SaySomethingin Chinese (Beta)

[welshspringbok]

Looking forward to the arrival of the Chinese course. Won’t be doing it myself but I have a candidate who is very happy to start paying for this once it arrives.

I’m already on Italian, Welsh and French and will be starting German as soon as it becomes available. Need to try and get back to Spanish as well - got a little lost on that one.

I would also be highly interested in knowing when the first Slavic language will become available. I noted recent comments about Russian which may start at some point next year. I’ll be on the guest one that becomes available. Czech, Croatian, Serbian, Ukrainian would all be particularly useful.

[aran]

It looks at the moment as though 2025 will be a year for continued publication of languages which are well supported with translation and voice services, while we continue to fine tune the app, the schools version, and content creation so that we can start to get clarity on how much each new language will cost us outside of the automated options.

I think by the end of 2025 we should be able to map out a pretty clear way forward for new language production

[thomas-cassidy]

Chinese for English speakers just passed Alpha stage and so it should appear in the app anytime in the next few days.

[thomas-cassidy]

Oooh! Big news. Chinese is out!

[mintonman]

I’ve started to give this a go - I’m maybe twenty minutes in. I’ve begun to learn Mandarin a little in the past, but not much - enough to have a little confidence in recognising, remembering and reproducing tones. I’ve been looking forward to SSiMandarin for a long time - I will be giving it a good go

Just writing with some beta feedback so far, while I remember:

For much of the first ten minutes or so, it asked me to produce variations of “I want to speak Chinese with you now” (having previously taught “speak Chinese” as a phrase). A few shorter combinations of elements, but mostly the whole phrase or almost all of it.

Then it added “but” and “and” on the end of that phrase, without first introducing either word; and introduced the initial long phrase as if it was new; and is now mainly repeating the initial long phrase, alternating with the “but” and “and” additions (still not actually introduced, though).

This seems like a lot of one long phrase, plus two variations with not-yet-introduced conjunctions - and other than the recent introduction of “I speak” there has been rather little making of shorter phrases from the same words compared to how I remember other courses beginning.

I like a rollercoaster, though! I’ll carry on and try and note feedback regularly (especially where words are asked for that have not yet been introduced) - do let me know if that’s not useful and/or if feedback through a different channel is better …

Thanks again for all this new course creation work!!

[thomas-cassidy]

This is all great feedback. It shouldn’t really be asking for words that haven’t been introduced

But I think you’ll be able to work it out. And you can just skip ahead if you’re finding it a bit repetitive

Seriously though, we used to be fanatical about being asked to say words that hasn’t been previously introduced, but it turns out that people get used to it. And it prepares them for when they start to hear words in real conversations that they don’t know

And they can start getting used to being out of the comfort zone

I’m quite a long way through the course now and I think it’s one of our best. It takes a little bit of getting used to, but after a while it really starts to come together

My advice is to just keep going, but do let us know if there’s anything else bizarre in there.

[thomas-cassidy]

To follow up on this with a little more depth.

We know there are some problems with the beta courses, which is one of the reasons they will stay in beta for a while.

We used this heuristic as a way to work out when to move a course to beta:

1. Does it play?
2. Will the errors prevent learning from taking place? (ie. provide so much interference that learners can’t progress)

And provided we’re happy that the answers to both of these questions are satisfactory, we will release the course and let people play with it

Having said all that, we are extremely grateful for all the feedback, so please keep it coming.

[thomas-cassidy]

We’ve identified an error with the very first sentence. Which does add the words

‘but’ & ‘and’

in English without having previously introduced those.

Most of this is an error, but there’s one interesting thing.

Chinese doesn’t really use ‘and’ the way we do in English

and the way they use

和

which we translate as ‘with’ as part of

和你

with you

is used mostly when we might say ‘and’

you and me

I want to speak with you

kind of translates as

I want to with you speak

with/and

I want to with/and you speak

so, you already have been introduced to the Chinese word

和 (sounds a bit like ‘her’)

just not the English prompt for it

‘and’

these aren’t hard and fast rules because #languages

the Chinese do have a different word for ‘and’ when it means, furthermore, or moreover

which is most commonly

而且 (sounds a bit like ‘our chair’ which is very natural in speech and is probably the most conversational option. It flows well in daily talk.

well, of course they have tons of ways to say things

but

而且

is used by us in the course

But the reality is we don’t believe grammar is really worth explaining

Because then people will start thinking about grammar rather than just going for it and trusting their instincts

so, my broad advice would be

just plough on and after about 30 hours in-app you’re speaking Chinese confidently

[ingridjukes]

I noticed the same things. It was very repetitive and didn’t introduce the words and & but.

[mintonman]

A new one: “is spoken very well” is introduced with the woman saying shou de hen hao, and then the man says something completely different.

[thomas-cassidy]

Thanks for that.

shuo de hen hao

is one of the ways to convey the ‘speaks well’
‘is spoken well’
etc.
dependent on the context

“说得很好” (shuō de hěn hǎo) means “spoken well” or “speaks well.”

For example “你的中文说得很好” (nǐ de zhōngwén shuō de hěn hǎo), means “Your Chinese is spoken well” or more naturally in English, “Your Chinese is very good.”

Breaking it down:

• 你的 (nǐ de) = your
• 中文 (zhōngwén) = Chinese language
• 说得 (shuō de) = speak (with 得 as a structural particle)
• 很好 (hěn hǎo) = very good

This is a common compliment in Chinese.

but since the voices are generated independently, they’re not ‘coupled’ to each other and so there can be instances when one or both are garbled

We thank you for all this type of feedback.

When the voices are different from each other in the target language, you know that at least one of them is wrong

possibly both!

[julia-treen]

I wanted to try the Chinese course (having previously done lots of Welsh). I listened to the first two phrases to check the app was working (a few days ago) then came back to it today and can’t get it to skip any further back than “I want to speak Chinese with you but” but I don’t know any of the words yet! Is there a way to get it to go back to the very start?

[thomas-cassidy]

Actually, if you just continue the words will get introduced again and again in very slightly different configurations, so if you managed Welsh, you’ll find the Chinese absolutely fine.

It’s a little different in the new courses in that single words are introduced as well as phrases with quite a lot of variation as introduction items.

eg.

I want to speak
to speak Chinese
I want to speak Chinese
I speak
I speak Chinese
speak Chinese with you

etc.

So, if you go ahead you should make it fine.

We are trying to fix the behaviour of the skip and revisit buttons so that it’s more logical to people.

The next version will go backwards to the previous introduction item upon pressing revisit

and forwards to the next item on pressing skip

In the meantime, have a go and see what happens.

I’m pretty confident you’ll like it.

If you still can’t get anywhere sensible, then please message @rich and he’ll be able to help you