Learn the Mandarin Chinese characters and words in everyday use in China! This book helps you to quickly learn the intermediate-level Chinese characters you need to know if you want to live or work in China, or progress to the next level with your language skills. Alongside 1200 closely-related vocabulary and phrases, it presents the characters in a series of 20 easy lessons--giving clear pronunciations, English definitions and a writing guide showing you how the character is written. In this book, you'll find: 300 characters grouped into themes A warm-up narrative for each lesson explaining how the characters in the lesson relate to the theme All characters and vocabulary needed for the HSK Level 3 exam and the Advanced Placement (AP) Chinese Language and Culture Exam Exercises that help you practice recognizing the characters and using the vocabulary to create sentences Reviews that provide a variety of drills and exercises to increase your proficiency Downloadable online audio by native speakers to help with pronunciation Printable flash cards This book is intended for intermediate learners (HSK Level 3). For HSK 1 & 2, see Beginning Mandarin Chinese Characters--the first book in this series.

This user–friendly book is aimed at helping students of Mandarin Chinese learn and remember Chinese characters. At last—there is a truly effective and enjoyable way to learn Chinese characters! This book helps students to learn and remember both the meanings and the pronunciations of over 800 characters. This otherwise daunting task is made easier by the use of techniques based on the psychology of learning and memory. key principles include the use of visual imagery, the visualization of short "stories," and the systematic building up of more complicated characters from basic building blocks. Although Learning Chinese Characters is primarily a book for serious learners of Mandarin Chinese, it can be used by anyone with an interest in Chinese characters, without any prior knowledge of Chinese. It can be used alongside (or after, or even before) a course in the Chinese language. All characters are simplified (as in mainland China) but traditional characters are also given, when available. Key features: Specially designed pictures and stories are used in a structured way to make the learning process more enjoyable and effective, reducing the need for rote learning to the absolute minimum. The emphasis throughout is on learning and remembering the meanings and pronunciations of the characters. Tips are also included on learning techniques and how to avoid common problems. Characters are introduced in a logical sequence, which also gives priority to learning the most common characters first. Modern simplified characters are used, with pronunciations given in pinyin. Key information is given for each character, including radical, stroke–count, traditional form, compounds, and guidance on writing the character. This is a practical guide with a clear, concise and appealing layout, and it is well–indexed with easy look–up methods. The 800 Chinese characters and 1,033 compounds specified for the original HSK Level A proficiency test are covered.

Welcome to the world's most efficient method of learning Mandarin Chinese, whether you are striving to learn Chinese on your own, or studying in a classroom setting. Part of the widely-used and highly acclaimed Kubler series, Intermediate Spoken Chinese provides separate but integrated "tracks" to help you learn to read, write and speak Chinese efficiently, at your own pace. Some students and teachers wish to emphasize speaking ability first, whereas others want to focus on learning to read and write Chinese at the same time. These Chinese language study books allow you the flexibility to acquire the spoken language and the written language with the method that best fits your needs. Intermediate Spoken Chinese allows you to experience real-life situations in different Mandarin-speaking locales. (It also exposes you to the authentic range of Chinese accents; you're not limited only to learning an imaginary "textbook Beijing accent" as in other books). Each of the everyday situations explored here—from shopping at a market to playing unexpected phone tag—is one you're likely to encounter as you interact with Chinese language speakers. You can choose to use this book with its corresponding Intermediate Chinese Practice Essentials Workbook, available separately, that offers you a wide range of one-of-a-kind activities to help you practice the language skills you learn here. Key features of Intermediate Spoken Chinese: Clear and detailed explanations of natural, colloquial Chinese grammar, pronunciation and usage Recommended strategies to help you learn to speak Chinese more efficiently Experience the actual speaking styles of Chinese people in various parts of mainland China as well as Taiwan, Macao, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Malaysia Notes on Chinese culture and society allow you to understand situational etiquette Discussions of challenges faced specifically by English speakers who are learning Chinese and how to overcome them Downloadable audio recordings by native speakers of all the vocabulary, dialogues, and other vital items A separate Teacher's Guide and a full character transcript (Simplified and Traditional) are both available electronically Accompanying digital content contains 56 videos shot on location, which allows you to view conversations involving Chinese speakers from different parts of China Feel confident traveling in the Mandarin-speaking world; with this language learning set you will be speaking Chinese gracefully and fluidly in no time.

Learning to read and write Chinese requires lots of practice. This unique practice guide can be used with any Chinese textbook or on its own to enhance your proficiency in reading and writing Mandarin Chinese. Intermediate Written Chinese Practice Essentials offers a wealth of carefully-designed exercises and activities to help you develop every aspect of your reading and writing ability. This workbook has been designed so it can be used either in a class with an instructor or by independent learners working on their own. Both simplified and traditional characters are taught and practiced in the same volume. This means students can learn either or both kinds of characters without having to purchase another book, and instructors have the flexibility to teach a combined class where some students read and write one type of characters and other students the other type. This workbook provides character practice sheets for the 336 characters introduced in Intermediate Written Chinese, with complete information on stroke order and direction for both the simplified and traditional forms of the characters. Reading and writing exercises are included, such as those involving dictation and the answering of questions based on the content of each lesson. English-Chinese translation exercises are provided for each unit. The Downloadable content provides: Native-speaker audio recordings for dictation practice. Printable flash cards for all the new characters and words, with Chinese characters on one side and Pinyin and English on the other. Printable pdf files with additional exercises and activities. Together with this book, you can use Intermediate Spoken Chinese if you want to learn fluent spoken Mandarin. About the Series: Respected Chinese language expert Dr. Cornelius Kubler, who has taught diplomats, business people and students, presents a learning system that uses separate but integrated "tracks" to help you efficiently master the basics of spoken and written Chinese. The materials in the Basic Chinese series allow you to move from complete beginner level to basic fluency.

This continuation builds on the material in the earlier book, allowing users to expand their familiarity with Mandarin Chinese. The new audio CD feature is especially helpful to learning and understanding the language as spoken. The ten lessons, although similar in structure to those in the earlier volume, provide a stronger emphasis on grammar and vocabulary. The glossary features vocabulary lists from both volumes.

Learning Chinese can be frustrating and difficult, partly because it's very different from European languages. Following a teacher, textbook or language course is not enough. They show you the characters, words and grammar you need to become proficient in Chinese, but they don't teach you how to learn them! Regardless of what program you're in (if any), you need to take responsibility for your own learning. If you don't, you will miss many important things that aren't included in the course you're taking. If you study on your own, you need to be even more aware of what you need to do, what you're doing at the moment and the difference between them. Here are some of the questions I have asked and have since been asked many times by students: How do I learn characters efficiently? How do I get the most out of my course or teacher? Which are the best learning tools and resources? How can I become fluent in Mandarin? How can I improve my pronunciation? How do I learn successfully on my own? How can I motivate myself to study more? How can I fit learning Chinese into a busy schedule? The answers I've found to these questions and many others form the core of this book. It took eight years of learning, researching, teaching and writing to figure these things out. Not everybody has the time to do that! I can't go back in time and help myself learn in a better way, but I can help you! This book is meant for normal students and independent language learners alike. While it covers all major areas of learning, you won't learn Chinese just by reading this book. It's like when someone on TV teaches you how to cook: you won't get to eat the delicious dish just by watching the program; you have to do the cooking yourself. That's true for this book as well. When you apply what you learn, it will boost your learning, making every hour you spend count for more, but you still have to do the learning yourself. This is what a few readers have said about the book: "The book had me nodding at a heap of things I'd learnt the hard way, wishing I knew them when I started, as well as highlighting areas that I'm currently missing in my study." - Geoff van der Meer, VP engineering "This publication is like a bible for anyone serious about Chinese proficiency. It's easy for anyone to read and written with scientific precision." - Zachary Danz, foreign teacher, children's theatre artist About me I started learning Chinese when I was 23 (that's more than eight years ago now) and have since studied in many different situations, including serious immersion programs abroad, high-intensity programs in Sweden, online courses, as well as on the side while working or studying other things. I have also successfully used my Chinese in a graduate program for teaching Chinese as a second language, taught entirely in Chinese mostly for native speakers (the Graduate Institute for Teaching Chinese as a Second Language at National Taiwan Normal University). All these parts have contributed to my website, Hacking Chinese, where I write regularly about how to learn Mandarin.