What can be easier than the Nominative case? It is the basic, the original form of a noun, and its major role in a sentence is to be a subject. This is what I thought until I opened a Russian as Foreign language test guide (Требования по русскому языку как иностранному). Surprisingly, the authors of […]
Author: Eugenia Vlasova
- Pronunciation
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Q&A: Practicing Pronunciation And Specifically Щ
Hey! A fellow learner here. I was wondering if you have any tip or site to practice Russian pronunciation, especially words those with “щ”, the hardest Cyrillic letter to pronounce as I have read in some pages. Thanks for your time and help! 🙂 Hi! Pronunciation is probably the hardest part of the second language […]
Rules? What Rules?
A few days ago, I watched a video of an English lesson for foreign students. Observing other teachers working with real students is a part of the Teaching English as Second Language certification, so I watched a young lady explaining to her students how to add the ending -(e)s to English verbs in the Present […]
Passive Voice In Russian
The passive voice is a very convenient grammatical category. When something has happened, we usually can tell who did what, but sometimes, we don’t want to name the agents. We may want or need to report the event itself, but would prefer to shift our focus away from the actors to the action itself. This […]
Q&A: How To Answer “How Are You” In Russian?
I was wondering if you had a post or if you could make a post about emotions. I want to learn more ways to respond to ‘Как дела?’ than simply “Я хорошо” and such. If not, could you direct me to a place where emotions in Russian are listed? Спасибо! Hi! Here are some options […]
How to Get Most Out of Language Exchange
It has never been easier to learn languages. The internet has made many language resources accessible for everyone. Language exchange platforms went even further: they facilitated the hardest part of the learning languages online. I’m talking about finding a language partner for speaking practice. Many websites and mobile applications dedicated to language exchange have been […]
What Language Learning Is Like
Since languages are often a part of a school curriculum, many people believe that learning a new language is like learning algebra or physics. It is not. Algebra and physics take understanding. Learning a new language takes development of new skills, and it has more similarities with playing music, dancing, driving a car, and other […]
- Podcasting
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Пять минут. Выпуск 25
Привет! Вы слушаете двадцать пятый эпизод подкаста “Пять минут”. Это подкаст для тех, кто учит русский язык. Меня зовут Евгения Власова. Я лингвист, я веду блог ProperRussian.com и преподаю русский язык. Сегодня мы поговорим о снеге. А снег идет, а cнег идет, И все мерцает и плывет, За то что ты в моей судьбе, Спасибо, […]
Language Learning And Real World
Once a student of mine explained to me in good Russian that he was bad at learning languages. He explained to me exactly why he was incapable of speaking Russian for thirty minutes. When I pointed out that he had been speaking Russian for thirty minutes in a row, he was shocked. Another student told […]
Learning vs. Acquisition
During my scholarly life, I have learned many languages – English, German, French, Bulgarian, even Latin and Old Slavonic. The only language that I practiced outside the classroom was English. No wonder the only second language I can actually speak is English. How is it that despite learning German, French, and Latin for three years […]