I've noticed that when I make errors in writing characters, I often make the same error on a regular basis. That is, some parts of the characters are easy to remember, while other things get mixed up. I'd guess this is common.
Has anyone tried the strategy of keeping track of his or her common mistakes, and then studying them, as a way to study characters?
I just mis-wrote 安静 for the millionth time, putting a heart-radical on the left part of 静。 (No idea why I do this... something is getting mixed up in my head I guess..)
Sometimes when I study characters (production, using anki), I circle the characters that I got wrong. I can look back, and even without looking at the incorrect character, I can remember exactly what the mistake was.. in fact, even a few days later, I can often still remember what the last mistake was, and the reason why it's been re-scheduled so soon on Anki.
Thus, I wonder if it might be helpful to do something like I suggested above. I'm probably going to try it anyways, but I'm wondering if anyone has used a strategy like this, what exactly you did, and if it was helpful or not.
Not sure if this is right, but there's a lot of common characters - 请， 情，清，晴 - which you come across at a relatively early stage that have 青 on the right. I suspect the pattern-noticing parts of the brain spots that and think of it as a rule, and so the exception of it being on the left in 静 causes confusion.
I can get 欠,攵and夂 mixed up all day long, but I work on the basis that if I ever have to write anything, my handwriting is so bad nobody is likely to notice.
Maybe you could try thinking along basic lines such as: 'The radical for 静 is 靑 (the heart radical meanwhile, that I mistakenly keep on writing, is thus pushed out of and no longer in the common left-side radical position), whilst the phonetic according to Harbaugh is apparently (or rather, "has to, can only be" therefore, by this process of elimination I'm engaged in) 争 (zhēng). So 静 = left radical 靑 + right phonetic ("phonetic") 争 .'
Monday, January 25, 2010
Chinses learning
This post is a general overview on studying Chinese. Many details will be omitted since I'm not writing a book. Any detailed questions can be asked below or searched for.
1. You start going up the roller coaster by learning the basics. You are thinking how hard it is to get the basics down, especially weird pronounciations like ǜ. Hearing the differences in tones is a difficult task, let alone speaking them quickly. You are forced to learn characters through brute memorization. The ascent is very very slow and you can't even make a basic conversation.
These are the basic skills you should MASTER in level one, all are equally important to your foundation.
Pinyin (pronunciation) Memorize all pinyin, and have a native speak correct your pronunciation.
Tones You should speak with tones, know the tone rules, and practice tone recognition.
Radicals After learning some characters, you should learn the first one hundred radicals or so. It will help on character retention and for memorizing new charcters.
Stroke order Even if you decide not to write, stroke order is important for dictionaries. If you decide to write its extremely important
This is a great thread with ideas on how to start. Beginner's guide
2. You get to the top, and start descending rapidly. You are able to understand some conversations, even picking a word out in a movie is inspiring. This is the stage where everything just 'clicks'. You start thinking Chinese is easy. Words come easily because they are used broadly, 开车，开门，开灯，打开电脑, etc. Grammar seems easy, 了 just makes everything past tense right?
You should have mastered basic grammar and start learning some intermediate grammar points
Learning words is equally important as learning characters
Strive for near native pronunciation, if needed spend more time on pronunciation
3. You're at the bottom and start realizing the once simple 了 is one of the hardest grammar points in Chinese. Reading Chinese starts getting harder because characters start looking alike. Chinese people start misunderstanding you because of minor tone mistakes, 通知，同志，统治，同治，童稚，统制，especially when you start using more advanced vocabulary. But all in all, still confident in yourself, especially since Chinese people are complimenting you all the time.
You will most likely become very self conscious about your tones, and realizing you forgot a lot tones to the most basic words (I didn't use Anki at the time). This is when you will start questioning your grammar, if you start becoming unsure about something you write or say, just write it down and ask someone. Classical Chinese is helpful to further understanding written Chinese.
4. Realizing you suck at Chinese. You start going back up the roller coaster, realizing there are countless idioms and sayings to remember. Reading newspapers is a daunting task; everything has its own abbreviation. 浙江大学 is 浙大 for example. While many grammar points are easily learned. You can understand and talk about most topics, but its just not good enough yet.
This stage is probably the hardest to get past. While you have a solid foundation in Chinese, its not enough. To top it all off, you are getting severly diminishing returns
1. You start going up the roller coaster by learning the basics. You are thinking how hard it is to get the basics down, especially weird pronounciations like ǜ. Hearing the differences in tones is a difficult task, let alone speaking them quickly. You are forced to learn characters through brute memorization. The ascent is very very slow and you can't even make a basic conversation.
These are the basic skills you should MASTER in level one, all are equally important to your foundation.
Pinyin (pronunciation) Memorize all pinyin, and have a native speak correct your pronunciation.
Tones You should speak with tones, know the tone rules, and practice tone recognition.
Radicals After learning some characters, you should learn the first one hundred radicals or so. It will help on character retention and for memorizing new charcters.
Stroke order Even if you decide not to write, stroke order is important for dictionaries. If you decide to write its extremely important
This is a great thread with ideas on how to start. Beginner's guide
2. You get to the top, and start descending rapidly. You are able to understand some conversations, even picking a word out in a movie is inspiring. This is the stage where everything just 'clicks'. You start thinking Chinese is easy. Words come easily because they are used broadly, 开车，开门，开灯，打开电脑, etc. Grammar seems easy, 了 just makes everything past tense right?
You should have mastered basic grammar and start learning some intermediate grammar points
Learning words is equally important as learning characters
Strive for near native pronunciation, if needed spend more time on pronunciation
3. You're at the bottom and start realizing the once simple 了 is one of the hardest grammar points in Chinese. Reading Chinese starts getting harder because characters start looking alike. Chinese people start misunderstanding you because of minor tone mistakes, 通知，同志，统治，同治，童稚，统制，especially when you start using more advanced vocabulary. But all in all, still confident in yourself, especially since Chinese people are complimenting you all the time.
You will most likely become very self conscious about your tones, and realizing you forgot a lot tones to the most basic words (I didn't use Anki at the time). This is when you will start questioning your grammar, if you start becoming unsure about something you write or say, just write it down and ask someone. Classical Chinese is helpful to further understanding written Chinese.
4. Realizing you suck at Chinese. You start going back up the roller coaster, realizing there are countless idioms and sayings to remember. Reading newspapers is a daunting task; everything has its own abbreviation. 浙江大学 is 浙大 for example. While many grammar points are easily learned. You can understand and talk about most topics, but its just not good enough yet.
This stage is probably the hardest to get past. While you have a solid foundation in Chinese, its not enough. To top it all off, you are getting severly diminishing returns
Chinese is more difficult than European languages
I went to China in the Autumn and while I was there I started learning Chinese and had a really excellent teacher for a couple of weeks.
However after that I moved on and I really struggled to apply the very rudimentary skills I had in any sort of every day context, which really concerned me and I think kind of made me give up on learning Chinese a bit.
I am Scandinavian and I speak and understand most northern European languages, and I normally find that if I go to for example Italy I can fairly quickly pick up some basic stuff and then build on that quite quickly, but this just did not happen with Chinese at all.
I cannot pronounce Chinese, I don't understand it and tbh the whole sign story I am not even contemplating yet, so I have obviously had a bit of a dent in my language buff image.
Chinese is a difficult language, and it is very different from all European languages. I don't think that it is considerably more difficult than, say, English, but you have a huge head-start in learning English, as it shares most of its vocabulary and grammar with Scandinavian languages.
It's relatively easy to pick up languages similar to your own, or from the same family. European languages have all borrowed heavily from Latin, so Italian and Spanish are easy to pick up due to the huge overlap in vocabulary. Many of us have been through the desperation phase when faced with Chinese and the glacial rate of progress.
A couple of weeks is really not a suitable time frame for expecting to learn anything. The fact that you don't understand anything is completely normal. It would be absolutely abnormal if you had rudimentary skills after a couple of weeks.
Chinese is a challenge for language learners, but a really rewarding one. You will need to measure your learning time in years instead of weeks though.
However after that I moved on and I really struggled to apply the very rudimentary skills I had in any sort of every day context, which really concerned me and I think kind of made me give up on learning Chinese a bit.
I am Scandinavian and I speak and understand most northern European languages, and I normally find that if I go to for example Italy I can fairly quickly pick up some basic stuff and then build on that quite quickly, but this just did not happen with Chinese at all.
I cannot pronounce Chinese, I don't understand it and tbh the whole sign story I am not even contemplating yet, so I have obviously had a bit of a dent in my language buff image.
Chinese is a difficult language, and it is very different from all European languages. I don't think that it is considerably more difficult than, say, English, but you have a huge head-start in learning English, as it shares most of its vocabulary and grammar with Scandinavian languages.
It's relatively easy to pick up languages similar to your own, or from the same family. European languages have all borrowed heavily from Latin, so Italian and Spanish are easy to pick up due to the huge overlap in vocabulary. Many of us have been through the desperation phase when faced with Chinese and the glacial rate of progress.
A couple of weeks is really not a suitable time frame for expecting to learn anything. The fact that you don't understand anything is completely normal. It would be absolutely abnormal if you had rudimentary skills after a couple of weeks.
Chinese is a challenge for language learners, but a really rewarding one. You will need to measure your learning time in years instead of weeks though.
What do you use Chinese for?
I, as a native Chinese and an instructor of Chinese in the states, am often asked by some people "Why would people in the states need to study Chinese?/What would you do with Chinese?", immediately after they find out that I teach Chinese. Based on my experience of this online forum, I feel that quite a lot of you guys have lots of experience of using Chinese as a foreign language for work and life. So what do you use Chinese for? And what has motivated you to study and continue studying Chinese? What's your view of the future of Chinese learning and teaching in the U.S. and other parts of the world?
Sorry for throwing so many questions here. But I would really appreciate you sharing your opinions/stories so that I have more ideas about this, and as a professional in this field I do need to know more about these.
I don't know much about the state of the teaching market in the US, so this is my speculation.
I think that the Chinese learning hype will continue, but ultimately the bubble will burst. I don't think that we'll ever have the situation where 10% of Americans (or German, or British, or French, etc.) speak Chinese, like they do with some other languages in some of these countries.
I do expect that the interest in Chinese will be higher than before, that there will be more people studying Chinese at the university level, or for professional reasons (translators, working overseas, etc.) and Chinese will be offered at more places (like schools and community colleges) but let's face it, this will always be a tiny minority of people. The language is simply too much work for the wide masses, and there are languages which are easier to learn and far more useful for many purposes.
Personally, I have zero need for Chinese. I cannot imagine any scenario where speaking the language might be in any way beneficial to me (professionally), other than possibly the "cool" factor when applying for a job.
I learn it for personal reasons, and because I'm interested in the language and the people. I certainly find it worthwhile. But reading Chinese classics and conversing with Chinese people (who will mostly speak English anywy) will not motivate most people to go through the necessary effort.
I might be too pessimistic here, but I don't think that people will learn a few semesters of Chinese en masse so they can go and integrate into a Chinese workplace. I mean, people moving to China to work will obviously find it useful, but they are still relatively few, and many don't even bother to learn the language.
It will likely continue to be the province of language lovers, people marrying into Chinese families, kung fu practitioners, feng shui hobbyists, and other people with a strong interest in the Chinese culture. More than today due to improved teaching and increased relevance of China, but still a fringe in the grand scheme of things.
Sorry for throwing so many questions here. But I would really appreciate you sharing your opinions/stories so that I have more ideas about this, and as a professional in this field I do need to know more about these.
I don't know much about the state of the teaching market in the US, so this is my speculation.
I think that the Chinese learning hype will continue, but ultimately the bubble will burst. I don't think that we'll ever have the situation where 10% of Americans (or German, or British, or French, etc.) speak Chinese, like they do with some other languages in some of these countries.
I do expect that the interest in Chinese will be higher than before, that there will be more people studying Chinese at the university level, or for professional reasons (translators, working overseas, etc.) and Chinese will be offered at more places (like schools and community colleges) but let's face it, this will always be a tiny minority of people. The language is simply too much work for the wide masses, and there are languages which are easier to learn and far more useful for many purposes.
Personally, I have zero need for Chinese. I cannot imagine any scenario where speaking the language might be in any way beneficial to me (professionally), other than possibly the "cool" factor when applying for a job.
I learn it for personal reasons, and because I'm interested in the language and the people. I certainly find it worthwhile. But reading Chinese classics and conversing with Chinese people (who will mostly speak English anywy) will not motivate most people to go through the necessary effort.
I might be too pessimistic here, but I don't think that people will learn a few semesters of Chinese en masse so they can go and integrate into a Chinese workplace. I mean, people moving to China to work will obviously find it useful, but they are still relatively few, and many don't even bother to learn the language.
It will likely continue to be the province of language lovers, people marrying into Chinese families, kung fu practitioners, feng shui hobbyists, and other people with a strong interest in the Chinese culture. More than today due to improved teaching and increased relevance of China, but still a fringe in the grand scheme of things.
Learning Chinese – advice for the new and independent student
A course
A structured course to follow is essential. Currently that means a paper-and-ink textbook, and the associated audio and video resources. Online and CD-ROM courses aren’t there yet, although they may make sound supplementary materials. Which actual course is less important – that will depend on what is available, what you like the look of, costs, etc. Some sound options:
a. Integrated Chinese
b. New Practical Chinese Reader
c. Chinese Made Easier
Follow one of these carefully and you can avoid the trap of focusing on what you find easier or enjoy, and as a result developing imbalances across the four core skills (reading, writing, listening, speaking) or letting either grammar or vocabulary fall too far behind. Supplement with other resources, but never forget that structured backbone.
Teachers and Tutors
An evening class, private tutor (online or off), instant messaging buddy or willing Chinese-speaking friend is an excellent way to practice and build confidence. But be aware that native speakers are not necessarily able to teach, and may find it difficult to provide explanations – ask any English speaker if the ‘th’ in ‘thumb’ is voiced or unvoiced, or the difference between ‘I’ve seen it’ and ‘I saw it’. Chinese people often assume Chinese is virtually impossible for foreigners and hence heap praise on minor error-ridden achievements. Accept no compliment without criticism – insist on knowing what your most intrusive fault is, as there will surely be one.
Pronunciation
Bad pronunciation habits are more easily acquired than lost, so don’t acquire them. You’re going to be reliant on pinyin for quite some time, so learn it early and often. Remember pinyin letters do not have the same pronunciation they do in your native language – the pinyin wǒmen is not the English women. Listen intently and repeatedly to the audio for your course, and use Audacity or a similar tool to record yourself and compare. If you have any time with a tutor or native speaker, spend the bulk on pronunciation and speaking.
Tones are often taught poorly or not at all by teachers and textbooks. But a student of Chinese cannot overlook the tones any more than a student of English cn ovrlk vwls. Do not ‘worry about them later’; you will not ‘pick them up over time’. You probably won’t produce tones accurately in conversation at first, but work from recognition to production in single syllables, to words, to sentences. Make sure you know the tones for every item of vocabulary you learn - if you don’t know the tones you don’t know the word. Further reading
It’s like playing the guitar or tennis – frequent, repetitive practice is key.
Characters
Characters are the most visibly different aspect of Chinese, and it’s easy to get hung up on them. Don’t obsess about how many characters you know, or how many you need to know – put words first.
You may decide early on that will not need to learn to write by hand, but will get by with pinyin input on computers. You will still need to learn to recognize characters.
You’ll need to decide whether to study simplified or traditional characters. The usual choice will be simplified but if you have a good textbook which uses traditional, plan to spend lots of time in Taiwan, or just think they look better, learning traditional is fine. Once you’ve learnt one set, the other is well within reach.
Methods for learning characters range from brute force with flashcards and repetitive writing to the use of elaborate mnemonics. In any case, an understanding of the components that characters are made up of is essential.
Vocabulary
Use flashcards. You can make your own out of card, buy them, or use electronic flashcards on your computer, phone or PDA. Look at products such as Anki, ZDT and Pleco. Opinions on whether your flashcards should feature characters, words or sentences differ, but everyone agrees you should have them.
Technology
Make full use of technology. Flashcard programs can simplify the grunt work of vocabulary learning. Podcasts and an mp3 player can automatically deliver you daily listening material. A pop-up dictionary can decode that problematic sentence. Even the least computer-savvy learner will get a good return on time invested figuring these tools out.
Don’t over-rely on electronic aids. You won’t be able to copy and paste an argument with a policeman into an online translator.
Practice
If you’re a movie buff, watch Chinese movies or TV. You’ll need subtitles, but picking out words and sentences is a huge confidence boost and eventually the subtitles get turned off (or swopped for Chinese ones). Bookworms should obtain a set of graded readers to use until they can start simpler authentic texts. Chatterboxes can find people to chat with over Skype. Chinese music, video games – it’s all out there. Initially authentic Chinese materials will seem inaccessible, but seek out the simpler ones and keep plugging away. You’ll get there, and it’ll feel great.
Spend Money
You can learn Chinese for free, but money spent may save you time and errors. Textbooks, a good dictionary, tutors. It’s still cheaper than golf, and much less pointless.
Discipline
Be rigorous. You’re not just self-studying, you’re self-teaching. It’s your job to make sure you complete the exercises at the end of every chapter, revise those words from three weeks ago, check the grammar in the passage you wrote, pull yourself up on pronunciation, find explanations for the stuff you don’t understand. Doing all that yourself isn’t simple - that’s why we’re here. But if you don’t care how good your Chinese is, your Chinese won’t be any good.
A structured course to follow is essential. Currently that means a paper-and-ink textbook, and the associated audio and video resources. Online and CD-ROM courses aren’t there yet, although they may make sound supplementary materials. Which actual course is less important – that will depend on what is available, what you like the look of, costs, etc. Some sound options:
a. Integrated Chinese
b. New Practical Chinese Reader
c. Chinese Made Easier
Follow one of these carefully and you can avoid the trap of focusing on what you find easier or enjoy, and as a result developing imbalances across the four core skills (reading, writing, listening, speaking) or letting either grammar or vocabulary fall too far behind. Supplement with other resources, but never forget that structured backbone.
Teachers and Tutors
An evening class, private tutor (online or off), instant messaging buddy or willing Chinese-speaking friend is an excellent way to practice and build confidence. But be aware that native speakers are not necessarily able to teach, and may find it difficult to provide explanations – ask any English speaker if the ‘th’ in ‘thumb’ is voiced or unvoiced, or the difference between ‘I’ve seen it’ and ‘I saw it’. Chinese people often assume Chinese is virtually impossible for foreigners and hence heap praise on minor error-ridden achievements. Accept no compliment without criticism – insist on knowing what your most intrusive fault is, as there will surely be one.
Pronunciation
Bad pronunciation habits are more easily acquired than lost, so don’t acquire them. You’re going to be reliant on pinyin for quite some time, so learn it early and often. Remember pinyin letters do not have the same pronunciation they do in your native language – the pinyin wǒmen is not the English women. Listen intently and repeatedly to the audio for your course, and use Audacity or a similar tool to record yourself and compare. If you have any time with a tutor or native speaker, spend the bulk on pronunciation and speaking.
Tones are often taught poorly or not at all by teachers and textbooks. But a student of Chinese cannot overlook the tones any more than a student of English cn ovrlk vwls. Do not ‘worry about them later’; you will not ‘pick them up over time’. You probably won’t produce tones accurately in conversation at first, but work from recognition to production in single syllables, to words, to sentences. Make sure you know the tones for every item of vocabulary you learn - if you don’t know the tones you don’t know the word. Further reading
It’s like playing the guitar or tennis – frequent, repetitive practice is key.
Characters
Characters are the most visibly different aspect of Chinese, and it’s easy to get hung up on them. Don’t obsess about how many characters you know, or how many you need to know – put words first.
You may decide early on that will not need to learn to write by hand, but will get by with pinyin input on computers. You will still need to learn to recognize characters.
You’ll need to decide whether to study simplified or traditional characters. The usual choice will be simplified but if you have a good textbook which uses traditional, plan to spend lots of time in Taiwan, or just think they look better, learning traditional is fine. Once you’ve learnt one set, the other is well within reach.
Methods for learning characters range from brute force with flashcards and repetitive writing to the use of elaborate mnemonics. In any case, an understanding of the components that characters are made up of is essential.
Vocabulary
Use flashcards. You can make your own out of card, buy them, or use electronic flashcards on your computer, phone or PDA. Look at products such as Anki, ZDT and Pleco. Opinions on whether your flashcards should feature characters, words or sentences differ, but everyone agrees you should have them.
Technology
Make full use of technology. Flashcard programs can simplify the grunt work of vocabulary learning. Podcasts and an mp3 player can automatically deliver you daily listening material. A pop-up dictionary can decode that problematic sentence. Even the least computer-savvy learner will get a good return on time invested figuring these tools out.
Don’t over-rely on electronic aids. You won’t be able to copy and paste an argument with a policeman into an online translator.
Practice
If you’re a movie buff, watch Chinese movies or TV. You’ll need subtitles, but picking out words and sentences is a huge confidence boost and eventually the subtitles get turned off (or swopped for Chinese ones). Bookworms should obtain a set of graded readers to use until they can start simpler authentic texts. Chatterboxes can find people to chat with over Skype. Chinese music, video games – it’s all out there. Initially authentic Chinese materials will seem inaccessible, but seek out the simpler ones and keep plugging away. You’ll get there, and it’ll feel great.
Spend Money
You can learn Chinese for free, but money spent may save you time and errors. Textbooks, a good dictionary, tutors. It’s still cheaper than golf, and much less pointless.
Discipline
Be rigorous. You’re not just self-studying, you’re self-teaching. It’s your job to make sure you complete the exercises at the end of every chapter, revise those words from three weeks ago, check the grammar in the passage you wrote, pull yourself up on pronunciation, find explanations for the stuff you don’t understand. Doing all that yourself isn’t simple - that’s why we’re here. But if you don’t care how good your Chinese is, your Chinese won’t be any good.
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