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Midlife Mom’s Mandarin Log: TAC Team 唐 | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Sunja Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6078 days ago 2020 posts - 2295 votes  1 sounds Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Mandarin | Message 81 of 149 23 March 2011 at 4:20pm | IP Logged | ||
Boy, do I know that feeling with Japanese! I've lost a lot of my reading ability just by stopping. There's a small consolation: it doesn't take me as long to review and remember characters as it does to learn them from scratch. I remember that right before I stopped studying I would spend a huge amount of time reviewing and so little time learning new stuff. It was frustrating and I think I lost sight of the fact I was actually progressing. The trick is not to stop. Good luck! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Li Fei Pro Member United States Joined 5116 days ago 147 posts - 182 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 82 of 149 23 March 2011 at 7:23pm | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks, Sunja. I definitely have that feeling that I'm forgetting more than I'm learning, but it helps to realize that
review goes quicker than learning from scratch. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Li Fei Pro Member United States Joined 5116 days ago 147 posts - 182 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 83 of 149 28 March 2011 at 2:52am | IP Logged | ||
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I did something different this week and tracked my language-related activities. I'm happy to report that I
averaged two hours per day. Here's how it broke down: TrainChinese (SRS flashcard program with audio): 2 hrs 30 min Homework for Uni class: 2 hrs. 45 min In-class time: 2 hrs. 30 min. Pimsleur: 3 hrs. 15 min Reading: 1 hr. Listening (radio and dialogues): 1 hr. 15 min Studying vocab flashcards: 30 min. Reading textbook: 15 min. Observations: Wow, I spent more time on Pimsleur than on any other activity! That's become a habit, 1/2 hour per day. I'm getting a lot out of it as far as basic conversational ability and improved pronunciation, good for my goal of being able to have some basic, polite conversations while in China this summer. I also spent lots of time on homework this week, which is good; it's mostly grammar exercises, reading short passages and answering comprehension questions, the usual textbook stuff, but it's serious, intense learning. I also spend a fair amount of time in class, which again is intense (my shoulders and neck are always tight after, from concentrating hard)-- with only four of us in the class, I'm often "on" for answering a question or participating in a dialogue. And the other biggie is my SRS, which I think is effective learning; I do both individual words and whole sentences, and since TrainChinese has audio, I am always working on my tones and pronunciation. The other stuff is lighter. I read a bit in the evenings, just trying to build a little ability there, using very controlled texts. And I've discovered Radio Free Asia, where I listen to native-speed news broadcasts a bit. I recognize a few words here and there, and sometimes know what the story is about (thanks largely to cognates like "Lib-ee-a" and "Ka-dah-fee"). I think it's good to remind me that natives speak faster and with a bigger vocabulary than the Pimsleur folks or my teacher! Overall, a good week with all goals fulfilled. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Li Fei Pro Member United States Joined 5116 days ago 147 posts - 182 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 84 of 149 28 March 2011 at 3:13am | IP Logged | ||
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Oh, yeah, and here are my goals for next week:
Pimsleur 3, lessons 4, 5, and 6, twice each Review vocabulary flashcards from Integrated Chinese, chapters 1-4, then go back to 6 & 7 and review those Continue tracking hours on task Ask my teacher about a couple more sentences I could use on my trip this summer Be ready to describe the weather each day for class, since this is something she often asks us about, and we usually fall back on English instead of answering in Mandarin. (To clarify, my class is online so the teacher is in a different locale than most of the students) So those are the goals. Have a good week, anyone who's reading this! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| jimbo Tetraglot Senior Member Canada Joined 6287 days ago 469 posts - 642 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin, Korean, French Studies: Japanese, Latin | Message 85 of 149 28 March 2011 at 4:21pm | IP Logged | ||
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It is inspiring to see that you are keeping up the brisk pace. I think you'll really enjoy trying our your Mandarin
during your trip this summer. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Li Fei Pro Member United States Joined 5116 days ago 147 posts - 182 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 86 of 149 01 April 2011 at 2:57am | IP Logged | ||
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Jimbo, thanks for reading and posting at such a busy time in your life. Good luck with your packing!
I've had to adjust my goals for this week, but it's all good. My teacher realized we weren't going fast enough to make it through Integrated Chinese Vol I by the end of the term, and so she has doubled the pace of the class. It led to a bit of panic earlier this week as she threw about 60 new vocabulary words out for us to learn in two days . . . but it was a good challenge and I enjoyed it. It remains to be seen how I did on the quiz, of course. Anyway, we're now zooming through chapter eight and I am studying new grammar forms that seem more complicated than we've seen before. I like the faster pace a lot, but I haven't had time to do the flash card review I'd planned earlier. The other thing I've been enjoying is Radio Free Asia. I get a real kick out of listening even though I definitely don't understand a lot. I have a feeling that I'm right on the edge of understanding, though. It makes me eager to listen more and more. And then I heard about the "Read More or Die" Tadoku challenge and decided to do it. It's a little silly because my reading is not at the level of most of the other participants, but it'll encourage me to read my graded readers more regularly. It starts tomorrow and runs through all of April. Wonder if I could read 3 pages (or the equivalent) per day? 5 pages? Well, maybe not if my teacher maintains the sprinter's pace in my class, but we'll see. I am becoming obsessed, which means that other things are being neglected (student papers, housework, writing projects). Oh, well . . . 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Leftcoaster Diglot Newbie China Joined 5024 days ago 22 posts - 36 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Russian | Message 87 of 149 01 April 2011 at 12:34pm | IP Logged | ||
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Had one quick question for you: do you think that you are moving faster (more smoothly actually) with Pimsleur or Integrated Chinese? I ask because I'm thinking of picking up Pimsleur as IC is getting a bit tedious.
With reference to your earlier compliment, even though I live in China my Mandarin is probably not as good as you think it is! I would definitely say that I am still at the beginner level. It's mostly my fault as I starting taking Mandarin classes six years ago and stopped after only two years. I actually didn't actively study Mandarin for another three years which has seriously degraded my language skills. Of course, moving here has given me that extra bit of motivation that I needed! Just don't think too much about where you are at in relation other Mandarin learners. Motivation and persistence is the key and slowly yet surely is definitely the way to go. If I had taken that path then I would be much farther along but it's not something I dwell on. Edited by Leftcoaster on 01 April 2011 at 12:35pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Li Fei Pro Member United States Joined 5116 days ago 147 posts - 182 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 88 of 149 02 April 2011 at 4:25am | IP Logged | ||
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Hi LeftCoaster,
Thanks for stopping by. I actually like the combination of Pimsleur and Integrated Chinese. Pimsleur gives you immediate conversational phrases with good pronunciation, but is shallow and all-audio (as I'm sure you know), and so it can become tedious at times. Integrated Chinese goes deeper into the grammar and with lots of nice examples, but it is a Textbook with a capital T, isn't it? I can't make myself do all the workbook exercises because they are dull. But I do like reading through the grammar explanations. So my advice is, pick up Pimsleur but keep slogging through Integrated Chinese. And I appreciate your advice about not comparing to others, and about persistence. It's hard to see my own improvement at times, and on this forum it's easy to feel inadequate, but you're right: it's not useful to dwell on those feelings. Happy studying! 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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