Student Experience
First Time Student Experience with Hutong Online Classes
Written by Juliette Pitt
Working for Hutong School I was kindly given some free lessons to try out their new system for online classes.
Today I’m going to share my experience with you in a hope to inspire future or past students to sign up to Hutong’s online classes.
With the borders still closed, learning Chinese online is a great opportunity and is a good way to utilize your time at home to continue or start learning!
Juliette’s Review
Overall, I have really enjoyed my online classes with Hutong School! Whilst yes it was sad that we could not meet face-to-face, this did not dampen my experience!
Firstly, I found the systems really well structured! The classes are monitored by minutes and each class had a set allocated number of ‘credits’.
Quick Tip: Be cautious of the timer before the class ends. Towards the last 5 minutes of the class, it cuts off quite quickly, so pay attention! But luckily you can always use the chat function to reach out to your teacher afterwards if you have any further questions.
Prior to the class I was given the flexibility to choose my teacher, and this was particularly useful as I could see other students’ reviews.
I chose my teacher, from a recommendation for which I’m very thankful. I recommend anyone taking online classes to send prior certifications of any past Chinese exams so that the teacher can assess your language level! This will make the transition easier and ensure that you benefit from the classes.
Whilst the classes are only half-hour, I found them to be thoroughly enjoyable and learned many key words and sentences.
What I particularly enjoyed is the interface of the class with the teacher, who can record key sentences and words, that can then be sent to you during the class. I found this particularly useful as I could then review the material after the class had ended.
At the beginning of each lesson, my teacher and I would review the past material that we had covered, and this practice proved to be very helpful.
During my class my teacher used Microsoft Word to write down any sentences that I had created, and this would then be sent back to me after the class had ended; this was very useful to view later for extra revision!
I found my teacher Lizzie to be really energetic and very friendly, and this made the class even more enjoyable. At the moment I’m studying for HSK 6 – which is difficult! But luckily the pace of the classes is a set to my speed and progress, so there is always good communication between me and my teacher.
As an international student I also had to be aware of the time difference between countries, but luckily my class schedule was very flexible, so I was able arrange my Chinese classes in sync with my other commitments.
To sum up, I’m looking forward to future classes with Lizzie. I would definitely recommend it for anyone looking to register for Hutong’s online classes. To make best use of the classes – check out our blog on 5 top tips on taking online classes.
Hope you all enjoy your classes, and it would be great to hear of your experiences. Please feel free to comment more down below.
