Advice please! 1. Good books with cds for beginners? 2. Pinyin help 3. Study in China and work?

[CDN Chinese Gal]

Hi everyone,

Thanks to all that responded to my last thread!

I would like some advice please!

1. What are some good books with cds for beginners?

I am currently borrowing library books but often have to return them within 20 days which makes learning difficult as I work long hours almost every day and can dedicate little, limited time to study.

2. I can understand tone (I think haha...unfortunately I have no one to correct me) but I am on Chapter 1 of my book and stuck on a section called "Table of initials" and "Table of finals".

It is laid out as such:

Table of initials

Columns--------------1----------------2--------------3---------------4-------------5

______________________________________________________________

Rows

1----------------------bo---------------po------------mo--------------fo----------------

2----------------------de---------------te-------------ne-----------------------------le

3----------------------zi----------------ci-------------------------------si----------------

4----------------------zhi---------------chi-----------------------------shi-----------ri

5----------------------ji-----------------qi-------------------------------xi---------------

6----------------------ge---------------ke------------------------------he--------------

** This chart below has certain spacing between the finals like the one above...but too tired to use the "-" and space it out.

Table of finals

______________________________________________________________

Row-a: -i a e ai ei ao ou an en ang eng ong er

Row-i: i ia ie iao iu ian in iang ing iong

Row-u: u ua uo uai ui uan un uang uang ueng

Row-u u ue uan un ** This row has two dots above the u

What is the importance in this?

What is the difference between the initials and finals?

Do I have to memorize this to learn? Like, if later in the book, I see "uan" & "mo" combined, I should know how to pronounce it the Chinese way? I think it'd be better for me to learn actual words and just try to pronounce it as I hear it, right?

3. I am trying to self-study at home with no classes (I work long hours and also cannot afford for now) but plan to go to China to get a full immersion experience.

What are some schools with good reputation (I was told to learn Putonghua) and affordable? I would like to stay 1 year/ study 6-8 hours a day etc. I do not want to be a casual learner. (Best bang for my buck - good schools that are reasonably priced...not necessarily the cheapest because I want to go to a good school.)

Is it better to rent an apartment/ dorm, share a dorm with a student, or try to find a Chinese family to live with?

I am unsure of which schools to consider is there are soooo many language schools that pop up when I search, and I don't want to go to an overpriced school and be ripped off and get lousy/ average education.

Is it adviseable to also work a few hours etc for money? Like washing dishes or something fairly low-skilled?

Lots of questions, but any help is greatly appreciated!

[imron]

For the most part, every syllable in Chinese is made up of an initial + final (although a few have finals only). The only real difference between them is that an initial occurs at the beginning of a sound, whereas a final occurs at the end (hence the names).

Have a look at something like this, and you'll get a good idea for what those tables mean and how they are combined. If you click on a sound on that site and then choose the BPMF spelling, you'll hear the standard way that the sound is combined (incidentally, you will never see uan & mo combined because there is no sound 'muan' in standard Mandarin).

You don't need to memorise these tables as such (although there's certainly no harm in doing so), but it's a good idea to practice being able to say each initial and each final correctly, and also being able to put them together. It's a bit like in English learning how to pronounce the different letters of the alphabet, and how those letters sound when combined with each other, which is more or less essential if you want to be able to pronounce words correctly from only seeing them written down.

It's also a good idea to realise that all Chinese syllables are constructed like this (initial + final), so when you see something like jian, don't think of it as being spelt j-i-a-n, but rather as being spelt j-ian.

Also, just a quick side-note, if you have multiple unrelated questions, it's usually best to ask them in multiple threads, rather than trying to cram everything in to one thread.

[abcdefg]

Is it adviseable to also work a few hours etc for money? Like washing dishes or something fairly low-skilled?

Unskilled jobs like that will have many local applicants and the pay will be extremely low.

[jkhsu]

What are some schools with good reputation (I was told to learn Putonghua) and affordable? I would like to stay 1 year/ study 6-8 hours a day etc. I do not want to be a casual learner. (Best bang for my buck - good schools that are reasonably priced...not necessarily the cheapest because I want to go to a good school.)

I've heard of these two private programs although I've never attended them. I am sure they are legit though. Others can probably comment / suggest more.

Mandarin House

http://www.mandarinh...ates_prices.htm

That's Mandarin

http://www.thatsmand...inese-programs/

There are also plenty of University programs. You might want to contact them to get their admission requirements. If you're a complete beginner, I actually suggest smaller private / group lessons if you can afford it.

Is it adviseable to also work a few hours etc for money? Like washing dishes or something fairly low-skilled?

Washing dishes? What about teaching / tutoring English? My suggestion is to save up so you don't have to work. Put your time into learning Chinese since that's what you're doing all this for.

You should also do some research on medical care before you go. Make sure you have that covered and know what to do / where to go if you get sick, get food poisoning, etc.

[abcdefg]

#4, I attended Mandarin House Beijing in early 2007. Was well pleased.

[OneEye]

I'm a little intrigued about this dishwashing thing. Why would you want to do that when you have options like tutoring English available? I was (jokingly) asked to work as a waiter at a local restaurant here in Taipei a few months ago. The pay was 100NT (about US$3.40) per hour. Now granted, that is better than servers make in the US, but they also make plenty of tips in the US and they don't here. I make 700-1000NT per hour doing English tutoring and proofreading. Washing dishes would not even be a consideration (on either side of the hiring process), and I'd imagine the difference in pay between the two types of jobs might be even bigger in China.