Thinking in Chinese

[ocrtech]

I have heard the advice to "think in Chinese" a number of times. I either don't understand what it means to do this or already do it and don't realize it. Does anyone have any more specifics of what this actually means and how you go about doing it.

[chrix]

have you learnt another foreign language before? If you keep using that language in your everyday life, at some point you will start dreaming and thinking in it. I once had a dream in three languages

The idea behind this is, you shouldn't think in your mother tongue (presumably English) first, and then "translate" it into the foreign language, but you should start using the foreign language right from the start. Of course you'd need to be at least intermediate for this to make sense.

[abcdefg]

When I’m in China, all my silent “self talk” thoughts are in Chinese. If I’m walking down the street to see a movie, I won’t think “Wonder when the movie starts?” in English; I’ll think it in Chinese.

If I stumble or hit a block or realize I can’t quite say it, I jot the problem wording down and look it up later when I’m near the appropriate resources. It’s not something I force myself to do, it happens naturally. The learning process is "switched on" 24/7.

[taylor04]

It's not so much if you use or study the language everyday, but if you are surrounded by it all the time. I didn't even know you could do this until I moved to China. One day I just started unconsciously thinking to myself in Chinese. This can come naturally or forcefully, I've heard of people forcing themselves to think in Chinese (while in other countries) until you naturally do it. Now that I'm back in America I think to myself in English again though with the occasional Chinese thought.

[chrix]

Well, I'm not sure. After I've used a lot of Chinese after spending a day with Chinese friends etc., I catch myself thinking the odd thought in Chinese, even when I'm alone... But I guess it all comes together...

[Guest Pipas]

You can start with compiling your daily shopping lists in Chinese. And swearing in Chinese. Or you can get yourself a Chinese cell phone. At the beginning it's quite a shock to be awakened by a Chinese song or poem .. And trying to shut it up is a learning process by itself. You will learn a word for "snooze" very quickly

[daofeishi]

Well, I think Steven Pinker would claim that you think in "mentalese" and translate that into human language whenever you have to. (You don't "think" in any given language - think about all the times you are trying to come up with the 'right' word to express your thoughts.)

"Thinking in Chinese" is rather doing away with intermediary translation from your mother tongue into Chinese, and trying to formulate your thoughts with naturally-flowing Chinese whenever you have to communicate.

I think the advice is pretty useless, because I think the implication goes the other way around. You will not become fluent by learning to think in Chinese. You will think in Chinese when you have reached a level where you can be considered fluent. Constructing Chinese sentences in your head without intermediary steps, I think, comes naturally the more Chinese you know and have been exposed to.

[ocrtech]

I was hoping it was a little easier. Something like meditate for a while and boom you are fluent

Sometimes when I am listening to some of the audio on the DLI course I seem to understand certain parts without translating each of the words. However I don't quite trust the "understanding process" yet and always seem to fall back on trying to translate everything word for word.

[taylor04]

You could try talking to yourself in Chinese, even basic things like I'm hungry, or I'm going to go get a glass of water. Your goal would be to use Chinese as much as possible so hopefully it will become natural for you.

[daofeishi]

You could try talking to yourself in Chinese, even basic things like I'm hungry, or I'm going to go get a glass of water. Your goal would be to use Chinese as much as possible so hopefully it will become natural for you.

Repeating sentences to yourself is a one-way process without real feedback. A danger in repeatedly talking to yourself or forcing yourself to express yourself without having some way of validating what you're saying is that it might consolidate grammatical mistakes and leave you speaking ungrammatical Chinese permanently. That is a trap a lot of my friends, both Chinese friends learning English and non-Chinese learning Chinese, have fallen into.

[tooironic]

If you think about it (excuse the pun), thinking in a language you know even a little bit about is not really that hard: there is no pressure to be coherent or grammatical. As other posters have indicated, this will generally come automatically as the situation calls for it. Whether this actually improves your LOTE "proficiency" is debatable. I've found the longer you cultivate the habit, the more messy things get inside your head... until, eventually, schizophrenia sets in. But that's not to say it isn't at times hilarious.

[abcdefg]

A danger in repeatedly talking to yourself or forcing yourself to express yourself without having some way of validating what you're saying is that it might consolidate grammatical mistakes and leave you speaking ungrammatical Chinese permanently. That is a trap a lot of my friends, both Chinese friends learning English and non-Chinese learning Chinese, have fallen into.

I think you are right. Early on I opted for fluency over accuracy and I'll probably pay the price for many years, if not for a lifetime.

[anonymoose]

A danger in repeatedly talking to yourself or forcing yourself to express yourself without having some way of validating what you're saying is that it might consolidate grammatical mistakes and leave you speaking ungrammatical Chinese permanently.

Talking to yourself or thinking to yourself by its very nature means you have no way of confirming whether it is correct or not. But I think the key is, regardless of whether you are thinking to yourself in Chinese, or communicating with others in Chinese, to always make a conscious effort to speak accurately. And I really mean always. This can be a pain initially when you just want to get a message accross quickly, but you have to think about the correct tone, the correct measure word, the correct word order, and so on. But after a while it becomes more and more natural, until eventually you do all these things without having to consciously think about it. Also, when you do hit a wall, and are unable to express yourself, then try to find out the solution so the next time you encounter the same situation, then you'll know what to say. A lot of intermediate level speakers say "my chinese is good enough such that if I don't know a particular word, I can usually express my meaning by rephrasing what I want to say". This is good, because it shows you already have a good enough command of the language to get the message across even with a limited vocabulary, but the other point that is often missed, is that to continue improving beyond the intermediate stage (where people complain about hitting a plateau), you musn't become too satisfied with just being able to communicate, but must continue to strive to take the communication to a higher level, so yes, even if you can expres your meaning by rephrasing what you want to say, still try to find out the word you would have needed to express yourself more concisely. Then the next time you want to say the same thing, your language will be at that little bit higher a level.

OK, I kind of got off topic here, but my point is that, you shouldn't not think or speak to yourself in Chinese because you are worried about fortifying errors, but rather just pay attention every time you use Chinese to be aware of the mistakes you are making, and fix them promptly.

[JustinJJ]

This is an old thread, but I was wondering if anyone had any advice/strategies on how they have trained themself to think in Chinese during their daily life, or ways you consciously blocked out thought in your mother tongue? I think this is easier when you are in China, but when you are surrounded by English speakers all day it's going to be more difficult.

[hedwards]

Justin, it's mostly a matter of using the language a lot. When you're looking for a book, you don't look for a book, you use the Chinese words for the book as well as any location that you're trying. As you walk down the street, you try to express your internal dialogue in Chinese.

 

But, mostly, you don't let yourself translate. Translation is probably the second worst thing you can do for this ability other than not use the language at all

[Matty]

It's when your inner-voice starts speaking in Chinese.

 

I think I'd break it into 2 parts:

 

(1)

A word is really just a label for a concept.

For example, when you see the word "cat", you will think of a cute, fluffy, friendly animal.

 

Many people when learning a new language, they translate from new_language => old_language => concept. (bad)

 

The goal is to go from new_language => concept, totally cutting out your original language.

 

(2)

When you're out and about and suddenly realize you're hungry, your inner-voice doesn't say "I'm starving", it says "饿死我了".

 

--------------------------

 

That's pretty much the basics of it.

 

So when learning new vocabulary, think not of the words counterpart in your language, but at what the concept/object actually is/does.

Many new words I've learnt I'm not actually sure how to say in English, simply because I learn faster without trying word translations.

[roddy]

Justin, off the top of my head:

 

1) Set yourself some kind of frequent reminder that you should be thinking in Chinese. Have your phone vibrate in your pocket every fifteen minutes and use that as a cue to ask yourself if you're thinking in Chinese, and if not to start doing so. 

2) Give yourself little thought tasks. If you're people-watching as you sit on the bus, tell yourself you're going to do that in Chinese and, as suggested above, scribble down any vocab you find yourself lacking. If you're watching TV, compose a little summary in Chinese you could tell to a friend who missed that episode. Etc. 

[JustinJJ]

Good ideas. I don't do translating (when I'm using English it's all English, Chinese it's all Chinese) but in an English environment it's easy to maintain a habit of using English for internal thoughts, so having a system to remind me to think in Chinese is useful/vital.

 

The goal would be to have all my internal dialogue in Chinese and just use English when I'm speaking to those who don't speak Chinese (i.e. 95% of the population here).

[Matty]

Well, I've been known to come into a new problem. I can't stop speaking Chinese.

 

Even when on the phone to English speakers overseas, it starts off all fine in English, and then suddenly I'm stopped mid sentence, by an unhappy person telling me they don't speak Chinese. 

[Adam_CLO]

I don't think it's something you have to actively focus on. When your Chinese is good enough, won't you automatically start thinking in it?

 

By this I mean, in the beginning stages when someone speaks to you in Chinese, you mentally translate it to English, formulate your response in English, do the translation back to Chinese, then reply.

 

Once you get good enough though, when you start hearing Chinese, you automatically understand it (without doing the manual translation) and are able to directly reply in Chinese instinctively without having to do any manual translations in your head.