Tuesday, July 30, 2013

I Made It a Little More Official

Today, at the beginning of week 5 of my attempt at Norwegian, I celebrated a little.

Since my knowledge of the language is probably hovering somewhere between A1 and A2 right now (closer to A1 than A2 but I will not allow this detail to deflate this balloon in which I'm currently traveling across the sky), I decided I deserve a little acknowledgment of the knowledge I acquired.

So instead of a little medal or a blue ribbon, I gave myself a virtual nod - I added Bokmål Norwegian to the languages I speak on my LinkedIn profile. Thank goodness LinkedIn allows for some indication of the proficiency level of the languages that people (claim to) speak. I wholeheartedly indicated that my proficiency level happens to be "Elementary proficiency".

On a moderately related note, I'm finding that the more advanced I become (advanced - doesn't feel right to use this word yet but since this is me patting myself on the back session, I'll let myself have it), the more distracted I become with different resources I find to learn Norwegian. I remember when at the beginning of this journey I was bemoaning the scarcity of the learning materials. Now I have more than enough. I almost feel I'm losing direction a little bit. The different resources are making learning more interesting but they're also making it harder for me to measure my progress. I may remain torn between quantifiable and organic knowledge - and I know most serious language learners are totally pro-organic (maybe with the exception of professor Alexander Arguelles who at any point in time knows exactly how many hours/pages of writing/pages of reading he invested into each language that he's studying) . And I so longed to know exactly where I stand!

But I guess that ship (or should it be balloon?) has sailed. I will learn to embrace all my knowledge then, no matter how it was acquired.