Nick Jantz

    • Drilling spanish verb conjugations - 2 months later

    language-learning

    Background

    Caption Title::Spanish verb conjugation chart
    Caption TitleRegular Image Caption

    For the last two months I've been forcing myself to drill spanish verb conjugations in an effort to make them pavlovian in my daily usage of the spanish language. I'm still very early in this process but I've learned enough that I feel like writing this blog is worth it.

    I knew going into this that it would not be easy and it would not be fun. But since my method of learning spanish has switched to a method that is 95% fun and I had faith this effort would be worth the misery I decided to give it a go.

    I actually attempted this earlier this year in April for 2 weeks before slowing bowing out and giving up. My main point of failure at that point was not sticking to it every day and eventually, thanks to the spaced repitition algorithm the daily cards to review caught up to me and I completely lost interest. The key to using a space repitition app like Anki is you must keep with it everyday or else your reviews list will grow too big and will take a big mental effort to whittle it back down.

    Method

    Anki flashcard interface showing Spanish verbs
    Regular Image Caption 2

    I have been using the Kofi method found here

    Please note, the site above is an extremely exhausting read. I read through it once as dedication to the method, however would not recommend it.

    The bulk of the reasoning for the method can be summarized by the following(my words):

    1. When learning your native language you don't learn to conjugate verbs, you should instead learn each individual verb conjugation as a separate word
    2. However, verb conjugations do exist and learning their patterns can be helpful, as can learning all the different conjugations for a single verb at the same time

    After that you're given a list of 72 verbs that should cover a majority of the conjugation patterns. The rules of the cards are the following:

    1. Only do 1 set of cards at a time, a set being a single verb
    2. When you're ready to continue, select custom study and add the next set of conjugated verbs(1 new word)

    My thought process going into this was I should comfortably finish my daily reviews, and want to have more cards. Only after multiple days in a row of thinking I should have more cards would I actually do the custom study and add the next verb set.

    There's more to it than that, such as symbols on the cards that help with when to use certain phrasing. For me, it's mostly about knowing certain scenarios to use things, and learning the pattern from that.

    I can't stress this enough, going into this, especially after my previous failed attempt, I went in with the mindset that I would not enjoy a single minute of it. The entire process was going to be a slow painful bit of effort I'd just have to force myself to do everyday. I fully believe having that mindset has allowed me to make it 2 months of everyday practice, and will be able to continue to finish the deck eventually.

    My Progress

    The first 2 words were HARD. I think it took me close to a week to just be able to get through the first word in a day. I was failing almost every time. I had no grasp of the pattern for anything outside of present tense or the two past tenses. Eventually, through perserverance I made it through. Same things for the second verb, almost another week. Barely any feeling of a pattern, it was hard and almost every day I had to force myself to do this.

    After the first two weeks there has been a massive snowball effect. By the time I started the third verb I was feeling a sense of a pattern. I'd created some memory tricks in my head that seemed to be working. I felt pretty good about it. Every 4 to 5 days I was able to add another card.

    Flash forward a couple more verbs and I was starting to feel lost again. My tricks were no longer working and I felt like I was starting to move backwards. I slowed down a bit and decided to go against my language learning rule of not looking up any grammar lessons. I went to my trusty spanishdict.com and dove deep into the difference between the conditional, subjunctive present and subjunctive past. These three were giving me the most trouble and I didn't want to cement the wrong things in my mind. By doing this though, it helped me understand the flashcards themselves better. I started doing reviews faster and feeling like I was actually learning, not just having them memorized.

    Now we're a week or two out of feeling like I have a grasp on all the verb tenses and what they mean. I have the patterns down and I'm regularly getting 90%+ of cards on the first guess, even on new verbs because I get the patterns better than before. I'm feeling comfortable adding a new set after only a day or two.

    What I Learned

    TBD - I have takeaways for this, but haven't put them down yet.

    Future

    I need to get better about actually putting this to use. I do feel like I have a somewhat pavlovian response to verb tenses, but it's not registering in my brain immediately. It is helping me understand and speak better though. I just need more practice in natural settings and with more natural content, not solely flashcards. This will come with time. Overall I am glad I forced myself to go through this and will continue working on it, I feel like I'm over the very tricky part. I am only 10 verbs in, but I am confident the remainder of the verbs will continue to go along faster.