Hacking Chinese

A better way of learning Mandarin

Articles tagged with ‘Chinese characters’ Page 4

  1. How to improve your Chinese handwriting

    Learning to write Chinese by hand is a complex task. This article gives an overview of what it means to write by hand, answering questions like: “Do I need to learn to write by hand?”, “What skills does handwriting in Chinese require?” and” How do I improve my handwriting?”

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  2. Is it necessary to learn the stroke order of Chinese characters?

    Stroke order can feel difficult and pointless for beginners, but if you want to be able to write Chinese characters, it’s important to get it right from the start. Instead of taking my word for it, let me explain why stroke order matters!

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  3. Chinese character challenge, October 10th to 31st

    Let’s learn characters together! If you need to expand your knowledge of characters, fight you ever-increasing review queue or just learn more of them, this challenge is for you. Enrol, set a goal and learn as much as you can before the end of the month!

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  4. Learning to read handwritten Chinese

    Everybody struggles with writing Chinese characters by hand, even if handwriting can often be avoided in a modern, digital society. But what about reading other people’s handwriting?

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  5. How to talk about Chinese characters in Chinese

    As a learner of Chinese, it’s useful to be able to talk about Chinese characters in Chinese. The right way is not to learn the names of the strokes, but learn how native speakers talk about characters.

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  6. Chinese characters that share the same components but are still different

    Some Chinese characters consist of the same components in different places, creating completely different characters. This article discusses this phenomenon and its implications for language learners.

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  7. Learn Chinese character meaning and pronunciation together

    Phonetic components in Chinese characters

    A large majority of all Chinese characters look the way they do because of how they are pronounced. You can use this to your benefit if you learn Chinese character meaning and pronunciation together.

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  8. How to verify that you use the right Chinese font

    For second language learners, using the wrong font can make learning characters very confusing. In this article, I will help you verify that you have the right fonts installed and discuss what happens if you don’t. This is a follow-up to an earlier article about Chinese fonts for students.

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  9. The real challenge with learning Chinese characters

    The real challenge when learning Chinese characters is not to commit a large number of them to memory, it’s to relate them to each other, including how they are used, how they are different and how they are similar. Creating such an interconnected web is a lifelong project.

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  10. Learning Chinese characters through pictures

    This article is about using pictures to learn Chinese characters. In order to learn characters efficiently, it’s important to understand how they work and what the building blocks are so that these can be used in other characters. Any pictures you use to remember should be based on this. Avoid using pictures that obscure the real meaning.

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