Enroll Course: https://www.udemy.com/course/college-spoken-chinese-fast-class-intermediate-1/
Learning a new language can be a daunting task, especially one as nuanced as Mandarin Chinese. However, resources like Udemy’s ‘College Spoken Chinese Fast Class Intermediate 1’ aim to make this process more accessible and efficient. This course, taught by an award-winning professor with 16 years of experience at prestigious American colleges, promises a rapid immersion into conversational Chinese, mirroring how children acquire language from birth.
The core philosophy of this course is learning ‘from mouth to mouth,’ minimizing reliance on written scripts and maximizing oral practice. While babies learn through pure immersion, this course cleverly incorporates minimal English explanations to accelerate the process for adult learners. The ‘Fast Class’ series is designed to cover the equivalent of two years of college-level spoken Chinese curriculum in just 16 hours, spread across four courses. Each course can be completed in approximately 4 hours, making it manageable even for busy schedules.
This particular installment, ‘Intermediate 1,’ dives into crucial everyday topics. You’ll find yourself navigating conversations about seeing a doctor, dating and courtship, renting an apartment, sports, booking air tickets, airport pick-ups and drop-offs, and understanding the cultural significance and daily practices of major Chinese festivals. This isn’t just about memorizing isolated phrases; it’s about engaging in full, real-life conversations that align with a comprehensive college curriculum in terms of vocabulary, grammar, and situational dialogues.
The teaching methodology is structured into three lectures per dialogue. The first lecture focuses on understanding the meaning of phrases and sentences with English explanations, crucially emphasizing imitation of pronunciation and tones by observing the instructor’s mouth movements. While a PDF with pinyin is available for those new to the sounds, the emphasis is on listening and repeating, much like a child learning their native tongue. The second lecture involves active practice, where the instructor leads the student through the dialogue twice and then engages in role-playing in new contexts. The third lecture is a review through acting, encouraging further practice and reinforcement.
What sets this course apart is its commitment to pronunciation accuracy and fluency. The instructor’s ‘all-talking head’ videos are specifically designed to showcase mouth shapes, correct tones, and sentence cadence – elements often missed in other learning methods. By avoiding pinyin subtitles in the main speaking videos, the course encourages learners to recall and reproduce entire sentences from memory, fostering a more natural and spontaneous speaking style. The instructor advocates for speaking after them without looking at the text, aiming for near native-speaker accuracy and fluency within a semester’s worth of content in just a few months.
For anyone looking to enhance their spoken Chinese, whether as a beginner or an intermediate learner seeking to refine their pronunciation and fluency, ‘College Spoken Chinese Fast Class Intermediate 1’ appears to be a highly effective and well-structured resource. Its practical approach, engaging methodology, and focus on authentic conversational skills make it a strong recommendation.
Enroll Course: https://www.udemy.com/course/college-spoken-chinese-fast-class-intermediate-1/