Hello all learners around the world,
After having real hard time and taking some wrong turns, I developed a good way of learning Chinese. So, I want to share it, to save newbies lots of study and time. I cannot say for sure, I am by no means an expert, but I can show you what kind of thinking makes it easier.
My basic rules:
1-) Dont trust skritter alone. Though it is great for learning lots and lots of characters, you should understand that CHINESE IS A HIGHLY CONTEXTUAL LANGUAGE. Thus, memorizing words without the context and usage is not a good idea.
2-) You cannot LEARN CHINESE by answering flashcards. You have to TRY to SAY YOUR OWN SENTENCES. Otherwise you will end up with 1000s of characters (yes, skritter helps you do that easily) but you will not be able to understand or say anything.(I learned more than 1000 words than Chines guys told me that I can find those words may be in a novel but not in daily life)
3-) Chinese grammar is NOT LIKE WHAT YOU MAY THINK. There are no strict rules, or rules that you can follow like many languages. You have to KNOW or at least be familiar with THE DAILY USAGE OF words/phrases.

My solution:
1-) Use chinesepod. Pick the lessons according to your needs. Listen. (or find a free equivalent for listening but not easy)
2-) Add chinesepod vocabulary lists, STUDY THE WORDS after(read:AFTER) you have heard them in a context.
3-) Have flash cards consisting of PHRASES and STRUCTURES that dont make sense to you. There will be a ton of those in chinese. (I can share my flash card collection with you, just ask with an email)
4-) have a book of stories with explanation. READ IT. So you can run into the words you learned again and again without getting bored(read:studying) (ask someone(or me) for suggestions, not all chinese books are helpful, trust me)
5-) DO EVERYTHING DAILY. LEARNING WORKS LIKE THIS.

These suggestions are for those who are just about to struggle and waste months like me.
Enjoy if you liked the idea.

I'd be interested in the flash cards.

jww1066 [same as here] at gmail.com

Me too. I've been noticing something like you describe; I know words, but not how to use them. I've considered nuking my account again and starting over, limiting my lists to only HSK and Chinesepod lists.

Anyway, please email to jcddvm (AT) sbcglobal.net

If you're interested, I described one of my primary learning methods earlier. While it's one of my most important theoretical methods, good theoretical methods typically only tend have a substantial _complementary_ effect and only a very small substitution effect (substituting practical methods).

The example was related to somebody studying 虽然...但是 (http://www.skritter.com/forum/topic?id=81894610):

Quote:

[ That's how to do it:

"__ __很早出门，但是我还迟到了。"

Add this sentence to the flashcard SRS software of your choice, e.g. Anki.

Front: "_ _ 很早出门，但是我还迟到了。"
Back: "虽然很早出门，但是我还迟到了。"

Then vary this for some more cards. E.g.

Front: "虽然很早出门， _ _ 我还迟到了。"
Back: "虽然很早出门，但是我还迟到了。"

Front: "虽然很早出门，但是我还 _ _ 了。"
Back: "虽然很早出门，但是我还迟到了。"


+ve:
This method is fast and efficient, works for all language levels*, helps you move the words into your active vocabulary, and it does not rely on non-Chinese in any way.

-ve:
A drawback is the fact that usually a variety of words fit and you need to remember exactly which one is the "right" one in this case. But that's not as difficult as it might seem in the beginning. In fact, you learn to quickly identify the "right word" needed in a particular context, which is precisely the skill needed if you want to improve your active knowledge of vocabulary.


* proviso: perhaps less suited for lower levels if you have trouble remembering the meaning of the words shown.


------

On a related note, believe it or not, memorizing sentences has an immense effect on the active vocabulary. However, it is probably not the most efficient method if your aim is to learn particular words. ]

K... I believe that way of studying flashcards is also a good method. I will try If I fell like preparing them.

jcdoss : I've already nuked my chinese and started over. If you really learned, I say, dont be afraid to nuke yours. Because it will all come back pretty fast. Working "CORRECT" is very important. (learned the hard way)

I nuked mine after I didn't study for 3 months and came back and realized I knew none of the characters from Chinesepod lessons that I didn't also use in my coursework (and had thousands of characters in my que). hicri is right in that it doesn't take very long after a nuke for Skritter to accurately portray how many characters you really know.

hicri: I agree with just about everything in your list, but I'm curious to know why you don't include any speaking practice with native Chinese? That's what has been most beneficial to me. After speaking with Chinese speakers on a daily basis for about 8 months now I'm way more confident in my speaking ability than I was after two years of study without hardly ever speaking with anyone.

I definitely agree with speaking to native speakers and reading as much as possible, but the idea that Chinese has no grammar with no strict rules is simply false. Also I would say Skritter is a kind of flashcard system, why bother replicating things?

I'd like to see your flashcards, too. godurbin at gmail dot com.

http://www.zhongwenred.com/ is a good source for sounds paired with sentences. I use them with Anki (www.ankisrs.net) for listening/reading practice, vocabulary expansion and dictation.

Generally most of what I do comes from, of course, www.ajatt.com, which I have followed with great success with Japanese.

Thanks a lot for you suggestions! What kind of books do you read?

Chinese is not my first foreign language (neither is English) and reading page-turners has always helped me a lot, so I definitely agree with you on this one.

hi again folks;

about "no grammar" issue:
I wouldn't trust my knowledge either. I can admit defeat on this. However, I insist on saying there are not many strict rules that you can be ok just by following. Chinese (as I know) gives the speaker/writer lots of choice to pick from, which in turn confuses the newbie listener/reader. (me, in this case)

about "chat with natives" issue :
definitely right. But in my case, this should come after elementary level. Because you need to learn to walk first. As you know, chinese speakers run and fly and jump... (they talk so fast with lots of different accents and generally they are not used to a foreigner's weird putonghua. it's hard to have a nice chat unless you are at a certain level)

flashcards:
I am making them digital right now. Soon, I will send them to all people who wrote their e-mail address in this topic.

why new flash cards ?
- skritter is too slow for long chinese sentences. Simple software (such as mnemosyne) can be highly efficient on just learning the structures, phrases etc.

For language in context, there's also jukuu.com (which also has a handy firefox plugin).

the flashcard issue has a better option:
USE ANKI.
It is a free software. You can download HSK sentences for free on one click too. I discovered it yesterday.
It cost me a couple of clicks and everything is downloaded and ready.
I also see that they are much better than mine
http://www.ankisrs.net/ (install, search mandarin, download, use)

thanks thinkbuddha, that's a great resource!

thinkbuddha,
how do I find and install the firefox plugin for jukuu, and what does the plugin do?
thanks

I think I'm the only one here who don't really think that ChinesePod is efficient, it's certainly the way I work but I usually cannot concentrate on their lessons, my mind is already somewhere else after few minutes.

Or else I have lately be hired by a company (PR, in Taipei) where everyone speaks chinese and most of the business is conducted in chinese. This has proven to be radical for me, no more flashcards or lesson (but still Skritter!) :p