Is it better to learn Chinese with pinyin or characters?

Is it better to learn Chinese with pinyin or characters?

When kids in China start their Mandarin course they learn Pinyin before they write a single character. Although learning Pinyin is not the only way of handling the pronunciation, it is the most efficient one. And it seems impossible for a new learner to remember the pronunciation of each character.

How many Chinese characters do you need to know to be fluent?

With the most common 5000 characters you can recognize 99.9 percent of modern Chinese. With the most common 6500 characters you can recognize 99.99 percent of modern Chinese. As a result, 3500 characters is considered to be the standard for literacy.

What is the easiest way to recognize Chinese characters?

Break Down the Characters Character radicals often indicate the meaning of the character and sometimes the way it’s pronounced. Recognizing radicals will help you more easily find the Chinese character translation, as many Chinese dictionaries list characters based on their radicals.

How many characters does a highly educated Chinese person know?

8,000 characters
An educated Chinese person will know about 8,000 characters, but you will only need about 2-3,000 to be able to read a newspaper. In our interactive character game you can learn how to write 60 commonly used characters.

Can we just learn pinyin and not Chinese character?

Can I just learn pinyin instead and get by? The answer is NO. You can’t read or write Chinese without characters. The Chinese language is always written in Chinese characters, as opposed to pinyin.

Should I learn to read or speak Chinese first?

It is best to learn how to speak first. In fact some people can speak but cannot read or write. Over time, it is good to learn to speak and write because, you can learn so much faster, the ability to read and write will mean you actually know the language well.

Can you learn to read Chinese without speaking?

Also, one technically doesn’t even need to learn pinyin to speak Chinese. For sure Chinese people have been speaking Chinese before pinyin was developed in the 1950s! Alas, to learn to read or write in Chinese, you have no choice but to learn Chinese characters.

What is the hardest Chinese character?

character biáng
The character biáng requires 62 total strokes to write and contains a 馬 horse, 月 moon,刂 knife and 心 heart plus other radicals.