How much can i cover in 4 month?

[Changy]

Hey guys i'm new to this forum and want to know how much i can cover in 4 month, i have 10 hours everyday to study and by self learning. In addition i have a little background in Chinese.

[OneEye]

This is an interesting question, but unfortunately there's no good answer for it. Mike Campbell, AKA Glossika, says that after 4 months he was studying 思想與社會, which is a fairly advanced textbook, and quite frankly astounding to me (though if there were one person capable of reaching such a level, it would be him). He also says he was putting 16 hours per day into it, and he was living in Taiwan and had a tutor pushing him. To my ears, and apparently to many Taiwanese people's, he is indistinguishable from a Taiwanese person when he speaks Mandarin now (though it has now been years since he started). But then again this was not his first foreign language. Nor his last — he speaks a lot of languages at varying degrees of competence, and last year he learned Thao, a Taiwanese aboriginal language, well enough to pass the government proficiency test with a score of 92% in only four months. He has gone into some detail about how he studied Chinese on his facebook page in the past.

Then on the other end you have people who seemingly have studied for years with little to show for it. Somewhere in the middle you have someone like "Benny the Irish polyglot". You can Google him to find out his results after a similar time frame. I'd think with good study habits anyone could easily reach or exceed his level with four months of 10 hours per day to devote to hard studying.

You didn't give any specifics about your situation. Do you live in a Chinese-speaking country? This can greatly influence how far you can get, because your non-studying time can become review and practice time. In any case, you'd likely be best off with a good tutor who will practice speaking with you, answer any questions you may have, etc.

[Shelley]

Have to agree with everthing OneEye said. This is not a question anyone can really answer. If you study like mad every minute of every day you may make good progress but also you may just burn out and give up.

Take it steady, love what you learn, learn what you love. Don't make it hard work, let yourself absorbe the information, don't hammer it into your brain with a sledgehammer as you will beat your brains but you may not learn anything.

learning Chinese is an enjoyable thing, don't ruin it with high expectations and failing to make your goals.

Welcome to the wonderful world of learning chinese and above all enjoy it.

[edelweis]

@Changy: what books, websites, etc. do you intend to use? how do you plan to divide those 10 available hours?

(Like posters above, I don't think it is possible to really predict how you will do, however if you tell us more about your plans we can tell you whether some aspect is missing, whether you are likely to fall in a trap others have fallen into before etc. and live the intensive Chinese study vicariously)

You might also want to consider going to China and enrolling into a school for those 4 months. Depending on circumstance, that may end up both cheaper and more efficient that sutdying on your own, especially if the cost of living in your country is high...

[renzhe]

In four months of really hard studying, you can build a wonderful foundation, learn the most common 1000 characters, start reading simple comics, and engage in very simple conversations.

You won't be mastering Chinese in 4 months, but you can move in the right direction and get on the threshold of using real native materials. There is still a long road to go from there. Depending on what you need it for, this might be sufficient for you, or not.

[Changy]

Age:19

The material that i will be using are CCTV Learn Chinese, Anki flashcards and Chinese drama with English subtitle. I am currently leaving in Macau (China) which does help me a bit, however i don't really want to go out to socialize this 4 month. In addition i can speak 90% Cantonese and plus I am living with my parents which can speak full Mandarin and Cantonese.

Study plan

2hour watching drama

4hour writing vocab

4hour reading,listening and grammar, sentence structures

Review words every week

Review words every month

[edelweis]

You should be able to make quick progress then (I think).

But you have to watch for burn-out...

You are not using a textbook or grammar book?

[Kobo-Daishi]

Why the 4 month time frame?

Are you giving up learning Chinese after the four months are up?

My advice to you would be the same as to the guy at the thread titled "How to learn mandarin from cantonese?"

http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/38100-how-to-learn-mandarin-from-cantonese/

Bond with your parents. Since they're both fluent in Cantonese and Mandarin.

Read entries from a good Chinese-English dictionary. Since you're fluent in Cantonese you'll find a lot of vocabulary overlap between Cantonese and Mandarin. I don't know the percentage but it's a lot.

Also, you might take to reading entries at the CantoDict project's CantoDict.

Get a copy of the GoldenDict open source dictionary program and find the StarDict dictionary files. I wrote about it (StarDict) in my blog but unfortunately the links are now dead. You could do a little searching and you'll still find the dictionary files, though.

Kobo.

[jkhsu]

Learning Mandarin from Cantonese is good for speeding up your comprehension but I suggest that for pronunciation, you learn from the ground up by listening to native Mandarin speakers and learning pinyin. Your schedule looks ok and the CCTV Learn Chinese site is a good resource for listening to proper Mandarin pronunciation. Ask your parents to only speak to you in Mandarin (probably hard to do but worth giving a try). However, keep in mind that your parents may not pronounce Mandarin that well.

Also, can you afford a tutor/teacher? While self study is great, having a (good) native speaker teacher can really help your spoken Mandarin.

[Changy]

I will continue to study Chinese after 4 month just not as much. Probably 2hr on weekdays and 4hr max on weekend. As for the tutor/teacher and textbook, I do not want to spend any money (I know some people will think that if you do not invest in tutor and textbook, it will slow down the progress, but I believe that internet resource can provide the same result.) Just need to research and compare different website or study course. It will be great if you guys give me some good website to check out, the more the better. =)

[edelweis]

how are you doing then?

are you satisfied with your progress?

have you been able to follow your plan?

[nicostouch]

Drama is good but drop the English subtitles. It's really easy to find Drama with Chinese subs which will help with vocabulary acquisition.