now that i’ve stuck to using pleco and its flashcard feature for a few weeks now (started at hsk 1 and am now starting hsk 3 for vocab), i thought i’d make a quick write up of how i’ve been using it! similar to anki, pleco offers the option to study flashcards using a spaced repetition system (srs), which promotes long term memorization by showing difficult flashcards more frequently while showing older flashcards less frequently. what makes pleco great is its ease of use; the learning curve is less steep when compared to anki and because it’s specifically for chinese, it’s super easy to add new vocab into your flashcard deck.
pleco offers many different “test types” (ways to study flashcards) and the option to create different “profiles” so that you can save your customized settings to study the same deck of cards multiple ways. the two test types i’ve used and liked are self-gradedandfill-in-the-blanks. imo fill-in-the-blanks is particularly great for those who are studying handwriting. i set mine up so that i have to write the chinese character after being shown the pinyin and english definition.
screenshot of how pleco’s fill-in-the-blanks test type works (excuse my handwriting haha):
i did eventually stop using this test type in favor of purely using the self-graded test type because memorizing how to write characters isn’t as important to me as improving my reading/speaking/listening skills. pleco’s self-graded test type is similar to the traditional flashcard system where you’re shown the character and have to guess the definition. i’ve also set it up so that i can rate my “answer quality”. i.e. even if i got the answer correct, did i get it correct because i knew it well? or was it something i had to struggle to remember? being consistent with the ratings you choose will help fine-tune the srs algorithm to help it determine the length of time that will pass before you’re shown the word again. notice how pleco shows both the traditional and simplified forms of a character too! great for people like me, who are studying traditional characters but want to also be familiar with its simplified counterpart because simplified chinese is so widely used:
this was just a brief overview of a tiny subset of the many settings pleco has for its flashcard add-on, which in turn is just a tiny subset of the many features pleco offers. note that though the app itself is free, the flashcard add-on is $9.99 usd (or you could get one of the bundles that includes flashcards along with other features like a document reader and more dictionaries).
i used anki for a bit in the past and while anki definitely has more customization for their flashcards–there’s a reason why they’re the go-to program for people wanting to use srs for studying flashcards–i find the overall experience of pleco a lot better and conductive to my chinese learning experience.
if you’re like me and want to eventually make reading your primary way of learning chinese characters, you’ll notice that a lot of the resources online are using simplified characters. new tong wen tang(chrome;firefox) is a browser extension that will help you convert webpages between simplified and traditional chinese. and regardless of the writing system, another helpful extension to have is zhongwen (chrome;firefox), which adds the ability to hover over a chinese character and see a pop-up containing the pinyin and english translation of a word.
before enabling the two extensions (notice how everything is in simplified!):
after enabling new tong wen tang and zhongwen (text has been converted to traditional chinese and doesn’t interfere with zhongwen’s pop-up dictionary):
“As you know, our ancestor, Sun Yee, had a mystical connection with red pandas. In fact, she loved them so much that she asked the gods to turn her into one.”
I saw this movie recently, and besides its other enjoyable aspects, something I really appreciate is its representation of Ming dynasty hanfu. Usually hanfu in animated films is a generic mix of various dynastic styles (and if inspiration is taken from mainly one dynasty, it’s usually the Tang). But here, we have rare representation of authentic Ming hanfu & hairstyles. Take this ancestral portrait of Sun Yee, where she is wearing a red pifeng, orange standing-collar changshan/ao, yellow mamianqun, and diji hair ornament:
It is clearly based on this famous Ming dynasty portrait (source):
In the pic below, the right outfit is the style that Sun Yee wears, and the left outfit (aoqun + square-collar bijia) is the style that her daughters wear (source):
I have tried my best to scour and compile it into a usable list.
“The Science and Civilisation in China series is the work of Joseph Needham, C.H., F.R.S., F.B.A. (1900-1995) and an international team of over 30 collaborators. Publishedby Cambridge University Press in seven volumes since 1954, from vol. 4 onward, each volume is divided into a number of parts. e project is now proceeding under the guidance of the Publications Board of the Needham Research Institute, chaired by Christopher Cullen.”
Quick update: First of all, let me apologize for not updating in a while. I have moved from China to the USA and from Boston to Virginia and have now begun studying for the LSAT. Whew! I’m back to a regular routine and you guys should see regular posts from me now!
If you’re self-studying or self-learning Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Spanish, French or any language, there are so many reasons why a language learning method could fail that you could be completely unaware of. After all, there is no one identifying your shortcomings or problem areas in language study for you. You have to do it all by yourself. When I began to learn Japanese and Korean in high school I did not know this and it was pretty devastating. When things slowed down or I couldn’t remember Japanese words, I got so freakin’ pissed! Why wasn’t all my hard work paying off!? How long does this stupid crap take?! Why am I not fluent!? How do I learn Japanese faster?! I was rightfully frustrated, but at the wrong things. I was angry at everything else except how I was actually studying.
What I have come to understand is that the language learning method is just as important as the content you actually learn.
Oh? Just came across this today (26 April 2022). It’s the preregistration site for the Traditional Chinese version of a CCS mobile game, and it seems to be pretty recent.
Is this just CCS Repaint Record though? But the Japanese server has already ended service… so, if it is, why are they still developing this? It won’t last long unless they develop materials just for the TW server? Or is this another game entirely??
