Slow Chinese

Slow Chinese 每周漫闻 is a resource which helps advanced learners of Mandarin stay on top of the latest language trends.

There are two ways you can enjoy the content depending on your language learning needs: a free weekly newsletter, and paid membership.

Free weekly newsletter

As a free subscriber you receive a ‘words of the week’ email every Saturday morning with around 20 words, phrases and slang picked out from one news and social media chatter that week.

The newsletter includes example sentences for each word, as well as background and context.

So if you’re looking for an entertaining read to learn some new words each week, and learn a little bit about what people in China are talking about, the free newsletter is perfect for you!

Membership

The paid Slow Chinese membership is for a community of hundreds of learners who are committed to taking their language skills to the next level.

They make use of the content as a powerful language learning resource.

Our membership resources help long-time, advanced, and aspiring learners of Mandarin maintain and improve their hard-earned language skills, and stay on top of the latest Chinese language trends.

1. Benefits 

The Slow Chinese membership resources will help you overcome your biggest learning challenges.

• Staying up-to-date: “Feeling rusty?” Learn about one thing people are discussing in Chinese every week, and the real language they are using to talk about it.
• Making time: “Can’t make time?” We save you time by carefully selecting 2-3 high quality Chinese news articles each week, and explaining all the vocab for you.
• Building a habit: “Can’t get consistent?” We help you form a learning habit, providing engaging content every Saturday morning. Now there’s no excuse!
• Getting motivated: “Can’t be bothered to sit down and learn?” We carefully select topics that are interesting and engaging, which you want to get stuck into!

And, most importantly, we teach you words and phrases to help you show off your amazing language skills with Chinese friends and colleagues through content you probably won’t find in a textbook.

2. Features

We do this through features designed for maximum flexibility. So you can use them according to your own learning style.

In addition to the text-based content in the free newsletter, and for less than the price of a coffee each week, you get access to a unique language learning resource for advanced and aspiring learners of Mandarin:

• Podcast
• Downloads
• Community

Watch this free user’s guide to the Slow Chinese resources.

Podcast:

• A member-only 30-minute podcast every week with 85% native Chinese audio.

• Format:
  • Introduction: Why I chose the story, why it’s interesting, and what I learned
  • Discussion about top phrases: Chinese deep-dive into our favourite words
  • Word list and example sentences: Words, phrases and sentences in Chinese
  • Audio article: Full audio of the main article we read every week

Resources:

• Print outs: 3 x PDFs
  • Word list which can be integrated into your own word lists
  • Example Chinese sentences with pinyin and English translations
  • Full Chinese transcript of the Chinese part of the podcast

• Integrations:
  • Pleco
  • Skritter
  • Hack Chinese

• Further reading:
  • A short excerpt of Chinese text in the newsletter
  • 2-4 links to Chinese articles carefully selected to practice what you’ve learned

Community:

• Live online meet-ups: Live sessions with members every month (the recording is published as a podcast or video)
• Monthly wrap-up emails: At the end of every month, we recap what we’ve learned that month, with an “ask me a question” thread to check-in with you
• Accountability: We are matching members to connect and practice together
• Member Dinners: Meet-ups in London, New York, Paris, Barcelona, Singapore and more.
• Deep Dives: Bi-monthly live sessions focussing on one particular topic to help overcome learning challenges.

3. Is the membership right for me?

Here’s a quick quiz to decide if membership is right for you:

• Are you frustrated that your hard-won Chinese language skills are getting worse not better?
• Do you find it hard to make time for improving your language skills?
• Do you struggle with motivation to carry on learning Chinese?
• Is it difficult to find good content to help you learn?

If you are an aspiring, advanced or long-time learner of Chinese, and the answer to any of these questions is ‘yes’, then you’re in luck.

Because hundreds of members of the Slow Chinese community all faced these exact same problems.

But they now have access to unique learning resources, engaging content, and a community of like-minded learners who are all taking their language skills to the next level.

So….

5. What does it cost?