Chasing The Holy Grail Of Fluency

[jiasen]

By way of background, I've been learning Chinese for the greater part of a decade. During this time, I've learnt to read and write Chinese to a level where I can work in my job on the mainland without too many hiccups. I've also been listening to Chinese radio / television everyday (thanks to Imron's suggestion of using Don't Break the Chain) to the point that I understand the majority of what I hear nowadays - although I still have room for improvement.

 

But my speaking ability after all this time is, by my own admission, hopeless.

 

In fact, in recent times I've just given up on this skill and tried to develop ways to get around it (e.g. I'll listen to a client on the phone, then ask if I can send a follow up email in Chinese with my advice). But I really want to improve. For one thing, it doesn't matter how well you understand a person if you cannot articulately respond to them during conversation. Also my wife is always harping on about how I should learn from Wang Lee Hom, who apparently didn't speak any Chinese before the age of 18..which is annoying .

 

I've made a list of all the areas I need to improve:

 

  - Speak with the correct tones - I guess we all have this problem at times.

  - Speak with an even pace, rather than stuttering and chopping words all the time.

  - Speak with proper intonation and a "closer to native" accent.

  - Improve my vocabulary. My passive vocabulary would have to be 5-10 times larger than my active vocabulary. There are so many words that I would understand perfectly if somebody else used them, but never come to mind when I speak.

  - Speak with correct grammar. This is easy to do when I write, because I have time to think about it, but pretty much every sentence I use during conversation has a grammatical error in it.

  - Use sentences longer than 5 words.

  - Come up with better ways to demonstrate understanding in conversation (e.g. "ah hah" and nodding head in English).

 

I'm really interested in what methods people have used to speak fluent Chinese. I would be really keen to try just about anything. However that is subject to: (1) Unfortunately I'm time poor due to my job and cannot put myself into a Chinese-only environment, and (2) In my experience many commercial methods available on the market don't work for me because, other than my speaking skills, my Chinese level has moved past these materials.

 

Many thanks for all your helpful suggestions in advance. Jiasen.

[Flickserve]

Talk to your wife in chinese?

 

I am learning mandarin now by the personal tutor approch.

 

However, I did learn cantonese almost from scratch in Hong Kong. Group classes didn't work for me (bit too busy and each person had a differing level of cantonese so making progress quite slow).

 

I went for the private teacher route - I would record the lesson. I would also get the teacher to write in chinese what we had said.

 

So, on another day, I would take the words to work and repeat it to a colleague saying 'is this how it sounds?

 

And on Sundays, I would go through the lesson and recording for about 3 hours trying to repeat those key phrases of sentences which matched my way of expression in chinese (but also grammatically correct).

 

Being in an immersive environment helped a lot. If I said something and could not be understood, then I would take the written words back and repeat it in front of tutor/colleague to get a better pronunciation or intonation of the whole sentence.

 

You might be able to do the same. There is no way I can pick up mandarin as fast because people around me are speaking cantonese all the time.

[li3wei1]

The obvious answer is that you need to practice. And you apparently have lots of opportunity to do so. It sounds like what's holding you back is fear of looking foolish, which, in a professional setting, is quite reasonable. So, what I would advise you to do is make a list of all the speaking situations in your life where you can get away with sounding foolish (with your wife, with close friends, with drinking buddies), and make every effort to speak as much as possible in those situations. Then, try to add situations (hire a private tutor, join some sort of activity-based group where no-one knows you) where you will be forced to speak and where it doesn't matter if you sound like an illiterate bumpkin. Every sentence that you utter will make you better, and I bet, with your massive passive vocabulary and extensive reading/writing experience, you'll make rapid progress.

[anonymoose]

I can sympathise with the OP. I think I have the same problem. I'm still trying to figure out the best way to remedy this situation. I don't think practice on its own is enough - I've been practising on a daily basis for the past few years, and I still feel my oral Chinese lags behind the other skills. I think pronunciation should be relatively easy to improve - I need to find a tutor perceptive enough to point out exactly where my sounds are wrong. The larger problem is expanding active vocabulary, and developing a more "Chinese" mindset, so that it can all be put together into more accurate sentences.

[li3wei1]

I would also add, think hard about your professional situation, and what kinds of things you would like to be saying, then work with your tutor so that next time you have an opportunity, you can say them. Little by little, you'll be talking more and more, and your confidence will improve, which will help you talk more. Replay conversations in your head, and if you find lines that you could imagine coming out of your mouth, say them to yourself over and over again (when you're alone), so that when you find an opportunity to say them, they come easily and quickly. 

[Flickserve]

There was another forum member who did a speech at a dinner. I think that's a great way of stepping up to increasing fluency by practice, thinking of things you would like to say bringing in words from passive to active.