It helps me to think of learning an unrelated language as the 'true' baseline - then Chinese seems normal, & Spanish looks like starting with a couple thousand hour head start. Babies learn them all at the same rate, so none is inherently more difficult. I also find it helpful to remember that we're literally wired to acquire languages if we accumulate enough input - it just takes time. Thousands of hours are necessary, but they are also sufficient. Over-efforting, frustration & beating ourselves up are just a form of banging our head against a wall - they aren't going to make the brain remodel itself any faster.
completely agree!! although the reason for this difference in language acquisition as a child vs an adult is due to a critical period in picking up languages! when we're children, no language is inherently more difficult as you mentioned because solid linguistic connections haven't formed yet. There's a process of forming connections as children that then get pruned (selectively eliminate unnecessary connections) to increase efficiency of language communication and solidify language from a more basic form of communication to something more nuanced and advanced. As adults though, our connections have already been formed and pruned for our native language because that is what is needed for our survival. Forming new language patterns ultimately becomes more challenging since you're going against the patterns your brain was told was the way things work. But neural connections are actually really fluid to help us adapt to situations, which means that although more difficult than language acquisition as a child, it's still incredibly possible to learn as an adult! we just have to rewire our perception of what language patterns are if they're different from our native ones!
I love how your videos also include a mental health/enjoyment/encourage aspect to them, in addition to all the knowledge that you provide. Thanks again for your help on this journey of learning Chinese!
aww thank you!! often times we can get so caught up in "I NEED TO LEARN WHY AM I NOT LEARNING FAST ENOUGH" (I definitely feel that a LOT), so it's really important for me to show that we can be kind to ourselves too. Language learning is definitely challenging, but it's also such an enjoyable experience! I hope that we can emphasize focusing on the amazing aspects as opposed to how much language we still have to learn.
This is one of the best language learning journey videoI have seen. I wished all beginners can stumble across it. this video addresses ever single beginner’s problem learning the language thank you so very ❤
“Watching 100s of hours of Matt v Japan content…” -Haha, yes and yes! Right now I’m working on going directly from Mentalease to the TL. 😪. Lol. So hard. Great video!
that is definitely challenging!! to help me with that, I made the effort from the beginning to not translate. Luca Lampariello does the bi-directional translation method, which is definitely helpful for acquiring language, but when I tried to do that with chinese, it just made me to focused on the english, not the chinese. From the start, even if didn't understand a sentence 100%, if I understand most of it in the chinese without translating, then I know it. the specifics will come along the way :)
@@bianca.phdinprogress That a great tip! Yeah Luca’s technique is def the opposite effect. I’m running into the trap of initially understanding the gist without translation but then checking it with English because I don’t trust I fully understood it! 😅
trust yourself! how do we pick up new words in our native language? we just hear it in a bunch of contexts and learn how it works even if we don't pick up a dictionary to look up its definition! As you get more advanced, a skill you'll need to develop is trust that you understand the sentence even if you don't look up every single word :)
I'm at a very beginner stage, and I'm so glad I found your channel. I'm not going to lie, this vid is equally motivating and terrifying though, lol. @9:50 - Yes, that's a common misconception I see in many forums and in a couple of conversations.... that Chinese and English have similar word structure, but that's only true in the basic sentences. As you move further along, sentence patterns start to change. For example, in English (or in Spanish, my native language) we don't leave the word "how much" at the end --- I can keep on going with more differences @10:23 - Yup, you called it here, and I think that's the key towards learning any language ---- think like a native. I do something that might be a little silly, but it has helped me: when I come across a sentence, I translate it literally, as it would be said/written in Mandarin; example: "liang3 ping2 shui3 duo1shao3 qian2? = two bottle water how much money?"...this has aided me in wrapping my head around the grammar and understand native speaker's thought process The characters are fun and I treat it like solving a puzzle or a riddle, but then again, I might have a completely different opinion on this a year from now lol
I love this!! and yeah, I mean it's unrealistic to say that learning a language is gonna be easy-peezy. it's unfair to portray language learning as something that "just comes naturally". It'll take work and will probably (definitely for me) be frustrating, but it's also so motivation, so exciting, so fulfilling, and just so much fun too!! Although it's difficult, we are more than able to learn given enough time, effort, and motivation :) and tbh I do that same thing HAHA. I was showing my taiwanese friend my flashcards (i'm focusing on just audio sentence cards, so just sentence audio on the front and the written sentence on the back). I try not to translate to english because there's things that just can't be translated 1:1 (I don't want to develop that habit), but I was translating a card for my friend to show her my progress and she's like wow, you said the sentence in english as if a chinese person was saying it HAHA. it's been really helpful for me to consciously notice when I'm trying to produce a sentence in more of an english manner as opposed to the chinese manner of thinking!
I'm only 2 ish months in but number three is so true for me. the tones come super easy to me to the point where I thought i was actually super bad because i WASNT struggling
yeahh some things just come more naturally to certain people while other things are much more challenging! for me, i'm a musician (piano, vocals, and dabble in acoustic guitar), so my ears are already tuned to pitch, which definitely helps out with tones!
I completely understand. 😂 Tones are definitely not hard, and after awhile of repeating the same word you just naturally pronounce it that way. (For me at least)
I have been studying mandarin for 3 months and I am using Duolingo, HelloChinese, ChineseSkill, and Du Chinese to practice. plus I have cue cards and lots of notes on words and HSK 1 vocabulary. I am currently studying for HSK 1 exam, should I buy the textbook and workbook to study?
There's abook series I'd like to hear your opinion on. It's called Cracking the Chinese Puzzle. I can send you a copy. Also I'd like to suggest you check out the youtuber that introduced me to the book, Stuart Jay Raj, especially his talk with Matt and other videos on tones. I didn't sign up for any of his programs but he name drops good resources now and then. Great video!
@@bianca.phdinprogress I have the abriged version- That's why I offered to send you a copy. I used it for getting a better understanding of Kanji. Chapters three through seven are a pain to get through, after that I referenced the book at whatever Kanji I was learning. I takes time but definitely pays off- I usually don't mind waisting my time learning particular histories of Kanji. I heard of it for the first time here: ua-cam.com/video/zIdnsfFg9Vs/v-deo.html Here's also a cool video of his discussing cursive Hanzi or grass style Kanji: ua-cam.com/video/0gfiRaQeAkQ/v-deo.html Hope you enjoy it:Many thanks for your great content!
when you talk about the hard things it really sound extremely hard to the point I would give up I haven't already decided to learn chinese. I've heard from other people that is easy, and you know at the end to learn a new language is not easy. English is easy in some things and hard in others, chinese is easier than english in some things and harder in others. For example spelling in english is not that as easy as spanish. I'm studying hsk3 and so far it's been easier than english, at least grammar is way easier than english at basic, and middle levels but again to achive the advance level of any language is never easy.
I completely agree! I find that withe Chinese there's an inverted bell curve to perceived difficulty. The beginning seems SO DIFFICULT because there are so many different components when compared with English. You got tones, characters, no alphabet, no phonetic way to "sound out" words, and that can be really intimidating. But as you get over those hurdles, it gets so much easier. I also found that once I got to intermediate levels, Chinese grammar was way easier than English, listening wasn't actually that hard, I read faster Chinese than in English because characters are so efficient! But now that I'm using native content, I'm realizing how much complexity is packed into each word and how well native speakers convey intricate meanings and word play into seemingly simple sentences! I think for English speakers that are used to learning Romance languages (I learned Spanish in school), the barrier to entry is much higher, which makes it seem impossible in the beginning for many!
It helps me to think of learning an unrelated language as the 'true' baseline - then Chinese seems normal, & Spanish looks like starting with a couple thousand hour head start. Babies learn them all at the same rate, so none is inherently more difficult. I also find it helpful to remember that we're literally wired to acquire languages if we accumulate enough input - it just takes time. Thousands of hours are necessary, but they are also sufficient. Over-efforting, frustration & beating ourselves up are just a form of banging our head against a wall - they aren't going to make the brain remodel itself any faster.
completely agree!! although the reason for this difference in language acquisition as a child vs an adult is due to a critical period in picking up languages! when we're children, no language is inherently more difficult as you mentioned because solid linguistic connections haven't formed yet. There's a process of forming connections as children that then get pruned (selectively eliminate unnecessary connections) to increase efficiency of language communication and solidify language from a more basic form of communication to something more nuanced and advanced. As adults though, our connections have already been formed and pruned for our native language because that is what is needed for our survival. Forming new language patterns ultimately becomes more challenging since you're going against the patterns your brain was told was the way things work. But neural connections are actually really fluid to help us adapt to situations, which means that although more difficult than language acquisition as a child, it's still incredibly possible to learn as an adult! we just have to rewire our perception of what language patterns are if they're different from our native ones!
I love how your videos also include a mental health/enjoyment/encourage aspect to them, in addition to all the knowledge that you provide. Thanks again for your help on this journey of learning Chinese!
aww thank you!! often times we can get so caught up in "I NEED TO LEARN WHY AM I NOT LEARNING FAST ENOUGH" (I definitely feel that a LOT), so it's really important for me to show that we can be kind to ourselves too. Language learning is definitely challenging, but it's also such an enjoyable experience! I hope that we can emphasize focusing on the amazing aspects as opposed to how much language we still have to learn.
Interesting ✨. I just restarted learning Chinese after dumping it for awhile 😅. Wish me luck 😸
you can do it!! just enjoy the process and be celebrate any and all accomplishments :)
Did you stick with it or drop it again?
This is one of the best language learning journey videoI have seen. I wished all beginners can stumble across it. this video addresses ever single beginner’s problem learning the language thank you so very ❤
I'm so glad it's helpful!! :)
Thanks for your content! I just finished HSK 1 thanks to your resources and encouragement.
woohoooo such a great accomplishment :)))
“Watching 100s of hours of Matt v Japan content…” -Haha, yes and yes! Right now I’m working on going directly from Mentalease to the TL. 😪. Lol. So hard. Great video!
that is definitely challenging!! to help me with that, I made the effort from the beginning to not translate. Luca Lampariello does the bi-directional translation method, which is definitely helpful for acquiring language, but when I tried to do that with chinese, it just made me to focused on the english, not the chinese. From the start, even if didn't understand a sentence 100%, if I understand most of it in the chinese without translating, then I know it. the specifics will come along the way :)
@@bianca.phdinprogress That a great tip! Yeah Luca’s technique is def the opposite effect. I’m running into the trap of initially understanding the gist without translation but then checking it with English because I don’t trust I fully understood it! 😅
trust yourself! how do we pick up new words in our native language? we just hear it in a bunch of contexts and learn how it works even if we don't pick up a dictionary to look up its definition! As you get more advanced, a skill you'll need to develop is trust that you understand the sentence even if you don't look up every single word :)
I'm at a very beginner stage, and I'm so glad I found your channel. I'm not going to lie, this vid is equally motivating and terrifying though, lol.
@9:50 - Yes, that's a common misconception I see in many forums and in a couple of conversations.... that Chinese and English have similar word structure, but that's only true in the basic sentences. As you move further along, sentence patterns start to change. For example, in English (or in Spanish, my native language) we don't leave the word "how much" at the end --- I can keep on going with more differences
@10:23 - Yup, you called it here, and I think that's the key towards learning any language ---- think like a native. I do something that might be a little silly, but it has helped me: when I come across a sentence, I translate it literally, as it would be said/written in Mandarin; example: "liang3 ping2 shui3 duo1shao3 qian2? = two bottle water how much money?"...this has aided me in wrapping my head around the grammar and understand native speaker's thought process
The characters are fun and I treat it like solving a puzzle or a riddle, but then again, I might have a completely different opinion on this a year from now lol
I love this!! and yeah, I mean it's unrealistic to say that learning a language is gonna be easy-peezy. it's unfair to portray language learning as something that "just comes naturally". It'll take work and will probably (definitely for me) be frustrating, but it's also so motivation, so exciting, so fulfilling, and just so much fun too!! Although it's difficult, we are more than able to learn given enough time, effort, and motivation :)
and tbh I do that same thing HAHA. I was showing my taiwanese friend my flashcards (i'm focusing on just audio sentence cards, so just sentence audio on the front and the written sentence on the back). I try not to translate to english because there's things that just can't be translated 1:1 (I don't want to develop that habit), but I was translating a card for my friend to show her my progress and she's like wow, you said the sentence in english as if a chinese person was saying it HAHA. it's been really helpful for me to consciously notice when I'm trying to produce a sentence in more of an english manner as opposed to the chinese manner of thinking!
Your video is really helpful, thank you.
Hard you are not wrong. You are so awesome! Great advice thank you, Miss.
thank you!!
I'm only 2 ish months in but number three is so true for me. the tones come super easy to me to the point where I thought i was actually super bad because i WASNT struggling
yeahh some things just come more naturally to certain people while other things are much more challenging! for me, i'm a musician (piano, vocals, and dabble in acoustic guitar), so my ears are already tuned to pitch, which definitely helps out with tones!
I completely understand. 😂 Tones are definitely not hard, and after awhile of repeating the same word you just naturally pronounce it that way. (For me at least)
有時中文圖像化會更好理解 希望能幫助妳思考
我也是看妳的影片學英文😌
Never have I heard about comparing the tones to melody❤
maybe it's because I sing and play piano! I find music in everything hahah
I have been studying mandarin for 3 months and I am using Duolingo, HelloChinese, ChineseSkill, and Du Chinese to practice. plus I have cue cards and lots of notes on words and HSK 1 vocabulary. I am currently studying for HSK 1 exam, should I buy the textbook and workbook to study?
Good advice for any language learners
thank you!!
I needed this thankyou
thanks for watching!!
There's abook series I'd like to hear your opinion on. It's called Cracking the Chinese Puzzle. I can send you a copy. Also I'd like to suggest you check out the youtuber that introduced me to the book, Stuart Jay Raj, especially his talk with Matt and other videos on tones. I didn't sign up for any of his programs but he name drops good resources now and then. Great video!
I will definitely check that out and can make a video about it! seems like a very large book HAHA. have you read through it?
@@bianca.phdinprogress I have the abriged version- That's why I offered to send you a copy. I used it for getting a better understanding of Kanji. Chapters three through seven are a pain to get through, after that I referenced the book at whatever Kanji I was learning. I takes time but definitely pays off- I usually don't mind waisting my time learning particular histories of Kanji.
I heard of it for the first time here:
ua-cam.com/video/zIdnsfFg9Vs/v-deo.html
Here's also a cool video of his discussing cursive Hanzi or grass style Kanji:
ua-cam.com/video/0gfiRaQeAkQ/v-deo.html
Hope you enjoy it:Many thanks for your great content!
这都是对的！我也一样 嘿嘿 我们加油！
Great video，but the background music is a little bit loud.
thanks for the comment!! fixed that for future videos so hopefully its better now :)
when you talk about the hard things it really sound extremely hard to the point I would give up I haven't already decided to learn chinese. I've heard from other people that is easy, and you know at the end to learn a new language is not easy. English is easy in some things and hard in others, chinese is easier than english in some things and harder in others. For example spelling in english is not that as easy as spanish. I'm studying hsk3 and so far it's been easier than english, at least grammar is way easier than english at basic, and middle levels but again to achive the advance level of any language is never easy.
I completely agree! I find that withe Chinese there's an inverted bell curve to perceived difficulty. The beginning seems SO DIFFICULT because there are so many different components when compared with English. You got tones, characters, no alphabet, no phonetic way to "sound out" words, and that can be really intimidating. But as you get over those hurdles, it gets so much easier. I also found that once I got to intermediate levels, Chinese grammar was way easier than English, listening wasn't actually that hard, I read faster Chinese than in English because characters are so efficient! But now that I'm using native content, I'm realizing how much complexity is packed into each word and how well native speakers convey intricate meanings and word play into seemingly simple sentences! I think for English speakers that are used to learning Romance languages (I learned Spanish in school), the barrier to entry is much higher, which makes it seem impossible in the beginning for many!
Guys i swear Chinese is so simple
Just the writing is a little bit hard
Interesting take! How long have you been learning Chinese?
veWy Big TeEth
You are pretty and your Chinese is very good. Subscribed your channel.