Learn Chinese

Learn Pinyin

Before you even think about learning Chinese characters or learning to speak Chinese, you need to learn Chinese Pinyin. Trust me when I say that learning Chinese Pinyin is absolutely crucial for you to get the right start when learning Chinese Mandarin.

What is Pinyin

If you’re wondering what does Pinyin mean, well I honestly don’t blame you. Chinese Pinyin is the most common and widely used ‘Romanization’ of standard Chinese Mandarin. Pinyin actually translates to ’spelled sound’ in Chinese – and that’s exactly what it means. What is the purpose or use of Pinyin you wonder? It is used to teach Mandarin chinese to school children in China, and also to foreigners who want to learn Chinese as a second language or perhaps even a third language.

In most other languages you don’t need to learn a wide amount of different sounds just to get started, so I can understand your frustration. At the beginning when I was learning Chinese, I decided to skim over this part and thought that I would do just fine. That ended up being a huge mistake and cost me alot of time in my efforts to speak and understand Chinese.

How to Learn Pinyin

Ok, hopefully now that you’ve committed yourself to learning Pinyin sounds, let me tell you exactly how you can learn Pinyin. I’m not going to bore you with all the boring details, and the history, and the super detailed explanation that only language freaks would care to read, if that’s what you’re looking for then you can head over to read it at Wikipedia. Instead, I’m going to be much more practical and tell you that you need to learn 420 sounds. Yes that’s how many different Pinyin sounds there are approximately. Before you start freaking out over this number, let me tell you that it really isn’t as difficult as it sounds. Most sounds start with a consonant and are followed by a vowel and sometimes a third or fourth vowel/consonant. The chart below summarizes all these sounds. So every single character in the Chinese language is formed by one of these sounds, words are formed by one or multiple of these sounds, and phrases with a bunch of these sounds put together.

You’re probably looking at that list and wondering how to pronounce the pinyin sounds. In fact it is very similar to how we would read them in English, but not exactly. When learning Chinese you need to make sure to learn how to pronounce correctly or else people will have difficulty understanding you. This is true of all languages but especially important for learning Chinese.

The easiest and best way to learn to pronounce Chinese characters is through a site called Chinese Pod. They teach Chinese through podcasts but also have a section where they provide free resources for beginners of Chinese. You can go sign up for free and access their Chinese Pinyin pronounciation section. It is definitely worth it to sign up for free, as you access this incredible software where a mother tongue Chinese will pronounce every single one of these sounds for you just so you get it right. Click this link and do that immediately, it’s no extra cost to you and a resource which you can’t do without.

Tips for learning Pinyin

Ok so if you’re initially overwhelmed by all these new sounds and have no idea how to memorize them all, don’t stress too much. Everyone at the beginning needs some tips, tricks, and methods of memorizing the Pinyin sounds. No one expects you to learn every single sound in the Chinese language overnight, make sure to remember that.

The first priority is to know the kind of sounds in the Mandarin language. After looking at the list, you should have a pretty straight forward idea on at least what Chinese ’sounds like’. After this basic discovery of the phonetic side of the Chinese language, you should spend couple of hours going through the whole list and pronouncing them one by one after hearing the Chinese native person pronounce it. Then you should do it a second time around but this time pronounce it before the Chinese person and then click on the sound only to verify that you’re correct. After you’ve spent couple of hours in this area, don’t worry too much whether you pronounce each single Mandarin Pinyin sounds correctly. Alot of the Pinyin sounds will start to come to you naturally as you spend time learning words, writing characters, and practicing speaking Chinese.

Learning Chinese pinyin will have lots of benefits for you besides learning to pronounce Chinese correctly. It is also the method used for inputting text into computers or mobile phones in order to write the Chinese characters. Follow the tips above, and you will be pronouncing Pinyin like a local Chinese and be ready to learn Chinese vocabulary and Chinese grammar in no time.

Learn Chinese

So you’ve finally taken that big step and decided you want to learn Chinese. First of all congratulations, deciding to learn Chinese will be the best decision you have ever made. There isn’t a single skill out there that you can pick up that will have more benefits for you than learning Chinese. At the same time, I must let you know that Learning Chinese is not easy. In fact, learning Chinese is one of the toughest things you could be learning right now. But at the same time, this is the reason why it will be such a valuable asset to you, not many people will have the will or dedication to learn the Chinese language properly.We all know that China is becoming one of the most important countries in the world and is on its way to surpass the United States as the main super power in the world. All the new jobs and opportunities for you in the future will be in China. Without learning to speak Chinese, you will be left behind.

I will try to help you learn Chinese the most easily and pain-free way possible. Below is an introduction to learning China’s language: Mandarin.

How to Learn Chinese

There is no single way to learn Chinese. However if you are wondering what’s the best way to learn Chinese then you have come to the right place. Alot of people when they start out trying to learn Mandarin, they have no idea where to start. Hence the common question how to learn Chinese. Well, I will get into the specific of how you can learn chinese most effectively at a later date, but for now there’s two main advices I can give you. First of all, if you have the resources and time, you should get a personal Chinese tutor. There’s no better way than a trained proffesional Chinese tutor helping you learn this difficult language. The other best way to learn Chinese, is to actually move to China. Yes, it really does help tons to move to the People’s Republic of China to learn Chinese. This is the case for most languages, but especially when we deal with Chinese, hearing locals speak and interacting them will speed up your learning process infinitely.

Learning Chinese Characters

The thing most new language learners fear when they start to learn to speak Chinese is the Chinese Characters. There are thousands of Chinese Characters to learn and each with their own way of writing and different meaning, that its extremely difficult to learn all the Chinese characters in a short period of time. However, worry not. After my personal struggles I have developed a very easy way to learn Chinese characters. I don’t want to get it into in this post, but you should know that being able to read the most popular 100 Chinese characters already allows you to understand 54% of what you are reading. Yes, you just need to learn 100 Characters and you can already understand half of what you are reading, its quite motivating way to start and I have the perfect study method for learning Chinese Characters.

Learn Mandarin Chinese Language

One word of advice to learn chinese is that you should learn the proper Chinese dialect. You see there are over a hundred different Chinese dialects with each their own vocabulary and way of speaking. Learning Mandarin is what you are looking for, it is the most common form of Chinese and it is widely use all across China and the formally recognized Chinese dialect of choice by the Chinese government. This is why I advise you to learn Mandarin.

Chinese language learning usually revolves around Mandarin, but there are also alot of people who decide to learn Chinese Cantonese. The Cantonese dialect is used predominantly in Hong Kong as well as in Guangdong Province. If you plan on living in Hong Kong or doing business there, this is a popular dialect and one used in many Hong Kong movies. However, when people refer to ‘Chinese’ it is usually to Mandarin

You should also know the difference between Simplified Chinese characters and Traditional Chinese characters. These refer to the characters used by the Cantonese Hong Kong (traditional Characters) and the characters used in mainland China (simplified Characters). In fact, everyone use to use Simplified Chinese characters at one point in time, but efforts have been made to make characters easier and to have less characters in general.

Learning Chinese with Pinyin

Learning Chinese is almost impossible for foreigners without something called Pinyin. Pinyin is the attempt to ‘LATINize’ the Chinese language. There is only a specific amount different sounds in the Chinese language. Each character represents one of these sounds. Some words are formed by joining several of these characters together. Chinese Pinyin will really make life easier for you and help you to learn Chinese.

This is a very basic introduction into the world of Chinese learning. I can say that I was exactly like you once, I just knew that I wanted to learn Chinese but I had no idea how to do it. There is so much garbage out on the internet, and if you don’t follow a proper path then you will not be learning Chinese Mandarin in the proper way. In the weeks ahead I will give you all the information tips advice strategy and techniques to learn Chinese.