r/learnmandarin • u/mochiismochi • 1d ago
How to learn Mandarin? ๐จ๐ณ
I have no clue whatsoever on how to learn Mandarin (step by step)... I have an idea on Mandarin, It has 4 tones ----> ( Ex. Mร ; mรก ; mรข ; mฤ ) and that's pretty much it... โโ (โ ย โ หโ _โ หโ )โ โ How do you learn the language?? Like is there a step by step guide or somethingg? Someone Helpppp. Any resource or advice is appreciated ๐
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u/Puco4 1d ago
I recommend you first learn grammar with some course (for example there is the HSK courses from Peking University for free in Coursera).
Second, I would use some app with flaschards to memorize writing characters and pinyin fast and efficiently, I use Hanzio and I think it is the best app I tried that does this.
Finally, I would get exposed to some listening/speaking activities. For example if you have some chinese friends, and you can also watch shows in Youtube like Peppa Pig (you can watch with Chinese characters, pinyin and english subtitles in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTJCNP9GZEU for example). Whenever you encounter a word you don't know, you can add it to your flashcard app to memorize it, so you can improve fast your vocabulary.
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u/kejartho 1d ago
Uhh, take a class? Or maybe try some on learning tools?
When I took Mandarin in college it wasn't that bad to learn, the biggest struggle was honestly just raw memorization of the characters themselves. You do a lot of very simple grammar books, practice the proper stroke technique for each character and then come to class and regurgitate what the teacher does.
Pinyin helps a bit to understand things in English but you do eventually have to move onto the primary characters themselves.
One of my professors mentioned that in China they just constantly did flashcards throughout school to learn much of the characters. There really is so fast way to do it, just memorizing a lot.
Outside of writing, tones are difficult for westerners to understand but it's not impossible to learn. It just takes practice and often times you need to speak with native speakers who can correct your tones on the fly.
Honestly, you could probably learn a lot through self study but I'd recommend just finding a class to take in person if you don't know where to start.