This volume opens up new vistas for the further advancement of student's knowledge of Chinese, employing the same method as Volume I: a way of learning Chinese taking into account its uniqueness as a written language of characters. In 25 lessons an addition of 500 of the most frequently used characters is introduced in a wider context of about 4,000 words formed with them.
The total 900 characters introduced in the two volumes allow student's to recognize 90% of the Chinese characters met with in everyday reading.
Mastering this volume will enable you to reach a level corresponding to two years of university studies.
The contents of these texts are very diversified, including extracts from literature, Beijing opera themes, Chinese traditional medicine, advertisements, customs and traditions, newsbriefs, ancient tales, letters to the editor, etc....
I lived in China for about 2 years and it was often difficult to find books that taught the Chinese Language for a Western Mindset. A friend found these books break down the language into segments where you learn the most common characters and then how the characters you learn form new words. In the last few years there might be better books that have come out that teach language learning for Mandarin but when I left in 2002, there was nothing I found that took this approach. There are companion Cassettes but I am unaware if they are available here.
by Gillian on 2010-09-10 22:59:58
I love this book and its predecessor, book I. This book, which deals with simplified characters, introduces you to plenty of new characters in each chapter, contextualized in a reading passage, which does not use pinyin. This is followed by detailed explanation of the new words, with definitions and phrases containing those words. Then the individual characters are highlighted, with examples of how they combine with other characters to form words. Also, where a complex version of the character exists, a visual comparison is made between the simplified and complex forms. After this there is a "Snowball" section with extra exposure to the characters and characters from previous chapters. There is a nice mini-dictionary at the back of the book.
In book I, 400 characters were introduced. Book II builds upon this, introducing an additional "500 of the most frequently used characters...in a wider context of about 4000 words formed with them", as the back of the book states.
I find this
by JWM on 2010-08-14 22:56:27
Works well in a classroom sitation where you have a native speaker teaching/leading the class. The book was originally written in French, then translated to the English.
