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Should I learn Chinese characters?
Aug 7, 2012 22:28


So, I have been teaching myself Chinese, and I enjoy it soo much. At school I had to take a Spanish class, and honestly did not like it, but I do enjoy Chinese. I have gone through a beginner book, and about to start an intermediate book. I have not been learning the characters, but i would love to.

I feel as if I would do better to learn it from a teacher, instead of teaching myself and making it sloppy. I was thinking maybe in a few years after i am better at speaking i could begin to learn characters?? any tips on if I should or not, and why you are or are not learning them??.. also where i live i have absolutely no one to practice with, which is a big interference to learning properly.. any others with this issue...?? thanks :)
Aug 7, 2012 22:42
#1  
  • FAYEXU
  • Points: 25
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I think you should learn it that you can fully know Chinese culture
Aug 14, 2012 22:05
#2  
GUESTPEGGY Z... Absolutely, characters are quite important for your future learning, if you just learn pinyin, later you will find words had same pronunciation are very difficult to remember.
Sep 2, 2012 05:52
#3  
  • IAMANN
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Chinese is the most difficult language to learn well. I suggest you should give it up, unless you could live in China for at least 3 years. English is actually the easiest one to learn, I found.
Sep 6, 2012 00:08
#4  
  • HEEHAW
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If you are interested in Chinese, you should definitely learn characters. Learn them now while you are young. Don't worry about learning hundreds of them, just start with the ones that you can use a lot and use them over and over again.

When you are writing on a forum such as this, you can use the expressions 太牛了! or 我完全同意，只是... each time you reply to someone's post.

If you want to learn hand writing, start with the easiest characters to write and recognise such as 山、人、日 and so on.

The main thing is to use them as you learn them otherwise it will be a real drag.
Sep 18, 2012 22:24
#5  
GUEST38132 i am Julie from Nanjing city(very closely Shanghai),which is a famous historical city in ancient china.I can teach your Chinese by Msn or ICQ or SKPYE.you can add my MSN or SKYPE .MSN:hotmail.com|mimi5521
SKYPE:mimimin

Julie
Sep 25, 2012 18:45
#6  
  • MAGISTER
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Definitely learn the characters! Like you I didn't enjoy learning languages at school but since I started working in china I've really enjoyed learning Chinese. What I found is it's not just good enough to try and learn a language by thinking that you can just translate your own native language into Chinese. There is an entirely different thought process, way of communicating and structure to the chinese language and learning characters is a very important way of being able to understand that. Furthermore, you'll be able to learn Chinese much more quickly if you can read characters. Just walking down the street you'll be able to read signs,etc. that will reveal new vocab and structures that you wouldn't be able to understand otherwise. It's certainly not an easy process and you'll have to spend time each day with flash cards or practice writing the characters on a regular basis. Pinyin is a useful study tool and is very easy to master for English speakers but it is not practical once you get out on the street in china.
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