First, here are some vids:
Now, to the musings.
I am pleasantly surprised to find out that I really, really like the textbook "Česky, prosím II: učebnice češtiny pro cizence" by Jitka Cvejnová from 2012.
The biggest complaint is that it's not second year or second semester Czech for English as an L1 student. It's more like third year.
Because Czech is really, really hard.
But, once you've gotten some words in your head and have a pretty good, broad, wide overview of grammar, this book is a good tool! It hits the exact right sweet spot for me personally. I catch my errors, but it's not dead boring.
It uses a communicative approach and uses relevant texts and dialogues. For example, the first chapter is all about vocab that a Czech as a second language student might want to know. They were at times painfully honest about why people tend to learn Czech: it's a cheap country to study in. But they even include the weird fringe category of Americans who want to learn Czech for cultural reasons, like me.
The exercises are straightforward, the grammar is explained in an intuitive way so far, and there are multiple modalities. The textbook is great for working alone - and would probably be good in a classroom. The CD has multiple voices. I really like the pracovní sešit as a tool for using when skyping with people. I will have to find a way to get this book into their hands somehow. It is great practice for me personally.
It has just been sooooooo long since I have found any kind of useful Czech textbook that I find this incredibly refreshing and surprising.
I am not sure why my goals always have to be so darn ambitious, but that is just how I am. Right now I am on basically track to finish this week's goal, but it's possible I may not be able to keep this pace for the next 10 chapters. If so, that is fine and it's just how it will have to be.
It feels great to study Czech again. It is really fun and I've missed it.
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