The ultimate goal as far as this thread is concerned is to be able to pass the HSK 6 test in 2021 (aiming for December).
There will be a new HSK test coming out in 2021, with apparently more words required but fewer characters at the HSK 6 level. Either way HSK 6 is the goal.
It might sound petty, but all this started because someone at my school back in 2018 gave me a very condescending look and told me that "Chinese is very hard" when I told her I'd like to take 3 years to learn Chinese to a passable level. That's my motivation. It'll end up taking me a little more than 3 years if I reach my goal in December, but it'll still count to me.
Where I am now
Studying Chinese on and off for about 4 years now, I am at the cusp of HSK5 (the old one). While in Korea this summer I took an HSK 5 class in a 학원 that would supposedly teach you to pass the test. I did well in the class overall, and might have been able to pass with an extra week or so of intense study. I'm not a great test taker, and I don't have all the HSK 5 content down pat, so there is still a ways to go even to get to 5.
If I had to guess (based on an averaging of 3 online tests and my own conservative re-adjusting down) I would say I know about 1,400 characters. I have a good 2400 unique words in my Chinese Anki deck, but I doubt that's capturing all the vocab I know.
Where I am going
This deadline leaves me with not a lot of time to cover some considerable ground. So I've decided to not focus on the actual test until around July/August of next year. From July/August, I'll start actually looking at practice tests, chasing down and memorizing characters I don't know yet, ensuring I'm covering all the grammar I need, practice the writing and listening, etc. Until then I'll continue with 'normal' language study.
Formal study
I'm using the book 신공략 중국어 (고급편) (http://www.kyobobook.co.kr/product/detailViewKor.laf?barcode=9788959956524) which I got in Korea. It feels like just the right difficulty level. I've done 3 out of a total 14 lessons, and figure 1 lesson will take ~2 weeks of study, which should take me up to ~April of next year.
I'll be taking 3 hours/week of classes (Sat and Sun) online with a tutor, and we will be using this book.
I'm hoping to find Chinese classes at my level where I live (Bangkok), and if so, will try taking them to increase class hours.
Informal study
Because classes will be hard to schedule/come by for me, a lot will ride on my informal study. Basically, when engaging in the below activities, at some points, I'll be trying to extract words, grammatical points, sentences, etc. which I can then revise with Anki and use in talking to other people.
- -Chatting with native speakers on HelloTalk, both voice and
-Watching shows (I just got into watching 爱情保卫战 on YouTube, it's great) and dramas (still looking for something fun to watch in the crime/detective genre here... suggestions welcome!)
-Finding Chinese-speaking friends in Bangkok. This will be a big one if I can do it.
So I hope to update this blog over the next 14 months with some notes on my progress.
As a first step, by year's end I think I should be somewhere near 1,600 characters known by my approximate estimation, and have about 2,700 to 2,800 words in my Anki deck, as a rough measure. And I think future posts should also include much more 中文 as a form of writing practice as well