Suggestions for a Grammar Book to Memorize

[Yadang]

I've searched the forums and found a lot of suggestions for grammar books, but I haven't read anything that gives the quality of the example sentences. I want to basically memorize a grammar book in the hope that memorizing different sentences with varied grammatical usages will help me better internalize the grammar. The main thing I'm worried about, however, is getting a grammar book, and memorizing all of the example sentences, only to realize when using the sentences that they aren't the way people actually speak.

 

When I was in Taiwan last year I bought the book  "Common Chinese Patterns" (simplified version here), thinking I'd try to integrate more grammar into my studying - more by trying to internalize the example sentences then by memorizing the rules (I definitely want to read the rules and understand them, but then ultimately internalize the grammar, not though rules but though memorizing content that I understand).

 

However, when I was using it in class (in a regular native Taiwanese school), I asked my classmates about it. They looked though it and on many of the sentences said things like "well, yeah, this is right I guess, but we never say that"... This really worries me, because I want to learn grammar and vocabulary that sounds right when I use it, not weird - even if it may be correct.

 

I don't know if this stems from the book being poorly written, or if perhaps it covered more literary grammar or something like that (which, admittedly, I don't really know how much spoken and written forms differ because I'm not advanced enough to read native materials...).

 

If it is the problem of differences in literary vs. spoken Chinese, would it make sense to memorize only the more spoken Chinese grammar, and then, when reading more native stuff, start to worry about the literary stuff? If this is so, than are there any books that just give the grammar that is used in spoken Chinese?

 

So, if any of you can suggest a book that would not merely be good at explaining but also be a good book to memorize, and use the actual memorized sentences themselves, as well as a basis upon which to build my own grammatically similar sentences, I would be very appreciative. My plan is to use the explanations in the grammar book to understand the grammar and then have the sentences recorded and put them all into Anki and memorize away.

 

Note: I posed this same question to John Pasden who said, that, he would admittedly advise using his own Chinese Grammar Wiki as they always try to keep the stuff current. I'm fine with online resources too, so if you would recommend that also, please do tell.

[Rowan]

From my experience (with a language other than Chinese, therefore take it with a grain of salt) it makes more sense to use grammar books and example sentences in the beginning to get a basic grasp. When natives say "we just don't say that" it's because they've lived around their native language for their whole lives and that level of exposure is what leads to a natural use of the language. The grammar books give you a basic grasp, and after that the more you read and listen the more refined and natural your Chinese will become. That's how it gets internalized. 

 

Now, I've heard that Chinese grammar has a lot more set patterns than Indo-European languages, so again, maybe I'm wrong.

[etm001]

When I was in Taiwan last year I bought the book  "Common Chinese Patterns" (simplified version here), thinking I'd try to integrate more grammar into my studying - more by trying to internalize the example sentences then by memorizing the rules (I definitely want to read the rules and understand them, but then ultimately internalize the grammar, not though rules but though memorizing content that I understand).

 

 

I have this book too and think it's great. I don't try to memorize any of the example sentences though - I just use it as a reference when needed, or some days I randomly pick 2-3 patterns to review.

 

However, when I was using it in class (in a regular native Taiwanese school), I asked my classmates about it. They looked though it and on many of the sentences said things like "well, yeah, this is right I guess, but we never say that"... This really worries me, because I want to learn grammar and vocabulary that sounds right when I use it, not weird - even if it may be correct.

 

 

I wouldn't worry too much. The "...but we never say that..." is a reply you'll probably hear from a native speaker if you show them almost any textbook that teaches their language to non-native speakers.  In the same vein, think about the English language/grammar books you studied when you were younger - I'm sure they were filled with "correct" and "proper" grammar, etc., which you didn't often use in daily conversation, because it would have sounded weird, too formal, etc.

 

To me, what's important is understanding the grammar pattern, and certainly the example sentences in the book help me do that, even if a native speaker thinks they are stilted or contrived. One thing that also helps me: I create ~5 new sentences using the pattern, then show them to a native speaker (or post them on Lang-, so that I can confirm, at least at a high level, that I'm using the pattern correctly.

 

So, if any of you can suggest a book that would not merely be good at explaining but also be a good book to memorize, and use the actual memorized sentences themselves, as well as a basis upon which to build my own grammatically similar sentences, I would be very appreciative. My plan is to use the explanations in the grammar book to understand the grammar and then have the sentences recorded and put them all into Anki and memorize away.

 

 

Search these forums for the "Glossika" method. This technique isn't focused on learning grammar per se, but the overall aims sound similar to what your seeking to do. Some people, myself included, use a modified version of this technique. Here's a current thread where the pros/cons of the technique are debated; also see this blog which goes into great detail about how to use the Glossika method without buying the Glossika materials).

 

I have seen a few books on Amazon purporting to teach Chinese "they way people actually speak", although I don't have any specific examples to give you. In terms of grammar books, one that I've always enjoyed is "Modern Mandarin Chinese Grammar: A Practical Guide" by Claudia Ross and Jing-heng Sheng Ma (there is also a companion workbook). It's a great reference, but neither the book's structure nor example sentences lend themselves to the kind of memorization that you want to do.

[Shelley]

I have always liked Modern Mandarin Chinese grammar and the accompanying workbook. One of my first grammar books was 201 Chinese verbs. It was quite good.

 

I think you should learn the "correct way" and then pick up the more colloquial forms. I don't think you can expect text books to do anything but teach the correct way as the colloquial forms keep changing.

 

Quote "Is anyone else really really bored of articles about people who can speak lots of languages?  我。"

- roddy & Meng Lelan"

 

I say no, I admire polyglots, what I don't like are the now famous (at least on this forum) exaggerated claims for unreasonable timescales to become fluent.

 

If you are bored with such articles, don't read them. Sounds a bit like sour grapes

[Demonic_Duck]

The problem is, the "correct form" is generally just a slightly older version of the way everyone says things. I'd suggest you learn the way people actually speak the language first, then worry about whether it's "correct"¹ later, when you're thinking about writing CVs, university essays etc. in Chinese. It's also worth noting that there are some things which dictionaries or textbooks will tell you are correct, and yet which even highly educated native speakers say differently. The classic example is tones and other variations in pronunciation of certain characters², but I'm sure there are plenty of examples for grammar too. I wouldn't really know myself, having never systematically worked through a grammar book.

 

¹i.e. marks you out as being well-educated

²Personal anecdote warning:

I was reading 再别康桥 aloud today, and the Chinese teacher at the school I work at told me that 荫 should be pronounced yīn and not yìn when it's a noun. All of my Chinese-English dictionaries only list the yìn pronunciation. Admittedly it seems that Chinese-Chinese dictionaries also list the yīn pronunciation, so maybe this is a problem with C-E dictionaries and not dictionaries in general.

 

I actually gain a lot of interesting insights into how high-level native speakers with no knowledge of CSL think about Chinese from said Chinese teacher. For example, she was convinced that 3-3 tone patterns are still pronounced as 3-3. I tried to explain to her that because of tone sandhi it actually changes to being read as 2-3, but she told me that tone sandhi is actually a relatively rare phenomenon which doesn't occur most of the time in 3-3 combinations. Clearly she was wrong, but it's interesting to me that someone so knowledgeable about the language could make such a mistake.

 

Anyway, moral of the story: listen to how native speakers talk, not how the tell you they talk

 

Also Shelley, you're replying to a signature there

[Shelley]

Demonic Duck is that not allowed? It provoked a response from me, It does seem a strange thing to have as a signature, which I understand you can change when ever you like so it might just be this weeks comment.

 

Anyway its way off topic.

[hedwards]

One of the main problems I've seen with books is where they leave out the literal translation in favor of only the translation. I've started working with Modern Chinese by Vivienne Zhang https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/295194

 

For example:

jīntiān èrshíyī hào.

今天 21 号。

Today is the 21^st.

(lit. Today 21 date.)

My Chinese isn't really good enough to tell you if the book is properly accurate, but it is consistent with what I've read in other books, so it's probably alright, but it does sound like the sort of book that you're looking for. I believe the intention there is for you to memorize the rule and drill the sentences based upon the provided examples.

[Mariana]

Thank you headwords! These books are exactly what I had been searching for! I found the author' website: www.learnmodernchinese.com and I purchased the 4 books on iTunes Store on my iPad. 

The word for word translation or literal translation is excellent. I never thought this approach in other books. There are lots of well thought out example sentences which help us better understand and memorize the grammar rules, and also for daily use.

Wish I found these books earlier.

[hedwards]

Out of curiosity, does the iTunes store have proper Chinese books where they use real fonts or are they like Barnes & Noble where the books are basically unusable because they've reduced the characters to images that won't resize? I refuse to buy Chinese books from B&N even though I have a Nook because if I buy from them the books are unusable on smaller screen devices.

 

I've been doing a bit of time myself for my own learning when I come across sentences that I don't understand. It's made it a lot easier for me to work through my books when I do a literal translation before I do a proper translation.

[Mariana]

Yes, iTunes Store or iBookstore have proper Chinese books with real fonts. In the 4 books of Modern Chinese by Vivienne Zhang I bought, the Pinyin, Hanzi, and English all can be resized at the same time. The characters have the real fonts, they are not images. 

 

I agree the literal translation is really helpful. I can read through the Modern Chinese books without the need of a dictionary. I search for the words I don't know inside these ebooks and the words come out with the example sentences which are very related to everyday life. It's relaxing to read and I can learn new expressions quickly.

 

On the author's website http://www.learnmodernchinese.com I saw these books are available in many other stores, e.g.,kindle, kobo...There are paperbacks on Amazon as well. Paper books are easier for writing notes on but I travel quite often so iPad is easier for me.

[Yadang]

Etm001:

 

I wouldn't worry too much. The "...but we never say that..." is a reply you'll probably hear from a native speaker if you show them almost any textbook that teaches their language to non-native speakers.  In the same vein, think about the English language/grammar books you studied when you were younger - I'm sure they were filled with "correct" and "proper" grammar, etc., which you didn't often use in daily conversation, because it would have sounded weird, too formal, etc.

Hmmm, yeah, that's a good point... But at the same time, when I look at English textbooks, I wince sometimes because it's just so contrived and unnatural... It would be nice to avoid this, if possible...

 

 

One thing that also helps me: I create ~5 new sentences using the pattern, then show them to a native speaker (or post them on Lang-, so that I can confirm, at least at a high level, that I'm using the pattern correctly.

An excellent idea! Thanks!

 

 

 

Search these forums for the "Glossika" method. This technique isn't focused on learning grammar per se, but the overall aims sound similar to what your seeking to do. Some people, myself included, use a modified version of this technique. Here's a current thread where the pros/cons of the technique are debated; also see this blog which goes into great detail about how to use the Glossika method without buying the Glossika materials).

Ah - yes I've been following that thread and because of it bought the first level (even though it's really easy for me as in I understand it all, I'm starting to realize that even really easy thinks I have trouble saying correctly, so I'm going over all of them to get a better grasp of that. Thanks for the blog link! By the way, do you know who writes that blog? For some reason I seem to recall reading somewhere it was OneEye...)

 

 

Demonic_Duck:

 

 

The problem is, the "correct form" is generally just a slightly older version of the way everyone says things. I'd suggest you learn the way people actually speak the language first, then worry about whether it's "correct"¹ later, when you're thinking about writing CVs, university essays etc. in Chinese. It's also worth noting that there are some things which dictionaries or textbooks will tell you are correct, and yet which even highly educated native speakers say differently. The classic example is tones and other variations in pronunciation of certain characters², but I'm sure there are plenty of examples for grammar too. I wouldn't really know myself, having never systematically worked through a grammar book.

Hmmm, I like that approach, especially because as it is now, pretty much all of my input is colloquial stuff, so it would be better to use that as a resource now, and when I start getting better and able to go into more advanced stuff, then worry about the more advanced grammar that goes along with it.

 

Good point about things being correct but people still saying them differently.

 

 

hedwards:

 

One of the main problems I've seen with books is where they leave out the literal translation in favor of only the translation.

Hmmm, when you're studying, how do you use the literal translation? Actually, I always kind of didn't look at literal translations even when they were there, because I didn't want to be thinking about Chinese as if it were English or think about English as if it were Chinese...

[Mariana]

Hi hedwards, yes, iTunes store or iBookstore have proper Chinese books with real fonts. In the 4 books of Modern Chinese by Vivienne Zhang I bought, the Pinyin, Hanzi and English can be resized at the same time. The characters have real fonts, they are not images. 

 

I agree the literal translation is really helpful. I can read through the Modern Chinese series without the need of a dictionary. I can also search for the words I don't know in these ebooks and the words come out with the example sentences which are very related to everyday life, and I learn the new expressions quickly.

 

On the author's website, the books are also available in other stores, e.g., kindle, kobo...There are also paperbacks on Amazon. Paperbacks are easier for writing notes on but I travel quite often so iPad is more convenient to me. 

[hedwards]

@Yadong, usually what I do with the literal translation is I see how the sentence actually works. Knowing that 他比她高 means he's taller than her is OK, it's a short sentence with only a few words, but for longer ones like 从这儿到那儿多远。 actually mean and how they work is somewhat trickier. The literal translation let's me see word for word what's going on, even though the result isn't grammatical English.

 

Typically after that, I'll see what words I can substitute in and out to generate new sentences that are more useful.从—到—多远。

[OneEye]

 For some reason I seem to recall reading somewhere it was OneEye

 

That's my blog, yes.

 

The post wasn't about how to use the method without buying the materials, but rather how to use the method using other materials because Glossika's course hadn't come out yet. I'd really recommend the Glossika course now that it's available though. They sent me a review copy of one of their courses, so I'll be posting the review soon (hopefully this weekend) here on chinese-forums.

[Shelley]

I also like to do the literal translation and then put it into grammatically correct English. I find it really helps me understand the way Chinese sentences are constructed and as hedwards says doing some substitution to really get my head round the form.

 

For me, especially when I began learning, translating something took 3 passes, one from characters to Pinyin, from pinyin to literal English and then finally to English.

 

I am trying now, with material that should be at my level, to just read it, but to check I got it right, if there is no translation available, then I will go through these steps.

 

Looking forward to the review OneEye

[hackinger]

Hi,

 

Chinese With Ease by Assimil has literal translations in addition to grammatically correct translations.

(I recommend Chinese With Ease by the way.)

 

I personally tried from the beginning not to translate at all if possible. I am usually reading "aloud" if circumstances permit,  i.e. I automatically convert the characters to spoken sound. Since I am a German speaker but much of my learning material is learning Chinese via English, I would then have to decide anyway if I translate to German or to English. I can also read French and when reading English or French I never translate on the fly. Only if I do not understand a sentence, I may try to translate.

 

Back to topic: It would be nice if all example sentences from Modern Mandarin Chinese Grammar by Ross et al. would be available as a sound file, may be with the "Glossika method".

 

Cheers

 

hackinger

[hedwards]

@Shelley, it's debatable whether or not it's worth doing a proper translation. Unless you're planning on providing translation or interpretation services, it's more important that you understand how to express an idea in Chinese than be able to map it back directly into proper English. Mainly because you can't get fluent by doing translations, if you understand what's being said and can produce it that's sufficient, the translations are kind of beside the point.

 

It's a bit like trying to read Chinese aloud, there might be some benefit, but mostly it just encourages bad habits. It's bad enough that well intentioned teachers encourage students to read English with subvocalizations, bringing it to a language like Chinese where it's even more clearly wrong is even worse.

[Yadang]

Thanks, hedwards. 

 

 

That's my blog, yes.

Excellent. A new blog for me to read!

 

I look forward to the Glossika review! Actually, I'm already using it, but I always like to see the different ways people use different resources.

 

 

 

It's a bit like trying to read Chinese aloud, there might be some benefit, but mostly it just encourages bad habits. It's bad enough that well intentioned teachers encourage students to read English with subvocalizations, bringing it to a language like Chinese where it's even more clearly wrong is even worse.

Really? Please elaborate! I find this very interesting and have actually been wondering about it for quite a while!

 

Actually... maybe we should start this discussion in another topic... Do you want to make a topic about that? I would, but I feel like someone who actually knows what they're talking about could focus it better than I could... But I'll start one if you don't

[Mariana]

@hedwards, just noticed that my two posts had appeared. Yesterday I replied to you regarding the real fonts in iBooks. After a few hours, I didn't see my reply appear so I wrote another one. Probably because I am new here, it takes longer time for my posts to show up.

 

I really enjoy the Modern Chinese series. It was a good choice! 

[imron]

Really? Please elaborate! I find this very interesting and have actually been wondering about it for quite a while!

Sub-vocalising generally has a negative effect on things like reading speed.  If you never learn to sub-vocalise, then theoretically your reading speed will be higher.  Honestly though, if you want to develop good speaking skills at some point you are just going to have to put into practice at least speaking out loud.  There are other things you can do to improve reading speeds.

 

Reading out loud will only encourage bad habits if you aren't getting any feedback on that reading (either from someone else, or through recording it and listening back to yourself) and correcting any problems.  At some point, you need to get used to the mouth positions and movements necessary for producing Chinese, and in my opinion drilling speaking out loud (either from memory or from something written down) is a great way to do that.