Where to start?

[WakkaakkaW]

Hi guys,

I've been wanting to learn chinese. But where to start?

I can speak chinese(mandarin) because I grow -in the Netherlands- up speaking chinese with my parants.

At the age of 10 I've been in chinese saturday school for a year.

Learned about 100-150 character but 10 years later I don't know any character more.

Last year I have tried to study chinese characters again - with flashcards- but after 1 week all my motivation was gone and didnt bother again.

Lately my desire to learn chinese characters have grown and I am motivated and disciplined to start study again.

Before I study I need to know what to study.

My questions are:

Do I study the basic first? What are they?

Which books do I use? Or prgrams?

How many characters should I study in a week?

My goal at the moment is to able to read news papers, books and some popular chinese site.

I think when I reached that level of reading skills, writing will not be that difficult.

These are the questions for now.

Thanks in advance!

[xianhua]

Do I study the basic first? What are they?

I'm not sure what you mean by 'basic'? If you mean the basics of the written script, then of course, you need to learn the basics first. A house needs a foundation.

Which books do I use? Or prgrams?

Have a look through the highly useful 'Resources for studying Chinese' section on this forum.

How many characters should I study in a week?

This all depends on the time you have available and your motivation levels. Learning the characters initially isn't a problem, but you'll need to maintain constant exposure to retain these new characters. Preferably learn them in context.

My goal at the moment is to able to read news papers, books and some popular chinese site.

Newspapers are notoriously difficult so I would think about some short-term goals which will eventually lead you on to that level. The danger, otherwise, is that you may quickly get de-motivated.

[kkaite2]

hmmmmmm motivation huh???

what if you build your vocabulary by listening to Chinese song first;

I thing it is easy to do and will stick to our brain faster.

practice in bathroom and when you are ready, go to karaoke and sing aloud!

use Jacky Cheung's songs for example.

try listening to the song in youtube then google to get the lyric

Then learn common conversation vocabulary; also at youtube.

then if you want to explore/add new vocabulary + characters meaning and usage; go to my site

I believe this will boost your vocabulary.

Thanks

ps: For browsing Chinese site; you can use google translate to translate the site; not accurate but will do.

[renzhe]

Definitely look up spaced repetition flashcard software like Anki. It will cut down on your daily flashcard revision.

There are many different ways people approach learning characters. What I did was to take the HSK lists and the frequency lists (can both be found online), stick them into a flashcard program, and tough it out over three years. It worked for me, and might be a good approach for somebody who can already speak.

Another question is whether you want to be able to write well, or are mostly interested in reading skills.

[anonymoose]

Since you can already speak Chinese, I don't see why you shouldn't dive straight in to proper texts. You will of course have to look up most of the characters to begin with, which you can then try writing out a few times. But as you do this, it will rapidly become easier and easier.

I think your situation is different to most foreign learners. Someone above mentioned that newspapers are notoriously difficult, and for someone without a Chinese background I would agree, but for you, since it is only the recognition of the characters themselves, and not the linguistic aspect of the language that you need to learn, I don't really see the benefit in starting with anything very basic.

In fact, I would suggest starting with a text book in some subject that you are already familiar with. The reason why I suggest a textbook is that the range of language and thus characters is fairly limited (compared with, say, a work of fiction) and is often repetitive, so you should be able to get a grasp of frequently used characters quite quickly.

[WakkaakkaW]

Thanks for all the feedback.

I try to answer all the questions asked. My chinese speaking skills is comperable with my english writing skills.

And yes, in the end I also want to write chinese characters. But I think it takes too much time to master writing skills.

So that's why I focus on one goal at the moment and that is able to read the characters. With this skill I think i can write chinese trough pinyin.

You guys all recommending flash card but with this method it takes years to master 2000 characters. Even if I am able to master 2000 charcters it wont be enough to read news paper since the language is very complex and my vocab is limited. There must be a basic to start with. For instance if you learn english you will start with the alphabet and for chinese there must be some sort of basic too.

I'm trying to find method that suit me the best.

[renzhe]

You guys all recommending flash card but with this method it takes years to master 2000 characters. Even if I am able to master 2000 charcters it wont be enough to read news paper since the language is very complex and my vocab is limited. There must be a basic to start with. For instance if you learn english you will start with the alphabet and for chinese there must be some sort of basic too.

Not really. There are about 200 radicals, and another few hundred recurring phonetic elements which you might learn first if you find a good resource which lists them all, but you can also learn these things in passing as you learn characters.

Whatever you do, and however you do, it will take you a couple of years. There are books which organise the characters in logical sequences and reach you clever mnemonics, and people have learned thousands of characters in a relatively short time (=less than a year), but it still takes years to really KNOW these characters to the point where reading them is natural and where you won't forget them after a week. Google Mathews&Mathews or Heisig for some examples.

Be very very careful with anything that promises you a special revolutionary way to learn 3,500 characters "the easy way". I have never seen one that works as promised. In the end, even with the best strategy, you will need to put in a lot of effort, a lot of reading, and lots of revision over a couple of years.

With your background, if you start now and spend 30 minutes per day with a good flashcard program (Anki, Mnemosyne or similar), you will be reading a proper book in less than two years. I'd just learn about all the things which can help you (a good dictionary, a list of radicals, a webpage with good etymologies) and get going. After the first 2000 characters it gets much easier.

[WakkaakkaW]

I did some research on the methods of learning chinese.

On this website I found out that radicals are the pretty important.

With radicals you can visual the characters as in how to write it and sometimes you can guess how an unknown character should be pronounced based on the radicals.

I remember that my mom used to teach me characters by using those radicals to explain what the components of the character are.

I think ill start with the radicals. I hope i can master them all in 1-2 months. But which characters should I learn next? Should i learn basic sentences or random common charcters?

Can someone confirm that the following link is up to date?

http://www.yellowbridge.com/chinese/radicals.php

[renzhe]

That looks like a standard list of radicals. Skimming through them, most of them seem quite important, so learning these is a good idea.

Make sure you learn them as characters too -- most of the radicals are characters in their own right. Keep in mind that "radicals" in this context only refers to semantic components of characters (which carry meaning), and not phonetic components, which are also important.

I don't know of a good resource listing common phonetic components, but most of them are characters of their own, so you'll pick them up as you go along.

My recommendation is to get a list of the most commonly used 1000 and 2000 characters and work from there. There is a list here.