Test your languages online

The University of Westminster runs language courses in about 20 languages. In fact I did 3 of their evening courses in the mid 90s. For some languages they have a brief online diagnostic quiz. This tests how much you know so you can enrol at the right level. The quiz contains 50 questions, in a…… Continue reading Test your languages online

Scandinavian challenge: how did it go?

In June and July, I set myself a challenge of working through introductory language courses on Danish, Swedish and Norwegian. I planned to work each day on one of the languages. I finished the challenge in late July. I worked on these similar languages in parallel and more systematically than in earlier intermittent and brief…… Continue reading Scandinavian challenge: how did it go?

Scandinavian language challenge day 39

Today I worked through the last chapter (chapter 12) of Norwegian in three months, covering: more about prepositionspast participle used as an adjectivecolloquial speechgreetings and congratulationsother words More about prepositions Some verbs and adjectives with av (by): le av (laught at); lide av (suffer from); stolt av (be proud of) Some verbs and adjectives with over:…… Continue reading Scandinavian language challenge day 39

Scandinavian language challenge day 38

Today I worked through the last chapter (chapter 12) of Swedish in three months, covering: ‘either .. or’, ‘neither … nor’, ‘both … and”all and ‘whole’ the impersonal pronoun ‘man’ adjectives without a nounhow to translate some common English verbsspellingother words ‘either .. or’, ‘neither … nor’, ‘both … and’ Antingen … eller = either ……… Continue reading Scandinavian language challenge day 38

Scandinavian language challenge day 37

Today I worked through the last chapter (chapter 12) of Danish in three months, covering: more verbs ending in sverbs used as adjectives and as nounsword formationother words The chapter also comments briefly on punctuation and on writing letters (ie correpondence) in Danish. More verbs ending in s Some verbs occur only in the passive -s…… Continue reading Scandinavian language challenge day 37

Scandinavian language challenge day 36

Today I worked through chapter 11 of Norwegian in three months, covering: more expressions of timein order to more about ‘det’ verbs of position other words More expressions of time Prepositions: for … siden (ago): for fjorten dager siden (a fortnight ago)om (in, for [yet]):om en ukes tid (in a week)først om tre dager (not for…… Continue reading Scandinavian language challenge day 36

Scandinavian language challenge day 35

Today I worked through chapter 11 of Swedish in three months, covering: transitive and intransitive verbscreating verbs from adjectivepast participle as adjective passiveother words Transitive and intransitive verbs Pairs of related transitive and intransitive verbs: Transitivebränna (2) (burn)dränka (2) (drown)röka (2) (smoke)väcka (2) (wake)lämna (1) (leave)kyla (2) (chilll)ställa (2) (put, stand)lägga (4) (put, lay) Intransitivebrinna (4)…… Continue reading Scandinavian language challenge day 35

Scandinavian language challenge day 34

Today I worked through chapter 11 of Danish in three months, covering: numbers: fractions and collectivesadverbs of place and motionuses of adverbsconjunctions and adverbs used in pairsconfusable nounsother words Numbers: fractions and collectives The adjective halv means half and is inflected in the normal way: På en halVv dag spiste de et halvt får.(in half a…… Continue reading Scandinavian language challenge day 34

Scandinavian language challenge day 33

Today I worked through chapter 10 of Norwegian in three months, covering: passivepresent participlecompound wordsmore about prepositions other words Passive The passive is formed using the auxiliary bli and the past participle. The agent of the action need not be mentioned, but if mentioned it is preceded by the preposition av (meaning by). Huset blir maltHuset…… Continue reading Scandinavian language challenge day 33

Scandinavian language challenge day 32

Today I worked through chapter 10 of Swedish in three months, covering: where in relative clausesquestion words in subordinate clauses compound verbs other words Where in relative clauses Where in question: var? (where?) / vart? (to where?) Where in relative clause: där (where) / dit (to where); Han vet en restaurang, där man kan äta fransk…… Continue reading Scandinavian language challenge day 32