[lojban-beginners] Don't memorize what you don't understand

[Matt Arnold <mattarn@123.net>]

I've been using SuperMemo for PalmOS regularly for a couple of weeks, and there is some advice from the SuperMemo pages that is applicable to learning Lojban. Don't learn what you don't understand. I've been learning vocabulary in order of how often they're used in language, but many of the definitions mean nothing to me. For instance, I've discarded "noi: incidental clause" for the time being, because I just don't know what that is. Also "je: tanru and" because I don't even know what a tanru is yet. Or the entire family of abstracts. The SuperMemo website says if you create links in your brain between some noises and definitions that mean nothing to you, you are only doing more harm than good to your SuperMemo process. It's important to crack open a copy of The Complete Lojban Language (or the internet equivalents) every day, and look up the explanation and usage of the linguist/logician jargon on the flashcards being committed that day. Then when you feel you can use a wor!
d in a sentence while drilling on it-- close the book, commit the flashcard and go on your way. If you're not ready to use it in a sentence, don't learn it or you're creating what's called "memory interference."

You should understand the pronunciation rules, and understand the differences between a gismu and a noun, verb, adjective or adverb, before you even start SuperMemo. Otherwise you are actively harming your ability to speak lojban, by mis-learning it and having to un-learn later with great difficulty.

Case in point: after I encountered so many definitions referring to "bridi" and "sumti," I finally had the idea to look up the flashcards with the definitions of those words and commit them first. I had to create one for "selbri." Do this when you find yourself ready in the Complete Lojban Language (or its web equivalent) to advance to certain classes of words whose definitions contain an unfamiliar lojban word, such as "brivla" "gismu" "rafsi" "lujvo" "fu'ivla" "tanru" "cmavo" "prosumti" "probridi" "discursive" "abstractor" or other jargon. If there are no cards for them, make them. Next, learn a gismu and some prosumti so you can make a simple utterance to use words in as you memorize. Learn a new gismu every day. Maybe a new pro-sumti or a simple vocative. As you learn grammar facts, make new grammar flashcards to remind you of them.
-Matt

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