#generalresources

Here’s a list of some conversation and writing prompts that I found. You can use these as conversation starters with a language partner or as speaking/writing prompts by yourself. Some of them might be okay for beginners, and others are pretty advanced.

20 Engaging Conversation Ideas to Practice Your Spanish

24 Excellent ESL Conversation Questions for Adults

36 Unique Language Exchange Conversation Starters

50+ Language Exchange Topics to Keep the Conversation Flowing for Days

119 Journal Prompts for Your Journal Jar

401 Prompts for Argumentative Writing

501 Writing Prompts

Conversation Questions for the ESL/EFL Classroom

ESL Conversation Questions

Grade 5 Writing Prompts

Journaling Junkie Prompts and these, also from Journaling Junkie

So What Do You Want to Talk About?

Ten Great Conversation Starters for Language Learners

Check out this Twitter! (link)

Disclaimer: I’m definitely not an expert on learning any language’s pronunciation, nor do I have perfect Mandarin pronunciation, but I thought this post might be interesting to myself in the future or to other people who want to work on their pronunciation. :)

First, I get a basic idea of the language’s pronunciation by going to the “IPA for [language]” page on Wikipedia.  I listen to each of the sounds and take note of the unfamiliar ones, like /tɕ/ in Mandarin.

Generally, once I know what sounds I might have a hard time hearing or pronouncing, I go on Forvo and listen to examples of those sounds in words. However, for Mandarin, I’ve found this pinyin chart to be more useful. Note: It can be kind of difficult to find examples of every sound in the language, especially in Mandarin because people seem to disagree on how it’s pronounced.

Then I listen to a lot of music, radio, and TV shows in my target language. Usually I just Google “TV shows in [language]” and find some.

After I’ve gotten a lot of listening practice in Steps 1-3, it’s time to start pronouncing stuff. First, I go back to the IPA chart and learn how to pronounce each sound. For example, to learn how to pronounce /tʂ/, I spent some time looking at diagrams of tongue positions and listening to and watching native speakers pronounce the sound in words.

Next, I find examples of every sound in the language, like in Step 2, and I listen to a recording of that sound in a word on Forvo (or the pinyin chart) and keep repeating the word until I think I’ve gotten it right. Then I record myself repeating the word so I can hear even better whether I’ve gotten it right or not.

Lastly, I try to find some recordings of native speakers saying whole sentences. I listen to those and repeat them, trying to get the intonation and rhythm correct, as well as the sounds in each syllable and word. (I also record myself.) I haven’t reached this step in learning Mandarin pronunciation yet.