Learn Mandarin

To learn Mandarin Chinese might seem like an nearly insurmountable task, and there are plenty of ex-students who have failed. Why is it that so many don't succeed learning Chinese?

There are a few major obstacles, but one of the most important ones is, that most teching methods don't allow Chinese students to feel they mak progress. Thus, the motivation level drops over time. And you know what happens when you don't put much effort into learning Chinese or any other topic: It's a vicious circle...

You don't make progress learning, you put less effort into it, progress is still less, even less time is spent studying Chinese and eventually you stop your efforts alltogether.

Here's what Michael from Paris, France has to say about the Pimsleur Mandarin audios and why he thinks they are the only way to learn Mandarin and to make sure you'll really speak Mandarin Chinese within a short time:

Anyone and I mean anyone can learn Mandarin with Pimsleur

With Pimsleur, it is so simple to learn a foreign language that anyone can do it. I'm terrible at foreign languages yet even I can learn Mandarin. I'm really impressed with how much I've learned. And the best part is I've learned while using time that would normally be wasted. What I mean is I learn while walking to the train station and while taking the train to work. Or while waiting at an appointment, etc. That's what I love about this program, since there is no reading or writing, you can do it while walking, driving, riding, etc.

Repetition is the mother of all skill, and this is the basis of Pimsleur. But they are masters at making you think and formulate sentences. You don't repeat what they say, you say and then listen to the native speaker and then you repeat again and then listen again. It's just how a child would learn. It's like having a tutor sitting next to you, correcting you. The vocabularly is well planned to allow you to say a maximum of sentences. And the number of sentences you say grows exponentially with every new word or phrase you learn.

I could go on and on but I think the other reviews have it covered so I will say a few things I haven't seen in the other reviews. I listen to most Mandarin lessons twice, and I try to make it on two separate days so that it sinks in over night. Some of the lessons were more difficult than others, a few I listened to five times.

One thing I will point out is that I think Mandarin is difficult enough that learning only from a audio is not enough. The reason is that each of us have a set of sounds we've learned over the years. When we hear new sounds, such as those of a foreign language, we fit them into our existing sounds (it's very hard to learn new sounds as adults). It's possible to listen to the native speaker and then repeat using our own English sounds and not know that the sounds aren't correct. For this reason, I think it's necessary to have a tutor to work on Mandarin pronunciation. As proof of my theory, I will use me and my wife. I am American, fluent in French (with a strong American accent). My wife is French, fluent in English (with a French accent). We are both listening to the Pimsleur audios yet when we say the same phrases in Chinese we say them differently! We even pronounce "wo" differently.

Living in Paris, there are a lot of Mandarin speaking people here so I decided to test out a few phrases. In the beginning, after only a few Pimsleur lessons, no one understood me. I had to say the words in English, then in Mandarin before they'd understand me! I think now that I'm on lesson 18 my pronunciation should be better. My tutor says she understands me better but that I have an American accent. Sometimes we spend 5 minutes on one word and I just don't get it. But like I said, I am not good at foreing languages. So if you're really good at foreign languages, maybe the Pimsleur audio will suffice. If you're like me, I think you'll need access to a native speaker to help you with the pronunciation.

Finally, one other thing important is to learn pinyin and that's not tought in Pimsleur. I find writing down the vocabularly in pinyin really helps. It helps me to learn pinyin but also to pronounce correctly the words. Somtimes it's not clear if it's a "d" or "t" etc. When I see the word in pinyin it's more clear. I strongly recommend doing this.
Overall pimsleur is excellent. I recommend the tutor for pronunciation and the pinyin exercise but I do not count that against Pimsleur because that is not Pimsleur's goal. Pimsleur's goal is to get you speaking Mandarin with only an audio program. And that it does exceptionally. If you think it's too expensive, I think if you listen to each lesson twice then there are 30 hours of instruction. The benefit of being able to do the lessons whenever you want, during time usually not very productive in my opinion justifies the purchase. I learn more with one hour of Pimsleur than one hour with my tutor.

There are plenty more students who are satisfied, here's the experience of Brian Babiak, Shreveport, LA, USA. He also used the Pimsleur Mandarin audios to learn Mandarin Chinese:

The best start to chinese!!

I have been studying Chinese intensively about 6 months. I am actually able to carry on with staff at Chinese restaurants, and talk to people at a low level online. I am actually planning a trip to Beijing in a year or two and want to speak very well when I get there. Also, there is a business opportunity to open up new markets in China, so this is important and practical to me.

I think this is very important background information when you read a review about Pimsleur. This is because Pimsleur seems to be designed for businessmen, practical people who need conversational Chinese quickly and efficiently. For these purposes, Pimsleur cannot be beat for any language. Period.

I have used living language, fsi, pdq, and most of them. Pimsleur made the basic syntax of Chinese grammar, the pronounciation of the tones, and the uniqueness of the Chinese measure words all very clear and simple. Anyone who does not appreciate the excellence of Pimsleur probably doesn't understand how difficult it is for a mature English speaker to wrap their head around these concepts -- until Pimsleur's Mandarin.

After finishing 1,2,3, I went on to Barron's Mandarin (to get the basics down in a more academic way), McNaughton's Reading and Writing Chinese (for the writing - which is actually very easy, not worth acquiring until after you have verbal fluency), and Schaum's Outline of Chinese Vocabulary (for more vocabulary) and Modern Mandarin Chinese Grammar (for comprehensive grammar).

All of these other study materials are very facile after pimsleur. Pimsleur duplicates the experience of being a child and learning language naturally from one's parents. There is plenty of time for didactic Mandarin grammar and literacy after verbal fluency, just like most readers of this learned their English. I don't think including pinyin transcripts is a good idea actually, because living language does that, and I found it confusing, that the verb to-be "shi" was really said like "sure". It was better to just learn the language.

Now when I use a pinyin book like the chinese vocab book, I make pronunciation analogies to words I do know, and my pronunciation per Chinese natives is supposed to be very good for my level. I credit Pimsleur with my excellent pronunciation and intuitive understanding of syntax. If you do something besides Pimsleur, your business task will be much more awkward. I can only imagine negative comments come from students, who need material that ties in with all the useless stuff that goes on with academic language instruction. I still can't get several useless phrases about pens and tire companies out of my head from years of school and university French! Pimsleur is about talking -- to Chinese people. Talk that gets the job done -- find a bathroom, book a hotel, order a dinner, catch your plane, and sign your contract. That's what you need to learn Mandarin.

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