Learning Mandarin for Beginners — Some reflections on get on to the Language quickly
Lately, have I been teaching Beginner classes where the learners have no prior knowledge of the language. I come to realise that the difficult part to make one aware of is the habit of reading through Characters. I understand, that for English language speakers, it is easy and tempting to just read through Pinyin. After all, it is the alphabet that they are most familiar with. I also come to think that, am I too strict about asking my students to read through Characters.
In my intermediate class, we were talking about the character 场 （chǎng）. Without knowing how to write the character, the student asks me if it is the same 场（ chǎng） as in 长城（cháng chéng）. I said no, 场 has the meaning of a field, such as 篮球场（lán qiú chǎng）, a basketball court. However, 长 means long. On the other hand, 场 has the third tone, whereas 长 is the second tone. From here, I think, it is easier to recognise the character than recognise the sound. Sometimes because of the closeness of the pronunciation of the characters, it is easier to think they “sound the same,“ but it you take a look at their characters, you will realise they are very very different.
Another common question I get is when my student asks me about the measure word. For example, a student said, I know 车 （chē）means car, but what is 五辆车（wǔ liàng chē）? I said 辆 is the measure word, and then suddenly they will click and understand. I thought about what the confusion is. Because if you recognise the character 五， you will know that it means the number 5, and if you look at the character 五辆车， you will immediately know that 辆 is the measure word. However, without recognising 五， one might think wǔ liàng is something, maybe an adjective to describe a particular car.
Those questions I get are common when a student is at an advanced beginner level. Also because of all that confusion. I do think it is very important to recognise characters from early on.
Here are some of the strategies I am using to help one recognise the characters, I hope you might find it helpful, and also let me know if you have more to add:
explaining the origin of the character, like how a character comes about
Comparing the character to other characters, find similarities and differences, for example, 他 and 她
when making sentences, I ask learners to write in characters even though they may not know the correct stroke and how a character is composed. The goal of this exercise is to find (recognise) and then consolidate the impression of the character by copying and writing it by themselves.
give other examples of when is character is using, making connections between the new knowledge and the existing one
