Crash Course #5: Speaking and writing

Why have I waited with bringing up speaking until now when it's what most people care abut the most? Because output without input will lead to bad results. Naturally, input without any output is not much better, so let's talk about how to improve your speaking ability.

In order to become fluent in Mandarin, you need to practise a lot. This means real communication, preferably with a native speaker. Online, offline or both (try one of these: 1, 2, 3, 4). Provided that you know the words and some basic grammar, learning to speak is to a large extend a matter of practice.

There are many things you can do to make things easier if you're not comfortable with chatting with strangers:

The bottom line is that in order to learn to speak, you need to speak. Some general advice for speaking includes limiting your focus, not being too afraid of making mistakes and mimicking native speakers as much as you can.

Pronunciation is important, especially tones.

Think in terms of initials, finals and tones, not Pinyin spelling.
Make sure you know how they are pronounced and then practice.
Get lots of (good) feedback.
Mimic native speakers as closely as you can.
Record you efforts, re-record until your production is close to perfect.

Learning to pronounce Mandarin will is a long-term project that stretches well beyond the first month of class, but you have to understand that you will be mostly on your own; most courses don't prioritise pronunciation. Here's a collection of 24 great pronunciation resources that will help you along the way.

When it comes to writing, the same principles apply, but there are some extra things you can do.

Make sure you break things down into smaller chunks.
Chat online rather than writing long essays.
Writing something is always better than writing nothing.
Get feedback on what you write on sites like Lang-8.
Pick topics that matter to you.

At a more advanced level, the most powerful way of improving writing is to do focused reading and then do writing exercises based on that. A good example of this is to read several articles about a certain topic and then write your own summary, using the language you have learnt. You can find more advice about how to improve your writing here.

Speaking and writing are hard in the beginning and it feels like an up-hill struggle. Don't give up! The more you practise, the easier it becomes. Learning to use a word or phrase takes much more than just seeing or hearing it a few times. Practice makes perfect. 加油！

Best wishes,

Olle Linge
凌雲龍