Frustrated with my lack of progress!

[trisha2766]

(Feel free to ignore this, I'm just in one of those moods where I feel extremely motivated to learn and at the same time extremely frustrated with how bad my chinese is after studying for so long.  )

 

Maybe its because its close to Chinese New Year and I went to some local chinese stores and a restaurant today but for whatever reason I'm feeling very frustrated at how bad my chinese still is.  Especially my listening skills.  But my desire to learn and understand what I here is just driving me crazy!  How is it possible after studying as many years as I have that I still can't begin to understand other people when I hear them talking, can't begin to put together the words to say what I would like to to them and can't hardly follow anything on TV. 

 

It's like its a puzzle that I just have to solve.  And won't rest until I do.  Although I could very well wake up tomorrow and not feel so obsessed with it.

 

Watching Chinese TV now and frustrated at how little I understand.  Even more so that when I look at the subtitles I see that I know most of the characters they are using but can't begin to understand when they are speaking it.  Of course I can't read as fast as they speak either or process the meaning of what I read quickly.

 

Today I bought some CNY decorations and snacks.   Then had lunch at a good Chinese restaurant.  Then went to a Chinese grocery store.  I remember when I first went there - it seemed so big and I was a bit overwhelmed.  At least now its not so overwhelming.  Except maybe the fish smell.  And the live fish.  I still don't know how to cook a whole fish yet either but would like to learn how.   I can't begin to read the labels on most items in the store or know how to prepare them to eat them. 

 

And compared to most other people I have met that are learning Chinese I seem to be able to recognize many more character than they do. 

 

Sometimes it just feels like I've been wasting my time.

 

There's a local meetup.com group here for Mandarin learning. I've been trying to go to that lately not sure yet if it will be helpful or not.  I've taken classes, have a ton of study materials, etc.  I don't know if I'm doing something wrong, am just not good at learning languages or its just that hard as an adult to learn a new language.

 

Anyway, sorry for going on for so long.  I think I'm starting to get tired and will maybe get out of this mood soon.   Maybe I'll try and not let myself watch TV in English anymore and instead just force myself to watch Chinese TV.  Try to immerse myself in the language as much as possible.  It might help a little. 

[gato]

How have you been practicing listening? Do you listen to a piece over and over again until you understand it 100%?

Watching TV is not the most effective way at your current level if you can't understand most of what is being said. It's like reading something too far above your level and having to look up every other word.

[trisha2766]

I do practice listening but maybe I just don't do it enough.  I'm not sure if anything except very slow beginner level stuff I could really understand 100%, but somewhere close to that.  I mean just listening and trying not to translate in my head and hearing every syllable. 

 

I really need to practice speaking out loud by myself too.  And it seems even just tonight, forcing myself to watch Chinese TV that it doesn't seem quite as fast now.  Maybe I just need to make sure I keep learning Chinese as the main focus of my life for a while, and not get side tracked.  I can't do that forever but maybe for a few weeks.  It feels like there's some hurdle that I just can't get over.   Like I can't make that connection between words I know and how native speakers actually sound when speaking them. 

[mr.kylelong]

How exactly do you practice listening?

 

I know for me I struggled to find a good way to practice listening at the beginning.  There does seem to be a high barrier to comprehension at the beginning- especially when it comes to hearing syllables as part of a word or phrase.  I think what gato talked about above is the best method.  Find a recording that you know all or most of the words for but cannot understand spoken at a normal rate, stick it into a program like audacity, and play is phrase by phrase over and over until you've understood EVERY WORD.  Do this 1-2 seconds at a time if you need to until you can build up to understanding the whole dialogue.  You would be surprised at how much regular, focused practice like this improves your listening.  Spending 30 minutes on a 30 second clip is more useful than watching 30 minutes of TV.

 

Don't lose hope!  Everyone gets discouraged and has bad China days!

[roddy]

Maybe I just need to make sure I keep learning Chinese as the main focus of my life for a while, and not get side tracked.  I can't do that forever but maybe for a few weeks.

 

But what happens after those few weeks? Do you just stop, or do you go back to some 30-mins-a-day routine? if you let us know what time you have available and what you're currently doing with it, we can maybe offer some practical advice. 

[querido]

I understand how you feel.

I'm interested in what you say and do about it.

-Listening over and over is good, but it is not as good as expected for this reason, I think: The piece on repeat gradually gets memorized, and to the extent that it is memorized it loses its effectiveness as listening comprehension exercise because it ceases to be a string of surprises. Do you understand?

-What Gato said about working too high above your level is also good. (It agrees with the (comprehensible) Input Hypothesis.)

So, combining those two, I have suggested the audio that comes with graded readers. 1) You can start so low that "knowing" the words is no problem and 2) the pieces are long enough to resist memorization. (But attend as hard as you can and as quickly as you can because these are gradually memorized too.)

Other than finding a tutor to spend many hours with who can converse naturally while sticking to a given vocabulary list, the above is the best advice I have at this time.

[mr.kylelong]

With regard to memorization, it's my opinion that memorizing the way short sentences sound is exactly what you want.  You might think memorizing short phrases is limited in it's usefulness but I would argue that memorizing the sounds in short 1-2 second phrases makes picking out those same individual sounds in other phrases possible.

 

She mentioned that she has trouble keeping up with the text on TV, even though she understands most of the characters.  I had this same problem and it wasn't until I focused on memorizing the sounds that short passages make before I could begin to look at novel phrases spoken at a normal rate.

 

Just my two cents.

[Ruben von Zwack]

Apologies for jumping in like this - I think what querido meant was, you may (subconsciously) memorise the content of the piece you are listening to, and then it would lose its effectiveness.

 

I agree, memorising the sound of phrases and typical sentences is very valuable for listening comprehension. It feels like my brain can take a second to breathe then, and concentrate on the more difficult stuff.

[imron]

This is a stage that every learner will go though so don't get too disheartened.  It's also the point at which many learners give up so being able to push through this is what separates those who will learn Chinese well and those who won't.  Think of your motivation for learning Chinese - I'm sure that will give you the strength to push forward even though it feels incredibly frustrating.

 

Anyway, this post from many years back describes an excellent way to improve your listening skills (be sure to read the follow up posts too).  It's basically what Gato and mr.kylelong mentioned - listening to a piece over and over.  This helps train your brain to process the language at a normal speed, but does it in small enough chunks that it's not so overwhelming.

 

Querido is right in that once a piece gets memorised it starts to lose some of its effectiveness, and the way to combat that is to regularly switch to new content.  You don't need to be doing long pieces of content at a time.  Maybe just starting out with single sentences, and then as your listening improves, moving on to multiple sentences then paragraphs and so on.

 

A good place to get material from is 锵锵三人行.  They have audio, video and transcripts available.  Realmayo has been writing a series of posts analysing small parts of episodes that he likes.  That would probably be a great place to start from.

 

Pick a sentence that seems interesting (and where you can understand most of the Chinese from the transcript).  Look up any words you don't know (and add them to whatever flashcarding program you use), then listen to the sentence over and over again in something like Audacity - maybe even just a few words at time.  Once you can hear and understand everything, then if you still have time, move on to a new sentence and repeat.

 

Make sure you spend at least 30 mins a day on the listening part (i.e. not including looking up words, picking a sentence from the transcript etc), and make sure that you do it every day!

[trisha2766]

mr.kylelong - How I practice changes now and then. What I like to do is listen with a transcript, then ideally without looking at it.  To listen to a short segment over and over I'll really need to have something in a mp3 or digitized.  I have a lot of dvd's but stopping and rewinding a zillion times can be tedious.  Right now I think the only audio I have mp3's for are the NPCR dialogues, which are maybe too slow and artificial.  I need a new computer, mines not in good shape right now.  I also need a bigger TV. The only one I have now is pretty small and trying to read subtitles is really hard unless I sit right in front of it.

 

Roddy, I have so many other things I should be doing rather than studying Chinese. If I could do whatever I wanted I'd do nothing but study until I made some really significant progress.  But I just can't.  I could make it my biggest priority for maybe a month.  Then I have to spend most of my time on other things but would still be able to study a little most days.  Another problem I have is that sometimes the only time I have is at the end of the day and I'm so tired its hard to concentrate on anything. 

 

querido, if I ever figure this out, I'll definitely share anything that might help someone else.  I get what you say about listening to the same thing over and over.  It somehow just loses its effectiveness after a while.  And I don't think that just applies to listening skills, but to every aspect of studying.  Reviewing the same text books over and over only has limited usefulness.  That's one thing I'd definitely do differently if I were starting all over again.  I have the Chinese breeze readers but haven't actually listened to any of the audio that came with them.  Yes, tutors would be great if you have unlimited money.  An hour a week with one doesn't accomplish much, and yeah, no one knows what words you know so far, so they don't know how to talk to you. 

 

QQSRX - wow!  Real people talking like real people talk in real life.  On TV anyway.  Way over my head to just listen to if there wasn't transcripts available.  I'll have to give this a try.  I'm curious about how hard it will be for me to understand it and follow along.  Should be interesting anyway.  If I could even eventually get through just the first one I'd be pretty happy with that!  I think I tried audacity once but couldn't figure out how to use it.  I think watching the videos in the links in that thread would be fine.  Free too, that's nice.  I've already spent so much money on learning materials.  I need to watch that.

 

Forcing myself to watch chinese TV has been interesting too.  Again tonight I watched a little bit of a kid's show that's apparently from CCTV1 but being shown on the KyLin Live channel.  It has couple of bears making life difficult for a logger.  Its cute.  And now I'm watching something on the CCTV movie channel about some people trying to put on some sort of show or something as far as I can tell. Maybe a new year's show.  A short word or phrase pops out now and then but most of it I can't understand.  It would be nice to have something other than this tiny TV, can't begin to see the subtitles from the couch.  In any case watching this has got to be better than spending my evenings watching old law and order episodes.  

[imron]

Subtitles will actually be bad for you if you are trying to improve your listening because you'll use them even if you don't mean to and it can be easy to convince yourself you're understanding what you hear when in reality you are understand half from listening and half from reading.

That's another reason QQSRX is so good - no subtitles, but full transcripts.

You won't be able to understand much initially, but that's to be expected, so don't worry. Rather than trying to watch full episodes, use the sentence by sentence approach and gradually you'll be able to listen to longer and longer pieces.

The link I provided above has links to mp3 downloads of the episodes so work with them and Audacity. For audacity related problems feel free to start a new thread explaining the issue. There are plenty of members here who use or have used audacity regularly and who will be able to help out.

[Ruben von Zwack]

I really like Audacity, I use it all the time to slice difficult dialogues into little pieces. Or to make my own mp3s for listening and speaking practice. But I can see how it might be troublesome if you're not used to it.

If you have any questions, just ask!

 

Something you could do, when you have only limited time, is to make Chinese audio conveniently accessible for you in everyday life. So that you won't have to invest time during a normal hectic week day, and only need to press "play".

For example, I have computer speakers in the kitchen. When I prepare dinner, I just plug in my laptop (or mp3 player) and voila I can listen to a Chinese talk show. I have enough material on my laptop, so I really just need to pick anything I fancy in that moment.

I'm sure there are other things one can do as well, but this is on top of my mind.

 

 

Again tonight I watched a little bit of a kid's show that's apparently from CCTV1 but being shown on the KyLin Live channel.  It has couple of bears making life difficult for a logger.

That's 熊出没 (Xióng Chūmò, English title Boonie Bears)! I often watch it when I am too tired in the evening to do anything sensible, or while I have my morning coffee. I downloaded a couple of episodes so again I only need to plug in my laptop or mp3 player while I'm still half asleep.

[tysond]

For motivational purposes I like Khatzumoto's series on Intermediate Angst.  It's about learning Japanese but same ideas apply.

[Nathan Mao]

I'm going to put in a plug again for Chinese pop music.

 

Find some songs you like the music to.  Start with 15-16.  Get the lyrics.  Spend time with a dictionary making sure you understand them.

When you are doing all your other activities, listen to the Chinese songs.  Sing along.

When you get to the point you can truly hear and understand most of the lyrics, get a new set of 15-16.

 

This requires a few hours of work to find and set up, but you can get a month of practice, but it doesn't feel like work, and doesn't detract from the other things you have to do.

 

Another thing that will help:

Yellowbridge:

http://www.yellowbridge.com/chinese/memory.php

 

There may be better flashcard games out there, dunno.  This one works for me.  I can work on a project for 50 minutes, and then take a 10minute break by doing a Yellow Bridge Memory game set.

Then back to work.

 

it breaks up the monotony of work, but uses my break time to improve my Chinese vocabulary and reading.

[Ania]

Something you could do, when you have only limited time, is to make Chinese audio conveniently accessible for you in everyday life. So that you won't have to invest time during a normal hectic week day, and only need to press "play".

For example, I have computer speakers in the kitchen. When I prepare dinner, I just plug in my laptop (or mp3 player) and voila I can listen to a Chinese talk show. I have enough material on my laptop, so I really just need to pick anything I fancy in that moment.

I'm sure there are other things one can do as well, but this is on top of my mind.

 

One advantage of having to spend between 1 and 2 hours daily in my car is the fact that I can listen to Chinese podcasts then When you're at home, sometimes it's difficult to find time for some "serious" learning, because there's always so much to do, but there's really nothing much that I can do when driving a car I used to listen to music, but since I started learning Chinese, I've been listening to Chinese podcasts, Of course at my level I still need material that is adapted for learners, but I dream of one day being able to listen to native material and at least know what's going on Although that's a few years into the future, if ever

 

I agree that listening to songs helps!!! That's one of my favorite ways of learning! So far I have translated and analyzed probably about 30 songs and every time I listen to one of them, I understand more and more. 

 

Since I really just started learning Chinese a year ago, for now it's relatively easy for me to see progress, but let's see what I have to say in a year

[FadedStardust]

Yes to Cpop (mentioned multiple times) and yes to plugging in to a set of speakers when in the kitchen (Ruben von Zwack #12). I do both and it helps immensely. I have a playlist on my Android phone (aka the Pleco Machine, lol) dedicated to Mandarin music that I listen to when commuting to and from University and sometimes at night when I can't sleep. I also watch news on cntv.com and random dramas on Youku and Youtube when cooking or just relaxing at the end of a long day.

 

Get the sounds into your ears, keep the sounds in your ears, but don't make it such a chore that you become frustrated with it.

 

If you can't understand what you hear, there's lots of threads with vocab lists here on the forums for certain Dramas or you can watch English fansubbed versions online and then after you know what's happening re-watch the shows without the English subs to try to understand the unfamiliar Chinese words and phrases through the now familiar context. Or read translations of Chinese novels in English then watch the Drama version without any English subs.

 

Knowing what's being said can help you figure out what's being said, as funny as that sounds.

[trisha2766]

Imron - I'm not so sure that having the subtitles on at this point is bad for me. I can turn away pretty easily since I can't read that fast.  But it can help with getting an idea of what they are talking about.  If I see something with subtitles in English on the other hand, I have a hard time not reading it.  My brain just seems to pull me towards it.  Kind of like if you are trying to read something in Chinese and pinyin is included.  I don't want to read it but my eyes just seem to be automatically drawn to it. 

 

I didn't see the links to the mp3's for QQSR.  Once I have a new computer maybe I could get them myself from the video but I don't think I can now. 

 

So what else does audacity do besides editing files?  I do already have some software that does that.  But what I don't have now is anything that will allow me to download video or audio from a site like YouTube.

 

熊出没 - I couldn't quite read the font they are using.  I like seeing kids shows that are pretty high quality.  The picture quality of most of the ones on the kids channel I get is not very good, sometimes the sound isn't either.

 

tysond - I looked at that site today and read a few articles.  It is pretty good and did help motivate me.  I'll read more next time I need motivated.

 

Nathan - I have one pop music CD, I don't have it in front of me but her name is something like xu meijing.  I have a lot of children's songs too but I can only listen to those for so long. I can't begin to sing along though!  I use pleco for flashcards but lost most of mine a while back.  Sometimes doing flashcards literally puts me to sleep but is nice when I have a little spare time away from home, I can make better use of the time. 

 

I'll try to start listening in the car again but I know I can't focus on Chinese and drive at the same time very well.  Wish I could.

 

Watching a movie again on the cctv movie channel. Its looks entertaining.  I sure wish I knew how to record it but I did manage to somehow rewind it and re-watch a little of it. 

 

[Ruben von Zwack]

Sounds like you could benefit from a little hardware update

So I take it you don't have an mp3 player?

And just how old is this computer of yours? Chances could be, maybe it isn't too old, just congested.

 

There are a lot of free add-ons for your browser to download videos from Youtube (or Youku or any channel), which is best might depend on your browser and computer. I am using "Download Helper" for Firefox for example.

 

Maybe you can give examples of what Western music you like, and then we can try give recommendations for something similar in Chinese?

 

About Audacity - once you imported your sound file, you can zoom in so you literally see the words (as soundwaves) so you can very precisely slice the dialogue into bits.

You can perform all sorts of magic on it then, like add pauses, put parts on repeat, even mark parts and slow them down without altering the pitch. That way you can work yourself through dialogues that would be just too ovewhelming as a whole.

 

I just wanted to add that I can feel your frustration. I think I have somewhere seen even renzhe, whose Chinese is not too shabby I suppose, say Mandarin listening comprehension was a "nightmare".

[trisha2766]

Its old and congested!  I do have a mp3 player.  I think download helper was one I had for a while.  I used to be able to download stuff, but anything I had to do it with just stopped working eventually.

 

I like '阳光总在风雨后', mostly because a local chinese school here put up a youtube video and used the song in it.   I used to listen to a lot of heavy metal music, which for whatever reason I feel embarrassed to admit now.  But I wouldn't mind listening to some Chinese metal bands some day.  The CD I have is probably easier to understand the words on though.

 

I've been watching 天天有喜, I wish I could record it because they actually speak clearly and it seems a bit slower.  Funny thing too - I enjoy watching Chinese commercials. 

[querido]

(From two posts above) "...a nightmare". Yet it is a relatively neglected topic on the forum. Let's remember to keep talking about it!

Edit: Sorry, I wrote a longer post but I don't have time to polish it right now.