Answers
Aug 01, 2013 - 05:36 PM
There are no Chinese characters in this program. Sonia does speak to this in the course introduction. It doesn't look like they plan to add it. You may want to look for an iOS or Android app that teaches characters, there are some out there. The nice thing about some of these is that with the touch screens you can trace the characters and the app will provide feedback. There is also "My Chinese Coach" for the Nintendo DS that is mostly well received. - Chris
Aug 05, 2013 - 08:49 AM
I think it's a sound choice to teach speech first. You'll have your hands pretty full anyway. There is a free program available for android and iOS, called Pleco. It's a dictionary and could help you with the characters as well. It has optional (paid, but sometimes "on special") character recognition tools that allow you to paint or photograph characters. i have the painting version, and it's pretty good. But other than that, if you're into some truely serous academic effort and decide to learn the characters (2000 should be enough to get by, begin to read a newspaper and so forth) Tuttle does some books that would help.Try this one for a taster:
http://www.amazon.com/The-First-100-C...
and this:
http://www.amazon.com/Basic-Written-C...
But I suggest you let yourself enjoy the success that Sonia will bring you first, then later go for the struggle of reading and writing when you are less likely to feel hopeless!) When you do, you might also want to check out "DUABLE". They're not live yet, but "DU" is Chinese for "Read" and they look like they have a very interesting techinque for turning regular web pages that you're interested in into flashcard like things, by changing a few words here and there into Chinese. Brilliant idea!
Good luck...
http://www.amazon.com/The-First-100-C...
and this:
http://www.amazon.com/Basic-Written-C...
But I suggest you let yourself enjoy the success that Sonia will bring you first, then later go for the struggle of reading and writing when you are less likely to feel hopeless!) When you do, you might also want to check out "DUABLE". They're not live yet, but "DU" is Chinese for "Read" and they look like they have a very interesting techinque for turning regular web pages that you're interested in into flashcard like things, by changing a few words here and there into Chinese. Brilliant idea!
Good luck...
Aug 26, 2013 - 12:13 PM
Found this yesterday. Looks like a pretty good teaching style. Small word of warning. The author seems to be Taiwanese (I think that's what i read), and she seems to use some dialect words that aren't "standard mandarin", or at least aren't standard according to my resources. Also, she seems to be working in traditional rather than simplified characters. However, it's pretty effective, so I hope it helps. She has a TEDx talk too that you can find by searching for chineasy tedx. Here's her main page: http://chineasy.org/
Sep 28, 2013 - 10:02 AM
I'm on Level 4 of German and would like to continue with Fluenz into another language when I finish German Level 5. I thought I'd try Mandarin, although I am sorry to see Fluenz only has Levels 1-3 for it. Thought I'd go with it anyway, but I definitely want written Mandarin, not just spoken, in part because it would help me somewhat with the Japanese I already know and want to learn more of. I'm glad I saw this discussion. I don't think I'll be taking up Mandarin through Fluenz. Thank you, earlier posters, for your info!
Oct 11, 2013 - 06:56 PM
I really don't think that it's a problem not learning the characters. The great thing about learning everything in Pinyin is that you are forced to learn the tones, which is extremely important. I just started doing some "level 2" evening classes for Mandarin at my university as well, and my memorization (and pronunciation) of tones is much better than those of my classmates, even though some of them currently speak more Chinese than me.
If you really want to learn characters, there are plenty of $20 books out there such as "Chinese in Steps" which have plenty of words in (and can also help improve your vocab). But I will say this: after 1 month of using Fluenz, I can speak far more Mandarin than after spending one year of my time on evening classes...
If you really want to learn characters, there are plenty of $20 books out there such as "Chinese in Steps" which have plenty of words in (and can also help improve your vocab). But I will say this: after 1 month of using Fluenz, I can speak far more Mandarin than after spending one year of my time on evening classes...
Feb 04, 2014 - 07:49 PM
I would like to say that this course is perfect for learning characters!Let me explain.If you switch your keyboard language to Simplified Chinese you can type in the pinyin and the corresponding character will show up.After many times of seeing that same character it begins to just 'stick' into your mind that that is what it means.And some characters look like the idea they convey!For example If I want to 'type' the character for to learn/to study I would type 'xue' (pronounced with the 2nd rising tone)and it will come out like this if the keyboard is switched to chinese.xue=学.To me it looks like a person with a light bulb going off on his head,so I can associate that with learn/or study.After seeing this so many times(typing I study chinese)It stuck in my mind!But then you might ask what about words that are spelled the same but with different tones!?!?Good question!Lets take 'wen' for example.'Wen' with the second rising tone means language and 'wen' with the 4th falling tone means to ask.So this is what I do.Say I want to type the character for 'to ask'.I will go into google translate and type in english 'to ask'.I already know it is 'wen' with the falling 4th tone.I just dont know the character.So after it translates it will show the character with the pinyin version below it.So after seeing the character I know that it is 问!So then I go back to what ever I was typing and(with the chinese keyboard mode still activated)I type in 'wen'.When typing a pinyin word with more than one meaning it will usually show two or more characters as a choice with a number beside it.For example it may show 问1文2.I want 1.So I will type 'wen' then hit 1 and I will get 问!So using this method I see a character over and over again and I just 'magically' learn it,so to speak ;)....Hope this helps.You can use Microsoft Pinyin or Sogou Pinyin.I like Sogou pinyin better but you may need someone to help you set it up since the instilationb is not in English.Happy character learning!Just remember the pinyin spelling you learned in Fluenz Mandarin!