Practical Chinese
Lutgarda Briseno
Books I and II consist of 50 lessons where the reader studies a vocabulary of 1,000 words, and basic Chinese phonology and grammar. The lessons tell the story of two foreign students of Chinese, Palanka and Gubo, first in their own country (Book I) and then in China (Book II). They give priority to everyday topics that Gubo and Palanka encounter (e.g. clothing, entertainment, socializing), and also provide background information on Chinese culture, society, and history.[1]
Books III and IV consist of 30 lessons with a vocabulary of about 2,000 words. Each lesson focuses on a wide range of topics such as history, education, economy, medicine, sports, literature and art, newspapers and broadcasting, marriage and family life, scenic spots and historical sites, etc. Books III and IV follow the same format as Books I and II and continue to follow Gubo and Palanka. Starting in Book IV, grammar explanations are no longer provided in English.
Books V and VI consist of 30 lessons with more than 3,000 words and everyday expressions. The foreign students of Chinese, Palanka, and Gubo, are no longer included in Books V and VI. Book V contains original essays and works on a wide range of themes and affairs in China. Each work varies in form, style, and length. Book VI contains excerpts from longer literary works. Both books give a brief introduction on the author, background, and explanatory notes are provided at the end of the text if necessary. English is not used at all. Even the new words are explained in basic Chinese.
The Practical Chinese Reader was the first set of dedicated textbooks on basic Chinese for use by foreign students of Chinese sponsored by the Chinese Ministry of Education, who commissioned three professors at Beijing Languages Institute (now Beijing Language and Culture University) to write it in the 1970s. It was praised by American and German academics in the early 1980s as practical and advanced. It also received a warm domestic welcome for its "meticulously planned" educational content and innovation in "using the communicative principle and strengthening cultural knowledge education", and won the second prize inaugural Beijing Philosophy and Social Sciences Award for Excellence.[2]
Practical Chinese Reader was completely revised in 2002 and was re-published as New Practical Chinese Reader. New teaching material and concepts were added, while older words not in common use were removed. The new series consists of six volumes: The first four target beginners, while the last two are geared for intermediate learners. The New Practical Chinese Reader pays homage to the older edition by introducing a new character, Libo, who is the son of Gubo and Ding Yun from the original edition.
The updated 4th edition series comes with 4 volumes of Textbooks, each with an accompanying Workbook and Character Workbook. The Character Workbooks in particular are super helpful when starting and the set up they have make it easy to learn the stroke order and practice making your characters legible. The Workbooks also complement the Textbooks nicely.
You can continue with this both these series until you complete them, but in general, they are ideal for the beginner who is just starting out. The beginning levels, Volumes 1-2, are what I recommend. Personally, I believe there are better options for the Intermediate and Advanced stages.
After completed the Level 2, Part 2 of the 3rd Edition Integrated Chinese series, I transferred over this Beyond the Basics. It was a big of jump in level, but a challenge that I loved. I found the Integrated Chinese books to be quite repetitive and predictable, so Beyond the Basics was the perfect next textbook.
It has nice, long passages, a huge variety of words, including useful supplementary vocabulary. A balanced range of idioms, and useful exercises integrated at the end each chapter are also super useful in increasing your vocabulary range. Each chapter has a different topic, unlike the Integrated Chinese series which is based on a set of characters and their life in school. At the intermediate level, it is definitely more interesting to speak about social issues and more practical conversations you might actually have in Chinese, if you know what I mean.
Another option you could go for is the A New China textbook, which is the textbook that comes before this next book recommendation. While I have used the next book, I have never used A New China, so I cannot vouch for its quality. Nevertheless, briefly looking at the content, it appears to be a slightly easier textbook compared to the Beyond the Basics.
This is my other textbook love, in addition to Beyond the Basics. This is called an Advanced Reader, but I would actually classify it is being at the High-Intermediate stage. It introduces the learner perfectly to the Advanced stage.
This textbook is split into two parts. The first 12 chapters are in the format of dialogues. Chapters 13 to 32 are real newspaper articles that were published in the past. This is a great way to smoothly switch into the advanced stage of Chinese.
This is a 2-volume set, the first being advertised at the Upper Intermediate level and the second at the Advanced level. To be completely honest, both should be classified as advanced. I remember taking this book around the time of Beyond the Basics and it was too difficult and overwhelming. A challenge is nice, but it needs to be a suitable one when it comes to languages like Mandarin.
If you want to improve your colloquial Chinese and, at the same time, learn more about Chinese culture, then look no further. This book is a set of 2 and provides dialogues according to common daily life scenarios. There is almost no English in these books, which is something to note, in comparison with the others mentioned.
If I had had this list when first starting to learn Chinese, I would have saved so much time and energy searching for the best resources. So, I really hope you find this useful. If you have any questions, let me know in the comments below and share this with all your friends! Invite more people to learn Chinese!
Has anyone used these two textbooks and can tell me what some of the differences are? I've heard good things about them both. I've got about a year to self-study chinese before I move to China and I'm looking for a good textbook to work through. Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Thanks
One thing that you might want to know about book is that there is a common mix-up of Simplified and Traditional characters. For example, many times there would be Traditional characters replacing Simplified characters in the text. (The book has its contents in both Simplified and Traditional.) However, some examples of specific word usages are only in Traditional. This is good in that it will make you more accustomed to Traditional characters, which is useful. But for some, it may not be convenient.
The recordings of this book are generally well-done. The vocabulary list will be read aloud, and then the articles themselves will be read aloud. In the recordings, the article is divided into smaller parts. These parts are read first slowly, then at a normal speed, then at a conversational speed. This is very helpful for getting accustomed to the material. However, I suggest getting a CD copy of the recordings instead of a casette tape.
After each article, there are explanations of new grammar patterns found in the article. There are also some exercises for you to fill out to test your grasp of the material. There is also a useful glossary of the vocabulary material in the back of the book.
The articles are about contraversial topics that make good candiates for real-life discussions. For example, there is an article about animal abuse, and an article about firearm usage. There are also some articles that will teach you a bit about Chinese history and holidays.
Overall, I found that this book really improved my Chinese in all aspects, just as the title suggests. 听说读写! I think that it helped my reading the most, because I would read the articles over many times to get accustomed to the material.
I find it to be very good: it has useful vocabulary in its lessons. The lesson is in simplified characters, with pinyin beneath each line of dialogue, explanations of idiomatic phrases, very clear grammatical information, and character-stroke descriptions.
NPCR - volume 1 doesn't have traditional versions of texts but they do appear in all other volumes starting from volume 2 (except the texts for listening comprehension). Characters are introduced for both systems in all volumes, so is the vocab at the end of the book.
The first 2 volumes give a very good description of characters and sometimes of the components, the workbooks have traces for practising. In vol. no more description but there are still tracing and writing exercises.
Like many books/dictionaries fro learners I noticed - a few hundred most basic characters are explained well but then you can't find everything for each character. Wenlin software gives answer for most of the characters (both trad. and simplified, some rare characters, Japanese, Cantonese, etc.).
Characters are explained and introduced thoroughly, so is the grammar. Very academic and thorough book, IMHO. Suits most learners. Less focus on traditional characters but they are not ignored (can always check the vocab list or the trad. version at the end of the book), though.
However, I did notice that NPCR has 6 volumes (3 yrs of college chinese?) whereas Integrated Chinese has only 2 (2 yrs of college Chinese?) I wonder if its better to go with NPCR since it will carry you further?
Would someone who has them be able to tell me about them? I'm kinda curious as to how advanced they get. Also, if someone could provide me with contact details for the people who wrote the NPCR, I'd be *extremely* appreciative, as I've a few things I'd like to mention / ask.
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