Dorothy, I'm glad to know that you have a partner patient enough) It is good, that you've described here, how your lessons are structured. It must be helpful.

Personally, I'd like to train my pronunciation the same way when I'll need it, but seems i'm too shy to ask 70 phonetic questions in a row (if you mean it):)

What you're describing here is not just conversational practice, but 'mutual teaching'. It's a very good idea, and I'm not sure that many of language-exchange folks practiced it systematically.

Another good point is about finding 'kind and patient' native speaker.

The bad news is that we have tens of millions of young Chinese who <em>need</em> English vs. tens of thousands of not-necessary-that-young English speakers who <em>want</em> Mandarin:)
Happily, finding a partner isn't a problem, but it gives you more authority to offer/insist on whatever method you like. A Chinese student may be afraid of scaring out the partner.

The good news is that kind and patient people still exist:)

Hey pretty, you just need to relax!! I believe that many english speakers are very nice, when u need help, they always there. Additionally, they will understand that you are still learning english. So all you need to do is relax.  ^_^

Hi, Dorothy

I guess you are a very lucky language learner. I may share one interesting story heard from one of my friends. He said he does not know how to teach "Mandarin" in spite he is a very proficient native Chinese speaker. Why? He said he DOES NOT KNOW how to "teach" and his English is not all that good to communicate with English speakers. It seems not be the main problem you have to confront. Passion, kindness and patience may be far more important to be a good mandarin teacher. 

How to start your learning? just open your mouth/heart and brace your ear to listen. That is so much you have to do.

I think that language partners can be much more useful if both parties come up with things they want to learn and practice. It takes some of the stress off of coming up with topics to just chat about and then the two people can be at completely different levels and it still works and I find it to be a better use of time.

But yes, kindness and patiences are the keys! Everyone is learning here, so there are probably a lot of people who will be able to understand how hard it is to learn and will have patience. I have found a great many kind people here!

You're right KP that in some ways as an English speaker I have an advantage, but you would be surprised that it can be just as difficult for an English speaker to find a partner in Mandarin just because of the issues that Katarin is bringing up. People from China can be very embarrassed about their pronunciation and worried about the MANDARIN pronunciation and are frightened that they won't be able to "teach" Mandarin properly. 

I learned that in China there are countless dialects that then affect someone's Mandarin pronunciation. People get scared that they won't be able to speak to you well enough and that they do not know how to teach. I don't know how to teach English either! 

For that reason it's important for it not to be real teaching. I don't ask my Chinese friend to come up with things for me to learn. I asked her to teach me pinyin and then from watching a video I came up with 20 words to practice to learn my tones better (as she said I needed more help with the tones). I also had to reassure her that it is ok for me to go very slow, that she isn't responsible for having me learn and that we could just relax and giggle together at our own voices. Our hearts were both in the right place so we made it work out. It takes really good intentions on both sides. Together for her ideas came up on their own after she asked me for help with specific things. A little bit of creativity can make up for the lack of knowledge of teaching.

to be continued...