Chinese Reading and Writing
From the base of Chinese strokes, from shallow to deep, from easy to difficult, interesting teaching, to help students sum up the composition of Chinese characters, understanding parts and radical, and find their commonalities and differences.
Chinese characters play an important role in Chinese culture. Learning Chinese characters can help students better understand Chinese and speed up their learning of Chinese so that they can read Chinese newspapers and magazines. In addition, Chinese calligraphy art is an important derivation of Chinese characters, and mastering Chinese characters can open the door to understanding Chinese calligraphy. Whats more, if you want to pass the HSK test and go to a Chinese University, Chinese must be mastered.
Kunming College of Eastern Language and Culture is a distinctive school known for its excellence in teaching Chinese language and culture to foreigners. Our college employs professional teachers who use the latest teaching methodology supported by a conducive learning environment. We also offer lectures on selected subjects and related language-study activities.
College services are available to a range of international and overseas students. Our courses are designed to meet our students; needs. In addition to regular and extra-curricular classes, we provide many opportunities to practice the language and immerse one’s self in the local culture.
Kunming College of Eastern Language and Culture coordinates Advanced Learning programs with well-known Universities throughout China. International students who have studied Mandarin and successfully completed the HSK examination will be recommended to these universities to study for a Bachelor’s or Master’s degree or a PHD.
KCEL has not only been honored as the best mandarin school on Go Kunming website, it also serves as the training base for International Chinese teachers in Hanban, those who are professional and talented ensure our teaching of high quality. Teachers in KCEL have a good command of Mandarin, and they can speak English fluently, there are weekly teaching training courses for them at the same time. KCEL is a campus worth trusting as the World Bank, UNESCO and New Zealand embassy all appointed KCEL to teach their staff Chinese.
Kunming College of Eastern Language and Culture offers various activities to exercise language, culture study, culture exchange, research programs, business, and trade contact and conference services. Meanwhile, our school arranges characteristic cultural, scientific and recreational activities, including day-trips, social events and weekends away.
We hope we have the pleasure of welcoming you to our College!
Learn to Read and Write Mandarin Chinese
1. Learn Pinyin. Pinyin is a kind of Chinese writing system. The letters of Pinyin originate from the Rome alphabet, not the Chinese characters. Pinyin is very useful for Chinese learners, even if you haven’t learned traditional Chinese characters, you can learn to read and write mandarin with Pinyin. There are many Chinese textbooks with Pinyin, as well as learning materials. Although Pinyin is derived from the Rome alphabet, English native speakers cannot get hang of its pronunciation immediately. Therefore, it is very important to have a correct pronunciation guidance when learning Pinyin.
2. Learn to read Chinese characters. Although recognizing Chinese characters is not a necessity for learning Chinese, many people are attracted by Chinese characters because Chinese characters will make them feel closer to traditional Chinese culture. However, in fact, it is not easy to recognize Chinese characters. In order to understand the contents of the Chinese newspapers, an ordinary Chinese reader needs to familiarise himself with about 2000 Chinese characters – and this is just the beginning. It is said that there are more than 50000 Chinese characters (though some of them are no longer used). The greatest advantage of recognizing Chinese characters is that you can learn more about other cultures, including Cantonese, Japanese and Korean. These languages, though different from Chinese in pronunciation, use Chinese characters (or simplified versions of Chinese characters) in writing.
3. Learn to write Chinese characters. Once you learn to read Chinese characters, you may be interested in the writing of Chinese characters. Learning chinese writing is a complex skill. It requires patience and a little sense of art. The first step in learning Chinese characters writing is to learn the “basic unit”, that is, the independent radicals, which form the basis of Chinese characters. There are 214 radicals in Chinese, some radicals are single words, others are just part of complex Chinese characters. When writing Chinese characters, the stroke order is very important. You must follow certain rules – for example, from top to bottom, from left to right, first horizontal and then vertical. If the stroke is not correct, then the word you write is wrong.
4. Read Chinese. If you want to improve the level of Chinese reading, you need to read at least 15-20 minutes a day. First of all, you can read some children’s books (basically with Pinyin) to improve your reading level, and of course, you can also find some good materials on the Internet to read. You can also use the Chinese you learned in your daily life. You can try to read the Chinese tags on food, or ask a waiter at a restaurant for a Chinese menu. Once you have improved your reading level, you can get some Chinese newspapers (Chinese version) and try your best to read the articles. This is also a good way to help you understand Chinese culture and current affairs in China.
5. Learn to write Mandarin Chinese every day. In order to improve your Chinese writing level, you can write something in Chinese every day, no matter in Pinyin or in Chinese character. One way is to write a Chinese diary every day, write something about the weather, write what you feel or what you have done every day. If you are brave enough, find some friends who speak Chinese to help you check if there are any mistakes. Or you can also find a Chinese pen pal to write to each other. This is a win-win way, you can improve your Chinese level, and your pen pal can improve his or her English level. You can also ask your pen pal to help you modify your letter and send it back to you in reply. The last way to practice Chinese writing ability is to make a Chinese list, such as shopping lists, or Chinese tags for the household objects.
