1. Introduction 3 Learning Chinese: Learning Mandarin Chinese, Three Content Areas 1. Sounds: Mandarin, Pinyin 2. Shapes: Written Characters, Hanzi 3. Meanings: Historical/Cultural background, people’s life, daily activities

2. Learning Objective: 1.I can explain what phonogram and logogram are. 2.I can name the 3 parts of pinyin. 3.I can explain what Hanzi and pictographs are.

3. English, Spanish, and French are languages based on alphabet letters -- phonogram. The letters represent basic sounds of the spoken language. You can sound out the words by looking at them. Chinese language is not an alphabet-based language. It is a system of logograms in which each character represents a word, sound, and small unit of meaning. You can’t sound out the characters until you study and memorize the sounds. Phonogram: Each written word represents a speech sound Logogram: Each written characters represents a sound and a small meaning unit

4. Three Content Areas 1. Pinyin (Mandarin, Sounds ) 2. Hanzi (Written Characters, Shapes ） 3. Historical/Cultural background, people’s live and daily activities (Meanings)

5. 1. Pinyin (Mandarin, Sounds ) Sound out! Listen! (1). Pinyin is a phonetic system for transcribing the Mandarin pronunciations of Chinese characters into the alphabet. (2). It was adopted by China’s government in 1958 and became the official Romanization system in 2009. (3). You will see pinyin in Chinese textbooks, on road signs, maps, and other public notices. T HREE PARTS OF PINYIN : I NITIALS (23), F INALS (35), AND TONES (4).

6. Three parts of Pinyin : Initals, Finals, Tones 4 tones

7. 2. Hanzi (Written Characters, Shapes ） (1). Chinese characters, Hanzi ( 漢字 ), are one of the earliest forms of written language in the world, dating back approximately five thousand years. (2). Chinese characters evolved over thousands of years. (3). Basic unit (radical) of Chinese characters are often pictographs. Pictograph: a pictorial symbol for a word The written symbol for dragon in different stages of evolution. lóng

8. Examples of Pictographs 象 xiàng 形 xíng 字 zì 龜龟 guī, turtle 鳥鸟 niǎo, bird 人 rén, person, people

9. 3. Historical/Cultural background of the language (Meanings) (1). Chinese language and written characters reflect Chinese culture and people’s life through out the history. (2). By studying Chinese history and culture, you will enhance your understanding of the meaning of the written characters. The character 好 shows a woman 女 holding a baby 子. In ancient Chinese times, people considered a woman caring for a child wonderful and good.

10. character pinyin meaning pictograph

11. Practice 1 Short answer questions 1. Define phonogram, give one example of a phonogram 20% 2. Define logogram, give one example of a logogram 20% 3. Name the three parts of pinyin 20% 4. What is Hanzi? 20% 5. What is a pictograph? 20%