BLCU General Discussion

[Andrea.dispe]

I'm going to register for other 6 months term course but I cannot decided if taking a regular chinese course or the business chinese course.

Some of you ever had Business chinese course or heard some friends attending it?

[roddy]

Will merge with the BLCU discussion....

[prateeksha]

Andrea, I do not know anyone who took up the Business Chinese course. However, when I was doing upper intermediate level, it was one of the papers I took. 4 hours a week along with other classes for comprehension, listening, synonym distinction and so on. 

 

How good is your Chinese already? If you know nothing to basic Chinese, it might not be a good idea to opt directly for a Business Chinese course. The vocabulary is of course different, but the grammar and the language sense (I mean to say 语感) is a given prerequisite.

 

People will be in a better position to provide inputs if you could elaborate on your current level and expectations from the course. I tutor Chinese to businessmen in my country and one thing everyone seems to miss is - even if I could teach you all the necessary vocabulary in 30 classes, you will still need a lot of time to develop your speaking and listening skills, without which the basic purpose of learning Business Chinese will be defeated - you simply will not be able to communicate with the Chinese.

[sorbetlover1]

Hi all! Thank you so much for all the very informative posts so far.

 

Like Andrea, I'm also debating whether or not to take the Business Chinese course at BLCU.

 

I'm would say I'm pretty much fluent in general spoken Mandarin, but my reading and writing skills are relatively poor. I'm hoping to 1) pick up business vocabulary and 2) improve my reading/writing to the stage where I'd be able to actually do business in China. 

 

Does anyone have any views on whether it would be a better idea to take the one-semester Business Chinese course, or instead take the more general Chinese courses? Also, does anyone know whether I'd be able to, say, do one semester of Intermediate (Level C) Chinese followed by one semester of Advanced (Level D) Chinese to make up one full academic year?

 

Finally, I'm in my mid-late twenties and I am hoping that most people in any of the above courses I listed would be in more or less the same age-range, or older! As much as I feel young(er) at heart, I'd prefer not to be studying with a bunch of 18-22 year olds (no offense meant to anyone from that age range reading this!!

 

Many thanks!

[Shai]

Hello everyone,

 

i am thinking of going to BLCU for a whole year, but am having a hard time picking up information on their website.

 

http://www.studyinblcu.cn/lxs/_08003    is this it?

 

I'm looking at the 1 year program 

Sept.08, 2014— mid of Jul. 2015(Chinese Language Studies)
 

 

where can I find info on the content of this program?

Is it really a full year or do they have a break (han jia)?

[bailing]

CHINESE TEACHER TRAINING

 

Hi!

does anybody have any experience/insights/feedback about the  training courses organized by BLCU for teachers of Chinese? 

Are there any similar courses in other Chinese universities?

thank you! 

[Crystal Garden]

International Chinese Teacher Program (ICTP) & Teach Chinese as a Foreign Language (TCFL) by BLCU

 

Hi everyone,

 

I am a Malaysian-Chinese. Right now I am seaching distance courses that offered by BLCU on "training Chinese teacher" program but realizing there are different website which are offering the same course (but with different charges, if I am not wrong).... this make me quite confused!

 

Can anyone help me? I would have few queries in mind:

 

a. are eblcu.com & eblcu.net the same? if they are not, then which should be the genuine one?

b. are these websites related to Beijing Language and Culture University (blcu)?

 

Thanks.

[lifesucketh]

Has anyone done a comparison between the Mandarin courses in Tsinghua university versus BLCU ?

What are the differences and which one is recommended (assuming if I can spare the 1 year or less) ?

Thanks.

[BLCU_Simon]

Hello to everyone, I was looking for a place to share my experience in BLCU in 2014/2105 and registered on this site.

 

First of all : BEWARE SCAMMERS SITES!

 

BLCU website management is pretty messy, but the official sites are:

• http://english.blcu.edu.cn/col/col248/index.html (uni homepage)
• http://admission.blcu.edu.cn/default.aspx (admissions CN)
• http://admission.blcu.edu.cn/en/default.aspx (admissions EN)
• http://admission.blcu.edu.cn/en/info_v.aspx?m=20140312162135280962 (list of courses)

IGNORE any websites like "study in blcu" or "blcu.org". They are scammers who will surcharge the original price of the courses and by no guarantee will register you correctly for the university! The only way to apply to BLCU is online from these websites. 

[BLCU_Simon]

According to my experience (2 full semesters of intensive courses after having listened in to 2 weeks of regular courses) there are two ways of studying at BLCU:

1. A regular 20hr/week course.  This is going to be your "average" chinese study experience where you go to class in the morning and enjoy a free afternoon to do some homework and go out, do activities, sports, have booze with friends, etc... the books and the teching methods are standard, there is plenty of people from anywhere in the world, you'll socialize a lot, and have a lot of free time. Personally I do not think there is much difference between a chinese course taken here and a chinese course taken in another university. Professors are OK, books are OK, but nothing extraordinary. My teachers where following the books, and that was it. FYI, most of the people enrolled in chinese courses at BLCU take this kind of course. They are usually the ones you see drinking at beer garden since 4 PM in the afternoon. Lol.
2. The intensive 30hr/week course. Now here is where things get serious: the programme is, as the name says, pretty intensive: you attend 6hr classes / day , and the pace is very high. You will spend at least an additional 6-7 hours per day to study/review/preview (not kidding), which will leave you very little time to do other activities. Forget about getting drunk on a weekday evening. And many weekends you may need to sacrifice to do extra homeworks for the coming week. This is not the course for people who do not have strong motivation or a good reason to learn chinese. Now that I spoke about the cons, here are the pros: 

• classes are small, which means more speaking time for everybody and a lot more personal engagement with the professors
• professors are AMAZING. They are all scholars and researchers, most of whom studied abroad. They are experienced in dealing with foreigners and most of all they have a technical grasp of learning/teaching techniques. Most of them are conducting research on learning methodologies/experiencing new methods. Except for the occasional trainee we got in one of the minor courses, the average cultural level is really HIGH.  Just go give you an example, my 阅读 (reading) professor went to Tsinghua and Renmin to hold seminars, speaks japanese, russian and korean....
• Learning is much more interactive and dynamic. In class they make you speak a lot more than in the regular course.
• Grammar teaching is really strong. The 综合 (comprehensive) course is tough, but will really input a LOT of useful notions in your struggling brain!
• You always use the latest books: since this is an advanced training facility, the books are always new and updated (since chinese is a language that changes very quickly, this is very important, expecially for 口语 spoken chinese ), while in the regular course they still use old ones.
• This is an extremely motivating environment: The average age is a little older than regular course, students range from the 18 yr old indonesian to the 60 yr old retired korean. But all students in the intensive are there just to learn, and since a lot of them are really good, this will really push you to give your best.
• This may be a little biased, but I was really enthusiastic about this courses and I would go there again to take another one.  

My recommendation for anyone seriously interested in learning chinese is to attend the intensive course. You can only enroll in one 6 months semester long program at a time. i EXPECIALLY recommend it for absolute beginners, since it will give you very strong basics and correct intonation. 

 

Hope this helps. For any question, feel free to PM me, and I will reply in public. 

[Mekelou]

Hi guys ! 

I had no choice but to send my application to BLCU for the long term ( 1 year ) Chinese language program on short notice

because I didn't get the scholarship. The deadline is the 28th of July, and I have successfully paid online, send application and documents via email on the 28th France time.

Do you think I still get a chance to get into BLCU for the September term ? Should I send via post mail hard copies of the documents ?

 

Please let me know your opinions and thank you in advance !

[Areom]

Hi!

 

I was just wondering how I could send a letter or package to a student at BLCU? 
I have been looking eeverywhere (I feel), but I can't find anything :/

 

Should I just send it to the administration office (the official address of the university), and then just add the name, dorm and room number of the student??

 

Thanks in advance!

 

[shinvash]

yes you can send packages to students in blcu as I remember. There is a nearby post office inside the campus. 

[electricmaze]

Hey guys,

 

I'm wondering what the best way to make payment for my tuition would be?

 

I could transfer it, take the RMB in notes, use my debit or even credit card.

 

If I was to tranfer it I would want to do it sooner rather than later, especially with the spring festival coming shortly, what would you guys reccomend for BLCU?

 

Thanks.