Mastering Mandarin: A Fun and Interactive Guide
Hello everyone, it's William jiamin. welcoming you to my channel. In this channel, I'm going to share with you guys how to learn Chinese. As a native speaker, I believe I'm more than capable of teaching you how to speak this language fluently. I'll try my best to make this learning process fun and engaging.
I've got my program ready, so I'll be drawing on this pad to cover most of the study points in the Chinese language. Let's get started. First and foremost, before diving into Chinese characters, understand that Chinese is a tone-based language. Speaking everything correctly but with an incorrect tone can completely change the meaning, so it's crucial to get this right from the start.
Today, I'll share all the notes on the Learn Language Free website, and I'll leave the link in the description below. In Chinese, we call tone-based language 'Yin Diao'. You might have heard of Pinyin, which is somewhat similar to English but with a few pronunciation differences. As an English speaker, you'll grasp it quite quickly. Once you master Pinyin, you can read any Chinese character, even if you don't understand it. Applying the tone to Pinyin is key to sounding like a native speaker.
In textbooks, it's often said there are four tones in Chinese, but in reality, there are five. Let's use the example 'ma'. Even if you pronounce it perfectly, without the correct tone, it could mean something entirely different. For instance, the first tone 'ma' (妈) means 'mother'. Changing the tone slightly to the second tone, 'má' (麻), refers to a type of delicacy in Chinese cuisine. The third tone 'mǎ' (马) means 'horse', and the fourth tone 'mà' (骂) is used when insulting someone.
Don't forget the fifth tone, which is neutral. For example, 'mama' (妈妈) means 'mother', with the first 'ma' in the first tone and the second 'ma' without any tone. This is a short introduction to the four (and actually five) tones in Chinese.
In the next video, we'll talk about Pinyin. Once you get the hang of it, you can start learning all the characters. I'll add Pinyin to each new character we introduce. Remember, I also have other channels covering topics like finance, coding, digital arts, and music. Please leave any suggestions in the comment section, and I'll be sure to answer them. Thank you for your support, and don't forget to subscribe and give the video a thumbs up!
In our next session, we'll delve into 'Pinyin' - often loosely translated as a syllable in Chinese. Once you learn Pinyin, you can pronounce any Chinese word as long as it has a syllable. However, this is just the first step towards fluency.
We'll use the app Procreate for teaching. Today, we're discussing syllables in Chinese. We can't cover everything in one video as it's a vast topic, so we'll start with the basics. For example, the Chinese word 'you' (有) in Pinyin is 'yǒu'. We'll break it down into its initial and final parts to understand how syllables are formed in Chinese.
Every Chinese syllable has two parts: an initial and a final. Once you understand these, you can read anything. In the next few videos, we'll dive into initials and finals in detail. Don't worry if you can't memorize them all at once. The goal is to gradually improve your pronunciation and understanding.
That's a quick introduction for now. In the next video, we'll explore initials more closely. Stay tuned, and thank you for joining me on this journey of learning Chinese!