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Best way to learn Mandarin | ||
Tags: Mandarin | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| darkwhispersdal Senior Member Wales Joined 6041 days ago 294 posts - 363 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Ancient Greek, French, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Mandarin, Japanese, Latin | Message 17 of 19 05 July 2012 at 10:50pm | IP Logged | ||
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I'm learning Mandarin via the Open University and I'm enjoying that. You have to learn the script, which I seem to enjoy more than speaking, but that may be due to lack of regular practise. Tones are still giving me trouble at times but on-line tutorials are helping there.
I wouldn't recommend you use the Teach Yourself series there isn't any hanzi to work with in the Beginner's book (not sure about the other though). You need pinyin it's so helpful just with understanding the pronounciation of a word especially as some words sound the same until you see them written in pinyin. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Wulfgar Senior Member United States Joined 4672 days ago 404 posts - 791 votes Speaks: English* | Message 18 of 19 06 July 2012 at 8:34am | IP Logged | ||
I'm going to be somewhat contrarian here and say that the fastest way to lean to speak the language at a high level includes learning characters. I'm sure it's possible without, but imo it will be faster with. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Elizabeth_rb Diglot Groupie United Kingdom polyglotintraining.b Joined 4637 days ago 54 posts - 84 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin Studies: GermanB1 | Message 19 of 19 06 July 2012 at 5:30pm | IP Logged | ||
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I agree totally with learning the script helping to lead to higher levels. In my
opinion, script isn't optional for those who really want to learn Chinese thoroughly. It really IS very accessible, you just need to be taught it properly and in a no- nonsense, no-putting-the-wind-up-you type of way. 'Teach Yourself Beginners Mandarin' is an excellent course, but it is a shame that it has so little work on script in. There is one chapter that teaches the characters for numbers, time and date and that is a great start, but more is needed really. Having said that, I can't recommend the full 'Teach Yourself Chinese' at all. It's a monster that needs slaying. The two volumes of 'Colloquial Chinese' are FAR better. Actually, there are stacks of decent Mandarin learning resources these days and it would be sad to restrict oneself to Pimsleur courses. They are good and they are quite thorough for the small amount they actually teach (repetition being the mother of retention, and all), but they are only an introduction and/or supplement to other resources. There is so much more on offer! Edited by Elizabeth_rb on 06 July 2012 at 5:31pm 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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