How do you learn Chinese?

If I had things to do over, I'da just stuck with Chinesepod. The language, words and topics are so absolutely useful and high frequency, that to me other materials are almost a waste of time. Pour yourself into the old podcasts, review the expansion sentences. If you need structure, why not use the scheduling feature? IMO

"Be yourself after you're good at Chinese." A regular Plato. Exceptionally, exceptionally good advice in that post. This is one for the bookmarks.

Hi annietheeslteacher, I would fully support Lantian. Wished I have had CPod 8 years earlier. The only addition you need is material on writing characters - this topic is not covered here.

Hi annietheeslteacher!! Welcome to CPOD! Your avatar is adorable : ) You've heard from 3 of the most seasoned users of CPod above; they have given you some great advice. Here's my two cents: Staying motivated is no problem if you become part of this wonderful, intelligent and funny community of learners. The love of the language is so evident in the academic team and the regular poddies, that one can't help but stay motivated to learn along with everyone. Here's a thread on a great hanzi tool (which when I will get one of these days...) http://chinesepod.com/connections/viewpost/Frank/connect/Great+guide+for+learning+the+characters%21

I don't know if ChinesePod alone will suffice, if your ultimate target is something approaching fluency. A prerequisite for fluency is to acquire a large passive vocabulary, words you understand even if you can't use them yet. To truly learn new vocabulary you have to encounter it repeatedly in multiple contexts. ChinesePod alone can't present enough material to accomplish this, it's the equivalent of only a few paragraphs a day. The average human lifespan is something like 27,000 days, and this is probably close to the number of vocabulary items you need to learn to become fluent. Not to mention 5000 or more chengyu. Even if you're young, you're kind of in a race against time :( I have no idea how anyone ever managed to learn Chinese before computers (Chinese language websites, dictionaries implemented in software for instant lookup, input methods for rapid writing, MP3 audio, spaced recognition flashcard software, etc. etc.) Before the ABC dictionary there weren't even any alphabetically arranged Chinese-English dictionaries, so to look up a single word would take up to 60 seconds fussing with a radical+stroke count paper dictionary. What a nightmare. Sort of like the old joke about "in my day, we had to walk 10 miles uphill in the snow every day", only for real.

Hi AEFlow and AnnieTT, IMO vocabulary builds in a logarithmic way, it is not a continuous linear buildup, so the 27,000 days, one-word-a-day doesn't really apply. One important part of my learning Chinese over these few years has been motivation and persistence, the motivation fueling the persistence. I found a large part of this comes from NOT listening or paying mind too often quoted (I believe myths) about learning language and specifically Chinese. If one ignores the myths and continues merrily along the way, there are plenty of ah-hah moments and language achievement pleasures to keep it all quite enjoyable. Some Myths to Ignore (IMO) 1. Chinese is the hardest language of all 2. Write hanzi 20x, 50x, 100x to learn it. 3. Tones are hard, you'll insult your mom accidentally. 4. There's too much vocabulary. 5. I have to live in Beijing to learn proper Mandarin. Some Truths to Implore 1. Mistakes are natural. Making them is good. 2. Tones vary within themselves, listen and adjust. 3. Vocabulary comes in clumps, savor the clumps. 4. Go at your own pace, it's only your race. 5. Speaking is fun, if it's not, find someone else to talk to!

I have never lived in China and know very few Mandarin speakers who live locally. I'm not sure how this compares to your experience, but being that I have to really work for every opportunity to practice these might be useful suggestions. This is every way that I've used outside of Chinesepod to learn in the past year and 7 months (before that time I couldn't even say, write or read 你好). 1. Took a continuing education class at community college. 2. Listened to Pimsler Language series 1 & 2 for mandarin. 3. Used text books widely used by bigger universities and colleges for beginner Chinese classes. 4. Watch music videos with hanzi subtitles on You Tube. AND Listen to Chinese music (and I'm NOT traditionally a fan of pop. You CAN find something that fits your taste). 5. Find Chinese friends on Myspace and Skype, and use IM to chat with these friends in Chinese. Pin Yin is ok at first, but you should push yourself to use hanzi more and more. Using MSN or Skype to chat with friends in China will do wonders for your language development. 6. Watch Chinese movies whenever possible. Netflix has a pretty good selection, but if you can travel to Chinatown in a bigger city you can pick up VCDs much cheaper and they come with Chinese and English subtitles. 7. Audit a chinese class at local college or university. I found that most have an open door policy to the general public as long as seats are availabe after student registration. I paid $50 for a full semester. I didnt' get a grade, or credit, but the knowledge was well worth the price. 8. Flashcards. Flashcards. Flashcards. 9. Don't be shy to use what you know... even if it's not much it will reinforce your skills and give you more confidence. 10. Find someone to do a language exchange. My city is small, but shill has a chinese organization, a chinese church( you don't have to be christian to attend their functions and meet friends), and a chinese grocery store. All of which provide great chances to practice and to meet people who might be interested in improving their english skills in exchange for giving you tips on your chinese. Hope that helps.

annietheeslteacher, I think Chinesepod has enough resources to achieve a decent level of fluency. You have: 1- Lessons with real audio. 2- Expansion exercises to really understand what's covered in the audio portion 3- Modern language 4- Fun and informative podcasts (with humor to help keep learning fun). 4- A community of people to help keep you focused on your goals. Like Lantian said, DON'T BE AFRAID OF MISTAKES! Mistakes can become your greatest teacher. Also as Lantian said, everyone learns at different speeds and has different strengths. Play to your strengths, they can help you overcome your weaknesses. Beyond Chinesepod I would highly recommend finding Chinese friends in your local community or online to help you exercise what you've learned. Chinese movies is a good way to help you learn, but stay away from alot of movies that take place in ancient China because the language is very old fashioned and not a lot is useful in today's enviornment. (it's like the difference between "Oh Romeo, Romeo wherefore art thou Romeo" and "Romeo, Romeo why are you Romeo?") As soon as you possibly can, get in to learning characters, the more you can read the easier it will get in the long run because then the newspaper or magazine can become your texbook. As soon as possible get in to WRITING. Expressing your own thoughts in the new language is one of the KEY'S to learning. It makes the language more intimate and personal and above all INTERESTING if you can talk (or write) at length about what interests YOU, which in turn will keep you interested in the language. Finally, ask yourself if you REALLY ARE interested in Chinese. If it's just something your thinking would be fun then I'd stop now and go back to Spanish. Don't get me wrong, learning Chinese is GREAT FUN, if your interested in it. If your not, then every moment studying will be like trying to push a Semi up a mountain with your bare hands. If you have an interest in Chinese then I warmly welcome you to our community and if you ever need any help from me feel free to contact me through my profile, I'll be glad to help! 歡迎你！

As someone who has done American Universities, expensive one-on-one classes in China, tons of self-study and bought lots of books, Chinese universities, attended classes with Koreans and Japanese in small language schools for Chinese, and of course, listened to our beloved ChinesePod, I have to say that I wouldn't take away any of those experiences as they all played a part, but everyone takes a different path. But I should say what has really been helpful and a must I believe, if you want to really be fluent in Chinese is: * Learn from ChinesePod! Keep listening and learn at least one thing new every day. * Read some good text books with great grammar explanations (I recommend the set I went through in my 3 years of one-on-one at New Century in Tianjin http://www.newcenturychina.com: Chinese Made Easier) * Not only learn new things, but also review what you learned in class/from books using ChinesePod to reinforce listening (especially using the grammar tags) * GO TO CHINA!!! Actually this should have been before learning from Chinese Made Easier or other text books.... you need to do the exercises IN CHINA. I can't stress enough how important this is. Don't have time? People, control your lives a little more! You can do this... jobs and new friends await us around every corner, and old ones do wait for you when you come back, believe me, I know many people who have come and gone to China. I know families that just move over to China without giving it a second though because they want to be a part of it...it's what you just gotta do. It won't come to you as much as you can go to it! * But even in China, (no they don't pay me to say this, I'm just hooked), listen to Chinese Pod!! Well, now I'm preparing to go to grad school and get a masters in Chinese Studies... maybe that's a little far for most of you, so I will stop there with the recommendations. :)

Thanks everyone for your great suggestions! ChinesePod does have a great community of learners and their podcasts are great- I think the most practical of everything I did to learn Chinese before going to Taiwan. You gave me enough ideas to keep me busy for awhile. I think that finding someone to practice with or talk to should be top of my list for now, since you get rather bored talking to yourself and don't learn as much that way. I actaully have gone to the Chinese church in my area several times and I guess that would be a good place to ask.

I just speak everyday. When I started I carried a notebook with me and whenever I came across something new I wrote it down and then looked it up when i got home. I find that works well.

I actually have a pen pal in Shanghai. I live in California, U.S....We have started to correspond through voice recordings....I help her with her English and she helps with my Mandarin. It's a good deal and quite fun.

I have a couple of penpals in China and I got a book with CDs to follow along with at a bookstore.

I do pretty much the same thing as ngk79 and I learn a lot too. My penpals write one letter in English and the other in Chinese (hanzi). Sometimes it difficult finding out which characters go with which English words though, but it is good practice though.

I would actually say get as much grammar/exposure to the language as possible BEFORE going to China. This is my method for learning all languages. We are not children anymore and we can't learn through immersion (that's the biggest crock ever). The reason immersion doesn't work is that, unlike children, we can't "take our time" to learn the language, talking in baby words for the first 2 years of our learning. Also, the topics we have to engage in as adults are more sophiscated ("me want water" vs. "two round-trip tickets from Beijing to Shanghai, please"). You won't just pick up the language by being in China. Like I said, study Chinese to an intermediate-like level (maybe finish through Chinapods Newbie and Beginner levels) and then go to China. Oh, another reason you have to do it this way is that when you go to China not knowing anything at all, no one will speak to you in Chinese, no matter how hard you try. We have a whole discussion on this. Even when you are super advanced in Chinese, people will try to force you into an English-speaking corner, so-to-speak.

My advice: (1) To echo Lantian, the number one advice I ever got was:不怕错. In other words, don't NOT talk because you aren't your how to express yourself exactly. Speak speak speak speak speak. If you wait to talk until you are perfect, you will be waiting forever, because you can only get "perfect" by making mistakes. (2) BEST TECHNIQUE: Be fake. Don't be yourself. What, you may ask? The biggest tip I have is don't try to express your actual thoughts like you would if you were speaking a language you actually know. In the beginning, craft the conversations around what you are studying. If you learned a lesson about nature, care about nature, go talk to people about nature. It sounds crazy, but I literally created situations/conversations to use my vocab and chengyus (idioms). Consider the opposite. You learn all about nature, but when you go out with Chinese-speaking people or talk to your penpal, you want to talk about work. You don't have the vocab for that, so you will not be able to articulate yourself, meanwhile, you are not practicing what you learned re: nature. Be yourself AFTER you are pretty good at Chinese. I am not kidding, I would pretend to be studying dentistry when talking to the barber in one situation and in another say my parents were diplomats from Italy. You will never see those people again, so manipulate the conversation into things you know how to talk about or are learning to talk about, even if you have to fib a little.

I would echo what people said above. I've been studying for about a year and a half now, and the best things for me have been: 1) Consistency. Study something about Chinese every day - but don't be afraid to take short breaks once in awhile. That can actually cement what you've learned. Just don't wait too long to jump back in again. 2) Exposure. I know this seems obvious, but listen to everything Chinese you can get your hands on. Buy Chinese cds, movies, etc., and yes, practice with the Cpod lessons as well. I recommend browsing through yesasia.com and finding something that interests you. 3) Have fun! Whoever said language learning should be "all work and no play" is probably limited to saying that in one language. ;- ) I love watching Chinese / Taiwanese dramas, and you'd be surprised how much vocabulary you'd pick up, especially if the shows have English subtitles. 4) Practice. Yes, it's important. Find conversation partners who are "rude" enough to correct your Chinese, and who let you do the same for their English. Be bold! Try to take the lead in the conversation as much as possible, and use Chinese to do it! One more suggestion. I noticed you are an ESL teacher in the states. I also teach ESL in the states. One thing that has forced me to speak more Chinese is starting an ESL class specifically targeting older Chinese in the states (many of whom have little or no English). Find out where the older Chinese live or hang out in your city, and post advertisements about a new class. You may even want to ask someone's help to write the ads in Chinese. Then go out and find people. Introduce yourself in Chinese and start talking with them. Later, you can mention your class. Many older folks will come, if for no other reason than for socializing with friends. Prior to each class, study the content you want to teach in Chinese. That way you can (and probably will!) use Chinese to aid in teaching your class. Hope this helps! Feel free to contact me if you have any questions. Oh, and welcome to Chinesepod!

Brooke, where do you find these Chinese/Taiwanese dramas? Video store or online somewhere?

I couldn't agree more with pulsom's point above, 'be fake'. I wouldn't quite phrase it as abruptly but that was the idea my post about situational learning. Must be difficult for s.o. coming from a culture based on truth and honesty, but that is essential. Don't think manipulation / deception, just think you're making it enjoyable for both parties, and doing yourself a favour.

Agreeing with others here, w/o Chinesepod, I would have not attempted to learn Chinese. Basically, I'm an aural learner. Memorizing characters is not the easiest for me. I force myself to speak Chinese with other mandarin speakers here in the Bay Area, either to their chagrin or pleasant surprise. Just a little bit everyday. And I talk alot to myself! Lke all day, sometimes. People may think I'm growing prematurely senile! Like Ken said, it's learning the music of the language, the tempo, the rythyms and cadences. In intermediate and advanced lessons, one can really appreciate the flow of Mandarin and how musical it really is. It is that element that keeps me on motivated. English sounds boring in comparison, imo.