Intermediate Podcasts?

[WoodenFrogs]

Hello everyone - first post here on the site.

I have been studying Chinese for about two years and would consider myself to be at an intermediate level. I live with Chinese people and speak with them daily - but I have found that my listening comprehension is lacking. So I have been searching through the site for Podcast recommendations, and many of the threads are now outdated. What are Podcasts that are appropriate for the intermediate Chinese learner? If this has been covered somewhere else please link me to that thread.

Thanks in advance!

PS: Whats the opinion here on passive listening while doing chores? Helps? Not worth it?

[rebor]

I've mostly listened to elementary material, but also some on the intermediate level. My impression is that the big 2 are ChinesePod and Popup Chinese. They both have different levels, ranging from newbie to advanced(ChinesePod has both Intermediate and Upper Intermediate while Popup only has one Intermediate level). They both contain a dialogue, followed by explanations of vocabulary(often also introducing related vocabulary) and grammar. Now, this is only my impression, but I think that ChinesePod is more polished and structured, and the vocabulary is generally more high-frequency and usable. Unfortunately their voice actors aren't that great. They all have quite a bit of that robot-y naiveté that you only find in textbook listening exercises, and the dialogues are usually pretty stale. Popup Chinese's voice actors on the other hand are good, some of them really good, and while they may speak more slowly in the lower level material, they still sound natural to my ears(I do not mean to say that a chinese person would necessarily the same assessment, that I'm not qualified to say, only that to me they do not sound too unnatural). The dialogues are also quite funny to me, but this will of course vary from person to person. All in all, I get bored with ChinesePod, while I look forward to new episodes from Popup Chinese, so for me the choice is obvious. The latest episodes are available for free on Popup, and CP lets you sample a few lessons before having to show them your credit card.

[Flying Pigeon]

Hi,

Welcome!

I recommend iMandarinpod:

http://www.imandarinpod.com/hoola/

Here is a new one that's been creating a buzz on the forums:

http://www.yemaohao.com/

Sweeping or mopping the floor while listening to a podcast = worth it.

Admin,

Any chance of a podcast sub-forum?

[JCJC]

I think that I'll start listening to podcasts while doing chores then. Also, Dont forget that China Daily does have news broadcast that are in Chinese as well as some of their articles in Chinese with the English beside it. That could be helpful.

[Adam_CLO]

You can find more intermediate lessons on my site www.ChineseLearnOnline.com (CLO). The big difference with my course is that it's progressive, so each lesson continues where the previous ones left off.

I did it this way because I could never find content out there that was exactly at my level - either it was too difficult or too easy. CLO only teaches a few new words each lesson. Vocabulary that has been taught is reused in future lessons. This way if the content becomes too difficult, it's easy to go back and review earlier material.

I would recommend intermediate learners start with level 3 (click on the orange lesson links to access free content) which is almost all in Chinese, but it's all Chinese that was taught in earlier levels. There are 7 levels (420 lessons) in total, so hopefully there's enough content there to keep you busy.

[mnspg]

Here is a new one that's been creating a buzz on the forums:

http://www.yemaohao.com/

Creating a Buzz? Really? With only 6 episodes?

[imron]

At the time that post was written, it was creating a buzz - native speakers, natural conversation, variety of accents, full transcripts, regular updates and so on (not many podcasts offer all of these).

It seems however that the podcast in question was unable to maintain that initial motivation.

[Yang Chuanzhang]

Hi,

Yemaohao isn't dead, we still plan to publish more episodes.

The problem so far hasn't been a lack of motivation, but we weren't satisfied with the first few episodes we did.

Right now it looks like we might have something by this weekend.

It really helps us beat our perfectionism to see that people were interested in Yemaohao, thanks!

Yang

[MandarinCslpod]

Hi, may I recommend CSLPod's intermediate podcasts?

http://www.cslpod.com

There are 400+ intermediate episodes for you.

In intermediate lessons:

Teachers employ normal speed (which is relatively close to the regular speech of a native Chinese) to record and explain the lesson text. Users can make use the Learning Guide and audio to firmly master the more difficult words, word order, sentence pattern and means of expression. In the process, users can use the audio and improve their listening ability of the Chinese language. At the same time, lessons for the intermediate levels and above are designed by CSLPod to cover more relevant and interesting topics pertaining to China, Chinese culture and current trends in China. By learning those lessons, users can better understand Chinese culture and the way the Chinese people think.

Hope you like it.

[Flickserve]

Chinesepod is also on Spotify. Just discovered it a couple of days ago.