Memorising characters and more.

[Adequace]

Hey,

I'm trying to remember more characters but I seem to be forgetting to be able how to write 60% of them after learning them, is there a way of overcoming this? Sadly, I'm not too keen of the thought of constant revision of the words since I've remembered quite a lot and would rather learn even more words.

For idioms, I learn them and then write them in to a note book. How should I incorporate them in my writing? Should I whip out the notebook while writing practice essays?

Additionally, what sort of writing piece should I become comfortable with? At my XJS school we've only learnt how to write personal writing pieces and just starting to write imaginative writing pieces. Are there any essays easier to write than others?

I'm aiming for 35 or above, if that helps.

[strawberries]

Hey,

I'm trying to remember more characters but I seem to be forgetting to be able how to write 60% of them after learning them, is there a way of overcoming this? Sadly, I'm not too keen of the thought of constant revision of the words since I've remembered quite a lot and would rather learn even more words.

For idioms, I learn them and then write them in to a note book. How should I incorporate them in my writing? Should I whip out the notebook while writing practice essays?

Additionally, what sort of writing piece should I become comfortable with? At my XJS school we've only learnt how to write personal writing pieces and just starting to write imaginative writing pieces. Are there any essays easier to write than others?

I'm aiming for 35 or above, if that helps.

I didn't get 35+, but here's my two cents:

Personally I find it easier to write evaluative, then persuasive (set structure). I probably wouldn't even consider the other text types for the exam. For personal you would need to use more idioms and for imaginative you'd also need idioms and plus you need to be creative - if you wanted to produce a good essay. Most students don't do the imaginative one though - but do what works best for you

I believe you would need to learn how to write all the text types anyway, but for your SACs one of them will be a personal OR imaginative writing SAC and another will be a persuasive or evaluative or informative writing SAC (I didn't go to XJS though...I believe it should be the same in all schools anyway as we all have the same outcomes??)

And with the memorizing characters thing, what technique are you using right now?

Back when I was in primary school, our teacher made us copy characters into our books like 10 times/one row and then we'd get a dictation quiz on them. That worked quite well for me. Although now your teacher won't do something like this, maybe get your parents (if they speak Chinese) to quiz you?

sorry if this doesn't help but good luck

[Adequace]

I usually remember a couple words or idioms at night, I'd write them on to a piece of paper and leave to lines for re-writing them. I'd also abstractly write them in the air throughout the next day while at school when I'm doing nothing.

[kani]

Unless you prefer rote learning as a learning method, I (personally) don't believe copying characters does much to help learn them at all. It might help you remember a large amount of information for a short amount of time (i.e. cramming for vocabulary tests or something) but it does very little to help you actually utilise them in the long term.
I think a better way to learn would be to write them into sentences - or, even better, use them actively in practice essays. The more times you write them in context, the more likely you are going to remember the characters as well as their meanings.
With idioms, there's nothing wrong with using a notebook to write them at first, because you will gradually come to remember the more useful ones. Seriously, some of the phrases in the XJS list are utterly and completely useless, in addition to being tediously long and difficult to write and remember. And plus, your grasp on the actual language is far, far more important than how many idioms you can regurgitate.

With types of essays, I found writing persuasive and evaluative essays the easiest since they're quite similar in style and content, and like strawberries said, they have an almost fail-proof 'formula' to adhere to. They also have standard idioms you can use in most pieces. Personal and informative pieces rely somewhat on improvisation, and I wrote zero imaginative pieces through the whole year because I'm a depressingly uncreative person. Though you need at least a basic grasp on all/most essay types, I think the most important thing is to find what style you are most comfortable with writing, since it's different for everybody.

So that's my two cents. I'm really sorry if I come across as stuck-up and condescending... I don't mean to ><;;

[Adequace]

Unless you prefer rote learning as a learning method, I (personally) don't believe copying characters does much to help learn them at all. It might help you remember a large amount of information for a short amount of time (i.e. cramming for vocabulary tests or something) but it does very little to help you actually utilise them in the long term.
I think a better way to learn would be to write them into sentences - or, even better, use them actively in practice essays. The more times you write them in context, the more likely you are going to remember the characters as well as their meanings.
With idioms, there's nothing wrong with using a notebook to write them at first, because you will gradually come to remember the more useful ones. Seriously, some of the phrases in the XJS list are utterly and completely useless, in addition to being tediously long and difficult to write and remember. And plus, your grasp on the actual language is far, far more important than how many idioms you can regurgitate.

With types of essays, I found writing persuasive and evaluative essays the easiest since they're quite similar in style and content, and like strawberries said, they have an almost fail-proof 'formula' to adhere to. They also have standard idioms you can use in most pieces. Personal and informative pieces rely somewhat on improvisation, and I wrote zero imaginative pieces through the whole year because I'm a depressingly uncreative person. Though you need at least a basic grasp on all/most essay types, I think the most important thing is to find what style you are most comfortable with writing, since it's different for everybody.

So that's my two cents. I'm really sorry if I come across as stuck-up and condescending... I don't mean to ><;;

Thanks for the reply.

How would I differentiate between useful and useless idioms? Should I remember more general idioms?

Also, a bit off topic. How many essays should I try to write before I finish units 1/2? I wrote quite a bit during the term 1 holidays since I got 13/20 on my personal writing SAC, and that's in the lowest XJS class. I might also need to learn how to write evaluative/persuasive pieces as well before it's too late.

[kani]

Thanks for the reply.

How would I differentiate between useful and useless idioms? Should I remember more general idioms?

Also, a bit off topic. How many essays should I try to write before I finish units 1/2? I wrote quite a bit during the term 1 holidays since I got 13/20 on my personal writing SAC, and that's in the lowest XJS class. I might also need to learn how to write evaluative/persuasive pieces as well before it's too late.

I found that if the translation of an idiom makes you go "when am I ever going to use this?", then generally it is fairly useless. This includes highly contextualised phrases, like "有缘千里来相会" and "欲穷千里目，更上一层楼". I believe that general idioms are much better; they are easier to slip into your writing flawlessly as you will have had more practice using them. Some might argue that uncommon idioms are exactly what give a competitive edge, but I don't believe the effort put into memorising them will pay off in the long term.
In saying that, though, I speak mainly for my preference of writing persuasive and evaluative essays, and the useful/uselessness of idioms depends largely on what style of writing you are doing - for example, the idiom "一寸光阴一寸金，寸金难买寸光阴" (can and probably should be shortened depending on context) is going to be a lot more useful in personal writing than persuasive/evaluative for most given topics. If you prefer personal/informative/imaginary writing, then the broader range of topics and issues is likely to mean a larger variety of idioms that you should memorise.

With the second question, I believe quality matters more than quantity. Our teacher told us last year that correcting an essay three times over is worth more than writing ten separate pieces, and while that may be somewhat of an exaggeration, I don't think a quota of how many essays to write is really necessary. Up to the point where you feel comfortable and confident writing it, really. And don't stress or worry too much about it right now!! There is still plenty of time