I like names :3

[barnowling]

Hi, I'm Karl or any shortening of my username. I use he/they/she pronouns and I'm a minor. Idk how often I'll post but im new to this so bear with me

[barnowling]

I just got to level 5 in all my unit one assignments in Duolingo today! I’m playing around with the unit review, too, and it’s really easy for me. I feel so powerful today!!

I’m also starting a list of Chinese phrases that I’m probably going to use frequently, whenever I have the courage to make a HelloTalk

[barnowling]

I like doing little things to celebrate holidays from whatever culture related to the language I’m learning. I used to tidy up the gravestones for dia de los muertos back when I was learning spanish, but this year I’ll clean my room for the lunar new year. I could use a fresh space

[09zakka]

あけましておめでとうございます🐅

[barnowling]

yes i have adhd how could you tell

[debelice]

[haystarrs-deactivated20200728]

[peakingeveryday-deactivated2025]

[europeanportuguese]

fr tho

[balloons-and-shadows]

* Language Learning *

[linghxr]

A Resource for Reading Practice: The Chinese Reading World

I wanted to share a resource for reading practice that I stumbled across recently. It’s called the Chinese Reading World, and it was a project led by the University of Iowa.

The site was put together from 2005 to 2008, so it’s not super up to date. However, there is a ton of content! Everything is sorted into 3 levels: beginning, intermediate, and advanced. 

Each level has 30 units, and each unit has 10 lessons. The lessons begin with a vocab pre-test, then there is a reading with some comprehension questions. Lastly, there is a vocab post-test, which is the same as the initial test (at least for the lessons I’ve done so far). There’s audio for each lesson text, but unfortunately it can’t be streamed—you have to download it. There is also an achievement test at the end of each unit.

My experience has actually been that I already know all the words on the vocabulary tests, but the reading passages contain other words that I’m not familiar with.

So far, the readings I’ve encountered are not very long. This is nice since reading longer pieces can be frustrating at times. With shorter readings, you can just read 1 or 2 on some days and read more when you have more time/patience. I believe the readings are taken from Chinese newspapers.

Also, every unit has a theme. With 90 units total, there are bound to be themes that interest you. Example unit topics:

Directions and Asking Direction 方向和问路

Sports and Outdoor Activities 体育和户外运动

Chinese Music and Musicians 中国音乐和音乐家

Chinese Minorities and Local Customs 地方习俗和民族风情

Chinese Sports and Olympic Games 体育和奥林匹克

Contemporary Chinese Literature and Writers 中国当代文学和作家

The 3 levels also each come with 5 proficiency tests. They seem to be based on vocabulary knowledge, so expanding your vocab is clearly a huge focus of this site. The only thing I’m unclear is about is I’m not sure exactly when the proficiency tests are meant to be taken. After completing all units? Or are they spaced out so you are supposed to take test 1 after the first few units, test 2 after the next few, etc.?

I’ve started working my way through the advanced section this week. With 300 advanced lessons alone, it really feels like I have an infinite number of articles to go through!

[barnowling]

I love it when languages smash old words together to make new ones. It's always the best thing ever. like in Mandrin, chick is 小鸡 (small chicken), family is 家人 (home people), telephone is 电话 (electricity words), and bread is 面包 (flour bag). Look me dead in my eyes and tell me this is not the most delightful thing ever.

[lowpolyanimals]

Cucco from Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time

[dsm-wannabe-linguist]

NFT (Nasal Fricative Trill)

[liu-anhuaming]

Reading Manga as a Stepping Stone to Novels

So recently I made a post about how I started reading Chinese novels, and gave some suggestions for how to find native content that would be enjoyable but not overwhelmingly difficult. One of the tips I gave was to try reading comics or manga in you TL, especially if novels were too hard for you. What I wanna do in this post is further break down the pros of reading manga, explain how I used manga as a precursor to reading novels, and give some ways to find manga in Chinese!

Keep reading

[balloons-and-shadows]

Ways of language immersion

If you know some more ways of language immersion, please let me know so I can add them!

Watch a movie in your target language

Change the settings of your phone to your target language

Listen to a podcast in your target language

Read a book in your target language

Listen to some music in your target language

Add a chrome extension to your browser, which changes random words on the web to words in your target language (like Toucan for example!)

Watch a tv series in your target language

Listen to the radio in your target language

Change the settings of some home/kitchen appliances to your target language (your microwave for example)

Join Tandem to speak with native speakers of your target language

Watch the news in your target language

On social media, follow some accounts that post in your target language

Play a videogame in your target language

Cook via a recipe in your target language

Read Buzzfeed in your target language

Listen to an audiobook in your target language

Watch TV shows for children in your target language

Use Lyrics Training

Set your internet browser to your target language

Change your calendar/planner to your target language

Watch some Youtubers in your target language

Follow an online tour of a museum in your target language

Read your horoscope in your target language

Check out children’s songs and lullabies out in your target language (on mamalisa.com)

Read poetry in your target language

Watch interviews in your target language

Read a comic in your target language

Write your grocery list in your target language

Search for motivational quotes in your target language

Read fanfiction in your target language

Play word-based games in your target language

Talk to voice recognition technology (Siri, Alexa, Google) in your target language

Talk to yourself in your target language

Try to think in your target language

Sing along to Disney songs in your target language

Talk to other people on your target language

Research topics that interest you in your target language

[study-to-rule-the-world]

Chinese is really logical - Part 1

红 （hóng) = red

绿 (lù) = green

灯 (dēng) = light

红绿灯 = traffic light

_____________________________________

呼 (hū) = to breathe out

吸(xī) = to breathe in

呼吸 = to breathe

_____________________________________

开 (kāi) = to turn on

关 (guān) = to turn off

开关 = switch

[bngrc]

TIL the word for ham is 火腿 “fire (cooked) leg/shank”: 一片火腿 “a slice of ham.” Weird how I went my whole life not realizing what specific part of a pig ham comes from until I read this term in Chinese. I mean I’m sure if I thought about it I might have come to that logical conclusion, but we tend not to think about where our meat is coming from in the US.

I’m also somewhat bemused that Mandarin food terminology specifies that 牛奶 milk is “cow milk” and that 鸡蛋 eggs are “chicken eggs” but 火腿 ham is just “cooked leg” not 火猪腿“cooked pig leg.”