This entry was orginally published on reddit.com and describes my process with learning Norwegian – in the hope someone can benefit from it.
This post is my own take on u/FurryFurryGoatLegs post, which inspired me a lot and gave me the confidence that I can also learn Norwegian in such a short amount of time, while having a full-time job with 8.5 hours a day.
A few days ago I received the results of the Bergentest, and, to my own astonishment, I passed every delprøve with godt bestått. To give something back to the r/norsk community, I wanted to share with you my language learning journey, in the hopes that some of you might find inspiration or any practical advice.
Short disclaimer: My native language is German, so I might have an advantage that other learners do not have since the two languages are quite similar. Further, since I did not need to practice for an oral exam, my spoken Norwegian is probably not quite up to C1 standards.
About my background: I began studying Norwegian in the middle of June and wrote the Bergentest in the middle of January. During this time I did not live in Norway, but in my home country. My motivation is to study in Norway in fall 2020.
Studying Process
In order to stay organized, I set myself rather rigid deadlines when I wanted to get done with each resource. This really helped me to maintain my discipline and a sense of that I’m doing progress. Since I had a full-time job I mostly did about two hours of studying after coming home from work and was sometimes able to do a bit during lunch breaks. On the weekends I used more time for studying, but never really more than maybe 4-5 hours.
The first thing I did was to complete the Norwegian tree on Duolingo. I started in June and was done with it sometime in the middle of August. It took me about 2 months. I think Duolingo gave me a pretty strong grasp on the basics of the language, and I can recommend it to everybody starting out with Norwegian.
To memorize all the vocabulary, I used the app Anki on my phone. I’m sure most have already heard about it; it is based on the method of spaced repetition learning. I squeezed my Anki sessions mostly into my half-hour commute to work and back.
Alongside Duolingo, I used the German textbook Et år i Norge which I picked up for cheap at a used bookstore. I finished it at around the same time as the Duolingo tree and can recommend it to all that speak German, because it sheds light on Norwegian from the angle of a German grammar, which can be useful.
Another resource I started using early on were TV shows and podcasts. The great advantage with shows is that you can use Norwegian subtitles and thereby both have and audio and text input. Mostly I watched them on the NRK website. While there are some shows that were available in my country, most were not. If you also don’t live in Norway, I can therefore recommend using a browser extension like Hola, that allows you to bypass a website’s geblocking. This was pretty easy to implement into my daily schedule, because it just replaced Netflix.
I started to seriously listen to podcasts after finishing the Duolingo tree because I realized that my listening skills are bad, and I need a lot of practice. To accomplish this, I analyzed where in the day there’s potential to squeeze in some podcast time alongside work and studying and found out there’s quite a lot! For example, right after getting up and showering, I plugged in my earphones and listened to Norwegian podcasts while eating breakfast, getting ready, biking to the train station – and I already had an hour! Similarly, I listened to an hour of podcasts when in the Gym or going for a run. And then some more when doing chores at home or to fall asleep, etc. Like this I would easily get around 3 hours of listening practice a day.
In the beginning I barely understood anything, maybe a few words here and there. But after having pushed through this initial “pain period,” I started to understand more and more. Then it became more motivating, and in the end, I could pick up almost everything. A list of my favorite podcasts is at the end of my post. I really recommend the app Pocket Casts because it allows you to adjust the speed pretty accurately. If it’s too fast, you can therefore begin at i.ex. 0.6 the normal speed and slowly work your way up.
Also, having completed the Duolingo tree, I started reading a lot of fiction and non-fiction in Norwegian. Since I travelled to Norway a few times, I could buy some books there. If you can’t do that, I can recommend using the website and app ebok.no. There’s tons of Norwegian books you can buy and read on your phone or tablet. Unfortunately it’s rather expensive, but if you subscribe to the plus service, you have unlimited access to many e-books and audio books for rather cheap.
Another great resource I used is the website ndla.no. As far as I understand it, it is directed at students in the videregående skole and provides a wealth of texts on selected subjects, ranging from maths, to history, literature and more. I felt most at home with the texts about Norwegian literature and history. Maybe halfway through my learning process, I seriously wanted to get into Norwegian literature business and thus got myself some copies of Knausgård’s Min Kamp, which I can recommend!
Back to the actual studying: After the Duolingo tree I started with the book Norsk grammatikk by Kirsti MacDonald, for which there exists an arbeidsbok, a tekstbok and a website with free content. The motivation was here that I wanted to get a really strong grip on grammar from early on. I completed this resource in about 2 weeks at the pace of about a chapter a day.
Afterwards I started with the book Stein på stein (B2) which also consists of an arbeidsbok, tekstbok and a website with online tasks. It took me about 3 weeks, and I was done mid-september. Ensuing, I took the logical step and took up Her på berget (C1), which continues where Stein på stein finished and also has its website. This took me longer to complete with about 8 weeks, and I was done in November.
While I could already get some feedback by doing the tasks in the textbooks and comparing them with the solutions, I realized that for the writing I would need an actual person to look at it. Initially, I took use of the notebook function of the website iTalki. The idea is that you can post something and other users in the community, that speak your target language, will correct it. Here’s an example of a post I did very early on. While this tool is great, I quickly felt its limits, because you cannot really get explanations on the feedback (i.ex. why is this wrong? If it’s wrong, how would you say the very thing I am trying to say?). Also, it’s not that reliable as you might need it, since it depends on the goodwill of other users. Therefore I booked a few lessons with a Tutor on iTalki, and I asked him to check my texts for errors and then give me some feedback via Skype. This worked well, but was too expensive for me, since each time I needed to book a full lesson.
A cheaper alternative I found later on, about one and a half months before writing the test, was via the website fiverr. The concept of the website is that people offer to do small jobs for around 5$. There I searched for “Norwegian Proofread” and asked the seller, if we could do a longer order where she corrects my texts. Eventually, I sent her one text per day over the course of a bit more than a month and paid all in all about 120$ for the service. Like this I could really hone my writing skills and was really well prepared for the test. And, if you compare how much you would pay for actual Norwegian lessons (at least in my country), it’s super cheap.
After I finished Her på berget in November, I focused more on the actual Bergentest itself. To practice, I obtained a few earlier versions of the test, and did them every once in a while, to track how well I am doing on which part, and what I still have to improve upon. Another resource I can definitely recommend is the website bergentest.com. They offer access to unofficial example tests. Even though the diamond membership is not cheap with 499 NOK for 30 days access, it was definitely worth it (considering how much the official tests cost). While for the reading, listening and grammar parts you get direct feedback on the website, in the essay and referat part, I sent the text to my contact on fiverr to get it corrected. I really think the website is great because you get constant feedback on where you stand with the test, and you also get a feeling for how much time each task takes to do. Be aware that the tasks on the website are often a bit more difficult than the Bergentest itself (I think they even state this on the website), so that one rather overshoots the target than failing the test.
When I finally wrote the test in mid-January, I felt I was really well prepared. I’ve gone through (too) many practice runs of the test, and it was at that point almost routine for me. I’m not going through the structure itself (quite well description here). However, two things I want to call attention to:
I read somewhere that to prepare, one should also do the listening with actual speakers (not earphones) since it’s a different sound quality. Well I did it with the inbuilt speakers of my laptop, and there I didn’t have any troubles understanding. However, in the exam room they had big speakers that were situated in the front of the room. This was again a different audio quality, and since I was not used to it, I had some troubles understanding it. Thus, I recommend to also practice it with actual speakers (maybe Bluetooth speakers are enough?) and not just the inbuilt ones of your device.
Already in the practice run I realized that 45 minutes is super short for writing the referat part. And even though I trained myself to be quick about it, it was still very stressful during the exam. So just be careful about timing.
Concluding Remarks
I really hope that I could somehow help or motivate you with my post. I was really unsure in the beginning, whether my endeavor is realistic at all, and now I’m so happy that I passed with such good results. My two cents are that if you are willing to immerse yourself fully in such a project, you can achieve really a lot! In the end, it also gives me a huge boost of confidence for future projects I might have.
Below I list some of the podcasts I listened to, plus some other resources which I used.
Podcasts: Aftenposten Forklart ; Ekko ; Verdibørsen ; Krig og fred ; Tyskerne ; Konspirasjonspodden ; Historiepodden ; 198 Land ; Karrierekoden ; Karrierepodden ; Forstå Norge ; Historie Nå ; Tore Sagens Podkast ; Kjente bøker på 4 minutter ; Ida med hjertet i hånden ; Andregenerasjonen
Other Material: dinordbok (the best Norwegian – English dictionary I could find so far) ; naob.no (academic dictionary, often useful if all other dictionaries don’t help) ; Tandem (Language Exchange App) ; Språkrådet (Grammar Rules and Language Guides)