Study strategies for those who are low on time

OK 知道了， starting with the A-Cups then. 看完了再说吧。

Hehe, no, I don't think the order matters. I've actually only read a couple of her books, but I do think they're a good entry point into longer-form Chinese. I'd be interested in hearing what you think!

Hi John, on your 推荐 I checked out 张小娴 and got 《三个 A Cup 的女人》, 《我们都是丑小鸭》 and 《荷包里的单身床》. Would you recommend that these be read in any particular order? The title 三个 A Cup ~ did grab my attention first. Sounds so familiar to me, like something written by a Japanese woman.

Facebook: yes MySpace: no :-)

Being totally unfamiliar with Chinese breeze readers, I put that into google and think I got what you were suggesting. Very helpful, plus they look like they attempt to provide you with a sense of how many characters you need to know before you can read the books. Just what the doctor ordered.

I was able to head to the Wangfujing bookstore to get some of the books. It looks like i'll be able to get some really helpful content. Thanks for the suggestion.

Just found I can rename the Group so I changed it to "learning books"....

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time sounds interesting.

However I am confused as I thought we were discussing books in Chinese!

I suffered from my own geekiness then! I was thinking of My as in "MySpace" or "My Sites" guess I should have gone less cryptic :-)

There was already a group out there with one book in it so I had to call it something other than reading list......

I'd envisaged a lot of books going in as a topic then people discussing them and helping to figure out what level they should work for. Though I'm not sure there is an easy way to figure the level as the 500 words you know may not be the ones in the books etc...

You should really try for the Chinese breeze readers to begin with, it makes you feel good to read a book that looks like a Chinese novel but they are really accessible. I'm doing the intermediate lessons most of the time but tend to test out as elementary, though I would admit my reading is better than my listening and speaking.

I would have only recently become interested in a reading list in the past couple of weeks. I did see that you title the group "My Books" so i would have interpreted it as your own reading list, even though you clearly put in the body of the group that it was for everyone.

I'm not sure that its a matter of interest also, just more where you are in your Chinese studies, and whether you think those studies will benefit you. I would have then asked for something easy to read.

I tried something similar by creating a book group

http://chinesepod.com/community/groups/view/my-books-1336

some time ago but nobody really seemed interested so rather than keep putting them in there I stopped at three or four. I've put some of mine into Pretzellogics thread.... A good resource for book suggestions has been something I wanted to find for a while. I got the chinese breeze readers from someone here but the rest I have just bought of the internet....

Hey yeah I know there are a number of us Trevorb; we've talked about this on several occasions. I guess the point is this is Xiaophil's post and he has asked for efficient study strategies for him. Many of us know that he is already quite advanced, he has Chinese family and he's been living in China for some years now. Whatever discussion I had here about children's books I never considered would be of particular interest or help to him. As you say, learners at different stages need different levels of reading material, and I guess that's why Pretzellogic has started a new thread, for Suggested Reading.

Hey zhenlijiang I'm with you I like Childrens books, I've read Harry Potter loads of times in English. I considered tackling it in Chinese but reasoned that knowing the Chinese for Expeliramous... may not help too much (unless I run into a chinese wizard I guess!). I think later HP novels were published with an adult and a kids cover too...

Definitely at my level children's books are good because they allow you to read a story and feel like you have achieved something without having a dictionary constantly to hand. If I can read 2 or three pages and encounter only a handful of new words I feel the book is about right for me. I can often determine the meaning of the new words from the context and sometimes even a possible pronunciation from the sound components of the characters. Finding them in context helps them to be less of a surprise in future.

what I'd love to know is if anyone has encountered chinese childrens eBooks for getting onto a kindle. I've found a few like Sun tzu but they are way over my head at my current level.

Now that is an excellent book. I bought a copy in Bangkok a few years back, and have bought several other copies since to give to discerning friends. One described it as 'priceless'!

Hi Mike

Not long ago I read the 2003 book titled The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, a book that has been published with two different covers, one for an adult market and one for the children's market. Publishers love labels. I read a comment by the author that he wrote it as an adult novel but the publisher decided to put a different cover on it to capture the kids as well.

I think it is an enjoyable read. Not sure if I read the adult or the children's version, but the contents are identical. Also not sure if it comes in Chinese.

Mike I took it as a reaction to my exchange with Pretzellogic--a tad impatient but nothing personal, not a criticism. Given that you're seconding my suggestion to Xiaophil, qualifiers like 'real', 'proper', 'adult' and 'dumbed down' (which is also not appropriate) struck me as rather unnecessary.

Can we be clear that I'm not arguing for children's stories over 'real, proper, adult' literature? Thanks.

Zhenlijiang - you seem to have taken my comment as a critism of you! It was not intended to be so. Nor is it a criticism of children's books. Perhaps I should not have used the term 'dumbed down' - sorry.

If you like reading children's stories in their own right, then fine. I prefer to read books written for adults.

Xiaophil is a much more advanced learner than me. I'm aware of that, and am not suggesting that advanced learners should seek children's literature.

Writers of quality books for young readers will be shocked I'm sure, to learn that their life's work is all about some dumbed down stuff. They probably don't see it that way. Their readers probably don't see it that way, and children are generally very smart.

Thanks for the tip. I'll check out your link. Actually, I read quite a lot. I recently read a history of Europe. I enjoyed the irony of reading about Europe through Chinese. I just recalled the name for the Normans, 诺曼人. I guess I just mention this because I know you are English, hehe.

My personal 2 cents to John's 2 cents...Even though I believe that John's advice makes perfect sense for people located in China, I do also personally believe that people located outside China should put the accent on speaking and listening (rather than reading) especially when they are beginners. In fact there are plenty of speaking and listening natural opportunities for people living in China but those opportunities are very few when living abroad. I'm in no way saying that someone shouldn't learn Chinese characters...Chinese characters are our best friends in the long journey toward mastering Chinese and will greatly improve someone's ability to learn new vocabulary (more often than not you can guess the meaning of a new word by just looking at the characters) but they probably probably should remain tools rather than goals for people living outside China.

xiaophil

What about trying reading real current novels?

I have enjoyed struggling through 人生情渊 which is a detective story - eventually I got to enjoy the story for its own sake. You can find the first half of the book online and therefore use electronic aids to look at words you don't know.

http://www.dushu.com/showbook/101594/

I am now starting 人生黑洞 by the same author.

These are proper current adult literature so lots of vocab. I just can't enjoy dumbed down childrens stuff.

This is pretty much my strategy now (other than listening to CPod when I go for walks). It's funny. I think I did this post only to confirm that I am doing the right thing. I actually can read newspapers and read books with a fair amount of comprehension ability. I have actually thought about making a post about how I go about reading Chinese texts, but I haven't got around to it. Perhaps I will do it on my break here.

My Chinese level is higher than many, but far from others, and nowhere near where I want it to be. I guess I'm always looking for a just a little better method to squeeze just a little more ability out of me.

Thanks for the tip.

armed with my 450 characters, I thank you :-)

I always feel strange recommending this, but I think 张小娴 is a great entry into long-form Chinese lit. Total chick lit, lots of touchy-feely-ness, but really straightforward plot and easy to read. The first book I ever read straight through was 再见野鼬鼠 http://book.douban.com/subject/1084918/

One just general tip would be to pick an author and read several of his or her works in a row. The first one might be tough, but after one or two you'll get used to the author's style and his or her pet words, and it will take a lot of the edge off.

johnb, same thing to you as to ZLJ, any good simple easy-to-read (think nice simple words) recommendations for materials? Anything you've read in this category that you found interesting yet easy to read? I already know I can/should read childrens fairy tales, but i was hoping for a few recommendations for something at least in the young adult category. Maybe the Harry Potter translation is indeed the way to go.

That version of 西游记 is quite a lot of fun - although the vocab is sometimes a bit on the esoteric side (unless you spend your life casting spells and hitting demons with a large rake...)

I have this book based on 西游记 by Carolyn Shor Novick that is short chapters working its way through the story but has vocabulary lists and exercises as well as covering a relevant cultural story. ISBN:978-7-303-09390-8 if you are interested.

I was kinda hoping for a simplified version of the Water Margin but this one is good at my current level and seems to challenge as it goes through. The authors goal was to improve vocabulary through reading.

I also have a few of the Chinese Breeze books but I'm not sure about the status of these availability wise. These are good because they feel like a proper chinese novel but during the story they find ways to repeat certain things a number of times so they become understood.

Thanks Zhen. It seems this is similar to JohB's idea. I read a lot, so much so that my wife says I should talk more. But regardless, great minds must think alike! hehe

Hey thanks for the recommendation. I'll have to take a trip to the Xinhua bookstore for 一年甲班34号. Or at least I hope its there. I've just started diving into Bus Adventures (we got it for my 5 year old, as it has nice characters named Bei3bei, Nan2nan, xi1xi, and dong1dong) and i'm finding with my meager word and character count, this is probably challenging enough.

Erm, my teacher's advice I am taking to heart, but have not actually been practicing it yet--sorry to disappoint! But for the reaons cited above I do really believe in reading novels, if you're at the intermediate or higher level, have limited time and need to choose just one thing to do.

So you're open to juvenile lit? Do you know 《一年甲班34号》? When I found this poetic, cinematic picture book by Taiwanese illustrator-author 恩佐 (Enzo) I was mesmerized. Enzo shows us the world through the eyes of a boy in first grade, but this book isn't just to be enjoyed by kids.

http://book.douban.com/subject/2365261/

It was apparently made into a movie and released this year.

Enzo's website: http://www.wretch.cc/blog/tellenzo

I'm reading now 张天翼童话（一）, this one a for-children book of stories by 张天翼 which for me is just challenging enough without being too painful--and finding it so delightful. So much vocab and usage to learn! The little illustrations are wonderful too and help me stay engaged and my imagination expand. Trying to read this one through without using dictionaries, even if it means going over some bits not fully understanding.

The other thing I'm staying away from now is translated works, though I did really enjoy trying to go through the Alice in Wonderland books in Chinese before. I want to read Chinese people expressing Chinese thoughts in Chinese now.

zhenlijiang, do you have specific recommendations for novels? Anything you've read that you found enjoyable and recommend for a relative beginner? It would be helpful (at least for me) to have a sense of what i'm in for based on other people's recommendations; the Chinese equivalent of Harry Potter is one thing, War and Peace is another, and The Bluest Eye is another thing altogether.

I'll take a look. Thanks!

The funny thing is that the more I think about it, I don't think it is exactly a translating problem. I don't think I come up with an English sentence first, and then translate it. It is more of a recall problem when I get into minute details. I can recall, but sometimes there is a delay while I am putting together all of the elements to say what I want to say. Meanwhile, the conversation goes on.

i was thinking that too. thats what I felt subtitles did to me, dragged me back to english. I am pleased when I listen to a CPod conversation and I just recognise what I hearing without thinking "that means...." most often this is one or two words （generally really basic ones).

I think this thinking in the language is the key and I really hope that if I listen enough and read enough it will start to come.......

>>Not just translate in my head

There's your problem. At a certain point in time, you have to force yourself to think in the language and not translate. You are not a translator, you want to communicate.

For English, my trick was tell myself "I have to think in English". Stop translating words and grasp their meaning in a Chinese context.

I'm not at that stage yet, though :(

You need to be assertive and keep reminding her to slow down for you

Honestly, I couldn't disagree more. In one-on-one conversations, sure, your wife and friends should try to accomodate you, but even then it's not really doing you any favors. In most situations people won't slow down for you -- they'll either switch to another language that you speak better (if that's an option), keeping going full speed and lose you, or simply not communicate (the third is normally the case in any non-business situation).

In pretty much every pursuit, raising your game, rather than lowering your standards, is the way to go.

Ok, I have a similar problem with our a1yi2. She uses lots of slang, and has an Tian1jin1 accent. Usually, after she fires off some comment to me, and everyone else laughs, by the time I think of what I want to say, its 1 minute later.

My wife speaks slow enough. It's the other people. Actually it isn't a comprehension problem usually. It is a "I can't think fast enough' to jump in problem. By the time I organize my thoughts, they have moved on in the conversation. Basically, I need to think faster. Not just translate in my head (although I don't do that for basic stuff). Happily, I can usually handle it if they talk directly to me.

You need to be assertive and keep reminding her to slow down for you, so you can learn and at worst at least passively participate in the conversations by being able to get the gist of what is being said..

Well, I think I'm frustrated with all aspects (as I always am), but lately I hope to just build my vocabulary to the point that I don't always rely on simple, basic words. I also wish that when my wife talks to other people in Chinese, I could jump into the conversation somewhat as easily as if it were English. You see for me communicating is not a problem; keeping up at a native's speed and not asking "what?" all the time (or at least sometimes) is.

I also want to write without always checking a dictionary.

Okay, gotta go. Thanks for thinking, but don't think too hard. I would feel bad :-)

I went ahead and made a group for this if you are interested called "Daily learning journal". Feel free to join in....its lonely on my own :-)

Hehe, well, by all means don't do it. It's better to drink from a faucet than a fire hydrant if our mouths aren't big enough yet. I hope that analogy isn't stupid.

Yeah you can just ignore it, but something about it makes my headache!

Maybe its because you are at a much higher level than I and already have all the sentence patterns down, for me I find variations in the translation that make it more confusing rather than less..

I like the diary idea. I've never been good at keeping one, but I bet I could manage a couple sentences about my day in Chinese. Here goes:

天气：晴朗的，不太冷

今天我第一次有足疗（疯的，对吗？我一年没去）员工都是年轻男人，不跟我聊天。我觉得修脚女人是比较好人。但是可能这些男人怕我。其实，我是非常可怕的。

Actually, this would be a good 汉字吧 conversation.

I also like all the suggestions for reading. Prolific reading is how I learned to express myself in English after all... wait, can one read prolifically? You aren't actually producing anything. I may have just refuted my own argument.

But can't you just ignore the English side and only look at it when you run into trouble?

I've tried dual language books but often find that this makes things worse for me. I've done the same with movies put them on the iPod with the subtitles and just become even more confused.

I think this is because my biggest issues are about word order and things and I'm so busy trying to work out how "xxxx" lines up with the English. I decided to take off the subtitles and just listen to as much as I can understand. I now hear more I understand even if it is only a small percentage of a film.

Working through readers is the way I'm picking up most at the moment as with lack of any chinese friends or spouse vocal use of chinese is not common. I find working through a book that is in Chinese only and reading chapter by chapter ( current book is a reader based on 西游记）I note down 汉字 I don't know as I read then look them up afterwards. I feel doubly ashamed if these continue to show up in future notes!

Next year I plan to write a daily diary.....maybe even on CPod for others to laugh at/correct ;-)

to no. 4: after simon pettersson's reference to "shadowing", I started shadowing lessons which were beyond my scope and found that, while not understanding everything of course, I could understand more than I thought when I shadowed (albeit not quite like the officially recommended way, out load and in motion - I just repeat in my head what they are saying . This stops your mind wandering). What happened to Simon Pettersson by the way?

All the books I've got don't have any English translations, but they have characters and pinyin underneath (like childrens' books in China). Although the pinyin is useful if you want to look something up in the dictionary, the downside is I often find my eyes wandering towards the pinyin instead of the characters which is not so good.

I agree, it's also interesting to look at how different languages deal with concepts in different ways. And a good translation can really help bring out the 'flavour' of the language rather than just the literal meaning.

Thanks for the tips. Regarding number five, do you ever read dual language books? I have in the past read books where one side is English, and the other side is Chinese. I only look at the English side if I need to understand. Sometimes the translation expresses a concept, especially an abstract one, in a completely different way, which I like because it is more authentic, or at least I imagine so.

yeah, 150-200 sentence patterns. I didn't go through all the TLI books as I should have, but had I done so, I believe I would see somewhere between that many that were taught. That's the basic pattern; you could of course build up on these. I created a group to focus on these patterns, but I'm not sure how the group is going to evolve. I'd welcome input if you have any.

http://chinesepod.com/community/groups/view/sentence-patterns-1423

I was thinking the same as Sue, I amaze myself at tripping over the same patterns again and again. Once someone has translated it I always kick myself but it still does it time and time again.

Is that true pretzellogic that there's ("only") 150-200 sentence patterns in Chinese ? are they listed anywhere as such ? I think you're probably right in working this way. It gives structure to your learning, a daily (or whatever) target and workload. And the freedom and creativity to choose your own content to practise the pattern.

based on my casual observations, I think i'm 3 years behind you on Chinese learning, plus I do not have a Chinese spouse, plus I do not work in China. So I can believe you don't have the sentence problems I have. But as I said, if you try this, let me know. Motivation is always a challenge to doing what i've suggested. You have to think that this is worth doing.

That's a pretty good suggestion. I might go for it. Thanks. Although, I actually am not sure if I have problems with sentence patterns (and I am quite serious when I say, "I don't know"). But I think there might be another benefit to your approach, at least for me. It is a good way to use use new and forgotten vocabulary. I often tell myself that I should make sentences using vocabulary because just memorizing words without context is meaningless. However, I just never feel like it is interesting to write random sentences. If I had a sentence pattern to test my vocab with, somehow I might trick myself into liking it better.