The Polish language - it's bloody hard!

Ok ive been told in a sense that i dont give anything towards this forum, so im going to learn Polish, its hard but i will get there and thats my contribution.

I am trying to learn polish but it is so bloody hard!!!Any ideas on the best way to learn?I have a book but it hasnt helped that much!

I think you need to start from the basics - do you know the basic words yet? Also, Polish movies might help.

i have tried watching Roman Polanski's Knife in Water but they talk really fast!I know how to say hello and good afternoon-but my knowledge is very basic-the prounounciation of words is difficult for me to get the hang of-i can write things in polish as opposed to saying them!

For me it was more difficult to speak than write English too. I know Polish is generally more difficult than English. Do you live in the area where there are many Poles? There are radio and even TV chanells in Polish (in Chicago and NY area). You could try listening to Polish online, for example

polskieradio.com/news_audio/102020061736662.mp3

(they are based in Chicago so they don't talk 100% pure Polish .

You can also check this thread -- good Polish dictionary:

http://www.polishforums.com/translation_dictionary-17_3125_0.html

Do not feel bad, I am at the diadvantage of being 'old' and trying to teach myself Polish. Sure I live in the US and we have a large Polish population but I live 2 hours from Baltimore and Washington DC and it is expensive. The Polish Embassy has classes but they are during the week at night (woman alone travelling in DC is not good!) and it is $400 usd not cheap!! sigh

I have tried tapes and books, but the pronunciation part is my down fall. LOL and word recognition - they start to look alike. What is helping me is the class I am taking to understand language formation. Understanding IPA for English at least makes the ocnnection for me to the Polish:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_phonology

I wish you lots of luck!

Francesca ya never to old to learn

Now I know why so few people learn Polish

Lot's of goodies here

http://www.langsites.com/Polish.htm

I'm also in the process. Not having many problems with the vocabulary, but the grammar is killing me.

Nice link FISZ, good one!

I found this language software on the net. The free shareware version is great. It actually 'speaks' the words to you!! You can buy upgrades for more words, but the free stuff is enough to get anyone started. Hope this info helps someone

Go to byki.com It's a fast way to learn a language. First lessons are free and it's a good start. They pronounce the words fast or slow, they write them and it's a very good start. Please try it.

There are movies on TVP Polonia with English written translation.

I started learning polish about a year ago (because of a man!!!!). I taught myself from a phrase book and we used to text all the time so my reading and writing was ok. As for pronunciation.... well.... i'm getting better!! I did a course which helped and am friends with my tutor (native polish girl) so try to talk polish when I'm with her - except her English is great so we more often than not end up talking in English!!!

For pronunciation, would say the first thing to do is learn the alphabet (I know it sounds daft but if you know how letter and groups of letters are said, then words become easier!)

Good luck all of you!!! x

I do not know how easy it is to find now but Poland produced a very good book in the 1960's entitled Mowimy Po pOlsku. It came with records but is a very good course if you can get hold of a copy. There is a course called Linguaphone and their Polish course is very good, Perhaps you could get a copy from a library? Polish grammar is logical and is not so difficult as French.

I find it very hard, I've got a Polish book but I get confused on all the different variations on words.

My Polish friends say for an English person my pronounciation is good, but I always use the wrong variations of words.

the best way to practise is to speak . try to mingle with us and you will pick it quickly

You need to understand the polish alphabet if you have no knowledge or understanding of this you may find you struggle to comprehend the language.

Then you have to master the grammar.

I have been studying at college 14 weeks tomorrow and i still find it difficult but determination is the key and you really need to know that you want to learn the language as it is difficult and hard

I struggle on the pronounication and i still structure my polish sentences in the same way you would say or write it in english which is incorrect as polish sentences have the words jumbled but i will get there eventually perservance is the key to anything in life!!


Which software is that then???


It is the best way ... but when you dont see many people you knew anymore its difficult and when you dont get chance to meet new polish people even more difficult

whew ... i get my tongue all twisted pronouncing the words. it is mighty hard indeed, but am really determined to learn. though i am not aiming to be a scholar of the language, i just want to be able to carry a decent conversation.

---

"With each new language you learn, you become a person richer" ...

There is a good book by B.W. Mazur called Colloquial Polish and it is very good. Otherwise there is a book called Mowimy Po Polsku written in the 1960's. It too is very good. No one course can teach you everything though Polish is not difficult and you should certainly not have to pay for lessons to learn it-that would be the worst thing you could do. The language is logical and phonetic and produces few if any problems for the learner.

Michal,

As far as the relative transparency of Polish, to reiterate, it most definitely is far "easier" from the point of view of pronunciation than English or French, even German with its "voiceless" dipthongs (e.g. "wie" =how. pronounced as a single phoneme vs. Polish "wie" = she/she knows, pronounced as TWO separate letters, only the "w" as English "v"-sound, taking some getting used to!).

Its constant irregularities (typical of pan-Slavic nothwithstanding) however, can pose serious problems for the average English-speaking learner (as opposed to Spanish or italian, phonetically speaking, of course), who have to contend with a seemingly capricious case system (as with all inflected languages) and occasional discrepancies in verb classes, not mention aspectual issues as well as word order.

Having grown up with German as a second first language and having many years of Latin under my belt, Polish was not a problem to learn.
I am, though, a notable exception among my colleagues who have also studied Polish.

Marek

ALE JAJA !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Uderz w stól, a nożyce się odezwą

Nie od razu Kraków zbudowano

Czego Jaś się nie nauczył, tego Jan nie będzie wiedział

please do not attempt to translate

heheheh

ale jaja!!!!!!!!!!!

Yeah it's hard

In Krakow learning polish at a language school struggleing with my prononciation of the polish alpabet ....ahhh Nie wiem


hope I can achive something at least after my two weeks is up! think it will be harder once I get back and I'm not around native polish speakers

PLG,

The first, I'm frankly unsure about how to translate. The second is, "Rome wasn't built in a day.", The third, " What Jack never learned as a boy, he won''t learn as a grown up either."

Marek

Regarding that first phrase, Uderz w stól, a nożyce się odezwą - may I offer a possible translation for what sounds like a piece of dialog from Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Do you favor something literal such as, "Pound the table, and the scissors will respond"? Or, do you prefer a bit of artistic license in, "A demanding fist receives a cutting response"?

i`m trying to learn english.........

phrasal verbes, conditional, past passive.... THIS is bloody hard

I'm currently trying to learn polish. Luckly i've got a polish friend with a masters degree in polish teaching me. But despite that, it's still difficult.

From a beginners point of view, my advice is to become aware of gender, word suffixs and become vaugley aware of przypadek.

Learn about:

on - he
ona - she
ono - it
my - we
wy - you lot
oni - them

When you refer to yourself or other the suffixs can change. Jest (is) jestem (i am) jestesz (you).

That's a good place to start, once you've done that an understand how words are modified you'll be able to spot the base word easier.

After that learn commen words such as nie, czy, to, etc.

Then start to build vocab so you can start looking at sentence structure and the unholy przypadek.

mark your English spelling is poor mate >STRUGGLING>PRONUNCIATION.ACHIEVE>.

NIE WIEM......

who rattled your cage anyway?

Probably had a few piwo when I wrote that about three weeks ago ...how time flies (being careful to spell just for you PLG in this message !)

I was actually just starting to pick up certain words in the Polish language right at the end of my two weeks.
As I said a lot harder now I'm not hearing it everyday but improving slowly also helps that I can refer back to some Polish films I bought back and try to pick up new words too

then i've got to get my head around the Polish grammar...but one step at a time