MANDARIN CHINESE

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Course Name: Chinese 1
Course Code: 0711300
Honors Course Code:
AP Course Code:
Description:

Come and join various native speakers of Mandarin Chinese as they give you a lively introduction to the language and its rich culture. Join them in their everyday environment as they take you through different daily scenarios and give you the necessary skills to read, write and speak Chinese.

In this course you will learn the basic Chinese language. After one semester, you will be able to engage in conversation in Chinese including greeting people, introducing yourself to others, and exchanging basic information with others. You will be able to count from 1 to 1000, and make simple sentences in both spoken and written Chinese. You will also learn 160 "magical" Chinese characters, and use them on a variety of topics. As you walk through the units with us step by step, you will get to know not only the language itself, but also the culture where the language takes place and keeps developing.

At the very beginning, we will start by introducing you to a general knowledge of Pinyin, Mandarin Chinese, Chinese dialects, and Chinese characters.

Estimated Completion Time: 2 segments/32-36 weeks

Major topics and Concepts: Segment 1:

Vocabulary

• Greetings
• Nationalities
• Numbers 1-1000
• Family Vocabulary
• Introductions (names, age, address)
• Roads and Streets
• Pets
• Talking about Friends
• Telling Time
• Calendar (Days of the week, months, year)
• Seasons
• Holidays and Celebrations

Culture

• Major Cities in China
• Chinese Names
• Chinese Families
• Chinese Zodiac
• Chinese Festivals

Grammar

• Chinese Characters
• Pinyin
• Basic Sentence Structure
• Forming negations
• Verbs: jiào, y?u, hái, xing
• Prepositions

Major Topics and Concepts:

Segment 2

Vocabulary

• Food and drinks
• Table settings
• Colors
• Clothes
• Hobbies, games, and sports
• Directions
• Making appointments
• Ordinal Numbers
• Another way to state the days of the week
• Art
• Movies
• Music Instruments
• Business
• Asking and describing prices and brands
• Currencies
• Electric Appliances

Culture

• Chinese Cuisine
• 2008 Beijing Olympic Games
• Traditional Chinese Art
• Chinese Movies, actors and colors
• Chinese Companies and Products
• Shopping in China

Grammar

• Describing people and things (adjectives)
• How to state likes and dislikes
• Verbs: able to, can, háishi (had better), guò (action happened)
• Forming Questions
• Measure words
• Expressions: hé…yiq?(together with), néngbùnéng (could you?), zuì x?hu?n( like…the most)
• Adverbs
• Possessives or properties (de)

Course Assessment and Participation Requirements:

Besides engaging students in challenging curriculum, VLACS guides students to reflect on their learning and to evaluate their progress through a variety of assessments. Assessments can be in the form of self-checks and practice problems, worksheets, assignments, oral assessments, pre-tests and practice tests, quizzes, discussions, hands-on activities, and module and semester exams. Instructors evaluate progress and provide interventions through the variety of assessments built into a course, as well as through contact with the student in other venues.