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Many teaching systems try to teach new vocabulary by giving you a list of new words to memorize (this same principle applies to learning to read and write new characters). The problem is that without context, it is hard to remember these words, so you are facing an uphill battle by using this approach. This is especially the case in Chinese where the same character can have multiple meanings in multiple contexts. Our approach at CLO is to help you remember the usage of words in context. Use the word bank to see where else within other lessons a character or word you are studying has been used, to get familiar with other possible usages.

One advantage to learning Chinese in a Chinese speaking community, is that the local residents are usually a lot more receptive to talking to you in Chinese and helping you practice what you’ve learned. They usually find “foreigners” to be a novelty and find it as interesting (if not more) to talk to you than you are to talk to them. This can also extend to non Chinese speaking communities where Chinese may be even more surprised (and intrigued) to hear you speaking with them in Chinese than they might be if you lived in a Chinese community. So use this to your advantage by striking conversations with Chinese people where you can, to practice what you already know. Even if the conversations are rather simple, you will still be training yourself to listen to different ways of speaking as well as training yourself to come up with answers on the spot.