HairPullMeIn 21 Jan 2010 #25
How cab you learn Polish from a book WRITTEN in a language that you DON'T KNOW ???:))):!!! that's probably the stupidest thing I heard in a long long time...
>>
It is very possible... and a good idea because they will be able to promote the book in the many tiny European countries we have and all over the world really. We have been studying with this book for a few years in a Belgium language school. Instructions are usually quite similar once you get the basic grammar terms. It's not hard to look up things nowadays ;) We do have a teacher though but we never find ourselves asking what the instructions mean, it's quite obvious and if not she will explain... Saying something is stupid when you haven't even tried it won't really get you far I'm afraid :-)
I've been trying to learn this language for many years, bought a lot of CD's + books to study it on my own, even tried with a Polish relative who used to teach, but in the end what works for me is going to evening class every week, listening to the radio in the background, traveling to Poland and practicing as much as I can. I don't really believe in self-study... I totally believe in as much listening and speaking immersion as possible. But everyone's different :-)
Good luck everyone!
Pozdrawiam
I know the grammar in and out, and have heard Polish spoken correctly since a small kid. But I lack a vocabulary, and have been away from it so long, I forgot all the idioms. So, what do first through third grade Polish kids read? In the US, reading in these grades was based largely on seeing words written and all common words (verbs and nouns) were eventually presented. My theory is that I'd likely learn some vocabulary by studying very elementary reading materials. The rest I can handle. Anybody know of very elementary, preferably graded reading material where I might acquire a vocabulary? I'm planning a trip to mój ojczyzny kraj sometime next year. I became fluent after 6 weeks while I was there - but that was 45 years ago, and I still got by, largely (and very poetically) just making up words when I didn't know them.
