Archive Page 4

Pinyin Guide and Listening Test Makeovers

Published by John Pasden March 27th, 2007 in Uncategorized. 12 Comments

Long-time ChinesePod users are familiar with the Listening Test we developed a while back, as well as our pinyin chart, which provided all the syllables of Mandarin Chinese in all the tones in an easily clickable format. V3 is taking these two resources to the next step.

The most obvious change with the Listening Test and Pinyin Guide are their tighter integration with the user’s experience. They’re both right there on the “Study” page now. (See if you can spot them in the image below!)

study page

Listening Test
In case you’re unfamiliar with our Listening Test, it works like this. You click on a button and you hear a random Chinese statement of a pre-determined difficulty level. If you wish to, you can click again to hear it one more time. Then you must click “Yes” meaning “I understand” or “No” meaning “I don’t understand.” The test gives you new statements based on your responses, roughly zeroing in on your level. (This is a simplified form of the CAT model.)

The test is not multiple choice because we don’t want people guessing. If you’re the kind of learner that feels you understand when you have only 80% comprehension, then fine. Your answers will place you at a higher level and recommend relatively more challenging podcasts. In the same way, if you’re the kind of learner that insists on 100% comprehension of everything, then that’s fine too. You should end up scoring a little lower, and be recommended a level in which you’ll understand closer to 100%.

The last time we presented the Listening Test, we got a lot of great feedback. “Don’t speak so painfully slow at the Newbie level!” some of you said. “Regularly update it so I can take it over and over!” others requested. So we’re doing those things. When you see the new V3 Listening Test, you will notice: (1) that it got a visual makeover, (2) that it’s more tightly integrated into the learning experience, and (3) that it will be updated and improved with time. Be sure to check it out!

Pinyin Guide
As for the Pinyin Guide, on V3 it has finally turned into a real guide rather than being just a chart of syllables. Drawing upon my personal experience learning Mandarin, my experience describing the sounds of Mandarin, and the knowledge I’ve gained in my studies in applied linguistics, I have designed and written a full guide especially for the beginner learners of Mandarin Chinese. The guide specifically addresses all the problematic sounds (as well as the less problematic ones). Use the guide for help in those problem areas, or even read the guide from start to finish to enrich your understanding of the phonetics of Mandarin in a logical, cumulative progression.

The chart of syllables has also gotten a visual makeover. We never really liked the tabs for the different vowel sounds, but the problem was that the chart loaded way too slowly. We decided to do away with the tabs altogether, redesign it for the new V3 look, and offer the pinyin chart as a standalone download. This ensures easy access on your computer anytime, and no wait time.

Whoo-hoo! All this sounds like fun, yes? V3.

-John

Next Up: Practice

The All-New Grammar Guide

Published by John Pasden March 26th, 2007 in Version 3. 10 Comments

Yes, ChinesePod has been promising a grammar guide for a while now. There’s a good reason that it has not yet appeared. Basically, an entire language’s grammar is a lot of information, and we want to organize it well. With the help of the Academic Team, I’ve been working on the Grammar Guide since the middle of last year. ChinesePod V3 will finally see the launch of the Grammar Guide.

ChinesePod has always had a sort of funny relationship with grammar. From the beginning, Ken has applied the top-down approach in the podcasts, preferring to let students infer grammatical structures on their own as much as possible. But still, some have asked for more grammar, or even grammar-centric podcasts. Ken’s method is working really well, but if this learning experience is really “on your terms,” then the more grammatical-minded among you should have a choice that meets your needs, no?

The Grammar Guide is the compromise. It will be a wealth of information on Chinese grammar, not only browsable by topic, but also intimately connected to the lessons by grammar tags. (No, I’m not talking about the “grammar tags” that exist now, which sometimes come with a “grammar point summary,” I’m talking about grammar tags that link to full-fledged Grammar Guide entries when you click on them.) Thus, those seeking more info on grammar will be able to find it easily, and those that would rather do without will not have it intruding upon their podcasts.

Let me explain a few more specifics of the Grammar Guide. Unlike our trademark modular, stand-alone lessons, the Grammar Guide is a hierarchical monolithic entity. We briefly considered reorganizing Chinese grammar somewhat, but that’s a really big can of worms, and there was not enough benefit to the student to make it worthwhile. That means we chose to follow more or less traditional categorizations of grammar. The explanations are clear and and to the point (written by me personally), with lots of examples of usage.

As for the grammar tags themselves, they are all being redone. Each tag will consist of a word (rather than a formula-looking thing), like jiu (就) or keyi (可以). Those tags (and their explanations) will be at the bottom of a hierarchical structure, and it’s easy to browse around in it to discover more about the words’ grammatical classifications and their usages. In addition, there are lots of links to similar grammar points, grammar points not to confuse with, and grammar point comparisons. Basically, it’s my own dream Grammar Guide for the Chinese language, and I think you’re going to like it a lot.

Because the construction of the Grammar Guide is such a monumental effort, it will be released first in a “lean” form, consisting of the underlying hierarchical structure and tags. After V3 is launched, both grammar points and category descriptions will be gradually fleshed out and improved upon. This will be a top priority after the V3 launch, second only to the development of the new lessons themselves.

Keep the faith, grammar fans. Help is on the way!

-John

Next Up: Pinyin Guide & Listening Test

Interview with John Ralston Saul

Published by Ken Carroll March 25th, 2007 in Praxis Language. 9 Comments

John Ralston Saul is one of Canada’s leading public intellectuals. He believes the process of globalization has all but fizzled out. This, I think, was reason enough to invite him to the ChinesePod studio for a chat the other day. The result is posted over at Praxis.

Part 1

Part 2

Ken Carroll

ChinesePod is a community of practice

Published by chinesepod March 23rd, 2007 in China, About ChinesePod and Version 3. 30 Comments

 

Our recent posts have talked about ChinesePod as a tool. Today I want to emphasize the people (learners, experts, and practitioners). We’re all here to share knowledge, work towards common goals, and learn Mandarin collaboratively. We are, in that sense, a Community of Practice.

The concept of CoP was originally framed (20 years ago) in terms of small, off-line groups (networks) of learners. It was powerful then, and it’s powerful now. But think about this: put that notion together with a global platform, some web 2.0 tools, and a great community, and you could have something tremendously powerful, a CoP on steroids.

V3 connects us in new ways. It’s a seriously efficient network that forms the basis of a latter day CoP. Networks are definitely good for learning. (Some people say the network is the learning.) Consider that the the most effective learning tool we know of is a network - the neural network known as the brain. On V3, finding lessons, information, discussions, comments, answers, solutions, etc, will be RSS enabled, easier and faster than ever to manage.

So, the network is central to what we’re doing. But ChinesePod is more than just an efficient network. Ultimately, any CoP is about people. I believe our culture of openness and sharing on Chinesepod has created what Robert Putnam calls ’social capital’, a kind of community good will. This makes for some very positive consequences: a collaborative, non-threatening environment that fosters relationships and creates a sense of belonging (for example). It’s warm, fuzzy, and human. After 20 years in classrooms I know how important this is.

So think of what happens when the people on our network strive towards common goals in an atmosphere of motivation and collaboration. Information flows freely, shortening the learning curve for newcomers and helping them to understand the larger context of the challenge. It reduces the need to re-invent the wheel for their common problems. Meanwhile, the constant buzz of activity gives us all a reason to come back regularly. Whatever your level, if you visit and revisit this CoP, I think you will learn here. Sharing, developing, and managing knowledge is where it’s at and V3 is designed to maximize that.

So, the new toy we’re calling V3, is more than the sum of its properties. I see it as a way to disseminate good learning practices by relying on the tools, the network, and each other. To a certain extent we already do this but I want to get better at getting better. I hope that you, the Big Brain, do too.

We have the chance to do something really special here - building the biggest and greatest CoP around. I think this could have a real impact on how ‘e-learning’ is perceived. Are you with me on this?

Ken Carroll

The Connect Section

Published by Hank Horkoff March 22nd, 2007 in Version 3. 3 Comments

Brand new to this version of the site we are introducing basic social networking features. In this section, we hope to facilitate two functions: (1) finding other users and (2) tracking conversations.

connect

Finding Other Users

All registered users (Free Account, Basic, Premium) will automatically start a profile. First, we recognize all users will not be interested in maintaining a public profile, so privacy control options are available. More sociable users will be able to personalize their accounts with a brief bio, photo, general personal details (city of residence, sex, age group, etc) and some personal interests. We haven’t been very ambitious with the feature set, but hope over time this section can evolve into a system that will support user meetups in various locations around the world. We are very interested in seeing how it develops.

Once profiles are established, lesson comments, user posts and user post comments will all be linked back to the author’s profile page.

Tracking Conversations

To help save time in monitoring site activity, we are using 3 types of conversations (Yours, Your Watchlist, All) that will list out latest posts and comments. As you find authors that you want to pay special attention to, you can save them to your watchlist so that they get more emphasis. All of these conversation types have RSS feeds as well to help save time by subscribing.

Future Developments

These 2 features are just the core plumbing of inter-user communication. Going forward, we would like to implement real-time AJAX-based chat or perhaps just leverage Skype. Communities of practice are a key element of learning for Ken and he will have more on this tomorrow.

Next Post: Communities of Practice.

Vocabulary Study Tools

Published by Hank Horkoff March 21st, 2007 in Version 3. 9 Comments

The vocabulary study section has much of the current functionality with a few enhancements.

Vocabulary Lists
First of all, vocabulary words can be added from the lesson review similar to as they can now. Once words have been saved, users can add tags to categorize them as they see fit. Instead of using ‘folders’ as we do now, we have adopted ‘tags’ to allow for more flexibility. For example, apple might be tagged with both ‘fruit’ and ‘red’. These tags form the basis of your vocabulary lists. From these lists one can both listen to the audio for the word or find the lessons that it can be found in.

To help promote self-discovery of related, new vocabulary when you view your tagged vocabulary lists, you will also be presented with other vocabulary that the community has tagged in a similar fashion. For example, if you were viewing 苹果 and 西瓜 in a ‘fruit’ list you might be presented with related vocabulary 香蕉, 柠檬 and 葡萄.

screenshot0

Flashcards & Concentration Game
The functionality of the Concentration Game remains the same, but has a fresh, new look. The Flashcards, also have a new look and some new user requested features, including:

- an automatic setting to scan through the flashcard deck
- a temporary exclude feature; this removes the card from the flashcards, but still leaves it in your vocab list
- test 汉字 with audio option

screenshot1

Vocabulary Sets
Similar to how we have grouped together Lesson Sets, we have created Vocabulary Sets of groups of words that are often learned together (e.g. travel-related words). These can be saved as a vocabulary list for future review in the flashcards, concentration game, etc.

Importing & Exporting

s2

Pretty straightforward here, select which lists to export then select your preferred export format (CSV, XML or iFlash). A new import option has been added to help with the mobility of word lists. We were hoping to get printable flashcards up for the launch, but it looks like we will regrettably have to push this back for a while.

Note on Mobile Flashcards
We have temporally removed our mobile flashcards system, but will be back over the next month or so with a much more extensive mobile site to compliment listening to podcasts on-the-go.

Next: The Connect Section

Better pop ups, more learning

Published by David March 20th, 2007 in About ChinesePod and Version 3. 15 Comments

In the past week or so Hank, John and Ken have let slip some of the improvements we’re planning for V3. In this milestone blog post (ok, I’m overstating things, but it *is* my first) I want to talk about some of the backend changes we’re instituting in the run-up to V3, and start a conversation about what this can bring us in the post-V3 era.

As John mentioned in his last post, one of the bigger changes that will happen with V3 is the shift to having customized pinyin popups for the dialogue and expansion sentences. The basic idea is to provide more useful and contextually clear explanations. This doesn’t mean taking away the ability for readers to access all of the other definitions for any particular word, but it does help us be as specific as we need to be to explain any single sentence. This has required some significant changes on the way we develop lessons on the backend as well as a lot of editing work. It is one of the major improvements that is taking up a lot of the academic team’s time.

The result of this is more than better popups though. What it gives us (you) is deeper knowledge of our Chinese content. There should be a number of reasons why this matters pedagogically. Practically, it also gives us a much more flexible system for designing new games, exercises and other site features. Here are three of them off the top of my head:

(1) Better Support for Traditional Chinese:

We’ve been getting a lot of email from people expressing concern about continued support for traditional characters. It almost feels like Ken declared traditional chinese dead without telling us. By ensuring that we have all the necessary data on traditional characters for our materials, the new system should provide a stronger base for supporting traditional Chinese moving forward.

(2) Better Exercises and Games:

Most Chinese language learning exercises that are user-oriented are either flashcards or flashcards-in-disguse. Look past the interface and you’ll notice that gameplay consists mostly of recognizing a chinese word and matching it to either the pinyin or english. There isn’t a lot of variety in these sorts of exercises even if we add audio and switch things up. A word-by-word understanding of sentence content is the first step in building games with different sorts of fundamental gameplay. I have no idea what these will be. But if anyone has suggestions please let us know.

(3) Better Site Search

It’s hard to find lessons about “opening a bank account” in Chinese if you don’t already know how to say “bank” or “account” or “are my deposits insured” in the language. Tagging and english-language site introductions are helping make Chinese content accessible now and in V3. In the long-term we will want better bilingual search, which requires a very fine-grained intelligence on lesson content.

That’s it off the top of my head. None of this stuff will be ready for V3 launch, but they are in the pipeline in the long-term. Thoughts and suggestions are invited as always.

David Lancashire

[Ps, I thought I would include this pic of David solving the pop up question in an unusual fashion. Ken Carroll, ed.]

John Pasden in the People’s Daily

Published by chinesepod March 20th, 2007 in ChinesePod Media Coverage. 5 Comments

You can read about your friend and mine, John Pasden, in the People’s Daily today. And no finer place to read about anyone! Just file him under ‘Expat corner’.

Ken Carroll

Lesson Discovering & Management

Published by Hank Horkoff March 19th, 2007 in Version 3. 7 Comments

Lesson Discovering

While we will be publishing a new lesson every day of the week, most people will find studying lessons in this order awkward with the levels and subject matter constantly changing. With more than 500 lessons in the archive, there should be more than enough to keep everyone very busy!

We have tried to support a number of different approaches in helping users find lessons amongst this mass:

1. Browse by levels
This is the default search method for the ‘Explore’ menu option. A brief description helps new users get a better understanding of what to expect from each level. Lessons in each level can be sorted by popularity (number of times bookmarked by the community), ranking (average community ranking) and date. Basic and Premium users have the added function of being able to ‘Bookmark’ lessons they are interested in for future study.

2. ‘Stumbling upon’ via topic, function and grammar tags
While we believe guidance is important in learning languages, we also feel flexibility to ’self-discover’ relevant language is an important part of ‘Learning on Your Terms’. To support this, for each lesson we provide multiple tags or labels for the topics, functions and grammar of each lesson. If you liked a lesson tagged with ‘Olympics’, you can click on this link to find all other lessons with a similar tag.

3. Keyword search
At the top right of every page is a search box. Keywords entered will be matched against lesson titles, descriptions, vocabulary and tags to help find the best matches. After the initial search, most advanced search options will be presented:

screen1

4. Grouping via Lesson Sets
To add a bit more guidance as to what lessons to study, we will continue our use of Lesson Sets, which contain 10-12 lessons that could be grouped together and studied in sequence. Basic and Premium users will also be able to ‘Bookmark’ these.

Lesson Management

Basic and Premium subscribers will have a number of additional features to help them manage their Bookmarked lessons.

1. Study Schedule
Once lessons are bookmarked, they will be added to the Study Schedule page and will be available for scheduling. Study Schedule is very similar to the current My Course section where lessons can be saved and put in various folders. Instead of folders, Study Schedule utilizes a series of Calendars, much like Google Calendar. We have switched to a calendar format because we found that lesson pacing is important to not consume too much, or too little at once. In addition, if you have a Chinese teacher, they can pre-design a schedule that you can save with one-click and the appropriate lessons will appear in your iPod on the appropriate day.

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2. Your Feed
In the current site, you can not only subscribe to the public RSS feed with the new lessons, but also to your My Course RSS. We will continue with this functionality and add more features. First of all, instead of using an obscure id number, we will institute a unique username system. Personal RSS feeds will look like: http://chinesepod.com/hankhorkoff/lessons/feed. On the Your Feed page you will be able to control the settings for your feed, specifying what types of programs you would like to receive and also what format of MP3’s you prefer.

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3. Lesson List
For users that are a uncomfortable with accessing the downloads from the RSS feed, there will also be an HTML version that will reflect the same lesson information as the feed.

The cost of learning Chinese

Published by Ken Carroll March 18th, 2007 in About ChinesePod. 12 Comments

Come all

The former Australian Immigation Minister, Amanda Vanstone, may be in trouble for spending somewhere between 30,000 and 70,000 (Australian) dollars on Mandarin classes while she was in office.

In ChinesePod terms that higher figure would buy something like 200 years of premium subscriptions. Even if she took the uninterrupted daily practice sessions with the 8 Week Program, that kind of money would buy her years of access for several members of her department. Next time anyone out there bumps into her, please let her know about us.

The ChinesePod premium subscription works out at 65 US cents per day. In the last couple of months it may have seemed as though we were not constantly adding features to the premium service (as we were wont to do for the first year of our existence). The reason was, of course, that we were busy putting them into V3. I can assure you that we want to create as much value as we can possibly pack into 65 cents a day. That will continue.

There are many ways we can do this. It was obviously a major factor in Hank’s thinking when he led the development of V3. I also spoke with John Pasden and David Lancashire the other evening, and we talked about how they plan to continuously ramp up that value ad infinitum. (They have some great ideas.) I am not invovled in the tech side of ChinesePod, but it’s really starting to dawn on me that V3 is going to… how can I put this?.. kick butt and keep getting better.

Once we release the V3 beast it will be up to all of us to maximize what it can do. For months, I’ve immersed myself in everything I could find on the subject of CALL, Informal Learning, Connectivism, Blended Learning, E-Learning and anything pedagogically related. I want to benchmark ChinesePod, put it into some theoretical perspective, and figure out the best possible ways to leverage it as a learning tool. I’ve got tons of ideas. Now my plan is to work with the Big Brain to get it done. If you continue to contribute feeedback and ideas here, this could become be the mother of all Communities of Practice.

[Btw, let me say one thing: If you’re considering a premium subscription, I’m definitely not suggesting that you delay! My point is just the idea of constant improvment. Meawnhile rolling out all these new developments requires, er, cash]

Ken Carroll

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Ken Carroll discusses issues concerning learning generally, and learning Mandarin in particular. With technology as the driver, he believes the most effective learning combines elements of collaboration with self-direction. If that seems like a contradiction, then you need to read the blog.