Chinese Take-In provides an interactive environment where first-year Chinese learners can practice listening outside the classroom according to individual needs and paces while receiving immediate feedback. In a foreign language classroom, listening proficiency is perhaps the most difficult to cultivate among the four basic language skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing). Therefore, it is important for foreign language learners to develop listening skills at the beginning level. Chinese Take-In helps first-year Chinese learners improve their listening comprehension.
The design of each passage or dialogue is an attempt to approach real-life communications. The ultimate goal of these exercises is for learners of Chinese to integrate their linguistic and background knowledge when listening. Your task is to make interpretations of what you hear; this means that you must listen carefully. You may have to employ your ability to make logical inferences, just as you would when communicating in real life.
All the vocabulary words and grammar structures in these exercises are based on the textbooks (PCR I & II, Lesson 1 - Lesson 40) used at the University of Texas at Austin for first-year Chinese I & II (CHI506 and CHI507) as of the fall semester of 2009. There are a total of 30 units; with the exception of the first two, each unit corresponds to a lesson in the textbooks. Following is the index for these 30 units:
Unit 1: Lesson 1 - Lesson 9 Unit 2: Lesson 10 - Lesson 12
Unit 3: Lesson 13 Unit 4: Lesson 14
Unit 5: Lesson 15 Unit 6: Lesson 16
Unit 7: Lesson 17 Unit 8: Lesson 18
Unit 9: Lesson 19 Unit 10: Lesson 20
Unit 11: Lesson 21 Unit 12: Lesson 22
Unit 13: Lesson 23 Unit 14: Lesson 24
Unit 15: Lesson 25 Unit 16: Lesson 26
Unit 17: Lesson 27 Unit 18: Lesson 28
Unit 19: Lesson 29 Unit 20: Lesson 30
Unit 21: Lesson 31 Unit 22: Lesson 32
Unit 23: Lesson 33 Unit 24: Lesson 34
Unit 25: Lesson 35 Unit 26: Lesson 36
Unit 27: Lesson 37 Unit 28: Lesson 38
Unit 29: Lesson 39 Unit 30: Lesson 40
Each unit includes a vocabulary section which consists of key vocabulary used in that unit and ten situations (dialogues or passages). Each of the ten situations is accompanied by four (or occasionally five) choices given in English. You can listen to each item for as many times as you like before making the proper choice and you will receive immediate feedback. The transcript for each situation is provided. Upon making the choice, you can choose to read the transcript, if you so desire, in either the traditional or the simplified characters.
If you experience buffering or skipping issues related to the audio, chances are this is due to your internet connection. If this happens, click on the page you want to use and wait 15 seconds to a minute to allow the audio to load into your browser before you press play.
We hope that Chinese Take-In will improve your Chinese listening ability and your overall enjoyment of the Chinese language.
