Great lesson! Tones are really a challenge for me, and it's super useful for me to hear the how the 4 tones totally change the meaning of a word. Weaving the 4 tones of zhu into a cohesive story really brought home the importance in a super fun way :)
The 2nd and 4th tones are often hard for me to distinguish and the 2nd is really hard for me to produce. I'm starting to think of the tone of a word almost as an additional letter. I don't know why, but way too often I seem to think just knowing the pinyin pronunciation in whatever tone happens to roll off my mouth at that moment is "obviously" good enough.... almost as if I think it would not matter if I said B-at, P-at, M-at, or Th-at. But those are all totally different words, just like the 4 tones of zhu are all totally different words. So I really liked hearing the different tones of a word all used together in one lesson. It's really good listening practice! And even better news, I followed this up with the recent lesson on the 4 tones of ma as you suggested! Thanks Grace! ;)
Posted on: 4 Tones of Zhu
September 11, 2018 at 5:52 PMGreat lesson! Tones are really a challenge for me, and it's super useful for me to hear the how the 4 tones totally change the meaning of a word. Weaving the 4 tones of zhu into a cohesive story really brought home the importance in a super fun way :)
The 2nd and 4th tones are often hard for me to distinguish and the 2nd is really hard for me to produce. I'm starting to think of the tone of a word almost as an additional letter. I don't know why, but way too often I seem to think just knowing the pinyin pronunciation in whatever tone happens to roll off my mouth at that moment is "obviously" good enough.... almost as if I think it would not matter if I said B-at, P-at, M-at, or Th-at. But those are all totally different words, just like the 4 tones of zhu are all totally different words. So I really liked hearing the different tones of a word all used together in one lesson. It's really good listening practice! And even better news, I followed this up with the recent lesson on the 4 tones of ma as you suggested! Thanks Grace! ;)