First Week of Chinese LL Challenge - How to start?!

你好！

Hey!

First of all, this week was super hectic. What I wrote in my proposal for my first week of this challenge, wasn't what I had in mind. I found out that I have an exam next week, (not because I'm a bad student, but because I forgot). Since it was 4 units of content, I decided to learn 2 units this week, and learn the other 2 units next week so that I would be prepared for the exam next week.

Therefore, this week, I will be covering the units: 4 and 5, and next week will be units 6 and 7.

Although this workload was more than I expected in the final proposal, I thought that it would be the most perfect opportunity to use Quizlet and Pleco to its full extent.

Unit 4 and 5 Study & Integration of Technologies

Quizlet

So I mentioned in my proposal that I would use this for its Text-to-Speech function. This function allows me to hear the pronunciation of the word precisely whilst looking at the Chinese character. More specifically, the app would first say the English word (along with the written English word), and then show the Chinese character whilst saying the Chinese character out loud.


***Quizlet users who make a study set (Vocabulary list + Translations) are mostly shared - meaning I can get access to them and use already-made flashcards etc.***

(Thanks jeremy_weir!)

I was able to find someone else's study set so that I didn't have to make up my own. I played the whole 37 character list for this unit on this app at least twice a day, and I was able to memorise how to say the Chinese word when I saw the English translation within the first half of the week.

Now that I was able to memorise the word verbally and be able to read it in the text-form, it was time to memorise how to write the Chinese characters.

As per usual, I started off by writing out the vocabulary list and writing down the characters. The left-hand side column is the English translation of the word, and on the right, are the repeated Chinese characters for that word.

(My Study Notes)

Pleco

As for Pleco, I mainly used it for Unit 5 as there were more complicated words that I struggled to memorise in rote. As I said in my final proposal, I used Pleco mainly for its stroke order and the example sentences given for the specific word.

As you can see, the words I chose to use in Pleco are not that many. I expected that I would use Quizlet far more than Pleco as the main goal was to learn and retain a certain number of words by the end of the week. This meant that I would be using apps such as Quizlet to memorise a high frequency of words easily, rather than to emphasise and spend too much time on a specific word unless they were too hard to memorise even after a few times. The words chosen for Pleco are words I had difficulty memorising even after writing them repeatedly.

Comments on these apps

I'd like to mention that these apps are perfect for both mobile phones and computers! The reason why I say this is because, the ubiquity of these devices allow me to find time wherever I am, to study these vocabulary. I remember reading in Mike Levy's (2009) study on 'Technologies in Use for Second Language Learning' that these devices were already great since the main focus for many developers were of the creation of applications and materials for easier vocabulary learning in this period. This was also one of the reasons (that I forgot to mention in my proposal) that I chose to use mobile devices and its applications; this is certainly working out very well!

  

Evaluation

I know that in my evaluation approach in my final proposal states that there would be a pre-test and a post-test in Week 1, however, that would mean I would be doing 4 units of pre and post-tests (2 units from previous week + 2 units in the current week). This was a little unreasonable as the workload was way too heavy (literally have no time to do this much work), therefore, weeks 0, 1, and 2 will have to be an exception so that I can achieve the main goal.
Hence, for this weeks evaluation (and for next week), I chose to evaluate on Unit 5 as it was the harder unit (Unit 4 was far easier/simpler), and next week I will do Unit 7 evaluation.

***Clarification*** I know this is getting way too complicated, but this is the final verdict for this week and next week.

This week's pre-test will be Unit 5 and there will be a post-test next week on Unit 5 along with the pre-test of Unit 7 and so on.

Pre-Test Results (Unit 5)

I stated in my proposal that my evaluation would have the actual quiz results from the Chinese class as my Pre-Test evidence, but I found out that it's not allowed to take assessed materials out of class for discussion. That's why I had to make this sketchy grid paper to make the tests.

(A little bit dodgy, but will improve on the format)

As you can see in the photo above, the pre-test and post-test were done on the same page. I had forgotten to take separate pictures of before and after, however, it is important to note that the pre-test and post-test photos have a whole weeks gap of learning through Pleco and Quizlet in between.

***The tests were done in pen to show that I haven't corrected any mistakes and to keep it authentic and credible. *** 

As you can see from the above results, I made 9 mistakes (highlighted in green). I guess the excuse for that week was that I had to do TWO quizzes instead of one so I made many mistakes. My prediction is that on the weeks where I do only ONE quiz, I will have much fewer errors since the workload isn't as heavy as the former.

Post-Test Results (Unit 5)
Since the start of making and editing the final proposal, I knew that the evaluation aspect of this challenge couldn't fail me as long as I did the work. I had ZERO errors in the post-test of the Unit 5 which had 9 errors in the pre-test! I already knew the results as I was doing the post-test since I was confident in what I was writing and I felt that it was almost too easy.

Final Thoughts

Despite this week and next week being the second-hardest weeks of this learning challenge, I think that if I keep doing what I am doing (with minor tweaking in between), I should be able to obtain my learning goal of memorising and retaining the knowledge 200 Chinese characters! I'm aware that there is a need to stay motivated in order to achieve it, but, knowing that I'm achieving my weekly goals gives me the satisfaction and motivation to drive me forward.

Let's see how long that lasts! 😆


References:
Levy , M. (2009), The Modern Language Journal, Technologies in Use for Second Language Learning. 
doi-org.ezproxy.library.uq.edu.au/10.1111/j.1540-4781.2009.00972.x