I'm Learning Mandarin is a podcast that dives deep into the questions that matter to Chinese learners. Host, Mischa Wilmers, talks to the world's leading scholars and draws on his experience of self-studying the language to fluency.
Visit the Im Learning Mandarin blog. Popular posts include:
Your Ultimate Guide To Learning Chinese Tones: https://imlearningmandarin.com/2024/09/16/its-never-too-late-to-learn-chinese-tones-heres-how/
How Long Does It Take To Learn Mandarin: https://imlearningmandarin.com/2024/09/09/reality-check-can-you-actually-master-mandarin-in-six-months/
Busy working mother records first podcast in Mandarin after 6 months
Links:
Download my free fluency cheat sheet: https://imlearningmandarin.com/ (https://imlearningmandarin.com/)
Six months in, zero Chinese background, and already holding her own with the tones.
In this episode, I introduce you to Elizabeth, one of my ILM Gym students who came to me with no prior exposure to Mandarin whatsoever, despite being ethnically Chinese.
Growing up in Indonesia and now living in Canada, Elizabeth decided she wanted to reconnect with her Chinese heritage through the language.
But there was a catch: native speakers often assume she already speaks it fluently. That pressure made getting the foundations right non-negotiable.
You'll hear a clip of her reading a script she wrote herself, and the results show her brilliant progress within just 6 months.
1 Jun 2026
How this woman in her 50s learned Chinese later in life
Link to Mandarin Retreat: https://imlearningmandarin.com/retreat (https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=QUFFLUhqbGx6eTFZcnM2M2swazBzc3RlTDZ5RWRsVmVCUXxBQ3Jtc0trT3lzMHI5a1F1U0lRQXJwdTBHSzVvWXFoMnlsSjRMRW1JOFNuY3M2aFh3NnVadHBaSFZvNzFibWlnSWR2VEd6bmkyb1had1NSZkMyaTZGcmROeEtBa3VyMGxWRVNmZkQ1bEdnTnZnYkJpQlAtY1dvRQ&q=https%3A%2F%2Fimlearningmandarin.com%2Fretreat&v=00BHjPVBY8c)From absolute zero to conversational Mandarin in one year — in her 50s, as a busy mum.Most of my student progress videos show a before and after. This one is different. When Katharine came to me a year ago, she was starting from nothing. Zero Mandarin, zero background. Her goal was simple: learn enough to help her young son with his Mandarin homework. But she ended up going much further than that.Katharine is a busy mother in her 50s, not living in a Chinese-speaking country, with limited time and a lot of real-life commitments. The question she had from the start was the one I hear most often from adult learners: is it actually possible at my age, and can I crack the tones?The answer is in this video.Over the course of a year, we built Katharine a personalised immersion system, her own Mandarin world she could dip into around family life. By the end of that year, she attended our Easter Mandarin retreat in Somerset, took part in conversations, made dumplings, went on countryside walks — all entirely in Mandarin, and gave a presentation about her learning journey in front of her classmates. Completely in Chinese.What struck me most when we sat down for this interview? Her tones. They're accurate. Really accurate. And that blows apart one of the most common myths about adult language learning - that once you reach a certain age, the tones are out of reach.They're not. Katharine proves it.
16 Apr 2026
British Guy Interviews His Chinese Mother-in-Law ENTIRELY in Mandarin
Links: Download your fluency cheat sheet for free: http://imlearningmandarin.com/ (https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=QUFFLUhqbkp5SU1VbVBwclNveGtrdlBkelF0aUdLUWNFZ3xBQ3Jtc0treVpFZ3NVYzdibHE5d0NpOHZ3dC1zejlhTHhHTWZtcTUwUzVScDJ2M1BUejlpeUY5UVA1RE5Rc0pEMVZSWnE4Vkc5bEFzZkZXNEZVSlpnMlRaUFlPVk55emxWY3dYbkxOSU51Y29DeWtibTZsVmlFVQ&q=http%3A%2F%2Fimlearningmandarin.com%2F&v=t567D6nPXV8)
Watch this episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t567D6nPXV8 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t567D6nPXV8)ILM founder, Mischa's blog documenting his incredible Mandarin progress with recordings: https://imlearningmandarin.com/2023/0... (https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=QUFFLUhqbWVON2xYUldwRVB0OHFVSldGTGxUMzJXLWxaZ3xBQ3Jtc0trOGhIdnAtOTMyeTIyeTV0OUtpdXdlMzROVmZ6TzNKeE9NVGktVEE5eXJpSlpPWWZYcmRnWjB3bEVfblU0TjlEWTRFTk11aW9ZaDR4M3ZrSnBOMXAzWVlRWm84OTFwRTNyQXJiN1NOYWx4Z3JSM2JZdw&q=https%3A%2F%2Fimlearningmandarin.com%2F2023%2F07%2F25%2Fi-conducted-an-experiment-to-see-if-i-could-overcome-chinese-accent-fossilisation-here-are-the-results%2F&v=t567D6nPXV8)--After years of studying Chinese, Lewys still couldn't hold a single conversation with his Chinese mother-in-law. In this video, he shares the full story - and proves how far he's come with an interview conducted entirely in Mandarin.When Lewys first started learning Chinese, he did everything "right": regular lessons, HSK study, consistent practice. But every time he stepped outside the classroom, nobody could understand him. It all came to a head during what he calls the most awkward car journey of his life - picking his mother-in-law up from the airport and being met with blank stares. She couldn't understand Lewys, who lives in the UK, was busy a senior job and a young daughter. He was on the verge of quitting when he discovered I'm Learning Mandarin founder Mischa who learned Mandarin while living in the UK - and crucially, recordings of how Mischa used to sound before he used effective methods (see blogpost link above). That's when everything changed.Lewys joined the ILM coaching programme and identified two critical mistakes he'd been making:Learning content that had nothing to do with his real lifeNeglecting native pronunciation and tonesOn the programme, Lewys was supported to build his Personalised Immersion Learning System — a four-step method:🔵 Collect — gather Mandarin audio and sentences you'll actually use🔵 Immerse — absorb the content through spaced repetition and loops🔵 Mimic — copy native pronunciation until you're truly understood🔵 Use — apply what you've learned in real conversationsAfter one year of consistent practice, Lewys went from barely being understood to interviewing his mother-in-law entirely in Chinese - on her home turf in China.
Reach and audience
Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.
Apple Podcasts (US)
5.0 / 5
5 ratings
Spotify
4.6 / 5
23 ratings
Podcast Authority Score: 48 / 100
A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.
Quality
65
Social presence
0
YouTube
0
Engagement
77
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