Glossika method

[Insectosaurus]

There was a new review by Days of French 'n' Swedish a few weeks ago. (Here) As a native Swede I can confirm that some of the sentences are really weird.

 

The fact that they use the same sentences for all languages is probably the biggest minus for me, with native audio being the biggest plus. 

[Tomsima]

I've been on glossika for about 30 mins a day for Canto for about 3 months now. Screenshot:

 

(The little medal things at the bottom represent green for days new words are learned, blue for days SRS reviews are completed)

 

After thinking about Glossika for a long time now, and having always voiced my support for shadowing, I invested a few months ago. I would say my verdict is: if you are learning Chinese languages, this is the resource you should be using at some point in your journey. Its not something you want to do forever, but I would highly recommend it for a year at least. My Cantonese tones (esp minimal pairs in sentences) have improved a lot in the last few months. I've solely been learning new vocab through the sentences too - very slow but I simply don't have enough hours in my day to learn new vocab elsewhere.

 

One big takeaway with the structure of the learning is just how realistic the CEFR alignment is. There's no gimmick, just lots of emphasis on hard work and putting the time in. Having done 50+ hours on the site, I'm still only a third of the way through the A1 level sentences (It seems there are 1000+ sentences in the 'A1 High' level still to learn).

 

Note: you need a grammar book or a teacher to accompany this resource, it definitely isn't standalone. As I already have Mandarin, I'm going to stick with just learning through Glossika to see out of curiosity how my Canto improves over the next few years. Will probably report back here in....2023? 

 

As for Michael Campbell, he's definitely a walk the walk guy leading the company - very, very knowledgeable about Chinese languages and dialects, some of his blog posts are fantastic on this subject. That being said, I wouldn't use Glossika for any other language than Chinese-related ones, as (and correct me if I'm wrong) it seems they've been 'plugged in' from what I hear (sentences haven't been organically mined). 

 

 

[Balthazar]

Decide to go for the Black Week offer, have been meaning to do more listening practice and shadowing.

 

I like the simplicity of it so far. A bit of a bummer that it's frozen on a sentence in my third session (Chinese audio will not load, so I'm not able to proceed). Not sure if it's a server error or something on my end (Windows 10, latest Chrome browser). Hope it's not something that happens often.

[Crush]

On 11/24/2021 at 6:21 AM, Tomsima said:

That being said, I wouldn't use Glossika for any other language than Chinese-related ones, as (and correct me if I'm wrong) it seems they've been 'plugged in' from what I hear (sentences haven't been organically mined). 

Well the majority of the original sentences were actually taken from English grammar books (an older edition of English Grammar in Use i believe). I think someone found the books and shared them earlier in the thread. So the base sentences for all languages were translated from English.

 

That being said, i believe they've started adding language-specific sentences for some languages. For Chinese languages i think Glossika works particularly well, especially if you have access to a native speaker to ask questions since it comes with zero explanations.

[Moshen]

Quote

Well the majority of the original sentences were actually taken from English grammar books (an older edition of English Grammar in Use i believe). I think someone found the books and shared them earlier in the thread. So the base sentences for all languages were translated from English.

 

That was my biggest beef with Chinese on Rosetta Stone.  I got free access to the program but soon quit because all the sentences were obviously imported from English or some other European language.  The photos also, if I'm not mistaken.  It felt really absurd to be studying Chinese with no jiaozi, no Great Wall, no real Chinese flavor at all.  The underlying concept, that languages are all the same except for the particular words and script, is quite useless and weird, in my opinion.

[Moshen]

Another comment about the strategy of using the same sentences for all languages...

 

Quote

The importance of family and culture for U.S. language learners was echoed in a recent national consumer survey Duolingo conducted in collaboration with DKC Analytics. Across all respondents, including those not currently learning a language, 65% said learning about a new culture would be their top reason for studying a new language—and culture ranked ahead of all other potential motivators.  https://blog.duolingo.com/2021-duolingo-language-report/

 

To me, this says that a language learning app that uses the same sentences for all languages is missing the boat with respect to why many people learn languages in the first place!

[eddyf]

I think that's a bit unfair. The Glossika method would not be a good way to learn about Chinese culture even if every sentence was originally written in Chinese and then translated to English. The way I see it, the Glossika method is best understood as a way to reach speaking fluency as quickly as possible for people who are very motivated and not easily bored. It's not a standalone resource. You'll have plenty of opportunity to learn Chinese culture from other resources, probably ones that are focused on listening or reading rather than speaking.

 

Would Glossika be better if all the sentences were originally written in Chinese? Of course. But there is no such collection of sentences out there which can match Glossika in terms of the thoroughness and the level of thought that went into organizing them. (Someone can correct me if I'm wrong on that--I haven't gone looking in a while).

 

One big advantage with using the same sentences for every language is that it's much cheaper than coming up with new sentences for every target language. And it's kind of cool to think that you could study any language using another other language (e.g. a Spanish speaker could go from Spanish to Chinese instead of English to Chinese). Or at least that's the theory. Do the advantages outweigh the disadvantages in practice? I'm not really sure. I think it mostly hinges on the quality of the translations. I was happy enough with the Mandarin translations. But I would not really recommend using Glossika as your only resource.

[Moshen]

Quote

The Glossika method would not be a good way to learn about Chinese culture even if every sentence was originally written in Chinese and then translated to English.

 

Actually the sentences and their vocabulary couldn't help but reflect and reveal the Chinese way of thinking if they derived from Chinese culture, society and life in China.  That's the point, not that the sentences would constitute a course on Chinese culture in themselves.

 

I remember when I was learning Spanish, I was really puzzled that in dialogues people called each other things like "joven," "viejo," "gordo," "flaca" and so on instead of using names, but that's an illustration of how learning a language is learning a culture.  If you translated those words directly into English, you'd sound stupid going around calling people "young man," "old man," "fatso" and "skinny."  We don't talk that way in English.  If I can think of a good Chinese example I'll come back and add it.

[Balthazar]

Anyone know if it's possible to manually select one's "level"?

 

I took the level test initially, and after having gone through 236 sentences at "C1 low" I am told that I've "reached the highest level and learned all the content we have so far!"

 

That's a bit of a bummer, but I wouldn't mind learning the sentences at a couple levels below too, since I'm doing this mostly for pronounciation practice. Can't see any way to do that though, except doing re-test and trying to guess which questions I should answer wrong to get to the level I want. There must be another way, no?

[Tomsima]

None that I'm aware of either, though you could always shoot them an email, they've been helpful answering similar questions ive had in the past

[pon00050]

On 4/16/2022 at 3:17 AM, Balthazar said:

That's a bit of a bummer, but I wouldn't mind learning the sentences at a couple levels below too, since I'm doing this mostly for pronounciation practice.

 

Is there a reason why it has to be Glossika?

If there isn't, I may have a suggestion for you.

 

Take any sample of spoken language. On YouTube or anywhere that's convenient for you.

Personally, I'd suggest downloading audio of interview style dialogue/speaking.

And use something like WorkAudioBook to play the mp3 file on repeat and mimic sentence by sentence.

 

[Flickserve]

Are people listening to the English and then shadowing the Chinese?

 

I am not using the website but curious to know how other people use it.

 

 I am not sure if it’s worth the money for Mandarin. However, for Cantonese, where there’s fewer good resources, I can see the benefit.

 

 

[Balthazar]

On 4/17/2022 at 12:54 AM, pon00050 said:

Is there a reason why it has to be Glossika?

 

None other than convenience. It gives me a complete (and curated) package which saves a lot of time, of which I have precious little after I recently became a father. Open a link, press one button, ready to go (well, mostly).

 

@Tomsima thanks, I'll try sending an email. Posted the same question on their FB group, and does indeed seem like there's no way except re-taking and failing the test on purpose. But I'll try an email, maybe they can manually alter my level setting for me.

[squishafish]

In case anyone is interested, Glossika is running a "challenge" in October that gives participants 1 month free + 3 months more if you do 3,000 reps and post on social media. Thinking about giving it a go... https://twitter.com/glossika/status/1569702449551736832?s=20&t=F3g956vYr3ekB1Ps_BM56g

[mouse]

I signed up.

[mouse]

Why after completing the reps does it want me to immediately do it all again? Then I go back to the main page and the same number of reps remain.

[squishafish]

Not sure, mouse—maybe something to do with settings?

 

I’ve been doing new sentences each day, in groups of five with five reps each, and reviewing everything from the beginning (one rep each).

 

To be honest, it’s getting a bit boring, although I see the value in practicing the same sentence multiple times. I might try to start skipping the easy sentences in reviews, or play around with the settings.

 

Anyone else have ideas on how to Glossika right?

[eddyf]

Lately I’ve been using Glossika a lot (mostly for some other languages, not Chinese). And although I’ll probably continue to use it, I’ve definitely been noticing its flaws more and more.

 

1. They claim that imitating sentences is a natural way to learn a language. But encountering the same sentence 10-20 times is not natural at all. Natural would be to encounter the same grammatical structure in 10-20 different contexts. Instead of practicing 3000 sentences 10 times each, it would be much more “natural” to encounter 30,000 distinct sentences.

2. As compared to studying standalone vocab, sentences are supposed to be more powerful because they give you context, and that’s definitely true. But I keep finding that even single sentences don’t have enough context. Standalone sentences are too short and ambiguous to convey all the nuances in meaning between different grammatical constructs, synonyms, etc. This also manifests as imprecise translations, where the meaning of the translation isn’t quite the same. If you’re using a base language other than English then that problem is even more obvious since you’re essentially using a translation of a translation, and the drift in meaning is more apparent.

3. On the topic of translation—any material which was first written in English and then translated into your target language will necessarily be less natural. The translator will be tempted to match the English phrasing too literally, which will result in sentences that are noticeably different than true native content. And the standalone-sentence format only aggravates this further.

So then why am I still using it? Ultimately because I haven’t yet found a routine for mining my own sentences which works well enough for me. But my attitude now is that I want to get through as many of the Glossika sentences in as little time as possible. So I’ve actually stopped using the review mode entirely. I only use the “new sentences” mode so I only see a sentence 5 times and then I move on. Even at this pace, it’s going to take many months to make it through all of the sentences (and I might give up before then). But I’m just not willing to put even more study time towards Glossika at this point. There are other resources and study methods that I use that are more fun and effective, and any minute spent on Glossika is a minute that I can’t spend studying in a different way. I only keep Glossika in the routine because it’s complimentary to the other things and I don’t want to abandon sentence shadowing entirely.

[chuugokugo]

Glossika's basic English mistakes are starting to make me question my own mother tongue.

 

This obviously means, "They are reading books." "Looking at books?" Who says that? I'm dumbfounded.

 

Mike's Mandarin is impressive and he's a native English speaker so how does this glaring mistake go overlooked. It was in the old PDFs and I signed up for their online platform to see if they cleaned up these issues... nope, no quality control checks.  The online platform is: 1. woefully overpriced, 2. probably has more typos past the initial 3000 sentences, 3. offers little user control (only allows you pause the audio in full practice mode, not listening when doing reps).

 

I already assumed it made more sense to sentence mine from textbooks and native resources, or have native speakers audio record sentences to make audio Anki flashcards. True, it takes time but complete control of the creation/editing/review process is guaranteed. Glossika is wonderful is concept, but sorely lacks in delivery.

[Tomsima]

I have completed the whole of the Mandarin package (granted, it is overpriced...), there are a few of these kinds of sentences, but ultimately I think its a necessity for being able to do sentence recall for what would otherwise be ambiguous. There seem to be two situations where this kind of oddity arises:

 

1. There is a very similar sentence somewhere else in the database, perhaps 他们在读书 which is then paired with 'They're reading books'. To avoid ambiguity, the sentence then paired here uses a more direct translation 'looking at', to jog your memory. I do this all the time with my anki cards in order to remember subtle differences, eg. 从头到脚 'from head to toe'， 从头到尾 'from beginning to tail end' (rather than both being the more often used 'from top to bottom'.

2. The sentence was originally part of a dialogue that was then split into individual sentences for the database. In the dialogue the bad translation is not labelled as 'bad' because the context made it clear to the reviewer. In this case you can flag it and the maintainers will review and change (I think I probably flagged around 20-30 sentences altogether)

 

I'm not trying to justify mistakes in what is ultimately an expensive service, but in some cases Mike may have in fact seen and intentionally kept some awkward translations for the sake of avoiding ambiguity.