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Pinyin sounds. How to memorize them? | ||
Tags: Chinese Characters | Mandarin | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| Komodo Triglot Newbie Brazil Joined 5189 days ago 10 posts - 13 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, English, Spanish Studies: French, Mandarin | Message 1 of 14 15 March 2010 at 3:42am | IP Logged | |||||
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I've just started learning Hanzi this week, (I've learned 50 so far, 10 a day) but despite facing no difficult to memorize a hanzi's meaning, it's extremely difficult for me to associate the pinyin sound with a hanzi character. Pretty much every time I see a hanzi that I've already memorized I can remember its meaning, but its pinyin sound, no dice. That's extremely frustrating, as I have to spend an ungodly amount of time to finally associate the pinyin sound to a hanzi.
Is this really a inherently problem in learning Hanzi? Or are there some efficient methods to associate pinyin sounds with the hanzi characters? Right now I'm using the good old 'write repeatedly until you learn' approach, it's good to memorize stroke order and the character's meaning, but, at least for me, very inefficient to associate the pinyin sounds to the characters. Can some of you Mandarin students give me some hints on this? Thanks. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| indiana83 Groupie United States ipracticecanto.wordp Joined 5310 days ago 92 posts - 121 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Cantonese, Italian | Message 2 of 14 15 March 2010 at 5:57am | IP Logged | |||||
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What does the phrase "pinyin sound" mean to you? Pinyin are not sounds, they are phonetic romanization. Meaning, each syllable has exactly one pronuncation.
Are you having trouble remembering how to pronounce the character? If that's the case, then just write down the pinyin next to the character and memorize them together. Or trouble remembering how to pronounce a specific pinyin syllable? If that's the case, then spend a little more time listening to how each syllable is pronounced. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Komodo Triglot Newbie Brazil Joined 5189 days ago 10 posts - 13 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, English, Spanish Studies: French, Mandarin | Message 3 of 14 15 March 2010 at 6:36am | IP Logged | |||||
Sorry if I wasn't clear (and I really wasn't, I should have worded it better). But that's my problem:
Yes, despite having memorized a character's meaning and its stroke order, remembering how to pronounce it is very difficult and requires an awful amount of time.
Actually I'm doing exactly that, but I'm feeling it's not working, maybe it'll get easier in the future? Honestly, I'm just surprised that this has turned into a problem. I was somewhat expecting to have some difficult memorizing the characters, but curiously, it's just how to memorize their pronunciation that's problematic, in fact, I think I could learn much more than 10 hanzi a day if I could memorize their pronunciation as good as I memorize their meanings and stroke order. Edited by Komodo on 15 March 2010 at 6:37am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Pyx Diglot Senior Member China Joined 5555 days ago 670 posts - 892 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: Mandarin | Message 4 of 14 15 March 2010 at 6:59am | IP Logged | |||||
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Just keep going. After a couple hundred characters it'll get easier. You'll learn to recognize the phonetic parts of characters, and that'll give you hints as to their pronunciation. But don't expect any real inherent logic, and don't expect that it'll get much easier before you get to 1000 characters or so. There's a reason Chinese has that reputation, you know? :)
BTW, make sure to use a SRS system or something like that, or else you'll forget the characters nearly just as quick as you're learning them. Of course, some people do well without them (and have been doing so for millenia), but I, and many others, find that they help tremendously. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| indiana83 Groupie United States ipracticecanto.wordp Joined 5310 days ago 92 posts - 121 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Cantonese, Italian | Message 5 of 14 15 March 2010 at 3:32pm | IP Logged | |||||
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A lot of people will say it's a waste of time to study pinyin specifically. But if you are looking write at the pinyin and unsure how it is pronounced, then maybe you should find a website where each one is pronounced, and go through them a few times.
That's what I did. I also agree that putting all your flashcards into a computer program such as SRS will help, by delegating the task of when to remember when to review the cards again to the program. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Pyx Diglot Senior Member China Joined 5555 days ago 670 posts - 892 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: Mandarin | Message 6 of 14 15 March 2010 at 3:40pm | IP Logged | |||||
By all means, do that. I'm getting bitten in the ass right now, by having mispronounced a couple of sounds all the time (I'm looking at you, /sh/, /zh/, /ch/). Have a look at sinosplice.com. It gives some very good pointers as to which sounds are different than what you'd expect. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| nescafe Senior Member Japan Joined 5229 days ago 137 posts - 227 votes | Message 7 of 14 15 March 2010 at 9:20pm | IP Logged | |||||
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[1] Google Pinyin will be helpful. It is a tool to input Hanzi on computer. Input a pinyin with GP, and you get the Hanzi's corresponding to the pinyin. Using Google Pinyin is the best way for Mandarin begginers to leran how to read Hanzi.
Google Pinyin is available for free at http://www.google.com/ime/pinyin/ [2] The shape of a Hanzi, its meaning and sound is closely relating. For example, here four hanzi's pronounced as "Qing" 请 (please)，清 (pure, purity)，情 (feeling, emotion or love)，青(blue)， You know all the hanzi have 青 as its part, and these hanzi seem somewhat relating in their meanings. To learn a new hanzi will become easier as you make progress in Mandarin. Edited by nescafe on 15 March 2010 at 9:31pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
 Hencke Tetraglot Moderator Spain Joined 6714 days ago 2340 posts - 2444 votes Speaks: Swedish*, Finnish, EnglishC2, Spanish Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 8 of 14 15 March 2010 at 10:23pm | IP Logged | |||||
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You don't say how far along you are with actually pronouncing and speaking Mandarin but I am guessing you are just beginning.
I'd recommend you to work on your pronunciation and speaking skills. After having to struggle to produce those sounds, and make them sound right, they tend to come alive in a different way and start feeling like old friends after a while, which helps memorization. Another thing I have found can be helpful is to mentally associate different hanzi that have the same pronunciation, especially when they are wildly different in shape and meaning. Sometimes it also works for same sounds but different tone. And, much as I'd hate to be the one to add to your difficulties, and I guess this is clear to you anyway, but don't forget that the tone is part of the pronunciation too. If you can remember the character and the sounds, but miss on the tone, you are close, but you haven't quite got that character down yet. I can also endorse and recommend John Pasden's site to set you straight on any misunderstandings on exactly how the different sounds should be produced. There are lots of misconceptions and bad advice out there, and his article cuts through all the rubbish quite convincingly. Edited by Hencke on 15 March 2010 at 10:33pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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