Self-teaching vs. Classes - The Great Debate

[yersi]

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[imron]

I have mostly self-studied, but that was due more to circumstances than to choice. I would have loved to have had the time and money to spend a few years doing a degree in the language, or the time and money now to use the language to pursue a further degree in some other subject but that's not going to happen anytime soon.

The problem I've found with self-study (and that I've mentioned earlier) is you tend to end up with gaps - or at the very least perceived gaps, which can be even worse as that eats at confidence. When you self study you tend to do the things that interest you most, often at the expense of other skills.

I also don't think that the usefulness of lessons decreases as your level increases - actually I would argue that for the really advanced stuff it's the opposite. For example, I would love to have some good advanced lessons on structured writing with corrections and feedback from someone who knew what they were talking about. For self-learning there are things like lang-8, but at an advanced level you tend to get mixed feedback with some people making corrections and other people saying there is no need to make those corrections and so it can be difficult to know whether a change was made for stylistic reasons or because of an error. If it was for stylistic reasons, you then have to consider whether you trust the language abilities of the person making the corrections (not every native speaker knows how to write well in their own language), and did the stylistic changes make the writing better or did the person making the corrections just make them to match their own personal style.

Anyway, all that being said, I don't think it's an either/or situation. For me the ideal would be classroom lessons for structure, plus copious amounts of self-learning on the side, and I think you really need both at some point.

[roddy]

I think it's also important to note that there's a huge difference between self-studying in the sense of getting textbooks and other resources and working with them largely by yourself, and the 'chuck yourself in and hope you swim' approach of some of the immersive methods. While I was several years into my Chinese study before I actually paid for classes, I wouldn't have got anywhere near as far as I did without various textbooks. And while I still managed to fall into that trap of imbalanced skills that Imron mentions, it would probably have been worse without them.

[renzhe]

I have learned English and Spanish using classes, learned German by a combination of classes and immersion, and I am learning Chinese mostly by self-studying.

I have made the following observations:

- Having a teacher and structure early on is really important, especially for Chinese. I failed to self-study from the beginning, even with a motivated girlfriend. A class with a motivated teacher, who went through the tones, basic strokes, word order, pronunciation, etc. made the difference between giving up completely and moving to lower-intermediate stages. Twice.

- Classes are generally too slow for motivated people. They cater to the slowest people in the worst case, and average people in the best case. I found that if I did extra work in my spare time, I outgrew the class very quickly, to the point where there were no classes available. If you want to learn at a decent pace, your choices are a private teacher or self-study. This applies to studying at a university too, though they tend to be far more speedy.

- Input is crucial, especially if you're studying on your own. A tutor or language partner who is honest about your mistake is a must, or you'll learn things the wrong way.

- Like imron said, if you self-study, you need structure. I followed a good textbook for grammar and structure and to make sure that I have all the bases covered.

- You need a variety of approaches for Chinese, focussing on reading, listening, speaking and writing. Some of these may be less important to you than others, but you should be careful not to let one of them fall too far behind. You need to pay attention to this if you study on your own.

I think that learning on your own is good for people who have learned a few languages and have the discipline to go through with it. I do like many of the immersion strategies and I read and watch an awful lot of material, which is a great and fun way to improve your skills, but I do think that some structure is necessary. Get a good textbook, follow it, and do all the cool immersion stuff on the side.

I personally hate language classes. I've done literally dozens, with well over a dozen different teachers, in several different countries. I hate them. They are boring, unmotivating, slow, I hate reciting exercises, I hate writing essays and making speeches about boring stuff. It probably works for some people, but they don't work for me. A tutor in a small group of motivated people is fine, though.

And last remark, specifically for Chinese: Flashcard program. Using SRS. A must. Alpha and Omega. Not using it is masochism and intentional self-sabotage.

[wushijiao]

This is a great discussion, and I can’t say that I disagree with anything that has been said.

In my case, I took one semester of Chinese in college, and basically, I didn’t do too well and found the whole thing to be way too big of an endeavor, so I quit, but knowing full well that if I were to learn Chinese some day in the future, I’d basically need to move there.

Also, I had taken Spanish from junior high through highs school and into college, and I eventually majored in it. My junior year of college, I studied in Chile, and while I made a lot of progress in many respects, I also recognized my failures.

So, later, I think two of the biggest factors in my progress were:

-a knowledge about what one needs to do to learn a language successfully, combined with the confidence to know that it will happen sooner or later (stemming from experience with Spanish)

- A base, no matter how small, in which I knew about 100-250 characters, and about the central concepts of tones and pinyin. Like renzhen said, I think that the fundamental base is crucial, and many self-learners in China starting from zero fail because they never get over that (metaphorical) Great Wall, hehe.

So, I would paint two ideal scenarios:

1) If starting as a child or in high school, have a good teacher who can hammer home the basics and get one to a solid intermediate level in terms of pronunciation, tones, listening, characters, reading, grammar, vocabulary…etc. Then, in high school or in college, live for a year or two in China and get to an advanced stage.

2) If starting in one’s 20’s (or later), take a course in college (or at a community college…etc) or buy some very good beginners materials. If learning on one’s own, perhaps hire a tutor. Go over the basics again and again. Then, go to China, find a way to support oneself, live in the middle of nowhere, but have lots of material (bought in cities with good textbooks- like Shanghai or Beijing….don’t skimp either…get anything that might at all appear useful) and then teach oneself by interacting with locals, while studying by oneself.

Overall, while I envy those people who have started Chinese at a very young age and correspond to situation 1, I think self-studying is generally better for the reasons imron and renzhe mentioned. Most people I know have tended to find classes to be a waste of time and money. Also, and please forgive me for sounding harsh, but the establishment Chinese educational system seems incredibly motivated by a (subconscious?) desire to put China’s best foot forward, at best, and an almost intractable desire to socialize and acculturate the non-Chinese, at worst.

With that said, I think there’s a lot of things out there, for me personally, that I wish I had had a good teacher to help me understand. Finding that type of person doesn’t seem to be easy though.

[anonymoose]

I don't think self-teaching and classes are exclusive of each other. However, if one is serious about learning Chinese, I think that self-teaching is an indispensable part of the process, even if one is attending classes.

Attending classes with a qualified teacher has obvious advantages. For example at the beginner stage, practice in pronunciation is of great benefit. At advanced stages, classes, or at least access to a teacher, is useful in ironing out specific problems that are not always covered in depth in textbooks.

However, in order to make one's Chinese functional, one needs to build up a broad range of vocabulary, and practice extensively. In the framework of regular classes, there is simply not the time or opportunity to do this enough. One must spend a lot of time outside class, at the very least consolidating what was covered in class, but ideally expanding upon and learning material independently outside of classes.

The majority of my chinese was self-taught. I started by learning grammar and to read and write using text-books and the internet. With various websites showing animated characters, I think effective self-teaching is very feasible.

At the time I was at university, and I was lucky in that the Chinese department was looking for volunteers to attend an experimental course in Chinese listening skills. Although this course did not teach any oral chinese, I was at least able to pick up the sound and tone system of Chinese, which provided a good basis for further study. Whether or not I would have been able to pick up pronunciation as effectively through self-study (in other words, with chinese friends) is difficult to say, but one thing that I am certain of is that from the very beginning I always paid a lot of attention to getting the pronunciation correct. This depends on personal motivation, and just going through the motions of attending classes on its own is not going to automatically lead to good pronunciation.

After graduating from university I spent a year in China teaching English. During this time, I spoke almost exclusively in Chinese with Chinese people. I always carried a notebook around with me to write down any new words or expressions. If I didn't know how to say something, I would either ask someone, or research it on my own, but I always made the effort to find out somehow. I also spent time to read frequently and build up my vocabulary. I consciously tried to slip new vocabulary into conversations. Over this year, I think my Chinese improved quite dramatically, even though I did not attend a single class.

Just over the last few months, after having self-studied for several years, I have been attending a course at a university in China. I can't deny that my Chinese has improved as a result of attending classes, but I think the greatest reward has been acknowledgement of my self-taught Chinese from the teachers here.

Whether or not classes are "worth the money" depends on how much the money is worth to the person paying for the classes. Personally, I don't think I have learnt much from the classes that couldn't have been self-taught, but attending the classes has made learning this material that much easier.

I understand that self-teaching is not for everyone, but at least it is not an impossibility either. The important thing is that one puts in the necessary effort, whether self-teaching, or attending classes.

By the way, I also learnt French for 7 years and German for 3 years at school, so I wasn't new to learning languages when I started Chinese.

[Senzhi]

I've studied English and French since I was 4 (blame mom!) up to the age of 25, always in a classroom environment. In my teens I added self-learning to that, mostly reading, purely out of literature interest.

Now I'm unfortunate that I can't find any classroom based teaching of Mandarin locally. I have to rely solely on myself. Using tutors here is not such a good idea: I've tried and found that speaking is mostly influenced by local accent, no matter how hard people try, or how hard people try to convince me that "their version" of Mandarin is the "only correct one".

As people generally are reluctant to change, I do miss the feedback (compliments, encouragement and criticism) of a classroom environment .... together with the feeling you're never alone in making the most stupid mistakes. Not to mention all the benefits of having peers ... just look at the success of this forum.

A classroom environment would also support regularity in my learning a little better. As an English teacher, I do not always have time (or so do I sometimes pretend to myself) to learn by myself. In addition, being in an area where Mandarin is not commonly spoken, I can rely little on feedback I receive from locals.

Honestly, I received more useful feedback from my Dalian friend back in Dublin than here.

Edited June 9, 2009 at 06:50 PM by Senzhi

[self-taught-mba]

Worth it or not?

What is missing in this discussion is the value of one's time. Self-learners sometimes spend a lot of time looking for the best way to learn, trying out different approaches, reading forums (ahem:mrgreen:), and such.

I used MapleXP(billing by hours program) to track my hours playing with flashcard programs and such -- 100 hours--wow. I eventually found better ways for many things but there was a lot of trial and error to get there.

We cannot count the "cost" of our classes and then compare them to self-study in which we have not assigned a "cost" for our time.

[wushijiao]

We cannot count the "cost" of our classes and then compare them to self-study in which we have not assigned a "cost" for our time.

That's a good point.

I actually take lesson in Cantonese, partly because it's useful (and my time is less abundant than it used to be), and partly because, as a gwailo in Hong Kong with mediocre speaking skills, my language environment isn't all that great. Perhaps that's a bit similar to Senzhi's experience.

[imron]

We cannot count the "cost" of our classes and then compare them to self-study in which we have not assigned a "cost" for our time.

Yes and no. Self-study doesn't require that you pay a year of tuition upfront Even if the cost works out the same or greater, self-study is effectively paid in installments and doesn't take away from your existing capital (except for books/study materials).

I also agree what people have mentioned about the basics. Whatever route you choose, it is well worth the effort in the beginning to spend a significant amount of time on things like tones/pronunciation. It really pays off later down the track.

[Don_Horhe]

I pretty much agree with everything said. For a total beginner, having a professional teacher or at least someone with experience to give you a solid foundation is a must. Then, as time goes by, you rely less and less on your teacher, when eventually get to the level which you can do it all by yourself.

[xianu]

This is a really really interesting discussion, and as a teacher of Mandarin in the US (university), I feel compelled to weigh in (and as we all know teachers just love to hear themselves talk).

I began studying Mandarin as a freshman in college, and did what seems to be the traditional way a lot of people got Chinese back in the day. I studied for 2 years in a structured environment and then went to Beijing for a year for language study abroad. Since then, I have gone on and gotten a PhD, and have studied in Taipei another year, and have made several trips to Chinese speaking countries either for travel, or business, or most recently for taking students to China for study. I unfortunately don't remember as much of my early years learning Chinese as I want, but I was NEVER bored in 1st year, mostly because the class was challenging enough to keep me engaged. Even though the topics and dialogues were somewhat lame (some worse than others), the basic content and the desire to perfect what I learned kept me engaged (and I liked getting teachers' approval). 2nd year, the text really sucked, but again, I was more motivated by the desire to do well in the class, and so studied. Plus, now that I reflect, even though I had learned another language previous to Chinese, I wasn't conscious enough of the effort required or the steps necessary to learn a foreign language to have done it effectively on my own.

As a teacher, and a student, I have seen a lot of people with different habits and levels of motivation, and different motivations for learning Chinese. The self-study approach never really worked for me, at least not long term. I find that Chinese, like all my other skills and talents, are improved mostly out of neccessity, or out of laziness (like I learned a word because I got tired of looking it up, or when using software, I learned something because I wanted to make some stupid process easier and less time consuming on me).

A lot of the students or classmates or just random people I have met are like me in that respect, and for them, the classroom structure forces them to actually do work. With a good teacher and a decent program, students learn in progressive steps, and can identify specific issues to work on. The teacher gives feedback, and the classmates help others learn (yes they do despite how much some people seem to disdain any time another student is speaking or using classroom time) by seeing different problems, or asking questions that might not have occurred to you before. One other plus for formal study, is that I have seen a lot of people who do the "I can't or won't learn unless I immerse myself" method without a solid foundation before they dive in. Although the result is that they can communicate, they tend to develop some really really bad habits in terms of pronunciation/tones, and especially in terms of sentence structure or grammar, which takes a bijillion years to correct. Though communicative and functional, they will always come across as uneducated barbarians. On the other side of the coin, I have seen and experienced this scenario: having had formal study and gaining a solid base, and then immersing myself in a Chinese speaking environment, (and being ethnically chinese), I was able to become fully functional in everyday situations, and even "pass" as legitimately Chinese (back in the day when there was really a big and state-sanctioned difference in prices for foreigners and Chinese). However, without further formal study, my level of language was stagnating at the advanced-high level. If speaking on topics I was very familiar with - particularly the "where are you from? you look Chinese, are you of Chinese descent?" conversation - I was fine, and could pass as fluent. When speaking about other topics like the economic repercussions of blahblahblah, or the sociological question of gender equity, topics that even in English I can barely handle, I really struggled for words and sentence patterns, and never sounded or came across as terribly educated. I have seen others who reach a very high functional plateau, but without the formal study, cannot get past it into the superior range (and really be fully and intellectually functional in Chinese society). Having formal study long after I had already achieved a high level of competence in Chinese was crucial in my ability to actually negotiate business transactions, discuss pedagogical or literary theory, critically examine literary or historical or philosophical texts, and conduct and kinds of big people activities, like major money transactions, or abstract and intellectural discussions, etc both in writing and speaking.

I have also seen a lot of people for whom the classroom structure is not the ticket. Partly because of the time required, and partly because of the discipline of working for someone else just gets under their skin, they just don't do well in class. For these people, (again as the teacher) I would rather have them dive in and do a sort of experiential learning thing. for the less disciplined, this helps them identify their weaknesses and motivates them to suck it up and do the work. For particularly disciplined individuals, this experience gives them the real-world motivation to actually do the work, and if they have previous language learning experience, and were consicous of their learning process, they can do it very well.

So bottom line, I still believe that it is important to have formal study at different stages in one's Chinese learning, but that formal study alone is not enough. ANd I am so damn impressed with people who self-studied and sound good/correct, because I can't seem to convince myself to do it that way, so KUDOS!

[Scoobyqueen]

What does self-study constitute?

I am attending intensive courses in China once or twice a year and have skype lessons 2-4hours a week. Additionally, I spend some 15 hours a week studying which centres around revision, preparation for class and other material that I have chosen myself. I wouldnt consider this self-study as I am mainly focused on the lessons and I would not want to do without them for the world. I have sometimes found that however much I prepare for a lesson, the teacher always provides an additional angle that had not been covered in the text book. I would gladly invest in more lessons if the time difference between Europe and China wasnt a major issue. I learn more from (one-to-one) lessons than if I were to study entirely on my own. It is well worth the money.

I agree with the notion voiced by several people above. If you have already studied other languages at an advanced level, it helps you in your Chinese studies in knowing that you will eventually learn it and also because you dont necessarily need to “learn to learn another language.“

[yersi]

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Edited August 10, 2013 at 09:39 AM by yersi

[Alicia]

I have a question in regards to this debate. I believe everyone has made it clear that having someone teach pronunciation in the beginning stages of learning Chinese is crucial, but what if a person wanting to learn Chinese doesn't have this option? Would it be better for the person to put off learning until they had a teacher/tutor, or would it be fine for them to try and teach theirself? Would the possible bad habits be enough to make self-study from the start worthless?

[Scoobyqueen]

This is emblematic of a typically Scandinavian ideal (this was a Norwegian class) were classes are supposed to be collectives which learn together rather than hierarchies of ability.

Very communist

[JenniferW]

From what several people are saying, I think that some of us self-teaching are doing it because we have little or no choice.

I live somewhere in the UK where there are no Chinese classes and have other commitments which mean I'm not going to move to where there are classes. So far, the option of on-line one-to-one tuition is beyond my budget. I had formal classes in the past, some in the UK, some in China, and am carrying on now on my own.

Given the choice, I would attend formal classes, but at the same time I think there are long-term benfits to studying without a teacher - and I speak as a former language teacher myself.

I now realise how much the teacher takes responsibility for the management of learning - planning, organising, motivation, goal-setting, and discipline, for example. I now have to manage all that for myself, and although in 18 months of studying on my own I've been horrified at how badly I do all these when I'm the student myself, slowly I'm learning to manage it all better. As a result, I think the quality of my learning has changed a lot, and for the better. But I always do now feel - not unrealistically - that my progress is so, so slow.

[renzhe]

I realize that there are cultural differences between countries that may make the classroom experience differ from person to person, but in my case it was a mostly positive one and I hope this somehow provides a counterpoint to those who are largely dismissive of it.

I have to point out that I'm not dismissive of class learning as a principle, always. I'm simply saying that it didn't work best for me, and that I found that I am at my most productive when I learn alone and create and follow my own study plan. It is very likely that other people would feel differently, and this is perfectly OK. It's just that a debate is more lively if people present different opinions and provide arguments for them.

I'd also like to point out that I'm not into intellectual pecking order and "me, me, me". It's just that in most class situations, people have very different goals and different levels of motivation.

A friend of mine is learning Chinese with a tutor. She can probably read and write about 800 characters by now. I told her about flashcard programs, she's not interested. I lent her a Doraemon comic book, and it took her months to read it. She enjoys learning at this speed. She takes her time and enjoys the slow, but sure progress. She doesn't want to spend the entire weekend for months at a time reading Ba Jin like I do. She doesn't want to learn at my speed. Learning the way I learn is uncomfortable. It wouldn't make any sense for both of us to sit in one classroom and read the same conversations over and over. It's not about who is intellectually superior, it's about what goals you're interested in and how much time you want to invest in it. We're learning for different reasons, and that's OK.

A small group of very motivated students helping each other learn a language and pushing each other forward is a great thing, and probably the best learning environment possible. Language classes very rarely look like this, though.

[renzhe]

Would it be better for the person to put off learning until they had a teacher/tutor, or would it be fine for them to try and teach theirself?

IMHO, it is really recommended to drill the pinyin pronunciation and the four tones very early on, to develop an ear for it, so you can hear them in conversation and reproduce them. I am eternally thankful to my girlfriend and first teacher for fixing my pronunciation at the very beginning. If it sits early on, you'll never lose it.

If you don't have a tutor, you could print the pinyin chart and go through it a few times with a native speaker.

If you can't do that, then use audio materials extensively and try to reproduce the sounds you hear. Stuff like Pimsleur, textbooks with good quality sound samples, etc. And get a native speaker ASAP to see whether you're on the right track.

Would the possible bad habits be enough to make self-study from the start worthless?

Definitely not worthless. But tone and pronunciation problems are probably the most difficult thing to fix later.

[imron]

@alicia I think it's fine to learn pronunciation and tones by yourself. First start by practising listening and make sure you can differentiate all the 4 different tones. Spend some time to learn about pinyin and the tones of mandarin, then use a pinyin table such as this one to listen to the tones of each syllable in Chinese.

Once you can consistently hear the difference between the tones then practice trying to reproduce those sounds yourself. Record yourself using a program such as Audacity and compare your pronunciation with that of recordings of a native speaker. Make corrections as necessary, and keep repeating the process until you're satisfied.

I agree with renzhe that correct pronunciation is definitely not something you want to leave until later.