Restarting studying Chinese after a period of nonstudy

[simonlaing]

Hey all,

I am wondering about sustaining motivation and tricks into getting back into studying chinese. I have for the past 5 months or so gone back to teaching english. My work was quite difficult, (lazy, rich students with bad attitudes that need to get up to a university level of english understanding in a very short time)

So I have neglected my Chinese studies.

I am having trouble getting back into the "mood" or routine of studying chinese.

My spoken level of Chinese is high and I am living in China so my level hasn't regressed that much I just feel like going back to studying Chinese doesn't have the pizzazz of doing something great that I felt it did before.

In short I think I am having motivation issues.

Do you guys have suggestions about where to proceed?

Suggestions welcomed,

have fun,

Simon:)

(p.s. the weekly episode is a great resource but my weakness is in reading and writing . )

[renzhe]

(p.s. the weekly episode is a great resource but my weakness is in reading and writing . )

...damn! Well, I don't know then

Seriously though, why not get a book that's interesting to read? Not something that you need to read to improve your language, but something that you want to read because it's so much fun.

Something like a Jin Yong wuxia novel, or similar.

[gato]

You can only improve reading by reading.

[heifeng]

You can improve your writing by reading too! The more you read the more you can internalize some writing styles. It' much harder to just start writing having never read anything,....that's a guaranteed way to make something sound non-native and overly informal. Of course this really depends on what you want to write: reports, letters, stories, essays....

Anyway, you may want to ease yourself into studying again by some leisure reading in Chinese. Slowly you'll come across new words and other things that will have you picking up the dictionary and encourage you to study more. If you want you can keep a journal of what you are reading and do a quick weekly summary OR write some 读后感 essays or something. This way you actively learn a bit by going back and reviewing what you have read and practice writing along the way.

Just my 2 cents:mrgreen:

Edited October 2, 2009 at 03:24 PM by heifeng
just once i'd like to post w/o typos....ughh..

[wushijiao]

I can't disagree with renzhe, gato, and heifeng! (Would that even be legal?)

But beyond reading a lot (which is very important), I think it might be good to try to take a good deep look at what your true motivations are for learning the language. Whatever that is, get pumped up about that somehow, so you can get that fire in the belly that can sustain you through intense studying. Sometimes getting in touch with your motivations for learning Chinese may not even require doing something in the Chinese language itself. Sometimes when you get lost in the day to day routine of living (and teaching English), it's easy to get disconnected from the things and feelings that can sustain you on your journey, so to speak.

My two cents. (Hope it makes sense).