Unconventional ChineseReviews of unconventionalchinese.com

I love Juno! I’ve been working with her for 8 months now and my confidence in speaking and listening has gone up exponentially (I asked to focus on speaking/listening, not writing/reading). I studied Chinese in college and then was so embarrassed that I’d forgotten everything I learned. And even back in college, I always felt pressure to “perform” Chinese rather than actually enjoying myself. But now, Juno is so welcoming that it feels easy to practice and make mistakes with her, and she customizes all of my lessons so that they’re interesting and relevant. I’m so glad I found Unconventional Chinese!

Effective and great program, the majority of the teachers are great! However, professors who flaunt their MAs but can't maintain humility ("sore loser" attitude) when presented with facts and research don't advocate the leadership qualities a teacher should have, an important quality that should be transferred to students beyond just the lessons themselves.

Keren's classes are practical and fun. She mixes in just the right amount of input and output. Since I started taking her classes, I have noticed huge improvements in my ability to speak and understand Chinese. I always feel challenged in her class, but at the same time, we have a lot of fun. I highly recommend her. When I struggle with complicated sentence patterns, she repeats them back to me so I can hear what the proper response should be. Keren is very intentional about placing me in the right group where I can feel comfortable, yet her classes are rigorous. I'm so glad I found her.

Keren has a true talent for education and a talent for teaching. This is true to the point where you don't really feel like you're in a class and then ten lessons later, you're shocked by your own progress. If you've ever taken language lessons before, you'll know that feeling of reaching a sort of plateau, struggling to continue conversation, etc. These are the sorts of experiences you will not have in this class. The ability Keren has to find your level, enter your skill range and modify vocabulary, speed and grammar accordingly is what will make you feel the most comfortable. Even if you have never taken a private Chinese course in your life, you'll feel at ease from the jump. For the technical folks out there, comprehensible input does work. Growing up in Canada, I wish this was the way I was taught French as well. It will solidify your passion for the language as well as your foundation as you progress. This method of language education is really becoming popular, however only really for English -- it is basically non-existent when it comes to Mandarin. In short, take this chance! Hop on the comprehensible input train to learn ((in))arguably the most useful language in the world.

It’s hard to put into words how good a teacher Keren is, or how brilliant her course is, by which I mean, the course she has so thoroughly and painstakingly mapped out. There are so many ways to learn a language out there, with different pressure points and moments of struggle. Having lessons with Keren is basically cheating, not least because these moments do not exist. She has laid down the road for learning Chinese and watched, adjusted and perfected it as her many students have walked the path. How can I make such a claim? Well I reviewed and re-watched or listened to my single weekly lesson every day, somedays adding the previous week's lesson, etc. I got to a point in which I had almost memorised the lessons word for word (yes I know, but I love studying, and know the value of repetition in language learning). Even with this level of repetition, I was able to harvest new vocab and patterns of speech from every review. The more times I reviewed a lesson, the more layers were revealed. I reached a point, perhaps after watching a lesson 7 or so times, that I began to notice with incredulity that Keren seemed to predict and be prepared for every type of situation that arose or mistake I made. Even when I knew what was coming, she was still many steps ahead of me! Not only that, she would correct the mistakes often without me realising, even picking and choosing when to do so. Keren is an expert, a master teacher, constantly weighing up what’s going on, if you’re enjoying yourself and what to do next. She taps into a genuine wealth of experience and creates what I would describe as a genuinely exhilarating learning experience. Regardless of studying Chinese, this in itself makes the lessons worthwhile. This is the real deal. It is not made to be scalable (beware of every app, book or non human “method” of learning a language), it is made to be as effective as possible for the student, thus it necessitates heavy involvement from the teacher, just as a parent is heavily involved in teaching a child their first language. After 10 lessons with Keren, I was speaking with another Chinese teacher and she literally did a double take when I told her I’d had only 10 lessons, and said that I’m already between HSK2-3. It’s true I can already have a very basic exchange with a native speaker, yet although I have a really long way to go, when the process is this enjoyable, I’m certainly not impatient for it’s end! Thank you so much Keren. I’m glad I discovered you while you still had some availability!

I have taken 9 lessons with Keren so far and am very happy that I started. Keren is a very good teacher. She uses TPRS and focuses on Comprehensible Input to teach. She is very good at teaching proper sentence structures and making it feel natural.

The teaching method emphasizes comprehensive inputs. The teacher speaks Chinese most of the time and uses fun, interesting stories to teach new vocabularies which the students can remember and recall easily.

Keren has a deep and thorough understanding of Comprehensible Input / TPRS. She’s the one who only needs to teach a student once and the student remembers her forever because of her fun and effective teaching style. Her sense of humor creates such an engaging vibe that students fully focus on the message she’s delivering, rather than trying to decode a different language. She cares about her students’ opinions and encourages them to clearly, and slowly, express themselves in the target language. Keren’s students have the sense of being seen and heard, rather than having to keep up with their teacher’s lessons that go by in a blur and feeling frustrated. As a comprehension based Chinese teacher myself, I’m so grateful that we have Keren in this field. She is a big player in spreading the word of Comprehensible Input / TPRS teaching. I look forward to seeing more and more language learners benefiting from her awesome teaching!