The 2012 Aims and Objectives Progress Thread

[rmpalpha]

Well, it's the beginning of May, and I have to say that I have not really done much towards studying Chinese.

(1) Finish NPCR 3 by getting through Lesson 38, and get through NPCR 4 (through Lesson 50).

I did finish NPCR 3 and have also finished the first two lessons of NPCR 4 - I'm currently on Lesson 41. I've found that NPCR 4 is more difficult than NPCR 3, and also has more exercises that I'm not sure what to do with yet. I think that NPCR 4 would work much better with a tutor (or at least someone who can look over my Chinese and give me feedback on grammatical/syntactical errors). It's also interesting that the grammar section of NPCR 4 is less about general grammatical points and more about word usage. I think it's great that NPCR 4 has started to introduce useful, "grown-up" words, talking about contemporary issues in China.

(2) Go to Taiwan to study Chinese in January and possibly in the summer as well.

Going to Taiwan in January was great - I spent two weeks in Taipei and Yilan, and met several Taiwanese deaf people as well. I'm definitely returning this summer for nine weeks, and have a tutor lined up who teaches at NTU. I am actually not sure how to outline what I really want to learn (as in goals for the nine weeks I'm there) - I really want to improve my overall Chinese language skills in terms of reading and writing, but I don't know how to be more specific than that. I'm also not sure how to even start looking for a place to live there, as my Chinese is still quite basic. But the trip is basically set.

(3) Try to chat with my Chinese friends in Chinese more often.

I have a close friend who is from Changsha - he has been a great help in terms of my asking questions regarding vocabulary (not so much grammar). He and I occasionally text each other in Chinese, but he is quite well-educated, so his Chinese is quite advanced compared to mine. I have been trying though.

(4) Read some written Chinese that isn't in a textbook (this could be Chinese Breeze, or one of the other readers I have). My Chinese isn't advanced enough to try to read newspapers yet.

I got halfway through one of the Chinese Breeze books and stopped reading. Maybe it's the book I chose to start with, but I didn't find it very engaging to make me want to keep reading. "A New China" is somewhat more interesting, and the vocabulary is challenging - but the grammar is pretty simple for my level. It's hard to avoid the temptation for me to look at the vocabulary list at the bottom of the page though - but I'm sure a couple of words have sunk in after repeated exposure.

So, not a bad start, but I still have eight months left to go before the end of the year. I'm really hoping that my stay in Taiwan paves the way for a marked improvement in my Chinese language skills. I'm also planning to take one of the Chinese classes offered at one of the universities where I teach, so we'll see how THAT goes

[OneEye]

April's goals:

1) Mini Radio Plays (in class): we'll probably finish through chapter 10 this month if we keep moving at the pace we are now.

Well, close. We take the Chapter 9 test tomorrow.

2) TOCC: Maybe finish half the book (6 chapters)? I'll be using the audio intensively and drilling sentence patterns with this one.

Nope. I've done the first two chapters. Did some stuff with other textbooks too, though. So...success?

3) Literary Chinese for Advanced Beginners: Lesson...8? Not sure, because I may end up putting this on hold for a bit so I can do some reading from my 四書讀本.

Nope on both counts, but I did a lot of 文言文 from other books anyway. I'm switching to Shadick's A First Course in Literary Chinese 文言文入門 as my main 文言文 text, but since a lot of it is fairly easy for me I'm using it more like a reader than a textbook. I'll return to LCFAB later. So, success.

4) Keep reading Harry Potter.

Yup. I haven't been consistent with it, but I'm able to read 5 pages or so in a sitting without tiring, so it's going well. Success.

5) Listen to, shadow, and even memorize as much audio as possible. My conversational Chinese is not keeping pace with my reading, and this is something I really need to address.

I really need to work more on this. It's a taxing process, but very effective. Failed.

Supplementary Stuff:

1) New Radio Plays (another text from ICLP, with audio) for listening practice

Sometimes. This is really good, I need to work more with it. The annoying thing is that the recordings use a lot of 兒化, which of course nobody here uses. Oh well, it's still good.

2) Supplementary Chinese Readers series, for extensive reading practice

Sometimes.

3) Maybe some other stuff, not sure.

Yup. Ranma 1/2 (which I'm reading much more quickly than before), newspaper articles (actually from real newspapers now, not the 國語日報 for kids, though this is slow going), occasionally dipping into other textbooks like 思想與社會, listening to some extra audio material, etc. I also read 孔乙己, which was my first short story. It was much easier than I expected. I remember trying to read it before I moved here and I believe it took me an hour to get through the first paragraph. This time it took me a good bit less than an hour to read the whole thing. My reading ability has changed dramatically since moving here.

4) Review old material more often. This is holding me back a little right now, so I need to work it in somehow.

Sometimes. I have a playlist with a bunch of older lessons, and once or twice a week I put it on random and listen to several.

5) Don't quit French.

Failed! I "quit" in exchange for Japanese, which will be much more important and useful for grad school. I'm OK at reading French, I guess, and I'll be able to dust it off when I need to in a few years. For now I'm only focusing on conversation, and I'll begin learning to read later on in the process. I'm sort using myself as an experiment to put some of my friend's ideas to the test (he's doing a PhD in Chinese, but has done some research and publishing in second language acquisition). We'll see how it goes.

I feel like I haven't made much progress this month because I wasn't as systematic and focused as I have been the past few months and I didn't reach many of the goals I set. I have done a decent amount of other stuff though, so I'll say this month was a success overall. My English student bought me some middle school and high school 文言文 textbooks, which are really nice. I've used the middle school ones some, but the high school ones are too hard.

This month I really need to get back on track with TOCC. Another thing I've really bad about is keeping up with my SRS reps. I have some 1500 cards backed up, many of them writing cards which take longer. Hopefully this month I'll keep more on track with the goals I'm setting and work in the other stuff on the side of my main books instead of replacing them. My mom is coming to Taiwan to visit from the 23rd through the 2nd of June, so I won't have much time then to study. Anyway, here are the goals:

1. Mini Radio Plays (class): We should finish the book, and maybe start on Newspaper Reading I.

2. TOCC: Finish Lesson 7

3. New Radio Plays: Finish Lesson 6

4. Shadick: At least through Lesson 22 (finished Lesson 10 today). Finishing would be better.

5. Keep reading, or finish, Harry Potter.

6. Keep up with SRS reviews.

7. Keep reading other stuff.

8. Don't quit Japanese.

I also want to do well on my final this term. If I score a 60 I can move on to the next level. I scored a 65 last term on the same test, so that will of course be no problem. But if I score a 75, I can skip a(nother) level and take Thought and Society. If I skip a level, it will be all the more important for me to have mastered as much of the stuff in TOCC as I can, because of its academic nature, and because Thought and Society was originally designed to follow TOCC.

Since we're a third of the way through the year now, I want to "briefly" go over my original goals for the year.

1. Continue to improve speaking. My goal is to take Thought and Society 思想與社會 at MTC during the Winter term, [...] I've had a look through and I think it's a good (high, but achievable) goal for the year. It will require me to do very well in my classes until then, or I won't make it to that level by then. [...]

It looks like I may be able to take Thought and Society 6 months (two terms) earlier than I thought. Major progress here. Had I followed the "standard" progression at MTC, even in the intensive program, I wouldn't have been able to take this until next spring. So if I can take it this summer, that's three terms ahead of schedule. This would mean I've kept pace with students at ICLP who started at the same level I did when I started at MTC. I'm pretty happy with that.

2. Reading. [...] I need to be able to read academic articles in Chinese for grad school, so that is my goal for my time at MTC. I want to be somewhat comfortable with a newspaper by the end of this year. [...]

Not to the point that I can read articles, but I'm beginning to be able to get through newspaper articles. Slowly, of course, but I still have some time on this goal.

3. My 文言文 also needs to improve a lot before I start grad school. [...] this year I will be doing some work on this every day. I have 1-2 hours before class every day to work on whatever, and 文言文 will be first every day.

My 文言文 has improved a lot, but it needs to improve a LOT more. I haven't been as consistent as I'd like to be, though I have made progress. Time to hit this hard.

4. I need to get in touch with professors at the universities I'll be applying to. [...]

I have more time than I expected here, since my wife is signing a two year contract with a school here in Taiwan (at a real school teaching music and art, not a cram school teaching English), starting this fall. I still do need to do this, but it isn't urgent right now.

5. Work on my statement of purpose and re-working my writing sample. I may scrap the writing sample and write a new one, in which case I need to think of a topic for a paper.

Same as #4 above. After another year at MTC, I'll have a full year in which I'll work and read as much in Chinese as possible. I'll continue studying advanced 文言文 with a tutor during that year, and I'll also write a paper on something or another. I'll have the chops in Chinese by then to really be able to use Chinese sources, so that will be better.

6. Read some in English. I brought a bunch of Chinese history books with me to Taiwan, and I'd like to make it through some of them in my spare time.

Could do better here. Hopefully by the end of the year I'll be able to start reading some history books in Chinese.

7. Find some students to tutor privately. Money's tight.

Success here. I have one regular student a few hours per week, and I get some really well-paid English proofreading work on a fairly regular basis. This income is plenty to cover my tuition costs, which helps a lot.

8. Start playing chess again. This one keeps getting shelved, but it really helps me to clear my mind, so I'd like to play some.

Still failing hard at this one, but I plan on reading 棋王 by 張系國 this summer so maybe that will spark some interest? The real issue is finding time with all the other stuff I'm trying to do, but I'll have an hour less of class per day starting this summer because they don't have intensive courses past my current class.

All in all I'm happy with my progress so far this year. I still have a long way to go, so I just need to keep at it. I have applied for ICLP, but at this point I don't know if it will be worth the money. I've been more or less keeping pace with what I'd be doing if I were in that program, plus I have another two years here in Taiwan. I can study full-time for another year and part time the following year, so I'm not nearly as pushed for time as I thought I'd be. I think with fewer time constraints, I can afford not to go to ICLP, and I'll come out ahead financially in the end anyway. I'll also have time to audit some university courses here in Taipei, which I don't think I'd have time to do if I were at ICLP due to their workload.

OK, really long post. Sorry!

[querido]

Epic, OneEye!

We're on track to "finish" CSLPod Intermediate this year, easily, but being truly conversational with it will still take an additional miracle.

I am somehow talking with my tutor in Chinese for a half-hour at a time (with CSLPod Intermediate lessons as the subject matter), and constructing simple monologues as needed.

I'm now also studying shufa (writing with a brush).

[Meng Lelan]

my wife is signing a two year contract with a school here in Taiwan (at a real school teaching music and art, not a cram school teaching English),

Congratulations to her, do tell her that leaving Texas and going to Taiwan to teach was the smartest move ever because Texas is teachers agony on earth, always was and still is.

[renzhe]

Let me have a quick recap:

1) Introduction of the "Chinese Saturday"

2) Finish 水浒传 . About three pages per day should do it.

3) Watch TV shows without reading any subtitles. Stuff like 非诚勿扰 , but also 男人帮. Stuff I can follow without reading any subtitles. Reading subtitles harms my listening comprehension.

4) Finish old HSK vocab, which I started this year (not a priority). I'm not missing much, but I want to solidify it all, and getting through easy stuff I know is time-consuming

5) Finish the 1400 chengyu I started this year

6) After 4) and 5), start working on writing characters by hand

1) turned into "Chinese weekend", and is going strong. I take pen and paper with me, take notes, get tips on how to say complicated things, and then revisit those topics regularly.

2) Glacial pace. Got stuck about a quarter of the way in. Considering reading something easier in the meantime, and going back to it later.

3) is going fine. I try to watch modern stuff with no subtitles whenever I can.

4-6) went nowhere, though I'm sure that I'll go back to 5) before the year is done.

7) is pronunciation practice, which I started. I've noticed that prolonged reading outloud with an attentive tutor (in this case, the missus) really helps with accent troubles, as does concentrating on small tricky parts of speech such as tone pairs. So I plan to do some more of that

Anyway, since Portuguese is taking some of my time, and other things are taking the rest, I don't find much time for anything resembling "work" or "study". And at the moment, 水浒传 feels like both. It's not something you can just do for 30 minutes before sleeping, and I rarely find 3 hours at a time to dedicate to it. The passive immersion stuff is going just fine. Oddly enough, I think that my Portuguese level will easily surpass my Chinese level this year, despite far less effort put into it. It's already close.

As much as I think that the flashcarding extravaganza I went through a few years ago was useful and crucial for success, I feel that I've spent my SRS credits for this life and I just can't stand them. I guess that I won't be doing much of that anymore I still intend to do the chengyu, though.

[gato]

1400 chengyus might be too much. 500-600 should be plenty.

[renzhe]

1400 chengyus might be too much. 500-600 should be plenty.

I do agree in principle, but the question is which 500 you should know.

Previous attempts to come up with a definitive list here on the forum resulted in a rather comprehensive list of 1400 chengyu, complete with an anki deck, compiled by chrix.

In absence of a better, more concise list, I think that learning those is a good project. The obscure ones will fade from memory soon enough, and the useful ones will stick.

[gato]

You can start with the Singapore list of 250 or so that I posted before. I've another list of 300 or so that would bring the total to about 500-600. Chrix was a bit unrealistic with his list, but he's an academic linguist (and native Japanese speaker). Not sure if he's still studying Chinese, though.

[renzhe]

Well, that sounds like a reasonable plan then, perhaps 1400 all at once is a bit pointless. Could you send me the extra list, if it's not already linked somewhere in some thread (no time to search now)?

[roddy]

Stick a new topic up if there isn't one for it already.

2) Glacial pace. Got stuck about a quarter of the way in. Considering reading something easier in the meantime, and going back to it later.

My copy just arrived today. Thanks....

[gato]

Here you go. I've uploaded the 2 lists here: http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/16981-a-list-of-chengyu/page__gopid__281051#comment-281051

[simplet]

Well I'm just going to throw some thoughts in here, not really objectives. I just think I might take a look at what I wrote a few months down the line, maybe it'll give me the impression that I'm progressing... Or someone might have some good advice for me.

I'm thinking about passing the new HSK advanced in October, hoping to get level 6, maybe I should start studying for it right now, but I just hate studying for a test. I prefer studying on my own. I guess I need to try and get some mock-up tests and see what I need to work on, hopefully I'll do that this month...

I'm mostly watching chinese TV on youtube to study. I watching a lot of 锵锵三人行 and something called 时事辩论会 on Phoenix TV. I kind of like 时事辩论会 because it lets me catch up on some political and historical vocabulary and concepts, and it's also kind of easy to understand. I'm getting a bit fed-up with it though, especially the nationalistic commentators and the posturing. 锵锵三人行 is of course awesome as everyone knows. When I watch an episode of those shows I can either try to watch it in one go first without pausing it, then watch it again checking everything that I didn't understand the first time, or I start checking everything from the beginning. Usually I understand about 60-80% of what's going on the first time, but I can still have periods of 30 seconds to up to 2 or 3 minutes where I'm lost. I usually get 95+% of everything that's said when I take the time to check stuff. Some 锵锵三人行 episodes are too hard though, and I need the transcripts. I found out recently that I was able to understand most of the 德国之声 daily news on the first listen, and I was really happy about that but maybe they've just been talking about the same stuff for a long time. I'll just keep on doing what I'm doing now I guess.

Weirdly I find that I'm usually unable to really understand TV series and movies without checking the subtitles. I dunno if it's because TV series are harder than talk-shows, or if I just can't stop myself from looking at the subtitles or what. For this reason I'm not watching too much of that kind of stuff at the moment. Though I'm in the middle of watching the 无间道 trilogy with mandarin dubbing.

I'm still not really practising my reading, I just look at transcripts or subtitles and sometimes follow some links and read a few chinese articles. I'm also able to use chinese/chinese dictionaries now everytime my automatic chinese/english dictionary doesn't pick up a word. But I'm not reading any books, mostly because I'm too lazy to switch from my book to my computer every 2 minutes to look for words and because I feel focusing on listening is making me read a lot anyway... I should probably still start.

According to my Anki deck I know around 4150 characters right now. I don't really have a precise objective for that, maybe get to at least 4500 before I take the HSK, not sure how many characters I'm supposed to know for that. They say 5000+ but that seems a little bit much to me...

[Silent]

For me last two months were a waste. There are several reason for that but turbulence at work and above all lack of discipline and motivation are the most important issue's for March. In april these reasons were supplemented with my choice to go travelling for 2.5 weeks and the anki backlog as a result of the travelling.

At this moment I'm not really sure what my strategy should be for the next months as I feel there's a big disconnect between what motivates me and what would be best for progressing my Chinese. At this moment I strongly feel like following the more motivating path as I'm pretty sure I would mean keep improving while the alternative may mean I will skip my excercises and no progress will be made at all. This means I will go back at my reading for motivation and see how I can supplement this with excercises that can diversify my skills to listening, writing and speaking. Listening and writing being prioritized above speaking. Below the results and my new goals where relevant. The new goals are not very solid yet.

- Read my first book in Chinese. With book I mean a book aimed at native adults. This most likely will be: 许三观卖血记, 余华 (I hope to make a start this year)

As mentioned in my previous update I've finished this one and I've decided to start my 2nd book in the native level category. I've choosen 圈子圈套。If I look at vocabulary alone as I did with my first book I probably should choose a different one. However, the theoretical comprehension rate is a bit higher then for 许三观卖血记 at the time at started out. I feel this book has more usefull and modern vocabulary then the alternatives.

- At least double, hopefully triple, my vocabulary from about 2500 now to 5000-10000.

As mentioned before, dropped. As of the count for today I'm at a little over 3400 words and adding 2 words a day when there's no backlog.... I'll see how things develop. Minimum goal is to keep up with the decks. If things go well I may add a few words more but it's important that I keep the time spend on SRS low.

> to work on grammar at least an hour a week.

In march I probably met this goal, in april I did nothing at all.... On paper the goal doesn't look too demanding specially if I spread it out a bit. So I'll try to stick to it.

> spend at least 1/2 an hour a day on listening (watch movies, soaps, audio books, real excercises)

again, in march I came close though as before listening wasn't very intensive, in april I did some listening, but no more then 1 or two hours a week. I'll try to stick to watching a movie/soap etc every once in a while but want to get into a habit of intensive listening for at least half an hour to an hour a week.

> start to actively use chinese (maybe find language exchange, tutor or abuse some chinese friends)

Language exchange is still there though it often is just a chat session. Not sure what to do with it as I see no big direct benefits. But it does provide a little motivation and I at least actively use Chinese what I really do need.

Again, in march I met the 1 message a week at lang 8 goal. In april I failed. Want to get back to the one message a week. Feedback is not always perfect, but the feedback I get is usefull.

> 4-6 weeks of travel in China this summer.

It's going to be autumn. Booked a return ticket (5.5 weeks) to Beijing for a very friendly price. Substract a few days to a week for an excursion to North Korea (still to be booked) the rest will be China. No solid plans about what to do/where to go yet.

> New objective: pronunciation excercises

Failed in March and april to excercise consistently. I feel I should do them, but feel very little motivation for these excercises. In doubt how to proceed with this.

[renzhe]

My copy just arrived today. Thanks....

Sorry, roddy. If you start it, I'll get back into it with you, promise!

[imron]

I do agree in principle, but the question is which 500 you should know.

Just read, and add the ones you come across to a flashcard program for drilling. You'll get the most relevant ones for you and the type of material you read most.

[jbradfor]

(from post #21)

my primary goal is to regain my interest in continuing to learn Chinese.

I was wondering how the trip to China would affect my study motivation. After returning, I'm still not sure.

My reading ability is better than I thought, at least based on being able to read signs while touring. It was relative rare for me to encounter a character I didn't recognize, and most of the time I could understand signs. Understand, that is, given enough time, as my reading speed is still very slow. [For the record, "relative rare" means every 500-ish characters I see, not every couple of days.] I had based my reading level on light fiction / web news, and based on that, was glad to see my day-to-day reading is getting there. So that was heartening.

I still totally suck at understanding Mandarin with any accent. This is getting frustrating. [The ironic part was that the harder it was for me to understand someone, the easier it was for my wife (native Cantonese-speaker) to understand them. I would have expected that in, say, Guangzhou, but this was in Sichuan!]

Unfortunately, my speaking ability seems to have decreased, based on getting people to understand me. For example, even something as simple as telling the front desk that the card key didn't work took a lot of effort. [On the plus side, I learned a new grammar point: "打不開門" and "打得開門".] I don't recall having this much trouble before. Is is possible that focusing mostly on reading will actually make my spoken ability worse? Or maybe it's age. Whatever it is, I think I need to work on this more before my next trip.

[abcdefg]

For example, even something as simple as telling the front desk that the card key didn't work took a lot of effort. [On the plus side, I learned a new grammar point: "打不開門" and "打得開門".]

I'm traveling now in China (Shanxi) and had the same hotel situation yesterday. I told the woman at reception "我的房卡把门开不了。“ Didn't occur to me to say it the way you learned, though that does sound more efficient.

[rebor]

I'm currently finishing up my second and last semester at BLCU, so my year in China soon coming to and end. I feel I have a good foundation to build on, and I don't think I would have made it past the first months of frustration and constant failure without the structure of "real" classes, but now I'm actually looking forward to study on my own. I've come to the realization that studying on my own coupled with a few sessions with a private teacher every week would be more effective for me, and that we just waste a lot of time futilely trying to memorize the texts from our textbooks. I've been pretty 努力 I'd say, but by blindly following the mandated tempo and material I've come close to burnout and lost a lot of the passion I had before. What I need to do is to keep the good habits I've built(daily SRS - which has made an enormous difference for me, and listening to podcasts while commuting, exercising etc), focus more on my relatively weak grammar, and find a way to keep speaking chinese on a regular basis, while focusing more on finding material I enjoy. The time I have at my disposal for Chinese will be limited, as I will begin an undergraduate degree this fall, so I also need to set reasonable goals and make habits out of them.

Vocabulary: Skritter says I'm at around 1600 characters and 2300 words right now. Some of these are very 书面 stuff from our 阅读-class, some are expressions from 听和说 which I only have a very passive knowledge of and some words I can confidently use in speech. I was a bit obsessed with my character count for a while(I guess a lot of people fall in to this trap). It's just a number of course, but it's nice to track your progress, however imperfect the measurement. I feel I'm doing fine with most material at elementary/lower intermediate level in terms of reading. After classes are over in the middle of June I will only do reviews for two-three weeks before I start adding new material. After this pause I will add 10 new words a day to Skritter, mainly from the HSK lists, but also words I encounter in podcasts, articles etc. I will start adding all words I look up in Pleco as flashcards, and then sort through them once a week or so to see if I want to study any of them. Based on experience this should demand about half an hour out of my day.

Grammar and writing: I will buy Ching's and Rimmington's Basic and Intermediate Chinese grammars and work with them for four hours every month. When I encounter difficult points I will do my best to research them and then post on lang8. I will also find a private teacher for tutoring over Skype to help me with difficult structures.

Listening: I will continue listening to Popup Chinese and ChinesePod while out walking, cleaning, riding the bus to school etc. I will also watch chinese TV shows(I've already started on 局中局, which is hard but also quite interesting). I won't set a specific number here, but I want to make sure I watch some every week. And I will watch chinese movies, too, of course(though probably with english subtitles at first...)!

Speaking: I will try to find a language partner in my city, but failing that I will get a tutor over Skype for one hour every week. There's a language exchange café in my city which I will attend. I don't expect to much here, I just want to keep as much of what I have as possible.

Reading: I will probably buy a few textbooks here and bring them home with me, most likely from the Road to Success series we've been using. As much as I can I will read simpler native material and slowly start reading news articles(but this will be a bit down the road and I will probably need a book to help me with that). I will read something in chinese for at least 10 minutes every day to start with, just to build the habit.

All in all, this should be manageable for me. It is not very ambitious, but I'm confident that I will make some progress if I follow my plan. For me, forming habits is the key, and in the long term ten words or ten minutes of reading a day amounts to quite a bit. Hopefully I can make some more time for my chinese studies after a while, but even if this is it I think I will have progressed quite a bit after three years(the duration of my degree).

[icebear]

@rebor

All in all it looks pretty good. I would also suggest trying to follow a TV show, of which there are many recommendations and most available on YouTube at high quality and speeds. Starting slowly, with maybe 10 minutes a day (of content - but maybe more time as you look up words that are necessary for comprehension) will get you through an episode a week. I find that this helps a lot more with listening comprehension and reinforcing learned vocabulary than podcasts (although podcasts help more with learning new vocabulary).

I also strongly support your hour a week goal with a online tutor (I'd say keep that, even if you find a ok language partner). Decent tutors on iTalki are cheap enough to do an hour a week if you are too cash strapped, and over the long run I think it will do a lot to help maintain your tones. I recently started this after more or less 3 years of very limited Chinese speaking (save a few short trips back to China) and not surprisingly have had a lot of trouble with tones on some words - frustrating to have to relearn those habits which you were once relatively good at.

[rebor]

@icebear:

Yeah, as I mentioned above I've watched a couple of episode of 局中局 which I found in the TV series recommendation thread. Podcasts are very limited in their chinese content(at least before you get to something like ChinesePod advanced), so as you say they don't really reinforce your vocabulary that much. I actually find that they reinforce grammar more than vocab, as they usually go in to more depth than our textbooks. ChinesePod usually has a good selection of words, so I think I might start grabbing some from there to complement the HSK ones. The little chinese TV I've watched has been very helpful, and it's so nice to listen to actual, living and breathing chinese instead of the clinically embalmed version you get in 听力-books(I get why they do it like that of course and that you can't start with native material from day one, but god I hate 听力-books). My problem is that I need to pause very often to read the subtitles, but this is a matter of practice, to, I guess.

I think you are right here. I don't think it fair to demand to much from you 语伴, and I will need someone who is both knowledgable and patient for all my questions. I should also say that my tones still need improving, so the progress I've had is probably very fragile. I will try do meet my tutor here in Beijing as much as I can before I leave to reinforce and improve.

I was actually a bit inspired by your approach that you outlined before in this thread, so it's cool that you took the time to respond to me