Free Language - learn mandarin chinese

ChinesePod.com Mandarin Chinese Podcast with Free Audio Downloads for your iPod

polyglot — Sun, 11 Feb 2007 03:28:49 +0000

Summary

ChinesePod.com is a fabulous resource for Chinese learners of all levels. The content is fresh, up-to-date and constantly flowing. They are hip to the latest trends and vocabulary and do a solid job of producing good content to work with. The production quality of the podcasts is high, and the personalities involved are varied.

From Website

ChinesePod is a new way to learn Mandarin. Whether you’re going for a jog, preparing for a business trip to China, or just looking for a challenge, everything about ChinesePod is designed to get you communicating in Mandarin – fast. There are seven ability levels to choose from, from Newbie to Advanced, and business lesson topics like “Initial Client Meetings”, “Getting Tough on Employees”, “Chinese Guanxi” and “Business Introductions”. ChinesePod releases a fresh lesson everyday.

Visit ChinesePod.com

PopupChinese.com: Popup Chinese Language Show w/Free Mandarin Lessons (Audio MP3), Free Online Tools and a Hip Team in Beijing!

polyglot — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 16:43:27 +0000

Summary

Hailing from Beijing, Popup Chinese offers refreshing, high-quality audio podcast lessons for Mandarin Chinese learners: free! Carefully planned and well-recorded, these lessons are professional, useful and fun. The Popup Chinese team is young, vibrant and eager to guide Chinese learners to true fluency in the language. Popup Chinese is truly one of the most exciting language podcast resources to hit the scene for any language! In addition to offering free audio lessons for listening and download, they also provide a host of amazinly powerful free software tools including a user-editable English-Chinese-Pinyin dictionary, an excellent Chinese text annotator, a steady flow of annotated news in Mandarin Chinese and a Firefox English-Chinese-Pinyin dictionary plugin. And for those serious about speaking Chinese, a reasonable paid upgrade that includes lesson transcripts, supplemental exercises, a personalized vocabulary training software tool and access to a vibrant user community. All in all, the Popup Chinese team and user community are incredibly dedicated and helpful! Get started (or keep learning!) now by immersing yourself with this talented, friendly and active Mandarin Chinese learning website: Popup Chinese

From Website

An Institution in Chinese Learning... Popup Chinese dates back to 2001, when work on our Chinese learning technology began at the University of California, Berkeley. Our service developed rapidly during the SARS crisis in 2003 with the first web-based edition of our distinctive popup annotator going online later that year, hosted from a budget server based in Beijing. Over the next few years, our learning systems attracted a following among bilingual translators. We began to release data for use by the open source community, and eventually run ancilliary reference services including NewsinChinese, and the Adso Textbook project. By late 2006 our textbook portal was garnering rave reviews as the premiere site for students with a serious interest in advanced mandarin acquisition. Popup Chinese is our latest step forward, and an effort to bring the same excellence in language acquisition to students at earlier stages in the learning process. From our hutong in downtown Beijing, we produce materials that give foreign speakers the confidence to engage with China in mandarin: the language of the 21st century. We encourage you to subscribe to the site and accelerate your learning. In addition to our basic subscriptions, we're delighted to offer custom learning packages to individuals and companies with unique training needs.

Visit Popup Chinese.

StudioChinese.com: Studio Chinese Offers Unlimited Live Instruction, One-on-One in a Realtime Mandarin Education Environment

polyglot — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 08:58:58 +0000

Summary

Studio Chinese allows learners to engage instantly a realtime education environment for the Chinese language.

Online tools include audio, video, screencasts, exercises, etc. Live, on-demand sessions are also available.

Currently, Studio Chinese is offering a Free Trial Lesson to get the flow going. You can use this an an opportunity to start communicating in minutes with a real Chinese instructor - especially good if you are a total beginner. If you feel good about the lesson, you can continue with a paid subscription.

One noteworthy detail about Studio Chinese's program is that all subscription packages include unlimited connections with live teachers!

From Website

When it comes to Mandarin, speaking is believing.

1. Discover
Each StudioChinese session starts with you discovering the language through an interactive mix of audio, video and exercises. You’ll learn about how to use Mandarin in a specific situation while preparing the material you’ll use when you connect in the live conversation with one of our tutors.

2. Connect
Connecting to your instructor is easy. Log in, press connect, and that’s it – we’ll be there, ready to start your live session. Having live, relaxed conversations is the key to your progress. Moreover, our tutors will guide you without interrupting the flow of the conversation and help you build your own sentences, so you get the most out of your time online.

3. Review
Hearing yourself back shows you where and how to perfect what you’ve learnt. StudioChinese records your conversations, carefully marking and annotating areas to focus on. Hone in on your individual needs, so you can move on quickly and efficiently. If you want, download your conversations to your computer or mp3 player to improve your skills for the next session.

StudioChinese is designed for:

• Students ready to explore China
• Business travelers working in China
• Travelers preparing for ChinaThree simple steps in each session:
• Discover Chinese with online content
• Connect with a native Mandarin speaker
• Review feedback on conversations

Visit StudioChinese.com

A Round-Up of 45 Mac OSX Language Software Apps: GPL Software, Freeware, Shareware and Demos from Apple's Download Center

polyglot — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 01:58:32 +0000

Summary

This (lengthy) article brings together a pile of Free Software (GNU GPL'd as Public Domain), freeware and shareware for language learning and reference for Mac OS X.

Software descriptions are taken from Apple Downloads. We will be adding more GPL applications soon.

Polyglot Culture: Quick Wikipedia Tip for Multilingual Language Surfing Goodness

polyglot — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 00:01:55 +0000

Summary

The now-ubiquitious Wikipedia.org has some multilingual gems tucked away in its folds. This article serves to point out one of the most powerful polyglot culture feaures that Wikipedia offers: the myriad articles in a multitude of languages at a single click away.

For instance, while browsing the topic "Language" on Wikipedia in English, down the left navigation bar you will find entries for the same topic in literally dozens of languages:

Afrikaans, Alemannisch, العربية, Aragonés, Arpetan, Asturianu, Avañe'ẽ, Aymar aru, Azərbaycan, Bamanankan, Bân-lâm-gú, Basa Banyumasan, Башҡорт, Беларуская, Беларуская (тарашкевіца), Boarisch, Brezhoneg, Български, Català, Чăвашла, Cebuano, Česky, Cymraeg, Dansk, Deitsch, Deutsch, Diné bizaad, Eesti, Ελληνικά, Español, Esperanto, Euskara, فارسی, Français, Frysk, Furlan, Gaeilge, Gàidhlig, Galego, ગુજરાતી, 한국어, हिन्दी, Hrvatski, Ido, Ilokano, Bahasa Indonesia, Interlingua, isiXhosa, Íslenska, Italiano, עברית, Basa Jawa, ქართული, Kernewek, Кыргызча, Kiswahili, Коми, Kongo, Kreyòl ayisyen, Kurdî / كوردی, Latina, Latviešu, Lëtzebuergesch, Lietuvių, Limburgs, Lingála, Lojban, Magyar, Македонски, Malagasy, मराठी, مَزِروني, Bahasa Melayu, Nederlands, 日本語, Нохчийн, Norfuk / Pitkern, Norsk (bokmål), Norsk (nynorsk), Nouormand, Occitan, پښتو, Polski, Português, Ripoarisch, Română, Romani, Runa Simi, Русский, Саха тыла, Sámegiella, Sardu, Scots, Seeltersk, Sicilianu, Simple English, Slovenčina, Slovenščina, Српски / Srpski, Suomi, Svenska, Tagalog, தமிழ், Tatarça/Татарча, ไทย, Tiếng Việt, Тоҷикӣ, Türkçe, Türkmen, Українська, Volapük, Võro, Walon, Winaray, ייִדיש, 粵語,Zazaki, Žemaitėška, 中文

This list discludes several languages for which this particular computer does not have fonts installed. Many of you will see font-related issues for some of the languages above. Find out more here if you do.

How to find the links.

This image shows how to find what other languages are available for a given topic on Wikipedia:

These are not translations.

Each entry is an organically-written encyclopedia article on the topic of "Language" in a language. The time and space for language and culture persists!

It's quite intriguing surfing Wikipedia for multilingual goodness. If you'd like to hear more on this topic or have something of value to share, please comment on this article!

Use these to learn!

This feature of Wikipedia can be used to learn and teach languages. Find a topic of interest and study up on the vocabulary in your target language, build a linguistic knowledge of specific interests, get materials for educating, compare entries in different languages to bring out cultural nuances and more. There are many ways to twist and tweak this vast maze of plurilingual content!

From Website

A language is a dynamic set of visual, auditory, or tactile symbols of communication and the elements used to manipulate them. Language can also refer to the use of such systems as a general phenomenon. Strictly speaking, language is considered to be an exclusively human mode of communication. Although other animals make use of quite sophisticated communicative systems, sometimes casually referred to as animal language, none of these are known to make use of all of the properties that linguists use to define language.

In Western Philosophy, language has long been closely associated with reason, which is also a uniquely human way of using symbols. In Ancient Greek philosophical terminology, the same word, logos, was used as a term for both language or speech and reason, and the philosopher Thomas Hobbes used the English word "speech" so that it similarly could refer to reason, as will be discussed below. More commonly though, the English word "language", derived ultimately from lingua, Latin for tongue, typically refers only to expressions of reason which can be understood by other people, most obviously by speaking.

Visit "Language" on Wikipedia in English and look at all the languages on the left navigation bar. Those are the languages for which the article you are viewing has equivalents.

RocketLanguages.com Rocket Chinese (Mandarin) Complete Language Audio and Software Course for Total Beginners

polyglot — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 16:53:12 +0000

Summary

The Rocket Chinese product from Rocket Languages has proved to be a highly successful, fun! and fast method for beginners to learn the Chinese language. The Rocket Languages team has designed a multi-faceted course including extensive audio lessons, software and learning games, grammar lessons with audio clips and a member's forum for help on demand.

As with any Rocket Languages product, try it out and if you don't like the results, you can get all your cash back for 60 days after you place an order. No risk there, and the potential to truly learn a new language!

From Website

Rocket Chinese is designed to be the easiest to follow system for learning how to speak Chinese available. It is an interactive course that makes you want to study. Also, it's practical. You'll discover exactly what to say in virtually all situations.

With Rocket Chinese, you are going to learn Chinese rapidly, effectively, and easily. You are going to be able to speak at a restaurant, at an airport, with new friends...

With the Rocket Languages Chinese Program you get:

A Rocket Languages Interactive Audio Course that prompts you to speak Chinese in a conversational and friendly way so that the words just stick in your mind! Learn a language the easy way!

Mega Software Learning Games that are specifically designed to increase your vocabulary and understanding of Chinese and allow you to have fun in the process!

Fully illustrated and easy-to-follow Grammar Lessons, for those of you who love to know how Chinese works. Most of these come with embedded audio clips in the lessons so that you can hear exactly how the words are pronounced!

If you have any questions, you can either email us or post a message on our Members Only Learners Forums, where our team of language experts and fellow enthusiasts will respond to your needs. With every Premium order you get unlimited and full access to our Forum - imagine having a teacher, virtually "on call" 24 hours a day!

And of course all Rocket Languages products are backed by a 60 Day 100% Money Back Guarantee. We're that confident, and it's that simple.

Rocket Languages will teach you how to speak Chinese naturally, so you can read, write, speak, and understand the language as though you have lived there all your life - these are truly cutting-edge multimedia courses!

Find out more about Rocket Chinese.

Free 6-Day Chinese Course!

hskflashcards.com Free Download HSK Vocabulary Cards in PDF Format + Print New Practical Chinese Reader Text Flash Cards (NPCR)

travelinguist — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 09:35:37 +0000

Summary

hskflashcards.com offers an amazingly easy way to prepare for the Mandarin Chinese HSK (Hànyǔ Shuǐpíng Kǎoshì; simplified Chinese: 汉语水平考试; traditional Chinese: 漢語水平考試) exam (view Wikipedia). The site provides you with free PDF downloads for all the vocabulary you'll need to pass the test! You cana also browse the vocabulary through the site itself, or create an account to study them online right through your web browser.

Additionally, the site provides printable vocabulary cards for two of the major Mandarin Chinese intructional textbooks used worldwide: the Practical Chinese Reader (PCR) and New Practical Chinese Reader (NPCR).

And it's all free! Bravo Jake, nice work indeed. :)

From Website

Welcome to HSK Flashcards. This site is intented to be a one-stop resource for HSK vocabulary lists and flashcards for people studying Mandarin Chinese. To begin studying the flashcards right now, just click the green “study” button on your left.

The entire HSK vocabulary list is available to download in several file formats, including flashcards in PDF format (suitable for printing on Avery business card paper). Recently, I added the Practical Chinese Reader textbook vocabulary lists, as well as the vocabulary lists from the New Practical Chinese Reader.

If you find errors in any of the lists, please email me. If you need the lists in another file format, please email me. If you have a suggestion for the website, please email me. If you're bored, please email me.

Mandarin Chinese is an interesting, useful language! I hope this site helps your exploration and learning!

Hànyǔ Shuǐpíng Kǎoshì: “The Chinese Proficiency Test (HSK) is China's national standardized test...to assess the Chinese language proficiency of non-native speakers”

In 2006, I tried to find a list of the HSK vocabulary so that I could make myself some flashcards. I did find a couple of lists, but they were all incomplete in one way or another, so I merged several of those lists to get something better. The results of that work are available on this site. Many people have contributed since then by sending in the typos, errors and missing words they have found in the lists. Topple recently reviewed all of the words in all four lists, and found several deficiencies. Thanks, Topple!

New Practical Chinese Reader: “NPCR is a new series of textbooks designed for native English speakers to learn Chinese. ... The objective of this series is to develop the student's ability to communicate using Chinese through the study of language structure, language function, and related cultural knowledge along with the training of listening, speaking, reading and writing skills.”

In 2007, I found the Practical Chinese Reader textbook series, and started using that curriculum to better formalize my study. Matti Tukiainen has the vocabulary lists for books 1, 2 and 3 on his website. I've added those lists to this site. The PCR books have been rewritten in a second edition, called the New Practical Chinese Reader. I have digitized NPCR books 1, 2 and 3. Topple recently offered his help by digitizing NPCR books 4 and 5 (well, book 5 will be here soon).

— Jake Marble, 马杰克

Visit hskflashcards.com

Learn That Language Now! ebook with Quick, Easy and Efficient Method for Learning Any Foreign Language

travelinguist — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 13:37:33 +0000

Summary

Learn That Language Now! is a truly excellent, highly useful e-book for learners of any language - available for instant download to get you learning better right away. The study approach presented in the book is refreshing, exciting and even intoxicating, because it works so well once you start using it! Having personally learned six languages to varying degrees myself, I was pleasantly surprised to find many new tips and tricks that I'd never come across in over 15 years of studying and practicing foreign languages.

The author offers language learners perspective (earned through years of learning multiple languages) as well as practical methods you can start using right away to improve your language study flow and achieve fluency many times faster than with standardized methods.

This ebook provides essential information that will save you time and energy, helping you reach your goals faster and with more confidence. And with a low price tag of $19.99 USD - and instant delivery to your email - you will have a hard time finding a more valuable investment in your foreign language learning endeavors.

Finally, teachers will also benefit greatly from this book as it will give them insight into creating better study programs and stronger learning tools for their students.

Find out more about "Learn That Language Now!"

From Website

Learn That Language Now

What if I told you that you can become fluent in a foreign language in a matter of months, learn thousands of words without worrying about forgetting them, master grammar and do all of this in an enjoyable, painless manner. Sound too good to be true? Well, prepare to have your language learning experiences turned upside down. Read on to learn more...

What is “Learn That Language Now”?

Learn That Language Now is a comprehensive manual that will teach you the tips, tricks, techniques and method to achieve fluency in a foreign language with the goal of learning as quickly and fluently as possible with the least amount of effort.

Learn That Language Now was written because all other traditional methods of language learning, including classes, textbooks, audio courses and software programs, were slow, costly, inefficient and used language learning philosophies that were out-dated. Most language resources teach language along the same lines as languages were studied hundreds of years ago: endless grammar, syntactical rules and vocabulary lists.

Visit Learn That Language Now.

Semanda.com Free Chinese Vocabulary Cards with Downloadable PDFs plus Multiple Choice Quizzes for Children (Kids)

travelinguist — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 13:36:29 +0000

Summary

Semanda offers quick and simple review and download of Mandarin Chinese vocabulary cards and online multiple choice quizzes for children/kids! These are all free. :)

Be sure to have a look at the printable PDFs of the vocabulary packs.

From Website

Free Mandarin Chinese Flash Cards

Semanda.com is a website for learning basic Mandarin Chinese vocabulary using illustrated flashcards. Online flashcards and multiple choice quizzes in several subjects are available, as well as printable PDF flash cards.

On semanda.com, you will find basic Mandarin Chinese flashcards and vocabulary exercises for children and beginners.

The flashcards use both simplified Chinese characters (hanzi) and pinyin, and are available both online and as printable PDF files.

The wordlists cover a wide range of basic concepts, such as colors, animals, fruits, vegetables, vehicles, furniture etc. New flash cards are added all the time, so please check back regularly for updates!

Visit Semanda.com

Verbix.com Verbix Free Verb Conjugation Website (WebVerbix), Verb Wiki and Windows Freeware (FreeVerbix) for 100+ Languages

travelinguist — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 08:16:10 +0000

Summary

Verbix is "an independent non-profit organization that aims to promote and protect linguistic diversity." The tools on their site "contain verb conjugations for hundreds of languages, ranging from national and international languages to regional and even extinct languages."

There are four main things to bring your attention to in this article:

1) WebVerbix, a great free online verb conjugator for over eighty languages.

2) WikiVerb, a wiki site dedicated to languages, verbs, and verb conjugation.

3) FreeVerbix, a freeware version of the Verbix Windows software which bumps the number of available languages to above one hundred.

4) The Verbix website, where all three of the above and more (including the $40 paid version of Verbix 2008 for Windows) are available. Your purchase will support the non-profit group and expand the Verbix non-profit organization and web presence.

Also of import is the list of supported languages for the above-mentioned free and commercial products and online services.

The free Verbix stuff (WebVerbix, FreeVerbix and WikiVerb) provides plenty to work with for language learners and educators alike. The free online version works great for conjugating an enormous amount of verbs instantly.

From Website

UNESCO, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. Verbix is an independent non-profit organization that aims to promote and protect linguistic diversity [UNESCO Observatory: Multilingualism]. This site contains verb conjugations for hundreds of languages, ranging from national and international languages to regional and even extinct languages.

FreeVerbix 7.3 is a universal Verb Conjugator that shows verb inflections in 100+ languages. It is based on Verbix language extension technology, so after installation of Verbix you can easily install any language extension to add more languages in Verbix.

WebVerbix is a free on-line verb conjugator. It contains a subset of Verbix for Windows features.

WikiVerb is a site dedicated to languages, verbs, and verb conjugation. It's not going to be a copy of information available in WikiPedia, but it will focus in verb conjugation. It won't replace www.verbix.com either, but it includes information and languages that are not available there.

Visit Verbix.com

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