Since probably more than just me wonders over the characters I thought that I as well could post my own structure of the words in the lessons. I take one word per post since otherwise the post would be too long.

New word                                

衣服   yīfu clothing               

Character: 衣

Pinyin: yī

Meaning: clothes, clothing; cover, skin

HSK level: 1 (basic)

Frequency: 590

Strokes: 6   

Stroke animation: (the strokes are drawn the direction the picture is tipping)

Etymology: The picture shows on the top the outer garments with sleeves and the bottom the flowing robes.

You have probably seems the Chinese cloths with the big hanging sleeves:

Stroke order animation: http://www.yellowbridge.com/chinese/character-stroke-order.php?searchChinese=1&zi=%E8%A1%A3

 Is a radical. Combined with other characters parts it denotes something with clothes.

袈 jiā Buddhist monks robe          

Notes, when the radical is on the left in a character it changes shape to this: 衤

衬 chèn underwear; inner garments

Gives pronunciation to other characters, such as依yī rely on, consent, obey a wish (here it is the person that is the radical)

Example words:

Example words:

洗衣机 xǐ yī jī washer / washing machine 
内衣 nèi yī undergarment / underwear 
睡衣 shuì yī night clothes / pajamas 
衣装 yī zhuāng garment 
雨衣 yǔ yī raincoat 
衬衣 chèn yī shirt 
救生衣 jiù shēng yī life jacket / life vest 
洗衣店 xǐ yī diàn laundry-shop 
戎衣 róng yī military uniform 

衣厨 yī chú wardrobe

衣架 yī jià clothes-hanger clothes-rack  

Character: 服  

Pinyin: fú

Meaning: clothes; wear, dress

HSL level: 1 (basic)

Frequency: 357

Strokes: 8   

Stroke animation: (the strokes are drawn the direction the picture is tipping)

I like the explanation for this character. It is so logical once you see it.

Character: 你

Pinyin: nǐ

Meaning: You

HSK level: 1 (basic)

Frequency: 38

Strokes: 7   

Radical part: 人 亻

Alternative shapes of radical: 人 亻

Radical meaning: man; people; mankind; someone

Stroke animation: (the strokes are drawn the direction the picture is tipping)

Stroke order: http://www.yellowbridge.com/chinese/character-stroke-order.php?searchChinese=1&zi=%E4%BC%B1

Etymology: In the original form the right part where an pictograph of a balace loaded with equaly load on both sides. This is now simplified but we can still se the balancer and the load hanging down on each side. By adding the person radical we get something that balances and is about persons = you. An equal person( equal weight) to you self is another person. 

Character: 很 

Pinyin: hěn

Meaning: very, quite, much

HSK level: 1 (basic)

Frequency: 175

Strokes: 9  

Radical part:  彳(step )

Etymology: The phonetic part (the right part) where originally written as

They eye means defiant and the lower part means to turn around. = stubborn, to refuse to look away. Today this is simplified to 艮 The left part (彳)that is the radical and means step . Together they mean very indicating the amont of steps needed to deal with such stuborness.

Stroke order: http://www.yellowbridge.com/chinese/character-stroke-order.php?searchChinese=1&zi=%E5%BE%88

Hi..

I have now just started to write Hanzi on a daily basis. I am using the Hanzi Helper program made by a poddie, his name starts with "col" but I can't remember the other 3 letetrs in his username right now. Anyway, the point of this post is to ask a really basic question: How can I tell which direction the stroke shoulod be written.

I can use the Animated GIF website to show me the stroke order but I am wanting to be sure I am also making the strokes in the correct direction as well, as I am sure this will aid me later on. When I look at a character that is using a decently rendered font, I can see there is a thin end and a fat end of each stroke.

I am assuming that the fat end is the end of the stroke and the thin end is the start of the stroke, only because if I was using a brush, I would end up with a fat end at the end of a stroke; or if I was doing one of those tiny strokes, I would end up with a tapered stroke with the tip of the brush pointing towards the thin end of the stroke.

Just really wanted to confirm that I had this correct.

I'm trying to do 10 to 14 characters a day, writing them out 10 times each. Not using any context at this point because I am just really getting used to writing. Next month a new book will be released called "Remembering The Hanzi Book 1", so when I get that I will take more of a structured approach to Hanzi learning.

Hello everyone,

  I had a relatively good learning week! My technology problems seem to be solved right now, and I am back into a good grove. I have flashcards made for about 520 words and word combinations. Out of this, I have proficiency on about 339. I have acquisition on an additional 90 terms. The verbal part is going slower than the written part, but I am doing better on both areas. The past week, I had done the taxi conversation series and a couple of other lessons. I like the idea of an audio phrasebook, and I also like when the lessons are grouped together like that.

  As I have stated in an earlier post, I have found a way to print flashcards. This has the benefits of being faster than writing, and being more accurate. For example, it took between 50 minutes and an hour and 15 minutes to do 15 flashcards using the handwriting method. Last night, I printed off 100 flashcards in about 3 and a half hours. What I do is I use ms paint, do print screen and set up a paper with 5 terms as if I were going to print them on a sheet of 8.5 X 11 paper. What I actually do is use packing tape and tape my flashcards to the paper, and feed the paper through the printer. It uses very little ink, and it never jams up. I use the same flashcards that I was using for the handwriting method, so there is no conflict there.

  My greatest gains are in reading. I am at a point where I can read much of the newbie expansions. I would say that half the time (50%), I get the essential meaning of the sentence right. another 25%, I might understand all the terms, but my lack of knowledge of how the terms are actually used prevents me from understanding correctly what is being said. For the remaining 25%, I generally will not understand a word or two in the sentence, or flat out get the sentence wrong. Elementary level expansions are more difficult for me. I would say that 15% of the time, I am able to get the essential meaning of the sentence right. another 15% or so, I might understand all the terms, but my lack of knowledge of how the terms are actually used prevents me from understanding correctly what is being said. For the remaining 70%, I generally will not understand a word or two in the sentence, or flat out get the sentence wrong.

  Much of my study time is spent going through the lessons trying to find terms and words that I don't know. I don't bother going through the newbie lessons doing this anymore because I might only find one or two unknown words. I currently do well doing elementary lessons, but I figure it is just a matter of time before I feel like I am panning for gold in my bathtub. I notice that in the community page, people build vocabulary lists. I also notice that I can set to share my vocabulary lists. Is there a way to find lists that others are sharing so that I can get words from them? I am guessing that there is such a way, but I havent figured it out yet.

  Guess that is it for right now, below (hopefully) you will find two photos that will show my progress that I have had since joining Chinapod. In the first photo, I have a small stack. It was taken about a week or so after I started the chinese lessons. The Bottom photo was taken on the 3rd of this month. I guess I will be doing these updates on Thursday/Friday instead of Sunday as I am scheduled to work on the weekends for the time being.

I want to start reading to get used to Chinese characters and grammar, but I don't know where to go! So, I ask, newbies- what do you read? Children's books? Newspapers? Blogs? Posts on Chinesepod?

spam4

If you're a new subscriber, and wondering where to start in learning Mandarin, I have some suggetions.  These suggestions are tailored to a person ACTUALLY HEADING TO CHINA FOR A YEAR.  If you a hobbyist and merely interested in a place to begin to hone ideas on your own starting point, this might also be a good post to read.

BACKGROUND

My approach has been is to treat learning mandarin as a 3 credit course at a university.  Once you're here in China, you'll realize how unprepared you are, and wish you'd PRIORITIZED LEARNING CHINESE higher among your many daily tasks, instead of looking/feeling like a babe lost in the woods all the time once you're here.
 
As part of the self study thing, i'm thinking that ideally, I would love to be "fluent" in mandarin by the time my CPOD subscription runs out in Sept 30,2010.  "Fluent" is defined as having working knowledge of around 5000 words/phrases.  5000 words/phrases was arrived at somewhat arbitrarily, and is certainly arguable why 5000 words/phrases isn't better that 6000, 7000 or even 10,000 words/phrases,  but it's a decent metric to start for the following reasons:
 
-5000 words is about 100 words a week for a year.  I've thought 100 words/week  was a lot, and in practice, i'm running at maybe the 20-30 words/phrases per week on average (this is what happens when you have a full time job with 2 pre-schoolers around).
- I'm told that you need knowledge of about 2000 characters in order to read a Chinese newspaper and get most of the gist of the articles (certainly more characters is better, but this might be a reasonable mimimum).  i'm hoping that 5000 words gets me to that level.
 
I have an engineering background, and one of the things you're taught is to break up big tasks into smaller ones.  "BE FLUENT IN MANDARIN" is a big task.  Learn 100 words a week is a smaller task. Learn 20 words a week sounds almost easy (until you try it). 

YOU'RE ON THE GROUND.....

.... At Beijing Capital International Airport (or Shanghai Pudong, or Shenzhen BaoAn or whatever entry point).  After having received your passport back from the consulate/embassy, bought your tickets, got your guide book, maybe even bought some renminbi. You board the airplane, giddy with excitement and anticipation. 10-14 hours later, you land, go through customs, and then you see the signs for drivers picking up paying tourists, they're screaming, yelling, people coming up to you saying in bad english, "you need taxi?" "where you go?", the written text is in English and Mandarin, and then you
realize, what the %$@#*&% do I do now?

CURRICULUM

This is the part where I continually tweak, but here goes

download taxi lessons. i'll put the links for the best ones shortly.

LISTEN to the lessons FIRST.  (I'm using caps to get your attention). Do not bother with the pdfs at this point.  download to your iPod/Zune (i dare to be different).  At this point, you'll need to anchor your intuition about Mandarin through listening to it.  Mandarin, as you already suspect and know, is really different from English (i'm a native English speaker, and an American one at that, so forgive my biases/metaphors/etc...). LISTENING TO THE PODCASTS FIRST starts you on the path toward learning the mandarin pronunciation quickly. 

More posts to add. Will do shortly

Hi all, i've been learning mandarin for a few weeks now and really getting into it. If there are any other people at at the same stage that want to swap resources, ideas, pace ourselves in the study, general chit chat on progress then feel free to get in touch. Cheers, gavin

just curious cpod, if you guys are making a distinction between 1)people who just in the past couple of days/weeks subscribed to cpod

2) people that are at the newbie level, regardless of how long they subscribed

3) people that are new subscribers, but come to cpod as an intermediate learner.

Hello All!

Well I've decided to learn a new skill, and Chinese is it! I spent a year teaching English in China a few years back, but I'd quite like to have conversational ability that extends further than ting bu dong.

I have to say I'm pretty impressed with ChinesePod so far. I reckon this is a great way to keep interest and motivation levels high.

Is anyone in the NW/Cheshire area? If so, get in touch, it'd be great to hear from you. Even more so if you're a Newbie like me!

Cheers,

Helena