My Simple Chinese Study Plan

Not so long ago I posted this, 我应制定学习计划。我要学习计划。I should make a study plan. I need a study plan.  As I have been very busy with a number of things I still haven’t made this study plan.

So today I am setting out my attack on Chinese learning. It is very simple and I plan to do the following;

• Have an online / Skype Chinese lesson on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. 2 x 25 minute Pomodoros
• Listen to my Pimsleur Chinese Mandarin II audio once a day (maybe twice a day) 1 x Pomodoro
• At least 50 minutes of Hanzi learning on Skritter ( I usually break this up into 2 X 25 minutes Pomodoros 

Now this is rather a lot and I may not be able to do every task every day. However I am going to try this for the next 65 days as that is the countdown to my ELTF Dalian Study.

There are some other tasks I need to do.  I do try to do my Homework or revise my lesson notes…my very competent Chinese teacher would say I don’t do this….
Regarding the Pimsleur Chinese I often do while walking, doing the washing up or preparing dinner….yet somehow I still manage to do retain much of what I want from the course.

Also I shall be incorporating the following;

• Set specific times – I will study in the early morning
• Pre book Chinese lessons – My thrice weekly lesson is @ 11:00 am
• Make the content interesting – While I still have to study NPCR 3 (this is another story), I do plan to make the lessons and study specific to my needs
• Set a concrete goal of what I want to achieve

I am going to try to work something out according to this formula –> number of classes +  hours spent studying Chinese = Should be able to do the following in Chinese. Might set this out in a detailed post soonish..
I have to thank two people for their suggestions and ideas.
Brandon @ Study More Chinese.  Study More Chinese is a free social Chinese learning networking site.
Kevin Principal @ Mandarin World. Chinese language school for foreigners in Shanghai.

Guest post by Principal Kevin Lewis of Mandarin World

Mandarin World is a newly opened Chinese language school in Shanghai - Pudong. We are offering group classes, online classes and also one on one tutoring. We can also aide people in getting student visas if they wish to study for a longer period of time in our school.

Our brand new school has five classrooms, two language clinics, a lecture room and an activity room, that also doubles as a TV room. We also have a beautiful lounge for students to chat in, a computer room for students to do self study, as well as a quiet study room. We have an English language DVD and Book swap service for our students and also a growing library of books on learning Chinese, as well as about China in general. Follow the link for some complimentary Chinese Language Learning Resources.

 
The whole idea of Mandarin World is that we don’t only provide students with a chance to study in the classroom, but also plenty of resources to learn outside of the classroom. I hope that students who come to our school will want to stay after their classes to make use of our facilities and to ‘hang out’ with fellow students and staff.

 
I have been told that there are approximately 200 schools in Shanghai offering Chinese language however I believe we have a few strengths that help us stand out from the crowd.  

• Firstly thanks to our contacts with many local universities we can supply student visas.

• Secondly we are foreign run so that we can try to offer foreigner friendly classes for our students.

Also when you are new like us, quality is the main focus - we care about every student - we’d be foolish not to! After hearing about many students’ complaints in relation to unhappy language learning experiences in other schools and colleges, I’ve taken those complaints to heart and we have tried to do our best to provide the best Chinese language service that we believe our students will be happy with.

However more importantly if you are not happy with our school, work with us to make the learning experience work for you.

To learn more about our school visit our website at Mandarin World

Want to know more contact Mandarin World 

Teaching Chinese language through STARTALK

Meanwhile in America...

Teaching Chinese language through STARTALK program at IU School of Education

It would be good to have something like this in Oz. While we don't have summer schools it would be good to see something like this happening after school or on the weekend. 

Social Mandarin Excellent Website

Recently I found an interesting Chinese learning website.  Social Mandarin 

Social_汉语

The site's aims are;

Social Mandarin is a social bookmarking site that aims to collect and bring together the best Mandarin learning resources online. In doing so, it enables other learners to share the same resources with each other. An online Mandarin resource, can be anything from a music video to a word list. It is defined, by how you learned Mandarin from it. So as long you can let us in on how you learned something from it, you can post it here. So join in!

It certainly does all this and more. There are four main content sections, Beginner, Elementary,  Intermediate and Advanced.

Other divisions of the site include;

1. Speaking
2. Vocabulary
3. Learning Tools
4. Culture
5. Writing
6. Listening
7. Reading
8. Grammar
9. Pinyin
10. Characters
11. Music
12. Film
13. Art
14. Other
15. General

The site certainly includes every sort of content a Chinese learner could need. There seems to be something for everyone on Social Mandarin.