r/Portuguese • u/floodeda • 5d ago
Brazilian Portuguese 🇧🇷 Learning with harry potter
This is a post to document my progress and strategy for learning Portuguese (Br).
I started learning Br Portuguese a few months ago. I have long been immersed in Brazilian music and dance culture (forro) and so have been exposed to the language for a long time without making an effort to learn.
My strategy so far has been
- watching videos on youtube, the channel "Decoding Words" with Andrew is great for grammar, and basic introduction to the language with an emphasis on pronunciation.
- listening to and translate voice messages/ videos from native speaking friends.
- translating songs that I like
I can understand quite a lot of written text, but my comprehension is still quite basic and speaking even more so. I can formulate basic phrases.
A friend is going to send me the BR Portuguese harry potter books, and I have started to listen to the audiobooks while waiting. I know these books incredibly well in English, i can recount some scenes and passages almost word for word because i read them so many times as a child.
I started listening to the first audiobook at 0.8 speed and I am about 1/4 of the way through. My basic vocabulary and knowledge of the story allows me to understand what is happening in a general sense, but I am missing a lot of detail, because the language is above my level. Despite this, I have experienced many little moment of insight and understanding- hearing certain words together and understanding what they mean through context, so I am clearly learning. It feels incredible, even if a lot of the time it feel like my brain is straining to understand and missing a lot of detail.
I have decided to accept that I cannot understand everything yet, and just let my brain pick out the things it understands without too much effort and accepting that my concentration will drift at times. When the books arrive I will begin some structured daily reading and listening in parallel, pausing to look things up and translate, but not insisting on brute forcing understanding of every word, phrase and sentence- I'm trying to take a more natural approach. My main concern is that the level of input is slightly too high for me but I'm going to persevere.
I'm posting this for accountability and for feedback or ideas. Will post updates.
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u/MistakeThis5905 5d ago
I opted to go for Matilda by Roald Dahl, because it's a fun, nostalgic story and a slightly lower level than HP. Unfortunately bilingual books are very limited in BRPT/English so I set to translate each chapter and put both versions side by side in a pdf (the Official English version is not a clear translation).
There's a bunch of good Youtubers that do slow and simple vlogs though, I listen to those in the car on the way to work.
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u/swedxn 5d ago
I just started HP at low B1. Like the other commenter, I started with Roald Dahl books and Diary of a Wimpy Kid.
The first book took me until chapter 4/5 until I could read it without translating often. A lot of the vocab gets easier so I would suggest powering thru until at least then. I change between reading alone or reading aloud to my Brazilian partner to get my pronunciation correct and my mouth used to the new sounds.
After I’ve read a chapter, I listen to the audiobook afterwards on a walk or something. Also on 0.8x speed. First two chapters were difficult (listening is my worst skill), but now I can completely follow along even if I don’t get every word.
It’s improved my speaking and listening sooo much when I speak with my partner. :)
Keep going!
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