Word for word transcripts ensure you understand every word
Online tools help you perfect your pronunciation
Get feedback from real teachers whenever you need it
One on One
The current CLO course is great at providing you with lots of listening and reading practice. What it lacks however is an opportunity for you the learner to practice your speaking capability. That’s where the Premium One on One plan comes in.
Depending on your schedule, you can have a CLO teacher call you using Skype after each lesson to review with you the fundamentals of the lesson. During this time you can practice your pronunciation, engage in conversation as well as answer review questions on the subject. You can also use this time to ask any additional questions you may have on the material.
After the lesson, you will be sent an email with a summary of any new vocabulary taught in the session.
Here are some testimonials from users of our One on One service:
I must start off by saying that Kirin greatly impressed me with her teaching skills. If there is one quality that a teacher must have above all else, it is patience. And Kirin was very patient with me as I started to speak Chinese once more after the gap of some months. I am sure you can tell by listening to the Skype audio chats, that my speaking skills definitely started out pretty badly in the first lesson but were improved ten-fold by the end of the last lesson. More than anything else, this made me very glad and my general confidence level in speaking Mandarin increased a great deal with the few people I know here in Seattle who speak Chinese with me.
First, I believe the key there is simply to have someone to practice with regularly and to have some sort of aim. Having these 15-minute conversations with Kirin scheduled made me prepare for them by reading the text aloud to myself beforehand again and again until I got it right.
Secondly, a huge advantage of having these lessons is that I have a critical audience. When I am speaking Chinese with someone else, if I say something incorrectly (grammar or tone), he will probably not correct me because it might be considered rude. But, when I speak with Kirin, I know that I will be corrected, and that is the way I prefer it, because there’s no other way for me to learn.
Lastly, I think it is simply fun having someone talk to you from a somewhat distant place, where points of view are a little different and things are done differently and where the language you are learning is the lingua franca. I definitely love meeting new people and making new friends and I’m sure most other people do too. “
In regard to my thoughts on the one-on-one live lessons, I did listen to the sessions and found them very helpful. Kirin was extremely pleasant and accommodating to work through my pronunciation issues. As a beginner, I am trying to absorb vocabulary and understand Chinese language speakers in normal speaking pace. I do find myself lacking in pronunciation and other speaking nuances more so after listening to the sessions to the point of embarrassment. While listening to my sessions, I distinctly speak Mandarin with an American dialect, which would be taxing on native Mandarin speakers to understand.
The first lesson went very well and Miwa is a good teacher. I had no problems understanding her and she was very clear with her Chinese and English. Also, Miwa overall is pleasant to work with and uplifting with her praise! A good quality which I recognize as important to a student’s learning, whose confidence in speaking Mandarin may be shaky.
The most valuable part of the lesson for me was creating sentences with words she picked out. For example she asked me what “xi1 wang4″ meant and then asked me to make a sentence using this. I had to think for a minute because then I had to go over all my vocabulary and think! This is the hardest part for me because it requires original thinking and knowledge of sentence structures and vocabulary. Plus, I have learned Mandarin by practicing CLO dialogues, which is good but has a downside to it. That is, I associate vocabulary with the sentences in the dialogues so much that it is ingrained in my head. For example, when I want to say something or someone asks me a question, I think of answering with the dialogue that I learned, ahh!
The first 10 minutes or so consisted of me reading the dialogue, going over the vocabulary words, reading the dialogue together, and then giving English meaning to vocabulary words. For those who are struggling, especially at “Level I” or so, this would be good for them, as first one must master pronunciations and meanings before moving on to anything else.
Miwa gave a good introduction asking my name in Mandarin and reciprocating back. She acknowledged every line or answer I gave which is good.
You can purchase 5 hours of sessions for $99.95 US. These can be spread out based on your schedule and preference.
To see if this plan works for you, you are welcome to try out 1 hour of sessions for free. Simply contact us with your schedule preference and we’ll get you started. To take your Chinese learning to the next level, purchase a subscription today!
During this time you can practice your pronunciation, engage in conversation as well as answer review questions on the subject. You can also use this time to ask any additional questions you may have on the material.
0