Status Update #1

It's been two months now. That is, two months since I actually started LEARNING, not just telling myself I would do at some point.

At first, I wasn't sure if I would need to motivate myself to do any studying but luckily for me, that hasn't really been a problem so far. <Insert smiley face here!>

I've mainly been going through the Rosetta Stone lessons and I'm almost finished with the level one software. I've also been working through this fantastic book, too:

So am I anywhere near fluent yet? Well, no, sadly not.

Although I can now put basic sentences together and have equally basic conversations about where I live and what I do, my vocabulary is still very small - maybe 150 - 200 words at a guess. Even with such a small knowledge at this stage, I can describe a number of different things....places, colours, objects, people, etc.

The level one stuff is basic, since it has to be as a starting point. There is an old saying that goes "don't run before you can walk." I've mentioned before that this is a long-term ambition of mine. Two months is no time at all to learn a new language, especially with a full-time job which limits how much time I can spend on it.

One thing I really do need to work on is my accent. Speaking Dutch with an English accent just sounds odd - imagine Steve McClaren in reverse! Dutch vowel sounds are very different to ours, and words that look identical to English ones often have very different pronunciations.

The audio files with the Rosetta Stone pack have definitely helped up to now, but I need to hear real Dutch conversations to pick up the best accent I can. Luckily, a friend told me about Radio 538, a Dutch station aimed a younger listeners. My Belgian friend Marie hasn't heard of it so I'm going to start listening to it and found out what it's like. Even if I can't understand half of what's being said, I will at least be able to immerse myself in Dutch for long periods of time and embed the accent into my mind.

So, in summary: I'm still very much a work in progress. It's still early days but I've learned looooaaads since I started and with my books and other resources to help with the Rosetta Stone lessons, hopefully my next update will see me much more accomplished:)

Tot ziens!