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In-Depth Reviews And Recommendations - Without The BS

Memrise Review – Useful But Don’t Overuse It

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Quick Review
Summary: Memrise is one of the most popular language learning apps around. It’s basically a gamified flashcard app. It’s a good way to help build vocabulary and beginner students would benefit the most from it. While it can be very useful, it’s important to not try to use it as your main tool for learning a new language.

Quality
The app is extremely well designed, but courses are user-made, so quality can vary.
Thoroughness
There are courses covering tons of topics, but you’ll need to use additional resources.
Value
Free and very useful. Awesome!
I Like
It uses spaced-repetition software making it easy to learn new words and review them periodically.
It’s a bit more fun than traditional flashcard apps.
There are tons of different courses to choose from.
I Don’t Like
 I personally prefer other flashcard apps that are less gamified (Anki or Pleco for Mandarin).
It should be used with other resources, not in isolation.

Price: It’s free. The Premium Plan costs $9 per month or $59 per year.

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italki Review – The Good, The Bad, & The Just Alright

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Quick Review
Summary: italki is the most flexible and affordable place to find a tutor for the language you’re learning. They have a huge number of teachers offering classes to students of over 100 different languages. As a learner, you’ll be able to find a tutor that best fits your learning style, schedule, and personality. Teachers are able to set their own prices and make their own schedule.

Teacher Quality 
You’ll find everyone from long-time professionals to brand new teachers.
Platform 
The overall platform has tons of useful features but also some room for improvement.
Value 
Huge number of teachers, low prices, and flexible scheduling.
I Like…
There are large numbers of teachers available even for less common languages.

You can find skilled teachers even at low prices.

The flexibility to schedule lessons whenever convenient. The huge number of teachers guarantees you’ll find someone to fit your schedule.

The extra features like answers, notebook, and language partners makes it easy to ask questions, get your writing checked, and find a free language exchange partner.

I Don’t Like…
You have to load money onto your account before paying for a class. You can’t simply pay one class at a time without buying credits first.

You may need to try several tutors before finding one that fits your learning and personality style.

It’s easy to not take classes as often as you should.

Price: The prices vary by teacher and language with some being as low as $4 and others as high as $60 per hour. Most will fall somewhere near the $10 per hour range.

Visit italki Now
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Five Love Languages – Simplified Summary – Advanced Chinese Reading Practice

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爱之语：持续相爱的秘密

如果问我从这本书中学到了什么？那就是重新关注你与伴侣的沟通方式

世界上有不同语言，例如英文、中文、法文、德文等，如果某人用我们听不懂的语言与我们谈话，我们不会理解他说了什么。在没有共同语言的情况下沟通，可能会导致误解、愤怒和对抗，但是幸好，我们多数人和伴侣说着同样的语言，应该吧？

事实上，伴侣间经常使用不同的语言沟通。表达爱意能用不同的语言和方法，理解你和伴侣的沟通方式，是任何良好关系和婚姻的重要组成。在此摘要中，你会了解人们对爱的需求，爱在人际间的沟通方式，以及如何寻找你可以说出口的爱之语。
你将学会：

    为何马克和安德莉雅的爱之语没有清楚地翻译
    为何爱只持续两年；以及
    糟糕的圣诞礼物如何损害你和伴侣的沟通

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Du Chinese Review – One of the Best Apps to Practice Reading and Listening

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Quick Review
Summary: Du Chinese is one of the best resources for learning Chinese. This app will help you to improve your Chinese reading skills, as well as listening comprehension. There are articles across six different levels – from beginner to master. The design of this app is absurdly good, making it exceptionally easy to use. The biggest weakness is that new content isn’t added frequently enough.

Quality
Amazingly high-quality with lots of useful features.
Content
New articles are added fairly slowly, but they age well.
Value
You can read some articles for free.
I Like
The design is superb with lots of useful features. I love how the audio is synchronized to the text, with the current word being highlighted.
The articles cover interesting content that remain relevent months after originally added.
Articles can be downloaded to listen to and read offline.
I Don’t Like
Content isn’t added frequently enough. For most levels a new article is only added about once per week.
Content is added even slower for advanced and master levels.

Price: A subscription to Du Chinese costs $11.99/month. A six-month plan costs $54.99. A one-year subscription would cost $89.99/month.

Use the promo code “ALLLANGUAGERESOURCES” to save 10% on a subscription to Du Chinese.

Try Du Chinese For Free

Alternatives:

The Chairman’s Bao is the biggest competitor to Du Chinese. They release far more content, but the design isn’t nearly as good. They also don’t have English translations which are really helpful – especially for beginner level students.

The Du Chinese app is quite possibly the best designed Chinese learning app around. I don’t know if it’s the best app overall to learn Chinese but the developers really did an outstanding job. In this review, I’ll tell you more about Du Chinese and help you decide whether or not it’s worth the subscription cost.

Impressive Design

First off, I just have to reiterate how smooth and well made this app is. It’s about as sexy as a Chinese learning app can be. It packs all of the features I would want into a clean interface that can be customized to fit your preferences.

Across the top of the screen is the English translation of the currently highlighted sentence. I love that you can tap it to show or hide the translation. If it always showed the English, I’d likely feel it was a crutch and use it too much. However, without it, there would be instances where I’m not certain I understood the sentence correctly. I like hiding the English and then using it to check comprehension later if I’m confused about something.
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eChineseLearning Review – 1 on 1 Online Chinese Classes

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Quick Review
Summary: eChineseLearning is one of the oldest and most popular websites for finding an online Chinese tutor. It isn’t my first choice because it’s more expensive and less flexible than competitors, such as italki. It requires a longer-term commitment which for some might provide the motivation needed to stick with learning Chinese.

Teacher Quality
Teachers are professional with most teaching full-time.
Platform
The platform has a very old feel and lessons are taught on Skype.
Value
Fairly expensive while lacking some flexibility of competitors.
I Like
The teachers have a lot of experience and background in teaching.
A commitment to taking weekly classes can prevent some people from abandoning their lessons.
Lots of unique lesson topics.
I Don’t Like
 With some plans, if you miss a class one week, you lose it and won’t get a refund.
There are other cheaper options for finding a Chinese tutor.
It may be hard to schedule lessons only a week or less in advance. A popular teacher’s schedule may fill up quite fast.

Price: Lessons cost between $9-$25 per hour – depending on the number of lessons and length of the plan.

Get one week free if you sign up for a 3-month or longer package

Visit eChineseLearning

Alternatives:

italki is the cheapest and most flexible place to find an online Chinese teacher. You can book lessons directly from the teacher. This is my top choice.

Verbling is similar to italki, but a bit more expensive with fewer teachers.

Hanbridge Mandarin is another online Chinese school that may be worth considering. Unfortunately, their working hours are fairly limited.

Finding a Chinese tutor or language exchange partner is essential for learning Mandarin. You need conversation practice and feedback from a Native speaker. A skilled teacher can pinpoint your weak areas and significantly speed-up the learning process.

In this review, I’ll look at eChineseLearning. They’re one of the oldest and most well-known companies for 1-to-1 online Mandarin lessons. I took two hours of trial classes and researched other people’s experiences for writing this review.

I’ve used italki (read my review) rather extensively for help with my Chinese. While this isn’t meant to be a comparison article, there are places where I’ll be comparing my experience with the two services.

Get one week free by mentioning “All Language Resources” when you sign up for a 3 month or longer package.

Find a Chinese tutor on eChineseLearning
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