Learn Chinese Idioms-Armchair Strategy

Welcome to another series of learning Chinese idioms. In this section, we will introduce the idiom "纸上谈兵 (zhǐ shàng tán bīng)" or “armchair strategy” in English. This idiom has always been a difficult one in learning mandarin and Chinese tutors say it confuses many Chinese learners who have taken Chinese tuition at Chinese school. 

The idiom"纸上谈兵 (zhǐshàngtánbīng) armchair strategy" comes from ancient times China. It refers to people who engage in idle talk, but are unable to act on their high minded theories. It also refers to people who are seemingly excellent but actually when comes to practice proves to be incapable, so this idiom is usually used to urge people to combine theories with practical knowledge. After all, actions speak louder than words. Just like Chinese learners who perform very well at Chinese school, but cannot even speak a little Chinese in real Chinese circumstances.

This idiom originates from an ancient-time story in China. The story: The general Zhao Kuo of Zhao Dynasty began studying military strategy and tactics at childhood, but he could only talk about military strategies over paper. When Zhao Kuo became a general, he changed all the military laws and assigned officers thoughtlessly. He never went to the battlefield, really fighting enemies. Without knowing what the real battlefield is, a lot of wrong strategies were made. As a result, Zhao Kuo's army suffered a severe defeat in the famous Campaign of Chang Ping. Zhao Kuo himself died in the war and the Zhao Dynasty was unable to recover from the defeat.

From this idiom, we, as Chinese learners should put what we learn from Chinese tuition to practice and test our progress through real circumstances.

Learning mandarin is actually not as difficult as we thought. The key is to find the right way to learn it. For example, in order to master Chinese idioms, you should read lots of idiom stories which will be a great help in learning Chinese. Besides, you will get to understand a lot of Chinese culture reading those stories which are fun and interesting.

Learn Chinese characters series-Can’t be hurt anymore

We will continue with our series of “learn Chinese characters”. In recent years, the appearance of Chinese popular words not only enriches our internet life but makes the Chinese language more touching and interesting. Most of these trendy words come from the Internet, because most of the netizens are youngsters. Those who are learning mandarin online should also notice what new is popular concerning Chinese learning.

Today, we will talk about "伤不起 (shāngbùqǐ)" which is a new popular expression in China. It means someone has already been hurt so badly that he or she cannot take any more. At first, "伤不起 (shāngbùqǐ)" was only popular in schools and on the internet, but now "伤不起 (shāngbùqǐ)" is widely used in daily life. Some television programs are using this phrase to create dramas. It has even been used as a song titled by popular singers. It’s a pretty musical song and you can take a listen. Using the normal sentence order, the sentence should be "你伤不起… (nǐ shāngbùqǐ…)", but it is now much more common to say "…你伤不起 (…nǐ shāngbùqǐ).”We put the object in the front of the sentence to emphasis our feelings. So students are exposed to many online Chinese words in their life.

They make new words or give new meaning to old words. It’s them who make the internet lively and interesting. If you are bated by many mosquito，they will say that is “new mosquito gave you continuous kisses”. All of these imply their desire for creating. In learning Chinese characters, we should continually stick to what’s new about Chinese language.

With the continuous development of society，lots of new words are created on the internet. These interesting and touching ideas deeply enrich our vocabulary and at the same time. Make your Chinese more fashionable by learning mandarin online!

Learn Chinese Idiom-To Eat the Date Whole

Chinese idioms are of equal importance to English idioms in the process of learning mandarin. The wording of the Chinese idioms is simple and cultural. Each Chinese idiom has cultural story behind itself, so to learn Chinese language by understanding the story will help us better understand the idiom. Learning Chinese idioms is also an important part of mandarin learning at Chinese school.

In this article, we will learn the idiom "囫囵吞枣 (húlún tūnzǎo)". This idiom may seem a little complicated to those who is trying to learn Chinese characters, but being able to say it and understand the meaning of the idiom is more important at first. "囫囵 (húlún)" means "the whole;" "吞 (tūn)" means to "swallow;" "枣 (zǎo)" is "date.”So, this idiom literally means "to eat the date whole."

Let’s understand the story behind the idiom and know what it really means besides the literal meaning:

A long time ago, a person who considered himself clever went to a friend's party. Everyone was chatting together while eating fruits. A guest among the group said, "It is hard to have the best of both worlds. Let's take eating fruits as an example. Pears are good for our teeth, but they harm our stomachs if we eat too many of them. Likewise, dates are good for our stomachs, but bad for our teeth." The others agreed with the guest. The man who considered himself clever continued the conversation by saying, "This problem is easy to solve. We can discard the pulps when eating pears in order to avoid hurting our stomachs, and we can also eat the date whole in order to protect our teeth."

In Chinese study, this idiom refers to a person who accepts information without digesting and analyzing it or who does things carelessly without paying attention to the details.

There are many ways to learn Chinese idioms. You can learn Chinese idioms online or attend a Chinese school, both of which are effective and necessary. Personally, I would recommend iChineseLearning who focuses on the needs of customers and offers interesting Chinese lessons and all kinds of Chinese learning materials for language learners. Give it a try!

Learn Chinese characters-to Add Fuel

With the increasing influence of China, Chinese language learning is becoming popular and Chinese characters or phrases can be seen on more and more occasion such as “中国制造” on products, or people chanting “加油” in Olympic Games. So, what do these words mean? And how do we pronounce them? No hurry! From today on, we will introduce the series of ”learn Chinese characters”, good news for those who want to learn pinyin or Chinese characters.

In this article, we will particularly focus on the word"加油 (jiāyóu)". Jia4 means to add in Chinese, while You2 means gas or fuel, so literally, "加油 (jiāyóu)" means "to add fuel". Why do Chinese say “add fuel” to encourage their players? It may confuse many foreigners who is trying to learn mandarin.

What is the relationship between petrol stations and athletes? When a car is running slower, probably the gas is running out. The example is just like an athlete running out of energy. It means something like "Come on!" or "Go! Go! Go!" and can be heard during any sporting event or game in China. Isn’t it interesting?

Now do you get the meaning of 加油 (jiāyóu)? You can stay tune to our “learn Chinese characters” series, which will introduce more popular Chinese characters in the future. You can also seek Chinese tuition at iChineselearning school, one of the best online mandarin schools in China.

Learn Chinese characters series-Can’t be hurt anymore

We will continue with our series of “learn Chinese characters”. In recent years, the appearance of Chinese popular words not only enriches our internet life but makes the Chinese language more touching and interesting. Most of these trendy words come from the Internet, because most of the netizens are youngsters. Those who are learning mandarin online should also notice what new is popular concerning Chinese learning.

Today, we will talk about "伤不起 (shāngbùqǐ)" which is a new popular expression in China. It means someone has already been hurt so badly that he or she cannot take any more. At first, "伤不起 (shāngbùqǐ)" was only popular in schools and on the internet, but now "伤不起 (shāngbùqǐ)" is widely used in daily life. Some television programs are using this phrase to create dramas. It has even been used as a song titled by popular singers. It’s a pretty musical song and you can take a listen. Using the normal sentence order, the sentence should be "你伤不起… (nǐ shāngbùqǐ…)", but it is now much more common to say "…你伤不起 (…nǐ shāngbùqǐ).”We put the object in the front of the sentence to emphasis our feelings. So students are exposed to many online Chinese words in their life.

They make new words or give new meaning to old words. It’s them who make the internet lively and interesting. If you are bated by many mosquito，they will say that is “new mosquito gave you continuous kisses”. All of these imply their desire for creating. In learning Chinese characters, we should continually stick to what’s new about Chinese language.

With the continuous development of society，lots of new words are created on the internet. These interesting and touching ideas deeply enrich our vocabulary and at the same time. Make your Chinese more fashionable by learning mandarin online!

Learn Chinese Online

Are you struggling in bed in the morning because you have to get up early to lean Chinese at Chinese school? Are you driving more than 1 hour to meet the Chinese class? Are you… You don’t have to learn Chinese this way!

In this fast-pace modern life, people from every walk of life are being increasingly busy, so how to save time consumed at school or improve the efficiency has been much more urgent, especially for those who want to learn Chinese but have to waste a lot of time on the roads.

The development of Internet technology has enabled online learning possible. Learning mandarin online saves you on tuition fees, book costs and system completion. You can spend less on it than the traditional study way. Meanwhile, it is more convenient .It can offer the same educational and academic benefits while removing many of the hardships and difficulties often associated with attending schools offline. You can study wherever you are and whatever the time is.

Online school is a hot topic nowadays. As for learning mandarin online, I’d like to recommend this online Chinese school. iChineseLearning provides the best Chinese language education service worldwide. Students from all across the world, no matter time or place can get the most enjoyable and fruitful Chinese learning experience.

Now are you ready to learn mandarin online?

Learn Chinese at school or home

Chinese learning is not all about learning Chinese characters or pinyin, or saying a few phrases or sentences. When people learn mandarin online, they should also focus on Chinese culture, history or just know what it is about China, such as the higher education in China, especially for those who want to further their Chinese learning in Chinese universities.

The Chinese higher education normally last 3 or 4 years, with some particular major lasting 5 years or more. In order to be admitted to universities, all students must attend the College Entrance Examination, which has been on hot discussions these yeas in China, because the exam values a student only by how many scores the student get in the exam. No matter how capable the student is or how well he performed at high school, he may not be considered “good” if he performed badly during the exam.

A good education should train students to think for themselves, but the value outlook of traditional education pays much attention to the examination system. A student’s ability is valued by weather he or she can pass the all kinds of tests designed by school or other institutions.

Attending universities to study may seem a little traditional, but there is good news for those who want to lean Chinese online, especially for those who are not in China. With the development of internet and China’s economy, online higher education has been spread in many parts of China. They can learn mandarin online at home with traveling to China.

So, which one do you prefer? Study Chinese at school or home?

A good way to master Chinese characters

For those who are learning online Chinese, they can get a lot of speaking and listening practice, which is a big advantage learning mandarin online, but they also need to do a lot of practice of writing the Chinese characters.

According to statistics by Chinese Education Bureau, a growing number of people across the world are making efforts in learning Chinese characters. Why? Because you can see Chinese characters everywhere! Sometimes, it may cause big trouble if one cannot recognize the seemingly weird Chinese characters.

To learn Chinese characters is not as difficult as most Chinese learners say. The Chinese characters do not consist of many weird irregular strokes which trouble many Chinese learners. Actually, each Chinese character can be divided into several parts, called radicals and each character has its own meaning. For example, 喝(drink) is a common Chinese character, the first time you see it, you may think it is too complicated and there is no regular patterns to follow, thus having difficulty in learning Chinese characters. However, the upper part of it was a日, which is the sun. And the lower part of it is a “人” who stands under the eave, being surrounded by something so that he can get water and drink it. Under the burning sun, people naturally get thirsty and drinking is done by mouth, thus 喝(drink)’s components include both "口" and "日", and the remaining part is a vivid picture of people drinking water. So, learning the meaning of each character is a must because it helps better understand and remember the character.

Learning mandarin online requires associative memory. Chinese characters are fairly similar to the image of the objects they represent. If the Chinese learners are able to create link between the characters and the objects, it will be much easier to learn Chinese online.

Polyphones in Mandarin Chinese

For those who want to learn Chinese characters, I think the difficult lies not in the writing part, because Chinese characters are imaginary and will be very easy to remember if you divide a certain character into parts. What really troubles the Chinese learners who learn mandarin online is the polyphone of certain characters.

The most common polyphones in Chinese for beginners are: “乐” in音乐(yīn yuè) and 快乐(kuài lè), “干” in 干净(gān jìng) and 干部(gàn bù), “似” in 似乎(sì hū) and 似的(shì de).

Once there was a foreigner who was taking Chinese for beginners, he considered Chinese people to be very arrogant after his trip to China. However, others disagreed in that Chinese people were generally famous for their modesty and humility. When asked why he thought so. He replied: “In China you can see sentences like ‘中国人民很行’, ‘中国建设很行’, ‘中国工商很行’, ‘中国农业很行’ and ‘中国很行’ everywhere in the streets, that is too pompous, don't you think so?” Actually, he has actually mistaken “银行(bank)” for “很行(very good)”. “银”resembles“很” and“行”is a polyphone，when pronounced “xíng” , it means good or okay; When pronounced “hang” in the phrase “银行”, it means bank. No wonder the foreigner misunderstood the names of the banks, polyphone is so puzzling and deceptive.

In order to learn mandarin online well, it is necessary to understand the usage of the Chinese characters with more than one pronunciation. There is no doubt polyphone is a barrier if you intend to learn Chinese well. So if you want to learn pinyin or Chinese characters, never ignore the polyphones or jokes like the one above may often happen.

Enjoy your process of learning Chinese!

Being old may not be a bad thing in China

To learn Chinese well, one should be as careful as possible, because the same word can have various meanings in different situations. Obviously, it is the context that decides the meaning of a particular word. So when you go through Chinese learning, do pay extreme attention to the context and only in this way can you figure out the correct meaning of the text.

While learning Chinese language, people are sometimes confused by the usage of老 (lǎo), which literally means “old” in English, but in fact it has other meanings besides “old” such as always, respected (senior), outdated and tough.

In Chinese learning, 老 (lǎo) is translated into "senior" particularly when depicting aged people as a way to show respect. The Chinese call someone “old” to show respect. Chinese people tend to add 老(lǎo) after an aged person’s family name to address him or her respectfully, for example, Ji Xianlin, was called by many as 季老(jìlǎo). However, this kind of usage should only happen in daily Chinese conversations.

In another example, the phrase “老爸”, “老” has an exceptional meaning, which is to show the close affiliation to the father in a common and vulgar way. So “老爸” approximately means “daddy”, instead of meaning old daddy.

It’s been proven that finding Chinese tuition is one of the most effective ways to really learn Chinese well, because the Chinese learners not only can take in lots of Chinese knowledge, but have great chances to practice speaking during the Chinese tuition.

Tips for mastering Chinese language

Chinese study in classroom is actually not as difficult as we thought. What really trouble the foreigners who learn Chinese mandarin is how to put what they have learned in class to practical use.

Learning spoken Chinese is different from learning Chinese characters which involves a lot of writhing, so one should practice speaking a lot and really imagine he or she is in a real situation. To master Chinese mandarin, one must try to start a conversation which helps him or her to practice oral Chinese. To start a conversation properly, it requires considerable knowledge in conversational principles.

If you don’t have time to come to a Chinese-speaking place or if you are elsewhere in other countries, I mean not in China, you can do it by watching Chinese movies and dramas or find an immersion program of an online Chinese learning school, in which various conversation principles are involved. You can also learn mandarin online, by communicating with native Chinese. In these ways, you can gain considerable knowledge of appropriate means of expression and after some time you will find yourself much more comfortable while speaking to a local Chinese people in a real Chinese situation.

Whether you learn Chinese at Chinese schools or learn Chinese online, it is crucial to grasp some patterns of conversation so that you are able to convey their meanings on different occasions. As long as you can devote yourself into Chinese study and find the right way to learn it, the road can never be long.

The Chinese is Coming

The Chinese is coming! I do not mean the Chinese people are coming, but the Chinese language is coming! If so, are you ready for the Chinese language learning?

Why are the Chinese studies becoming so popular? There are some reasons. First, Chinese has long history full of legends. Second, Chinese is spoken by the largest population in the world. Third, China has raised its international influence, furthermore the rapid economic development dramatically. Fourth, the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games has provided a good chance to show the Chinese culture to the world, and thus attracted more foreigners to study Chinese.

As a Chinese tutor, I'm very pride myself on the popularity of Chinese language. The fact that more and more foreigners study Chinese reflects China’s economic development in a sense. Take America as an example, from kindergartens to a high school, there is a rapid rise of interest among American pupils to study Chinese language. On the other hand, over two hundred Confucius institutes have been set up in 69 countries; from TV we can see many foreigners take Chinese learn online. The number of foreign students who are attracted by the mysterious and charming language and come to china learning Chinese also increases steadily every year.

While Chinese learn online is a fever among foreigners, many Chinese learners tend to ignore the importance of their mother tongue, grammatical mistakes constantly occur in their essays, not to mention coarse wording and improper style. That’s why we should attach equal importance to our mother tongue when we study Chinese.

Taking part in Contest to learn Chinese

Learning mandarin is no doubt the first choice when people consider picking up a language to learn. The reason is various. There are many ways to learn mandarin: some tend to seek Chinese tuition while others take part in Chinese contest. Many students who are learning mandarin take part in such contest as Chinese speaking contest, Chinese debating contest, etc. That’s why a lot of Chinese language completions were held in many countries, such as Singapore, America, and Australia.

Those who learn mandarin Singapore may be excited these days. In the afternoon of 17 senior group of final, 8 contestants have not satisfied through the speech show Chinese, have the talent show, not only the authentic Chinese name, the talent show is tunnel: blow to pull her, Chinese kung fu, tongue twisters, rap, Chinese "the mouth kung fu" native to China than young people was opened.

Get the "Chinese bridge" senior group of champions Si MaXian also say, Chinese in Singapore was "fire", he has been learning Chinese for less than 1 years, but learning mandarin helped him understand Chinese culture, so more study is fast." He said, learning Chinese, let him know that his past to know China better "superficial", now more and more like Chinese, also more and more like Chinese culture.

Chinese consulate general education counselor Cen Jianjun attended the game, he cannot help but praised the players "high level", he also encouraged beginners to learn pinyin and to take part in Chinese language contest like this one "one country language learning is the best way to learn about the country that China and Singapore Cultural exchange between the countries will continue to put forward the friendship between the two countries.

Are you also one of those who learn mandarin Singapore? Why not join us in the contest and show your Chinese off?

Benefits of Learning Chinese Online

Are you still learning Chinese at school? You are out! Instead of wasting time on the way to local schools, you can take Chinese lesson online.

In a traditional class, one teacher attends to as many as eight students at one time. This number can make learning difficult, especially when trying to understand accents or difficult words. When you learn Chinese through a Chinese course like the one offered by iChineseLearning, you can to be the only student to learn mandarin online with a native Chinese teacher.

Learning Chinese online can make things easy.

First of all, you can work at your own pace and log on to your course when you have the time. If you need to quit before the lesson is completed, you can always log on later to complete the Chinese lessons.

Second, with some online Chinese courses, you pay for lifetime access to the entire course. So, anytime you need to refresh your memory, you can log on and practice again.

iChineseLearning offers professional online Chinese courses and focuses on improving your ability in four aspects: speaking, listening, reading, and writing. You will have live, one-on-one test preparation based on your actual level and needs. The teachers will select appropriate Chinese language related materials based on your specific needs and level. 

Advice for Learning Chinese Online

Many people choose to learn Chinese because Chinese is one of the most widely spoken languages in the world aside from English. And also many students find it’s hard to find a native Chinese tutor, so they choose to learn Chinese online. Today, I will give you some advice.

1.      The first, also the most effective way to learn Chinese online is to get a tutor: If you went the self-study route, then tutor who can help you learn Chinese online is a must. There is a source--Skype, there will most likely be a charge unless you bargain to teach English, to learn Mandarin online with a native tutor will make you Chinese learning much easier.

2.      Second, one cannot become proficient in any language without taking the time to learn it. Use flash cards, audio, tutors and so on. Learning some basic Chinese phrases online is quite important. Exposure to these phrases, even if you've only learned vocabulary, will help you understand sentence structure. Websites such as ichineselearning.com have lists of basic and common Chinese phrases.

3.  Third, choose a great program. There are a multitude of online programs ranging in price from free to $500. You have to decide which program is best. Of the many online resources, hskcourse.com is maintained by a team of professional Chinese teachers with years of experience in teaching Chinese as a foreign Language. 

This site uses a progressive approach to help you learn hsk grammar, with each session built on the previous one. Every grammar point is introduced with easy-to-understand explanations and typical examples. 

If you are a serious learner who wants to learn HSK grammar the easy way and to speak Chinese efficiently, this for you!