educational advice for frustrated student.

[yonitabonita]

Hey folks,

I've been in Beijing for 2 months now. I'm finding that my classes at the BLCU are painfully slow. I thought I could improve the situation by going to Diqiucun after class for additional classes. Again, my kouyu class is too slow.

Although I've enrolled at the BLCU for a year, I think I'll pull out for the second semester. I figure I'll buy a stack of books on my own, work through the exercises myself, and go to a good tutor for a sanity check twice a week.

Have I gone off my nut?

I'm a native English speaker, but have learnt Japanese, and can speak Cantonese fluently. I'm quick with tones, I'm quick with grammar since it's close to Cantonese, but my reading and writing is weak since I've not spent much time learning Mandarin.

Any advice for what approach to take?

Grateful for your advice!

Yonnie.

[gato]

By "slow," do you mean that the BLCU and Diqiucun classes are too easy for you? Since you say you are fluent in Cantonese, I'm guessing that your family background is Chinese? Your case sounds like that of a typical ABC/BBC/CBC. You are much better than speaking and listening than at reading and writing. Are you not to allowed to take oral classes at one level and reading/writing classes at another?

In the meantime, I would recommend spending at least an hour every day focusing solely on memorizing characters. Study with flashcards of characters made from a graded list as this:

http://www.chinese-forums.com/showthread.php?p=64602

http://polycrit.com/CharactersGraded.txt

Once your read/writing skills improve to where your oral skills are, it might become easier for you to get into classes more suitable for your background.

[mr.stinky]

can you rearrange your schedule? drop speaking/listening and increase hours of reading

and writing? then hire an outside tutor for speach.

or what about dropping all the group classes, and letting the uni provide the tutors?

[yonitabonita]

Hey folks,

Thanks for responding. Yeah, my family are from Hong Kong. There's no question of the BLCU letting me switch my schedule. It doesn't recognise that foreigners from different backgrounds might have different learning needs.

By "slow", I mean that I can understand and apply a grammatical point just about instantly. So sitting through an hour or two of explanation and examples can be frustrating. There's so much I don't know and I'd rather be spending my time being taught grammatical points I find difficult.

I don't think I can skip the listening and speaking - even though they tend to be my strengths, I'm still no where near the level I want to be.

Thanks very much for the advice - I'll have a look at the lists and will certainly start cramming characters.

If anyone knows of a tutor that's particularly strong on Chinese grammar, I'd be grateful for the tip.

cheers,

Y

[roddy]

Couple of things which may or may not be useful.

The 北京华文院校 apparently focuses on teaching overseas Chinese, Hong Kong and Taiwanese folk, etc. Their website doesn't appear to be working now, but there's also this page with some info.

I only know of this school because someone asked about it a couple of years ago, I don't know of anyone who has actually studied there. However, you might want to have a look.

Also, isn't there a section of BLCU that caters to overseas Chinese who want to improve their Mandarin - there's a now non-functional link here - I seem to remember it's called the 速成汉语学校 or something similar. On the right as you come in the south gate past the bookshop? Can't look for a current link as the BLCU website appears to have broken.

Having said all that, it appears like you have a slightly unusual set of needs and experience of learning Asian languages - which probably means you might be better off finding a decent tutor and doing your own thing.

Best of luck

Roddy

[gato]

I've found these two HSK grammar prep books to be very helpful. You should check them out.

http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/7961-hsk-grammar-patterns&highlight=grammar

For the elementary and intermediate level

HSK语法点速记速练（初、中级篇）

And for the advanced level

HSK语法点速记速练·高级篇

[yonitabonita]

Again, thanks for the advice. It's been really useful.

Y

[yonitabonita]

Just for the record. I've asked at the BLCU whether they have a programme for ABC/CBCs and they don't. They closest they come is the intensive course (6 hours per day) for those that want to accelerate quickly in a short space of time. But since it's not particularly geared towards those with Chinese family backgrounds, you start from the basics just like any other foundation course.