Arabic I Here I Come!

So after about 20 emails, everything is in place. I am officially auditing Arabic I!

One of the residents I work closely with (she's our multicultural commissioner in the dorm!) told me about these two great websites: antimoon.com and alljapaneseallthetime.com. Both of these websites give strategies for language learners to increasing their language learning success.

I've been reading their pages and getting myself very excited about this. I forgot how much I love language learning!

One of the strategies which one of these websites gives is increasing your INPUT (exposure to the language) on a daily basis. They recommend reading a book in the target language for an hour a day, watching TV programs, listening to music in the target language.

This year I haveCable TV in my apartment in the dorm, and had a TV donated to me for use. Though I had cable last year, I didn't have a TV, and I insisted on not going out and buying one - since honestly, having a TV is simply another distraction that frankly I don't need! But - flipping through the channels I've realized that ND's Cable package features a number of foreign-language channels - including one in French, German, and Italian. It's been super fun to watch Italian game shows and catch the tail end of German news programs. Although I don't understand a whole lot all the time, I've found myself being able to understand more and more of it as I watch it more and more frequently. Doing this has given me a renewed interest in learning languages. I think they might even have some Arabic programming, although I'll have to double check.

Someday I hope that I will be able to be fluent in one or more foreign languages, and that I'll be comfortable in communicating with others in a foreign language as I am in my mother tongue.

Wish me luck!