sketchc89 language log - Chinese

[sketchc89]

I've noticed in the last couple of days that the GSR sentences are getting a little longer. It's more difficult since I need to keep more information in my working memory. So far I haven't had any of the sentences fall out of the review without being able to answer ahead of the speaker. I think those days are numbered. I've had multiple sentences over the past two days where I have trouble repeating after the speaker is done. I'm able to shadow (repeat with the speaker) which eventually helps with comprehending and learning the sentences. I suppose this degree of difficulty is what I should expect and embrace if I want to improve.

[sketchc89]

I'm into the third day of using GMS-C files. These are transcription and dictation.

Transcription
For the transcription piece, I open the GMS-C file in Audacity, cut off the beginning and ending portions of the track (Highlight + Ctrl+K), and run Sound Finder (Top bar -> Analyze -> Sound Finder). This splits the track into individual sentences. I can then scroll through the tagged sentences by pressing Tab and play the tagged section by pressing Enter then Space.
I keep my transcriptions on Google Docs in one large file. At the top of the file is a score of each individual 50 sentence section. I just completed sentences 201-300 today. After I complete the transcriptions, I check them against the Ebook which takes a while. So far I've gotten 47-50 out of 50 on set, which is good since these sentences are easier.

Dictation
I also do dictation. I run the GMS-C file which gives the Chinese sentence once, then I repeat while recording in Audacity. I've been saving these recording so that I can analyze them later with Praat. My first check just to see if I could get Praat to work showed that my tones are a little flat and my second tone doesn't rise very high. I'll be reading over Tamu's post mentioned in a previous post here. I've been recording each pair of 50 sentences for 4 days. So day 1 will have 1-100, day 2 1-200, day 3 1-300, day 4 1-400, day 5 101-500, etc. Dictation has only been taking 5 minutes per set of 50 sentences since I record while playing the GMS-C file.

GSR
Finally, GSR got a little bit easier. A combination of reviewing hard sentences (around sentence 600 about planes and travel), sleeping, and shadowing got me through the sentences alright. I'm fairly convinced that the reason that I'm having difficulty recalling the sentences is because I'm not storing what needs to be said well in my working memory. I'll get half way through the sentence, then forget what the sentence was about. As I work through the sentences over and over, the pieces of the sentence are chunked together and there are fewer things for me to remember. Once I get to the point where I remember what needs to be said, I don't have issues saying it.

I've been sick with a cold for last few days, but that hasn't stopped me from studying yet. My dictation might be suffering and being cooped up in an apartment studying is less enjoyable than walking around outside and studying.

[sketchc89]

I've been away from the forum for a little while over the Thanksgiving holiday. I managed to keep up my studying even with days booked with activities. Today is day 41/147 in Glossika's C schedule. I'm on the third day of GMS-B files.

Unrelated to Glossika, I listen to Olly Richard's I Will Teach You a Language Podcast. He just came out with a listening course called Conversations. So far I've enjoyed it. Conversations is a course designed to help improve your listening comprehension by providing longer (3-4 minutes) intermediate level graded conversations with transcripts. It's targeted at people that understand the vocabulary when spoken slowly, but have difficulty keeping up with conversations when spoken at a normal speed.

I listen to each lesson a few times to get what I can from the recording. Afterwards I open the lesson in Work Audio Book, software that breaks audio content into phrases. I then transcribe the phrases as best as I can. After transcribing I look through the targeted vocab to see if I misinterpreted any confusing words. Then I listen through again while checking my transcriptions. I then check my transcriptions against the provided transcriptions, make sure I understand the lesson, and finally read over in English to check that my understanding is correct. It takes a while, but it's pretty cool to see how much more you understand between the first listen through and the final listen through.

[sketchc89]

Today is day 64/147 in Glossika's program. I've since moved to shadowing for all GSR material. I'm about a third of the way through Fluency 2 with GSR and I'm doing GMS-A files.
I think of the three types of GMS files A is the least useful. GMS-A is listen twice and repeat. Since I listen straight through I don't have much time to really learn the content. I think it's noted in the material that GMS-A is for getting a feel for the patterns of the language. I feel like I get that better from GSR.
GMS-B is difficult, but good for production (listen to English then produce Chinese). If I weren't trying to follow the schedule exactly I'd probably add more of these in place of GMS-A.
GMS-C is good for listening comprehension and possibly writing. I use the computer for all of my writing and don't plan to learn writing until after learning speaking and reading to a high level. I often
Overall, I think I'm learning, but I don't have a test or set of metrics to really judge my progress so it's hard to know for sure. Consistency has probably been the most important thing in these last few months. I haven't missed a single lesson the entire time I've been doing Glossika and my Anki streak is even longer. Glossika clocks in at about 2 hours per day and Anki is about 20 minutes so that's a big chunk of time even when I decide not to do anything else. I tend to get consumed by my hobbies. Before Glossika, I had a running streak of at least a mile for >150 days straight then I abruptly stopped after having a medical procedure and starting Glossika (Michigan winters don't help either). Usually one hobby will become my main focus while the others will fall by the wayside. In the last month I've been programming a lot more, but I haven't let that get in the way of my Chinese so I consider that a big win. I just bought the tickets for an April trip to China at that should help with maintaining focus as well.

[sketchc89]

Day 83/147 (56%) - still haven't missed a day.
I'm working on time tracking this year. It's useful for me to understand where all my time is going so that I can find areas for improvement. I've previously had great success with tracking calories (myfitnesspal) and tasks (ToDoist). Now I'm using NowThenPro for time tracking my days on the phone. I'd previously tried Toggl which has a great desktop web interface, but was really disappointed with their mobile apps.
Time tracking has had the benefit of helping me understand how much time I'm spending studying Chinese.
Last week I spent 35 hours studying. This was driven by an extra day off work and a lot of time on the weekends. My typical work days are around 3 hours/day. I spent 53 hours sleeping (much better than usual) which was also helped by extra time on weekends and time between starting the timer and falling asleep. Sleep is probably the biggest area for improvement in my routine, but I haven't been able to stick with a good sleep routine since I started college almost 10 years ago.
The holidays were nice. I used the extra time to see family and study. I also got a few more graded readers to go through in 2018 .

[sketchc89]

It's day 105 of 147 (71% complete). I haven't missed a day yet. I have completed some of the lessons after midnight on especially busy days. This focus on completing my studying no matter what happens has been very important in keeping me on track. The benefits of this are slightly offset by the missed sleep on particularly busy days, but on balance I'd say it's a positive. One of the contributing factors to my overall busy-ness is work getting busier and scheduling more outings with friends. Both good things, but not great for having a fresh mind and lots of time.

The difficulty of the material progresses from module to module. I noticed at the beginning it was simple, then it ramped up in difficulty stabilized, ramped up , then stabilized and so on. I'm currently in the middle of a more difficult section and get a little frustrated by how tongue-tied I seem when stringing together longer sesentences.

Time-tracking has been a clear positive for keeping my studies on track. It also highlights all of the areas where I'm not using my time productively (playing games/browsing the web). In January, I spent 133 hours (19% of my time or a bit over 4.3 hours/day) studying Chinese. I only spent more time sleeping and working. This seems like the high-bar of what I'll be able to achieve. This is primarily audio lessons (2 hours/day) and Anki (0.5 hours/day). I spent time in order of decreasing relevance: reading graded readers, listening and transcribing IWTYAL conversations, watching and reviewing Chinesepod episodes, reading textbooks and completing exercises. I didn't count conversations in Chinese or time where I caught a TV show in Chinese or time while I was working on something else with audio in the background.