I couldn't give it 5 stars because a few spoken phrases do not match with the text.

If you are using the language learning strategies of memorizing phrases to begin learning a language, the mismatch is confusing. Another common purpose of using a phrase app is for those who have no knowledge of the language. The inconsistency is confusing for this people group as well.

But there are only a few of these inconsistencies and it really didn't bother me that much. I would certainly recommend the app.

I will share the text below (and share any corrections Hindi speakers share with me in the future).

Basics

A photo from our trip...I will share more photo stories soon.

Kya aap dohrane ki kripya karenge?
Can you please repeat that?

Bhagwaan aapka acha kare
Good luck

Woh kya hai?
What is that?

Business

Jitnee jaldi ho sake
As soon as possible

Acha kaam kiya
Good job

Yeh raha mera business card
Here is my business card

Hum bharat mein kaam karna chahtein hain
We want to work in India

Emergency

Doctor/Police ko bulayo
Call the doctor/police

Yahan par aspatal kahan par hai
Where is a hospital

Kya aap angrezi boltein hain?
Do you speak English?

Main kho gaya hun
I am lost

Main bimar hoon
I am sick

Mujhe madad ki jaroorat hai
I need help

Call for Hindi Writing Topics

Dhokra Clay Base...West Bengal, India. More on my Art Blog.

What do you want me to practice writing about in Hindi?

Pehele, please send me some easy topics so I can practice (vocab, tenses, verbs etc). My goal is to write about a page every week this month (though I'm not making any promises to post them to this blog in a timely manner, magar main khoshish karongi). If it goes well I will continue through March.

Dusra, I would also be up for suggestions for online kids books in Hindi to read.

Tesra, anyone willing to proofread, let me know...

haha they might be rough but I'll include the English of what I'm trying to say which should make it a bit easier.

Phir se dhanyavaad doston! 

You can find me on Facebook or Twitter. If you want to read more about my India inspired artwork check out my other Art Blog.

My First Hindi Phrases - A Great Starting Place

I went to India knowing how to say, How are you? What is your name? and how to count to 10 in Hindi. While there I picked up a few more words and phrases. English was spoken almost everywhere and I was not trying to learn Hindi at the time so language learning was not a major goal of the trip. The trip was actually an art class through the University of Wyoming, if you would like to my artwork in response to my India travels, be sure to check out my art blog.
see more about

Even though this trip did not focus on the language, here is a list of the words and phrases Ilearned while in India.

Found this little guy crawling around the Bishnapur Temples
in West Bengal, India

Chalo
let’s go!

Thik hai
ok

Aap Kaise Hain?
how are you

Main Thik Hoon, shukriya*
I am fine, thanks

Mujhe aapka desh bahut pasand hai.
I like your country very much.

*Chinto
Chinta mat karo
Don’t Worry

Alvida
Goodbye

Shubh Rhatree
Good night (literally, I’m going to bed)

Nahin…bus
stop…enough

Ek, do, teen, char, panch, sath, aath, nou, dus
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

Kahan hai…?
Where is…?

Aap ka naam kya hai?
What is your name?

Mera naam Felicia hia
my name is Felicia

For those of you interested in learning a language, Hindi or any ohter, I would suggest starting with this or a similar list of phrases. Memorize these phrases. Once you get them move on to some more. Eventually you will find more vocabulary and be able to start having basic conversations with people.

*While in India I quickly learned that shukriya is not Hindi but Urdu. I have since learned more about Urdu…But I will post on Urdu later

Listening Practice Playlist

I am not going to go into detail in this post about the importance of listening practice as I am sure you are aware of why any language learner needs this specific practice.

Great Playlist with Hindi-Urdu speakers

Some other great listening resources include Bollywood songs and movies as well as spending time with native Hindi speakers.

What are your favorite listening resources?

HindiPod101 Review

For those of you who have been asking for some various language learning online resources one of the first ones that comes to mind is langauagePod101.

HindiPod101 was not my favorite but the LanguagePods overall are pretty good. There are a lot of options and ways to utilize this resource. I believe this post will help you learn from my mistakes more than anything .

I would rate my experience with HindiPod101 at a 2 out of 5 starts but I think that is because I didn't use it in the most efficient way.

I subscribed to the free Premium month long subscription of HindiPod101 early on. There is a great vocab list and there are some excellent listening practice sections but I was unable to get the most from them early on.

However, I would suggest waiting a while longer until you have a decent grasp on the language especially if you are just going to use it for the free trial month. To make the most out of your free month I would wait until you know the alternate alphabet (if there is one) and can use at least the intermediate to advanced lessons with success. This will also make the beginning ones more valuable as listening practice and review.

The beginner lessons are really good but I think they would have been more valuable as review and ways to ingrain words into my memory. You can learn the beginner sections on your own and from other resources such as Mango, Pimsleur, and I am assuming Rosetta Stone.

Pros
HindiPod Premium does have some great features such as 2000 core word lists, Pod Casts, great phone app, listening lessons (which are amazing and include a script in English and the language), cultural lessons, emails (though they come for free too), and more great and unique features. 

Cons
My criticism of the word list is that many seem very obscure even though they are said to be the top 2000 used words. Also many of the words are simply the English word pronounced a bit differently and in Hindi script. Though I am sure these are useful and more colloquial than their actual Hindi translation (and these words have tripped me up while trying to read I couldn't figure out kap was cup one time), I am not convinced the 2000 word list is the biggest strength of HindiPod. The premium subscription is also quite expensive at $24 per month.

The LanguagePods have great potential but I would say my experience was not so great. I would love to hear from someone who did use their perspective LangaugePod101 a few months into their language learning experience. I am at 6 months studying the language and am considering purchasing a month-long subscription in the near future. I will tell you how it goes if I do. I am also starting to use the app and will let you now how it is.

Never-Ending Hindi Resource List

In a previous post responding to those of you asking how I am learning Hindi. I said that I use as many resources as I can and promised to share a list.

I learned about keeping "never ending resumes" in college. It's the idea that you build a resume that grows as you do. This list is the same way. I will continue to add resources as I find, discover and use them.

Enjoy the resource list below. I will post some details about these in future posts. If you have specific questions, please ask. 

Conversational
Learn Hindi on FB (Anil Mahatho)  
Pimsleur helps a lot with sentence order but only for a small portion of sentences 
Chatting and texting

Grammar
Learning-Hindi.com
Anil Mahato on YouTube
Hindi U on YouTube

Vocabularay
Crazi Lassi on You Tube
MyLanguages.org 
hinkhoj.com

Speaking
Spending time with Hindi speaking friends
Creating YouTube videos in Hindi "Black Girl Speaking Hindi"
Mango - log on through a public or University library database list

listening
Hindi U on YouTube 
Bollywood Movies and Songs
Guli Guli Sim Sim - Sesamie Street
Shaka Laka Boom Boom - Kids show

Writing
Flashcards
Writing in the script for my typed notes from Learning-Hindi.com
      I will post a pdf file of my notes when it is finished

TenguGo Hindi App is the best I've found for the alphabet 

Beelingual - this app allows you to select texts and has some great tools for studying a variety of reading topics

Reading
Kids Stories
Alphabet phone App - My favorite is TenguGo Hindi
looking at Hindi meems on Google+ and then using the translator to check and learn the words I don't know
Mango
Hindi Bible
Learning-Hindi.com has some great reading lessons

Beelingual - this app allows you to select texts and has some great tools for studying a variety of reading topics

Thinking
Pimsleur Lessons
Mango
HindiPod101 helps with all areas
Doulingo it's out!! I just finished the tree and am writing a review!

Misc.
Flashcards
Painting using Hindi (Helps things stick) 
Sign Language (mathcing signs or actions to words will help with recall)

http://taj.chass.ncsu.edu/urdu/

A friend just sent this site to me. I will tellyou more in the future 

I will be sure to make a list of the Best Places to Start and to my Favorite Resources. I will continue to update this list as I find more resources I find helpful and I will continue to edit and revise...this post is a work in progress :)

What are some of your favorite language learning resources?

How I Am learning Hindi and The Brain

My Indian Culture Class and a Volunteer/Friend...More about my students

People all over the web and in real life have been asking how I am learning Hindi and honestly the answer is that I am using as many resources and techniques as I possibly can. There are many arguments for the best method and honestly I think that many of these arguments are valid; however, none are complete. I believe that more than one tool is necessary for learning a language.

Your brain doesn't function on one level but many. Learning a language is not learning one skill but many at the same time. The more connections we make the more we will retain.

Teaching language arts to people with intellectual and developmental disabilities has helped me to see the varied ways that the brain learns. Though my students brains work differently than many of us, it's almost easier to understand and more plain to see these layers.

Oversimplified, the more teaching styles you can combine into one class the more brain activity will take place creating more connections which means more will be retained and recalled later because of these connections.

This is especially true with language. It is is fascinating to see the differences between how reading, writing, speaking, and listening skills are developed. These four areas are developed at different speeds and through different types of practice. They are also different for different people.

Another critical aspect to language learning is being able to think, both on the subconscious level and the more structured grammatical level. Both of these are essential to understanding a new word order and sentence structure and therefore language.

Pimsleur argues that language learning in schools is messed up because we focus so much on grammar and though I 100% agree that the way kids naturally learn is ideal and Pimsleur was onto something huge with this idea, I also realize that the world a baby grows up in is different than the world an adult lives in. That being said I am using as many children's resources for learning Hindi as I can and surrounding myself with the beautiful language while using other more traditional adult language learning resources at the same time.

I suppose this is enough for one post. I will list the resources here soon and plan to share specifics about individual ones later...