keeping Chinese skills polished while in the west

[bomblog]

- Anki (spaced-repetition software) for in-context vocab memorization

Along the same line of thought as Devin above... If you wanted more software to hone your already developed Mandarin skills, there are eight different ones I've listed here under Free Software Packages for Learning Chinese- found in various places around the Web. Hundreds of free online resources to help in Chinese language learning on that site.

[Teddoman]

Lately, I've been posting in a facebook group. I've sort of realized that in conversations I think I use a lot of verbal pauses and other crutches to avoid constructing grammatically correct sentences. It's much harder to do that in writing, even if you're just writing colloquially and it's nothing formal. So I would say participating on people's facebook pages is a good way to slow yourself down and practice writing proper sentences.

On the input side, I'm also finding I'm getting good exposure to real colloquial Mandarin this way. Since it's facebook, it's people you might have some connection to, so that helps keep my interest level up. Facebook is also less of a commitment. You can just read someone's update or follow a short thread and then move on. Perfect for our ADHD lifestyle :-)