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“I have studied Chinese for 2 years, but many times I still don't understand what my neighbors want to say to me…”
Maybe you've been learning Chinese for a while, but in real life, when you start to talk to the local people, you may still be confused about…
What does that mean? Why can I still not understand?
I would like to tell you that it's perfectly normal. Even though I am a native speaker and a Chinese teacher, I have encountered many situations in my life that even I do not understand.
Specifically, there may be the following reasons.
China is vast, there are several major dialect areas, and there are dozens or even hundreds of dialects. If you live in the southern part of China, you must have a similar feeling. When you communicate with people in non-Mandarin speaking areas, you will inevitably encounter problems of poor communication.
China's top ten dialect areas
People have different levels of education, especially when facing some older natives, it is normal to not understand. Because they usually can't speak standard Mandarin proficiently. So don't worry, you need to understand that it's not just that you're not learning enough.
In school, teachers do slow down their speaking speed to make you hear more clearly. But in real life, our speaking speed is obviously faster than our speaking speed. If you are accustomed to the teaching speed, you may feel uncomfortable with the speaking speed in daily life.
“You speak too fast, speak slowly”
Overcome the mental obstacle
If you continue to study while giving yourself extra pressure of becoming more “understandable”, it will actually have a negative impact on your fluency. Even our Chinese teachers sometimes doesn’t understand the natives either. Just calm down.
When I was learning other languages, I often went to the coffee shop to "eavesdrop" on what the locals were talking about. I would also take the initiative to listen to some FM radio or the news on the bus. I didn't really care what it said, just treated it as a kind of BGM. With time went by, you will gradually build up your own language sense of Chinese. Believe me, by having this sense your feeling for the language and fluency will increase.
Especially for listening materials after class, you can try to play the listening materials at 1.2 times, 1.5 times or even 2 times. As time goes by, you will also find that you gradually get used to the real speaking speed, then you will quickly begin to understand much more.
You can ask your Chinese friends for help, and I bet most of them are eager to help you with your language problems.
If you have a Chinese teacher, bravely express your doubts to your teachers. For example, we always have a section in class to review students' questions in Chinese Surfing.
Your questions, our answers! Study with curiosity and questions and get double the results in half the time!
Our teachers will tell you some expressions that are different from textbooks, which will also help you better understand the parts you may not understand.
Bravely express your doubts to our teachers, our teachers will tell you some expressions that are different from textbooks, which will also help you better understand the parts you may not understand.
Any questions? We'd love to help!
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