Online Course: Mastering Verbs of Motion

The complete course is divided into two parts. 

The courses are available online, in a format compatible with any modern web browser. Each lesson begins with a brief video, with embedded comprehension checks. Interactive quizzes with immediate feedback let you test your understanding. 

Next, audio review lessons let you practice the material from the video lessons for active mastery. I encourage you to download the audio and load it onto your smartphone, so you can practice as often as possible.

There's more to language learning than grammar, of course, so many lessons include portions of poems or links to songs with examples of the material. And bonus lessons cover common idiomatic expressions based on motion verbs.

The basic course covers "going" on foot and by vehicle, in one and in more than one direction. Video lessons detail the nuances of choosing the right verb in the past, present, and future tenses. 

You'll also learn other verbs that are part of this system: Russian equivalents for taking people & things places, carrying, running, flying, and motion in water. A bonus lesson introduces idiomatic expressions like "it's snowing," "blue looks good on you," "we were lucky," and more.

In Verbs of Motion (II) you'll learn how to use prefixes to express concepts like arrival and departure, entering and exiting, going past/through/up/down, etc. 

We pay special attention to prefixes that can have different meanings depending on the context, and finish with another bonus lesson on idioms like making friends, switching to ты, asking "How was your trip?", going (or driving someone else!) crazy, and more.

To take Verbs of Motion (I), you should be reasonably comfortable with

• the Cyrillic alphabet
• case endings for nouns and adjectives, including accusative and dative
• using verbs in the present, past, and future
• the basics of verbal aspect (imperfective and perfective – несовершенный вид и совершенный вид)

To take Verbs of Motion (II), you should be reasonably comfortable with the material of the first course (and its prequisites):

• the notion of multidirectional vs unidirectional motion
• conjugation of all basic verbs of motion

Feel free to take a free, 5-minute placement test to see if you're ready!

If you're taking just a year of Russian to satisfy a requirement (it's OK to be honest!), Verbs of Motion (I) is all you'll need. 

If you plan on taking the equivalent of at least two years of university Russian, or are serious about learning Russian, you'll certainly benefit from taking both courses.

The free, 5-minute placement test should help you decide which level is best for you.

Be sure to download them and put them on your smartphone or tablet. After watching a lesson, go through the audio reviews until you can repeat accurately, with little hesitation. Repeated practice is the key! 

This format was inspired in part by my own experiences as a beginning student of Mandarin with audio review lessons at yoyochinese.com. I loaded them onto my phone and practiced when doing dishes, going for walks, etc. Within a few weeks, I was responding with pretty good accuracy. Best of all, my kids (who've had several years of Mandarin) stopped laughing at my attempts to speak!

I believe that the insights of retrieval practice explain the effectiveness of these exercises. Cognitive scientist Pooja K. Agarwal has written extensively on this approach; I recommend her retrievalpractice.org site for more information.

Yes you can!

The course is entirely online, using modern web technologies. It should work well on any device (Windows/Mac/iOS/Android) with a modern web browser.

No, sorry. The online format doesn't include security features, so there's no way to offer official credit.

But if you pass the final quiz for Verbs of Motion (I) and Verbs of Motion (II), you can print out a nice certificate to put on your wall and show off. In fact, if you take a selfie with your certificate and send it in, I'll add it to the доска почёта on the website!

This course takes advantage of features not available when passively watching Youtube:

• questions embedded in the videos, to check your understanding as you watch

• quizzes with immediate scoring

• downloadable audio review exercises to activate and practice what you're learning

• complete coverage of directional prefixes (in Verbs of Motion II)

Most videos in Verbs of Motion II are not available on Youtube.

The videos that form the foundation of the course were created by Dr. Curtis Ford. Dr. Ford lived in Russia for several years, has a Ph.D. in Slavic Linguistics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and taught first- through fourth-year Russian at the University of South Carolina for 16 years. He also runs the Russian Grammar channel on Youtube.

Audio for most of the audio review exercises was recorded by Dr. Maia Solovieva of Oberlin College.

Each registration is for one person only. That means that you can only be logged in on one device at a time, so do be sure to log off one device before logging in on another!

This course represents several months of work and was not funded by a grant, so please don't share your login information with all your friends on the Internet. Спасибо!