Do you speak Polish?: Taking a jump... into formal Polish lessons.

You might remember me telling you about the Polish textbook series, Hurra!. I've finished the first book (A1) level quite easily and I've been working my way through the second book. My primary teacher all this time has been my wife (and she's done a good job considering I'm a horror student) teaching me during the evenings. During the daytime, in between lessons, I used to practice my Polish with another teacher who has now gone to work for the E.U. in Brussels, leaving me stranded practicing my Polish throughout the day with people working at the swimming pool, coffee shops or banks.

This situation has been less than ideal and I felt my Polish becoming stagnant or worse getting worse. So, on Tuesday I went to the Rynek and walked into arguably the best Polish language school in Wrocław. If your from Wrocław you probably know which one I mean. I took a qualification test which thankfully put my level at A2 and I'm now signed up ready to join A2 classes next week.

And boy am I nervous. I know this A2 class a little more advanced than I am and I've been told to make sure I get the basics of conditionals and aspect before I come on Tuesday. I'm also nervous because I know how competitive I am and I literally won't stop studying until I know I'm the best in the group...

Polish lessons are expensive, like all language lessons and originally I was sceptical they could be of any use if I lived in Poland, exposed to the language everyday but I decided it would be useful to have some structure in my Polish learning and hopefully, this school will provide that for me.

I've been here one year now and I have a little better than elementary Polish, What about other expats out there? How has your Polish come along? What level do you have? How do you learn?

6 comments:

Pan Steeva21 January 2011 at 11:32
My learning started with a 'Teach yourself Polish' book in England, primarily followed by working here and picking everything up from people speaking and reading Polish work related documents, etc. My PC translator was my primary learning tool. Supporting this was sitting in pubs, listening and speaking to people, with domestic conversation coming up next. (My wife is overly helpful for my IQ and her flow of examples and analogies normally confuse me.)

I speak Polish continuously - even to the dog - and get along fine as people are always patient when I am incomprehensible. Quite a few Polish people have started talking to me in English, but eventually find it easier speaking in Polish.

I never write in Polish. Writing in English often takes me a lot of time and effort to get right.
upyoursuki'moff22 January 2011 at 00:45
i'm going the slow route, i'm learning with my Daughter she is 2 and already ahead of me I find I understand alot more than i can say although i sometimes get the wrong end of the stick and look like stupid i also find alot of the times i try to speak in shops i get a reply in english but i think 3/4/5 years and i should be able to string together a conversation
TeflSecretagent22 January 2011 at 08:13
Steeva - I too have that teach yourself book, but I didn't find it that great :(

upyoursuki - don't worry my dog speaks better Polish than I do.
Jeremy23 January 2011 at 20:54
I've been here 6 years and can hold a conversation comfortably. Yet writing escapes me mainly do to a lazyness i have. I tend to do away with conjugation. Also i am only just getting to grips with past and future simple/continuous. I tended to say every thing in just past or future continuous rather than specifying simple. As far as my dog goes I made it a rule that we speak only Polish, apart from the command 'heel' which i didn't know in Polish when I was training him.
Paddy24 January 2011 at 20:23
Would that be the language school not a million miles away from the flower part of the market? Plac Stolny? In which case it's the best language school I've ever learnt at.
TeflSecretagent29 January 2011 at 11:35
Paddy - That is indeed the one.

Up the stairs?

Everyone is welcome to make a comment. It's a free world after all :) the only thing I ask is that if you're going to write something nasty please have big enough balls to include your name and email address.