Audio Review Study Feature on Yoyo Chinese
One of the most important parts of learning a new language is practicing speaking out loud. It's also one of the biggest challenges when you are learning online, and don't have ready practice partners!
Simply put: you can't learn to speak a new language without actually opening your mouth and speaking aloud!
Speaking a new language is a skill you build up through practice and exercise, not something you learn by just acquiring knowledge from a textbook, like how you learn history. You've got to think like an athlete and train yourself everyday through practice and repetition.
Of course, listening to the Audio Review is also great listening practice too! Hearing the words without actually seeing Yangyang's face forming the sounds really forces you to listen closely.
The Audio Review combined with our Dialogue Replay study feature give you powerful tools for improving your speaking and listening skills.
How Does it Work?
We designed our Audio Review study feature to work as guided practice, with Yangyang as your speaking partner. Yangyang goes over the vocabulary from the lesson, prompting you to match her pronunciation.
The Audio Review is also great for studying offline, and working Mandarin practice into your busy life. You can download each audio review and listen on your way to work or school, while your exercising, cooking or washing dishes... we've even had a student tell us she likes to put it on while she's sleeping!
Listening to the Audio Review is really critical when learning Mandarin: you've got to train you mouth, tongue, and lips to make these sounds.
By mixing audio reviews with the visual learning you get through the videos, you're engaging different parts of your brain, and that helps make the lessons really stick.
Watch the Demo
Yangyang and Jason gave a great live demo of the Audio Review in this live hangout on YouTube. Check it out:
Instructions
There is an Audio Review for almost every lesson in our conversational courses. That's nearly 600 lessons!
(Please note that there are no Audio Reviews for our Chinese Character Course, as that courses focuses just on learning to read and write, not speaking or listening).
You can start the Audio Review on the website by clicking the orange "Start Practice" button under the video on the lesson page, or you can download it as an mp3 by clicking "Audio Review" in the "Learn on the Go" box:
If you click "Start Practice" to use the Audio Review on the website, it will bring up the review, with controls to play and pause the Audio Review, jump forward or backwards 30 seconds, adjust the volume, or download the MP3 to your device:
It's pretty simple!
TIP: You can also download all the Audio Reviews for each level of the conversational courses you own from the Resources page of the website. Just click Resources from the menu at the top of the site, and then "Download Center":
We hope you'll make the Audio Review part of your daily study routine! If you have any questions or need any help, click the blue chat icon in the bottom right corner of the page and let us know! :)