1on1 Private Chinese Course

Thanks to That's mandarin and to the teachers, though I didn't know much chinese, after two weeks I was able to ask my way, take a taxi... It was a real linguistic experience that made me progress though I still have much to learn. Thanks to the teachers! The accommodation was very comfortable and not far from the school. It was a good experience!

My program at That’s Mandarin was quite unique. I’m in university in London studying Chinese and business, and this summer I decided to come and try to get a step ahead for next year. I gave a copy of my textbook for next year to my teachers, and they divided the content between them. I have one teacher for vocabulary, one for grammar, and one for general speaking practice.

This was my second time studying with That’s Mandarin. Last year I took a two week course, and what appealed to me was their ability to tailor a class to my time and my needs within a very short period of time.

I had previously spent time studying at a Chinese university, and I really prefer the personal aspect of class at That’s Mandarin. In university, you might get the chance to speak for just five minutes out of two hours of class, but here, you speak almost constantly throughout the lesson. The teachers are very funny, really good at teaching, and especially good at constructing clever and effective ways for you to remember words and characters. This works very well with my learning style, much more so than just being taught out of a textbook.

After finishing an Internship in Beijing, I was looking into taking part in an intensive Chinese program, I was staying with some family who suggested That’s Mandarin and I am very glad they did. I choose the small group classes as it was just me and one other student, I found that after a small group of lessons I was able to go out around the city and just talk with people and practice my Mandarin right away.

When I had my trial class, we discussed focusing on my proper pronunciation; this was an area I had struggled with. Being in the small group class gave me lots of speaking time where I was able to focus and build confidence with my speaking. I think there’s a very cool part about That’s Mandarin, in that they teach what you really need to know for daily life rather than when I learnt Chinese back home they focused more on the reading and writing, whereas since being here and concentrating on my listening and speaking skills I have experienced a really fast progression with Mandarin.

I did the intensive program which was 4 hrs day, from 10-12 in the mornings & 1 to 3 in the afternoons, 5 days a week. I signed up for 3 months and am currently having a break for the summer but have decided to sign up again at the end of August. The intensive course covers speaking, listening, reading & writing so you learn every part of the Chinese language, which includes learning the Chinese characters which is quite hard! I think That’s Mandarin has an interesting approach in teaching you to speak straightaway, I choose to study the video classes where they show you a video and you need to describe what you see, this way you learn a variety of things right away, this really worked for me. I heard at University people can study for over a year and still can’t speak Chinese because they learn a lot of reading and writing.

I started learning as an absolute beginner, since my studies I can see that I can understand a lot more, when people are talking to me in the beginning I was just lost but now I kind of know what they are talking about and sometimes I can recognize full sentences and phrases, I can see the progress I have made.

I came to study Chinese at That’s Mandarin to pick up some of the Chinese that I’d forgotten over the past 6 years and it’s also fun, at this point it’s a hobby for me but maybe in the future I would like to work using my Chinese.

My classes were really fun, we talked a lot in class and listened to recorded conversations, watched videos and read short articles, so I would get to practice all sides of the language. The video classes were probably my favorite type of class; they were certainly the most fun! I’d get to watch the film and then discuss what’s going on and it was very good for learning practical vocabulary, revising old words, new words as well as descriptive vocabulary. The listening classes were also very useful as we’d get into the grammar which is obviously very important.

The teachers are great, they have their plan of what they want to work on but they’re also very flexible; if I told them at the last minute that I wanted to focus on a certain aspect in class they were always willing to do this with me. I really liked the Mandarin Café, the fact that all my notes were online, I can login and find them and they’re always there which is a great feature.

I’ve been studying here for three months now. I like the That’s Mandarin teaching style, it’s a conversational teaching style. I came here actually to learn to speak Chinese & the best way to do that is to speak as much as you can and that’s what I’ve been doing here, everyday, in class with my teachers and I love it! You can personalize your classes, you work with the teacher to personalize it to your language goals and I don’t know if you can do that in any ever school, but this is pretty important to me.

I requested accommodation through the school and I’m staying in a really nice shared apartment with another student, it’s in a really nice neighborhood where I get the opportunity to practice my Chinese with my neighbors.

Everyday I look forward to coming to class, which is quite a surprise for me! Now I’m able to express myself, which is great! Two months ago I thought it was impossible for me to do that but I’m really satisfied with what I’m doing here.

the words and senses you learn on the private lessons are more focused on the student (what he or she needs to know for his conversations). But if you don't review all the words daily it's pretty hard to not forget them. I'm lucky that my teacher is giving me mnemonic to remember the words.

The teacher of professionalism in this course has been exemplary. The teachers are able to guide you smoothly through the curriculum whilst still tailoring each lesson to your personal needs.The accommodation provided by the school was beyond expectations. All the cooking, working and cleaning amenities one could hope for. And the rooms are serviced daily!