I am starting to do 3000 words of reading and about 400 new words per day. What is your opinion on this amount and should I increase it? I have plenty of time but I’d imagine that efficiency drops after so much study. I am very eager to progress and start reading novels, I’d rather not waste time but also avoid burning out and becoming bored.
I would spend all the time that you can and if/when you start to feel bored with some activity I would put it away and do something different (but still related).
Incidentally I was amazed to find that when I started to feel tired of reading on LingQ I could just switch languages and it would feel fresh again… Not that I want to encourage you to start up another language.
I am currently focused on German and intend to achieve B2. I have no plans to begin another language until the completion of my objective.
I will be listening also but I believe reading to be far superior for intensive learning than passive listening and that is solely how my vocabulary is being gained at current.
1 Like
In English I am reading 6000-9000 words per day. I guess, I am adding 50-60 new known words per day. I also try to create at least 20 lingqs per day. I’ve been focusing on English lately however now I want to switch to Spanish and spend more time with it. I am reading 1500 - 2000 words in Spanish but I want to increase it.
“I’d imagine that efficiency drops after so much study.”
That’s totally normal. The marginal returns decreases whereas the invested time increases.
“The law of diminishing marginal returns is a law of economics that states an increasing number of new employees causes the marginal product of another employee to be smaller than the marginal product of the previous employee at some point.”
New employee here is new minutes you’re investing in language learning. You need to find the optimal point. The optimal point is the point where the efficiency is at the highest point. After this point the efficiency starts to decrease. After 2-3 hours I feel like I am losing concentration thus I stop reading or listening.
BTW Your questions are encouraging me to write in English which is my target language. Thank you!
Note: Not advice, just my humble observation.
(Sorry for grammatical mishaps and errors. I can edit my post if you can’t understand what I meant.)
Are you kidding me? Your English is excellent!
1 Like
It’s good, Silver, that you do so much every day.
But I’m afraid that it’s impossible to keep such a speed for a long time.
And as a teacher I would recommend you not only to read novels but also to go through some grammar and topic lessons from the German library in lingq.com, to listen a lot and to write a bit.
And one day to try to speak.
Good luck! Viel Erfolg!
out of interest if you are reading between 6000 - 9000 words per day how long are you reading and listening for? I am studying Spanish (Listening and reading) for 3 hours a day and was just wondering how many hours you are investing!
I am of the same opinion! I have no desire to dabble in another language or until i reach a high level in French. Like Steve, i think the most interesting language is the one you’re currently studying and until you’ve reached your desired/high level there’s still lots to learn.
It depends. You will notice that as you get better and more comfortable with your target language your reading speed will also increase. Reading interesting books is also very helpful, sometimes it is hard to STOP reading. When I started learning French I was probably reading no more than 1000 words per day, but now that I am learning for a while already it doesn’t take nearly as much time, and I enjoy it more so I have spent about 3 hours a day this week reading 20-25 thousand words daily.
Just read as much as you want, when you start with novels it should get easier to put more time into reading.
I completed Duolingo and watched many grammar related videos before LingQ. I am aware of the grammar and will begin to write sometime soon. Thank you!
That’s a lot of reading but with fewer new words. I hope to get to 10k known words relatively soon.
You’re welcome and your English is great. I know many native speakers with a much worse level of mastery of their own language.