J: i am just catching up on my Chinese homework.
M: oh, i didn't know you were taking Chinese.
M: online? Doesn't the college offer Chinese classes?
J: They do, but the regular face-to-face classes were full. i like this class better anyway.
M: How come?
J: well, for one thing, it's so convenient. i mean, i don't need to worry about fitting it into my schedule. i can just go online whenever i want and do my work.
M: whenever? don't you have deadlines?
J: Yeah, we have to post the homework and participate in group discussions by a certain date. but i don't feel perssured, you know, the way i do in a reguiar class.
M: i see what you mean. i'm not always ready to participate in class.
J: Uh-huh. and another thing i like: the people in the class. my classmates are from all over the States and even from abroad. There's someome from Canada and people from Germany and Brazil.
M: wow. that's a lot of differnt time zones! Seems like the whole world wants to learn Chinese these days.
J: yup. and grt this: the instructor is in Beijing.
M: That's so cool. but how does hecorrect your pronunciation? don,t you need the face-to-face contact?
J: No, he listens to our voice recordings and gives us feedback. and once a week we tall on Skype.
M: so you know what everyone looks like?
J: sure. we've all become friends and chat on Facebook all the time, too and we've all ageerd to stay in touch after the course ends and meet next year in China.