[quote=“canucktyuktuk”]I’ve been experiencing tests almost every day, homework from the books and also various handouts every day and unbelievable stress. I started out prepared to do 3-4 hours a day of home work in order to succeed, but it quickly became 5-6 hours. Now I have eyestrain, I’m stressed, my hand hurts from trying to write those fucking characters and phrases over and over again, and I’m failing.
Hopefully when I take level one again, at a hopefully slower pace with a teacher more suited to my learning style (and vice versa), armed with knowledge of what I don’t want in a class, I’ll do better. If not, I’m going to pay for a private teacher. If that doesn’t work, I’m going to quit completely and leave or accept the fact that I’m going to live here unable to speak to people or read to any level of competent communication.
I have my final exam tomorrow. The teacher gave us a preview exam. I don’t even know 5% of it. It covers exactly all of the crazy grammar that I don’t understand one bit. Almost nothing from the chapters I do understand.I’m not taking the f-ing exam. I’m sick of tests all the time.
I honestly don’t understand how somebody can learn 30 + characters and the confusing nonsensical grammar in 3 days. That’s just crazy. 10 class days per chapter would be ideal for me. It would give me time to thouroughly understand what I’m doing and to apply my knowledge in the direction I want to go, as well as do what they want and get the feedback I desperately need in order to feel that I’m doing something right.
Honestly, I learned more German in one year of high school and more Spanish in a few months of backpacking in South America than I have learned Chinese in 3 years of living here and thousands of dollars worth of lessons.
It’s time for the MRI.
But i’m not bitter. Really.[/quote]
I have a lot of experience studying languages, and your post concerned me. It sounds like you are studying too much - if the way you are studying isn’t working, studying even more won’t help. I suggest you go to a different school and take a class where they 1. go slower, and 2. concentrate on the spoken language. You don’t need to know the characters for everything you say, especially a student like you who seems to have a hard time memorizing the characters. Spoken Chinese, while more difficult for us than Spanish, is not that hard - and remember, the nouns and verbs don’t change, so in some ways it is easier than European languages.
At TLI, for example, we didn’t have to learn the characters - though I did - and in my class at least there were no tests. We used a textbook, and the teacher explained the grammar, but we mostly just talked.
Once you get to a good level in the spoken language, you could start learning the characters - go at a slow pace, though.