Are books Chinese students use to study English helpful?

[Jan Finster]

Today, at a bookshop in Kaohsiung, I saw a vast array of books for Chinese students of English. I wonder if you guys think those book can be used in reverse to study Chinese. Obviously not to learn Chinese grammar and the like, but for vocabulary, phrases and the like?

 

I also saw the book 史上最強的英語會話8,000. It has been recommended several times on this forums because of the dual Chinese and English audio sentences? Has anybody used similar books?

 

There are several similar books e.g.

https://www.books.com.tw/products/0010742257

https://www.sanmin.com.tw/Product/index/006961172

https://www.sanmin.com.tw/Product/index/005155550

 

To me it is often not obvious, if the books have Chinese and English audio or only English? Is there a way to tell?

 

 

 

[Lu]

10 hours ago, Jan Finster said:

I wonder if you guys think those book can be used in reverse to study Chinese.

They would be useful in the absence of better, more suitable materials. With only limited time (and money) available, I think it's better to find books made for students of Chinese.

 

Something to keep in mind when looking at such books is whether the vocabulary and especially the example sentences are normal, natural English sentences translated into Chinese, or vice versa. You need vice versa.

[Jan Finster]

10 hours ago, Lu said:

Something to keep in mind when looking at such books is whether the vocabulary and especially the example sentences are normal, natural English sentences translated into Chinese, or vice versa. You need vice versa

 

Yes, I believe this is where they fall short. To be honest, at my level I would not be able to tell if they are normal/natural Chinese sentences or not. Therefore, I am somewhat reluctant to buy the recommended 史上最強的英語會話8,000

[abcdefg]

I read a bunch of short classics of western literature that had been translated into Chinese. These had English on one page and Chinese on the page facing it. These were printed for Chinese kids who were studying English. Charles Dickens, Arthur Conan Doyle, Robinson Crusoe. Most of them were entertaining to read. Good stories. I found them worthwhile.

 

I read the Chinese side and only looked at the English when I got stuck. They were not actual literal translations, but the Chinese conveyed the gist of the English prose. My recollection is that there were several series of these, with different levels of difficulty.  These books are popular, easy to find them in bookstores, don't need to be ordered on the internet. Cost was low; they were cheap.

[dtcamero]

On 12/27/2019 at 3:40 AM, Jan Finster said:

I wonder if you guys think those book can be used in reverse to study Chinese.

this is actually a good idea.

1) these books are mostly chinese, with some bits of english. 

simple understandable chinese with the english there as a guide to help you understand the topic. similar to how a manga has pictures that can help when you don't understand what's going on

2) these books are written in real chinese for a chinese audience.

whenever possible you want to avoid study materials created for foreigners and get out of that unnatural chinese foreigners learn in classrooms. 

i can't tell you how many times i've heard japanese people ask me "how do you do?", and i have to inform them to their great surprise that no one says that.

[suMMit]

9 hours ago, dtcamero said:

whenever possible you want to avoid study materials created for foreigners and get out of that unnatural chinese foreigners learn in classrooms. 

i can't tell you how many times i've heard japanese people ask me "how do you do?", and i have to inform them to their great surprise that no one says that.

Nah, I don't agree. Well, I don't know your level. Maybe useful for upper intermediate or so. And in the case of these dual language English learning books, things maybe written unnaturally because they are translating from English, saying sentences they would never even say in Chinese. The thing about a good textbook or learner resource is that it gives you stepping stones that build on each other and grammar/vocab is recycled. I just checked back, the very first line in my first course was "nǐ hǎo! wǒ shì John." That sounds ok to me. And anyway, if someone said to me "How do you do?" , I don't think thats so bad, I definitely have uncles who would say that. I remember I learning "他在我这儿“ from my textbook and a Chinese friend commenting that she was surprised that I knew that "natural" grammar. Anyway, until I'm at a much higher level I'll put my time into graded readers for extra reading, and if it is native material, it'll be something like menus I pick up rather than a the type of book you mention.

 

[道艺]

I 100% recommend native materials if you can follow at least ~60%. You will find native ways to discuss language, grammar, linguistics etc. The best part is it often repetitive and predictable in many ways.