After trying out five different websites over three weeks to learn as much Chinese as possible for free, the one that had the majority of my requirements was Loecsen. It enables a person to quickly learn everyday phrases.
Here are links to the Mandarin learning journey:
My Story
Though I’m not brand new to the Chinese language, I still consider myself a beginner for the Mandarin dialect. What helps me recognize some of the simplified Chinese characters used for Mandarin and the related tones are my experiences below:
- Growing up with the Toishanese dialect at home
- Attending Cantonese/English bilingual classes in elementary school
- Seeing the traditional Chinese characters in Chinatown
- Hearing Cantonese spoken on TV shows
- Taking a conversational Cantonese class in college
With the small bridge that I had, I marched on to start my journey to learn Mandarin/simplified Chinese in a more methodical way.
My Best Mandarin Resource
The best option for me to learn a new dialect is to receive feedback on my pronunciation and lessons in spoken Chinese with translations in American English, while being able to slow down the speaker. In addition, seeing the simplified Chinese characters with pinyin, along with the traditional Chinese characters and drawings would help me recognize the content quicker. Lastly, having quiz results would allow me to gauge my progress.
Below is some information from my internet search and trial period that will hopefully be useful for you:
Search
There are many ways to learn Mandarin online, but where do we start? Referencing the article on the List of Freeware website, 31 Best Free Websites To Learn Chinese Language Online, and the post on FluentU’s Mandarin Chinese Language and Culture Blog, The 11 Best Free Resources to Learn Chinese Online in 2022, can help narrow down some choices, depending on the goal. Do you want to learn to speak or write Chinese? Do you want to learn through reaction videos, songs, drills, etc.?
Assessment
Here are the results from trying five different resources, a couple of which were also listed on the above linked write-ups:
| Review Criteria | 1. Duolingo | 2. Mondly | 3. Loecsen | 4. COERLL (Chinese Word Order Practice) | 5. COERLL (Dialogues Podcast Collection) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Required Account Sign-in | Yes, to save progress | Yes | No | No | No |
| Translation Options | Chinese characters and pinyin shown for a word or phrase | Option to switch between Chinese characters and pinyin | 1. Option to listen in Chinese or Chinese and English 2. Option to view the phrases with Chinese characters, pinyin, English, or all three 3. Option to hear English translation after you provide an answer in Chinese 4. Drawings to help visualize each phrase 5. Quizzes given in Chinese where English (British) answers can be selected and vice versa | English translation for the sentence you are to create in Chinese | 1. Simplified or traditional characters available 2. English translation provided 3. No pinyin available |
| Pronunciation Practice | None | Option to participate in the Conversation section if you give permission to the website to access your microphone | Option to test your pronunciation of a given phrase by giving permission to the website to access your microphone | None | None |
| Speed Control | None | None | Option to slow down the speaker | Not Applicable | No option to slow down the speaker |
| Knowledge Test | Four checkpoints | 1. Weekly quizzes and monthly challenges 2. No access to a weekly quiz if a daily lesson is skipped for that week 3. No access to a monthly challenge if the weekly quizzes are incomplete for the month | 1. Many quizzes available 2. Times when quizzes stop working and browser needs to be refreshed 3. Possibility that waiting for all the vocabulary words in each theme to appear in the quizzes to confirm your knowledge will take a long time | Not Applicable | Not Applicable |
| Other Notes | Missing alternative ways that an English sentence can be provided as an answer | None | None | No option to save progress to continue at a later time | None |
| Steps to Access Free Content | 1. Complete as many free lessons as available 2. Spend any earned lingots to access more lessons * 3. If you have some Chinese knowledge, try completing Checkpoints 1-4 to access the tips section for the remaining lessons | 1. Complete the lessons in the Hello category, including the Conversation section if your microphone is accessible 2. Complete the Daily Lesson each day, quizzes each week, and challenges each month | All content available without charge | All content available without charge | All content available without charge |
As with learning any language, practicing is the only way to improve. Below is a way for me to do just that for learning Mandarin:
Continuous Improvement
- Attempt to converse with my kids in Mandarin. Though they’ve only each taken three school years of the dialect, it’s still more than enough for me to practice the vocabulary, grammar, and tones!
Over the years, I have noticed some Chinese characters in Japanese and Korean writing, so I would suggest to my earlier self the following when I developed an interest in watching Japanese and Korean shows:
Lesson for Dumber Self
- Try to connect what you already know in the different Chinese dialects and writing systems to the Japanese and Korean languages, so maybe one day you won’t need to rely on the subtitles when watching the shows!
What will you do now?
Next Step for You
- Try one of the above resources to learn Mandarin?
- Read articles on how Mandarin/Chinese are related to some of the other Asian languages? Below are some examples:
- Korean vs Japanese vs Chinese from The Linguist blog by Steve Kaufmann
- Similarities between Thai and Mandarin from the blog from 1-StopAsia
- Read another post on this site? (Go to the menu at the top of the page.)
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