That begging part of the test is 大家好，欢迎参加hsk一级考试. I like how they alternate with a male and female voice for the intro. For whatever reason, when I first started studying I had more difficulties understanding male voices than I had understanding female voices. The character changes that happen throughout the series of books really help open your listening ability to a range of voices.
I find it so interesting that its harder for you to understand male voices than female voices. I was actually the opposite early on and i think it's because even though I am female, I found that in Mandarin some female voices were very high pitched and I couldn't hear the tone differences. Also, whenever I would try practicing speaking by saying what I heard, I would always over compensate by speaking in a higher tone. I found that when I listened to male speakers and tried 'shadowing' I stayed in my normal vocal range. I wonder if it's because I don't have a high-pitched voice (I typically don't like listening to speakers who have a high-pitched voice in English anyway). Maybe your pitch matches more so to female Chinese speakers. Eitherway, I think listening to a variety of speakers/pitches is very helpful as you said!
I also think it could be related to my musical background. I’m very tuned to relative pitch differences, and I find that it’s easier to hear those differences when someone with a higher timbre voice speaks! Someone with a lower voice tends to have a smaller pitch change when they say different tones since it’s lower in their vocal register. The most interesting thing though is that my natural speaking voice has actually gotten lower because of the third tone! It was very hard to say the third tone while speaking through the roof of my mouth (characteristic of Romance language speakers), so I had to shift my speaking pattern to come from lower in my throat!
I watch your videos religiously, but I'm not learning Chinese. Some of your videos are general language tips but I watch the niche Chinese videos and I don't know why. I think it's the good editing? You also have great energy in your videos so I think that plays a part. Anyways, keep making great stuff!
awww thank youu!! I really appreciate that hehh. i'll be making more videos showing my experiencing life in chinese, so hopefully that'll be interesting for you as well!!
Hey Bianca! I love your videos! With the help of your anki flashcards, I finally passed hsk 4 exam. I'm just wondering if you're planning to share hsk5 cards. It would be extremely helpful if you do so. Thank you for making these videos. You really encouraged me to move forward
omggg wooow congrats!!! that's such an amazing achievement!! and yes, ill be posting them in two months!! as a little sneak peak, i'll also be showing my daily progress going through a very intensive HSK5 study plan (I want to take a mock test in 2 months!). I'll be posting the study schedule, short daily vlogs, and i'll release the HSK5 anki deck by the end of February! so keep an eye out for that!
you are a big help for me, I am going to take level 4 in June and I'm actually freaked out. I made a very serious study plan for the upcoming weeks now, I've made tons of practice tests. at first when I made the practice test it was very hard for me to understand ESPECIALLY the second reading part where you have to re-arrange the sentences, but after I've been making more and more tests I feel like I'm getting slightly more confident about my HSK Exam. I know that I can easily beat the test now wit at least a 180, but that is not enough for the university that I want to enrol in. so one of the things I want to share based on my experience: LEARN THE VOCAB, CHINESE CHARACTERS AND GRAMMAR ASAP! because o boy you will have a hard time on the test when you don't know them. especially with the advanced levels where I heard that you need to write a freakin ONE PAGE ESSAY on the test. man I'm going to die when I pass level 4 and move on to level 5, I wonder how people write an ESSAY in CHINESE within 2 HOURS!
Such an amazing point!!! Pinyin is just a learning tool, but it will hold you back if you don’t actually learn characters. And especially for the HSK, you’ll need to learn how to write the characters from memory to write those essays (unless they’ve officially transitioned to all computer based tests which would be amazing). Plus, part of the fun is fully immersing yourself in the language, which includes the beautiful characters!! Good luck on your exam!! I’m sure you’ll kill it :)
Just FYI for learners of HSK1 who might read this, at 13:50 the last character in the sentence is a typo and should be 吗 not 码 (I would guess this is why Bianca faltered right there!). 吗 is used for questions whereas 码 usually relates to numerical things.
Awesome video! I Just started learning 中文 like a few days ago. I'm 24.If you don't mind, could I ask how old you are? How much of a difference do you think for example learning Chinese at age twenty is vs age thirty? These are things I'm curious about. Anyways I'm having a blast with the language thank you for your time.
i'm also in my twenties!! honestly, the only real biological difference to language acquisition is childhood versus adulthood. there's a critical period in childhood in which we are more predisposed to pick up languages and even accents due to the stage of brain development at that point! as we get older, our brains runs more efficiently, so it gets rid of connections that aren't necessary. children on the other hand, have constantly changing and forming neural connections that help them pick up tons of new information, including languages. however, once you're past your teen years, in terms of brain development and language acquisition, it's all pretty much the same. so there isn't a huge difference learning a language in your twenties versus your thirties, at least from a brain anatomy and neurochemistry perspective. the thing that is different, however, is stamina, motivation, and time. in your twenties, you tend to have less responsibilities and commitments with higher levels of intrinsic motivation and time. this means you can devote more time to studying per day and studying for longer periods of time, all of which help with language acquisition. in your thirties, you can still do this and get tons of progress, but most people decide to focus more on their careers, have a family, devote their time to other things in life. priorities shift from solely learning the language, which will decrease their ability to learn. it's not a matter of one age groups predisposition or ability to learn a language, but rather their willingness and time they invest into learning. as mattvsjapan shared about his own language learning journey, intensive study can be an incredibly isolating process depending on your goals, and some people would rather prioritize other things!
That begging part of the test is 大家好，欢迎参加hsk一级考试. I like how they alternate with a male and female voice for the intro. For whatever reason, when I first started studying I had more difficulties understanding male voices than I had understanding female voices. The character changes that happen throughout the series of books really help open your listening ability to a range of voices.
I totally agree with you!!!! its so important to expose yourself to a variety of voices when you're studying!
I find it so interesting that its harder for you to understand male voices than female voices. I was actually the opposite early on and i think it's because even though I am female, I found that in Mandarin some female voices were very high pitched and I couldn't hear the tone differences. Also, whenever I would try practicing speaking by saying what I heard, I would always over compensate by speaking in a higher tone. I found that when I listened to male speakers and tried 'shadowing' I stayed in my normal vocal range. I wonder if it's because I don't have a high-pitched voice (I typically don't like listening to speakers who have a high-pitched voice in English anyway). Maybe your pitch matches more so to female Chinese speakers. Eitherway, I think listening to a variety of speakers/pitches is very helpful as you said!
For me a ''male'' voice is the best in GPS.However, Female is better while learning.
I also think it could be related to my musical background. I’m very tuned to relative pitch differences, and I find that it’s easier to hear those differences when someone with a higher timbre voice speaks! Someone with a lower voice tends to have a smaller pitch change when they say different tones since it’s lower in their vocal register. The most interesting thing though is that my natural speaking voice has actually gotten lower because of the third tone! It was very hard to say the third tone while speaking through the roof of my mouth (characteristic of Romance language speakers), so I had to shift my speaking pattern to come from lower in my throat!
I watch your videos religiously, but I'm not learning Chinese. Some of your videos are general language tips but I watch the niche Chinese videos and I don't know why. I think it's the good editing? You also have great energy in your videos so I think that plays a part. Anyways, keep making great stuff!
awww thank youu!! I really appreciate that hehh. i'll be making more videos showing my experiencing life in chinese, so hopefully that'll be interesting for you as well!!
Hey Bianca! I love your videos! With the help of your anki flashcards, I finally passed hsk 4 exam. I'm just wondering if you're planning to share hsk5 cards. It would be extremely helpful if you do so. Thank you for making these videos. You really encouraged me to move forward
omggg wooow congrats!!! that's such an amazing achievement!! and yes, ill be posting them in two months!! as a little sneak peak, i'll also be showing my daily progress going through a very intensive HSK5 study plan (I want to take a mock test in 2 months!). I'll be posting the study schedule, short daily vlogs, and i'll release the HSK5 anki deck by the end of February! so keep an eye out for that!
Yes!!! a practice HSK 1 exam 🙌🏽 this is clutch👌
you got 5 practice exams!!! :) 加油！
you are a big help for me, I am going to take level 4 in June and I'm actually freaked out. I made a very serious study plan for the upcoming weeks now, I've made tons of practice tests. at first when I made the practice test it was very hard for me to understand ESPECIALLY the second reading part where you have to re-arrange the sentences, but after I've been making more and more tests I feel like I'm getting slightly more confident about my HSK Exam. I know that I can easily beat the test now wit at least a 180, but that is not enough for the university that I want to enrol in. so one of the things I want to share based on my experience: LEARN THE VOCAB, CHINESE CHARACTERS AND GRAMMAR ASAP! because o boy you will have a hard time on the test when you don't know them. especially with the advanced levels where I heard that you need to write a freakin ONE PAGE ESSAY on the test. man I'm going to die when I pass level 4 and move on to level 5, I wonder how people write an ESSAY in CHINESE within 2 HOURS!
Such an amazing point!!! Pinyin is just a learning tool, but it will hold you back if you don’t actually learn characters. And especially for the HSK, you’ll need to learn how to write the characters from memory to write those essays (unless they’ve officially transitioned to all computer based tests which would be amazing). Plus, part of the fun is fully immersing yourself in the language, which includes the beautiful characters!!
Good luck on your exam!! I’m sure you’ll kill it :)
Just FYI for learners of HSK1 who might read this, at 13:50 the last character in the sentence is a typo and should be 吗 not 码 (I would guess this is why Bianca faltered right there!). 吗 is used for questions whereas 码 usually relates to numerical things.
oh I didn't even notice that LOL rip
Awesome video! I Just started learning 中文 like a few days ago. I'm 24.If you don't mind, could I ask how old you are? How much of a difference do you think for example learning Chinese at age twenty is vs age thirty? These are things I'm curious about. Anyways I'm having a blast with the language thank you for your time.
i'm also in my twenties!! honestly, the only real biological difference to language acquisition is childhood versus adulthood. there's a critical period in childhood in which we are more predisposed to pick up languages and even accents due to the stage of brain development at that point! as we get older, our brains runs more efficiently, so it gets rid of connections that aren't necessary. children on the other hand, have constantly changing and forming neural connections that help them pick up tons of new information, including languages. however, once you're past your teen years, in terms of brain development and language acquisition, it's all pretty much the same.
so there isn't a huge difference learning a language in your twenties versus your thirties, at least from a brain anatomy and neurochemistry perspective. the thing that is different, however, is stamina, motivation, and time. in your twenties, you tend to have less responsibilities and commitments with higher levels of intrinsic motivation and time. this means you can devote more time to studying per day and studying for longer periods of time, all of which help with language acquisition. in your thirties, you can still do this and get tons of progress, but most people decide to focus more on their careers, have a family, devote their time to other things in life. priorities shift from solely learning the language, which will decrease their ability to learn. it's not a matter of one age groups predisposition or ability to learn a language, but rather their willingness and time they invest into learning. as mattvsjapan shared about his own language learning journey, intensive study can be an incredibly isolating process depending on your goals, and some people would rather prioritize other things!
@@bianca.phdinprogress thank you for this well thought out reply! Keep up the good work on UA-cam!
@@bianca.phdinprogress congrats on 2k :)
@@unattendedcandle thank you soo muchh!! hopefully I can keep releasing good stuff :)
2k baby lessgoooOoOo
wooohooooo c:
:)
c: