I'm Learning Mandarin

My eBook: https://www.peakmandarin.com/free-ebook Links:  For more information on the UK Mandarin immersion weekends visit: https://mandarinretreat.com/ Check out my in-depth guide to tones here:  http://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/02/12/its-never-too-late-to-learn-chinese-tones-heres-how/ -- If you ask any Mandarin learner which aspect of the language they find most challenging, it’s highly likely they’ll give a one word answer: tones.  For years I would have said the same. Tones did not come easily to me and like many learners I neglected them for years thinking I could get away with it. In fact I only really started taking tones seriously around four years in and it took months of retraining my brain to perceive and produce tones properly before I truly felt comfortable. I regularly get asked about how learners should go about learning tones so I thought this topic probably merits an episode in itself. On today’s podcast I’ve assembled a group of Chinese learning friends who are all at different stages of learning and have interesting insights to offer. 

My eBook: https://www.peakmandarin.com/free-ebook Links: To learn more about the UK Mandarin immersion retreats visit: https://mandarinretreat.com/ Blog with information about the immersion retreats: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/08/14/i-tasted-full-immersion-for-the-first-time-on-a-weekend-mandarin-retreat-and-you-can-too/ Essie Birt's Twitter: https://twitter.com/Essie_M_B -- Professor Stephen Krashen has arguably had more of an impact in the  field of modern language education than any other living academic linguist. His Input Hypothesis – a group of five hypotheses developed  in the 1970s and 80s, argues that comprehensible input is the key  component required for successful second language acquisition. Language education in schools and universities has traditionally been  based on the belief that practicing speaking, vocabulary memorisation, repetition drills and grammar rules are the keys to learning a second language. According to Krashen, however, studying information about languages in the form of grammar rules and practicing speaking through repetition  drills are of marginal importance. Instead we acquire languages when we  understand messages through reading and listening to our target  language. If we follow his principles, our task as language learners is simple:  seek out reading and listening material we find compelling and  comprehensible, then consume enough of it until we’ve internalised the  language. If we get enough comprehensible input appropriate to our  level, our comprehension skills will consistently improve and our  ability to speak the language will then gradually emerge. The online language learning community is full of influencers and learners – myself included – who have been inspired by Krashen. The likes of Steve Kaufmann and Matt Vs Japan (who I interviewed for this podcast) are examples of what can be achieved when Krashen’s principles are applied successfully. But Krashen is not without his critics and there are question marks  over how applicable his ideas are to learning Mandarin. Can Mandarin pronunciation and tones be acquired through comprehensible input alone or is in necessary to  learn rules, use rote memorisation and repetition drills to become  proficient? And what about grammar? Can we acquire Mandarin to a high  level without deliberately studying grammar rules? In this episode I want to take a critical look at the input  hypothesis. To do so I’ve invited two Mandarin learning experts, both of  whom have appeared on this podcast before. Professor Karen Chung is a linguist with decades of experience working at National Taiwan University. Daniel Nalesnik is the founder of the leading flashcard website hackchinese.com  Together we explore the strengths and limitations of the input hypothesis in the context of learning Mandarin.

My eBook: https://www.peakmandarin.com/free-ebook *To contact Karl about his sentence mining app email ActiveLearningApps@gmail.com *For a full guide on sentence mining visit: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/07/03/your-ultimate-guide-to-chinese-sentence-mining-in-5-basic-steps/ *Join the I’m Learning Mandarin Facebook Community on: https://www.facebook.com/groups/imlearningmandarin/  Last Christmas I set myself a new years resolution to improve my spoken Chinese to the  point where I’d feel comfortable recording podcast interviews in  Mandarin. Of all the methods I’ve used this year the one that I feel has helped me the most towards my goal is sentence mining. The term basically means collecting large numbers of sentences  conveying key grammatical structures before revising them later. Each time you’re watching a TV programme or have a conversation with a native speaker, you listen out for  sentences you feel you might want use yourself and record them down in a  document or using flashcards. The idea is that by collecting and learning hundreds of these  sentences you will start to develop 语感, or a deeper sense of the  language. I recently wrote a guide to sentence mining for my blog and in this episode I’ve invited a few of my Chinese learning friends –  Karl, Ryan and Jorge – to share  they’re approaches and discuss how the technique has helped them.

My eBook: https://www.peakmandarin.com/free-ebook Links:  Benny's Blog: https://www.fluentin3months.com/ Benny's Ted Talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0x2_kWRB8-A Benny's Book on Learning Mandarin: https://www.amazon.co.uk/LANGUAGE-HACKING-MANDARIN-Learn-Mandarin/dp/1473674271 My Blog on Learning Tones: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/02/12/its-never-too-late-to-learn-chinese-tones-heres-how/ On today’s episode I interview arguably the world’s most popular language learner, the one and only Benny Lewis.  To many listeners, Benny or Benny the Irish Polyglot as he’s also known, will need no introduction.  He first began blogging over a decade ago at a time when the online language learning community was still in its infancy.  His engaging style and optimistic message that languages is about communicating, having fun and embracing mistakes stood in contrast to other polyglots whose methods seemed more dull and academic.  Through his blog, books and Ted Talks Benny brought the idea of self learning a new language to millions of people, many of whom had been put off by bad experiences at school. In 2012 ago he set himself the challenge of becoming fluent in Mandarin within three months. Ten years on I caught up with Benny to reflect on his Chinese learning experience as well as discuss his approaches to language learning in general. 

My eBook: https://www.peakmandarin.com/free-ebook Links:  Karen's Ted Talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQEWEPIHLzQ My Roadmap to Learning Mandarin Tones: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/02/12/its-never-too-late-to-learn-chinese-tones-heres-how/ On today’s podcast, I chat with a very distinguished guest. Someone  who has designed a technique she believes can help learners of any  language achieve near native accents. Karen Chung from the USA has lived in Taiwan for more than 30 years  and for most of that time has worked as a linguistics professor at the  National Taiwan University. In 2018 a Ted Talk which she delivered in flawless Mandarin received over a million views  and brought her methods to the attention of a large international  audience. In the video she explains her accent training technique which she  calls the echo method. The method which is based on her own learning  experiences takes advantage of our echoic memory. First we listen to a sentence or phrase in our target language,  waiting for the audio to replay or echo in our minds, before finally  mimicking it out loud. Doing it this way allows us to mimic native  speech much more closely than conventional listen and repeat methods. In this podcast, we explore her own language learning journey, how  she learned Mandarin to such a high level and why she disagrees with  conventional language learning opinion which argues accents don’t matter  as long as we can more or less make ourselves understood. She also kindly agreed to give me a brief demonstration of her method to help improve my own Mandarin accent.

My eBook: https://www.peakmandarin.com/free-ebook Links:  I'm Learning Mandarin Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/imlearningmandarin/ Will's YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7LmgMa8XhIusF7RI7YI_KQ/featured Will's interview in chinese: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CggHugyhyJU My Blog on Interviewing Will: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/06/04/interviewing-this-master-of-oral-chinese-made-me-rethink-everything-i-believed-about-language-learning/ My Blog on learning chinese tones: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/02/12/its-never-too-late-to-learn-chinese-tones-heres-how/ On today’s episode we delve into one of the most remarkable language learning stories I’ve ever come across. It’s the story of Will Hart, a 20 year old medical student who on the eve of the first UK lockdown in 2020 had never been to a Chinese speaking country, had no Chinese family and had never had any meaningful contact with the language in any form. Fast forward 12 months and he posted a short video to YouTube speaking with the kind of fluency many people fail to reach after more than a decade studying the language immersed in Chinese speaking countries. Recently, a second video appeared on YouTube in which he was interviewed in Chinese at length at the 1.5 year mark. Watching that video I was astonished by how fast he had progressed. A lot of people upload videos claiming to have reached fluency in as little as six months. I've written previously about why I'm usually not a fan of this kind of content. But Will's case really is different. His Chinese is genuinely phenomenal, as any native speaker or advanced learner who hears him speak will confirm. So I decided to invite him on the podcast to see what I could learn from his methods. What he told me is, I believe, utterly invaluable to all Mandarin learners, especially people with an interest in making their learning as efficient as possible.

My eBook: https://www.peakmandarin.com/free-ebook Links: I'm Learning Mandarin Language Exchange Facebook Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/imlearningmandarin My blog on learning Mandarin tones: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/02/12/its-never-too-late-to-learn-chinese-tones-heres-how/ Karl's blog on using flashcards to learn Chinese: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2021/03/10/how-useful-are-flashcards-for-learning-mandarin-vocab/ Many listeners of this podcast are people who, like me, get immense joy and gratification from the language learning process. However, it’s also worth being aware of the psychological pitfalls which those of us studying Chinese intensively commonly fall into.  On my podcast today I discuss this issue with two friends who have both experienced the ups and downs of Mandarin learning.  Karl Baker is a language app programmer who has appeared on the podcast before. Esther Spiering is a UXP designer who is currently on a secondment from work during which she is self-studying Mandarin intensively.  We talk about dealing with comments and judgments from native speakers, coping with those moments when we failed to live up to our expectations of ourselves and much more. If you enjoy this podcast please subscribe on Apple, Spotify or on imlearningmandarin.com to have new blogs and podcasts pinged straight to your email. 

My eBook: https://www.peakmandarin.com/free-ebook Links: My blog on DuoLingo Chinese: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/04/07/i-completed-duolingo-chinese-heres-why-you-shouldnt/ My blog on the best apps for learning Chinese: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/02/20/thanks-to-these-apps-self-studying-chinese-is-much-easier-than-ten-years-ago/ Karl's flashcard app: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=spaced.repetition.mandarin.chinese.learning.vocabulary.builder&hl=en_GB&gl=US Karl's Twitter: https://twitter.com/mandarinbaker Teo's Twitter: https://twitter.com/_TeoValdes On today’s podcast we discuss the world’s most popular language app, Duolingo. I’ve long been a critic of Duolingo, having spent a ridiculous amount of time completing the Mandarin Duolingo Tree as a beginner. I’ve previously blogged that I found my progress during that time to be almost imperceptible and subsequently discovered other learning tools which I found to be far more effective for learning Chinese.  So on today’s podcast I wanted to open up a balanced discussion about the pros and cons of DuoLingo Chinese. Joining me to discuss this are two guests with experience of using the app and fascinating perspectives.  Teo Valdés is a Doctor of Education candidate at American University. He is an experienced language learner and Spanish teacher who has also studied Mandarin.  Karl Baker is a language app designer whose free flashcard app Mandarin Vocabulary Builder is available for android phones. 

My eBook: https://www.peakmandarin.com/free-ebook Links:  Matt’s YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/MATTvsJapan Matt’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/mattvsjapan My blog on how to acquire Chinese tones: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/02/12/its-never-too-late-to-learn-chinese-tones-heres-how/ My blog on the importance of accent: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/04/24/is-matt-vs-japan-right-that-your-accent-really-matters/ On today’s podcast we have a very special guest, the YouTube superstar and fluent Japanese speaker Matt Vs Japan. Matt is a well known face in the language learning community who has risen to prominence thanks to his insightful YouTube videos which explain how he managed to reach a near native level in Japanese in the space of a few years, all the while while living in the US. Like me, he is a big fan of the linguist Stephen Krashen and is on a mission to popularise language learning methods which prioritise the importance of getting lots of reading and listening input. More recently he has also taken a keen interest in the question of how we should go about acquiring native-like accents when studying a new language as an adult. We discussed all this and much more in a very wide ranging interview, one of the most fascinating interviews I’ve ever done.

My eBook: https://www.peakmandarin.com/free-ebook Links:  My blog on Language Talent: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2021/09/03/why-i-dont-believe-in-language-talent/ My roadmap for learning Chinese tones: http://imlearningmandarin.com/2022/02/12/its-never-too-late-to-learn-chinese-tones-heres-how/ On today's episode I debate the concept of language talent with two guests. Yong Jun is a PHD student researching the philosophy of language. Katherine, who has appeared on the podcast before, is a Masters student in translation studies. Both guests are language learning enthusiasts and have ample experience of learning languages to high levels. We discuss whether it's meaningful to talk about having a gift for languages and whether it's true that some learners really are more gifted than others.