This is the first post in a my progress blog. Welcome!
Hi, I’m Rebekah. I’m making Strokes, which is a web application that will help people learn all the different aspects of Chinese Characters, from translation to stroke order. The problem I’m addressing and trying to solve is combining multiple levels of Chinese characters that right now only exist in many different platforms into one. I am good for this project because of my unique combination in areas of study. I am a Computer Science major with a minor in Chinese language. These studies are in very different fields and while they have some overlap there is not much. This is a project that I want to work on because it is something I have wanted in my studies. I have jumped between different platforms and come up with my own systems to learn Mandarin. It would be nice to have all these different strategies in one place. I know if this platform will help me study then I know others will also benefit from this tool.
In class today we talked about our projects and what our ideas for our comps are. As Professor Luman mentioned, putting our ideas into words brings them to the next level. Speaking our ideas pushed us to articulate them more clearly. For my comp idea, I am planning to make a tool to assist people in learning Chinese characters. Learning Chinese characters includes many different aspects. There are different layers and levels. Learning characters includes learning the stroke order and directions, knowing the sound that each character makes and then also knowing the tone attached to the sounds. There are also other aspects that could be added like a speech testing piece, or learning juyin(another typing method on the computer), or adding radical testing or learning the history behind different characters and words.