All posts by Sandra Bogerd

About Sandra Bogerd

Music: composer, singer-songwriter, recording artist, conductor. Language: author and illustrator (A. L. Uitdenbogerd) of the Gnomeville comic book series for absolute beginners in French. Work: Chief Scientist of Ad Hoc Software Pty Ltd trading as Agile Electronics. Academia: RMIT honorary fellow with computer science research interests in music, language, and usability. View all posts by Sandra Bogerd →

Language Qualifications

1 April, 2014PersonalAlliance Française, CEFR, exams, French, language, language learning, studySandra Bogerd

As I write a comic book in French for language learners I thought it would be a good idea to update my qualifications. A long time ago I did senior high school French and the corresponding Alliance Française exams. A few years ago I did a few courses at the Alliance Française. This year I sat the (CEFR) A2 exam – a fairly low level exam just so I could see how it all works, and because I haven’t done an exam for a few years.

Europe has a set of standards for language skill, known in English as the “Common European Framework of Reference” (CEFR). The 6 levels go from A1 to C2, and reflect practical skills in listening, speaking, reading and writing, rather than just grammatical skills. I hope to do the B1 exam soon, which is still a lower level than expected by international students entering TAFE in Australia, so I have a bit of a way to go. B2/C1 is needed for tertiary study.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Reference_for_Languages

Extensive Reading Competition

18 January, 2014

Extensive Reading Competition

While finding my way around WordPress blogs I came across this competition where you try to read as much as possible in your target languages. Naturally I signed up.

Vocabulary Analysis of the Gutenberg Collection

8 January, 2014

Vocabulary Analysis of the Gutenberg Collection

I found this page when looking for things on vocabulary density – something of relevance for reading books designed for language learners. The guy who wrote it is also interesting, in that he has a non-traditional career path into academia.

He shows his analysis is of ~2000 Gutenberg texts based on vocabulary – the kind of thing I like to muck around with. It is “unpublished” work, so lacks a few things, like references and axis labels, making it less useful than it otherwise might be.

Language Comic Books Stuff Here

8 January, 2014Personalcomic books, extensive reading, French, language, language learningSandra Bogerd

I decided to split my creative blog, as the language geekery probably doesn’t belong in my Sandra Bogerd blog. So in here I’ll muse about language stuff and report on the progress of my life-long Gnomeville comic book project.