Learning a New Language

We have finally made the plunge and are learning a new language.  We of course, know English.  I'm fluent in Spanish and the boys can understand Spanish and speak it a little.  So what are we learning now?  Russian! 

I looked at book stores and all I see is books for learning Spanish, French, Latin and German.  Very few books are out there for Russian.  Hubby took it during high school and can read very well although he might not understand everything he is reading so this is why we decided to learn it.   

So how are we learning?  At the moment we are diving into the language and learning different ways.  I made the alphabet cards with Russian letters in front and the sound in the back.  Did you know that some letters in Russian are printed one way but look totally different when written in cursive?  We have got lots of learning to do.  

We have dictionaries.  We even have the bible and some other books in Russian.  Oldest son can already read Russian some and so can I but that doesn't mean we know what we are reading.  We compare the Russian Bible to the English Bible and we do the same with the other books we have.  We have also attended a bible study meeting in the Russian language.  Total immersion is the way to go.  We have the written page and audio and then Russian speaking friends to help us along.  

We are also using Mango language program through our library.  Since Rosetta Stone left the library they now have Mango.  It's a pretty good program and we can do it from home and best of all it's free.  We don't have to be at the library to use it although we do need our library card number.  No problem there.  

So hands on and total immersion is the way we do it to learn a new language.