It’s A Low-key Kind Of Day

10/3/19

Gotta love that NMR!

Also can we appreciate those perfect hexagons because it took ages to draw those ahaha

Have a great Sunday!

A Levels 2019 - an update

I’m not dead (yet!), although after my maths exams I’d like to be 🙃

I’m mad at the paper (Edexcel pure maths paper 2) and I’m even more mad at myself - I didn’t have time to think and overcome the obstacles that presented themselves so I came out of the exam facing the possibility of getting less than 20% and just realising my mistakes and how to do some questions. I was upset. There were tears.

HOWEVER, what’s done is done and I know that whatever letter I get at the end is not representative of my abilities. (I’m talking I might get an E or a U when the lowest I’ve got in my hardest mocks was an A... yeah it was bad.) I have done 7 exams and have 6 left. 2 of them are today, 13th June, the day after my most horrific exam yet - I have to pick myself up and move on.

I can do maths. I have learned so much that will be helpful to me in the future and that’s the main thing. I am 100% not stupid and I am ready to kick arse in my last exams.

Also a word of advice: don’t try to revise a whole module of biology the night before your exam. According to my mum, I woke up with a manic look in my eye xD

28/10 - 3/11/18: 47-54/100 days of productivity

Thank you all for your patience and >700 followers! I’ve been taking it easy for the rest of this week and making time for hobbies because I know my reaction to potentially screwing up my Cambridge test was very unhealthy. I am now “over” it in the sense that if I get an interview, that’s great, but if I don’t, then my life’s worth isn’t defined by not getting in. I had a moment, but now I am back to my old self and thinking positively about the future :)

I still have offers from both York and Nottingham, which are both fantastic universities - I have a lot to be grateful for.

Pictured above: moments! I really dislike mechanics, but not as much as I hate stats. Earlier on I was doing some chain, product and quotient rule questions - I can’t believe I am literally 3/4 of the way through pure maths already! I’m well ahead of the main lessons so I can afford to take it easy if I want to, which is nice.

Next steps: research for my German IRP, preparation for a presentation I have to do for Chemistry in a couple of weeks, and some filing 😩

You know when you *should* work but you are having such a bad day you can’t? That’s me right now. And I’m cool with that

3-8/12/18 - 84-89/100 days of productivity

Omg life is so hectic right now - sorry for no posts for ages! So I have had my Cambridge interviews (I think they went... ok?) and am now revising for mocks beginning on Monday morning with German!

I’m at my friend’s house doing some Quizlets of new vocab :)

To all exam-takers

Gentle reminder that however much of a shitstorm your exams are, they do not tell you shit about yourself really. All they do is tell you how good you were at conforming to a mark scheme on that particular day. 0% doesn’t mean someone is stupid and 100% doesn’t necessarily mean someone is smart.

Of course try your best and revise and do what you can to maximise your success. But if it doesn’t go your way, know that there is a light at the end of the tunnel and as long as you end up doing what you want to do, nobody gives a fuck if you don’t get straight A’s or whatever ❤️

Happy 2020 :)

My resolution: to get this account more active next year! In all seriousness, 2019 was a complete upheaval of everything I knew and wanted, full of salutations and goodbyes in equal measure. It brought me new friends and experiences but also new anxieties. I’m still working on feeling comfortable in this world and I have a long way to go but I’ve come so far. I am proud of myself - and I wish it didn’t sound so arrogant to be able to say so. So what if my A levels weren’t quite what I was gunning for? So what if the university I am attending isn’t the one that filled my childhood dreams? So what if the course I am pursuing isn’t the one I maybe should have chosen based on my personal talents? I’m happy and learning so much every day. I can’t wait for 2020 and I hope it brings you all good things as my super supportive followers.

22/3/19

Real studying is messy

Also if you haven’t heard Lewis Capaldi’s “Grace” I THOROUGHLY recommend you do because it is amazing

Happy Friday folks! Enjoy your weekend x

14/08/19 22:11

Less than 11 hours until I get my results! My plan is to wake up at 7am... except this plan is inherently flawed because it follows the (false) assumption that I will sleep at all.

I’m so stressed even though I shouldn’t be but I am because in this moment it’s a big deal even though it’s not really and oh my god why am I like this

OMG I needed this

How to teach yourself linguistics online for free

Wish you were enrolled in an intro linguistics class this semester? Starting a linguistics major and looking for extra help? Trying to figure out whether you should study linguistics and what comes after?  Whether you’re just trying to grasp the basics of linguistics or you’re trying to construct a full online linguistics course, here’s a comprehensive list of free linguistics websites, podcasts, videos, blogs, and other resources from around the internet: 

Linguistics Podcasts

Specific episodes:

The International Phonetic Alphabet and vowels

Constituency

Gricean Maxims and presuppositions

Kids These Days aren’t ruining language

Learning languages linguistically

Phonemes

Prepositions and determiners

Morphemes and the wug test

Podcasts in general:

Lingthusiasm

The History of English Podcast

Talk the Talk

Lexicon Valley

The World in Words

A Way With Words

Linguistics Videos

Modular topics:

NativLang (cartoons)

The Ling Space

Tom Scott’s Language Files

Arika Okrent (whiteboard videos)

Structured video series like an online course:  

Introduction to Linguistics (TrevTutor)

Another intro linguistics series (DS Bigham)

Phonology (TrevTutor)

Mathematical linguistics (TrevTutor)

Syntax (TrevTutor)

Another syntax series following the chapter structure of a free online syntax textbook (Caroline Heycock)

The Virtual Linguistics Campus at Marburg University

“Miracles of Human Language” (on Coursera from Leiden University)

Blog posts

General

How much do I need to know before taking intro linguistics? (Spoiler: not much) 

28 tips for doing better in your intro linguistics course

How to find a topic for your linguistics essay or research paper

For typesetting linguistics symbols: What is LaTeX and why do linguists love it? (with sample LaTeX doc to download and modify).

Further linguistics resources about specific areas, such as sociolinguistics, psycholinguistics, language acquisition (first/second), historical linguistics, neurolinguistics, prescriptivism. 

Phonetics & Phonology

How to make your own paper model of the larynx

Teaching phonetics using lollipops

How to remember the IPA vowel chart

How to remember the IPA consonant chart

IPA transcription practice

A detailed explanation of sonorants, obstruents, and sonority

A very elaborate Venn diagram of English phonological features

The basics of how Optimality Theory works, with coffee analogy

Allophones of /t/, explained with internet gifs

Several good visualizations and explanations of the vocal tract

How to type IPA on your phone (Android and iOS) 

Various ways to type IPA on a computer

Morphology & Syntax

Morphological typology cartoons

So you asked the internet how to draw syntax trees. Here’s why you’re confused.

Types of trees: a sentence is an S, a sentence is an IP, a sentence is a TP

A step-by-step guide to drawing a syntax tree, with gifs

Distributed Morphology

Garden path sentences: how they work, some examples

Structural ambiguity and understanding people in Ipswich

How to draw trees on a computer (TreeForm and phpSyntaxTree) 

Pronoun typology and “the gay fanfiction problem”

The solution to violent example sentences: Pokemon

Semantics & Pragmatics

The difference between epistemic and deontic, necessity and possibility (with bonus modals as Hogwarts houses)

Why learn semantics? Comebacks to annoying people.

Presuppositions, implicature and entailment, and more presuppositions in Lizzie Bennet Diaries

Gricean maxims in Welcome to Night Vale

Scalar implicature and a duck gif

Giving a shit about Negative Polarity Items, NPIs explained using Mean Girls references, and a follow-up on Free Choice Items

The lambda calculus for absolute dummies

The Lambda Calculator (software for practising in Heim & Kratzer style)

Teaching & Academic/career advice

Linguistics resources for high school teachers

Teaching linguistics to 9-14 year olds

On writing an IB extended essay in linguistics (& follow-up)

IPA Bingo

IPA Jeopardy and IPA Hangman

Practising syntax trees using cards and string/straws

Find a linguistics olympiad near you!

Editing linguistics Wikipedia articles instead of writing a final paper that no one but the prof will read (see also wikiedu.org)

Should you go to grad school in linguistics? Maybe

Figuring out if you actually want to go to linguistics grad school

How to decide which linguistics grad school to go to

How to look for linguistics undergrad programs

How to interact with someone who’s just given a talk

An extensive list of undergrad and/or student-friendly conferences - apply to one near you!

Advice for linguistics profs on increasing enrollment and supporting non-academic careers

Linguistics jobs - a series about careers outside academia

Languages

Linguistic approaches to language learning resource roundup

Will linguistics help with language learning? / Will learning a second language help with linguistics?

The problem with “economically useful” as a reason for language learning

Further link roundups

This list not enough? Try these further masterposts: 

A very long list of linguistics movies, documentaries, and TV show episodes

A list of books (fiction and nonfiction) about linguistics

A comprehensive list of language and linguistics podcasts, from Superlinguo 

A very long list of linguistics YouTube channels and other free online videos about linguistics 

20 linguistics blogs I recommend following

How to explain linguistics to your friends and family this holiday season