Chinese Reflection Blog

Before I started writing this paper, I doubted my ability to actually write a research paper in Chinese. Since I have been writing, I have realized that most people can write a paper, but it is really hard to write at an advanced level. I feel that I have simplified my topic a lot due to the fact that my writing style is very limited in Chinese. Therefore, I intend to use this experience to bring my writing level to a higher level by incorporating new grammatical structures. I know that I can make myself understood by using my basic level of Chinese, but I understand that is not the best way to write a paper.

Because we have really started to write our research papers this week, I have been using, for the first time, Chinese sources! Since I started studying Chinese, I have always been asked to write journals, short essays, etc and thus have become a bit more accustomed to writing in the language. Even in this class, we have been asked to write quite a bit, yet have never been required to do outside research. Therefore, as I started writing the first page of my paper lat night, I was confronted with not only writing the page, but also with doing my research only in Chinese. Perhaps this is not a surprise, but it took me considerably longer to write this one page than it normally does to write a reflection paper in Chinese. In any case, although it is frustrating at times when I realize that my writing in Chinese is not as advanced as I would like, I think this  I is a very good exercise overall. Of course, it is a bit daunting to go over your own writing with fellow students, but I guess this is something that I will have to get over.

Wow, I feel it has been a long time since I have written in this blog, but I guess that spring break will do that to you! I think like most people, my week before spring break was incredibly busy and I did not have much time to formally study Chinese. However, as part of an interview process for an internship, I had to write a one page project proposal using only the Chinese sources that they gave to me. Although I was not IN school during spring break, I spent much of it working on this proposal and am glad to say that I got the internship. This gives me confirmation that my Chinese is really improving, as I doubt I would have been able to complete that task as well as I did only a couple of months ago. Because this class is my first Chinese class that is more of a “class taught in Chinese” rather than a class that only teaches us vocabulary, I feel that I have been learning more and more complex terms. Additionally, I am gaining familiarity with reading different sources in Chinese and feel that my understanding of the language has really skyrocketed. At this point, I think that my speaking and writing skills are not quite as strong as my listening and reading, but I think I am still shy to speak Chinese. In any case, since returning to school a week ago, I have been working on my “great leap forward” project, and even though I am nervous about the actual presentation (I am shy about my Chinese!) I am excited about the fact that I can actually read Chinese sources to some extent now. Of course, Chinese is a language that one has to consistently keep up in their  that day to day lives in order to retain all of the vocabulary, and I am trying to read as often as I can, even if only for a few minutes a day. My internship this summer will place me in a direct Chinese speaking environment and I think that this will really help me!

I enjoyed the last week of class, and feel that my Chinese is getting better, although I still feel behind some of my classmates. I guess in any language class there is always a difference between students who grew up being exposed to the language and those who started studying it a later date. Because I have never been in a class with people who had more experience speaking and studying than I did, I feel that this aspect of class is a little bit of a culture shock! Having only studied the romance languages where everyone started learning them the same time in high school, I am used to always being surrounded by people the same level as me. I have probably had some of the least exposure to studying Chinese language, as even though I was in the country for five months, I only formally studied for about a year. At times, I think that this puts me at a disadvantage.

In any case, I think that continuing to push myself and continuing to come to office hours will help increase my language and hopefully I will feel more confident speaking Chinese!

As I mentioned in my previous post, I am trying to take a REALLY  proactive stance with learning Chinese, as I am quickly realizing that four hours a week is simply not enough. As a result, I am trying to read more, and have spent a long time trying to decipher BBC articles! I understand that Chinese is a hard language to learn, and in order to see progress, I need to make the extra effort. I always have considered myself to be a very hard worker, but languages have always come easily to me. Even when I was first in China knowing very little Chinese, I was able to pick it up SO quickly due to the fact that I was living in the country and had to use Chinese all the time. I assumed that restarting Chinese class would allow me to learn at the same speed that I was learning at before, yet I have realized that the only way I will effectively learn the language is if I make the extra effort to continue to push myself outside of class. I am lucky enough to work at the library, where I can practice Chinese every day with my boss, but I have also recently attained a language partner. Hopefully this will continue to raise my language level. It was difficult for me to understand a lot of “Early Spring in February,” thus making it a bit difficult to reflect on the movie, but I am confident that my level will continue to increase. I am excited for my Tuesday morning drill sessions as well!

Due to my current internship search (and subsequent interviews) I have come to the conclusion that I need to immerse myself in the language as much as possible. Therefore, starting from last week I have tried to read the BBC in Chinese ( as much as possible) and will listen to broadcasts just so I can improve my language level. Chinese language improvement partially comes from being accustomed to listening and speaking the language, and thus I am determined to do as much as possible outside of class. I think that the small group sessions with the TA are really going to help as well, for I will get to focus on the areas of the language where I have the most difficulty. Hopefully, all of this hard work will help me do better in my upcoming interview, which could very well be in Chinese!

Additionally, I am really enjoying the lessons that we are getting about Chinese history. Even though I have studied some of it in the past, it is really interesting to learn it from the Chinese perspective and discuss the differences between Taiwan and mainland China.

I really enjoyed the activities we did during the third week of class. I always feel the most confident in class when I am forced to speak and thus I really like when we do interactive games. For some reason, I think that I struggled the most with the essay due on Monday than I did with the others. I feel like Chinese is always a game of me trying to find the words that can best convey my meaning without knowing a substantial amount of Chinese vocabulary. Last semester, we memorized countless amounts of vocabulary, but because we learned so much in such a short time, many words did not stick. I think this is my biggest challenge with learning Chinese for only four hours a week because I have difficulty retaining all of the vocabulary. It is frustrating to compare learning Chinese with learning romance languages, as I feel I absorbed the language much faster in French and Spanish. I am not sure how to get my vocabulary up to a higher level, but I think if I continue to read as much as possible in Chinese (and listen to broadcasts) hopefully this will happen in time!

I think I was dealt with a firsthand experience about why I need to really practice my Chinese fluency this week. I had a “surprise” Chinese interview with the UN in Beijing on Wednesday, and I really struggled to get my points across. Of course, I had no way of knowing that this interview would not be conducted in English, as all prior communication had been done in English and the woman I was speaking with did not know Chinese. Unfortunately, I learned the hard way that one should ALWAYS be prepared to speak in Chinese about any topic. It was discouraging to say the least, as I had really prepared for the interview in English and struggled to adequately express my ideas in Chinese. As a result, I really want to continue practice speaking the language in class and discuss a wide range of topics so I am able to handle myself well in any “surprise” Chinese situation. Although I could understand the questions and answer them in some capacity, I struggled to find the right words to express myself. I think that this class is going to really help me think on my feet in Chinese and be able to speak well, I just wish my interview had been later in the semester!

Hi all,

I think that this first week of Chinese has both been a bit daunting, as I fear I don’t really remember the language as well as I should, but also exciting because I am confident that I will get a lot out of the class. My Chinese learning experience has always been inconsistent, as my university did not offer many classes in the language. As a result, by the end of my freshman year of undergrad, I had already finished the Chinese language curriculum. I actually minored in Spanish, but was able to study abroad in Beijing with an intensive language immersion program. Most of my Chinese came from just living in the country and being forced to use it on a daily basis, so sometimes I feel that I can express myself fairly easily in the language, but that I continue to have a very basic vocabulary. I am excited that this class will be more reminiscent of the Chinese courses I took while in China because it is REALLY interactive! I like how we have been forced to do presentations since the first day of class, and I hope that I can regain the confidence that I once had with learning Chinese. Even though I feel that we studied a lot of new vocabulary last semester, I do not think I retained it very well, as we were not continually forced to use it. I am really excited for this class and hope that I will be able to keep up!