Searching for how to improve Chinese ability with minimal commitment? Here are 5 easy activities you can do everyday to maintain and grow your Chinese listening and reading skills.
There’s no doubt about it: learning Chinese is hard. Like real 辛苦 vibes. And no matter your level of Chinese – beginner, intermediate, or ninja – keeping up motivation for learning Chinese can be tough.
Luckily, it’s actually quite easy to dip a little bit of Chinese language into your daily life, even if you don’t live in a Chinese-speaking country like Taiwan, China, Singapore, and (parts of) Malaysia.
What’s more, with these 5 daily activities plus some tips to improve Chinese, you don’t have to spend that much time focusing on the language; it’s more about what you’re subconsciously absorbing and practicing than drilling vocabulary and grammar into you.
Sounds good, right?
So, whether you’re stuck on learning Simplified Chinese or wanting to improve Traditional Chinese, here are the some of my foolproof daily activities on how to practice and improve Chinese reading and listening skills.
How To Improve Chinese Reading
1. Read the news
你聽説了嗎？Reading the news is actually good for you when it comes to improve Chinese reading skills. That’s because it’s a great way to practice vocabulary and grammatical constructions since news writers love to repeat information.
Reading the news is also an easy way to come into contact with specialized vocabulary that you might not have the opportunity to interact with normally. While it can be daunting to look at a document with Chinese characters that you’ve never seen before, this is one of the best ways to improve Chinese reading, so bear that in mind.
2. Read Books
It may seem like reading books in Chinese is not exactly an easy daily activity, but with practice this is a great way to identify your language weak points and improve your Chinese language understanding.
If you’re looking for a way to improve Chinese reading, but aren’t confident that you know all the words you’ll encounter, I recommend using the Chinese-English translator Pleco alongside whatever reading materials you’ve found. With a handy handwriting tool, it’s easy to find that challenging word that you may not know the Mandarin pinyin or Chinese Zhuyin for.
3. Watch the news
沒想到看新聞這麽有興趣吧！Yes, watching the news can be very interesting, especially when it comes to learning Chinese. That’s because it tests both your reading and listening abilities, offering the perfect space to challenge your knowledge of vocabulary and grammatical constructions.
To improve Chinese reading in the best possible way with this activity, I recommend watching short newsclips on YouTube, rather than live from the TV. While some TVs do have playback functions nowadays, Chinese newsclip segments from renowned TV stations on YouTube are usually quite short – about 5 to 10 minutes long – which are perfect for replaying again.
✨Tips to improve Chinese✨
Here are some popular news channels in Taiwan that frequently upload content to their YouTube Channels: SETNews, ETtodayHow To Improve Chinese Listening
4. Do Yoga
Yes, learning Chinese is good for the mind and the body. Watching yoga videos (or any workout videos) where the main language is Chinese is an easy way to improve Chinese listening skills because it demands that your sole focus isn’t on the screen in front of you, aka no helpful subtitles to give the answer away.
Flow with Katie is my personal favorite when it comes to a bit of Chinese x Yoga time, as I find her voice clear and her poses relatively challenging. That said, there are plenty of other yoga instructors out there with Chinese-speaking content on YouTube, so it’s easy to find someone that you match with too.
5. Watch films & TV
A classic form of revision of your Chinese skills is catching up on Chinese films and TV shows. This is a great way to improve your Chinese speaking, listening, and reading ability. Watching films and TV also introduces you to different Chinese accents, testing your Chinese listening capabilities as well as improving your Chinese speaking accent.
Watching shows are also an easy way to pick up popular slang terms and language nuances.
✨Tips to improve Chinese✨
Although Netflix is adding more and more Chinese programs to its catalogue everyday, there are ♥️FREE♥️ streaming sites available that are ideal to improve Chinese listening, such as: Gimy (Traditional) and Iyf (Simplified).Conclusion
While these 5 daily activities are a great way to kickstart, continue, or maintain your Chinese learning, the best way to learn a language has, and will always be, to immerse yourself in it. So, for those more willing to spend a little to a lot more for online or physical classes, I recommend taking the time to explore Taiwan’s best places to study Chinese.
Depending on your Chinese Mandarin preference (Simplified or Traditional), there’s a ton of resources and schools out there waiting for you. Just keep fighting the good fight and we’ll all be fluent soon – I promise!
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