I'm Learning Mandarin

Links:

Download my free fluency cheat sheet: https://imlearningmandarin.com/

Six months in, zero Chinese background, and already holding her own with the tones.

In this episode, I introduce you to Elizabeth, one of my ILM Gym students who came to me with no prior exposure to Mandarin whatsoever, despite being ethnically Chinese.

Growing up in Indonesia and now living in Canada, Elizabeth decided she wanted to reconnect with her Chinese heritage through the language.

But there was a catch: native speakers often assume she already speaks it fluently. That pressure made getting the foundations right non-negotiable.

You'll hear a clip of her reading a script she wrote herself, and the results show her brilliant progress within just 6 months.

Link to Mandarin Retreat: https://imlearningmandarin.com/retreatFrom absolute zero to conversational Mandarin in one year — in her 50s, as a busy mum.Most of my student progress videos show a before and after. This one is different. When Katharine came to me a year ago, she was starting from nothing. Zero Mandarin, zero background. Her goal was simple: learn enough to help her young son with his Mandarin homework. But she ended up going much further than that.Katharine is a busy mother in her 50s, not living in a Chinese-speaking country, with limited time and a lot of real-life commitments. The question she had from the start was the one I hear most often from adult learners: is it actually possible at my age, and can I crack the tones?The answer is in this video.Over the course of a year, we built Katharine a personalised immersion system, her own Mandarin world she could dip into around family life. By the end of that year, she attended our Easter Mandarin retreat in Somerset, took part in conversations, made dumplings, went on countryside walks — all entirely in Mandarin, and gave a presentation about her learning journey in front of her classmates. Completely in Chinese.What struck me most when we sat down for this interview? Her tones. They're accurate. Really accurate. And that blows apart one of the most common myths about adult language learning - that once you reach a certain age, the tones are out of reach.They're not. Katharine proves it.

Links: Download your fluency cheat sheet for free: http://imlearningmandarin.com/

Watch this episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t567D6nPXV8ILM founder, Mischa's blog documenting his incredible Mandarin progress with recordings: https://imlearningmandarin.com/2023/0...--After years of studying Chinese, Lewys still couldn't hold a single conversation with his Chinese mother-in-law. In this video, he shares the full story - and proves how far he's come with an interview conducted entirely in Mandarin.When Lewys first started learning Chinese, he did everything "right": regular lessons, HSK study, consistent practice. But every time he stepped outside the classroom, nobody could understand him. It all came to a head during what he calls the most awkward car journey of his life - picking his mother-in-law up from the airport and being met with blank stares. She couldn't understand Lewys, who lives in the UK, was busy a senior job and a young daughter. He was on the verge of quitting when he discovered I'm Learning Mandarin founder Mischa who learned Mandarin while living in the UK - and crucially, recordings of how Mischa used to sound before he used effective methods (see blogpost link above). That's when everything changed.Lewys joined the ILM coaching programme and identified two critical mistakes he'd been making:Learning content that had nothing to do with his real lifeNeglecting native pronunciation and tonesOn the programme, Lewys was supported to build his Personalised Immersion Learning System — a four-step method:🔵 Collect — gather Mandarin audio and sentences you'll actually use🔵 Immerse — absorb the content through spaced repetition and loops🔵 Mimic — copy native pronunciation until you're truly understood🔵 Use — apply what you've learned in real conversationsAfter one year of consistent practice, Lewys went from barely being understood to interviewing his mother-in-law entirely in Chinese - on her home turf in China.

👉 Download the Free Fluency Cheat Sheet here: https://imlearningmandarin.com/gym

Watch this episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=io2Elr3Qmjk

A few months ago, Rebecca — a singer from the USA — joined the ILM Gym with one goal: to take her spoken Mandarin to the next level.She'd been learning on and off for a few years and could hold a basic conversation, but kept hitting a wall when it came to expressing herself naturally. Her pronunciation was inconsistent and her tones needed work.So we did what we do with every ILM student — we set two clear goals and built her a personalised immersion plan around her life, her interests, and her voice.Six months later? Her tones are on point, her delivery is confident, and she sounds natural in a way that most learners take years to achieve.If you want to know exactly how Rebecca trained her ear and transformed her pronunciation, I've put together a free cheat sheet walking you through the same approach she used.👉 Download the Free Fluency Cheat Sheet here: https://imlearningmandarin.com/gym

Links:

Watch the video version of this episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtJxxePRMtU

Download the free Fluency Cheat Sheet here: https://imlearningmandarin.com/Check out flashcard website Hack Chinese here: https://www.hackchinese.com/--One year ago, Chris reached out with an ambitious goal: deliver his wedding speech entirely in Mandarin Chinese. His Chinese wife's family would be gathering in Sichuan, and he wanted to connect with them authentically - not just survive the conversation, but thrive in it.The Challenge:

• Working full-time in the UK with limited study hours
• Inconsistent tones and pronunciation
• Only 12 months until the wedding

The Method:Chris joined the ILM Gym's 12-month coaching program, focusing on:- Months 1-6: Controlled Output Training to polish tones and pronunciation

- Months 7-12: Wedding speech preparation and natural conversation flow

- Daily practice using the four-step personalized immersion methodThe Result:Chris absolutely nailed it. His wife's family was in stitches at his jokes, he communicated effortlessly with his in-laws, and he delivered his speech with confidence and clarity—complete with some Sichuan dialect thrown in for good measure.As Chris said: "I forgot I was speaking Chinese a lot of the time; it just felt really natural."Want Similar Results?If you're impressed with Chris's transformation, you can download the free fluency cheat sheet containing details of the exact method he used at imlearningmandarin.com🏔️ Mandarin Retreats (Immersive learning experiences in the UK) https://imlearningmandarin.com/retreat/

Links:

Read a blog by Lewys, the student I interviewed in Mandarin on the last episode, about his journey to conversational Mandarin in 12 months here: https://imlearningmandarin.com/2025/03/12/lewyss-6-month-transformation-to-conversational-mandarin-video/

Learn more about my coaching programme here: https://imlearningmandarin.com/gym

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So, over the past six months, I've been coaching Katharine, a busy working mom from Wales who wanted to learn Chinese to connect with her friends and help her son with his Chinese homework.

And unlike most people who come to me for coaching, Catherine was starting from ground zero. She tried Duolingo for around a week, but quickly realized that she needed a more systematic approach that would actually enable her to reach her goals.

So, Katharine has a demanding career. She's raising a family and she lives in the UK. Hey, so moving to China or dedicating full days to study isn't really an option. And so we set a very specific goal for her first 6 months, which was to establish a rock-solid foundation when it came to pronunciation, tones, and sentence structure.

So that meant rather than cramming thousands of random words from HSK lists, focusing on the words that she needed to use herself to talk about, the things that she was interested and wanted to talk about, and making sure she could say those things really well.

So making sure that her pronunciation and tones were really good for the things that she wanted to say. And so that's what she's done for the first 6 months, collecting phrases that she actually wants to say and building her own kind of personalized immersion environment where she's immersing in those things that she wants to talk about all the time while walking the dog, commuting to meetings, etc.

So, in a moment, we're going to hear a clip of Katherine reading a script that she wrote about whales, entirely in Chinese with excellent tones.

And after you hear that clip, I interview Katherine in English about her experience over her first 6 months of learning Chinese. So, now let's listen to Katherine in Chinese on the topic of Wales, where she's from.

💬 Links:

🎯 My Coaching Programme: https://imlearningmandarin.com/gym

📹 Watch this episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Io0UWFtVIwk

📹 Lewys’s 6-Month Progress Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29Oxh1eA9xs

Can you learn Mandarin to a conversational level in just one year while working full-time and raising a family? In this video, I share Lewys’s inspiring one-year Mandarin learning journey - an example of what’s possible with the right approach.A year ago, Lewys joined my coaching programme with one question in mind: how much Mandarin can a new dad with a full-time job realistically learn in a year?Lewys works as a senior accountant and has a young daughter, so finding time to study was always going to be a challenge. Yet, through consistent effort, a structured plan, and regular coaching, he managed to make remarkable progress.This episode documents his one-year results and includes our final interview, conducted entirely in Mandarin. It’s an honest and inspiring look at what can be achieved with the right mindset and method, even when time is limited.If you’re learning Mandarin and want to see what’s possible, this story is for you.

Links:

My Discord server: https://discord.gg/b9PAyKwT9p

My blog: imlearningmandarin.com

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In this episode, I share my personal experiences and practical tips on how to use language exchange to supercharge your Mandarin speaking skills.

I talk about:

• When I think it's best to start looking for a language exchange partner.

• Where I’ve had the most success finding partners.

• How I structure my sessions using a simple Green, Amber, Red system to match different stages of learning

If you're looking to build real fluency through conversation, this one's for you. Don’t forget to check out the I'm Learning Mandarin Discord server — a growing community of nearly 400 learners supporting each other on the road to fluency!

https://discord.gg/b9PAyKwT9p

Links:

My website: imlearningmandarin.com

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In this episode, I discuss one of the biggest challenges Mandarin learners face: improving listening skills.

I explore why this aspect of language learning often feels so frustrating, including the psychological hurdles unique to Mandarin and the sheer amount of vocabulary needed for smooth comprehension.

I share practical strategies to overcome these obstacles, focusing on the power of consistent exposure through both extensive listening (broad, varied content) and intensive listening (focused, repeated study of specific material).

Links:

My website: imlearningmandarin.com

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On today's episode, I'm going to talk about a genre of Mandarin learning content which in recent times has exploded on the internet.

And that is what I would broadly term as Mandarin learning snake oil.

I break down how you can easily tell the difference between Mandarin learning advice given in good faith versus snake oil, basically designed to scam you.