How to Learn Chinese

A lot of people confronted with the task of how to learn Chinese go into a absolute panic. The symbols look so strange to English speakers, and the words sound nothing like your home tongue. But there are quicker ways to learning Chinese that will have even the most panic-stricken student speaking this unique language in no time.

You can overcome the first problem - those strange-looking but beautiful symbols by separating the act of speaking Chinese from the act of reading it. Admittedly Mandarin doesn't use the Western world's normal alphabet, or specifically, any alphabet at all. Those symbols are called characters, and there are a lot of them. But fortunately, many Foreign speakers learn to speak basic Chinese without learning Chinese characters, because Chinese can be written in a Roman alphabet called Pinyin. This greatly helps foreigners struggling with how to learn Chinese!

The second stumbling block - the sound of Mandarin words themselves can be explained by realizing that Chinese is very dependent on pitch and tone. For example, the sound "ma" said in a high-pitched tone could mean "mother" in a different tone, it could mean "horse." Thus, it's important that students concerned with how to learn Chinese approach this mysterious language in a way that allows them to hear the words and phrases pronounced. Rocket Chinese is a excellent program for this reason; it will help you learn the Mandarin language in the quickest and most effective way and you could learn to speak basic Mandarin within 8-weeks.

Concluding how to study Chinese, you must know which type of Chinese you need to study. There are quite a few variations of the Chinese language; whether these are dialects of a single language, or related but separate languages like Japanese and English, for instance, is difficult to say. Two of the most commonly used variants of Chinese are Mandarin , spoken by 1.075 billion people, and Cantonese (more commonly spoken in Hong Kong). But each language variant is completely unique from the others, and a Cantonese speaker cannot be understood by a someone who speaks only Mandarin.

In addition to practicing with a good audio language learning program such as Rocket Chinese, it helps a lot to befriend a native speaker to practice with. This is true when learning any foreign language, but it's a very important factor in how to learn Mandarin. Have you ever heard someone say an unfamiliar name on the mobile phone, and failed to understand what they were saying? This is because you can't see the movements of their mouth, lips, and tongue as they produce the sounds. With so many Chinese words dependent upon tone and the slightest variation of pronunciation, it helps so much to have a Chinese friend to practice with.

You say you don't know any Chinese people? I'll bet you do! Is there a Chinese supermarket nearby? If their workers speak the variant of Chinese you want to master, make them your Chinese speaking friends, because they'll absolutely will help you on how to learn Chinese! Is there a Civic Association in your area? In all likelihood, there will be Chinese people there. Look on the Internet for forums and meeting places featuring Chinese language and culture. And as a last resort, you can learn a great deal from viewing Chinese films.

My last advice is, practice at least 30 minutes a day! You'll never sound like a native, but before you know it, you'll be able to carry on a smooth, articulate conversation in your new language. And your friends will never believe that only a few weeks ago, you had no idea how to learn Chinese!

Gerrit du Plessis founded the popular language learning site www.learnalanguage.me.
Do YOU want more ways to learn Chinese fast? Visit my Rocket Chinese review page for more information and grab your FREE 6 day Chinese lessons.

How to learn Chinese was originally publish on Synthasite.com