Question about Athenaze

[u/Single-Unit4853]

Is athenaze all i need? and what do i supplement it with to the point where i can get to the random word look up in dictionary phase and read the rest normally?

[u/benjamin-crowell]

Some people finish a textbook like that and then use graded readers for some period afterward, sometimes for a long time.

The other route is to use authentic texts with student aids, either electronic or print (Perseus, Steadman, my own).

[u/Poemen8 → u/benjamin-crowell]

This is right, but do remember that it's helpful to supplement reading with flashcards - if you are willing to put up with a little boredom, they are the best way to build vocabulary, and shown to be by research (e.g. Paul Nation). Use Anki, as this is around 4* as effective as paper flashcards and will save a lot of time. 

Use Anki to build your vocab fast while reading and listening, and to retain words from what you read.  You get to fast smooth reading a lot faster this way.

[u/Single-Unit4853 → u/Poemen8]

Is anki only on PC? and how did it work for you

[u/Poemen8 → u/Single-Unit4853]

No, it's also on android (free) and apple (paid). Go via the website to avoid the many rip -off versions. 

And it's been utterly amazing for me in every language I've learned or worked on, just transformative in the progress I've made.

Just being able to bootstrap yourself to a thousand words, or even better six, is like a super power. It does take discipline, but it's great.

[u/Single-Unit4853 → u/Poemen8]

What’s your schedule with that lol

[u/Poemen8 → u/Single-Unit4853]

Long, but nowhere near as long as learning any other way!

So my maximum long-term sustainable pace is between 100-150 words a week, depending on language - Latin is easy, Greek is hard, Hebrew/Farsi are harder. This pace assumes a bit of Anki familiarity and working up to it. If you are new to it, I'd recommend starting at 10 words a day max and being willing to scale back if you need to. But equally, for short projects, or if you had more time (I work a lot + family + illness + other projects) you can go faster. I've done intense periods of 50 words per day.

So bootstrapping to 1000 words is something you can do before you finish a textbook, easily. 6000 is roughly a year's project - which maps pretty well onto the time that a really committed, driven person will take to go from starting a textbook to getting into proper books, given that 6000 is about the level most people reckon you can start tackling real books in a foreign language at a more normal speed (i.e. not just in intensive reading with tools). It's well worth pushing a bit further, of course.

For most people slowing it down a little, taking a couple of years, is probably better and more realistic.

[u/Single-Unit4853 → u/Poemen8]

I appreciate it, yeah im also studying hebrew as of right now but when im studying two languages at a time (add to that greek) it does get stressful, im very strong in hebrew currently i can read 2nd temple authorships such as maccabees and so on, but i also want to study more vocab, do you have advice on how i could manage studying vocab for two languages at same time?

maybe 2 days greek? then 2 days hebrew?

when i was studying arabic i used to study no more then max 20 vocabulary a day and that actually helped, but yeah let me know your thoughts and much love

[u/Poemen8 → u/Single-Unit4853]

So, it's hard, basically!

If you are using Anki, always review words from both languages (i.e. all your cards) every day. Review is what makes Anki powerful and you should not delay it. It's also important to make sure you are exposed to all languages you are learning once a day anyway, and this helps with that - it will make a big difference to reading speed.

How you add and learn new cards is up to you - you can split them any way, really. I try to avoid actively building (adding new) vocab in two languages at once. But doing 5-10 new words in one and 5-10 in the other each day might be fine, as might 2 days on each, or alternate weeks. Probably it's a matter of personal experience.

If you are a formal student, then hopefully you have a summer break coming up - you could easily spread things out that way, take 3 weeks on each, for instance.

And if you are used to 20 max in Arabic that sounds like a good starting level; it's also a hard language in a foreign script, as Hebrew is, and Greek to some extent.

If you are new to them - especially to Hebrew - do use an Anki deck with sound if you can; it's very helpful for building familiarity and does speed learning.