197. Master 3000+ Chinese Characters in Just One Year (part-time)
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2:00 Comments & Emails 3:40James Rogers by Email
Hi Luke and Phil, itās been a while since I touched base with you guys and thought you might like to hear how things are going for me.
First of all I want to thank you again for teaching me 3000+ Chinese characters! Itās amazing to think that at about two hours a day I managed to learn to read a lot of the most useful Chinese language in a year! Thatās about 5 years quicker than it took me to learn my native language, lol! Itās an incredible gift to have and I donāt think I could have done it without you. I had been doing the Heisig books but being given all the tools to break it down a lot more, connect the pieces A LOT better (I didnāt have to go back and learn pronunciation!) as well as embed all the reviewing into the course was invaluable. It really is a world class course.
So I finished the course in June last year and have just been ploughing my way through as much content as I possibly can. I did find that itās one thing to know two characters, itās another thing to know the compound wordā¦but slowly Iām getting there. Iāve listened to a lot of podcasts and read a lot of stories since June and itās paying off. I had a few speaking lesson in July but was really disappointed in myself, I just couldnāt process fast enough and couldnāt output well enough. I felt I just needed more input time so decided delayed speaking lessons. I found a new tutor in Novemberā¦
She has been fantastic for me. Sheās so patient and reassuring and this time I found that I improved quite quickly. Within 4 weeks I was getting most of what she said at Native speed! The outputting has taken a while to get into, some of it is learning how to use what you know and not just trying to translate from English. As Luke has been saying recently simple sentences that are correct beat more complex incorrect sentences hands down. I love every lesson.
I signed up to ChinesePod about a month ago to get some good conversation exposure as I was finding a lot of what I was reading was great, but not as useful as conversation material as what I really want to do is talk with Chinese speaking people. I really like ChinesePod, the content is great and Iām picking up a lot of phrases after many times of listening to the dialogues on repeat. In a month Iāve read through and learnt to understand about 140 dialogues which I think is invaluable.
I made some Chinese friends last August and I could speak a little with them but didnāt get much of what they saidā¦we went to go and see them again in Januaryā¦the difference was huge! There was a few times I caught them out as I was able to understand what they said, that was pretty cool.
All in all Iām loving learning Chinese and Iām just relaxed into it now, taking in as much as I can and itās working. We have some friends in Taiwan who we are going to see for 8 weeks next January, weāve will have been saving for over three years and Iāve been learning Chinese with that in mindā¦and Iām starting to feel that I may be fluent enough to really enjoy it.
Thanks again, hope itās going well at Mandarin Blueprint HQās. Jimmy.
14:27Christopher Dolman on Make a Movie #3050 ā ę·
Wow. Made it. Itās strange to think that when I started with Mandarin Blueprint it didnāt even have a character #3050. But we knew thatās where we were headed and back then, to reach this point seemed like the summit of Mt Everest.
Now Iām here, I think it seems more like Iāve arrived at Base Camp, having trekked from the Bay of Bengal. Quite a journey, steadily putting one character in front of the other.
Thanks so much to Phil and Luke for synthesising different fields of knowledge to create this approach which has made it possible for me to become so fascinated with this language.
Thanks to the other MBs for your posts and inspiration, especially those in the early days including Chad, Dom, Julian, Ija and William. Theyāre the real legends of language learning!
Thanks to all my Actors, I couldnāt have done it without you. Thereās too many to name but you know who you are.
Now, Iām looking forward to setting off from Base Camp and gaining some altitude pretty quickly ā putting time into active listening, revisiting all those short stories and expanding my world of comprehensible input. Thatāll be fun. And Iām looking forward to those flashcard review decks gradually trailing off too!
Thanks again Luke and Phil ā Iām looking forward to staying in touch with MB!
17:00Teodor Ruokolainen on Level 58 Review
Iām finally here! The intermediate course has been an interesting journey. At the end of the foundation course, I had just started to dip my toes into easy immersion materials. But Iām amazed what I can understand now. Previously listening to the podcastč¶ęäøę was a real struggle and I had to constantly look up words. Today I have listened to all 61 episodes, and it is easy! I donāt know every single word, but enough that I can easily follow along when using transcripts (and even without when I do passive immersion).
This is not to say that I am fluent. I still struggle to comprehend other immersion material. In some cases, itās due to a lack of ę±å knowledge, but often itās a lack of vocabulary. I often find myself understanding 99% of all characters in a text but still not completely comprehending the full picture. Itās a pretty surreal experience that ę±åis not necessarily the hard part anymore. Who couldāve thought? This is mainly due to me not spending a lot of time with the unlocked sentences, I simply read them once and continue. But Iām confident that Iām able to catch up if I continue to be diligent with my immersion and maybe revisit some old sentences if needed.
For some data, I started the Intermediate course the 20th of December 2022. I initially kept a pace of 10 new characters per day. At level 45 I started a new pace of 20 characters a day. This was also around the time when I stopped adding new sentences to my review. Itās nice to be able to have a higher tempo but it requires me to immerse a lot more as mentioned earlier.
Another thing I noticed during the intermediate course was that my visualization skills really has improved. During the early stages of the foundation course, it was hard for me to form scenes in my head. I had to be really careful when choosing actors and props to make sure that they were really distinctive in my mind and had a clear usage or behaviour. I also couldnāt animate my scenes, instead I had to form still images in my mind, preferably constructing a āsnapshotā that contained actors, props and meaning in one. That was really challenging.
But now I donāt stress about it at all. I can choose any prop I want, as long as Iām familiar enough with it. I can even form all the āspecial effectsā such as zooming in, slow motion and changing camera angles.
I wanted to bring this up because I donāt think this is highlighted enough in this program. We are not only improving our Chinese, we are also improving our visualization skills as well. This is of course not only useful for Chinese, but for almost anything in life as memory athletes has shown us. Training visualization gives us the tools to remember anything we want. Maybe we need to use different techniques to encode data, but the main principle of visualization is still the same.
Anyway, thank you Luke & Phil, as always, for creating such an amazing platform. See you in the Upper Intermediate course!
23:46John McCann on Pick a Prop for å
This is my second go-round with MB. I now can make this my priority, was in the hospital off and on since Dec. 25, 2022, and my doctor wants me not to be over-active (I am not working, and am on disability), That said I have put aside all distractions- the biggest was studying two languages at once (French, which I am much more advanced in), however, am taking Lukeās advice about making learning Chinese my #1 priority (along with health). Despite the fact that it is possible to study French and Mandarin, there became the ātimeā issue. I made the decision to devote 2 hours a day to studying Mandarin (maybe more)instead of an hour on French in the am and Mandarin in the Pm >I struggled with the Hanzi movies because I made them too complicated. I am a visual person, as my vocation is a Chinese and Japanese art historian. Am only going to focus on Mandarin and try to keep my movies memorable! I took the time, very valuable to do revision on the pronunciation segment. Wish me luck!
28:00Teodor Ruokolainen on Vocab Unlocked from č
Haha, yes I agree with all the others about ę±čÆčå¾. Thanks for the laugh!
28:25Gabriel Perera on (BONUS) How to Develop Great Study Habits Part 4: Belief
Thank you guys ā really starting to feel some momentum.
29:14Jen Soccorsi on (BONUS) The Language Learning Tripod Part 1: Attitude
Thanks for sharing about conversations/listening to opposing views in Chinese culture. This makes me even more excited to acquire Mandarin and engage in authentic conversations because often in the West, Iām holding my tongue!
29:46Lancelot Everyman on Choose Your Challenge
Iām going for Insanity!
31:15Dean Depenbrock on ę³ in Context
Does ęę³ä½ äŗ have a romantic connotation or is this something one would say to friends and family members as well?
The post 197. Master 3000+ Chinese Characters in Just One Year (part-time) appeared first on Mandarin Blueprint.
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