User Comments - eupnea63355

Posted on: Reviewing in Class

abelle, I really identify with all that you wrote. Your experience with the classes getting cancelled for lack of enrollment, and the Taiwanese teachers, ditto! What, are you in the Washington D.C. area?

I took 101 and 102 maybe 3 or 4 years ago. Stopped studying for a while out of frustration and lack of classes. Still don't have a class to attend. There are some offered here at night but I can't drive at night. Also, in a bad neighborhood AT NIGHT far from my home. No parking, so you have to take the metro and then walk at night in a bad hood. No way!

I've posted this before that the ABC students that were the majority in my classes complained that the IC textbooks did not have real spoken Chinese. "Nobody talks like that" they would say. That is one of the strong points of CPod, I think. You get real conversational material.

Posted on: Reviewing in Class

Writing with the non-dominant hand! Thank you for posting that! I never thought of using that technique in writing characters. I used to teach my kids to do other things with the "wrong" side in order to improve the "right" side, like kicking a ball, scrubbing their bikes, anything and everything, but not for ME writing characters. Thank you for a great idea.

Posted on: Reviewing in Class

Hi alwingate. By internalizing, I mean either reading or saying something in Chinese with real meaning going on in my head. for example, I study the Cheng & Tsui Tales and Traditions series. They are advanced beginner level traditional stories and sayings. Since I am not actually using my Chinese in dialogue with other people, I do practice reading the stories I've studied so I do not forget them. I practice improving my diction, tone, and try to get what I think would be a natural speaking rhythm as I read out loud. What happens, though, is that I get so "good" (that's relative, I know!) at reading that the sounds roll off the tongue without the meaning going on in my head. Maybe that's because I used to be a musician? For example, I read a sentence about the farmer who became the laughing stock of the village, but sometimes the meaning isn't there in my head, only the sounds (by now, partially memorized) coming out of my mouth.

When I am disciplined, I read out loud "nong2min2" and I see the farmer. I see the ye3tu4 (hare) and the shu4zhuang1 (tree stump) and I SEE him picking up the hare that bashed into the stump and knocked himself out (hun1 guo4qu4). Sorry if my tones are not correct. I'm not double checking them.

That's what I mean by internalizing. I have the characters memorized, but I have to keep the meaning attached. Concrete.

Posted on: Reviewing in Class

请跟我读两遍。

Strange, when I listen to this sentence in the Expansion sentence, the "q" of "qing3" is obvious. However, when listening to it in the dictation of the Excercises section, the "qing3" sounds like it begins with an "x."

It must be the very same recording, but it sounds very different to me.

Posted on: Reviewing in Class

Same for me. I didn't know the word for "golf" (although it's been in previous CPod lessons - perhaps because I dislike golf I kept sweeping it under the rug.) I also didn't know "接下来." I'm glad for the expansion sentences using this phrase. It's one of those frequently used phrases that zips by so fast, I can't differentiate the words.

Posted on: Reviewing in Class

Oh how this reminds me of how much I miss being able to study Chinese in a classroom! It's just me, my books, CPod. Lonely, unmotivating (no reflection on CPod) and of course, since there is no conversation, speaking/listening practice, less productive.

In Chinese 101 we were using Integrated Chinese ed. 2. I think it's chapter 4 (地四章 dì sì zhāng）titled "Hobbies." In my hommage to classroom learning, the pattern so easily roll out of the brain and off the tounge:

你这个周末想做什么？
nǐ zhè ge zhōu mò xiǎng zuò shénme?

我想打球。
wǒ xiǎng dǎ qiú.

我想看电影。
wǒ xiǎng kàn diàn yǐng.

我想学中文。
wǒ xiǎng xué zhōngwén.

我想吃美国菜。
wǒ xiǎng chī měiguó cài.

To this day, I still confuse 复习 fùxí (review) and 预习yùxí (preview). Always have to take a moment to insure I am internalizing the correct meaning.

Posted on: Catching a Train

I was wondering if this practice of stealing a position in the line transfers to other environments, such as the supermarket? How about during traffic while driving? I am in the states, and when I go to the Chinese market the lines are pretty "tight." That is, people crowd themselves, one behind the other. I'm one who likes her space, so this crowding, I do notice.

The potential difficulty of using a train in China is one more thing that I find a scary deterrent to going there to study.

Posted on: Renting an Apartment through an Agent

你对这个活动有什么要求？regarding this activity

公司对这个职位的要求很高。regarding the requirements

财务部对预算控制得很严。regarding the budget

In these expansion sentences, (and after listening to the QW0124) are all of these cases where "对于" could have been used? Thanks.

Posted on: Renting an Apartment through an Agent

Would that be off of one month's rent? (The first month?)

Posted on: Renting an Apartment through an Agent

Yes, I studied the Expansion sentences and saw the context difference. Just one of the reasons Chinese is so difficult (for me) is because the context is so variable, and I have difficulty differentiating the words, aurally at least. And...so many words are the same sound (darn it!) but in reality and meaning, totally different WORDS. UGH!

Then you can have the same word, but in different contet, ...you know what I mean. Frustrating, challenging, but no matter how defeating it can be at times, its so interesting, that overrides all of the difficulty!