| please advise what form of Chinese i should learn | |
|---|---|
| May 9, 2008 06:46 |   |
 | would like to read a Chinese newspaper so what form should i learn and are there books that little children use to learn that i may buy regards peter |
| May 9, 2008 22:22 | #1 |
| Peter, what is your Chinese level? How many Chinese characters do you know? If you are a beginner, it must be hard for you to read a Chinese newspaper. For children books, there are many in the stores. Usually, it provides Chinese characters with Pinyin. |
| May 9, 2008 23:22 | #2 |
| Zoey i have no Chinese at all - i would like to learn - i just thought that the newspaper would be written for the bulk of the people to read so i would like to leard that form. where do i find a book with the Chinese characters so that i can learn them thanks for your time regards peter |
| May 10, 2008 01:29 | #3 |
| Peter, to the best of my knowledge there is only two written forms of the Chinese language: traditional and simplified. It is the form of speech that varies greatly throughout China. This is a very good book: http://www.amazon.com/ However, I have many different books and flash cards and such. I found that actually trying to write the characters helps the meaning stick in my brain. The Chinese language is a chicken or the egg sort of language because learning the characters is not especially useful if you want to speak. It is one reason the language is taught with pinyin in Chinese schools. If you can say correctly say pinyin words you can speak Chinese. From what I've learned, speaking from Chinese characters is similar to the way we read outloud - we do not really read each word, we instantaneously recognize it and know how to say it. When you are a child you sound out the words because our written language implies sounds, however, the Chinese characters really don't provide much in the way of pronunciation unless you already know the language well. Learning Chinese is like learning two languages: pinyin and characters. ...and to make it even more interesting, I think the Chinese language depends on groups of characters with long standing meanings. I believe they are referred to as idioms. Consider: "a chicken with its head cut off" to describe someone who is running around in frantically; or "knee high to a grasshopper" to describe a small child...except the ones that I've read are usually a little more profound than those trite examples. It is a fascinating language. I wish that I could give it more study time. I think my explanation is reasonably accurate, but the real authorities will fix what I've got wrong. I'll look forward to getting a better understanding from the experts. :-) |
| May 10, 2008 06:07 | #4 |
| thanks very much Steve - i will try and get that book . i certainly do appreciate your help and guidance regards peter |
| May 11, 2008 21:02 | #5 |
| a good web site www.echineselearning.com |
| May 12, 2008 02:11 | #6 |
| I read somewhere that in order to be able to read or write a simple e-mail between friends you need to know around 800-1000 characters...to read a newspaper requires at least 3000 characters. That's disheartening at first, but once you start reading the excitement of deciphering this code really is addictive. I have found in my own studies that the first 800 or so characters are necessary to book memorize, but after that the best thing is force yourself to read and write new and harder things. I love Disney books with the charcters and pinyin. Copy the link below for an example. These books are easy to find at the local bookstore in China but might be harder to get elsewhere. It's worth a try, though. http://www.amazon.cn/ |
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