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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| owshawng Senior Member United States Joined 6829 days ago 202 posts - 217 votes  Speaks: English* | Message 1 of 19 27 January 2007 at 1:57pm | IP Logged |
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Yesterday I purchased Assimil Chinese with Ease 1 & 2. I started it last night. The first disc has 11 tracks that deal with practicing the sounds of Mandarin. I went through this once and then did the first 14 lessons in the book and cd a few times and did the mandarin exercises once. My goal is to finish volume 1 passive phase by the end of February.
So far I'm enjoying it. I purchased it because I have assimil's Spanish wih ease and it suits my learning style. Although I have a decent passive Mandarin vocabulary, I need to convert it into an active vocabulary. I also want to go from thinking and speaking in phrases and short sentences to thinking/speaking in paragraphs/dialogues. The speakers in the first 14 lessons speak slowly and the dialogues are spoken twice. Every 7th lesson is a review. However assimil says they will speak slowly in the beginning and the tempo will pick up on the 15th lesson and the dialogues will only be spoken once. I'll find out later today when I start the 15th. I've only learned a few new words so far, so I've been focusing on tones and pronounciation. Edited by owshawng on 29 January 2007 at 5:26am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
 Keith Diglot Moderator JapanRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6720 days ago 526 posts - 536 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 19 27 January 2007 at 8:23pm | IP Logged |
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It sounds like you will be finished by the end of January!
I might be finished in a couple of years. So, you are using Chinese with Ease in the exact manner specified by Assimil? 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| owshawng Senior Member United States Joined 6829 days ago 202 posts - 217 votes Speaks: English* | Message 3 of 19 28 January 2007 at 6:35am | IP Logged |
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Today I reviewed lessons 1 to 14, then did 15 to 21. I'm listening to the new lessons 2 to 3 times while reading the pin-yin. I then listen to it again 2 to 3 times while reading the english translation. Next I shadow the lesson a few times while reading the pinyin. And finally I repeat after the speakers 2 or 3 times without looking at the text. I go thru each lesson 8 to 12 times before doing the next lesson. I also read the chinese exercises out loud and then fill in the missing word(s). I am not attempting to learn to read chinese at the moment.
I then spent the afternoon with my wife and a Taiwanese family. We spoke a mixture of mandarin and english. I think when I'm with my family, if I know how to say what I want to say in mandarin I will and use english for words/topics I don't know. I've been doing this the last few days and I think it is really helping my ability to think in mandarin, plus hopefully it will encourage our son to speak more mandarin. He's bilingual but has a tendency to reply in english when someone speaks to him in mandarin. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| owshawng Senior Member United States Joined 6829 days ago 202 posts - 217 votes Speaks: English* | Message 4 of 19 29 January 2007 at 5:26am | IP Logged |
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I just changed the subject of this thread. Originally I was calling it assimil chinese. Even though I'm planning on using assimil chinese with ease as my main text for the next few months, I've realized why limit the subject of my log to just assimil? I use other texts and audios, watch dvds, and practice with friends and family. I felt by changing the thread name to learning mandarin I can feel free to write about a wider variety of learning experiences.
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| owshawng Senior Member United States Joined 6829 days ago 202 posts - 217 votes Speaks: English* | Message 5 of 19 01 February 2007 at 11:08pm | IP Logged |
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Today I finished lesson 33. Even though I'm moving from Australia back to the US next week, I still think I will be able to reach my goal of completing Volume 1 by the end of the February. Only 16 more lessons to go. I hope to be able to do one lesson a day over the next few weeks while we are moving. I will definitely use the long flight to listen and review the dialogues a few times.
I'm changing my technique a bit. I now listen to the new dialogue while I read the pinyin for 3 to 5 times. I then read the pinyin to myself and then read the english translation line by line. After that I listen to the dialogue one more time, then shadow a few times. After that I read the notes and due the exercise. It's only a slight change, but it seems to help my pronounciation and speed of comprehension. I also shadow the previous 8 to 10 lessons everyday. The earlier lessons get 1 to 2 reps, while the previous day's will get from 3 to 6 or more. I may not be able to post for the next 2 or so weeks due to the move. Hopefully if I can't post to mid Feb my next post will be that I have completed volume 1 and have started the active phase of volume 2. Ideally I can finish volume 2 by the end of May. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| myann23 Newbie United States Joined 6488 days ago 18 posts - 18 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin | Message 6 of 19 03 February 2007 at 4:01pm | IP Logged |
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On the whole, how would you grade Assimil Chinese with Ease so far? I have just received volumes one and two. I'm leaving for China in May, so I'm hoping to complete the whole course, or at least a good chunk of it before I arrive there.
I plan on doing Assimil concurrently with Pimsleur Mandarin. So far, I've finished level 1 for that. It seems so slow! - but quite effective, and yes, it does give you confidence. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| owshawng Senior Member United States Joined 6829 days ago 202 posts - 217 votes Speaks: English* | Message 7 of 19 04 February 2007 at 4:17am | IP Logged |
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I think the first 30 to 35 lessons of Assimil volume 1 are equal to all 3 levels of pimsleur in terms of amount of vocabulary, phrases and sentences learned. I also prefer how assimil's audio is exclusively in mandarin, while Pimsleur kept switching back and forth between mandarin and english. I think the notes in assimil are also very helpful.
Pimsleur is very good at improving pronounciation, but by the time I got to Level 3 I found it painfully slow and would definitely not do level 4 if Pimsleur made one. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| owshawng Senior Member United States Joined 6829 days ago 202 posts - 217 votes Speaks: English* | Message 8 of 19 12 April 2007 at 3:42pm | IP Logged |
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Today i started on lesson 40. I'm behind my origianl goals due to a combination of life (moving twice in 2 months the first move being 10,000 miles, and other things) plus lazyness. Probably 30% life, 70% lazy. I think with learning a new skill the most important thing is persitence. Once i took a week off, it was very easy for it to become 2 weeks, then a month. I started up again 2 weeks ago by reviewing the first 35 lessons over the course of a week, then working on new material. I need to makes sure I do at least 20 minutes a day, even if all I do is read the grammar notes.
Now I spend about 20 to 30 minutes reviewing 5 to 10 previous lessons 1 to 3 times each, and then do a new lesson. The new lesson I listen to 2 or 3 tmes, then shadow 2 or 3 times. I then read each sentence in Chinese outlooud and then read its corresponding translation outloud. Later on in the day I'll read it outloud again and then read the grammar notes. This new way seems faster and the new lessons seems to stick in my head better. I don't learn a new lesson the first day, but around day 4 I've probably gone over the lesson at least 15 times. It then gets reviewed once or twice a day for another few days then is dropped from the rotation. Meanwhile I am adding a new lesson to this rotation virtually everyday. This is similiar to a technique I used to study for exams while in college. Instead of trying to cram for a test in a day or 2 I would study for 45 minutes to an hour everyday starting about 2 weeks from the exam. By the time I had the exam I could visualize the page from my text or notebook the question came from. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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