Thread: Hi....

Hi....im new and i was wondering if there were any tips for a beginner...that arnt already on the site?

Привет .... им нового, и мне было интересно, если есть какие-либо советы для начинающих ... что Arnt уже на сайте?

Originally Posted by Sudzy1225

Привет .... Я - новичок, и мне _ интересно, _ есть ли какие-либо советы для начинающих, которых ещё нет на сайте?

Sorry, I don't know much about a question you've asked, but hello and welcome!

Here are my tips:

• Try to learn in a structured way, e.g. working your way through a book (I'd recommend "The New Penguin Russian Course: A Complete Course for Beginners" by Nicholas J. Brown). I didn't do this to start with and as a result my knowledge of Russian is somewhat patchy. (If you are getting formal lessons, this doesn't apply so much, as the structure is already provided for you by your tutor, and you will probably already be assigned a certain textbook.)
• Sound clips are your best friend! I know MR has some, as do many sites. Listen to them if you want to get your pronunciation right! Don't rely on transliteration. Also listening to native speakers helps a great deal, if you have Skype that's ideal.
• In my experience, words and grammatical rules will stick better if you learn how to use them in a sentence than if you learn them in isolation. E.g. just learning that the genitive singular of masculine nouns often ends in «а» is easily forgettable, but if you learn a sentence such as «У Ивана есть ручка» (Ivan has a pen), you not only learn to apply this rule, you also learn the construction «у [genitive] есть _____» to show "[x] has a _____"