I need to build spontaneous thinking/speaking

In addition to continuing in my children's books, I need something to whip my thus far inert Chinese into something automatic and natural-feeling. It isn't useable language yet. This is partly due to my main resource, New Concept Chinese for Children, having almost zero dialogue (so far).

I've already read many threads about many well-known resources, so I'm not sure what advice I'm looking for, but posting here often helps me.

My flashcard making/doing time is already maxed.

1. FSI.

Pro: the drilling here is probably the perfect exercise, subject matter is practical.

Con: no character text a con in this case? audio not BLCUP quality?

Possible usage: *don't* collect its characters or flashcard it- force audio-only.

2. "Conversational Chinese 301" (two volumes).

Pro: BLCUP audio/visual top-quality, conversation/phrases format *ideal*, doable in a year, layout easily sentencewise-flashcardable if desired.

Con: none?

3. NPCR vol. 1. Pro/Con similar to "301".

4. "Standard Chinese"

Pro: another children's textbook series by pep, almost *all* dialogue, goes through second grade 2000+ chars.

Con: audio via online courseware is not delivered naturally.

Possible scenario: flashcard it, merging nicely into my other children's materials.

5. Many excellent internet courses. Impossible to choose one.

6. (Pimsleur: annoyed by spacing, would take too much work to move the gaps around, don't want to discuss it here)

-FSI, pure audio-only and no flashcards, is the hard-core choice.

-"301", mainly treated as audio/visual only but with a textbook lookup/confirmation, is the probable choice.

Thinking/speaking simple sentences easily and automatically should be possible.

I need something to whip my thus far inert Chinese into something automatic and natural-feeling.

@querido -- I've read many of your posts and you always come across as thoughtful and diligent. The main thing I wonder now, in reply to your musings, is whether you are getting any face to face exposure with native speakers and if so, how much. That ingredient is what always makes the most difference for me. It's what makes it all come alive and be "real" instead of just an academic exercise.

5. Many excellent internet courses. Impossible to choose one.

If they're all excellent, choose one at random, or the cheapest.

To abcdefg:

Thank you.

face to face exposure with native speakers

Almost zero. At the moment I can recite poetry and that is, radically, all! I actually did that- I recited a poem to someone... ... and then was unable to follow up with any pleasantries or greetings of any kind weird .

I'll consider your suggestion and prepare for it.

To roddy:

That's hard to argue with. I'll look at them once more.

I'll tell you two of my study methods which may be useful to you. One to work on grammar, and one to work on fluency; both are boring (yet useful).

I'll use English for the examples so everyone can understand.

For grammar I find this exercise useful to really drill a sentence pattern into long term memory so it becomes more reactionary when using it.

Example sentence: I take a bus to work every day at 5.

First, you need clear division of the parts of speech in a sentence.

subject | verb | object | place | frequency | time

I | take | a bus | to work | every day | at 5.

Then, say the sentence, slowly and properly. Say it again and again until you can say it quickly (like near naive quickly) and properly.

Once you have that done, start swapping out vocab. You can swap out one word at a time at first, but try to work up to as many words at a time as you can handle. This will help with forming sentences using this pattern. Plus, you can even practice using new vocab.

Example:

I | take | a bus | to work | every day | at 5.

He | takes | a bus | to work | every day | at 5.

He | takes | a bus | to school | every day | at 5.

He | takes | a private car | to school | every day | at 6.

He | takes | a taxi | to the park | every day | at 8.

She | takes | a train | to Hong Kong | every month | on the 5th.

My friend | rides | a bike | to work | every week | on Monday.

etc, etc.

As soon as you finish one sentence, start another. Absolutely no breaks (no time to think in English). I find I often need to speak slowly at first; but I do get quicker, and most importantly, I find that after a number of sessions I can focus on what I want to say with that piece of grammar, and don't need to focus on how to say it.

This other study method is one of my favourites. I often show Chinese students this exercise when they mention that they have no one to speak English with. It's basically talking to yourself.

You need many small pieces of paper; I'd suggest ten or more. Make them small enough to easily handle and flip through.

On each piece of paper write a word or phrase. Don't write all adjectives, or all nouns, mix things up.

Each time you do the exercise shuffle the papers so the order changes.

The actual exercise is telling a story and using the words to dictate what happens in the story.

Lets say we have decided to tell the story of a dog looking for his ball. To begin, just start talking about a dog looking for his ball.

Occasionally (every few sentences), take the top word from your pile and include it in your story. This is the variable that ensures the story is always unique.

Some notes:

• NEVER look through your stack of words for the most suitable one, ALWAYS take the top word. This will challenge you much more than always giving yourself an ideal environment.
  
• Do not look at a word until you're ready to use it. Making it spontaneous makes it so you have to think on your feet.
  
• Never stop speaking. This exercise isn't about having perfect grammar, it's about speaking quickly.
  
• Record yourself once in a while and find your grammar mistakes. Drill them as shown above. This exercise will expose a lot of grammar mistakes, take advantage of it and fix them.
  

I'll try to write out a small example to make it completely clear.

The word list:

• dog
  
• cell phone
  
• search
  
• lovely
  

The story:

There once was a dog who was looking for his ball. He couldn't find it anywhere.

dog

While looking he came across another dog who seemed to be lost. He asked that dog if she had seen his ball but his query was ignored. Our hero decided to bite the dog to get her attention.

cell phone

Just as he bit the other dog a man on a cell phone came over and started failing his legs around as if trying to do an Irish jig. The little dog ran like the wind and continued his search.

search

On his search he came across a cup of water.

lovely

There was a lovely dog drinking from the cup. He took up a seat at the cup and attempted small talk. Things between the two dogs went pretty well, and he soon forgot about his ball altogether.

One thing I must mention again, never stop speaking (never give yourself time to think in English).

Both of those look like good exercises!

The first one resembles the thesis of "Conversational Chinese 301": building a speaking repertoire via substitutions into 301 fundamental sentences. Some of the drills in FSI give a sentence form, and then a series of words to plug into the form.

As I become able, I will try them.

Here's my suggestion to overcome self-consciousness in speaking Chinese. During your commute to and from work just pretend there's a fascinating, old Chinese man sitting on the passenger seat next to you. Of course, he only speaks Chinese but he probably has harrowing tales to tell you about his life. Talk with this man, get to know him and ask him lots of questions. The more you talk with him, the more natural it will become to speak Chinese.

In fact, i knew exactly such a Chinese man a few years ago and he became soooo real to me that it saddened me to realize eventually that he didn't exist. I still miss him and at times have an urge to place ads in the major Chinese newspapers: "Will the fascinating, old gentleman who lived in my head for six months in 2001 please get in touch with me at ..."

To me, imaginary friends are the best. They are more interesting than real people and easier to get along with. Whether you would label this phenomenon creativity or schizophrenia is debatable.

Amen brother/sister. You read me right.

O.K., I spent a few days reexamining the online learning sites usually mentioned here, and also my other resources.

Theory about why flashcards failed for me in this specific regard:

I don't think "production" flashcards are really training that. I think they are in effect backwards-recognition or something. Reading aloud (which I can do well from my books) somehow also falls far short. Reading aloud (unless real "production" is echoing in the mind as it would for a native) is like answering a string of flashcards. Now, *if* there is any truth in that, then maybe similarly a "production" flashcard is just a cue to remember the corresponding recognition card = unnecessary agony and missing the point. That is what I experienced before I killed all of my "production" cards a few months ago, but this is the first time this explanation occurred to me. (A production card simply asks me to remember the recognition card to which it is the answer. No production is happening. I'm I proof?)

How to gain and retain production skills then? It has something to do with chatting and interacting with other people in real life, and *wanting* to do so... have mercy on my soul. Well, I *want* to post here, don't I? Ah hah! I shall begin posting in Chinese in the appropriate subforum someday soon... have mercy on *your* soul.

Consistent with my inclination to begin with children's books, I think I will now choose the hand-holding offered by ChinesePod Newbie. I don't think I should believe or claim that I can "speak" Chinese, as long as these simple drills (in the review mp3s) are not automatic. Right? Its vocabulary totals 900+ words (according to a compilation done by one of the members), a pretty good base. (Newbie + Elementary = 2600+ words as of 14DEC09.) I feel optimistic, having listened to a few.

P.S. Otherwise, cslpod would be my favorite, and I'd like to use chineseteachers.com someday soon too.

Interesting discussion! I don't get a lot of speaking practice either, only in the weekend class I've been taking. And what's really pathetic, after saying things like 'We have two cats and one dog', saying the date, time and stuff like that (in chinese of course) - over and over and over again in class, I still stumble over the words. And it just feels awkward.

One thing I'm trying is to practice saying things out loud, over and over again by myself until I can do it smoothly. Things like introducing myself and talking about my self a little. I think it would work better if I actually spent more time practicing it like I planned to.

When I read the dialogs in the first and early part of the 2nd NPCR books out loud, I don't think I sound too bad though. I haven't actually taped myself and listened back yet though! But it at least feels better and more fluid. The later chapters I can't do that with maybe because I don't know the words as well yet and/or haven't listened to the audio as much yet. I think listening really helps with speaking. And maybe there is no way around it - maybe for most people their speaking skills will lag behind their listening skills a bit.

I like Hero Doug's suggestions with: 'I | take | a bus | to work | every day | at 5.'

I might try something like that.

"Conversational Chinese 301" sounds interesting too.

Recording yourself is a great idea. Even when you think you are reading things smoothly, recording yourself soon dissuades you of that notion. It really drives home how well you are speaking (or usually how poorly ). Audacity is free software that allows you to do it on your computer.

To trisha2766:

If you've done NPCR 1 and 2, you probably needn't bother with CC301. In two volumes, its vocabulary is 750 words. The publisher and the excellent sound quality and delivery are the same. I like its videos very slightly better, and it might be a little better for tourism preparation.

While books and those kind of courses are a good way to keeping yourself on a structured study plan, I recommend not relying on them too strongly, especially when you are trying to improve speaking.

The approach I took when I needed practice speaking was far more simple. I always carried three things with me, a small notepad, a pencil, and a dictionary.

Every time I said anything not in Chinese, I would write it down in my notepad. At my earliest convenience, I would find out how to say it in Chinese. Sometimes I would look it up right away, sometimes i would look it up in a few hours if I was too busy. The sooner the better. After that, if I ever had a similar thing to say, I would try to remember the Chinese, or I would check it in my notepad.

After about a week, I adjusted and forced myself to always rethink everything in Chinese, re-say everything in Chinese. At first I couldn't convey as much detail in Chinese as I did in English, but I would just say it in a more simple way.

Basically it was my way of giving myself crutches; with time I was using the notepad less and less. It was my way to train my brain to think in Chinese.

The reason I used the notepad is because I would always go to a store and say, I wish I could say that in Chinese, but then I would forget about it an hour later. The notepad kept me committed.

Don't depend on books too much when it comes to speaking.

Progress report:

I've started a new flashcard deck, sentences only, one side English text, the other side a question mark "?" and Chinese audio, tested both ways. About the English being text instead of audio: 1. I don't have the audio 2. I can read the sentence in a flash with no effort; this is *less* intrusion of English. The experience is of either hearing and trying to understand, or of having a thought and trying to speak... question/answer randomly. Pretty good, eh? (I'm responding to the common advice to maintain everything in one big deck- doesn't work for me.)

The idea of keeping a separate deck is to protect a pseudo-conversational mental mode from constant interruption. This is a MUST for me personally.

The idea of having no hanzi or pinyin is to keep me from focusing on that... which I would.

My other deck continues as word-only, recognition only, front hanzi, back pinyin and English definition, one-way.

CPod lessons have many parts. With the goal being exactly this thread's title, and already knowing most of the words (a common case for readers of this thread, probably), here is how I've begun using them:

Text parts: non-critical, as I said, just flashcard the new words into the recognition deck.

Audio parts:

Don't bother with single-word audio.

Collect all individual-sentence audio (including expansion sentences) with wlcpod.py (CPod subscription required). Flashcard all as described, both ways. This gives about 15 sentences (30 cards) per lesson.

This leaves

1. the lesson mp3: Listen one or more times- not exactly time-efficient but many unexpected nuggets.

2. the "audio review" (drill) mp3: snip off intro/outro if desired, and put into random/repeat playlist and listen as many times as necessary to build skill to answer the questions on the fly.

3. the dialog-only mp3: snip intro/outro and put into more or less permanent random/repeat mass playlist with all other Newbie dialogs.

Choosing CPod has reduced the overhead of the above, since it is available already snipped-up. But with Audacity you could do the same with other (free) sources.

As usual, I cogitated excessively before settling on a new/additional mode/system, and I feel pretty optimistic as the new year begins.

It seems that what you need most is some real contact.

You can join some language exchange sites.

An even faster way to make contact is get QQ instant messenger account.

Just put "I speak English now learning Chinese" in the description next to your name and you will get get a lot of contacts from people in China - in the evenings, China time, there are often over 90 million users of QQ. From those contacts you will find some people who are able to help you.

You can get the English front end version version here http://www.imqq.com/

If you are looking for an online tutor with reasonable/good English and experience teaching online (privately, not in a commercial organisation), PM me and I will recommend a friend to you.

Thank you for your suggestion. I'll think about it soon, along with chineseteachers.com.

Does anyone agree with my ideas about the virtues of a separate deck, whole sentences, English text/Chinese audio, both ways? I'll restate it more briefly:

1. Since the English is read instantly, the study time is spent either hearing and trying to understand Chinese, or having a thought and trying to speak Chinese, input/output, randomly.

2. The idea of keeping a separate deck is to protect this pseudo-conversational mental mode from constant interruption.

It's like walking through a convention where people are seated at tables talking, listening for snippets, and lending your 2 cents while continuing to walk through. It isn't "conversation", but pretty close! And by the way, lending a random 2 cents is all most people do anyway in casual settings.

My last two posts describe my new system, until I seek live speakers. Thanks everybody.

Querido, particularly in light of the desired spontaneity alluded to in the title of your thread, i wonder whether you might be relying too much on structured lessons and SRS. I don't object to the use of either but these methods reflect optimum learning in a rigid environment whereas spontaneity is klutzy and messy but reflects more the real world. Spontaneity is also much more fun. The words you actually know, i.e. the ability to use them at will, is less than what you have mastered in Mnemosyne. To truly know them and have them accessible at all times, you need to use them as much as possible outside the context of being prompted.

I therefore recommend again to do something playful as Doug Hero and my previous post suggested. What i do now is i come up with little Chinese stories that i devise in a mixture of mostly Chinese and English. I make them up as i go along and i tell them out loud to myself (don't write anything down). The point of this exercise is not to seek perfect grammar/avoid mistakes at all cost but to develop the ability to think in Chinese and to feel comfortable ad-libbing in Chinese. Only when i'm done with this, do i look up in a dictionary words i was unsure about and find more sophisticated words/terms for the things i was trying to convey.

It's a bit like swimming. You can stand at the edge of the pool forever wiggling your foot in the water to figure out whether it's warm enough. When you finally plunge in, you discover that it just feels great and the worries about the water's temperature were unfounded. So, do take the plunge in the Chinese pond. The water isn't too cold and you won't drown.

What i do now is i come up with little Chinese stories that i devise in a mixture of mostly Chinese and English. I make them up as i go along and i tell them out loud to myself (don't write anything down). The point of this exercise is not to seek perfect grammar/avoid mistakes at all cost but to develop the ability to think in Chinese and to feel comfortable ad-libbing in Chinese.

I do this too and then try out appropriate bits and pieces with native speakers to see how well they really work. Sometimes they know exactly what I meant to say, and sometimes they think I'm nuts. Then I do it all again at the earliest opportunity with new people, incorporating learned changes, still aiming for fluency and understandablity.

In the course of any given day, I may use some of the same "material" with a taxi driver, a waitress, a shop clerk, a barber, and a stranger in the elevator of my apartment building. Their responses help me refine what I'm trying to say.

It's essential to not mind being often wrong and occasionally ridiculous. If they laugh at me, I laugh too. After all, I'm only six years old. What do they expect from a six year old?

@Querido -- You are going have to "go live" to achieve your goal, whether it's via written internet chat or long-distance Skype or something else similar.

My last two posts describe my new system, until I seek live speakers.

The time to seek live native speakers is right now, not after you have privately polished every phrase to perfection. Don't defer until later that which would help you most right now.

I hear you and will consider it. Thank you.

I hear you and will consider it. Thank you.

With all respect, what I'm urging is that you don't spend all available time in the classroom and lab perfecting your language skills in a relative vacuum. "Take it to the streets" and I think the live informal feedback of that will bring you the spontaneity you seek rather quickly, albeit with some bumps and bruises along the way.

I realize there are many ways to skin a cat and that this approach may not suit you temperamentally. I also realize that it can lead to some “Tarzan Chinese,” as discussed elsewhere in this forum.