LingoSpring Chinese Memory Game

LingoSpring was developed by an entrepreneur to help Chinese Language Learners practice recognizing characters. As you've probably guessed from the post's title, LingoSpring is a new twist on Memory.  Aside from the typical settings you would expect from a Chinese-based game like this, there is also a setting that allows you match simplified characters to their traditional counterpart!

LingoSpring will allow you to create your own personalized word list.  However, it also comes with a built-in character list arranged by frequency of use.  This is wonderful because if you have a student who has just started learning Chinese, you can quickly access beginning-level characters and jump right into playing. 

Inside each game of Memory is the ability to add a character to a "Focus List."  This is your personalized list of words that you want to review more closely.  Once you have a minimum of 12 characters in this list, you can play a game that randomly selects 12 characters from this list to play memory with or study.

36 Strategies or 36 Chinese Idioms

HuaYu World- This company has provided 36 Chinese idiom stories for free!  These stories provide an explanation for why certain phrases are said the way they are said.

You can choose to read the story or listen to it in Chinese.  You can read the story using either traditional Chinese characters with ㄅㄆㄇ or in English.  To view a story in English-- after following the link above, click on one of the 36 idiom stories and then choose the "ABC" button on the left side.  At the end of the story is an explanation of how the idiom relates to the story.

If that wasn't enough, the company has also created beautiful pdf's that include both the Chinese characters/ㄅㄆㄇ and the English translations.

Mini-Book 5- 我是 . . . .

我是 . . . . (Wǒ shì . . ., I am . . .)- This is the fifth book in the series.  To locate other Mini-Books, click on the "Mini-Book" label on the right hand side of the web page.

The fifth Mini-Book is designed to reinforce the use of 我是 . . . . (Wǒ shì . . ., I am . . .).  It also continues to expose the reader to common characters in order to reinforce character recognition.

This Mini-Book was created to be personalized by your child.  Please, take the time to paste photos of them into the books.  This makes reading more fun for your child and encourages them to practice reading.  Also, when you print be sure to print on both sides of the paper.  Page 2 prints on the back of page 1, etc.  Then stack the pages so that when they are folded along the center line, the page numbers proceed in numeric order.

我是 . . . . - traditional characters with 注音符號
我是 . . . . - simplified characters with 漢語拼音 (Hànyǔ Pīnyīn)

Pinyin Pronunciation Guide- Learn Chinese ABC

Check out this website by Learn Chinese ABC.  It provides a brief introduction to the history of pinyin development and also provides in-depth and accurate information about how to pronounce these sounds.  The description of each sound is complimented with an animated video of the articulators (teeth, lips, palates, and tongue).  This allows you to see exactly how to position your tongue for each sound.  In addition, there is also written step-by-step instructions to follow and video of a native-speaker as they say the individual sounds.

To access the free site, click on the link above and then use the topics along the left-hand side.  This site is a little visually overwhelming, but if you take the time to accustom yourself to it you will find it is a wealth of information.

Tips for Better Pronunciation and Reading

Need some tips for better pronunciation.  Here is some of what I've learned about tongue placement in Chinese sounds.

• b, p, m, and f- are all produced at the front of the mouth
• b, p, and m- are similiar to English and made with the upper and lower lip coming together.
• f- is a fricative and is made with the upper front teeth gently touching the lower lip.
• d, t, n, and l- are all produced by placing the tip of the tongue behind the upper front teeth.
• d and t- are plosives, meaning that the air is initially prevented from coming out of the mouth because the tongue is firmly against the top of the mouth.  Then the tongue tip relaxes and the sound is released.  This is very similar to the sounds "d" and "t" in English.
• n- much like the English "n," the sound comes out the nose.
• l- much like the English "l," the tongue tip is against the top of the mouth and the sound comes out around the sides of the tongue tip.
• g, k, and h- are all produced in the back of the mouth.
• g and t- are plosives, meaning that the air is initially prevented from coming out of the mouth because the back of the tongue is firmly against the top of the mouth.  Then the tongue relaxes and the sound is released.  This is very similar to the sounds "g" and "k" in English.
• h- much like the English "h."
•  j, q, and x- are all produced by touching the tip of the tongue to the back of the lower, front teeth.
• j and q- are affricatives meaning that the sound produced is caused by stopping the airflow at the place of articulation- in this case between the tongue and the roof of the mouth- and then continuing to let the air flow out for an extended time through a narrow opening between the articulators.
• x- is a fricative, which allows the air to slid gently between the tongue and the palate.
• zh, ch, sh, r- are all produced by rolling the tongue back in the mouth.  In English an r-sound can be produced in two ways (one of which is by rolling the tongue); however, in Chinese the r-sound must be made by a retro-flexed (rolled) tongue.
• z, c, and s- are all produced by placing the tip of the tongue behind the upper front teeth.  They are all affricatives meaning that the sound produced is caused by stopping the airflow at the place of articulation- in this case between the tip of th tongue and the mouth just behind the upper front teeth- and then continuing to let the air flow out for an extended time through a narrow opening between the articulators.

 *Please, remember I'm not a native speaker; however, I do hold a MA in Speech Pathology.  The tips above primarily concentrate on tongue position.  There are other differences in pronunciation, but they are much more difficult to master.  Concentrating on the tips above in combination with the Learning Mandarin for Beginners app will help you achieve intelligibility, but you'll still have an accent.




A few notes about reading and writing:

• y- 
• When a word begins with "i," change the "i" to a "y."
• ia--> ya
• ie --> ye
• iao --> yao
• iou --> you
• ian --> yan
• iang --> yang
• iong --> yong
• BUT . . .
• in --> yin
• ing --> ying
• w- 
• When a word begins with "u," add "w" before the "u." 
• u --> wu
• When a word starts with "u" and is followed by a additional letters, change the "u" to a "w."
• ua --> wa
• uo --> wo
• uai --> wai
• uei --> wei
• uan --> wan
• uen --> wen
• uang --> wang
• ueng --> weng
•   ü-
• To pronounce this, start by saying the English sound "eeeee" (like in "eel").  While keeping your tongue in the same place, move your lips to form the English sound "oooo" (like in "moon").
•  Always place a "y" in front of words starting with the "ü" sound and remove the umlaut (the two dots).
• ü --> yu
• üe --> yue
• üan --> yuan
• ün --> yun   

Learning Mandarin for Beginners & Pinyin Pronunciation HD

These apps, developed by Kotech Services Co., are exactly what's needed for anyone learning pinyin.

The first app, Learning Mandarin for Beginners, is an excellent program for teaching how to pronounce the pinyin sounds.  The user can select either an initial (beginning) or final (end) sound.  Then the viewer is taken to a screen that displays an video of how to produce the sound.  The video is an animated cross-section of the articulators (palates, lips, teeth, and tongue) so it is easy to see what is happening inside the mouth to make these Chinese sounds.  This is particularly important because often foreign language learners cannot hear differences in foreign sounds.  This app provides a visual context that allows the user to see how the sounds are produced differently.  Once foreign language learners can produce the difference in the sounds, they can begin to hear the difference in other speakers, which in turn allows for better comprehension during conversation.


As you navigate this app, pay particular attention to the positioning of the tongue in each video.  The slight differences between placement of the tip of the tongue is important.  For example, note if the tongue is placed behind the upper front teeth (as in the sound "s") or behind the lower front teeth (as in the sound "x").  The difference in placement is difficult to see, but it is there.  It would be nice if the developers would provide a written description of how the sound is pronounced to go with the animated video.  Until then, you can look here for access to more information about pronunciation.

The second app, Pinyin Pronunciation HD, is the follow up guide to the first app.  In Pinyin Pronunciation HD, the user can quickly select a initial, final, & tone and then listen to the correct pronunciation.  Not only is the interface very easy to use (my 5 year old could do this), but this app only allows you to make legitimite initial-final-tone combinations.  This allows observant users to see the pattern of rules that create legal combinations of sounds.  For example, the user might observe that "q" can only be combined with finals that begin with the letters i or ü.

I recommend buying these apps together as they compliment each other very well.  I've looked for similar free resources online but have been disappointed with the interface as the resources online tend to be very clumsy.  These apps are definitely worth the 0.99¢ each app costs and will allow you to have access to them wherever you go as they don't require internet access to utilize the apps after downloading.

Fun Books to Read

Toon Book has a collection of books in English and foreign languages including Chinese.  There is no pronunciation guide, so readers must be strong in character recognition.  However, some of these books don't require much vocabulary beyond one or two semesters at the university level.  A parent with such a background could easily read at least a couple of these books while encourage a child to read the characters he/she knows.