The Next Step in Chinese Reading... Reaching for fluency.

[Pengyou]

Ditto the prior 2 posters. I have been teaching English for 14 years and I often suggest that students choose one category of article in a newspaper or magazine and follow it every day - or week, if it is weekly....but, as the saying goes, "physician heal thyself!" I am beginning the process of learning how to read. I have been speaking for the past 10 years - can recognize 300 or so words but I need to push the envelope now.

[scoopneals]

Long time no post, I completely forgot about this-

I wanted to update everyone on the path I've been taking recently, as well as my progress... Chinese is the only language I've ever seriously tried to learn, and man, has it been humbling. I have a lot more respect for people who come to my country and try to learn my language.

My reading level is still ridiculously 差. I feel like I'm learning to completely different things sometimes. I elected not to go the graded reader route (personally I found them quite boring.. and the endings where anticlimactic and upsetting), but I've instead gone the article route. I've started with Slow-Chinese.com ; Shadowing the speaker and reading each article for a couple days in a row. Sometimes it feels like I'm not making progress, but comparing my level now to the last time I made a post, I've made a lot of progress. Shadowing is awesome, I definitely recommend it for any audio learners!!!

At the same time, I've started to go through the entire HSK word list. Originally I was adding 25 words a day at random, but it caught up to me... definitely don't recommend it. Now, I've suspended all cards, and unsuspend them as I come across them in articles. I've found this method much more useful, and I find myself often able to new words outside of reading if I do it this way. If the word is not in the HSK list, I have a separate deck I call "Article Words", and build in that as well.

After I finish all of slow-chinese.com 's articles, I'm planning on moving forward to something like these bro's that I've seen recommended on this forum: http://phtv.ifeng.com/program/qqsrx/list_0/0.shtml

汉子 is like... the most ridiculous thing i've ever studied. Do you guys think people who major in Chinese in the United States ever achieve reading fluency?

[icebear]

汉子 is like... the most ridiculous thing i've ever studied. Do you guys think people who major in Chinese in the United States ever achieve reading fluency?

Yes, I know some with good reading fluency and speed (that second part is the one that is often missing). It is difficult and takes years/decades, especially for the speed.