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Manic Quest for Mandarin - TAC ’14 Team 鹊 | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| LangWanderer Diglot Pro Member Australia digintoenglish.com Joined 4536 days ago 74 posts - 97 votes  Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: Korean, French, Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 17 of 52 27 February 2014 at 2:47am | IP Logged |
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Well, I fell off the horse a bit during my rather intense CELTA course, but only in terms of updating my log. I continued to study Mandarin every day, even on my busiest days. I had a 25 minute train ride each way, which I used to listen to Assimil lessons or read the Assimil book whenever I wasn't frantically preparing lesson plans. I didn't find much motivation for FSI during this time, but I have since got back into the swing of that.
Here is what I've been doing so far: FSI: Now up to Module 3, Unit 4. The money module (module 3) hasn't given me as much trouble as the previous module, so I've been able to get through it reasonably quickly. I listen to each of the tapes once, although I sometimes skip the P-1 tape, and then repeat the D-1 and P-2 tapes on the day after I finish the unit. I've been ripping the audio for the example sentences and any sentences with new vocabulary and creating Anki cards for them (recognition and production). Assimil: I'm up to lesson 42. I've been listening to 10 lessons a day, twice each, then moving onto the next lesson while the oldest lesson drops of my 'to listen' list. For example, today I will listen to lessons 33-42, then tomorrow, 34-43, etc. I have missed some days, but I know that on those days I have been doing something else - FSI or Anki reviews - so not all is lost. I do miss the humour of other Assimil courses though. The Mandarin course has no jokes at all, which really robs it of some of that 'Assimil charm'. John DeFrancis's Beginning Chinese Reader: I have been reading this on and off, reading through each lesson at least twice. I also have the audio, which I sometimes listen to when I'm running. Although listening to the audio is useful, it's hardly the most engaging listening material. The same could be said for the book. I know it's wonderful learning material, but the dryness and repetitiveness of the texts makes it a bit of a slog. Having said that, it is an enormous help. At least I can draw motivation from the fact that eventually I'll be able to move on to more interesting material and BCR will have given my reading skills a huge boost. For the future: I am yearning for some sort of authentic material, but I know that my level is still too low to get much use out of it. When I was studying Japanese intensively, at least I was at a level where I could 'switch off' of studying mode by watching a TV show or reading an interesting book in Japanese. My level was high enough for me to be able to understand them. Unfortunately I don't have that option yet with Mandarin. By that I mean couldn't watch or reading anything authentic while still understanding more than a minuscule amount. How have others handled this? Do you see benefits in watching TV at the beginner level, even if you barely understand anything? If it's worked for others, I might be willing to give it a go. Edit: formatting Edited by LangWanderer on 27 February 2014 at 2:47am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| LangWanderer Diglot Pro Member Australia digintoenglish.com Joined 4536 days ago 74 posts - 97 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: Korean, French, Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 18 of 52 27 February 2014 at 4:56am | IP Logged |
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Here is my late attempt at the January challenge for the TAC (cross-posted from the team thread). It's my very first attempt at writing anything in Chinese and took an age to write, but it's nice to finally get some free writing practice.
大家好。我叫Ben。我还没有中文姓。我是澳大 利亚人。 我学汉语学了大概三个月了。我每天学汉语。 很有意思，可我还不懂中国电影，中文书。 我今年要去中国学英文。我想去东北。东北冷 ，可我听说东北人说普通话很清楚。 我喜欢雪外国语。我在大学学了日语，前年在 日本大学学习了一年。因为我会日语，所以写 中国字还可以，可是汉语发音很难。 Hi everyone. My name is Ben. I don't have a Chinese name yet. I'm Australian. I have studied Chinese for about three months. I study Chinese every day. It's lots of fun, but I still can't understand Chinese TV or books. This year I want to go to China to teach English. I'm thinking of going to Dongbei (northeast China). Dongbei is cold, but I've heard that people from Dongbei speak Mandarin very clearly. I like learning foreign languages. I studied Japanese at university, and the year before last I studied for a year at a Japanese university. Because I know Japanese, I am able to write Chinese characters fairly well (is this a passable translation of 还可以?), but Chinese pronunciation is very hard. Now to translate a song for the February challenge before tomorrow！ 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| PointsDotsLines Diglot Groupie United States Joined 4004 days ago 76 posts - 110 votes Speaks: Mandarin*, English Studies: Spanish | Message 19 of 52 27 February 2014 at 5:35am | IP Logged |
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Hi, Ben,
That's pretty good after having only studied Chinese for three months! Keep up the good work! -Charles 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Expugnator Hexaglot Senior Member Brazil Joined 5164 days ago 3335 posts - 4349 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, Norwegian, French, English, Italian, Papiamento Studies: Mandarin, Georgian, Russian | Message 20 of 52 27 February 2014 at 9:40pm | IP Logged |
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I am dealing with the same issues, LangWanderer. I'm watching cartoons and I can
understand a bit of them. Sometimes enough, sometimes not enough. What works best for me is videos with both Chinese and English subtitles. This is the case of some of the CCTV series. Some are dull, boring, but others are reputed to be interesting, like the second season of Happy Chinese. I like the site Chinese Reading Practice too. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| LangWanderer Diglot Pro Member Australia digintoenglish.com Joined 4536 days ago 74 posts - 97 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: Korean, French, Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 21 of 52 28 February 2014 at 7:58am | IP Logged |
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Charles - 谢谢你！
Expugnator - Thanks for letting me know. I hadn't thought of watching shows with both sets of subtitles at once. I guess in a way it's like a bilingual text such as Assimil. I'll give it a try! Thanks for reminding me of Chinese Reading Practice too. I stumbled upon it when I was looking for a 炸酱面 recipe and thought, "Oh, this would be useful!" and then promptly forgot about it. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Crush Tetraglot Senior Member ChinaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5863 days ago 1622 posts - 2299 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Mandarin, Esperanto Studies: Basque | Message 22 of 52 28 February 2014 at 5:43pm | IP Logged |
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Two small notes about your text:
我今年要去中国学英文 - This year you want to go to China to study English? To teach is 教 (1st tone). 我喜欢雪外国语 - I think you've got a typo here, unless you like snowy foreign languages :P Anyway it sounds like you're doing great, i also did FSI, and while it was at times super boring and a lot of the vocab felt irrelevant, i think it did a lot for getting me to actually speak. People also commented a lot on my pronunciation, but hearing other 老外's pronunciation i tried not to let it get to my head too much. I don't really feel qualified to answer your question, but to me it sounds fine. Another option would be something like “我写汉字写得不错” or “我的汉字写得不错”. Also, i just found out about a Chinese cartoon for kids called 大耳朵图图 (图图 is the little kid's name) on one of the logs here. The vocabulary is pretty simple and spoken clearly, i was surprised that i could understand almost 100% of the show. Something like that might be a nice way to get some listening practice in, and each episode is short, about 10 minutes long. Regular TV shows i can only understand around 60-70% and the vocabulary is much broader. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| LangWanderer Diglot Pro Member Australia digintoenglish.com Joined 4536 days ago 74 posts - 97 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: Korean, French, Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 23 of 52 01 March 2014 at 1:37am | IP Logged |
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Crush - Thanks for your comments. 大耳朵图图 might be just what I'm looking for.
You're absolutely right about 教. I blame the FSI sentences that teach that construction - all of them talk about someone being here to learn Chinese or learn English. They're burnt into the back of my brain now! As for the "snowy foreign languages" thing, maybe I do indeed have a subconscious love for them, which might be the reason why I'm willing to brave the 东北 winter just to improve my Mandarin. :P 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| LangWanderer Diglot Pro Member Australia digintoenglish.com Joined 4536 days ago 74 posts - 97 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: Korean, French, Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 24 of 52 01 March 2014 at 1:42am | IP Logged |
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(cross-posted from the TAC team thread so it doesn't get lost)
Here is my entry for the February challenge. Being a beginner, I had to make a lot of guesses, and I kept my translations very literal so that I could focus on the language. I hope that I'll be able to look back on this at the end of the TAC and smile at my ridiculous mis-translations! Despite the quality of my translation, this was a fun challenge. I'd never really listened to any Mandarin music before, and while searching for a suitable song I discovered a few songs worth listening to. Here goes! ------ 伍佰 & China Blue 單程車票 Wu Bai & China Blue "One-Way Ticket" 朋友 為何悲傷 那陽光 早已經灑落身上 前方的道路 天氣晴朗 濃霧啊 也已經煙消雲散 My friend, why are you so sad? The morning sunshine is already shining upon your body On the road ahead, not a cloud in the sky The fog is already clearing too 可是你時常 還是低頭向下望 望向那空氣裡的一點茫然 我知道你怎麼想 But you still often gaze downwards Staring blankly at a spot in the air, I know what you're thinking 你說做個轟轟烈烈的事不是不能夠 但是你就會離開父母家人還有你的老朋友 你說人生匆匆 你也知道不要想太多 可是那距離越來越遠 夜深時候空虛不好受 The big things that you say you'll do aren't impossible But you just have to be able to leave your family and old friends You say life is a race, you also know not to want too much But that's becoming further and further away, late at night the emptiness is hard to take 人生是一張 單程的車票 只需珍惜現在擁有的 它會一直往前跑 Life is a one-way ticket You just need to treasure the present that you have, or it can escape before your eyes 朋友 不要悲傷 那陽光 燃燒著無窮希望 My friend, don't be sad That sunshine, your endless burning desires 你說做個轟轟烈烈的事不是不能夠 但是你就會離開父母家人還有你的老朋友 你說人生匆匆 你也知道不要想太多 可是那距離越來越遠 夜深時候空虛不好受 The big things that you say you'll do aren't impossible But you just have to be able to leave your family and old friends You say life is a race, you also know not to want too much But that's becoming further and further away, late at night the emptiness is hard to take 人生是一張 單程的車票 只需珍惜現在擁有的 他會一直往前跑 Life is a one-way ticket You just need to treasure the present that you have, or it can escape before your eyes 就像花開又謝雨水又來沒有人停留 失去那花瓣枯萎乾燥河流世界變得好普通 那張人生旅程單程車票人人都擁有 何不放膽的唱盡情的走還在等什麼 It's just like flowers bloom and wilt, the rains come, no one stops When the petals wilt and the rivers dry, the world can become ordinary Everyone has a one-way ticket through life Why not act boldly, sing as much as you like, or are you still waiting for something? (not sure what 走 means here) 朋友 盡情歌唱 那陽光 早已經灑落身上 My friend, sing as much as you like The morning sunshine is already shining upon your body 1 person has voted this message useful |
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