Topics you don't find in textbooks, but you need!

[Silent]

 

 

Most of my students are housewives living here in China or women working, but mostly need Chinese outside the office.

I guess it's a variety of my favorite statement that frequency strongly depends on your situation and interests.

 

I guess the main components would be getting directions, inquiries on products/services, asking/negotiating prices and making appointments. These are wide topics depending on where you 'perform' these. So from the top of my head subjects might be:

 

Transport: trains/buses/taxistands/bicycle/car

Shopping: groceries/clothing/electronics/furniture/shopping online

Services: hairdresser/beauty salon/massage/sportsschool

Going out: restaurant/pub/theatre/sports events/concerts

Repairs: clothing/electronics/housing

Travel: travelagent/tourcompany/hotel/guide/all kinds of sights/luggage(storage)

[xuefang]

@Shelley, thank you for your input! I saw around the forum, that you are using the NPCR, I'm familiar only with the first book of the series.

 

My starting point is looking at the textbooks I've used or am using at the moment. So far I don't have complaints about the sentence patterns or grammar they have chosen, but of course this need to be researched as well. But I believe that these can be learned in a textbook that is more interesting and useful for the target student group that I have in my mind. "Housewife Chinese" isn't necessarily the best title for a textbook, but it describes the target student the best at the moment. 

 

So what I want to do (for my thesis and later as a real book) is a textbook for beginners that relates to expats that aren't working and possibly have small kids at home. "Our Chinese Classroom" in Unit 2 talks about introductions and in the second dialogue a boss is introducing two new colleagues to others. This could be changed into a mother introducing her kids to family friends or other kids.

 

I guess the challenge will be to keep it as a systematic textbook, beginner level so around HSK1 vocabulary and grammar, but also include useful topics and words that are more advanced, but that are the things that a new comer to China often needs in their first month(s) in China.

 

Thank you everyone for the topic suggestions and keep them coming! As it's my master's degree thesis, I'm going to be working with this for the next year

[Shelley]

I can understand tailoring the vocab for the group of people you are aiming at and i am glad you are considering making a "proper" textbook in as much as they will learn how to use the language and will be able to cope with replies they might get.

 

This is the biggest problem I can see with phrase book type lessons is knowing what has been said to them.

 

I am interested in how you end up solving this problem, ie the language needs of certain groups.

 

I hope you post things as you go, it would nice to see how it goes

[li3wei1]

I would have a few dialogues about getting work teaching English, and about setting up language exchanges.

[Meng Lelan]

 Rather than this over formal, polite speak you find in textbooks that no one actually uses in daily life. 

 

 

 

This. Absolutely. 

[Angelina]

It's not only the vocabulary. Try to teach them grammar better than the way it is being dealed with in most textbooks!

[ZhuFei]

@889

Teach Yourself offered "teach yourself phone mandarin chinese". URL: www.teachyourself.co.uk.

I'm not sure if it is still available through that site, though.

[ZhuFei]

Maybe a better idea than a general textbook, would be a service where you consult with someone who makes you a personalised textbook based on your life. You could provide them with a list of places or topics which you want to be familiar with and they would go to those places/do those things (market/mall, restaurant, online shopping etc) and record their use of language. They would then provide you with transcripts and recordings of the conversations and exchanges which naturally arise.

[abcdefg]

#28 -- ZhuFei --

 

Maybe a better idea than a general textbook, would be a service where you consult with someone who makes you a personalised textbook based on your life. You could provide them with a list of places or topics which you want to be familiar with and they would go to those places/do those things (market/mall, restaurant, online shopping etc) and record their use of language. They would then provide you with transcripts and recordings of the conversations and exchanges which naturally arise.

 

I've actually done this several times, or something like it. I live in Kunming and usually hire a local person who is a middle school 中学 teacher during his or her summer holiday. We usually meet 3 times a week and go together to places where I need help or do activities in which I know my vocabulary is lacking.

 

Instead of recording the language live, I make "real-time" notes. We spend a whole morning, 3 or 4 hours, which includes a couple of casual sit-down breaks during which I write up my notes, get help with the relevant Chinese characters and be sure I've got the tones right. At the end of the morning, we have lunch (my treat) and review that day's language points, both vocabulary and sentence structure (grammar.)

 

The meal together also provides a useful situation for talking about food, how to read the menu, how to order, restaurant etiquette, and even cooking. Sometimes we have even cooked together at my home. Obviously, this was only with teachers who liked to cook. And it requires a certain level of comfort together, of mutual trust.

 

I review it all at home a couple times between sessions, including "out-loud" practice. Make some flash cards; do some drills with them. Perhaps do some extra Baidu lookup of things that needed more detail. We usually both wind up with a little homework. My teacher might come back with a link to a Youku video that explains something that I had trouble grasping.

 

Next time we meet, we start with a review of our last session. Spend 30 minutes or so that way. Kind of "cements" things and also lets me be absolutely sure I've got it all straight. Hate to memorize things that are wrong, that I've understood incorrectly. Hate having to undo and relearn later; that wastes my (limited) mental resources.

 

Helps a lot over the course of a summer. Way better than a textbook for me. (Must confess to not using this method as a beginner; only once I reached an intermediate level and had a decent foundation.)

 

Sometimes we go to tourist sites that are difficult to reach by public transport. My teachers help me with getting around, how to read bus schedules, how to ask directions. (I pick up the tab for bus, taxis, and admissions.) There is always "incidental" learning such as how to say "mud puddle" or what those huge yellow construction machines are called, the ones with a scoop in front. (挖机)

 

One or twice, we have even traveled out of town overnight, usually together with one or two of my teacher's Chinese friends. One teacher took me to her home town to meet her parents and childhood pals. I met the elderly grandmother with no teeth. Way back in the wild Yunnan mountains.

 

Sometimes our expeditions are more mundane. For example, to the bank. My teacher doesn't intervene or take over the interaction with the bank staff. But she listens, and when we get outside, helps with places where I've stumbled. Or she might say, "This would be a more natural way to phrase that, even though the teller understood. The way you did it was a little clumsy."

 

One problem we encountered early on was that the shopkeeper or teller (in the above example) would try turning to my friend as a translator. My teacher would say in English, "Sorry, I'm Korean. Don't know Chinese." I would translate that into Chinese and say it clearly. “她是韩国人，她不会说中文。”

 

As the summer wore on and my notebook got fatter, we would both make a point of trying to re-use things learned during earlier points in time. "Oh, but you have said something very similar before. Don't you remember. Look back about 2 weeks to when we visited the art museum." I would thumb back in my notebook and find it right then and there. This provided an element of "spaced repetition" and did it naturally.

 

Can't say enough good about this method of instruction if you live in China and don't have a daily job for which you must punch the clock. Not only rewarding from a language standpoint, but a great way to learn more about where you live, learn more about local customs.

 

Like having a teacher, guide, and casual friend all rolled into one. Great fun. I look forward to summers here, and will probably do it again this year.

[PBolchover]

I've got a book called "Urban Chinese" which is better at these topics than some others.  However, it is rather old (dated 2001), so the typography looks dated, and probably some of the phrases are no longer in common use.

[ZhuFei]

#29 @abdcefg

 

That sounds pretty ideal

Did you cold approach your teachers, or did you already know them?

I suppose as you noted, that your way (putting the speaking duty on yourself) is good for intermediates.

The way I was thinking of (someone else speaking for you to produce study material) could likely develop into a method like yours once a bit of confidence is gained.

[889]

That Telephone Mandarin CD is available on Amazon:

 

http://www.amazon.com/Teach-Yourself-Phone-Mandarin-Chinese/dp/0071591869

[ZhuFei]

@889

 

Seems too expensive for what it is.

$60 for 10 conversations vs ~$100 for Pleco with all addons...

[889]

Agree, it seems to be a very basic and brief introduction. But some sellers seem to offer the CD alone for around US$2.

[abcdefg]

Did you cold approach your teachers, or did you already know them?

 

I placed an ad and then screened applicants. Not everyone I talked to was interested in something this comprehensive. These weren't English teachers; two of them taught middle school Chinese, one taught music, one taught math. We exclusively spoke Chinese during our sessions.

 

I tried my best to make it fun for them as well as fun for me. Plus I paid top dollar.

[ZhuFei]

o

[winterpromise31]

I'd be interested in something for housewives, since that's what I am.  I'm still a newbie, though, so I am constantly looking up new vocabulary. A book specifically devoted to stuff around the home, running errands, raising kids... that would be PERFECT for me. We're bringing home our daughter in July/August and I still do not know how to show her around the house in Chinese, much less talk about what meals she likes. Having specific vocabulary lists available would be invaluable because I feel like I'm drowning in new vocab and still feel inadequate. 

[Flickserve]

I try not to buy books because I don't end up reading them a lot. But I saw one in a bookshop today with a couple of pages of juicy swear words and derogatory remarks. It is useful to know such words; well, that's my viewpoint.

[Silent]

 

I'd be interested in something for housewives

What do housewives need Chinese for apart from shopping, traveling, going out and obviously the handsome handyman? (I guess this one is going to get down votes...)

[Silent]

I just saw you are beaten.... by about 10 years: http://en.people.cn/200502/22/eng20050222_174296.html