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Hitchhiker’s guide to the Chinese Galaxy | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| outcast Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member China Joined 4739 days ago 869 posts - 1364 votes  Speaks: Spanish*, English*, German, Italian, French, Portuguese, Mandarin Studies: Korean | Message 49 of 230 19 May 2013 at 8:01am | IP Logged | ||
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Ling and Jasoninchina,
Thank you very much for your posts. They mean a lot to me, such unexpected words of support and encouragement are an instant motivator to double the effort. Ling, I will look at that phrase more closely soon. At first read I can't find the pun, but I haven't had a lot of time of late to relax. Jasoninchina your suggestions are outstanding, in particular the Chinese Breeze seems an amazing resource. I will now take a look at it on Amazon. - - - - - - - - Weekly Progress Entry 9 5.19.2013 Into the third month now... and it was a forgettable start for my language studies. The good news is, I managed to hold on to my Chinese, and keep to schedule (except the characters where I have fallen a couple of days behind, more in a second). In other words, I did what I expected to do and now I am fully into Unit 4, about done with lesson 1 and starting lesson 2. The bad news has really nothing to do with this log, but my French and German studies and speaking went disastrously. I had a very sub-par outing when I had my French weekly meeting, I just could not get into the conversation much, and the German meeting was cancelled last second altogether by the tutor. Furthermore, I didn't listen to much in the languages and read even less. I didn't even review as much as I normally do. Honestly, it was a combination of me going out into town a couple of days (I had some extra money for the first time in a while), and the fact my brain just seemed to refuse to want to think. I think I was burned out, after quite a few weeks of 6+ hour studies every day, in two languages a day (Chinese + French/German). It's happened before a few times so I'm not too surprised, and while I get a bit upset about it, I also just let it be, and take a breather. I am feeling "better" now and I think my brain is now more refreshed to continue. I had a great study session with Chinese and French today, so I hope this is the start of a new positive cycle. I will be brief on this WPE, my Chinese is advancing slowly. Some days I feel more is sinking in, and others I revert back. But this didn't happen before now. Before every day was a bit of a struggle, now I have what I see as "semi-fluid" days with the languages, and other days it goes back to being a struggle. Based on past experience with three languages auto-didact, I know this is actually a good sign. Still learning about Chinese expressions with numbers. There are some significant conceptual differences presented in the newest lessons, about how the Chinese express time and events. From word order before or after the verb and what this means about a time phrase, to how the Chinese say "THIS evening/morning" (not with "this"!), to how the language is more precise about things like last month, this month, next month, and when to use specifiers, when not to use them, and when NEVER to use them (with "day" or "year"), it all needs to be learned thoroughly in order to speak in a comprehensible manner. This takes time since it is a bit different from Western Languages. Not entirely so (Chinese like German has a "When? / Where?" order), but it does need to be practiced. No important grammar was really touched upon last week, except the "shi... de" construction for a past occurrence. The characters... as I said I fell behind a couple of days, this was the one area my mental 'malaise' this week caught up with my chinese. But I finished a day ago with the latest 100 batch, and I am north of 500 Hanzi now. I am now doing a review of all characters learned so far. Just a review, not an exhaustive one, as I do want to move on fairly quickly to the next 500... I don't want to lose the momentum. I can review learned characters all I want after I reach my goal of 1,000 unique Hanzi, both with flashcards and by being able to read some basic text later on this year. This week I hope to finish Unit 4 by the end of next weekend. I want to reach 600 Hanzi by the 31st of May (sounds like a good round date. I am giving myself a little more time than before to account for the review of old characters throughout the period. Till the next WPE on 5.24.13! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| outcast Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member China Joined 4739 days ago 869 posts - 1364 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English*, German, Italian, French, Portuguese, Mandarin Studies: Korean | Message 50 of 230 19 May 2013 at 9:07am | IP Logged | ||
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Special entry 6
Hanzi learned @ 5.17.2013 = 500 401-500 论 論 (S / T) 念 己 食 方 万 萬 (S / T) 苹 蘋 (S / T) 房 只 祗 隻 (S / T1 / T2) 音 已 足 跟 轻 輕 (S / T) 斤 尤 昨 户 些 兄 亲 親 (S / T) 产 產 (S / T) 接 着 能 乍 右 左 座 观 觀 (S/ T) 入 呐 石 础 礎 (S / T) 週 之 干 幹 乾 (S / T1 / T2) 每 道 而 找 理 必 相 部 乐 樂 (S / T) 第 加 反 米 单 單 (S / T) 哈 给 給 (S / T) 吾 另 酉 犬 满 滿 (S / T) 最 辆 輛 (S / T) 细 細 (S / T) 常 视 視 (S / T) 跳 舞 放 才 纔 (S / T) 错 錯 (S / T) 玩 品 睡 爱 愛 (S / T) 所 空 话 話 (S / T) 觉 覺 (S / T) Edit: cleaned the list up. I had several characters missing, one doubled, and others missing the traditional version. I made the list at 3am and half asleep, thus the many mental lapses. The list is perfect now. Edited by outcast on 02 June 2013 at 6:50pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| outcast Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member China Joined 4739 days ago 869 posts - 1364 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English*, German, Italian, French, Portuguese, Mandarin Studies: Korean | Message 51 of 230 20 May 2013 at 8:35pm | IP Logged | ||
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Unit Completion Entry 13
Unit 4 Lesson 1 Basic Spoken Chinese 5.20.2013 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| outcast Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member China Joined 4739 days ago 869 posts - 1364 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English*, German, Italian, French, Portuguese, Mandarin Studies: Korean | Message 52 of 230 25 May 2013 at 6:10am | IP Logged | ||
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Weekly Progress Entry 10
5.24.2013 I am finishing up Unit 4 at the current time. Pretty much done with Lesson 2 and probably with lesson 3 tomorrow. The reason for being done so quickly with Lesson 3 is because I studied the grammar and vocabulary well, as I didn't have the time to sit down and do the drills. All I need to do now is that and I will be done. Hopefully tomorrow. I am definitely more comfortable with numbers now, at least between 1-100. I still get tripped up sometimes, and hearing numbers said at full speed is still a bit challenging, but I know it will get better. The grammar remains quite understandable, and because the unit is so heavy in explaining expressions with numbers, there is not a ton of material in this area. I have been reviewing the characters, I remember most of the ones I have learned. I think the key is to do a review periodically, not let them slip away. With every review they get more fixed in. I have learned only about 20 new characters the past 5-6 days because of the review, starting sunday I will get on with the remaining 80 to finish up to 600 by May 31st. I hope to do that and start Unit 5 early next week... That means that I close to taking out the Pimsleur Chinese that is in the local library. I have never used Pimsleur and don't know how much of it I should do a day. I also know some people love Pimsleur and others not so much. I think since it's free it can't hurt, and it will expose me to other "voices" of people in Chinese, and most likely to other ways of saying things I have learned (it always happens that different courses have different phrases for things). I can't believe I will be in Unit 5 this next week... half way through Basic Spoken Chinese! Till the next WPE on 5.31.13! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| outcast Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member China Joined 4739 days ago 869 posts - 1364 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English*, German, Italian, French, Portuguese, Mandarin Studies: Korean | Message 53 of 230 25 May 2013 at 6:14am | IP Logged | ||
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Unit Completion Entry 14
Unit 4 Lesson 2 Basic Spoken Chinese 5.25.2013 Edited by outcast on 29 May 2013 at 6:07am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Flarioca Heptaglot Senior Member Brazil Joined 5672 days ago 635 posts - 816 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, Esperanto, French, EnglishC2, Spanish, German, Italian Studies: Catalan, Mandarin | Message 54 of 230 25 May 2013 at 5:11pm | IP Logged | ||
I've done Pimsleur Mandarin I and 1/2 of volume II. I've also done many other Pimsleur courses (namely, Russian I e II, Arabic I, some Hungarian and Romanian lessons), I don't hate it and would certainly do it if I still had a 30 minutes commute time. About the Mandarin one, it has been almost 10 years ago, but I'm quite sure that you'll go through it very easily. I believe that you'll find it very easy to do, at least, one lesson each day. It'd be even better if you go back and forth to work/school/university by train or metro. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| outcast Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member China Joined 4739 days ago 869 posts - 1364 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English*, German, Italian, French, Portuguese, Mandarin Studies: Korean | Message 55 of 230 29 May 2013 at 6:07am | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks Flarioca for the info.
- - - - - - - Unit Completion Entry 15 Unit 4 Lesson 3 Basic Spoken Chinese 5.29.2013 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| outcast Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member China Joined 4739 days ago 869 posts - 1364 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English*, German, Italian, French, Portuguese, Mandarin Studies: Korean | Message 56 of 230 01 June 2013 at 4:07pm | IP Logged | ||
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Unit Completion Entry 16
Unit 4 Lesson 4 Basic Spoken Chinese 6.01.2013 1 person has voted this message useful |
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