Have you ever wanted to learn a unique language that you are unfamiliar to or haven’t heard much about? Well now you can show off in front of your friends, or kick off the beginning of learning a new language with these simple tips to help you learn Mandarin Chinese!
Know your best way to learn. Do you learn best by rewriting phrases? Rereading? Saying them out aloud? Hearing them said aloud? If you are not sure, practice differently with new unique ways to help you remember.
Rewrite every phase or word on the page. This will help – as you can always refer to it if you have trouble.
Learn the tones. There are four tones. One type of tone is usually over each Chinese word. Each tone type is drawn over the word ‘ma’ to show the different ways of pronouncing it.
The first tone is a high, flat tone. Your voice stays flat, with no rise or dip in the way it sounds.
The Second tone is a rising tone. Your voice rises when you say this, sort of as if you were asking someone to repeat something by saying “huh?” or “what?”
The third tone is a dipping tone. The way you say the word goes down then up.
The fourth tone is a lowering tone. Just say the whole word as if your voice is becoming more manly, or as if you’re reading a book and have come across something new and interesting and are saying “huh”. Easy enough? If not, don’t fret. It’s definitely recommended to hear the tones demonstrated from a native speaker, since it’s hard to get an idea of what they sound like purely through text.
Say hello. The Chinese say ‘Hello’ as “Ni Hao”. This is pronounced: Nee How. The tones above each are both 3′s. Ni-(nee) means you, literally, in Chinese, and Hao (how) means good. So they are basically asking You good? The Chinese tend to say things more than once, it sounds very westernized if you only say it once.
(Source: bjchinese.bjedu.cn)