Mandarin Chinese in 6 Months?
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- čas přidán 25. 08. 2024
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I was asked to describe how to achieve fluency in Mandarin in six months.
Timelines:
0:21 A letter from one of my viewers.
1:49 Language is a lifelong journey.
3:37 The goal is to get comfortable.
4:05 Go to the country.
4:56 Listen to dialogues and lay off the characters.
7:49 Listening and reading is the most effective method.
8:49 Unapparent exposure method.
9:18 The biggest waste of time.
9:47 What books and materials should be used.
10:26 I would start to write as soon as I can.
10:59 Intensive program for a month.
11:42 80/20 principle doesn’t apply to language learning.
12:38 Don’t worry and just speak.
13:23 6 months are over. What’s next?
14:03 Your languages are always with you.
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So at the very beginning of the video, Steve states "How to become fluent in mandarin in 6 months...you can't do it" lol, great video :)
There are several factors in teaching yourself to talk Chinese online . One place I found which succeeds in merging these is the Magic mandarin blueprint (look for it on google) definately the most helpful resource i've seen. Look at the amazing info .
Some kids have actually done that but they are the prodigies. 4 Year Old Speaks 7 Languages!! czcams.com/video/Xd9u9N7Z4TU/video.html
If the Defence Language Institute can't teach someone to become fluent in six months, than neither can anyone else.
What a very wise man. I agree. Not like some
Ridiculously preaching fluency in 3 months.
Benny Lewis. I appreciate his ambition, but I scoff at his claims. I think he's more of a hype guy. I was taught to be fluent in Spanish in six months. I was able to do this because I went to one of the most efficient language schools in the world and I was in class 8 hours a day 5 days a week. I was in an environment of nearly complete immersion. I also participated in extra curricular language exchange after school hours. Spanish was my life for that 6 months. I don't think I could have done it in less time. Keep in mind that for English natives, Spanish is one of the easier languages to learn. It all goes up from there. Mandarin, Korean, Japanese, Arabic were all 14 month classes if I remember correctly.
Benny gets away with it because there are a broad range of definitions for fluency. When I finished my Spanish course I was tested at a 3+/3+/3+ (Reading/Writing/Speaking) or something close to that. That is a very high non-native proficiency. 5 would be considered native/academic on the scale that was used for testing.
I would say that one could definitely reach a 1+/1+/1+ after 3 months. This is probably enough to have simple conversations. (Get around town, order food, talk about family etc.)
You could probably get to a very fluent level in 3 months. I learned German in three months, to a level where I could read books without the use of a dictionary. I do still make mistakes though, and every now and then I might not understand a word. So I am probably only what you would call "Conversationally fluent"
@@SouthPark333Gaming assuming its approximately 20'000 to 30'000 words to not need a dictionary in a German text you learn 10'000 a month ? and retained 100% of them?
@@AlexG-wk3nh There is not chance that it's that many, if you don't count different conjugations of the same words. It's more like 7,000-10,000. Plus I already spoke English and Danish, so it's not like I was starting completely from scratch.
@@SouthPark333Gaming regardless of how you categories the words you learnt 10'000 root words in 3 months , thats over 100 a day on average and you retained 100% of them?
"Every language is a life-long journey". I was thinking about it and you said it. We should be really careful when choosing a language, there's a lot work ahead while learning it and maintaining it. Thank you Steve!
You are absolutely inspirational! A word for learners of Chinese ( I am a native speaker): Tone awareness is the key to achieving fluency in Mandarin.
Well we know that. It’s just hard to develop that including Steve himself.
This is so inspiring！I am a chinese who love learning English!I hopei in one day I can speak as fluent as a native！
Isn't CZcams blocked in China?
There are a few tips for how to learn Mandarin
Decide precisely why you wish to learn Mandarin
Try to use Chinese everyday
Find which process works for you best.
(I read about these and more on Magic Mandarin Blueprint website )
I use VPN or SS to bypass the block wall
Lol nice!
Do you know how an English native speaker can speak as fluent as a native Chinese speaker?
Thinking in the language is just something that naturally happens as we become more and more used to the language. This requires a lot of listening, reading and eventually speaking, lots.
Im at HSK5, and it took me 2-3 years whilst living in China rolf..
Currently learning HSK 6 vocabulary.
Before my HSK5 tests i memorized all the characters, now I recognize half in sentences and forgot how to write 3/4
Speaking is way easier than writing, believe me!
2013 Steve: Just go to China!
2020 Me learning Chinese because I need a pandemic hobby: ...
Definitely one of my favorite videos that you've made yet, Steve! :)
I recently spent 6 weeks in Romania, Moldova and Ukraine. I am currently learning Romanian and what you say is spot on about traveling to the country and being exposed and motivated even further by having the language directly in your surroundings on a daily basis. (It is also possible to learn a language without traveling to the country but for me it would be a lot harder to maintain the necessary motivation).
Should you still listen even when you're brand new and don't know a word they're saying AND don't have any subtitles on what is actually being said? There are mandarin kid stories on youtube but no English subtitles. Should I still listen? If so, why? Why is that beneficial? Thank you
BTW, you said in the vid if we flatter you, you will help us so you're amazing. you're awesome. You're the best language channel out there!! lol
yeah dude same question here but i think that the first things you should actually listen and read preferably in pinyin(at least in beginning ) are things that would help you in conversations. phrases that actually you would use with people(to order food ,ask for direction basic stuff like that) .once you get these familiarised I would suggest then to learn words (as he said somewhere ). this is probably when you would start learning characters too..to answer your question about stories its too inefficient and cumbersome on your first day .for me i had to pick up google translate on every words so yeah i am ditching that method for now. anyways i am learning japanese what am i doing here xd
Through my experiences yeah it's so beneficial even if you don't understand any single word
After few weeks you'll certainly be able to understand some of them
That's exactly how we learnt our native language
Yes, it's very important that you listen to your target language, even as a beginner. It'll help you pick out the sounds and distinguish phonemes, and after some study you'll be able to distinguish words and comprehend more and more.
I don't want to rain on anyone's parade but while that can be semi helpful as body language and expressions is more or less universal could that not slow you down be detrimental also? Reason being you start to guess what is being conveyed - positive / negative /casual / serious etc but really you are only guessing and in reality DON'T know the real words if you haven't studied them at all. Exposure can definatley help sure but by prioritising th at at the beginning you might just be wasting your time as it's ultimately at that point being acclimitized to babble just unintelligible noises
You would start to understand here and there eventually but it would take a LOT I mean a lot of listening to that for meaning to start to take place in your brain.
I learnt that in Greece before I started to learn more than hello, and, thankyou , coffee and goodbye . I tried to keep up with the conversation but ultimately I was completely lost and felt isolated lol.
Although mood plays a part too. the more relaxed you are the more engag3d your brain is if you don't understand much.
At that point I knew a handful of words from many years ago but conversation wise it barely helped me.
That's just me though
To summarise I think exposure is great but unless someone or something actually acts as interpreter / translator for what you are hearing it could really slow you down
Thoughts ?
Steve, you are a genius. I watched one of your interviews in Chinese. As a Chinese, I have to say you are much better than most native speakers.
could you send me this video pleas? I want to learn chines language to university purpose.
Steve, everything you've said has really resonated with me. It's seems like common sense. I am currently learning Mandarin and you've motivated me to keep going. Many thanks!
It's unprecedented that when I am listening to your speaking.It sounds like you are speaking my first language.I can totally understand what you are saying so effortlessly.But my experience was some native speakers' talk definitely sounds like a second language to me.
You are speaking English but I am receiving "Chinese" and my mind is telling me you are expressing my mothertone.
I sense so many languages while you are expressing certain idea or concept,because you feel/know how people express their concepts in different cultures.
This is an unprecedented experience for me and it's partly happening on a telepathy level or to say a psychic level(vibrational level?).
This is "magical" and amazing!And I just want to share this with you.
Thank you so much for sharing your perspectives on how to learn new languages,cultures and how to approach and communicate with people with different culture background .It helps a lot.My deep appreciation❤️🌻
I just found your videos and they are very well done. It's great to hear your thoughts and experiences on learning. Thanks for sharing.
Loved the video, Steve. I'm living in Taiwan currently, doing something similar to what the person who originally messaged you to ask your advice was- learning Mandarin, that is, not trying to learn it in 6 months. I have to say learning here without the resources to pay for classes has had its own unique challenges, but it's coming along and I'm quite grateful that I didn't insist on enrolling in a program upon arrival, for what the experience has taught me.
One resource I wish I had started using sooner is the reader series from John DeFrancis et al. For gradual, methodical exposure to characters and character compounds, and sheer volume of at level reading, I simply haven't found anything better in print. Some of the vocabulary is a little antiquated, of course, and there's always the what-goes-on-the-mainland-may-not-fly-in-Taiwan trouble when it comes to pronunciation and word choice, but it was only after adding the reader series into my regimen that my reading comprehension really started to take off.
Did you do any work with the above reader series when you were learning? If so, what were your thoughts?
De Francis is a good book. I didn't use it, but many others did back when I was studying in the late 60s.
You always said I went a little bit long! But we are here to listen and absorb your opinions and experiences to help us learn. Don't worry about time!
Thanks for your videos!
Paul
thank you soooo much ! I'm also going to start learning mandaring Chinese after 2 months & I'm super excited ...all of my resources will be online including linqQ , im using it right now on german & its very very helpful .
Mit solchen Enthusiamus wirst du sehr schnell lernen, da Chinesisch mangels Grammatik sehr einfach ist. 我 想 你 学 习 汉 语 很 好, 因 为 说 中 文 不 难!
The 'snowball' analogy is also apt. After getting to a functional level in the language, definitely engaging more in meaningful conversation and more complex media will certainly help you to progress consistently over time in the new language. There is (so far) no silver bullet for becoming truly fluent in a short time period such as 3, 6, 12 months. Language learning is a lifestyle choice.
I love this man, i could listen to him for hours.
"Let me begin by saying that you can't do that.."
I just discovered "Google Pinyin Input" - using an S-Pen on my phone and writing messages to myself in a messenger app. I spend 30min a day writing texts - eg, copying vocabulary into ANKI, checking myself if I can actively write down the audio from my textbook - eventually in realtime (without stopping after each word or sentence). The piles of my handwritten papers look nice, but what to do with it. - Thank you for sharing Steve! Very inspiring thoughts!
Diplomat for 7 years, lumber business executive for most of the rest up to now, own my own company in wood business.
I've been learning Chinese for about 6 months now (about 3 hours almost every day) and I can say I have a weak B1 level. If you're more hard-working and try not to procrastinate as often as I did, maybe you can get to a B2 level. That's how I see it, at least.
I'm a Chinese, I looking for someone to be language partner, we can learn fome each other. For example, if we have a hour to talk, 我们可以聊半个小时中文，和半个小时英文。感兴趣的朋友可以加我Hellotalk
@@michaellun6984 Hello 可以啊 只是我不知道怎麼加你在hellotalk上
"Any language is a lifelong journey", that's so true!. Very interestng video, thanks.
Steve I want to thank you for all of your videos. I have only been learning languages now for about a year and a half and have become fluent in Italian and am now working on mandarin. Your videos have helped me extensively, thanks again !
Tone is one of the most important parts, once i heard a british celebrity said 分尸(which means to tear dead body), but I assumed he was trying to say his 粉丝（fans）
man. I love motivated people like you
Steve, je suis d'accord avec vous mais je crois que ce qui fait vraiment la différence entre ceux qui réussissent dans les langues et les autres c'est l'implication dans la phase active.Trop souvent on passe trop de temps à étudier une langue plutôt que de la pratiquer surtout à l'oral.Au polyglot gatrhering de cette année, j'ai assisté à une conférence d'un Polonais qui avait comme but de parler couramment le chinois en 9 mois.Il en était à son 8ème mois et il faisait son discours à la fois en chinois et en anglais,c'était très impressionnant,il avait l'air de très bien maîtriser les tons en plus.Il disait qu'il s'était immergé complètement dans le chinois et étudiait le vocabulaire qui concernait sa vie.Il avait un bien meilleur niveau que moi qui ai commencé en 2013! Je pense que j'ai trop favorisé la lecture et pas assez la pratique orale.Je pense avoir un niveau B1 en compréhension écrite mais à l'oral je dois avoir un niveau A2 et j'ai toujours du mal à comprendre les phrases un peu complexes en chinois alors qu'en portugais du Brésil que j'étudie depuis 3 semaines je comprends souvent 70 voire 80% du contenu parfois même à l'oral mais je pense que c'est parce que je comprends déjà beaucoup l'espagnol.Je crois que je vais reprendre sérieusement le chinois car c'est incroyable les opportunités de carrière avec cette langue (même ici à Paris).
Go Steve , you are such a inspiractional.. your killing it
Good instructions on learning Chinese, sure Chinese is a difficult language but trying to figure it out.
You have to do both. Lots of reading, and lots of individual study, especially for the first 1000 or so.
I want to improve my Korean from B1.5(?) to C1 in 5 months...
Didn't know I'd see you here 😀, love your channel
5:37 I replayed that a couple of times
As for the 80/20 rule, I am with you that the 20% more frequent vocabulary will be absorbed gradually simply because the learner is exposed to it so often. This is a point I repeatedly make when being asked about flash cards or electronic memorization software. However, I still think that effective memorization software may have a role to play in speeding up the initial learning process for the 20% most frequent vocabulary.
well... I spent 5 weeks working in Japan after spending 7 months studying the language. Id say when I got there, I wasnt quite ready, but those 5 weeks in the country roughly doubled my fluency. There were some real struggles along the way. By the end of my trip I was able to Navigate Airports, Train stations, and highways, Order food, Buy tools and lumber, rent lift trucks, play the Kendama with local teens, read many signs, advertisements, and book titles passively... I think by the time I left, almost exactly 9 full months of learning, I was able to do what the Common European Framework describes as a B1 ability except for writing. but after 3 more years of studying at home I think I did get better, but still fit more into B1 than anything above.
So... Fluent in 6 months? probably not. Fluent after 6 months plus 5 weeks immersion? Decently fluent... Im sure that if it were 5 months instead of 5 weeks it would have made an unimaginable difference for the better
put a hold on my studies - and deciding to get back into learning Mandarin
Yeah. He announced in his Email list about an hour ago. As someone planning to learn Japanese eventually, (I am currently trying to get my French to a professional level but will probably start Japanese next year) I'd love to hear your take on this.
I agree with you 100% on conventional dictionaries and only use electronic ones for the last five years. In fact, I have given away my paper dictionaries. :) It is also a lot more practical to use a dictionary on your smartphone when you are traveling (smaller, lighter, quicker and more effective - as long as your batteries don't die ;) )
Very interesting points! Great video.
Pretty good thoughts on the subject, Thanks Steve !
Thanks for the motivation!
You can achieve HSK 2 in less than 6 months, so I did. Do not expect fluency in 6 months.
personally i like having classroom learning because it provides structure. its incredibly hard to maintain consitency and motivation when trying to 自学. i see it as like a minumum amount of effort i need every day. of course, youre gonna need to do a lot of practice outside of class regardless. hell, ive spent time talking to myself on countless occassions perfecting pronunciation
I think it is necessary to learn in a course and after that try to improve for ourselves in order to reduce mistakes.
Some good advice here, although I disagree about holding off on characters at the beginning. You can hold off on writing them if you want to, but I believe you should learn to read them from the start. Characters act as hooks that your brain can latch on to to remember a word. Chinese has so many homonyms that learning from pinyin quickly becomes very confusing, but when you SEE the differences in the characters it all makes sense. And when you do want to learn to write, you can't beat Skritter.
Maybe you are right, but probably it doesn't matter. I found that being able to listen to and follow dialogs using many words that I did not know the characters for, was a great introduction. But, I think this is probably best left to each learner's individual preference.
yo steve you the man. I've been in Shanghai for 3 years studying loosely but I'm gonna commit and get on these tools your talking about. pce
I do agree on the fact that learning a language is a process, and that you never are in a fixed state of the learning...Sometimes you are a bit more rusty, sometimes - especially when you're immersed into it, you feel more confident with it! I don't agree on the fact that the 80/20 principle can't be applied to language learning. Frequency lists can help you a lot, provided you learn words in context! As you're immersing again in Italian, I'd suggest you listen to my Italian podcasts on itunes!
When people talk about fluency, what they really mean is the "fluency" you get by studying the language every day for 10 years. It will take ten years before you're where you want to be most likely. The whole "get fluent in x amount of time" it the wrong way of looking at it, if you have an end goal you're not going to stick with it. You have to love the language, truly in order to be "fluent".
Dashan?
Really interesting video. I'm interested to see how Benny Lewis' fluent in Japanese mission goes over the next three months...
He failed miserably.
This depends on which languages you know in which languages you are trying to learn.
Fluent in 6 months is impossible. There's no question about it.
That being said, I believe you could reach low B2 comprehension in 9-10 months if you read+listen daily for hours.
🍎 老师好。。 你的中文很好 谢谢
I think you're already pretty good if you listen to "I promessi Sposi", so I'd suggest you start and listen to the free podcast "Awaken your Italian! Risveglia il tuo italiano!" available on Itunes and podiobooks: please do not consider any of the few times when I talk about the English language. The podcast is totally in Italian (except for a few warnings in English). Another free podcast of mine is "I segreti della lingua italiana per stranieri". I also have "impariamo l'italiano a Tropea".
You can always try Heisig. I don't understand what you mean by "learn Kanji along with words". You need to learn the individual Kanji, and you should also learn compound words as well as phrases.
you can also speak into Google translate if you use chrome browser.
The ony hard part of Mandarin is writing, you can choose not to write so much. Pronunciation can be achieved by listening, and the grammar is ridiculously easy, the vocabs have a regular pattern, anyway it's not that hard.
Sheridan Su well considering how big a role the internet plays in communicating with people from around the world, it really does help to learn how to write in Mandarin
@The Legend27 Definitely, you are right. Furthermore the acquisition of writing is helpful for memorizing Chinese characters.
I had another experience. Where I live, there I have no possibilty to speak Chinese. So I learned more reading and writing. From books I had to imagine, how chinese would be pronounciated. Very often, my imagination of that was wrong if you never heared or if you never can hear this language! I learned this language, before internet existed. It was very hard looking up in dictionaries, where to one german expression were a list of 50 chinese expression whithout pinyin. To choose the right expression, I had to look for some hundred words at the end. From another book I had to look up the characters to find the pinyin through radicals or with teh four number edge system. Then I had to find ther german expression for it, where also a list is appearing. So theses words had also been translated, where this process starts again!
This was the only way for me to learn chinese. It took no long time, to see a system behind all the characters. So I learned them very quickly and about a year, I was able to read and write books in chinese, but not able to speak. I had problems to understan a chinese even when he spoke words which I already knew it. My ears were not rained to hear the tone. When the chinese guy repeat the word 20 times I was not able to hear it. Tey were to quick in speaking and the tones are very flat. If chinese teachers teach mandarin. then they speak the tone extremly clear, where I have no problem to hear it. Speaking myself the tones whithout hearing them before, became often extreme. The chinese people don't understand me immediatly.
Chinese is very simple, but if you have not the right books, if you have no person where you can speak with, then it becomes very difficult.
525 000 imho to be good at writing Chinese we first need to be good at writing period. I’m Chinese and I recently took both the IELTS and the HSK 6 and my writing score were horrible for both languages. I think it’s because I’m just not so good at writing in any language. If I write more I’ll be better at writing in any language. I think writing is a very transferable skill across languages.
An app called Pleco is the best, I use it to look up characters on the fly all the time. You can draw them in and it's surprising ly good at deciphering your scribbles. Massive dictionaries available for it. I found an entry for futurama in it! 飞出个未来
Eu concordo com STEVE: LER E OUVIR são as habilidades básicas para aquisição da língua
O mais difícil coisa com aprendendo o português... SER CAPAZ OUVIR. Tão difícil.. especialmente quando você não tem uma pessoa com quem conversar. Escrevendo não é super difícil.. eu posso um pouco.. aprendendo claro.. ler.. também não é muito difícil. Mas meu habilidade de ouvir e entender.. parece impossível agora. Algum dia eu vou visitar o Brasil é isso vai ser o momento melhor na minha vida 😌
Большое Спасибо ❤️
that is the best recomending way to learn chinise thanks a lot
Each person is different.
Regarding the issue of having to memorizing thousands of characters to be able to comfortably read Chinese, I'd say this isn't really a problem now that we have mouseover dictionaries where you can instantly see the pinyin/meaning of any character (I use "Zhongwen Chinese Popup Dictionary"). In fact even a complete beginner can slowly read and understand texts without ever having rote memorized characters with the use of a mouseover dictionary.
I bought Pimsleur lessons 1-6. Cost me 11 quid. Realised that if I want to go the whole way with Pimsleur, I'm going to pay a small fortune.
Threshold lev. Lang a life-long journey, snowball, get comf with authentic matl, Be annoyed but decode + pick apart, 10-30 kanji per day, spaced repetition 1 hr daily to get to reading (+listening) best. Massive exposure if you can stand it. Mangled lang in classroom :(. Don't look up dict - use online or Lingq. Write as soon. Google translation! No drill. No interrupt while speaking. 80/20 Tim Ferris? Meaningful input. Motivation, initiative, exposure. Speak when ready.
Thanks Steve - will do!
You will not be "fluent" in Mandarin after 6 months but for someone studying maybe 2-3 hours a day you might be able to read basic texts and have a conversation on basic topics.
I would argue even then no
@@Re3iRtH There is no reason why someone who studies 2-3 hours a day for 6 months would not be able to hold a conversation on basic topics. If they can't, then I would really wonder what in the world they did for 450 hours.
I have rarely heard anything so relevant about language learning...
I am a language teacher and I agree it is a stupid question. First of all: how much time are you willing to dedicate to learning learning in those 6 months? Learning a language is a never-ending process.
I'm just starting. U can write me to see the updates 😄
你好，你叫什么名字 this is all I know currently
Any tips/advice on how to think in a foreign language like Chinese, or any other language for that matter? I think it would make a good video.
"Let me begin by saying, you can't do that".Lol
I think you missed the Pareto principle's meaning a little here. It just means that you should be prepared that after a certain period your acquisition is going to slow down. For example, learning twenty per cent of the Russian grammar such as basic inflection will net you around eighty per cent of all grammar used in conversations. The people who use this in language learning use it as a reference point. The first twenty per cent are the ones you need to really study for, the rest will come.
I was wondering if you could tell me what your profession has been through the years? Have you had a career related to language learning or has it only been a hobby for you? I am just curious because I would like to know how you have managed to dedicate your time to language learning.
I am studying English with great distress. If anyone wants to learn Chinese, we can exchange the language of learning each other. I also speak cantonese.
I have never found frequency lists useful, but language learning needs to be an individual pursuit.
I am 57 and learning and have difficulty recreating characters after practicing. I can however, use my iPhone and pick out those characters from others which tells me that I am remembering the characters. My question is will I be able to remember the characters at my age?
Yes you will, especially if you practice writing them.
Hello, do you know Rosetta Stone Programm for learning Mandarin? If yes, would you recommend it?
+Steve Kaufmann - lingosteve If I don't intend on learning characters in chinese at all and my goal is just listening and speaking, what can I read that will just have pinyin so I can keep improving?
Pareto's principle is accurate for many aspects of a language. However, it is not useful as a language learning strategy. You naturally learn the 20% most frequent words with enough exposure. The other 80% , or a good portion of them, are needed for meaningful communication. The 20% most common grammar rules, case and verb endings etc. , are often the most difficult to learn. So my basic strategy of language learning is not affected by Pareto's Principle.
you've mentioned Turkey/Turkish several times in this video. Are you contemplating learning Turkish by any chance Steve?
One question: what will be the point of learning 10 languages if you're going to forget 30 or 40 % of each one because you don't have the time to practice all the 10 at least 1 language a week? isn't it better just to handle 2 or 3 but handle those 2 or 3 very well, thant just ending "knowing" a few word from the other 7 left?
I don't forget the languages that I learn well, that is about 12 off them, and if I keep going with Korean, it will be 13. I don't count Romanian.
most natives speak Max 50%. look at a dictionary how many of those words do you use daily? .. exactly half the words most natives haven't even seen before
+Steve Kaufmann - lingosteve It is impressive if you can really speak all those languages Steve. But how you find that time to learn all those languages??
Why should we forget. You can use your brain in a way where you don't forget. You have also many experiences which you have not forgotten. May be you wish to forget something if you have nightmares from it!
Hi Steve , I'm not studying Chinese but I'm studying Japanese and i just thought , would be the same method used to learn Chinese work with Japanese ? I already tried to learn Kanji just by writing over and over but it doesn't seem to work , do you think that learn Kanji along with words is a good idea? somehow I think that it is working but i don't know whether it will keep working or not .
what are these first 1000/2000 characters you speak of? are they the most commonly occurring?
So many words and so few practical steps - aside from the amorphous mantra of "reading and listening" - as if reading is a beginning skill in Mandarin.
I did not realize that he was learning Japanese.
No, fluency is a useful concept. It refers to the ability to communicate comfortably on a variety of subjects, even with mistakes and gaps.
Do you think it would be easy to relearn Chinese even tho I haven’t spoken fluently in over 10 years?
You got me. I clicked!
Steve, I have a question regarding Chinese characters. You often talk about the way you studied and acquired the characters, and that seems like a good idea. However, do you recommend study one character at the time, both the pronunciation and the meaning? Or studying characters within words from context (e.g via reading). Thank you!
But Let's not forget the basics: learning styles: audio, visual and kinasthetic. These are natural ways to learn a language. But then, you've got the learning strategy, which you have to adopt. By "adopt" i mean " how and what to do to acquire a language.
How i learnt English: i started doing it when i was 11 back in 1989. When i was 16 ( 1994), i achieved my fluency:
What i did back then was read alot , go into grammar aspects of the language and i was lucky enough to find a book dealing with the phonetics. The more i read, the more i learnt vocab, language structure. Speaking came naturally as i came Across people who would speak the language already. What i liked the most was that the very people i spoke to, would eventually correct me.
Now i'm trying to learn mandarin Chinese.
I am from Mozambique
What drove me into learning Mandarin Chinese is/are movies. But later on, i found out that those movies were made in Hong Kong and that they don't speak Mandarin Chinese but Cantonese Chinese. Anyway, it was a good way to start.
Steve has highlighted the fact that memorising may Hinder the process of learning a language, which is true. Just see the words and your brains Will sort of store the pieces of information gradually. Once you see the words again, i am Hundred percent sure that you will remember them eventually.
" Just enjoy the language" because learning it is a Journey. In Steve's words, " it is a life-long experience"
Please give me the name or a link to your podcasts.
Yes, I think what he means is that people have a perverted perception of what fluency is exactly. The concept of being fluent or not fluent does not take into account that human beings learn continuously.
steve , from your point of view, how difficult are the mandarin phonetics and tones ? Is it feasible for english speakers to get them right ?
For a english speaker I think it is not very difficult to speak the tones. Hearing them is more diffcult. The phonetics may be difficult, because the English language has no clear vocals. They use more diphtongs. If you can speak A as u in but, E as in German Klee, O as in Tom, I as in knee, U as in latin castrum (not english oo), then you be able to speak the vowels correctly. Ü should be little difficult, becaus you must speak an I like bee, but you must form your lips like if you speak an oo (u). Some consonants would be also difficult for English speakers like ch in German ich, ach etc. or scottisch Loch Ness. In Wales the people there can pronounced it too, when they speak Cymru. My experience is, that some English speakers speak very good chinese or another foreign language, but most of them you hear a very strong English accent. When I was in Ireland, the people asked me my name. My answer was Wolfgang in German pronounciation. But what the people repeat to me, was extremly different from Wolfgang! They said to me Wulfgäng or in English orthography Woolfgeng! They were not able to speak an o correctly and also the a. a and o became diphtongs!
So I was astonished that they said something very different, to that what I have said.
I still don't think in English ... though I know English since I was a kid . How do you choose to think in a foreign language especially if you know 2 or more foreign languages ? Do you choose some days to think in french and in other days you choose to think in Mandarin ?
When I have to do something in foreign language with a lot of concentration, the result is, that I am thinking or also dreaming in this language. I dreamed in Sanskrit, Mandarin, English and Spanish. All these languages are foreign languages for me.
I went to Lingq and the chinese lessons don't seem to have the pinyin. Am I doing something wrong? Or is there any way to display the dialogue in pinyin? *****
Marlon Argueta There's a little button with an "A" under the course title so you just have to click on it in order to see pinyin.
Tbh Mandarin in 6 mos. is kinda unrealistic possible maybe if you live in with Mandarin speaking environment and will not speak any other language other than Mandarin and all your time is focus in learning the language fast like your life depends on it.
What is a reader? A book that has a glossary?
hello Pro, how many languages could you speak ?
Why always give the advise catering to those with money. We all know if you are able to travel to the country you are learning it's going to take your knowledge in learning that language to greater heights. What about us people that don't have money to do that or are able to interact with someone from the country we are learning. Basically it's a hard struggle and get oneself to a level whereby one can then watch TV in that language and just keep listening to the language being spoken by native speakers or experts alike.
I'm who you'd call a "penniless" language learner, who hardly ever travels and who has never lived abroad so far, and yet has managed to learn English to a level C2 (the highest possible, with a Cambridge Certificate) and Greek to level B2. There's no secret to learning languages, no magic recipe. Keep practicing the "five skills" (listening and reading comprehension, speaking, writing and grammar practice) a little bit every day. If you can't speak to anybody in your target language where you live, never mind, practice the remaining four skills, it'll be enough. Remember that language learning is an organic/holistic process, and every form of language usage is "practice"; speaking is not the only way, despite what Benny Lewis says. Ps: grammar practice alone won't make you fluent, but it's still the only way you can reach high levels. Input alone won't do, from my experience.
I try to learn Guarani. The problem here is, to get or receive resources. No books, no dictionaries etc. Exspecially in my mother language. When I learned mandarin, I bought about ten dictionaries. Some dictionaries I got as a present from a chinese professor from Shanghai. But all this dictionaries were written for chinese students. If I wanted to know from a german word the chinese expression, it startet a process where I have look up some hundred wörds to find the right expression for a special context. The chinese words, which appears is often a long list whitout pinyin! So I must look up in another dictionary to find the pinyin for each character. Each word must be translated back into german, where also a list is appearing where I have to translate and start the same process again. That takes a lot of time until I have found only one expression in the right context. During this time, I have to translate some hundred words and not for every word I can find a translation.
But how? What's the recipe ? Do we take a Chinese class and then learn online ?
Learn the characters, start with beginner material, then get on LingQ.