Andrew Methven

Reading an entire Chinese news article is a big challenge.

It can be slow, demoralising and almost impossible to get to the end. It's not the same as reading in your own language. So it needs to be done differently.

How? You need to learn how to skim read!

If you follow these 3 steps you can quickly skim read any article BEFORE you decide if you should invest your time into it:

#1 Read headings and sub headings

Get an overview of the structure of the article. Learn any challenging words in the titles as these will be key to understanding.

#2 Look at the pictures

These gives good clues about people, places and companies in the article. Look them up first.

#3 Read the last para

The main point is always at the end in Chinese. If you know how the text is going to end it makes it much easier to follow and understand.

Now you've done a quick skim of the article, you know: who's in it, what it's about, and how it ends.

Now you can start reading....

There's nothing like that feeling when your Chinese sounds amazing.

You've reached that "flow" state when it feels natural, and "fluent" (whatever that means). But it's an elusive feeling too.

Being away from China for 3 years also doesn't help. Everything feels rusty.

But being armed with the right phrases, it is possible to impress and get your confidence back quickly. Try these 3 types of phrases to impress:

#1 Advanced Idiom

Take a phrase you use a lot and learn a more advanced idiom to say it.

• Example: Replace 工作很辛苦 ("I've been so busy recently") with 披星戴月

#2 Trending Term

Learn a few "hot" terms people are using online. Try them in real life.

• Example: Use 栓Q "thank you" (sarcastic) instead of 谢谢.

#3 Philosophical Phrase

Learn a common philosophical phrase which makes a simple point.

• Example: 天将降大任于斯人也 from Mencius. Use it when someone has suffered pain. It means they've got great things ahead of them.

Mandarin is totally different to all European languages.

It's so alien that there are no common points of reference to help you remember. The only words with some link are imports like "salad" or "David Beckham".

So, I use "context learning" to remember and learn new words.

This helps create more connections and points of reference in the brain to things "stick" easier.

I use 5 kinds of context to help remember words:

1. "Now": Link what you learn to something happening - a news story, an event, an experience.

2. "Past": Linking to the past through idiom stories, poems, and literary references. This helps deepen understanding. 

3. "Theme": Connect words with overarching themes - such as with similar meanings, or related by common words or characters.

4. "Words": Through learning synonyms, similar phrases, opposites, negatives/positives, you'll remember and learn so much more. 

5. "Sentences": Learn words and phrases “in situ”, in real language as complete chunks.

When you learn something new in Chinese picture it as the centre of a network of connections. The more connections you can make, the more easily you'll remember it and be able to use it.

Building a daily learning habit is crucial for aspiring Mandarin learners.

Can't get motivated? Can't find time? No inspiration? Don't feel like you're improving? A daily learning habit will crush all of these.

But it's not as easy. Life gets in the way. Priorities change.

I tried lots of things that didn't work. But now, I've read and practiced my Chinese every day for the last 2 years and 10 days. And it's got so much better in the process.

How did I manage it? I did one thing:

Set small achievable goals, and then build.

When I started, I set a goal of reading 10 minutes a day for a week.

When I hit 7 days, I extended it to another week. 14 days in, I aimed for another 2 weeks. After 1 month, I aimed for another month. And so on.

After 4 months, I used the "pressure" of the uninterrupted consistent day count to keep me going. I marked each day on a calendar.

Now, I don't even think about it. I HAVE to learn a little bit each day.

At an "advanced" level of Chinese, reading is still a big challenge.

Chinese sentences are long, dense, and have no spaces. Punctuation isn't helpful: Sometimes a sentence is an entire paragraph. But, there is a way through. Here's a checklist I use when I'm feeling totally lost:

#1 Start at the end.

The key information usually comes at the end. So in a long sentence, the last few characters are the key point you need to grasp. This is your destination.

#2 Find the structure.

In the body of the sentence, highlight the bits you know, like nouns, verbs and conjunctions (就, 而, 才). These your sign-posts.

#3 Learn what you don't know.

Once you know your destination, and the main sign-posts, you are left with the characters you don't know, such as names, idioms, colloquialisms, poems, classical references. These are the potholes which you can avoid by looking them up.

I still find new words and phrases in Chinese all the time.

Even after learning for more than 20 years, most articles I read have the odd "advanced" idiom, colloquialism, or slang which is new to me.

ChatGPT is a great tool to learn and understand them quickly.

I've been using it in these 3 ways:

#1 Providing example sentences

ChatGPT is great at providing good quality example sentences. These can be adapted into "clozed" sentences (with a blank where the key word is) to help practice. Ask for 5-10 of them for each new word.

#2 Generating longer texts

As well as example sentences, ChatGPT can generate longer Chinese texts on topics. Reading longer texts can help deepen understanding through more practice.

#3 Learning about stories behind idioms

Many idioms have vivid backstories. These idioms are normally the hardest to understand based on only the characters. Learning the back story in English helps learn on a deeper level, create extra context to remember, while avoiding overwhelm.

China's Gen Z is 15% of its population (250 million people).

Reading about them in Chinese is a great way to practice your Mandarin reading skills, and learn about China now.

WeChat public accounts (公众号) offer the best Chinese language content.

But which ones? There are so many!

These 3 WeChat public accounts are my favourite resources to learn about the lives, habits and interests of China's Gen Z.

#1 DT Finance (DT财经)

Business focussed publication which focusses on consumer trends of Gen Z-ers and the companies that are tapping into that market. Always a useful read.

#2 New Generation Research Institute (后浪研究所)

Focussed on lifestyle, work and relationships of Gen Z. Published by tech blog 36Kr. The name is a play on words on the phrase, "the new waves of the Yangzi replace the old ones" (长江后浪推前浪). "New waves" means young people.

#3 Good Night Youth (晚安少年)

A publication aimed at Gen Z readers, focussing on social lives and work of young people. The cartoon artwork is typical of China's Gen Z style.

If you want to improve your Chinese language skills, why not hit two birds with one stone and read about China's Gen Z in these publications, in Chinese!

Chinese language international media sites are a great resource to practice your Chinese reading skills.

But there's also a big problem with using them as a language learning tool.

Although they offer Chinese language content which is independent that you won't find on mainland media sites, it's important to know there are two types of articles on these sites: Original and translated.

From a language learning perspective, my advice is:

Don't read translated articles

Lots of articles are direct translations of content published in English or another language. No matter how good the translation is, it's still not written as a Chinese article would be.

Translated articles are "clunky", don't have the flow of a Chinese news article, and are harder to read because they don't follow how information is organised in Chinese writing.

So, if you practice your Chinese reading skills by reading Chinese language versions of BBC, FT, NYT, VOA, and others, before you start reading you must check if it's translated or original content (by looking who the journalist is).

Invest your time in reading content by a native Chinese writer.

My favourite international Chinese language news site is: Deutsche Welle (DW).

Chinese language podcasts are the best way to improve your Mandarin.

As an advanced learner, they can help you stay on top of the latest trending topics, while maintaining and improving your language skills.

But only from the right sources.

The problem is there are too many to choose from. Over 3 years of not being able to travel to China, I kept my Chinese going by listening to these 4 Chinese podcasts:

#1 News and Pickles Restaurant (新闻酸菜馆 xīn wén suān cài guǎn)

Conversations with two hosts about what's happening in daily life in China. Good authentic language, lighthearted content, but they talk very quickly!

#2 Stochastic Volatility (随机波动 suí jī bō dòng)

Discussions about lives of ordinary people in China. It's conversations with 3 people which are more natural, but more challenging. Really great listening!

#3 Bumingbai Pod (不明白播客 bù míng bái bō kè)

Excellent discussions on what's happening in China. Topics are more edgy going into politics, geopolitics, and the challenges of life in China. Lots of interviews with people on the ground there.

#4 StoryFM (故事FM)

This is probably my favourite, but also the most challenging of all. Hosted by Kou Aizhe, who tells stories of real China, including interviews with people from all over the country. So lots of challenging dialects!

Sign up to at least one of these and start to listen. Just 10 minutes every day!

I was stuck in the "intermediate plateaux" for years.

Remembering new words and phrases was really hard, there was an overwhelming volume of new stuff to absorb, and no structure to help me remember it. I didn't use text books, and I was mostly self taught.

At that level, I needed to change how I learned new stuff to progress further.

So I tried lots of different ways to do it. Eventually, I found a framework which dramatically improved my ability to learn new Chinese vocabulary.

That framework is called: Language Chunking

“Chunking" is learning individual words and phrases together in bigger groups.

Three types of chunking can help dramatically improve how intermediate Chinese language students learn new Chinese vocabulary:

1. Word chunks: Put similar words into chunks like "idioms", "useful words", "three-character phrases", or "colloquial phrases".

2. Sentence chunks: Don't learn words and phrases in isolation. You have to learn and memorise it "in situ" within a chunk of real language.

3. Theme chunks: Chunk words and phrases based on similar themes: emotions, truth, crime, competition, failure, success, and so on.

Through chunking you'll improve how you learn new Chinese vocabulary by: Organising new words more efficiently, seeing them in context, and linking to other similar words and phrases.

Not being in China has made me forget a lot of my hard-earned Chinese.

I haven't been there for 3 years. So when I do have chances to speak (mainly ordering food in a restaurant) it's so depressing to get that confused look and nervous smile back in response.

So I decided to do something about it.

I created a Chinese environment even though I wasn't in China. I tried lots of things. These are the three tactics which worked best for me:

#1 Listening to Chinese podcasts

I listen to podcasts passively. A few times a week, I'll listen while I'm doing something else, like driving or washing the dishes.

My favourite is 不明白博客 with discussions on what's happening in China now.

#2 Watching comedy sketches on YouTube

This my active study. I watch one sketch of Rock and Roast (脱口秀) once a week. I learn the vocab and repeat until I understand everything.

Favourites are: Li Xueqin 李雪琴, Zhou Qimo 周奇墨, and Yang Li 杨笠.

#3 Speaking Chinese on WeChat

I force myself to message someone I know in Chinese and start a conversation daily. I listen back to myself, which is painful but a great way to self-correct.

With passive and active learning, and daily practice and self-correcting, my Chinese definitely feels like it's got better. Or, at least stopped getting worse!

Expressing yourself in an authentically "Chinese way" is really hard.

The key is to know how the language is structured differently.

There is one difference in particular which is crucial to understand if you want to communicate authentically:

Chinese is a "topic-prominent" language

The "topic" is the main thing being discussed, but it's not necessarily the "subject" as it would be in English, which is a "subject-prominent" language.

"Topic-prominence" creates subtle differences in the language structure.

If you make some simple changes, you can immediately sound more authentic. Try these 3:

#1 Put the topic first

Chinese sentences tend to follow "Subject - Verb - Object" structure, like in English. But "topic prominence" means the S-V-O order can be changed, like in the sentence: "I've been to the UK"

• 我已经去过英国了 - "I (S) + already go (V) + UK (O)"

• 英国，我已经去过 - "UK (O) + I (S) + already go (V)"

The second sentence sounds more authentic.

#2 Drop the subject

The subject can be removed altogether. For example, in same sentence:

• 英国，都去过了 - "UK (O) + already been (V)"

"I" is understood but not necessary in the sentence.

#3 Use topic markers

The topic is highlighted with markers like the "呢" particle, or the 就...而言 structure.

• 英国呢，没去过 - "UK + not been"

• 就英国而言，我还没有去过 - "UK + I + not been"

Understanding this one difference, and implementing these three small changes, will immediately make your Chinese sound way more authentic!

Reading a Chinese news article is really hard, even as an advanced learner.

One of my biggest challenges is names in Chinese: people, places, companies. Unless you know them it's easy to get totally confused and lost.

Four character names (Hong Kong, Japanese) are the worst. Or company names with obscure ancient Chinese character in.

I used to get caught out all the time with confusing Chinese names, but now I use these three steps to solve the problem and increase my reading speed:

Step #1 Learn the Characters

When you find a name in an article, copy and paste it into a document. Look up the characters in Google Translate, learn the pinyin, read and repeat out-loud until you can read easily.

Step #2 Check the Frequency

Then, using "Command + F" or "Control + F", open a search bar in your browser. You can quickly search for the name across the entire article. You'll see how much that person/company/place is in the piece, and where they are in it.

Step #3 Create a List

Keep a list of names and their relationships in a separate document. This is really helpful when there are lots of people and family relationships covered in a single article. It's a quick reference to refer back to if you forget or get lost.

With this system to quickly remove the problems caused by Chinese names, any Chinese news article immediately becomes easier and quicker to read.

Staying motivated is the biggest challenge for advanced learners of Mandarin.

Connecting with other language learners is a great way to solve that problem. Having an accountability partner is a forcing function when you want to give up.

And it brings discipline.

What's the best way to get the most of out of having an accountability partner, and stay motivated? Try these 5 rules:

1. Be clear about goals. It's important to agree what you are trying to get out of the partnership: How do you measure success?

2. Share goals in public. There's nothing like making a public statement to keep you going when times are tough. This can be on social media, with friends, in WeChat groups.

3. Make it a habit. Agree a weekly or monthly session to meet at the same time and place (on or offline). Put it in the diary. Set a reminder. Diarise your prep time too.

4. Agree the content. Remove the friction of choice by agreeing source material and topics ahead of meetings. Ideally, focus on one source or theme until you've found a rhythm.

5. Measure progress. Agree metrics to measure your progress and score yourself at the start. Check-in every 3 months and measure by the same metrics. A sense of progress brings momentum, which drives improvement.

What's your experience?

How have language accountability partnerships helped you stay motivated and improve your language skills as an advanced learner of Chinese?

All students struggle with memorising Chinese characters.

At HSK4 level it's especially painful: You already know lots of characters, your speaking isn't bad, but you are still learning to read with children's books.

And there's a big problem with how HSK lists are organised, which makes them so much harder to remember.

Problem: HSK lists are organised alphabetically

At this level of language learning you need to move away from the frameworks of your own language, and into a "Chinese way of thinking".

So long word lists in alphabetical order is really unhelpful. To avoid this problem you need to create "Chinese connections" in your brain.

Solution: Chunking words into Chinese categories

Forget the alphabetical list! Instead, sort words and memorise into non-alphabetical groups like:

1. Word type: Nouns, verbs, counting words, connectors

2. Theme: Body parts, emotions

3. Core character: Learn 打 with two-character verbs like 打扰, 打折, 打针

4. Radical first: Use radicals to connect words like the "water" in 活, 汗

5. Confusing similarities: "Handsome" 帅 and "lion" 狮

6. Opposites: "Win" 赢 and "lose" 输

So, don't fall into the trap of alphabetical lists. Learn by "chunking" instead!