Advice needed...I'm really discouraged with my progress

[cambriasinica]

Hi everyone--apologies in advance if this sort of post is frowned upon. But, I'm seeking both an outlet to express my frustration and seeking some advice from other people who are (on paper) at the "advanced" level. I'm going to admit to some very embarrassing things here...

I've been studying it for around 14 years (ok, off and on, but still regularly, and often intensively). I've studied at IUP for a summer. I have an MA in Chinese. I've lived in China and visited many times. 

I cannot get through a single newspaper article without extensive use of a dictionary. I cannot have a conversation of any substance without resorting to English for the meaningful parts. This morning I realized I couldn't even say "wash the dishes." I have conversation partners, and while in text I come across as very proficient, any spoken conversation quickly, quickly devolves. It's halting and riddled with errors. My listening is almost as bad. I can't follow most conversations, even if I technically know all the words. I can read passages of text, such as in novels, and I'll know every word in a given sentence but will not for the life of me be able to make the sentence make sense, let alone fit it into the flow of the rest of the article or page. But even worse, I'll frequently come across articles that are beyond my comprehension no matter what I do. It's almost like it's not even the same language. And I've studied Classical. 

I've subscribed to Popup Chinese (泡泡中文) but the advanced podcasts are insanely hard, while the intermediate are a bit too easy. 

I'm kind of at the end of my rope. I'm pushing 40, work full time, and am terrified that I'm simply never going to get it. This has been pretty much my only consistent life goal. No matter how many times I swear it off out of exasperation, I always come back to it. 

I think one of the catalysts for this post was when the other day one of my language partners went on about these Harvard exchange students and their Chinese proficiency. They'd only been studying for a few years but were, she said, almost fluent. And then there's me. 14 years in. 

ANY advice would be appreciated. I'm wondering if I'm just too old, and too obligated to work. It may be too late. Anyone ever break through? If you can't do it in 14 years, is it just time to lay it to rest?

[imron]

3 hours ago, cambriasinica said:

I cannot get through a single newspaper article without extensive use of a dictionary

If you want to be able to read newspapers then you need to start reading newspapers.  It will be hard at first, but it will get easier with regular and consistent practice (i.e. if you do it every day).

 

Likewise if you want to be able to do those other things you mention, then you need to start spending time doing those things.

 

See here.  And also here.

 

Train what you want to learn.  I don't know how much time a day you spend studying, and what you spend your study time doing, but if the bulk of your study time is not spent actually doing (or trying to do) the things you want to get good at, then don't be surprised if you are not getting good at those things.

[Angelina]

well said 

[Flickserve]

A) are you in China now?

 

B) when you lived in China, were you doing task based activities that use Chinese or just 'learning' Chinese?

 

C) working full time in English Is a distraction for second language skills. 

 

D) I would take 'almost fluent' with some lattitude.

 

E) learning something is one thing, using it is another.

 

 

As for my own history, I learnt Cantonese by living in HK. Couldn't understand any spoken Cantonese at work. After three months had one to one tutorials, a textbook and constant daily reinforcement.  It was tricky as Cantonese and written Chinese have their differences. I felt the most progress is achieved through task based activities using the language and constant reinforcement. I had once had a wonderful experience of being picked upon by the police. Using a mixture of English and Chinese in a stressful situation like that sharpened the mind considerably. I also had to teach and give some public lectures using Cantonese. Those really sharpen your expression in Chinese. I took a sports course in Cantonese, had to translate the book for the exam, demonstrate teaching for the exam and that pushed up my sports expressions. In that time, improving Cantonese was only a secondary by product (except for the ten lessons at the beginning). And it has been fairly successful. But when I am away from my environment for over a week, my level drops off rapidly. For those technical terms with English used for harder words, I really have to concentrate hard on drilling the Chinese equivalent. 

 

Now I try Mandarin but it is hard, not being immersive (that means lack of frequency), full time job and other distractions, L1 and L2 interference. Just tutors talking over Skype explaining Mandarin rather using it as a means for a task is taxing. Just reading characters is taxing. I do lose motivation and am on a down phase which seems to have hit the troughs 

 

I did go to Guangzhou earlier in the year. For that trip, I also met one of my online tutors who followed me around the day for a few hours. Whilst I was doing my activities, we chatted, discussed vocabulary plus sentences and she took notes on what I didn't know. Later, she wrote out the sentences and did recordings for me which I listened to again and again and again! Although the revising was hard, I felt with the real life situational experience, there was more relevance. Basically, the tutor acted like a personal assistant. I felt that worked quite well as a one off expense and experimentation.

 

So, I have two Chinese dialects. Very different results. I don't think you are too old. Many people study or take up hobbies at the age of forty. However, Chinese or maybe languages in general, can feel overwhelming. 

[Flickserve]

4 hours ago, cambriasinica said:

This morning I realized I couldn't even say "wash the dishes.

 

That's because you hardly ever use the sentence or get ordered to do it in Chinese.

[Angelina]

Why are you interested in Chinese? 

To talk to people? Culture? 

 

In the end of the day, you don't have to speak Chinese. I know it is often said how there is future and so on, but no one knows what the future holds. 

 

If it is to keep up with what is happening in intellectual circles in general, there is so much else you can do.

Is your current job related to Chinese? 

If you are making money out of your Chinese skills, you might want to think about it. Otherwise, no one is following you around, trying to check if your spoken Chinese is good enough. 

 

Have you tried Cantonese? Korean? You might discover that you like Cantonese-language cinema. Follow your passion. 

[Lu]

The thing with newspapers is that they by definition use words that are important but that you never encountered before. This makes them difficult. For a while it was part of my job to read several newspapers every day, and I found that what worked best was to first skim the English news (China Daily and such) and then move on to the Chinese news. I'd be able to match the unknown Chinese words (military equipment, obscure islands, names of government types, diseases, etc) to the English news words I had encountered already and it made reading much easier. After a few weeks of diligent reading, I got notably better at it.

 

I've studied and learned and used Chinese for some seventeen years now and I still have plenty of gaps in the language. I also can't make conversation as intelligently as I can in English or Dutch. However, I do notice that when I get the opportunity to regularly try (by, for example, talking with intelligent Chinese-speaking people several times a week) I quickly get better at it.

 

In short, I agree with Imron: practice what you want (or need) to master. Things you don't practice will remain gaps. If you don't have a Chinese speaker in your household, your kitchen Chinese will never be fluent (but that's ok).

[LiMo]

I wouldn't be so disheartened. I had a recent problem like this with speaking. After not really doing it for two years I realised how abysmal it was and I'm still struggling to build it back up (it was never great but it's been better) with a recently acquired language partner. I feel your pain.

[happy_hyaena]

Could you give an explanation or list of what you do actually are doing, on a daily or weekly basis? Have you set up any type of goals? It's hard to know what you're doing wrong without knowing your routine.

 

For example, I have the following goals/plan:

 

Very long term goal: do the HSK 6 in about 2 years.

 

Current short term goal: work through the HSK 6 standard course textbook (上,下) before February. I'm basically only using it to collect HSK 6 vocab.

 

Weekly: do about two chapters/lessons in the aforementioned book, enough to make sure that I get about 105 new vocab a week.

 

Daily: Do 15 new words a day in Pleco. 7*15=105. So long as I stick to this I know I will accomplish my weekly and short term goals.

 

 

I also do other things, like reading a book on my commute, consuming media, chatting to friends, and going to a language cafe. (But whatever vocab I encounter there is not added to my flaschard deck.)

[Mati1]

I don't know about Popup Chinese, but have you tried Chinesepod? They have more levels than just intermediate and advanced.

Don't overthink it, just enjoy learning the language!

[DavyJonesLocker]

I wouldn't worry about it . It's not a competition. I don't pay the slightest bit of attention to how fast someone can learn a language.  I do it for my own interests and enjoyment. I can study hard for months at a time and other times (months) not look at a single sentence .

 

 

 

 

[Tomsima]

On 2017/6/26 at 7:04 AM, cambriasinica said:

the other day one of my language partners went on about these Harvard exchange students and their Chinese proficiency. They'd only been studying for a few years but were, she said, almost fluent. And then there's me. 14 years in. 

 

Can I just say how cathartic it was to read this sentence. The sheer amount of times I have been knocked down by this kind of one up is honestly countless. I can still hear one in particular ringing in my head to this day: "your Chinese is good. But have you heard (insert name)s Chinese? It's like hes actually Chinese! And he's only studied seven months! His tones are perfect! When I listen to him use Chinese I feel comfortable, not like you. I don't like you speaking Chinese, you should just speak english."

 

But it made me angry to prove them wrong. And so off I went to study. A year later I bumped into some of their crowd again, and the response was "wow, youre Chinese is so good, the best I've ever heard! Seriously! Amazing! But have you heard some of the university students here, they speak fangyan and it's like they're locals. I heard even the first years are totally fluent!"

 

And then I realised it's all just completely blown up rumours about some guy who knew some guy who was knighted by dashan and passed hsk 6 in half an hour 倒著寫. You have studied for 14 years, you are better than you were 14 years ago, and it appears you have enjoyed the process of studying for as many years. We all know 學海無涯, and the fact that it's like that is great - you can enjoy studying forever. Age is also not as important as people younger than you (us) want you to think. Seeming effortless and being called a genius feels good, but knowing your modern 也 from your classical 也 feels so much better. I honestly bet you are so much better than you think.

[gwr71]

Dear Tomsima,

I started mandarin in earnest this year at the tender age of 45 now 46 in August.  Do not look at your age as a factor.  As for a foreign language.  I studies spanish in high school and failed miserably.  I have been learning it off and on for over 30 years.  I have visited Cuba, Puerto Rico, Venezuela and Panama and always regretted not fulfilling my potential with it.  But I still will retry spanish next year.  My wife spent 11 years in Cuba and is a specialist doctor and speaks it like a pro of course.  That does not discourage me.  I will learn on my own and on my own pace.  

 

Keep learning Mandarin. There are knowledgeable people in this forum.   Listen to them and above all you need to find confidence in yourself and in your ability.  It is harder for me to adjust to Mandarin at my age but I watch mandarin movies on the weekends and I have found that in between the lines I can recognize some phrases  etc.. This is encouraging to me.  I keep saying that in one year from now I will be able to understand mandarin better.  I am not giving up and so should you.

 

[snowflake]

I'm in my late 50's and started studying about 9 years ago.  I think of it in terms of what can be done now compared to say the beginning, 3 years ago, 5 years ago, etc.  I live in the US and function primarily in English so my Mandarin will never be great, but it still enables me to do things that weren't possible before. 

[DavyJonesLocker]

On 10/11/2017 at 1:23 AM, Tomsima said:

And then I realised it's all just completely blown up rumours about some guy who knew some guy who was knighted by dashan and passed hsk 6 in half an hour

 

 

Indeed I hear this type of thing a lot. Everyone seems to know "of" someone who is exceptional in Chinese but never actually meet them. Internet forums have a tendency to exaggerate a lot of claims of fluency. This in not just related to Chinese of course. It's a natural human tendency. 

 

For example take Mark Zuckerberg. He seems to be universally hailed as a Mandarin gyru, if one were to follow the media reports. However, the reality is his Chinese is still  basic . When he speaks it's  full of mispronouncation, incorrect tones and very non native like.

That is not to deride the chap by any means. He running one of the world's largest company's and still makes time to learn Chinese!

 

 

 

[Flickserve]

On 10/11/2017 at 1:23 AM, Tomsima said:

But it made me angry to prove them wrong. And so off I went to study. A year later I bumped into some of their crowd again, and the response was "wow, youre Chinese is so good, the best I've ever heard! Seriously! Amazing! But have you heard some of the university students here, they speak fangyan and it's like they're locals. I heard even the first years are totally fluent!"

 

Circular rumours right? With the story going around and a bit of misinformation, you later realise these totally fluent sounding people they talk about in fact refers to yourself.

[happy_hyaena]

Guys and gals who've been studying Chinese since pre-Pleco time, does it piss you off that us newer students of Chinese never have to go through that struggle? Don't you find it just a little bit annoying?

 

Or maybe there was something about the process of having to spend time looking up the word that helped you in learning it?

[Luxi]

3 hours ago, happy_hyaena said:

Don't you find it just a little bit annoying?

 

Far from it! 

I'm convinced that I started studying Chinese just at the right time. Of course I appreciate Pleco and the plethora of amazing digital resources available now, but having started studying in the 80s, even before GB and Big5 became widespread outside academia and computers cheap enough to bring home, gives me a lot of advantages. I must have searched characters (by radical/stroke number) zillions of times in scores of dictionaries, and my mind boggles to think how many  square miles of paper I used hand writing characters to memorise them. Makes you cherish what you can remember, even if not enough for much.

It wasn't only the searching and writing that helped, but the attention placed into the process, thinking of the components, coming up with tricks and ways to remember those characters and speaking them aloud time and again. Yes, very hard work but also, for me, a very enjoyable, relaxing activity. 

 

It was also a good time to connect with China and follow the opening up and modernisation process. An absolute wonder.

[imron]

6 hours ago, happy_hyaena said:

does it piss you off that us newer students of Chinese never have to go through that struggle?

Nope, and as much as I love Pleco, I still think I got the better end of the deal.

[Tomsima]

I wonder the reverse - some students are so heavily reliant on srs they will perhaps never know the fun in making real paper flashcards with stupid drawings and mnemonics, self-invented phonetic transcription systems scrawled in the corners and then stacking them in a big pile and seeing if they are taller than your body height yet