Hello everyone,
I really feel improvement in all areas of my Chinese study this week. I haven't done much writing practice, but I did do a little bit of work on the Pinyin chart. The flashcards and speaking/listening study is essentially the same as it was in recent weeks, with similar pacing. It turns out that I will not be leaving for China until September, so that means I can dedicate much time to doing Chinese studying until I leave.
Currently, I am spending an hour studying 3 newbie lessons, and I am spending an additional fifteen minutes or so studying older lessons. I am considering changing this up down the road. One of the ideas I am toying with is doing one elementary lesson, one new newbie lesson, and one old newbie lesson each day. I am not sure, but that is what I am thinking of doing in a month or so.
Showing posts with label newbie lesson. Show all posts
Showing posts with label newbie lesson. Show all posts
Monday, July 20, 2009
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
01 year 33 week into study part 2
Hello everyone,
I have been doing some thinking the last few days, and I wanted to take a moment to offer some suggestions and words of encouragement for the newcomer to ChinesePod.
Podcasts:
Thanks
I have been doing some thinking the last few days, and I wanted to take a moment to offer some suggestions and words of encouragement for the newcomer to ChinesePod.
Podcasts:
- I originally studied the podcasts in any order in which I desired, without keeping track of which lesson I studied and which I had not. I don't recommend this, I had better success when I organized the lessons and started keeping track of those lessons I studied
- At the beginning, the learning was very difficult. It often took me over an hour to master a newbie lesson when I first started. This is because I didn't know any of the words. If you are experiencing this, take heart! it does get better. I found that as I continued to study, I knew many words in subsequent lessons. This means that I might only need to learn a few new words per lesson, instead of every single word in a lesson.
- Do the lesson until you are able to pronounce each word. After reaching this level of proficiency, move onto the next lesson. Don't freak out if you find that you forget words, as they are repeated in subsequent lessons, and you can always go back and refresh on old lesson.
- Ken Carrol from ChinesePod frequently points out that it is best to learn language in chunks, and also says that learning different contexts for words is helpful too. My experience supports this idea. Listening to the entire podcast is helpful even if you know all the words because it provides the use of these words in different context, and I feel it helps me remember the terms better. At the very least, each podcast give a little insight to Chinese culture, which is important to someone like myself who has never been to China.
- I make good use of the 'audio fix' in each lesson. I use the reviews to test myself on the vocabulary. At first, I couldn't make much use of 'now lets use these words in context' portion of the review. I suggest you listen to them even if you cannot get it right, like I mentioned already, greater context helps me remember. As your Chinese skills improve, you will find that you can do the context exercises. To me, this shows that, not only am I learning the vocabulary, but I am also able to produce Chinese.
- Using the listening test has been helpful to me in showing that I am learning the language. Lately, I typically test at either newbie or elementary level. This is good because I think that is about what my proficiency level is.
- I find that I have a better study session if I am walking around rather than sitting when listening to the podcasts. I believe this is because my heartrate is faster, and blood is flowing quicker. I also find that I get tired if I try to sit for an hour listening to podcasts.
Thanks
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
01 year 30 weeks into study part 2
Hello everyone,
I tried an elementary lesson today, and it was significantly harder than the newbie level lessons. Right now, I wish there was a level between the two. I did learn the vocabulary in the audio review, but I don't really feel that I mastered the lesson in the same way that I pick up the newbie lessons. I am going to stick to studying an elementary lesson every 5 or so lessons. I am sure that I will improve.
Here is my latest stack photo. It does not look tremendously larger than the previous stack photo, but there are nearly 50 more cards in the latter photo.
I tried an elementary lesson today, and it was significantly harder than the newbie level lessons. Right now, I wish there was a level between the two. I did learn the vocabulary in the audio review, but I don't really feel that I mastered the lesson in the same way that I pick up the newbie lessons. I am going to stick to studying an elementary lesson every 5 or so lessons. I am sure that I will improve.
Here is my latest stack photo. It does not look tremendously larger than the previous stack photo, but there are nearly 50 more cards in the latter photo.
01 year 30 weeks into study
I must say, that it has been a good week overall for Chinese studying. I feel like I hit a good rhythm. In the past, the speaking and listening had been the weakest area, but I feel that the work I had done in those areas had reached parity with my flashcards. I don't do much studying on weekends on account of work, but I do much during the weekday. I will normally learn 3 podcasts per day at newbie level. I know that I forget much of what I learned, but the podcasts have much repetition. This means that when the vocabulary comes up again, I remember that I had learned it before, and I relearn it very quickly. My plan is to incorporate more elementary lessons into my daily speaking and listening routine. The newbie lessons are beginning to be too easy.
The flashcards are going good as well. It is frustrating that I typically forget many that I had learned, so I do much review.
Not much to say this week, no real changes to my methodogy besides my plan to include more elementary lessons. That is all for right now.
The flashcards are going good as well. It is frustrating that I typically forget many that I had learned, so I do much review.
Not much to say this week, no real changes to my methodogy besides my plan to include more elementary lessons. That is all for right now.
Friday, January 16, 2009
01 year 07 weeks into study
Hello everyone,
Just to give a heads up - this is a rather long post.
Things are progressing well. I have had to scale back the study efforts a little bit on account of having to do full time college starting this week. I don't expect to make the types of gains in reading that I have been making in the past few weeks until Classes are over in the summer.
I have almost finished studying the 520 flashcards from last week, expecting to add the final ten today. I will begin to make the next batch either today or tomorrow. Last week I added 100 flashcards. Ten of which were words that I previously learned, but found myself having trouble with. The remaining 90 were new terms. This week, I am adding about half of that. Currently, I plan on adding 50 words. 45 new terms, and 5 are words that I learned already, but are mixing up with newer terms, or other things to that nature. I am also in the process of converting the worst of the handwritten cards to the printing method discussed in the last email.
This has been a marginally better week than normal for speaking Chinese for me. I made it through 5 lessons in 7 days. My ideal is to do more like 10 lessons in 7 days, but that may be unrealistic. What I have tried is doing a new lesson every day, and redoing a lesson that I have learned previously. Currently, I have my lessons arranged in something I call 'books'. Each book has 10 lessons. My first three books consist entirely of newbie lessons, and starting at the fourth I have one elementary lesson thrown in. I don't necessarily have one elementary lesson in every book, but I have no more than one elementary in each book up to book 13. Starting at book 13, I am adding both elementary and newbie lessons as they are added to the site.
As I just mentioned, I am attempting at least two lessons per day. One new lesson and one old lesson. I want to take a moment to describe this more specifically.
For the new lesson I do each day, I have two goals. The first goal is to be able to say all the vocabulary in the audio review when prompted with the english word. At this point, I am not trying to say it right away, I just am content with being able to say it even with a brief pause. So what I do is I listen to the word, pause the ipod, and say the chinese word. My focus here is to say the word paying attention to sound and tone to get it close as possible to the way the model says it. The second goal is to be able to understand the dialogue within the lesson. At this stage, I am less concerned with meeting the second goal than I am the first. This is all I am trying to do at this point when listening to new lessons, and I attempt to achieve this by listening to the entire show at least once, and typically listening to the audio reviews as many times as necessary to I reach the first goal.
For the old lesson I do each day, my goals are different than the new lesson. I find that I can usually state each of the terms in the audio review, after the first time through. I do the audio review with the goal of saying all the words perfectly without using the pause button on the ipod. I also, at this point, attempt the phrases. I am not necessarily concerned with being able to recall the phrases at this point, because the phrases often have vocabulary that I havent been introduced to yet. I just want to practice using the phrases. The goals for the old lesson I do each day are not as clearcut, but the overall intention is to be better at doing the lesson afterwards than I was before doing the lesson that day. For simplier lessons, I might be able to do it perfectly. For others, it may not go so well.
I have a system for keeping track on where I am in my lessons. My tracking system has a number of steps. Like I said earlier, I have the lessons arranged on my Ipod in books consisting of ten lessons each. So this means that the first step in the tracking method is to change the album name that is assigned by Itunes when I download a lesson from the site to a name that I select to arrange it into the books. For example, if the default album name is 'show' I change the name to 'Chinesepod.com book 01'. I do this for the audio review (fix), the show, and the dialogue. This makes for 30 files within one book (or album), and keeps the lessons in a managable manner.
The second step in the tracking system is to change the name of the lesson. There are three objectives that I am trying to reach by doing so. The first is that I want the three files for the lesson to be grouped together. The second is that I want to distinguish between the show, the fix, and the dialogue. The third is that I want to be able to remember what the lesson number is when I change the track number (Ill get to that in a minute). So I use a format that go something like this;
old file names might be -
Newbie - I'm cold!
Newbie - I'm cold! (Fix)
Newbie - I'm cold!
As can be seen, there is no indication of lesson number, or which is the show or dialogue. I might change the file names as such -
Newbie - 286s I'm cold!
Newbie - 286f I'm cold! (Fix)
Newbie - 286d I'm cold!
Notice how it is easy to tell what is what and what the lesson number is? I like it much better.
The third step is to change the track number. Now that the lesson number is listed in the file name, I can change the track number to a number that makes better sense. This allows me to arrange the lessons within a book as I see fit. For example, in book 6, I arranged all the internet related newbie lessons, I.E. (surfing the internet, sending emails, and chatting online) into a group by modifying track numbers.
The fourth and final step, which can be best taken after the previous three have been taken, is to utilize the rating system that is built into the Ipod to keep track of how many times I have reviewed a lesson. So after I do the new lesson in a given day, I would 'rate' that lesson with a 1-star. After doing the review of the old lesson each day, I would change the lesson from a 1-star to a 2-star.
All this may seem complicated, but it really is not. These changes can simply be done by using the 'get info' option that is found on the right mouse button menu when right clicking on a file. All these fields can then be changed as such. I hope this is helpful to someone. I can certainly say that having a book of ten lessons with thirty files is much more managable than having 300 lessons or more in an album.
I have also undertaken a plan on writing the characters, and studying the pinyin chart. As far as writing the characters, I plan to simply go through my 'learned' stack and practice writing the term on a sheet of paper. I might write only a few characters a day. For the pinyin chart, what I did is downloaded the chart from the website, and started making flashcards for the different sounds. I plan on buying a four sided dice, and adding five to ten sounds per day. What I would do each day is shuffle my stack of pinyin flash cards, and draw a card. After drawing the card, I would roll the four sided dice to see which tone I would attempt. Suppose I rolled a 3. I would then attempt to pronounce the term in the third term, and play back on the pinyin chart to see if I am correct. I would repeat until I get it correct. My plan is to master the pinyin chart by the end of April.
Well, I have written alot. I wanted to describe the work I have been doing on the site since I have started back in November. I must say that I have been at it everyday with the exception of a week during December when I was having difficulties. I am happy with my progress, especially my progress with reading chinese characters. The speaking stuff is coming around too, but it is slow and more difficult for me.
I guess at this point, I want to know if these weekly updates are meaningful and useful to anyone. I do these updates mainly for three reasons. First, it gives those who have been around for a bit an idea of the work I am doing and the results I am getting. I have received good feedback that has influenced my study habits thus far, and I hope to receive more. Secondly, I describe what I am doing in the hopes that newer people may read this and be able to use things that I have learned in my experience. I simply want to be helpful. Finally, I find it reinforcing to show my progress each week. It helps me keep going, knowing that I will give an update each week showing how I have improved.
With that being said, I don't mean to add clutter to the board. If these updates are not useful, or if they are irritating, I will stop doing them. Just send me a message through the chinesepod mail system, and if several people say that they are either not useful or irritating, I would promptly stop posting to the community. The last thing I want to do is be a nuisance.
Guess that is all for this week.
Please goto this link if you would like to see a screenshot that illustrates what I have been discussion in this post..
http://us.share.geocities.com/gcharestiii/untitled.bmp
Just to give a heads up - this is a rather long post.
Things are progressing well. I have had to scale back the study efforts a little bit on account of having to do full time college starting this week. I don't expect to make the types of gains in reading that I have been making in the past few weeks until Classes are over in the summer.
I have almost finished studying the 520 flashcards from last week, expecting to add the final ten today. I will begin to make the next batch either today or tomorrow. Last week I added 100 flashcards. Ten of which were words that I previously learned, but found myself having trouble with. The remaining 90 were new terms. This week, I am adding about half of that. Currently, I plan on adding 50 words. 45 new terms, and 5 are words that I learned already, but are mixing up with newer terms, or other things to that nature. I am also in the process of converting the worst of the handwritten cards to the printing method discussed in the last email.
This has been a marginally better week than normal for speaking Chinese for me. I made it through 5 lessons in 7 days. My ideal is to do more like 10 lessons in 7 days, but that may be unrealistic. What I have tried is doing a new lesson every day, and redoing a lesson that I have learned previously. Currently, I have my lessons arranged in something I call 'books'. Each book has 10 lessons. My first three books consist entirely of newbie lessons, and starting at the fourth I have one elementary lesson thrown in. I don't necessarily have one elementary lesson in every book, but I have no more than one elementary in each book up to book 13. Starting at book 13, I am adding both elementary and newbie lessons as they are added to the site.
As I just mentioned, I am attempting at least two lessons per day. One new lesson and one old lesson. I want to take a moment to describe this more specifically.
For the new lesson I do each day, I have two goals. The first goal is to be able to say all the vocabulary in the audio review when prompted with the english word. At this point, I am not trying to say it right away, I just am content with being able to say it even with a brief pause. So what I do is I listen to the word, pause the ipod, and say the chinese word. My focus here is to say the word paying attention to sound and tone to get it close as possible to the way the model says it. The second goal is to be able to understand the dialogue within the lesson. At this stage, I am less concerned with meeting the second goal than I am the first. This is all I am trying to do at this point when listening to new lessons, and I attempt to achieve this by listening to the entire show at least once, and typically listening to the audio reviews as many times as necessary to I reach the first goal.
For the old lesson I do each day, my goals are different than the new lesson. I find that I can usually state each of the terms in the audio review, after the first time through. I do the audio review with the goal of saying all the words perfectly without using the pause button on the ipod. I also, at this point, attempt the phrases. I am not necessarily concerned with being able to recall the phrases at this point, because the phrases often have vocabulary that I havent been introduced to yet. I just want to practice using the phrases. The goals for the old lesson I do each day are not as clearcut, but the overall intention is to be better at doing the lesson afterwards than I was before doing the lesson that day. For simplier lessons, I might be able to do it perfectly. For others, it may not go so well.
I have a system for keeping track on where I am in my lessons. My tracking system has a number of steps. Like I said earlier, I have the lessons arranged on my Ipod in books consisting of ten lessons each. So this means that the first step in the tracking method is to change the album name that is assigned by Itunes when I download a lesson from the site to a name that I select to arrange it into the books. For example, if the default album name is 'show' I change the name to 'Chinesepod.com book 01'. I do this for the audio review (fix), the show, and the dialogue. This makes for 30 files within one book (or album), and keeps the lessons in a managable manner.
The second step in the tracking system is to change the name of the lesson. There are three objectives that I am trying to reach by doing so. The first is that I want the three files for the lesson to be grouped together. The second is that I want to distinguish between the show, the fix, and the dialogue. The third is that I want to be able to remember what the lesson number is when I change the track number (Ill get to that in a minute). So I use a format that go something like this;
old file names might be -
Newbie - I'm cold!
Newbie - I'm cold! (Fix)
Newbie - I'm cold!
As can be seen, there is no indication of lesson number, or which is the show or dialogue. I might change the file names as such -
Newbie - 286s I'm cold!
Newbie - 286f I'm cold! (Fix)
Newbie - 286d I'm cold!
Notice how it is easy to tell what is what and what the lesson number is? I like it much better.
The third step is to change the track number. Now that the lesson number is listed in the file name, I can change the track number to a number that makes better sense. This allows me to arrange the lessons within a book as I see fit. For example, in book 6, I arranged all the internet related newbie lessons, I.E. (surfing the internet, sending emails, and chatting online) into a group by modifying track numbers.
The fourth and final step, which can be best taken after the previous three have been taken, is to utilize the rating system that is built into the Ipod to keep track of how many times I have reviewed a lesson. So after I do the new lesson in a given day, I would 'rate' that lesson with a 1-star. After doing the review of the old lesson each day, I would change the lesson from a 1-star to a 2-star.
All this may seem complicated, but it really is not. These changes can simply be done by using the 'get info' option that is found on the right mouse button menu when right clicking on a file. All these fields can then be changed as such. I hope this is helpful to someone. I can certainly say that having a book of ten lessons with thirty files is much more managable than having 300 lessons or more in an album.
I have also undertaken a plan on writing the characters, and studying the pinyin chart. As far as writing the characters, I plan to simply go through my 'learned' stack and practice writing the term on a sheet of paper. I might write only a few characters a day. For the pinyin chart, what I did is downloaded the chart from the website, and started making flashcards for the different sounds. I plan on buying a four sided dice, and adding five to ten sounds per day. What I would do each day is shuffle my stack of pinyin flash cards, and draw a card. After drawing the card, I would roll the four sided dice to see which tone I would attempt. Suppose I rolled a 3. I would then attempt to pronounce the term in the third term, and play back on the pinyin chart to see if I am correct. I would repeat until I get it correct. My plan is to master the pinyin chart by the end of April.
Well, I have written alot. I wanted to describe the work I have been doing on the site since I have started back in November. I must say that I have been at it everyday with the exception of a week during December when I was having difficulties. I am happy with my progress, especially my progress with reading chinese characters. The speaking stuff is coming around too, but it is slow and more difficult for me.
I guess at this point, I want to know if these weekly updates are meaningful and useful to anyone. I do these updates mainly for three reasons. First, it gives those who have been around for a bit an idea of the work I am doing and the results I am getting. I have received good feedback that has influenced my study habits thus far, and I hope to receive more. Secondly, I describe what I am doing in the hopes that newer people may read this and be able to use things that I have learned in my experience. I simply want to be helpful. Finally, I find it reinforcing to show my progress each week. It helps me keep going, knowing that I will give an update each week showing how I have improved.
With that being said, I don't mean to add clutter to the board. If these updates are not useful, or if they are irritating, I will stop doing them. Just send me a message through the chinesepod mail system, and if several people say that they are either not useful or irritating, I would promptly stop posting to the community. The last thing I want to do is be a nuisance.
Guess that is all for this week.
Please goto this link if you would like to see a screenshot that illustrates what I have been discussion in this post..
http://us.share.geocities.com/gcharestiii/untitled.bmp
Friday, January 9, 2009
01 year 06 weeks into study part 2
Hello everyone,
I had a relatively good learning week! My technology problems seem to be solved right now, and I am back into a good grove. I have flashcards made for about 520 words and word combinations. Out of this, I have proficiency on about 339. I have acquisition on an additional 90 terms. The verbal part is going slower than the written part, but I am doing better on both areas. The past week, I had done the taxi conversation series and a couple of other lessons. I like the idea of an audio phrasebook, and I also like when the lessons are grouped together like that.
As I have stated in an earlier post, I have found a way to print flashcards. This has the benefits of being faster than writing, and being more accurate. For example, it took between 50 minutes and an hour and 15 minutes to do 15 flashcards using the handwriting method. Last night, I printed off 100 flashcards in about 3 and a half hours. What I do is I use ms paint, do print screen and set up a paper with 5 terms as if I were going to print them on a sheet of 8.5 X 11 paper. What I actually do is use packing tape and tape my flashcards to the paper, and feed the paper through the printer. It uses very little ink, and it never jams up. I use the same flashcards that I was using for the handwriting method, so there is no conflict there.
My greatest gains are in reading. I am at a point where I can read much of the newbie expansions. I would say that half the time (50%), I get the essential meaning of the sentence right. another 25%, I might understand all the terms, but my lack of knowledge of how the terms are actually used prevents me from understanding correctly what is being said. For the remaining 25%, I generally will not understand a word or two in the sentence, or flat out get the sentence wrong. Elementary level expansions are more difficult for me. I would say that 15% of the time, I am able to get the essential meaning of the sentence right. another 15% or so, I might understand all the terms, but my lack of knowledge of how the terms are actually used prevents me from understanding correctly what is being said. For the remaining 70%, I generally will not understand a word or two in the sentence, or flat out get the sentence wrong.
Much of my study time is spent going through the lessons trying to find terms and words that I don't know. I don't bother going through the newbie lessons doing this anymore because I might only find one or two unknown words. I currently do well doing elementary lessons, but I figure it is just a matter of time before I feel like I am panning for gold in my bathtub. I notice that in the community page, people build vocabulary lists. I also notice that I can set to share my vocabulary lists. Is there a way to find lists that others are sharing so that I can get words from them? I am guessing that there is such a way, but I havent figured it out yet.
Guess that is it for right now, below (hopefully) you will find two photos that will show my progress that I have had since joining Chinapod. In the first photo, I have a small stack. It was taken about a week or so after I started the chinese lessons. The Bottom photo was taken on the 3rd of this month. I guess I will be doing these updates on Thursday/Friday instead of Sunday as I am scheduled to work on the weekends for the time being.
I had a relatively good learning week! My technology problems seem to be solved right now, and I am back into a good grove. I have flashcards made for about 520 words and word combinations. Out of this, I have proficiency on about 339. I have acquisition on an additional 90 terms. The verbal part is going slower than the written part, but I am doing better on both areas. The past week, I had done the taxi conversation series and a couple of other lessons. I like the idea of an audio phrasebook, and I also like when the lessons are grouped together like that.
As I have stated in an earlier post, I have found a way to print flashcards. This has the benefits of being faster than writing, and being more accurate. For example, it took between 50 minutes and an hour and 15 minutes to do 15 flashcards using the handwriting method. Last night, I printed off 100 flashcards in about 3 and a half hours. What I do is I use ms paint, do print screen and set up a paper with 5 terms as if I were going to print them on a sheet of 8.5 X 11 paper. What I actually do is use packing tape and tape my flashcards to the paper, and feed the paper through the printer. It uses very little ink, and it never jams up. I use the same flashcards that I was using for the handwriting method, so there is no conflict there.
My greatest gains are in reading. I am at a point where I can read much of the newbie expansions. I would say that half the time (50%), I get the essential meaning of the sentence right. another 25%, I might understand all the terms, but my lack of knowledge of how the terms are actually used prevents me from understanding correctly what is being said. For the remaining 25%, I generally will not understand a word or two in the sentence, or flat out get the sentence wrong. Elementary level expansions are more difficult for me. I would say that 15% of the time, I am able to get the essential meaning of the sentence right. another 15% or so, I might understand all the terms, but my lack of knowledge of how the terms are actually used prevents me from understanding correctly what is being said. For the remaining 70%, I generally will not understand a word or two in the sentence, or flat out get the sentence wrong.
Much of my study time is spent going through the lessons trying to find terms and words that I don't know. I don't bother going through the newbie lessons doing this anymore because I might only find one or two unknown words. I currently do well doing elementary lessons, but I figure it is just a matter of time before I feel like I am panning for gold in my bathtub. I notice that in the community page, people build vocabulary lists. I also notice that I can set to share my vocabulary lists. Is there a way to find lists that others are sharing so that I can get words from them? I am guessing that there is such a way, but I havent figured it out yet.
Guess that is it for right now, below (hopefully) you will find two photos that will show my progress that I have had since joining Chinapod. In the first photo, I have a small stack. It was taken about a week or so after I started the chinese lessons. The Bottom photo was taken on the 3rd of this month. I guess I will be doing these updates on Thursday/Friday instead of Sunday as I am scheduled to work on the weekends for the time being.
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