<p>I have heard that six classes pretty much sucks...and you really don't want to do it. However, I really would like to begin learning Chinese (it would also be useful for some possible internship opportunities I may have soon). I'll be taking Japanese at the 300 level (I do not want to drop Japanese), and I'll be a frosh in Wharton. I know people consider Chinese hard, but I don't think it'll be too hard for me (hopefully). At least, Japanese has never been too too hard, and I've had quite a bit of exposure to Chinese (though I don't actually know any).</p>
<p>So, my question is: would taking Chinese pass/fail in the spring in addition to my normal five classes be a huge drag? (And can you start a language spring semester, as well? I can just check the registrar on that, though).</p>
<p>From my experience, very few semester I language classes are offered in the Spring. Certain languages are exceptions[Sign Language is the big one], but most language classes[at that level] are semester 2 of a year cycle.</p>
<p>If you are willing to do that to yourself, go for it. Keep in mind that you will have a ton of work with two language courses in different languages. You should concentrate on first semester first, though. Leave second semester for later.</p>
<p>What about Chinese 001 (focus mainly on speaking and listening) offered by LPS (liberal and professional studies)?
I’m kind of confused by that–do you get 1 credit for it, how much work is it (is it easier than normal language courses?), etc…because my interest in Chinese is more of, oh, I want to have a working knowledge of it/be able to speak some, but it’s not super important that I’m really great at it/reading/writing.</p>
<p>Anyone think I could convince my advisor to give me permission to take that in the fall?..</p>
<p>i know you think, hey, pass/fail, it won’t take that much time. but with languages, trust me no matter what, if you actually want to learn (which you want to since you insist on taking it), you will spent lots of time with it. especially chinese (which is rigorously taught at Penn, some others are less so)</p>
<p>freetense, I was actually (at least for the chin 001) planning on taking it normal grade if i could take it in the fall, since you’re not allowed to p/f anything freshman fall, anyway.</p>
<p>I know I’ll spend lots of time, that’s not the issue…it’s more that if, one day, I really really don’t have the time to study 4 hours for something to get an A for something totally extra, slightly less time would suffice and it won’t hurt my gpa. obviously this is slightly facetious, but yeah ((and also sometimes with languages, no matter how hard you try you can’t get the grade you want, and if chinese were to become one of those languages for for me–hopefully not–I wouldn’t want it hurting my gpa)).</p>
<p>I should just send an email to my advisor ((but still, if anyone knows anything about CHIN 001–focus on speaking–I’d love to hear what you have to say))</p>
<p>Scribbler, I truly hope you aren’t assuming that you can get an A in everything if you just study hard. It doesn’t work that way at Penn… I can honestly say I know of two people who have anything close to straight As. That’s all!</p>
<p>As a white dude who is a Wharton graduate and took both Chinese and Japanese at Penn (and Japanese in high school), I can tell you that the language classes will be the least of your worries.</p>
<p>I find Japanese harder than Chinese at Penn, to be honest. The grammar is harder to make sense of sometimes, whereas in Chinese, it’s a bit more intuitive (with the exception of that mothereffing “le,” which you basically just memorize by situation). But speaking Chinese is quite a bit harder, obviously. Also, say goodbye to direct verb conjugation. You’ll be practicing the hell out of speaking/listening in your early Chinese courses (it’s like the first thing they teach you – how to differentiate the sounds, how to use pinyin, etc). If you are able to jump into higher-level Japanese right off the bat, starting out with Chinese will be really, really easy for you, even with 5 other classes, and it will likely be easy for you even up through the intermediate levels. There are similarities between the languages that are made easier as a result of knowing Japanese. I can’t quite put my finger on what that is, but I can tell you that your mind will already be somewhat prepared for it all (unlike someone who would be jumping from Spanish/French/German into an Asian language).</p>
<p>Regardless, the language courses, even at the upper levels, will be easier than your Wharton courses, and the grades will be easier to come by. There’s quite a bit of timesink (homework, group projects, oral presentations, more frequent tests etc) compared to Wharton courses, but that’s my only complaint. It was also a bit weird because I was like the only white guy in my language classes past a certain point.</p>
<p>If you’re an incoming freshman, keep in mind that MGMT 100 will be a huge timesink for you. Plan around that course accordingly.</p>
<p>chrisw, thanks for the advice, but fortunately I already know that (had that experience in high school). Like I said, I was being slightly facetious =P</p>
<p>legendofmax, thanks for your comment! that’s really useful (I’m white as well). Yeah, I should be going into 311 (I emailed the teacher my “credentials” to see if I would place into it, because I had to have my cohort section changed because it was at the same time as 311–and she said to definitely not do 200s).</p>
<p>any chance you could tell me what you did in Japanese 311, if you took that class?
also, what do you think of me taking chin 001 (focus mainly on speaking) versus just taking the normal chinese class?
thanks so much!!</p>
<p>By 311 you should know a few hundred kanji already… you’re basically just hammering away at harder sentence structures and lots and lots of new vocab. Not sure how else to really describe it unless you want specific examples (although it’s hard to determine which structures came from which class, since it’s all really a sort of rolling learning experience, as you’re obviously using everything from past classes in your new ones).</p>
<p>I would say forget Chinese 001 and go with the normal Chinese class, most definitely. It’ll be, most likely, your easiest class, and one of your most enjoyed.</p>
<p>wow, really? I was really worried about 311 (I’ve been meaning to study Japanese during the summer but I keep on getting side tracked) but that doesn’t sound too bad at all. (I was reading Haruki Murakami short stories during winter/spring of high school…albeit with copious use of a dictionary…definitely not easy).
do you remember how good everyone’s speaking ability is? mine’s relatively good from being in Japan for 4.5 months last year (even if it’s gone a bit downhill this summer…) and I’m just curious as to how much of a conversation everyone else can have…I feel like I’m asking a lot here haha.
Hmmm, I wonder if I’m going to be mostly with juniors…?</p>
<p>Yeah, roughly so (there will be sophomores too). </p>
<p>Speaking ability is alright, on the whole – people absolutely hate written translation, though. The things you’ll be expected to speak aren’t nearly as complex as what you’ll be writing.</p>
<p>For example, in my fourth-semester Chinese class alone, one of the things we had to translate was “This country’s economic development cannot keep up with the population increases, and so this is the reason why this country is one of the poorest in the world.” You’d be expected to be able to translate that in writing, but you’d never be expected to actually speak-translate that on the fly.</p>
<p>EDIT: For instance, one of the Japanese oral presentations had to do with applying for a job interview. You’d have to be able to say things like “I want to work here in Japan because I like different cultures and seeing things from new perspectives” or be able to understand questions like, say, “Itta koto ga nai tokoro ni, iku no ga suki desu ka?” and be able to answer with something intelligible. It isn’t too bad at all, but the types of structures get harder and harder and you’ll be expected to have a pretty wide vocab threshold. However, most of the time you’ll only be tested on new stuff. Older things you learn won’t pop up unless it’s an exam (which is insanely evil, lmao, but it happens).</p>
<p>Like, on a Chinese final, there were words on there that we rarely used in class, but were in the book (we went over them, no doubt, but they were never used again or emphasized). So you have to take it upon yourself to really hammer in the material. Of course, if you do this and still miss those points on the exams, odds are everyone else will too.</p>
<p>sorry, another question:: I was just looking at the times for Chinese classes, and the only time i can take regular chinese is from 10-11 MW and 9:30-10:30 TR…versus the ‘speaking focused’ one on MW 4:30-6:30…and obviously the second option sounds a lot, lot more palatable. so in that case, would you say go for chin 001?</p>
<p>and kind of unrelated, but since you mentioned you’re a graduate, what are you doing now/planning on doing/using chinese japanese?/etc.?</p>
<p>I don’t have experience with the “speaking focused” one, so I can’t really say much about it. All I can say is that the normal class teaches you both speaking and writing, and I am not sure if you can jump straight from the “speaking focused” class into a next-level Chinese course (I don’t know how much writing, if any, would be taught in the speaking course). </p>
<p>I would say you’re the best gauge of your own language abilities. It may be better to start with Chin 001 since you’re an incoming freshman… you don’t want to bite off more than you can chew and screw things up right off the bat in terms of courseload (most people don’t start out with 6 as an incoming freshman… 5 at most). Also, keep in mind you can take additional courses over the summer while working an internship in Philadelphia if that is something you’d be interested in (it makes courseloads during the year a bit easier). You can also look into summer programs like Princeton in Beijing (which is an AMAZING boost if you want it, and you get credit), which you can get into with a good recommendation letter from your Chinese prof.</p>
<p>Either way, I would talk to an advisor about the Speaking Chinese course and how it would fit into a language-class progression schedule if you chose to keep Chinese.</p>
<p>Right now I am working in Philadelphia but I am currently uncertain if I will be staying here or working elsewhere once the summer’s out. I am not a typical Wharton grad (e.g. you couldn’t pay me enough to be a NY investment banker. Last summer I worked over 100 hrs/wk and it was the most miserable experience ever). Getting work abroad is a bit tricky since, in my opinion, it does require some leads and upfront cost, but it’s not impossible if that’s what you’re after. </p>
<p>You’ll definitely be glad you took both languages though… they’re so widely used. Although, here on campus, you’ll hear more Korean than you do Japanese. There are also mainly Korean students in Chinese/Japanese classes, from my experience. Rarely do I see an actual Japanese person in a Japanese class. In Chinese courses, there may be a few Chinese students who are in it for learning how to write even though they are fluent speakers. The exception here is the Business Chinese class, which is full of Chinese students.</p>
<p>You’ll need to practice a LOT if you want to keep things in memory. Finding international Chinese/Japanese students is a good start… I have a few friends that I speak to in Japanese/Chinese on a pretty regular basis. Keeping the languages fresh in your mind will be important if you’re looking to use the languages later on in a career or something, and it’s also just a lot of fun.</p>
<p>haha well I actually wanted to take Korean as my second language (closer to Japanese), but this summer I’ve been doing an internship with this US China Commission so I’ve been surrounded by a lot of Chinese stuff and it would be really nice to understand more than ‘thank you’ and ‘i’m sorry’!!
I actually have a friend from high school who’s going to penn and speaks mandarin, cantonese, korean, and Japanese, so if worse comes to worse I can always go seek him out LOL.</p>
<p>well, now I have to go convince my advisor to let me take 6 classes…fun…</p>
<p>Feel free to PM if you want to practice language at all, too… it’s always good to find more people who want to practice, haha. I don’t know Cantonese but I know a bit of Korean, lol.</p>