Phonetics&radical based approach to learn characters and words

[Pall]

I was advised to clearly show what was included finally in the method I was talking about. In fact, over the past year since I started working in this direction, my approach has changed to a large extent. Even its title has to be revised. However, some basics remain the same. And I'm going to edit my posts according to the alterations that I have to do as the method is developed and improved so that readers could see more up-to-date version.

 

What was the reason making me learn characters ahead? When characters are learnt as components of words traditionally,  memorising 3,000-4,000 characters takes 4-6 years, as I guess. Characters are the main handicap in advancing in Chinese as quickly as it's possible in the majority of alphabet languages. At the same time, one has to know those 3,000-4,000 characters (or 10,000 words, as Imron mentioned) that he can read books and especially newspapers. And this is my goal, too.

 

There are two main problems in learning characters apart from words in advance. First, it's difficult because there is no context. Second, while one is learning characters, he does not advance in the language as to words, word use and grammar. I can say that the first problem is solved now. I'm approaching the meridian in learning 4,500 characters set that I took as the 'must'  language base. It would take me less time if I didn't have to develop the system. I think, it would be not more than 5-6 months under normal conditions. Although in my particular case it was as that: in September 2019 I new about 300 characters (250 words). The second problem is partly solved due to introduction of special semi-anchor writing.

 

However, it's not the main measure to judge about the efficiency of the approach. The most important question remains to be answered: to what extent does that accelerate learning the language as a whole? Well, it can be proved only if I manage to pass official exam for some advanced grade in reasonable time span. 

 

 

Now what the approach is in details. It was right desision to group characters according to their phonetics, since there are only 400 syllables without accounting for tones. Also, it helps to learn phonetics as well. Although, I did a mistake at the beginning. Characters are very diverse, and only one basis for their groupping is not enough whether it is phonetics, character structure, origin, or whatever else. There should be two contrasting bases itersecting each other. So, I came eventually to intersection of phonetics and radicals. 

 

I should probably present the process in stages as I see it now to be more concise. 

 

First stage. Phonetics (pinyin, pronunciation) and HSK1 (words and grammar, not only characters) are learnt as an elementary basis.

 

Second stage. For each syllable without accounting for tone a character is selected as a representative of the whole syllable, about 400 'anchore' characters. All other characters are to be learnt by using these characters as the key stone. To learn anchore characters I composed seven mnemo-poems according to 声母  vs    韵母 correspondence. So there are B-P-M-F, D-T-N-L, Z-C-S, ZH-CH-SH-R, J-Q-X-Y, syllables written with 'y' at the beginning not having any  声母  , but they're represented by the same  韵母   as those with J, Q or X in the beginning, G-K-H poems and one poem for all remaining syllables without  声母  . In the poems (short verses in fact, not poems) in each line the meaning of all syllables of the same   韵母  are used while  声母  go one after another by lines. For example, in the B-P-M-F poem the meaning of the 拔， 怕，马， 法  characters is used in the first line,      白,  拍 , 卖   in the second ,  班 , 盘 , 慢 , 饭  in the third, etc. They represent syllables ba, pa, ma, fa (bá, pà,  mǎ, fǎ) ,  bai, pai, mai (bái, pāi, mài - syllable fai doesn't exist), ban, pan, man, fan (bān, pán, màn, fàn), correspondingly.  Initially I did another mistake: I took as anchore characters mainly most used ones, but many of them happened to have several variants of pinyin, whereas anchore characters could best serve as anchores only if their sounding didn't vary, or did a little. So I have to recompose all poems now, the first two are ready. Of course, one can learn those 400 anchore characters by other means, however they must be learnt very very confidently, otherwise they woun't serve as anchors. Poems are written in poetry metric, if possible, with rhyme for certain lines, stanzas are of certain length. All that helps to remember them very well and to find quickly each meaning of anchore characters and recollect their pinyin. For that poems are accompanied by tables, where used anchore characters are put in ceratin cells according to their syllable and tone.

 

Characters have a number of meanings sometimes, but for these purposes only one, two as maximum, are selected to indentify the character, it also enables to memorise it better. However learning the meaning of characters is not only for their identification, it'll be helpful in learning words, too.

 

Third stage. The set of 4,500 characters is subdivided in the following parts: 1st - the most frequent radical characters of 'hand on the left', 'tree', 'water on the left' ,  'mouth' (only the mouse is not crossed by other strokes), 'man on the left' and 'grass' (some 1,100 characters alltogether); 2nd -  characters of 9 not so frequent radicals, each represented by 70-150 characters (about 700), 3rd - characters of 27 not so rare radicals, represented by 30-70 characters each (totally more than 1,100), 4th -  ones of the most rare 140 radicals (totally about 1,200-1,300), 5th - unique characters and those with not very distinct radicals (only 150). If one doesn't want to learn all 4,500 characters ahead, I advise to learn the 4th and the 5th parts apart from words al least, while learning characters of the other parts can be executed by another way, see below posts. It took me not more than four months to memorise about 2,000 characters in fact (although I spent more time totally due to the necessety to develop the method), the 4th and 5th parts plus 'anchor' characters. The whole set of 4,500 characters can be learnt in 9-12 months for sure. However, I understand, that such a long preliminary stage can make the learner nervouse since he doesn't advance in other language aspects during this period. Then he should learn only the 4th and the 5th parts of the character set ahead of learning words. Also there is an option not to learn characters ahead at all, because there is a way to learn quickly HSK (1-6) word list, see below.

 

Now how characters can be learnt apart from words if one still wants to do that. An Excel tabel is kept for all characters, where they are distributed according to syllables. It's inportant, that characters relating to the same tone-syllable are spread in space 3X3, making 'macrocharacter'. It helps to remember the characters better and to keep in mind their position in the macrocharacter, which will be needed for the next stage. There can be only seven characters in one 'macrocharacter', the seventh character becomes the first one in the next macrocharacter for the same tone-syllable. The position of characters in the macrocharacter has numbers from 1 to 7, pic. The first character, the 7th, 13th (not 14th, since the 7th one is the 1st for the next macrocharacter), 19th characters are called 'head' characters. It's desirable that head characters are also of only one pinyin variant, though it's not so important. In the Table learnt characters are to be marked by the learner when they are set for learning in their turn,  in complience with the part of the set they represent.

 

The Excel table is an auxilliary tool, characters are learnt with character cards of special design. On the face of them the character is, on the reverse there is a table 3x3, in which the character is shown in its position in the macrocharacter, also the head character is present in the first place, and in addition in the bottom right corner in different color the anchore character is shown with the tone of the target character before it, pic. There is a space below the table, where a phrase linking the meaning of the three characters must be present. For the top fleshcard the phrase is 'our pheasant was strangled' (sorry), for the bottom one it is 'he let me weed in spite of the cloud', the target words 'strangled' and 'weed' are underlined. The succession of the meanings of the target, head and anchore characters don't matter actually. So the target character is remembered in relation to the anchore character and also (less important) head character. The anchore character with the tone of the target character before it serves instead of pinyin. I came to a conclusion that association between two characters works better than accociation between a character and Latin transcription. In the top card 雉 is the 13th character for the syllable zhì , so it's considered the head character for the given target character, whereas 至 is the anchore character. For that reason anchore character is not shown in the bottom right corner, and only two vertical orange lines on the left reflects that.

 

The cards are learnt as this (everyone has its own secrets, however I'd like to present my procedure). A pile of fleshcards, which is to be learnt currently, can include up to 60-70 cards. Several times a day characters on them are repeted. Those, which one was able to recognise at the very first repetition (was able to remember both how the character sounds and its meaning) are put to a special file. During next repetitions recognised cards are just put aside. By the evening usually only few cards remain that cannot be recognised. But on the next day all those cards are mixed up again, some new cards are added, and only those cards are considered as learnt that are recognised at the first repetition. The cards that were put to the file are revised once in several days. Those, which were recognised, are put to another file, cards in which are revised once in two-three weeks, and also there is a file to revise cards once in two-three months (I keep several files of each kind according to the part of the character set, otherwise the number of cards would be too big for quick revision at a time). Cards from any file, which were not remembered, are returned to the very beginning of the learning line. i.e. to the pile for today's stydy.

 

If a character has two or more variants of pinyin, it is present in all corresponding parts of the Excel table and cards, so the principal unit is character-syllable, not character itself.

 

 

[Pall]

I forgot to say that it is excitingly interesting to see which characters in outline have what meaning, and from which characters those or other words are composed. I think such interest enhances the memory's ability to remember material.

[Pall]

This post is deleted because semi-anchore view is no more considered as necessary component of the method.

[Pall]

So if one has learnt characters of the most rare 140 radicals, unique and those characters, which radicals are not detected very well, he has an opportunity to see any new text differently. If he sees a character that doesn't belong to those 42 radicals (it's not difficult to keep in mind, which those radicals are, because radicals like 'a man on the left', 'grass' , 'metal', etc. are easy to distinguish) and that he cannot recognise, this means that he has learnt it most likely. He just looks it up in the Table and, if it's found there, he'll never forget it. If not, it must be a very rare character, which to be either added to the Table or used only for one time to understand the text. As to characters of the 42 remaining radicals, they're easily determined and can be quickly looked up.

[Pall]

It's not a problem to learn a pile of a hundred fleshcards at the same time. The more cards are learnt the easier new are remembered. So it'll be not too difficult to learn not only the third part, series of characters of not very rare radicals (30-70 characters in each), but also the second part with series of not so frequent radiclas. With the exeption of 'man on the left' and 'grass' these series contain 70-110 characters each only. All that makes up about 2,000 characters. As a result in the end of character learning only 'man on the left', 'grass', 'hand on the left', 'tree' and 'water on the left' radical characters will represent some challenge, but it's not more than 900 characters of the 4,500 most used set. 

[大块头]

This mnemonic system you've devised is very unique, and I'm glad that you're sharing your experiences with it here.

 

Some thoughts:

• Your goal of constructing these cards for 4000+ characters is commendable, but I would prioritize getting started on the long and vital process of learning words and building your actual vocabulary.
• Consider migrating this system into an Anki deck. Electronic flashcards are easier to manage and aren't vulnerable to strong breezes.
• I don't think converting texts to "anchor" characters is the best use of your time. CSL students sometimes use pinyin reading materials too long because it's easier than reading characters. I'd recommend using your system to help you avoid such crutches and read Chinese in its unaltered original form (no spaces, no superscript numbers, "anchor" character substitutions, etc.).

[Pall]

On 9/13/2020 at 2:18 AM, 大块头 said:

• I would prioritize getting started on the long and vital process of learning words and building your actual vocabulary.
• Consider migrating this system into an Anki deck. Electronic flashcards are easier to manage and aren't vulnerable to strong breezes.
• I don't think converting texts to "anchor" characters is the best use of your time. CSL students sometimes use pinyin reading materials too long because it's easier than reading characters. I'd recommend using your system to help you avoid such crutches and read Chinese in its unaltered original form (no spaces, no superscript numbers, "anchor" character substitutions, etc.).

You're right, I should probably just learn the remaining 2,500-2,800 characters as quickly as possible or switch to learning words now that the most difficult characters to remember are learnt.

 

As to spaces I still believe that they are usuful for beginners like myself. Chinese write without spaces because they know where words begin and end, whereas beginners don't know. I understand that we should train ourselves to deal with real situations, but switching for text without spaces should  be postponed in order firstly to learn words and their use better.  

 

Also I don't want to change paper cards for electronic ones since the Anki algorithm doesn't meet my needs. I learn by big piles of cards, sorting through the cards one by one. I described my procedure above. Anki doesn't allow this. And I'd like to decide on the intervals between repetitions myself.

 

 

 

[Pall]

It can be helpful to concentrate on dealing with HSK materials firstly, up to HSK 6. The bulk of more used characters of the remaining series can be learnt earlier in words and in context then. 

[Pall]

I decided to focus on only HSK characters (up to HSK6)  in the remaining parts 3, 2 and 1.

 

 

[Pall]

I found a good basis to learn HSK (1-6) words in advance. It's groupping words by the radical of one of their characters, pic.

 

We take a radical character series, and characters of it are considered as 'supporting' ones, other characters in the words are memorized thanks to them to a large extent. Words are listed regardless the position of the supporting character in the word,  not only in the first position, but also the second and even third or fourth position is OK. Since the Part 3 characters are the easiest to learn because learning can be organised by character series, while those series are not too long, I started to group the HSK (1-6) words according to those. So far I've done this only for thirteen radiclas, and they cover as many as 1,400 HSK words. So, I expect that all 27 radicals of Part 3 will cover up to 2,500-3,000 HSK words. Then it'll be necessary to involve also radicals of the Parts 2 and 1, of course. But a large number of their characters will be used already in the words, listed on the basis of the Part 3 radicals, because a principle of priority of the radicals used earlier is employed.  So those long series will become considerably  shorter. It's important, because before words of a radical table section are to be learnt, it's necessary to memorize the supporting characters (only having that radical, not all charaters of the words, of course), otherwise they couldn't provide mental support in word learning. As a result, 41 radicals of the Parts 3, 2 and 1 seem to cover up to 90% of the HSK 5,000 words. (If I started with the radicals of the Part 1, then added 2 and 3, the number of radicals to cover 90% of the words would be less, but supporting character series would be too long, not convenient for learning supporting charaters). Colors in the table don't mean anything, they're just to seperate different supporting characters.

 

So even those, who haven't learnt the Parts 4 and 5 characters in advance, could benifit from the use of this table since they would have to learn preliminarily only around 700 HSK characters of the Part 3 and maybe some 500 charaters of Parts 2 and 1 to provide reliable basis to remember up to 90% of the 5,000 HSK words (or they could  select only certain level words, it's indicated on the left, hence the number of supporting characters would reduce).

 

As soon as I've finished regroupping words I'll upload the table. 

[Pall]

As I expected, 85% of the HSK 5,000 words can be attributed to the supporting characters, representing 42 radicals of the parts 3, 2 and 1. The total number of the supporting characters is 1410, but many of them create series of words, what enables their quickier memorization, since the listed words are learnt one after another and the same character repeats. Also there is a certain 'chain effect', for many characters, which become supporting ones in below sections of the list, firstly appear in its upper sections as other characters in the words that a learnt, basing on another supporting characters. For example, the supporting character 广 in the pic. in the above post, firstly appears in the word 广大, for which the character 大 serves as the supporting character. So, it would be remembered earlier if the words in the list are learnt from the beginning to the end, and when the learner comes to the lines, in which 广 is the supporting character, he knows it already. 

 

Also I decided again to resort to the opportunities that are provided by simultaneous use of two languages. Some time ago I wrote about a Russian-Chinese pidgin language 中俄混合語, which was used by Russian and Chinese fir traders in Kyakhta, a border trading place (now it's on the Russian-Mongolian border) in the 18th - the first half of the 19th century. This led me to the idea to learn Chinese words in mixed texts, organised as poetry for better orientation in them. See below the first six-line stanza of such mixed language text, which is called "On Direct Democracy or It All Began with Porridge", which corresponds to the fragment of the HSK word list in the other picture. In each odd line of the verse three Chinese words from the list are used one after another, in each even line two words. Totally in each six-line stanza fifteen Chinese words are employed. For convenience the 2nd and the 4th lines are rhymed, also the 5th and the 6th lines are. The English for this stanza is as follows: "Walk a few meters and you can eat boiled rice. It is long, a whole centimeter. And you can eat popcorn, but it is short, only a millimeter, all crumbled. I take care of you, I will also buy soft drinks, I am kind, look at my profile on the Internet. All this is made from good raw materials, I do not foresee problems with your stomach. But I guess you won't like the taste. We need to add some spices. I've done a review based on various materials and I know what is needed. But you put everything in a plastic bag without even trying. This is very unexpected." So, you can see, that the text makes some sense. I checked the use of Chinese words with a dictionary and examples. However, even if some words are not used exactly as in Chinese, I believe that this is not a big problem. After all, many words have a number of meanings, and the idea is just to memorize words with one of them, even if it comes with some approximation.

 

Learning the first hundred words took me three days. I learn them not only on the text, but also with fleshcards. It's important, that fleshcards are more learnt  to Chinese, than from Chinese, and I write in characters by hand all the words that I see at the cards in Russian. This seems to be a garantee that words will be remembered confidently. However, learning words in the text can also involve handwriting them if the text is copied with spaces instead of Mandarin. I expect, that learning all 5,000 words would take not more than half a year. After that it'll be necessary to read much, first of all graded texts to grasp the word use and grammar.

 

As to the remainder, 15% of the words, in which there are no characters with those 42 radicals, it is expected to be the easiest to learn for me, because all these characters, parts 4 and 5, I learnt in advance. 

 

I cannot upload the list right now because I make some changes in it as I proceed with the mixed language poetry and words. But some might be interested in getting the list and the poetry. I could upload the text by portions with corresponding poetry, but it's reasonable to do that by those parts, defined earlier (Parts 3, 2, 1 and the remaining 4&5). So, I'm going firstly to cover the whole Part 3, which comprises exactly 50% of the list, 2,500 words, then I'll upload the results. And I'll add English translation for each stanza.

 

 

 

 

Edited October 28, 2020 at 05:35 PM by Pall
changed schedule of uploading

[Pall]

I understand, that it's hard unfortunately to use this mixed Chinese-Russian language approach for English-speakers directly. However, the list itself even taken seperately is a good basis to organise learning. One can learn words from the list, just taking examples of their use from different sources.

 

But there is another solution. There are mixed languages, pidgins and creols, which originated from language contact of three and even more languages. For example, such are two languages spoken in Surinam: the Aukan language that originated from English, Dutch and Central African languages,  and the Saramaccan language - English (30%) and Portuguese (20%), and various West and Central African languages (50%). So, why not to combine English, where possible, with Russian and Mandarin?

 

In this application Russian has obvious advantage as a language for language mixed texts. In Russian almost any word order is possible without changing the meaning. Althogh linguists regard Russian as SVO language, nothing seriously changes if the succession is SOV, OSV, OVS, VOS or VSO. So, Russian differs greatly even from other purely inflected languages in this respect. This feature allows to put Chinese words to any place, and also to maintain poetry metric and rhyme. Poetry metric and rhyme are important, because they help to remember the text better and consequently to orient where Chinese words exactly are, what meaning they have. 

 

I converted the first stanza to such a mixed English-Chinese-Russian form, trying to maintain both metric and rhyme, and wrote notes on Russian words. So, English is everywhere, where it doesn't damage the metric and rhyme. I didn't translitterate Russian Cyrillic to Latin right in the poem on purpose, since some of the forum participants might not speak English at the level, which allows to distinguish all English and Russian words if the latter would be written in Lathin.  But I did that in the notes, as well as gave grammar explanations. Also I recorded an audio, see attachment. Sorry, if my English or Mandarin pronanciation isn't too good, but I hope it's not awful. 

 

So, if i have time and, of course, if anyone is interested to have all the poetry for the 5,000 HSK list in such English-Mandarin-Russian form, I can convert all the verses to it and also record audio. 

 

Here is the first stanza and the notes. Please, be aware that In the used Latin transcription of Russian 'j' is employed to show softness of consonants, where they are not followed by vowels (in such cases just 'i' is added right after the consonant), and 'y' is reserved for special Russian vowel 'ы', which sounds similar to 'i', but with one's tongue humpbacked. 
With bold letters stress is shown (in one case also for English, where it is required for metric). Glossing abbrevations are from here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_glossing_abbreviations

 

 

 

 

Several 米 лишь to walk, and we could米饭 eat, it is long,
                                                                           прямо целый 厘米,
Or воздушный popcorn, сделан он из 玉米, только он с 毫米,
                                                                 стал он crumbled совсем.
О тебе 照料ing, я куплю и 饮料, I’m kind, see 资料 of mine
                                                                                в интернете.
All that’s made from high end 原料, не 预料with stomach проблем.

But 意料 я, you will not like этот вкус. We should add to that
                                                                            some 调料.
                                               I've done a review based on разный 材料,
And I know what’s needed. But в 塑料袋 всё положила ты вдруг,
                                             не попробовав даже, it’s very 不料.

 

Notes:
лишь (lishj)                           only
прямо целый          
(priamo tselyi)                      as (long) as a whole; прямо means here
                                                 ‘as…as…’, however it’s main meanings are
                                                 ‘straight’, ‘right’, ‘direct’; целый - whole
воздушный  
(vozdushnyi)                         ADJ air, airy, aerial
сделан он из           
(sdelan on iz)                         it is made of; сделан – PP of the verb делать
                                                 (dielatj), ‘to do’ or ‘to make’, 3 person, SG, M or Neuter
                                                 gender; он – ‘it’, ‘he’; из – ‘from’ in this case (also ‘out of’)
только он с  
(toljko on s)                           but it is as (‘is’ is omitted in Russian), только – ‘but’ in this
                                                  case, and also can mean ‘only’ (synonym of лишь, lishj);
                                                  ‘c’ – ‘as’ here or ‘of’, but more usual meaning
                                                 is ‘with’
стал он                                  it has become; стал – PRS PRF of the verb
                                                 ‘становиться’, ‘стать’ (stanovitjsia, statj – INF
                                                 and PRS PRF correspondingly without person and gender), 3,
                                                 M - to become
совсем          
(sovsiem)                               completely
О тебе
(o tiebie)                                about you; ‘o’ – about, тебе – ‘you’ SG, or better to say ‘thee’
                                                  in PREP case
я куплю и
(ia kupliu i)                            I’ll buy also; я – ‘I’, куплю –  FUT of the verb купить ‘to buy’,
                                                1, SG; и - 'also' in this case, but usually it means 'and'
в интернете
(v internetie)                         on the internet; ‘в’ – in; on; интернете – PREP of интернет,
                                                 internet
не
(nie)                                        not
проблем
(problem)                              GEN case of проблемы, ‘problems’
я
(ia)                                          ‘I’
этот вкус
(etot vkus)                            this taste, ACC coincides with NOM case here
разный
(raznyi)                                  different, ACC coincides with NOM case here
в
(v)                                           in (into)
всё положила ты вдруг
(vsio polozhila ty vdrug)       you put everything suddenly; всё (also can be written as все)
                                                 everything, ACC coincides with NOM case here; положила -
                                                 PST of положить (polozhitj), 2 person, F
                                                 gender – to put; ты – thee; вдруг – suddenly
не попробовав даже
(nie poprobovav dazhe)      not having tasted even; попробовав – PRESP of
                                                ‘попробовать’, to have tasted; даже - even

N
 

 

 

 

[Pall]

I recorded a better version of the auduo, smoother, without long pauses between different language segments. But it's not for learning Mandarin, of course, it's only for better perception of the Russian fragments. However, I hope English is employed in the example in the sufficient amount to understand the meaning of the used Mandarin words. 

EngMandRus.mp3

[Pall]

I believe it'll be also reasonable to put words, which are not included in the HSK, to the same list (they should be only specially marked). They will not be covered with poetry, but the organisation of the list by radicals is itself a valuable asset besides words. We can expect that around 80-85% of new words will include characters of those 42 distinct frequent radicals, which it's easy to determine at once. The remainder of 15% has also a certain organisation, though not so convenient to operate as that the parts 3, 2 and 1 have. That is for advanced learners. As to those, who will learn the HSK words with that poetry, there is an additional opportunity to make some inserts in brackets in the poetry or footnotes to integrate new words into it and to link them with the known words. 

[Pall]

The most serious problem with this approach is that one cannot 急功近利。He has to learn all 5,000 words to start reading?

[Pall]

There is a solution to the mentiond above problem. In fact it's enough to learn by this way only the Part 3 words, i.e. those including characters of the 27 not so rare radicals. It's exactly 50% of the HSK list, 2,500 words. Then graded texts could be retyped so that, living these words in Mandarin, to substitute the rest for one's native language. I think even such analytic languages as English and French can be used in this method. There's no doubts regarding Russian, of course. Here is an example of HSK6 graded text. I just added to the known words all af the HSK1 taken as an elementary basis. Also I belive it's a good excercise to make spaces between words while typing. So, the other words would be learnt in the context of the text.

 

时间已经是晚上十点半了，吴晓萍对着桌子上的白纸沉思很久，还是一筹莫展，想不出什么好对策来对付老夫人。想到老夫人今天布置的新任务，吴晓萍就一肚子苦水。

Chua, Edmund. Graded Chinese Reader: HSK 6 (5000 Words Level): The New Housekeeper (p. 8). Kindle Edition. 

 

时间   уже   是   晚上   十   点   半   了，吴晓萍   对着   桌子   上   的   白   бумагой  沉思   很   долго，还是   一筹莫展，想   不   出   什么   好   对策   来   иметь дело с   老夫人。想到   老夫人   今天   布置   的   новое   任务，吴晓萍   就   душа   горечью。

 

I think the same approach can be applicable to not graded texts, living known words in Madarin and substituting the others. Although, in this case inflected native languages would be more advantageous, for the stretches expressed in them might be longer than seperate words.

[Pall]

The mode of working with the HSK poems, which was described here, didn't prove to be effective. See another post below on that.

.

 

 

Edited December 13, 2020 at 09:38 AM by Pall
not good mode

[Pall]

Sorry, I uploaded picture for another verse. Here is the translation of it: Usually people see what is in the foreground or near, and only what is in the present. But soaping is so dangerous. Then there will be no bright times ahead. And if you find fault, it will not help. We must dissect the past and compare the past times, exhibit differences and similarities, enumerate all the parallel moments, and only then will we be able to do something.
After all, the past is a long series of lessons, a procession of rulers of simple people, arranged in time. It doesn't matter who wrote the script and why he allowed turbulent events.

[Pall]

I decided to add electronic fleshcards, but for word use, not words themselves, since words are covered by other means. And word use for speaking first of all, i.e. it should be in transcription. As to reading, I think, it's not too difficult to understand what the use of the word is, provided that you've recognised it and know its meanings, in most cases at least. What I do. I write an example of the word use in Russian, substituting word by word Chinese text, leaving braсkets where there is nothing in Russian and showing the target word in capitals. On the reverse there is the same phrase with transcription instead of the target word. Also I am to write the word in characters on a piece of paper. 

[Pall]

I found it very effective for learning not only words, but also word use, to make series of cards of the above kind. You can see words in Russian are written in the cards of the series in capitals in sequence, and on the back the same word is given in its transcription, mupin, in the same sentence and seperately in characters. For this method there should be examples either consisting only of the HSK words or including at least several such words (words beyond HSK can be left in Russian only). After such learning one would be able not only to remember the words, but also to compose such not too simple phrase as 爱护 环境  是  每  一位  公民的  义务 . Sorry, the cards don't come in the order.

And it would be the best if one writes down the Chinese words in characters while reviewing cards.