How to learn Chinese in 6 months

RJ
May 05, 2014, 03:09 PM posted in General Discussion

worth listening to:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0yGdNEWdn0

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mikeinewshot
May 05, 2014, 06:42 PM

Well, I was not hugely impressed with his speech, and remain very sceptical that he could be fluent in 6 months.  What do you think?

His 'parent' idea seems good but where do you get one of those who can spend all their time with you?

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RJ

hehe, Im still looking.

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mark

Maybe, when I'm old and senile, I'll need twenty four hour care and someone will hire me a Chinese nurse, and I'll get my language parent that way.

On the video, the guy's pronunciation of 泡脑子 was not bad, but I'd like to hear him give the same speech in Chinese, then I'll believe a bit more.

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bababardwan

hehe, yeah, I have often thought I'd like to be adopted by a Chinese family. Thanks for the post RJ

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james137
May 06, 2014, 06:30 AM

Interesting. I try not to criticise guys like this who have a wealth of experience and are clearly passionate about their research, but being heavily immersed in language study i can see some points i agree with, and some i disagree with.

I really like what he said about tolerating ambiguity, I really get frustrated and angry at myself when i miss a word, or a tone is correct. When i was learning Korean, although i could understand 95% of everything i studied, the people who seemed to surpass me were the ones who retained about 70% of the studied material and  moved onto other material more quickly.

The good thing about chinesepod is that we can pick the lessons which interest us, which certainly gives an advantage.  

It would be even better if we study in a \"survival mode\" way, like his example with the bear. If there was a way to trigger the memory to really pay attention to what is being studied as if it was life or death, that would be great. I've met some nigerians here with flawless Chinese, and they said that they studied so hard because they want to make a life here, there is nothing for them back home. 

anyway good post mate :)