[lojban-beginners] A learning idea..... and my own attempt to do it.

[Betsemes <betsemes@gmail.com>]

Around two weeks ago, I got my eighth sponsored child; a filipino
little girl who lives on Manila city. I practically never before had
sponsored a child who doesn't speak my native language, Spanish, so
when I was reading her personal facts, it attracted my attention that
she only speaks Filipino. After some inquiries, I knew that filipinos
learn to talk in English very well, so it will not be necessary to
worry about it at all. Yet, I thought it would be really nice to be
able to write to her in her own native language, so I bought an audio
course on Tagalog. What immediately I notice is the easiness of
learning something if it is already recorded, specially if the player
is a highly portable one which I can bring with me everywhere and
listen to it even when I'm walking at the mall or driving my car. I
extracted all of the CD tracks and stored it in a small MP3 player
which I can take everywhere and listen to it almost anytime. I thought
just how much easier and faster would learning Lojban be whether we
would have an audio course. Of course, I know about the project that
Yanis have proposed to make, but it is in it's bare beginnings if any.
So I was thinking on this and I got an idea that might work better
than whatever I have being doing to learn Lojban up until now (task
that I have been doing inconsistently), and I considered it worth
sharing.

1) Write an English sentence. It could be almost anything; everyday
conversation lines, book sentences, or any sentence that you could
come up with both original or copied.

2) Do any possible effort to translate it.

3) Post your translation either on the Lojban list or the Lojban
beginners list and ask for comments and corrections.

4) Actively correct your translation as you get comments from the list
members. Post your new corrected translation. You might need to
correct and post repeatedly until the translation is totally correct.
You might want to know the way to pronounce it, so you might want use
your MP3 Player/recorder or your PC to record some words, post the
audio file and ask whether or not the pronunciation is correct.

5) Once you are satisfied with the translation and know precisely how
to pronounce it, then read it repeatedly, both silently and aloud
until you feel confortable reading it.

6) Record it using your MP3 player/recorder or your computer. If
recorded with a computer then store it in your digital audio player.

7) Play and replay it many times, over and over and over again. Reread
the emails and/or word definitions related to your sentence until you
know the full meaning of your sentence by heart.

8) Write a new English sentence and repeat the while process. I think
it would be more effective if your new sentence is related to your
previous one.

Well, that's about the whole of my idea. What do you think?

It might be flawed in many ways, but it seems to me that I would learn
Lojban much faster by using this procedure than by using any other
method including flash cards. At least I'm willing to try it out.

So then where should I begin? I think anything is good rather than
nothing, so I'll begin translating this very email. So my first
sentence was:

"Around two weeks ago, I got my eighth sponsored child; a filipino
little girl who lives on Manila city."

lojban translation:
zi lo jeftu be li re mi [pu] co'a pidversra lo mi bimoi be lo'i verba
be'o ne lo se natmrfilipino ke cmalu. nixli poi xabju lo tcadu pe me'e
la'o py. Manila .py.

pidversra: x1=s1 helps/donates to/supports poor child x2=s2=v1=p1 by
means x3=s4, child is of age x4=v2 and lacking in
possessions/properties x5=p2

co'a    ZAhO    initiative

moi x1 is the (n)th member of set x2 when ordered by rule x3

xabju x1 dwells/lives/resides/abides at/inhabits/is a resident of
location/habitat/nest/home/abode x2

x1 is a town/city of metropolitan area x2, in political unit x3,
serving hinterland/region x4

jeftu x1 is x2 weeks in duration (default is 1 week) by standard x3

natmi x1 is a nation/ethnic group of peoples x2; [people sharing a
history/culture]

So there is no type 4 fu'ivla for "Filipino". I think there should be
one. I also wrote each pause explicitly, please, tell me whether they
are OK and whether there should be another one. I think the "pu" is
not necesary from the Lojban standpoint, but I inserted it on brackets
to state where I think it should be.

Please, advise.