Comments on: Don’t forget to consolidate the Chinese you have already studied

By: marta

marta — Thu, 16 Feb 2017 18:52:01 +0000

I am 52 years old and I have passed HSK1 and HSK2 successfully, with the highest marks too. Although I can reproduce the textbook dialogues, I can hardly speak the language. Textbook vocabulary is so limited and subject-focused that I find myself being able to say things that are not likely to pop up in a conversation and unable to have a very simple conversation at home with my daughter. My exam do not mean much, I feel.
My private teacher presses me on to go for HSK3 but I have decided not to, too much characters that I do not know how to use in a likely context. She does not help me with any reading material and does not want to introduce the language in the teaching process. It is very frustating, so much so that I have reduced my classes and I am thinking of changing teachers and maybe joining a school, where I am more likely to get the chance to practise my speaking skills.
Frustrating.
Marta.

By: Fearchar

Fearchar — Wed, 15 Jun 2016 13:35:22 +0000

Exactly! Unfortunately, almost all courses and teachers or tutors fail to appreciate that nothing is learned by a single introduction followed by one or at best two reviews. Life isn’t like that, nor is the human capacity to add and control new skills, or we’d see sporty types taking on Wimbledon one year, the World Cup the next and then the US Open! ? People are not machines, and have to grow into using their faculties: learning is more like gardening than construction, and the environment can enable or hinder growth. Reviewing provides a congenial environment that encourages growth – or motivatiin, as we tend to call it.

By: Enrico Brasil

Enrico Brasil — Tue, 14 Jun 2016 15:23:19 +0000

I totally agree. I always tell my students to review on their vacations not what they have learned this semester, but instead review what they have learned a year or more ago. That’s good for many reasons:
1 – They get a great felling of improvement. (“I couldn’t understand that before, but now I can.”)
2 – They can ask questions they couldn’t have before. (“Now that I now this, why is that back then?”)
3 – They can consolidate what they have learned. (A sort of long term spaced repetition)