The 2017 Aims and Objectives Progress Topic

[DrWatson]

17 hours ago, Shelley said:

So do I, I have read the complete collection in the last few years and thought that when I was ready for some thing challenging I might try reading it in Chinese.

 

I am sorry to have mistaken you for a newcomer, welcome back. it was just odd timing but his name was actually Dr.Watson.

 

No worries! Again very sorry for your loss, time is such a puzzle at the end of the day. I hope overtime that your healing process goes smoothly.

 

Myself, I really like police stories, whether Sherlock Holmes or even modern beat cop stories. I really enjoyed the BBC's modern adaptation of Sherlock Holmes, and I also enjoy that Chinese reader adaptation--perhaps my Chinese level is too low, but it is allows me to enjoy the story while learning additional vocab. I also really enjoy recent Japanese police dramas too, but my Japanese is much better than my Chinese comprehension skills which I suspect is the reason. As such I'm also on the lookout for a good Chinese police series! If you ever find any please share the name!

[Shelley]

Well as I said earlier I have had an up and down time with my studies for reasons I mentioned in my earlier posts. Thanks to everyone for their kind words and comfort, I am doing well now and dealing with the suicide of my friend as well as can be expected.

 

I tried to get back to my studies, but found it hard going, not the study so much but the seeing, I was struggling with the size of the characters in the text book and had resorted to enlarging it using the photocopier. I then went for my usual eye test and was told my cataracts have now got so bad I will have to have them done in the New Year and indeed I have the first appointment to see the specialist in January with the actual op being done on one eye first then a 6-8 week break and then do the other eye. I am both nervous and excited about it. Having to have had to wear glasses from the age of 8, it will be life changing. I will need reading glasses but at least I will be able to see.

 

So when the op is actually done I will probably be out of action reading wise for a while (2-3 months), but I have come up with a plan, while I can still see I am going to organise lots of listening/speaking material. This might actually be a blessing in disguise to encourage my speaking and listening practise.

 

I hadn't realised how I had been putting off hitting the books because of this, it sort of crept up on me.

I will continue to do what I can but hope to hit the ground running after my eyes are done.

 

 

 

[abcdefg]

Best wishes, Shelley. Hope all goes well. 

[Shelley]

Thank you @abcdefg, as I say I am sort of looking forward to it, mixed feelings of nerves and the end result which will be a minor miracle

[Geiko]

@Shelley, both my parents underwent cataract surgery a couple of years ago and they were really satisfied with the results*. Like you, they had had to wear glasses for a long time, and the operation was a little miracle indeed. 

I don't know the type of surgery they underwent, but if I remember correcty their eyes were ok one or two weeks after the operation, so hopefully you won't need to be three months without reading?

Anyway, practicing listening and speaking skills in the meantime is also a great idea, 加油！

*The surgeon recorded all the operation and my parents were super happy to be able to buy the DVD with all the process

 

[Shelley]

Oh wow, a DVD of your op, not sure that would be top choice for me.

 

The time scale was because here in the UK they do one eye then leave a gap of 6-8 weeks to do the second to make sure every thing goes ok before doing the second one. So from start to finish it could be 12 weeks until your back up to full vision,  then you have to have another eye test to determine what reading glasses I will need.

In between the first and the second eye being done I will have to wear my glasses with one lens removed and no reading lens for the corrected eye yet. So I am not sure what I will be able to do and I don't think I will be able to drive.

 

I will know more and the answers hopefully to all my questions after seeing the specialist on the 22nd of January. I will post any relevant info.

 

Thanks for the encouragement@Geiko

[Jimmoo]

I m a 16years old chinese guy,with both parents chinese, i m here because i never learned chinese and that makes me a little sad sometimes,i cant talk with my family and expecially with my counsins that i love so much,some years ago i could only speak few words now i can say the basic of the basic but this year i want to make a change i want to learn to talk and have a normal conversation,i want to be able to read a bit and expecially i just want to get more closer to the chinese world that i have always been far away,i want to learn the language and one day live in china,it s hard too much,i have to do it almost alone,my parents arent usefull in this situation,sometime i feel like i will never learn it and get a little sad then i listen to some chinese music and it just motivate me  you guys dont know how much i was happy when i found this forum ahah

[Flickserve]

11 hours ago, Jimmoo said:

16years old chinese guy,with both parents chinese, i m here because i never learned chinese and that makes me a little sad sometimes

 

Learning at 16 is better than learning at 26 or 36 or 46.... Plenty of people are in the same position as you. Your parents may not be language teachers but they are a good resource for checking pronunciation. 

[Shelley]

Welcome @Jimmoo, glad you found the forum.

 

As @Flickserve says starting at 16 is better than later.

 

Do you have any plans for study? Are you going to take classes or self study?

 

 

[Flickserve]

11 hours ago, Jimmoo said:

i just want to get more closer to the chinese world that i have always been far away,i want to learn the language and one day live in china,it s hard too much,i have to do it almost alone,my parents arent usefull in this situation,

 

You know, I am quite jealous of your opportunities. If you are serious and have a sense of independence, this is what I advise you to do. Find a Chinese language school in China and plan to go there in the summer. I would suggest having a mix of private and group classes. Also try to find some activity classes that you have an interest in such as martial arts, a sport, drawing, musical instrument. Basically something you can learn where Chinese is used and join in just for fun. Ask your parents to subsidise the whole thing telling them you want to learn Chinese. 

 

In the meantime, keep watching videos, learning songs, learn pinyin, some common phrases and learn two or three hundred of the most common characters to prepare you for China. Then you are set! 

[DavyJonesLocker]

18 minutes ago, Flickserve said:

Find a Chinese language school in China and plan to go there in the summer.

 

 

that is a good idea. There are a few in Beijing that cater for young students in summer camps. They seem to have a really good time and the school take care of them.

[imron]

3 hours ago, Flickserve said:

Learning at 16 is better than learning at 26 or 36 or 46

I didn't start learning Chinese until I was 25, so if you start now you'll have at least a 9 year head start on me from when I began.

[Jimmoo]

3 hours ago, Shelley said:

Do you have any plans for study? Are you going to take classes or self study?

yes i attend a full chinese course with everyone chinese,but this dont really help me because they all are able to speak so they only focus to read and learn more characters, most of the time i m not even listening at it mostly because i m studying on my own words,or basic characters( i m behind them, i can only read 40 characters so i m studying the most used)and with the other guys indeed we talk in italian(my native language cause we both know that i cant make a phrase and if they talk chinese i wont really understand) maybe yea i should tell them to speak only chinese,i m even thinking of leaving the school as it s not helping me, or maybe i am the one wrong,what do you guys think i should do?

21 minutes ago, imron said:

I didn't start learning Chinese until I was 25, so if you start now you'll have at least a 9 year head start on me from when I began

Actually i m planning to move there when i will be like 19years old so in these 2-3 years i want to be able to speak it fluently,i dont want to go there and tell everybody that i m chinese and cant speak and my entire story is so ridiculous,and i m a little afraid that people will start to look me weird for thisy

3 hours ago, Flickserve said:

You know, I am quite jealous of your opportunities. If you are serious and have a sense of independence, this is what I advise you to do. Find a Chinese language school in China and plan to go there in the summer. I would suggest having a mix of private and group classes. Also try to find some activity classes that you have an interest in such as martial arts, a sport, drawing, musical instrument. Basically something you can learn where Chinese is used and join in just for fun. Ask your parents to subsidise the whole thing telling them you want to learn Chinese

This is seriosly a great idea that i have never thought about 

3 hours ago, Flickserve said:

 

[imron]

10 hours ago, Jimmoo said:

i dont want to go there and tell everybody that i m chinese and cant speak and my entire story is so ridiculous

It's not really that ridiculous if you think about it.  You grew up in an Italian speaking environment.  You speak Italian.  That's the normal situation.  Language is not passed on by blood or birth, it's passed on by usage.  If you didn't use Chinese you wouldn't learn it.  You might *regret* that your parents didn't speak it much to you and you didn't speak it much to them, but that's not a ridiculous thing and in fact it is very common among children of Chinese immigrants.

 

Even if you speak fluent Chinese in 3 years, people are still going to look at you weirdly when you get to China.  There will be many cultural things that you aren't used to or aware of because you grew up in a completely different culture.  Imagine for example someone who grew up in the US and moved to England when they were 19.  Even though they speak more or less the same language there are enough cultural differences that the person from the US will still stick out like a sore thumb and make occasional (or regular) cultural faux-pas.

 

That'll be you when you get to China, but again it's not ridiculous it's the normal situation because you grew up with different cultural norms.

 

 

[Flickserve]

14 hours ago, Jimmoo said:

i can only read 40 characters so i m studying the most used)

 

Good. You have made progress. For this class it's a different level so study at your own pace and don't worry about others.

 

You can always ask them how to say simple phrases in Chinese or the names of Chinese singers. Then start to recognise the Chinese names of the singers.

 

14 hours ago, Jimmoo said:

nd if they talk chinese i wont really understand) maybe yea i should tell them to speak only chinese,i m even thinking of leaving the school as it s not helping me, or maybe i am the one wrong,what do you guys think i should do?

 

It has helped. You learnt 40 words and still learning more.

 

some other things you do besides learning simple phrases is to photograph the Chinese menu of your local Chinese restaurant and start to learn how to order the common foods.

 

Take photos of the food that you like show the picture to friends and teachers and ask them how to say it. 

 

Once you learn how to say the dishes and recognise the characters from the menu, then try to order a couple of dishes with your friends around and then later on your own. That's very useful and practical stuff to learn. 

[艾墨本]

On 12/29/2016 at 7:38 PM, 艾墨本 said:

I really want to do some of everything this next year, but I need to trim down my goals into something manageable and achievable. 

 

Primary Goals:

1) Begin a year of Chinese study at a university (preferably on the CIS or CSC scholarship).

2) Finish at least 4 books or 1000 pages before starting my semester at a Chinese university (i.e. 活着，兄弟，三体，欢乐颂，雅舍小品). I need to find a book that progressively nicely in difficulty from 活着 but is about modern times so that I can learn more presently useful vocabulary. 

3) Continue Anki studies every day, but adjust quantity to match present circumstances.

 

Secondary Goals:

4) Correct pronunciation so that it no longer impedes communication

5) Introduce most all of HSK 4 grammar to active grammar and begin moving HSK 5 grammar into active use. This means practicing creating sentences with grammar.

6) Create a daily habit of reading news in Chinese and watching CCTV.

 

I did not include any speaking goals since I've found just living in China enough to develop my speaking ability. I will need to focus on speaking in the future in order to develop a more native, professional, and clear tone. For now, I am just happy to be understood.

 

I will give myself until January 31 to modify, add, or remove goals. On (or near) January 31st I will create a more quantitative plan for February.

 

On 4/7/2017 at 10:08 AM, 艾墨本 said:

 

Overall, this year is progressing nicely. There are a lot of things I want to do but haven't. However, the things I am doing are my primary goals, and for that I'm happy.

1) I have applied to Beijing Normal with a CI scholarship. If all goes well I will here back from them in the coming weeks. 

2) I have already finished one book (许三观卖血记) and I'm working through my second book (活着) and have lined up two more books for after that (圈子圈套，从出生到六岁宝宝能力训练与早期教育). So far my page count is at about 300. Finishing all four books will put me at 800-900 pages. 

3) I've been good at doing Anki and have brought around 300-400 words to "mature." Overall, I've studied 2/3 day, but this is more so due to a month that I was traveling and not doing Anki and less due to daily failures. 

 

4) Progress on pronunciation is slow as always. I've been working on my "ng"s recently. The wiki on Chinese phonology has been very helpful. I am very rarely not understood due to pronunciation, but it still does happen. The bigger problem is when I jumble up a grammar pattern or forget to use a word. But the latter is a problem when I speak English as well. I'll get so excited about what I'm saying and starting thinking faster than I speak and words don't make it from thought to sound. I can't help but laugh when it happens.

5)I haven't put any amount of effort into this. It does seem to be happening naturally, but I really should spend more time in my HSK grammar book. I did one lesson from it and found it quite helpful.

6) Yeah, this just isn't happening. I blame the current US political climate for this one. My hour of news time per day is done in English out of necessity. Too much to cover and not enough time.

 

I have been watching more Jackie Chan Adventures in Chinese on iQiYi which come in nice 18-minute episodes. Great for meal time.. I also watched Moana in Chinese and was happy to find I understood nearly all of it. I was also quite impressed with the dubbed voice acting, props to Disney for that. 

 

Looking back at this year:

1) [Completed] I am currently wrapping up my first semester at ECNU.

2) [partial] I read all of 活着 and 许三观卖血记. I never finished 圈子圈套 before the semester started and it still sits on my shelf at about page 100. BUT, since starting the semester I have read four full academic books and roughly 100-200 pages of academic journals in Chinese.

3) [completed] I maintained an Anki habit through the first few weeks of my semester, spare a couple months while I was traveling. Overall, I moved 1000 words (give or take) to the "mature" category. I have since moved over to Pleco notecards since it's quicker to make the cards and I can frequently change the study style to fit my situation. I haven't been emphasizing notecards as much since I am getting natural repetition of vocabulary through my coursework.

 

4) [completed] My pronunciation rarely, if ever, impacts whether or not people understand what I am saying. However, I still make plenty of errors that I have grown painfully aware of. They mostly exist in connected speech. Fixing this is for 2018.

5) [completed] I am finding I can use a lot of HSK 5 grammar in my writing for coursework. I want to go back to HSK 1 grammar and work through it all from the beginning, again, with the goal of learning how to teach it all. I imaging it will also be great review. This is for 2018

6) [partial]  Reading it hasn't been a daily habit, but I do semi-frequently read articles in Chinese now.

 

It's been a good year as far as my Chinese studies go.

[Lu]

On 28/12/2016 at 6:52 PM, Lu said:

I'm planning to continue on my current path: read Chinese, find the next book to translate, talk Chinese with people etc.

 

In addition, my Big Project for 2017 is to read all the translated Chinese literature I already own. I have over the years collected over a meter of translations, in both English and Dutch, from short stories to full novels to ancient classics, and much of it I've never read. I want to read it all to get a better grip on Chinese literature in general, and reading translations is a lot faster than reading the orginal. (I also intend to continue to read Chinese in Chinese.)

I did translate another book, and also two short stories. I talked to Chinese people. So, success there.

 

As to my Big Reading in Translation Project, I read

- 11 issues of Het Trage Vuur

- 5 issues of Pathlight

- Two or three other collections of short stories

- Some five novels (Han Shaogong's A Dictionary of Maqiao; The Carnal Prayer Mat; about a quarter of the Jin Ping Mei; several Zhang Jie books)

Some of it I didn't like, some of it I loved, most of it was worthwhile. I discovered several great authors. And I inspired at least three people in the What are you reading thread, which I didn't expect but is a lovely bonus.

I'm really enjoying all this reading, and as I didn't finish all the translated literature I own (and acquired a bit more during the year), I'm extending the project indefinitely.

[grawrt]

On 12/29/2016 at 2:41 PM, grawrt said:

I'm always so awful at keeping up with these things. But here goes anyway

 

 

 

 

1) Read 1 book per month.

 

 

2) Speak more. Same as wurstmann.. living in china but don't really speak Chinese xD

 

 

3) Pass HSK6. Mock exam once a week but practice on writing skills throughout the week, Either using the passage I read as a template for summarizing and writing out the essay or my class text or the actual mock exams. 

 

 

 

 

 

That's it. If I can work on these three areas I should be happy. 

 

 

Okay its almost the end of the year. Lets see how I did:

 

1) I read a total of 5 books in Chinese and about 3 English books (from what I can remember), so the total is 8,  I have about 2 Chinese books that I'm partly through (one of them nearly done, save for about 50 pages, the other a bit more) and one english book, on Chinese Characteristics that I started but couldn't finish.  I really wish I had more time to read more, I found myself slipping behind even in my class readings. I hope for the new year I can find more time reading in leisure and less on watching tv hahaha. 

 

2) Speak more, Ummmmm I think I would like to do better for the new year. I'll be honest, some days I'd get out of class so tired I just didn't want anything to do with Chinese. I think for the New Year I'd like to put more effort into practicing even if it means less time doing homework hahaha.

 

3) Pass HSK 6. Nope. I failed in the Summer by 4 points. I'm planning to retake the exam for the New Year. Hopefully can pass it haha. It's a bit embarrassing. 

 

Even though I didn't complete any goal *haha* I still feel proud of myself. I found time to continue reading even though I didn't get to finish as many books, I still tried to read more, and whats more important, I wanted to read more in Chinese and I did (more Chinese books read than English). So I think thats something to be proud of.  

[大块头]

Quote

My main goals this year are to: (1) improve my listening ability, (2) increase my reading speed, and (3) maintain my speaking and writing ability.

 

To achieve these goals I will do the following:

 

Listening

I intend to spend at least 4 hours a week passively listening to Chinese podcasts/radio or watching Chinese movies/television. Last year I used a stopwatch to measure the percentage of each podcast/show that I understood, but I found that there was too much variance in my performance to see any statistically significant improvement. This year I will just listen to as much as I can and keep track of the total duration.

 

Reading

I intend to spend at least 30 minutes every day reading Chinese. I saw a significant increase in my reading speed last year with only an average of 7 minutes of daily practice.

 

Speaking

I intend to spend 30 minutes every week speaking Chinese with a language exchange partner.

 

Writing

I intend to write at least 3 journal entries (length ≥ 50 characters) a week on Lang-8.

 

Passive Vocabulary

I intend to clear my Anki queue every day.

 

In 2017 I found it difficult to juggle all my PhD program commitments with my Chinese study. I failed to meet many of my Chinese study goals, but I still made good progress.

 

Listening - met goal

I spent an average of 6.7 hours a week passively listening to Chinese podcasts/radio or watching Chinese movies/television, which exceeded my goal of 4 hours/week. I've found some good Chinese podcasts and have gotten into the habit of listening whenever I'm walking to work or doing chores around the house.

 

Reading - didn't meet goal, but still did well

I spent an average of 20.9 minutes/day reading Chinese, which was less than my goal of 30 minutes/day. I still improved my reading speed, however.

 

In 2017 I started and finished the 2nd and 3rd 三体 books, during which my reading speed increased approximately 16% from 79 characters/minute to 92 characters/minute.

 

Speaking - didn't meet goal

I practiced with several language exchange partners over the year, but it was difficult to coordinate my schedule with them.

 

Writing - didn't meet goal

I didn't write as much as I wanted to on Lang-8.

 

Passive Vocabulary - didn't met goal, but still did well

I didn't clear my Anki queue every day, but I've managed to stay on top of it for the most part.