4, 3, 2, 1: Fluency! A great technique to boost your Mandarin speaking ability

Categories: Chinese

Do you want to speak Mandarin fluently, no matter what your level is? Use the 4/3/2 technique to build confidence and flow!

Becoming fluent in Mandarin is the goal of many learners, even though few agree on what fluency actually means.

Some see it as a very advanced, near-native level, while others define it simply as being able to speak without too many pauses.

I prefer a definition of fluency that doesn’t depend on your level. Instead, it’s about how well you can use what you already know.

So, a beginner might be fluent when talking about a familiar topic they’ve practised a lot, whereas an advanced learner might still struggle, even if they have a deep theoretical understanding.

Tune in to the Hacking Chinese Podcast to listen to the related episode (#276).

Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube and many other platforms!

Here’s what I will discuss in this article:

Developing fluency: Getting better at what you already know
What is the 4/3/2 fluency technique?
4/3/2 in a classroom setting and as an individual student
How does the 4/3/2 technique work for practising Mandarin?
How 4/3/2 will boost your Mandarin speaking ability
The role of feedback in 4/3/2 activities
Variants: 3/2/1, 3/3/3 and Marketplace
Topics for 4/3/2 in Mandarin
Potential downsides with 4/3/2 and what to do about them
Try it out and let me know how it went
References and further reading

Developing fluency: Getting better at what you already know

To work on fluency, you need to concentrate on topics and language you are already familiar with. The aim is to improve your ability to access and use what you already know, and if there’s too much that is unfamiliar, your focus will shift to that instead.

How to become fluent in Chinese

Fluency development, or directly working on activities that boost fluency, is often one of the most overlooked areas in traditional and institutional language learning. Textbooks bombard you with new words and grammar patterns in every sentence, and teachers often enjoy introducing new vocabulary whenever they can.

To practise fluency, whether you’re a beginner or a more advanced learner, you need to stick with what you already know.

But how?

One of the simplest ways is to use the 4/3/2 technique!

What is the 4/3/2 fluency technique?

This technique is simple yet very effective. You speak on the same topic three times in a row, but each time with a tighter time limit:

First, speak on your chosen topic for 4 minutes, trying to communicate as clearly and smoothly as you can. You are allowed to prepare before you start, but ideally, you should talk without notes.
Then, repeat the same talk in 3 minutes, focusing on keeping the key points while speaking slightly faster. Since you’ve already practised once, speed will naturally increase because you cut down on pauses, dead-end sentences, and so on.
Finally, deliver the talk once more in just 2 minutes. Now that you have talked about the topic twice already, you know very well what you want to say and you have most of the vocabulary on high alert.

One way of looking at it is that language ability consists of two components: the system and your ability to use it. While you can only learn new words and grammar through listening and reading (acquisition builds the system), you also need to develop the skill to access the language quickly enough to be useful in spontaneous speech.

Learning Chinese through comprehensible input

4/3/2 exercises are meant to target the skill component, not the acquisition component.

4/3/2 in a classroom setting and as an individual student

In a classroom setting, you deliver each version of your talk to a different person (switch pairs between each round), but you can also use this activity with a private teacher or patient friend.

Speaking with a different person each time is ideal, because it puts the emphasis clearly on meaning.

If the same person listens all three times, they know what you’re going to say the second and third time, so the focus ends up more on how you say it, not what you say. This can still be great speaking practice, but with a slightly altered focus.

How does the 4/3/2 technique work for practising Mandarin?

The 4/3/2 technique was proposed by Keith Maurice (1983), then further developed and popularised by Paul Nation, from whom I learnt about it. I’ve provided some further reading at the end of this article, but here are some of the principles underpinning 4-3-2 activities:

Known language: It’s important to choose topics that you can talk about using what you already know. Talking your way around an occasional word you don’t know is fine, but remember that new words take up a disproportionate amount of resources. This is supposed to make you better at what you already know, not teach you new words.
Repetition: Each repetition reduces the cognitive load. You no longer need to think about what to say next because you’ve already said it. This frees up mental resources to focus on how to communicate more effectively.
Time pressure: With each round getting shorter, you naturally learn to speak more concisely. You shed unnecessary filler words and pauses, becoming a more efficient speaker. A slight time pressure is also good for focusing on meaning, since you don’t have time to think about how you say it. Playing word games can have a similar effect and is also great for building fluency.

How 4/3/2 will boost your Mandarin speaking ability

Here’s what regularly practising the 4/3/2 technique can do for your Mandarin:

Increased speaking speed: Learners typically speak significantly faster by their third attempt. This increase is not just limited to the activity itself. One study by De Jong and Perfetti (2011) showed that learners who practised using the 4/3/2 technique retained their fluency gains over time and even transferred them to new speaking tasks, suggesting lasting improvements in speech rate and ease.
Fewer hesitations: Repeated attempts greatly reduce pauses, ums and unnecessary repetitions. These are techniques that students use, often without being aware of it, to buy time to think about what to say next or to retrieve words that are not immediately available when needed.
Greater confidence: Knowing exactly what you will say removes anxiety and builds confidence over time. Cycling through different topics (i.e. doing several 4/3/2 activities for different topics) builds general confidence. Just think about how confident you are when talking about something you discuss often, such as why you’re learning Chinese, compared to something you know but don’t practise regularly.
Improved accuracy: Interestingly, studies such as Arevart and Nation (1991) and Arab (2016) suggest that repeated retellings also enhance grammatical accuracy, as learners naturally refine their language each time. While you’re not meant to focus on accuracy as such, repeating the same content still frees up mental resources to pay attention to how you say things as well.

The role of feedback in 4/3/2 activities

Since the goal here is fluency development, focusing too much on accuracy early on is not a good idea. As mentioned, this will happen naturally as you go through the exercise, but explicitly trying to be accurate can partly undermine the effect.

If you want to focus on grammatical correctness, pronunciation or word choice, do so after you have completed the basic 4/3/2 activity. If you are doing this with a teacher, ask for one piece of feedback after the second attempt, then try to apply it in the third attempt. Or wait until you are finished, then repeat the two-minute version a few times with focused feedback in between.

Another option is to record your attempts and review them afterwards. I suggest focusing only on the two-minute version, as it is likely to contain fewer slips of the tongue, hesitations and so on. You can do this with or without a teacher.

Variants: 3/2/1, 3/3/3 and Marketplace

The original technique can easily be adjusted to fit your level or goals:

3/2/1: For quicker practice, use shorter intervals (3 minutes, 2 minutes, then 1 minute). Note that the activity will feel quite different from the original, since the third attempt is only one third of the first, compared to half in the original. Feel free to experiment with whatever time intervals suit you.
3/3/3: By removing the time limit, you shift the focus away from fluency development. The goal is no longer to communicate more effectively, but to improve how you deliver the speech. This is great for practising oral presentations and similar tasks, but note that as you become more familiar with the content, you will have time left over.
Marketplace: This variant does not use a time limit either. Originally designed for classrooms (see this post at The Language Gym), each talker has a desk where they are selling something (the newest smartwatch, trips to the Great Wall, a delicious tofu dish). Listeners then move around, listening to the sales pitch of each seller, before deciding what to buy. They also need to explain the reason for their choice.

There are many other variants, and you can probably come up with more yourself. The main point is that by talking about the same topic many times, you build fluency.

Topics for 4/3/2 in Mandarin

What specific topics you use depends entirely on your level and experience, but here are some ideas with increasing demands on proficiency:

Yourself
Your daily routine
Your family or friends
A memorable trip or experience
Why you’re learning Chinese
Something you’ve read recently
Your profession
A cultural difference
Opinions about recent news events

You can also combine this with input-focused activities, such as narrow listening and reading, or summarising content you’ve listened to or read.

How narrow reading and listening can help you bridge the gap to real Chinese

Potential downsides with 4/3/2 and what to do about them

While highly effective, 4/3/2 may initially feel stressful for some learners because of the shrinking time frame. In my experience, this tends to feel like a bigger issue than it really is. Just like with the word games mentioned earlier, having a time limit usually makes it easier to talk, not harder. This is especially true for introverted students.

It also helps to keep sessions varied to maintain motivation and interest. Change topics often or blend in variations to keep your practice fresh and engaging. I am not suggesting you do this in every lesson, but next time you meet your teacher or friend, try it out and see what you think.

Try it out and let me know how it went

Ready to boost your spoken Mandarin? Find a friend or another learner, set your timer and jump into your first 4/3/2 session. Before long, you will be speaking Mandarin more smoothly, clearly and confidently than ever before!

References and further reading

Arab, O. (2016). The Effect of the 4/3/2 technique on students’ speaking fluency The case of first year LMD students, Frères Mentouri University, Constantine. Expressions, 1(2), 148-159.Maurice, K. (1983). The fluency workshop. TESOL newsletter, 17(4), 29.

Arevart, S., & Nation, P. (1991). Fluency improvement in a second language. RELC journal, 22(1), 84-94.

Conti, G. (2017, March 17). En route to spoken fluency via task repetition – the 4,3,2 technique and “Market Place”. The Language Gym.

De Jong, N., & Perfetti, C. A. (2011). Fluency training in the ESL classroom: An experimental study of fluency development and proceduralization. Language learning, 61(2), 533-568.

Nation, P. (1989). Improving speaking fluency. System, 17(3), 377-384.