The Oxford Picture Dictionary: The 14 Day Trial

Before I came to Brasil, I mentioned that I took some lessons. Knowing that I'd do most of my learning in Brazil, my teacher prepared me for various situations the best she could and supplied various books. One of which I now refer to as the "ultimate tome of usefulness": The Oxford Picture Dictionary (English <--> Brazilian Portuguese). That was one of the things I was sure to have when I left and I assumed I'd be using it all the time. Well, today is the third time I've used it in almost 10 weeks here.

This is kind of disturbing. Right now, the only thing limiting my speaking ability (outside of my apparently outrageous accent), is my vocabulary. I have a good sense of "detail work" of Portuguese by watching other people and watching T.V, now all I need is the infrastructure; vocab.

So my first thought was, I have a large book of Portuguese words, a notebook and a desire to learn. So why not just do it?

Why?

Because for me (and I'd wager most other kids my age), sitting in front of a textbook when it's warm outside is...boring. So here's what I've schemed:

I'm going to make this process into a game. In my dictionary there are exactly 240 pages with over 150 separate categories. From basic colors to benthic marine biology, this book has every category you can imagine. Today I did 21 pages (about 10.5 notebook pages), which was rather exhausting. However that would mean - assuming I kept that pace - that in about 11 days, I'd have recorded and - hopefully - learned words for over 150 situations. But that's not very realistic, is it?

Now that I've read 21 pages, that leaves 219 pages to read, record and learn.

If I lowered my pace to, say, 16 pages per day (with 219 pages left), I'd maintain sanity whilst finishing in a celeritous 14 days.

So it begins! Starting tomorrow, my 14 day trial of wits commences. Will I be able to do it? Or will I crack under the crushing boredom? Time will only tell.

I'll post daily progress as we move forward.