In this episode I interview Alex Wagner, who now runs a pizza shop at a local Taiwanese night market.
Listen to find out:
– What brought Alex to Taiwan in the first place
– How he transitioned from teaching to selling pizza
– His process starting the business
– How the night market business works
– How he markets himself as the foreign face of the business
– Where he finds employees to work there
– How his Chinese has improved as a result of interacting with customers
– His plans for his business going forward
– How he got over the uncertainty of starting a business
– The crucial factor required to stand out at a night market
– His advice for those wanting to transition away teaching English
We have added a couple of new options to the pricing page.
New users now have the option of choosing between the existing Premium Online plan, or the new Guided Plan.
In addition to all the features from the regular online plan, the guided plan also provides an assignment for each lesson. This usually requires you to record yourself answering a question related to the lesson. If you require additional or customized vocabulary not taught in the lesson, you can ask the teacher who will provide an answer within 1 business day.
The guided plan also includes a level certification test for levels 1, 2 and 3. This consists of two parts. Part 1 is a timed online vocabulary test to see if you can identify vocabulary taught from lessons in your selected level. If you pass this test (80% or higher score), you then qualify for an online Skype test with one of our teachers.
We have prepared a set of questions for each of levels 1, 2 and 3. If the teacher is satisfied with your answers (passing score of 80% or higher) then you receive your certificate, which can be printed out.
Existing users can only purchase level certification tests for levels 1, 2 and 3. In the coming days, we will also add level certification options to the redeem credits program.
In this episode, I interview “Bear” – originally from Scandinavia, now working in China.
Listen to find out:
– What brought him to China in the first place
– His initial hardships in China
– Why he felt he wasn’t capable of learning Chinese in the beginning
– Why he didn’t make progress learning initially, and what changed that
– What motivated him to start learning characters
– The drastic improvement being able to speak Chinese had on his daily life
– How he’s able to make friends with local Chinese
– What aspect made a great improvement in his qualify of life in China
– Some of the big differences in company culture he found in China versus Europe
– The big difference in job interviews between China and Europe
– His experience with “face” and trust in Chinese companies
– His recommendations for foreigners living in Chinese communities and in local relationships
– How he learned to communicate using a Chinese version of English
– How learning Chinese compares to learning other languages
– His advice to foreigners who haven’t tried to learn Chinese yet, because they believe they aren’t capable
– Why it’s ok to make mistakes while speaking
In this episode, I continue the interview I did with Shaun Bettinson, where he discusses his “I love Taiwan” project.
Listen to find out:
– How this project got started.
– How he launched his initial promotional video
– The Project Website
– How he was able to promote it
– How he won a Guinness World Record
– Why he thinks the project was so popular
– What he gained from this experience
– How he benefited from the friendships made
– How his outlook on the future has changed
In this episode, I interview Shaun Bettinson, a Brit who now lives in Taichung, Taiwan.
Listen to find out:
– What brought Shaun to Taiwan initially
– Where he learned his initial Chinese
– What he didn’t like about his first group class
– What he liked about his next teacher
– What he recommends you look for in a private teacher
– What kind of effort he put in to learn Chinese outside of class
– What benefits he found from being able to speak Chinese
– How he transitioned from teaching into an alternate career path
– How his Chinese helped him in his new position
– What advice he’d give to someone wanting to switch from teaching to a different career path
In this episode, I interview Davide Saccon, an Italian now living in Qingdong, China.
Listen to find out:
– How he learned “street” Chinese in Italy
– What brought him to China after that
– Why the Chinese he had learned before wasn’t as useful in smaller Chinese villages
– How he used the Chinese he had learned to land his first job in China
– Why it was much harder to learn Chinese outside of China than in China
– What cultural differences he noticed between working in China versus Europe
– How compensation affects motivation with Chinese workers
– How he manages language and communication with his Chinese wife
– Why he had to change the language approach he used with his kids
– The language approach he finds works best with kids from mixed language couples
– The problem he found with the local education system for kids, and what solution they found for it
In this episode, I interview Ethan Feig, an American now working in a trade company in Taichung, Taiwan.
Listen to this episode to find out:
– What brought Ethan to Taiwan at age 18
– How Taiwan differed from his prior expectations
– How he learned Chinese from a fellow expat, and how that approach compared to his Taiwanese teacher
– How he maintained his Chinese listening and comprehension skills while back in the US for 2 years
– How he transitioned from teaching English into other work
– About the work culture at his current company
– What advice he has for others wanting to work in non teaching careers in Taiwan
In this episode, we welcome back Wesley (from our last episode) to share some of the more fascinating aspects of the Chinese language including:
– How abbreviations work in Chinese (and how they differ from English)
– Why Chinese can’t be the next global language
– Why understanding Chinese culture is so important to understanding Chinese
– The actual meaning of “Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon”
– How chengyus are formed, used and developed
– Sarcasm in Chinese culture and how it’s used
– How he learns and uses chengyus, and how this differs from how native speakers learn them
– Why accents in Chinese don’t matter
– Why Chinese TV has Chinese subtitles
– How the writing system of dialects like Taiwanese has evolved
– The multiple ways that dialects can be subtitled
– “False friends” in Chinese
– How colors in Chinese are used differently than they are in English
– Why language learning is a series of plateaus with no distinct peak
Dominic is from Oregon, USA, and now lives in Taichung, Taiwan with his wife and 3 year old twins. Listen to this episode to find out:
– What made Dominic move to China at the tender age of 16
– What it was like as a teenager living in China
– Why he lost a lot of weight while living in China
– What aspect of being a foreigner in China was the biggest cultural shock to him
– What brought him to Taiwan a couple of years later
– The biggest differences he noticed between Kunming, China and Taiwan
– What it was like to take a university degree in Chinese with local Taiwanese students
– How he transitioned from teaching English to his current position as Director of Operations for a US Tech company
– His advice for people wanting to transition into a different career path in Taiwan / China
– How he uses Chinese in his daily life
– His approach to language with his Taiwanese wife and his kids
– Why he changed his language approach with his kids
– His thoughts on educating his kids at this young age
Priya is originally from India, but has now lived in Taiwan for 27 years. She works as a simultaneous interpreter. Listen to this episode to find out:
– What brought Priya to Taiwan in the first place
– Her initial impressions of Taiwan
– How she began learning Chinese and what approach they took
– Why she recommends an intensive approach to learning Chinese
– Why she thinks knowing Indian languages like Hindi helps in learning Mandarin
– Which sounds in Chinese she finds many English speakers have trouble pronouncing
– How she transitioned into working as a translator / interpreter
– Why she prefers interpreting over translating work
– How preparation for interpreting works
– The various types of translating options available, and the skills required for each
– Consecutive, whispering / simultaneous without equipment, simultaneous with equipment
– How interpreting is done for more niche languages (relay interpreting)
– The process that goes through translating sentence by sentence
– Why she recommends putting kids through the local education system up to Grade 3 or so before switching to an international system
– When she recommends learning to write characters and when it isn’t
– Why she recommends Hindi speakers (Indians) learn using zhuyin (bo po mo fo) over pinyin
–
Cheryl has been in Taiwan for 26 years and has worked as a tour guide, translator and author.
Listen to this episode to find out:
– What brought Cheryl to Taiwan in the first place
– Why she recommends Taiwan as a place to learn Mandarin
– The advantage to learning phonetic symbols (zhuyin) along with characters
– How she was able to transition from teaching English to translation and then as a tour guide / translator.
– How she got her first job at a museum
– Why she thinks the demand for translation services will continue to increase
– How to create your own path in your own niche / specialty in Taiwan
– The importance of networking to find opportunities
– What types of projects she would like to do in the future
– The difference in working at a Taiwanese company versus a foreign company
– How to get your ideas through, when working at a local company
– The process of registering your own company here
– How her kids fared with bilingual education
In this episode, I interview Brad Sapp. Brad spent 13 years in China working in trade companies in Beijing and Qingdao. He currently lives in Toronto, where he continues to actively engage with Chinese clients.
Listen to this podcast to learn:
– How Brad landed up in China
– His approach to learning Chinese
– His take on learning characters and writing
– What it was like to work for a Chinese company
– The advantage to being able to speak Chinese
– The business culture differences with Chinese companies
– How he dealt with Chinese staff who didn’t speak English
– How he uses Chinese outside of China
– The perspective of Chinese immigrants in Canada
– How learning Chinese compares to other languages
In this episode, I interview Edward Greve. Edward is an American who has lived in Taiwan for the past 8 years. He initially started as an English teacher and is now doing a master’s degree in Applied Linguistics.
Listen to find out:
What brought Edward to Taiwan in the first place
What process he took to learn Chinese on the side
His standard process to learn a new language
His stance on learning characters from the very beginning
The difference between learning simplified versus traditional characters
Who he practiced speaking with
His take on learning Taiwanese and other local dialects
What he’s doing now with computational linguistics
How learning Chinese compares to learning other languages like Italian, Dutch, French, German, Thai and Indonesian
About the scripts used in different Chinese dialects like Taiwanese and Cantonese
The importance of being able to express yourself through written Chinese
The advantages of being able to speak Mandarin while living in a Chinese community
In this first episode of the new Learn Chinese Insights Podcast, I interview Joe Westerhof.
Joe came to Taiwan 17+ years ago from Michigan, US. He initially began teaching English but now works in a trading company in Taichung, doing import / exports.
In this episode, you will find out:
What brought Joe to Taiwan in the first place.
His background learning Chinese – what worked and what didn’t.
His initial impressions of Taiwan.
The benefits of living in a small town.
How he transitioned from teaching to working in trade.
Issues that westerners have, when working in Taiwanese companies
Why Taiwanese companies don’t hire western employees
What to focus on, when trying to get a job with a Taiwanese company
What it’s like to be married with kids to a Taiwanese
On dealing with the Taiwanese language versus Mandarin
Joe’s theories on westerners who are fluent in Chinese
Joe’s advice on learning Chinese (or any language)
I recently made a couple of small changes to the Course Outline page.
The “Complete” links have been renamed as “Transcript” and have moved to the front of every lesson. I feel “Transcript” is a more descriptive label than “Complete” and moving it to the front better reflects the progression that most users make with the lessons: Start with the lesson, while following along with the transcript, then move to the Vocabulary page, followed by the Activity and other pages that follow.
Hope that makes sense and doesn’t cause too much disruption in your lesson navigation.
One feature that many users have asked for, is the ability to export flashcards to Pleco, the popular dictionary app.
This could always be done of course through the Export page. However this required multiple steps.
I’m happy to announce that if you’re using an iOS device (iPhone or iPad), then head on over to the flashcard page and select the lesson range you want.
You’ll now notice a new button at the bottom called “Export to Pleco”.
Clicking on this will directly open the Pleco app (assuming you have it installed already). After a few seconds, you should see a message like this:
You’ll now have a list of CLO lessons inside Pleco that you can choose from.
Inside each lesson is the vocabulary, that you can then use to create your own flashcard lists inside Pleco.
Hope this is useful for you.
At the moment, Pleco says this function only works on iOS devices. We can add Android support when they do.
If you haven’t noticed, the entire site has been recently updated with a brand new design.
It was a bit of a rocky start at first, with lots of small features not working.
Most have now been fixed though, and early reviews seem to be good.
The biggest benefit of the new site is that it is completely mobile optimized. Most activities should work on your phone or tablet.
The only thing that doesn’t work on phones / tablets are tools for recording your voice, such as Test your Pronunciation and the ability to record voice responses to exercises. These can be done from the desktop / laptop version however.
New progress bar that shows up on the Course Outline page for each level. Complete all the activities in each level to reach 100%
Persistent audio player and mode switch on the Complete transcript page let you pause the audio and switch between characters, from anywhere on the page.
Please send me feedback on things you like or don’t like about this new design, as it’s an evolving process.
Well it took some time, but it’s finally here. The new CLO App for Android has been released on the Google Play store.
Like the iOS version, the Android version comes with the first 3 lessons for free. You can then purchase lesson content for levels 1 and 2 into the app.
These include the lesson audio, transcripts, flashcards and new character animations.
Try it out and let me know what you think.
Now that the Android version is released, I’ll be able to get back to making improvements to both apps, including content for later levels.
They are used when counting with a pencil and paper.
In western societies, a common way to note tally marks is like this:
You mark down a single stroke, each time you’re counting an item. After you have 4 strokes down, on your 5th stroke you cross off the first 4. That way it’s easy to count a group of 5.
In Chinese they use the same concept, but instead of vertical strokes, they try to build the character 正 as follows:
As you can see, each complete 正 character uses 5 strokes. So a series of 正 would each represent 5, just like the English ones above.
So where else can you see 正 tallies?
When you are ordering items from a menu, you can use 正 to indicate the number of dishes you want to order. Start with 一 for one, and work your way up.
So the next time you see the above strokes, you’ll know what its purpose is!
I have added a new home page for subscribers to measure their progress.
Once logged in, click on the CLO logo on the top left of the page to be taken to this new page. It is a modified version of the current course outline page. It will look something like this:
On the left, is a new navigation bar, to let you switch between levels.
On the top is your current lesson level. This is based on your score from the level test. I encourage you to take this test often, to measure your progress.
Next, we have the name of each lesson in the current level, along with color coded activity icons. Activities you have started, are colored orange, while completed ones turn to green. Obviously the goal is to complete as many of the activities as possible, so that you have green icons across.
Hopefully you find this page useful in your learning. If not, let me know what I can do to improve it.
The flashcard page on the site has been updated with a new format.
The old format was quite outdated, requiring Java and not being mobile friendly. The new version should work fine on mobile browsers – both desktop and mobile, without requiring any additional software to be downloaded. It uses a similar format to the level test that was added recently.
Additional modes and options will be added to this page in time, so keep sending me your feedback.
When you first go to the page, you will see a settings page:
Lesson Range: You can choose to test yourself on a single lesson, or you may select an entire lesson range. Your previously selected lesson range will be shown here. As you change the lesson range, the number of questions in the test will be updated at the bottom of the screen, above the Start button.
Test: You can choose to test individual characters, all vocabulary and sentences as well.
Mode: Choose between testing pinyin (if you’re not studying characters), simplified or traditional characters.
Question Mode: If you want to test your listening skills, choose listening. If you want to test your reading skills, choose Visual.
Test Definition: If you select this option, then each question will have two parts – one testing your recognition of the Chinese, and another asking you to select its English definition.
When you are ready to begin the test, press Start.
If you have chosen Listening mode, you will hear a word and will be asked to type in the pinyin for it. If you have chosen visual mode, you will be shown the characters and will be asked to type it below. Type in the pinyin for the characters, and select the characters that match the question.
If you enter an incorrect answer, the correct answer will be shown on screen for you.
If you have chosen to test definitions as well, then you will be asked to choose the correct definition, after you typed in the correct pinyin.
