How I Successfully Passed My First Russian Exam / советы по изучению!

Привет, my lovely people!

I never imagined I'd be able to write and read in Russian 5 months ago. I was complaining back and forth, but now I'm here. My semester is over,

and I passed my Russian class with a B!

MY TIPS

1.

It is important to have someone practice speaking (in your target language) with you. I am lucky to have a native Russian professor, which is understandable because I am a student of 'Slavic Studies'. She is a wonderful professor who does not require us to memorize everything, but rather encourages us to practice by speaking in class frequently.

2.

You should also try downloading language learning apps and practice there. In my case, I only use Duolingo because it allows me to practice all of my TL. It is not a 'perfect' app; the audios are not the same as if you were listening to a native speaker, but from my experience, it is the most enjoyable, and it is also free.

I had a lot of apps for Japanese studies before deciding on Duolingo and another one that is also very good. It makes me feel more productive and less scattered with 100 apps on my phone. If you, like me, dislike practice books, I recommend that you download the app that best meets your needs and limit your use to no more than two apps. You'll be able to finish the chapters and concentrate on one learning technique.

3. 

What was the most difficult for me at first was that the Russian language has different types of letters — what do I mean? They have cursive and block letters that look completely different, so I basically had to learn two alphabets! I printed out the document our professor gave us and practiced by doing homework before my Monday morning class every Sunday. I used to have to check each letter before writing a simple word, but now I can write faster without looking at the document. I've seen a lot of my classmates writing in printed/block letters, but I prefer cursive, so I'm writing in cursive.

4.

I was terrified of having to read in front of my professor and classmates. My pronunciation sounded more like a BCS most of the time. There was one day when the professor decided that we would read dialogues aloud, and I panicked because I had been focusing so much on writing and not practicing reading at home at all, so before my dialogue, I looked at the document and wrote Latin letters on top of the Russian letters, so I could read smoothly when it was my turn. Fortunately, I no longer have to do this.

Personally, I don't have to translate much because Slovenian (my native language) and Russian share many words, and even when they don't, I know how to speak BCS, so it's easier for me to understand. I'm glad I know those languages because it makes my studies easier, but there are a lot of words that I don't know what they mean, so I have to look them up in the dictionary. After all, Russian is a foreign language to me.

My goal was to memorize the letters rather than the vocabulary, so a Russian girl from my dorm lent me two of her books (children's books) so I could practice my reading and see how much I could actually memorize.

That's all I've got from my side, guys.

Thank you very much, and remember to practice and

read every day if you want to achieve your goal.

Byeeee,