802

 I went looking online for Youtube videos about te reo Maori. I came across one by Grant Whitbourne that recommended the book Te Rangatahi as the best Maori resource, according to the speaker.

I posted this comment:

I have my own copy of Book 1 (reprinted in 1973). I would agree with you that Te Rangatahi is good, but I don't think it is as good as it could be. Strengths (in my opinion) narratives, illustrations, simplicity, many useful sentences, and structures. Weaknesses (again in my opinion) insufficient scaffolding, unclear objectives (since section headings are in Maori), too many exercises and gap fills, and a 'backwards' arrangement of each chapter i.e. it starts with a narrative which it then breaks down. I would like to see a more bilingual approach where the Maori and the English texts are set side by side. The overall approach of this book is 90% left-brain-style thinking, and only 10% right-brain-style thinking.

725

I’ve created a playlist on YouTube. I’m collecting interesting-looking videos with Maori content. And although I cannot read or listen to them in full, I can play a game of extracting useful snippets.

I copy out and collect not just single words. Instead, I aim for couplets, phrases, and occasionally a complete sentence. (I need a bit of glue between words, or a bit of a pattern.)

My initial project is the children’s book about the seven stars. Luckily, I was able to save it to the list. For some reason, videos with content for children may not be saved.

214

It’s handy being able to access my place of work during the holidays. And that’s what I did yesterday. At the flick of an electronic key I enjoyed a quiet environment, comfy furniture, wireless, and a coffee machine too. (I even put my bicycle inside for safety.)

When my work was done, I played listening books in Dutch (De duivel draagt het licht), German (Vermiss mein nicht) and French (Le petit prince). It’s easy to create libraries of them on YouTube. I use Google translate to search for the equivalent of ‘Listening book’ in the languages that I’m interested in.