Week 4: Предварительные Знания (Prior Knowledge)

There are a few things I went over this week. The first is writing. I don’t have to include the writing portion in my Rosetta Stone lessons, but I choose to just to help with further review and familiarity with words. The writing lessons are probably also the funnest part, and not terribly hard either, mainly because the keyboard is mostly phonetic, and RS also has the keyboard right on the screen.

I was also finally introduced to numbers. Counting is always the first sign of knowing a language. Один (1), два (2), три (3), and so on. But one, two, and three is really all you need to know when it comes to picture taking. I remember learning these numbers when I was in Russia taking pictures, and so was able to recall them this time around.

Here it is asking me to say the number. I think I nailed it.

And speaking of recall and having things more solidified in my long-term memory, I came across some words in a new lesson that I was already familiar with because they were some of the items that I had labeled with post-it notes around the house back in week two. So it was nice to come across "стул" (chair), and "стол" (table) and not have to struggle to memorize it.

Words like chair and table I already knew, but only in the singular form. Now it is putting numbers next to them and making them plural.

Both of these situations with the numbers and words I had already learned emphasize the importance of drawing on prior knowledge in our learning. Making connections to our prior knowledge is a key part of the cognitive approach to learning. But it’s not simply that I went over the prior knowledge, it was built on. In both cases with the numbers and the objects, RS did not just give me the word, but also combined it with numbers and made them plural or allowed me to see the word within a sentence, in a different context.

And speaking of context, my wife and I just booked tickets to go to Russia in December. That’s right, a Russian winter. I don’t know what to expect, but I’m hoping that I’ll have some prior knowledge to draw on and use in a new context.