I'm quite interested, both personally and professional, in why people decide to learn languages. This morning I wrote a post asking the question in my blog, and I'd be interested in hearing what our Poddies have to say.

From LearningOnYourTerms.com: Practicing characters with your iPhone.

I'm glad the "honey, I'll use it to learn and improve myself" line I used to convince my wife to let me buy the iPhone wasn't totally bogus. :)

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.

歧路亡羊 （qí lù wáng yáng）


One neighbor of Yang Zi-a famous scholar lost a sheep. He asked all his relatives and friends and Yang Zi's servant for help.  Yang Zi asked, "Why do you send so many people out just for one lost sheep?"

His neighbor said, "Because there are a lot of branch road."

After a while, all the people came back. "Have you found the sheep?" Yang Zi asked."No," they answered, "Each road has branch roads and each branch has its forked roads. We just do not know which road to follow. So we give up."

On hearing this, Yang Zi became silent. His student did not understand what the teacher was thinking about. He passed the question to Xin Du Zi, a friend of Yang Zi. Xin Du Zi replied, "Your tutor is worrying about your study. What have happened reminds him of the difficulty of learning and researching. He thinks that if you fail to find the right orientation and method of study, you can accomplish nothing, just like those people trying to find the lost sheep."

学者杨子的邻居丢了一只羊，叫了亲戚朋友又请了杨子的仆人一起去找羊。杨子问：“丢了一只羊，为什么要找这么多的人去追呢？”邻居说：“因为路上有很多岔路啊！”过了一会儿，人们回来了。“找到羊了吗？”，杨子问。“没有”，大家回答，“路上有岔路，岔路上又有岔路。我们不知该往哪儿找，只好回来了。”杨子听了沉默不语。他的学生不明白老师在想什么，跑去问老师的朋友心都子。心都子说：“你们的老师在担心你们的学业呀。这件事让他想到你们的学习和研究上有很多困难。如果你们找不到正确的学习方向和方法，最终将没有任何成就，就像大家找不到这只跑丢了的羊。”

 歧路亡羊 （qí lù wáng yáng）
【翻译】 to go on the wrong track; to lose or miss one's way; to go astray
【释义】因岔路太多无法追寻而丢失了羊。比喻事物复杂多变，没有正确的方向就会误入歧途。
【例句】面对众说纷纭，我们应冷静地作出正确判断，否则就会无所适从、“歧路亡羊”。
【近义词】误入歧途
【反义词】改邪归正

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Chinese 900 is a portable tool for helping conversation which provides several example sentences. It provides Chinese, English and Korean sentences to facilitate your communication.
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For career related reasons I will have to cut down my Chinese studies significantly - probably for a time frame of about 2 years. I already limited my community time, but now I need to go to the real meat.

What I absolutely want to avoid is losing it all during that time. So my primary goal for the next to years is: Keeping and consolodating my level.

What I think might work:
- listening to podcasts in idle situations (housework, commuting, etc.)

- casually reading some Chinese material

- keeping a daily "hibernating slot" (max. 45 minutes) in which I do some writing, work through the lessons here, or do some HSK material (not all each day and not in a high dose).

The fun times with 90-120 minutes each day plus some really heavy learning on the weekends are definitaly over.

Sigh. Hope it works.

Notwithstanding the usual disclaimers about learning styles, and everyone learning differently, do what's best for you, there's no one right answer, and to each his own, etc..., i'm curious if people felt that they picked up mandarin effectively by listening to lots of lessons over a week versus studying them in detail and taking more time.

I'm starting to feel that it might make sense to blow though lots of lessons because:

1) Keeps me learning new "words" at a constant rate

2) the top level metric is better. in other words, i'm "learning" 50 words/week, albeit not retaining new words as well as i'd like, versus learning 10 words per week well.

I do remember Pimsleurs saying that a retention rate of around 80% was good enough to go to the next series of lessons.  If cpod were a college or high school class, 70 would be considered passing, and well enough to go to the next level (at least in high school). Cpod offers no guidance in this area, so i'm curious as to what others would say about this, or what worked for them.

Recently, my company will arrange a programme by travelling to China, i'm the organizer but I don't know any chinese right now. Actually, I have made some friends on the internet, but still I'm not quite confident to cummunicate with chinese people without any difficult. I'm always wondering which learning method is the most helpful, because if I begin to study when I go to China, it will be too late.