yesterday Chinese class before 老师’s power outage and 我的 internet issues

The Nature Method

The nature method textbooks were designed to be read, and if you knew a similar language you were meant to rely on cognates and the pictures to understand the whole textbook. The lessons would gradually introduce new words (around 3000) in context, and new grammar.

I want to share something awesome! A girl tried out the same nature method textbook I did. Her video is short so I recommend just checking it out:

She also linked the nature method resources in her summary, which I will paste below:

I read half of Le Francais par la Methode Nature, years ago, and it helped push me to being able to read graded readers I had and then eventually anything I picked up in French. I loved the book. I loved learning to read BY reading in the language immediately, learning a language BY doing stuff in the language immediately. I love learning through context, so I loved the style of these nature method textbooks and wish there were more modern ones being used. Lingua Latina for Latin is the only nature method textbook I'm sure is still being used in some classes.

I ended up finding print copies of the French version, the Italian version, and a similar styled book called the All Spanish Method.

I used the audio of Le Francais par la Methode Nature made by Ayan Academy on youtube, like her, to work on my listening skills a few years after reading the textbook. I still would like to both finish reading and listening to this textbook. I feel it got me to B1 level and then I just kind of jumped into reading other stuff I was interested in, and my reading skills improved but none of my other skills did lol.

If you like the style of the textbook, I really recommend these nature method textbooks. If you use them, using them the way she describes she studied them in her video is probably the best way. I just read and listened, and it helped my passive skills but I definitely want to go back and do the production exercises one day.

Be aware they're OLD textbooks, 70+ years old at this point, so some information and words may be out of date. I partly read the textbook when I first did because I was curious what differences there were in an older textbook, what things they taught differently, how they spoke about history and values, which is why I have a big collection of old textbooks at home. I'm into looking at that kind of stuff.

(I once had a horrifically bad chinese textbook from right in the middle of the simplification of characters, so some were simplified and some weren't, and the textbook only had a whopping 100 words it taught which really upset me... on the other hand I have an amazing Chinese Grammar textbook from 1930 that uses 了 only ever pronounced as 'liao' and only uses nin for you, but it's grammar and hanzi explanations are some of the clearest I've ever read).

Well the nature method textbooks were used most from 1920s - 1960s, and the older ones are often the Direct Method (mislabeled by someone as Nature Method) which involved a lot of dialogues in the target language but were not necessarily designed to be understandable without a teacher. Nature Method textbooks are designed to be understandable without a teacher, with just the context of the textbook and visuals, and assume the student knows a similar language to the target language already (so it assumes students know Spanish or Italian or French or English or German already).

Nature Method textbooks usually have more context and cognates in the beginning chapters. Direct Method textbooks usually have plenty of dialogues, and sometimes plenty of pictures to teach the words, but ultimately assume a teacher is teaching many words and grammar and so grammar is not explained in the context of long form stories like it is in nature method. I like Nature Method more. Direct method is okay, Poco a Poco is an example of a direct method textbook. Le Francais par la Methode Nature is an example of a nature method textbook.

Anyway I love the nature method textbooks, I wish some newer textbooks were designed in a similar way.

【 Korean Study Resource 】

» Book : Korean Grammar in Use: Beginning to Early Intermediate » Link : Google Drive link

I don’t use this as a standalone textbook, but it’s honestly one of the most useful grammar references I’ve found for the A1–B1 level.

It’s structured to make it easy to revisit specific points when reviewing or filling in gaps—clear explanations, good example sentences, and enough nuance to help things stick without being overwhelming!

I treat it more like a grammar dictionary + workbook hybrid. I usually go back to it when I’m feeling unsure about a structure I’ve seen before, or when I want to make sure I fully understand a pattern I’ve encountered in native content.

If you're somewhere between basic and intermediate and want a grammar guide that’s actually usable (and not dry or overly academic), I’d say this is worth having!

» My progress on the book : #kgiub posts

[Dental Anatomy; Development of Tooth]

You know the feeling when life is moving so fast that you get physical whiplash? Well, that and studies.

Until next time,

B.

"Blorbo from my shows" no. Blorbo from my BA. Blorbo from my major. Blorbo from my primary source document.

I expected the weird answers like machiavelli and napoleon but the amount of people naming their real life university professors is unprecedented

LONG TIME NO SEEEEE

okay i’m back from vacation (had the best time ever) and now it’s time to lock in 😼

i’m starting slow and doing zoology to pick up momentum so today’s goal is to finish the entirety of human physiology.

breathing and exchange of gases

body fluids and circulation

excretory products and their elimination

locomotion and movement

neural control and coordination

chemical coordination and integration

okayyy i’m gonna get back to studying now

have an amazing day my loves 🌼

Last weekend - 🇮🇸 🇯🇵- stay tuned for this weekend (I went out..)

I wanted to take a sick day, but my teacher managed to take it herself and canceled classes until Wednesday... Oops. Well, I'm not complaining - it's good for me! More time to study at home!

experimenting with writing my notes mostly, if not all, in korean.

✑ Korean Diary Entry #1

난 오늘 진짜 일찍 일어났어. 아직도 진짜 피곤했어. 오늘은 미샤엘과 함께 침대에서 자야 했어. 또 일어났을 때, 업무 밑이 있었어. 그리고 나서 미샤엘이랑 놀았어.

오늘 많은 국수를 먹었어 - 진짜 매콤했어.

지금 침대 가운데에서 한국말을 공부하고 있어요.

Was very tired and rested a bit. But every rest must come to an end at some point!

I am writing some exercises from the activities section; even if the activity is just to "talk," I still like to write it.

A little bit of kanji practice from the lesson's vocabulary. I tend to forget how to write them easily, so I need more practice! (hope isn't because i like to practice while watching some anime lol (sometimes!))

ps. I found this super cute hello kitty's cookie at the supermarket, and it's tasty—it's milk-flavored! and I started watching Blue Box and I'm enjoying it a lot!

I deserve a reward of some kind