So I've been studying the HSK word lists as a supplement to my college classes, and sometimes I feel like I'm not learning the words that well because I'm learning them out of context. I'm usually not able to remember these words when I'm speaking and instead I just recognize them when I hear them spoken. I most definitely remember words I learn/use in class more than words I learn from the HSK lists in Skritter.

That leads me to my question, does anyone here know a truly good way to learn new vocab through self study? I've tried studying words I come across in my reading, but it usually doesn't stick because I've only seen the word once or twice and I forget the context once it comes up in Skritter. I've tried the same with Chinese videos and ChinesePod podcasts, but I run into the same problem.

I'm starting to think that the best I can do is learn words out of context, and then have them reinforced later when I go study in China and use/hear the words in daily conversation. Or maybe I'm wrong and there's a better way, really interested in hearing people's thoughts. :)

Maybe you could get another textbook and study the vocab from it on Skritter? If you read the texts and do some excercises, that should give you a bit of context, even if it won't be as good as having a teacher drill you in class.

Your passive vocabulary will always be bigger than your active, so I don't think this is a problem per se. If you get enough exposure to Chinese I think you will find that passive can morph into active quite easily.

Personally, I'm currently studying the HSK 5 out of context, but even with my light reading, quite a bit of my new vocab shows up in context sooner or later.

I think the best way to supplement your studies would be to learn the most frequently used words, that way when you go to China you are most likely to come across words you have studied in everyday use.

Mandarinboy's 5 x 1000 "Chinese movie word frequency" lists might be a good place to start, as fewer words are used in the spoken language, so coverage rises comparatively quickly (according to my spreadsheet):
1,000 words are 81.51% of all words used.
3,000 words are 90.19% of all words used.
5,000 words are 93.31% of all words used.
See academic research at:
http://expsy.ugent.be/subtlex-ch/

For the written word, you might consider YueMeigui's "现代汉语常用词表" 2 word lists one of which is described as a: "Word Frequency List from a book published in China for fighting illiteracy among Chinese adults. "

Best of luck!

If you recognize them when you hear them then surely you're learning how the words work in context? You have a rudimentary understanding from skritter and then build on that by listening. That seems to me as about as efficient as can be.

Today a really cute Japanese kickboxer -- I know that sounds like an oxymoron -- came to my school (she went there when she was younger) to give a demonstration for its 30th anniversary. She came later during the day so my mind was already bogged down and fatigued by having to listen to lots of new Japanese songs earlier in the morning. When I finally was able to speak to her, away from the crowds, I said 英語話せますか and she replied, in English, “no”. I then froze. I then strung together a strange mixture of English and Japanese words along with some non-verbal body language in an attempt to communicate with her. I felt retarded. Even after being totally immersed in Japanese day and night for almost two years I still can’t have a simple conversation in Japanese. I was not trying to use difficult or esoteric or complex rhetorical techniques, I was just trying to make small talk! And I couldn’t do it.

Dude, I don’t know what to tell you. You just gotta practice until it’s all second nature. I can knock out back-to-back-to-back-to-back English classes with Japanese mixed in without a problem but if I’m thrown out into the wild I falter. You become good at whatever you do all the time. If you practice the words you want to learn every day it will soon become a cakewalk.

Hey Man I feel your pain!

I don't think that there is one correct answer to this type of a question but we all find little tools that help some. What I do is whenever I skritter-across a word that I have never learned before but feel like would be hugely beneficial to my spoken Chinese I will pause my skritter and go to http://www.nciku.com/

On this website you can just type in any word (use english pinyin), and a page with dozens of example sentences will pop up, additionally (and what I find most helpful) is that at the bottom of that page for most words there will be a list of common 搭配 's (or word combinations). So for example if I came across the word 坦率 (meaning frank / honest), when I look at the list of "Da Pei's" I see "坦率的人“ so then I know I can use this word to describe a person as being frank, I also see "坦率的讲“ so I know I can use it as an adverb to get across that I am speaking frankly to someone.

Sometimes the example sentences on skritter are either too hard to understand or too obscure to really help give you some concrete ways of using the word. I find the tools on this website helpful, and hope it helps you out too! 加油！