Lesson 1: Learn Chinese tones.
Mandarin Chinese is a tonal language, so learning its four tones and one neutral tone is an important step of your child’s language learning journey.
What are tones? Simply put, tones are distinctive pitches or sounds. In Chinese, the same word could be said in four different tones. Each of these tones, change the meaning of the word. For example, mā (in the first tone) means mother, but mǎ (in the third tone) means horse. The tone of the word, rather than just its pronunciation, conveys its meaning.
You can see the tones visually below.
What do tones sound like? And will your child be able to tell the difference? Remember, tones are distinctive pitches or sounds. So, learning how to hear the difference between the four tones is key. If your child loves to sing or plays an instrument, they are more likely to hear the difference right away. If not, they will pick it up with a little time and practice.
Here’s a breakdown of what the five tones sound like:
First tone
ā: The first tone is a high and level sound. It sounds like ringing a bell or saying, “ring, ring, ring.”
Second tone
á: The second tone is a raising sound. It starts low and ends higher. It sounds like how you would say, “well.”
Third tone
ǎ: The third tone pitches downward and then goes higher. It sounds like when you say, “howdy” or “y’all”.
Fourth tone
à: The fourth tone is a dropping sound. It starts high and ends low. It sounds like how you would say, “stop” or “no”.
Tones are important to know since Chinese is a tonal language. They may seem complicated, but once your child learns them, they know them — it’s like muscle memory. At LingoAce, your child will learn tones through an integrated approach. Instead of teaching tones by themselves, your child will learn throughout each lesson while learning everyday vocabulary.
Lesson 2: Learn the Super Six Verbs for Chinese.
Learning a new language is an exciting new way to express yourself, so the vocabulary your child learns is essential to their success. Can they communicate their ideas, thoughts, and needs in the new language?
Considering this, what words should they learn first? We suggest that beginners should focus on the Super Six Verbs!
Super Six Verbs, a concept by Terry Waltz, are the most commonly used verbs in a language that every beginner should know. Learning these verbs will help your child express the widest range of ideas in Chinese, even with a limited overall vocabulary.
The Super Six Verbs in Chinese are:
Indicates location, is at a place: 在 zài （句子：小鸟在树上）
There is, there are, has: 有yǒu （句子：我有一个冰激凌）
Negates “yǒu”= there isn’t, doesn’t have: 没有méi yǒu
to be, is:是 shì （句子：她是一个公主）
to like:喜欢 xĭhuan （句子：妈妈喜欢紫色）
to go: 去 qù （句子：爸爸去北京出差了）
to want: 想 xiǎng （句子：我想吃烤鸭）
Lesson 3: learn how to create a sentence in Chinese.
Creating sentences is an essential part of learning any language. All languages follow a particular word order and luckily, Chinese sentence order is the same as in English.
Subject-Verb-Object
Subject: The subject refers to the person or thing carrying out an action. Essentially, the star of the sentence.
Ex: John ate an apple.
John is the subject.
Verb: The verb is the action the subject is doing.
Ex: Sarah threw the ball.
threw is the verb.
Object: The object refers to the person or thing that receives the action of the verb.
Ex: Bill painted the wall.
wall is the object.
That’s it! Since Chinese doesn’t conjugate verbs like romance languages or have tenses like English, it’s simple to create a sentence. Essentially, once your child learns a verb, that’s it. To make a sentence, simply combine nouns and verbs in the same order as in English.
Lesson 4: Enroll your child in a LingoAce Chinese class
Enrolling a child in a LingoAce class is one of the best ways to jumpstart their Chinese language journey. Each one-on-one lesson is the product of over 100 hours of curriculum development, teacher training, and quality control. Our classes are tailored to meet your child’s learning needs.
Experience a redefined Chinese learning experience first-hand with a free trial lesson with us today.
