It has now been a month since I started my Mandarin Chinese language challenge, so I think it’s time for an update on how I’m doing. To be honest, it’s not being going all that well. The first week went quite well, I was generally following my study plan (except for some evening sessions), but then it became unworkable. I guess I didn’t really plan it well enough, so I have amended the plan in an attempt to make it easier to follow without reducing the commitment needed. Well, it still isn’t really working. Here is a summary of the key points from this month.
The Good
- I do listen to Mandarin radio most of the day in work;
- I have kept up with my vocabulary on Memrise (up to over 400 words now, although I did start that earlier this year).
The Bad
- I haven’t been working on my Mandarin every day;
- I still haven’t spoken to anyone yet (other than George & myself);
- I haven’t put much on my new Mandarin Twitter account yet.
Generally my commitment over the last month has been fairly poor for various reasons, but mainly because I am enjoying spending time with my son when I get home and by the time he goes to bed and we’ve eaten, I don’t feel like doing anything else. This is definitely not the right attitude if I want to improve so I am going to try to do better this month.
I will upload a video or audio clip of me speaking Mandarin in the next couple of days to show the progress I have/haven’t made.
Plans for October
- Practice more than twice a week;
- Publish at least one journal entry to Lang-8 per week;
- Publish at least two audio clips to Soundcloud;
- Learn at least 200 new characters using Memrise.