The first of two semesters on Mandarin Chinese that comprise CMU’s Elementary Chinese course. Click here for Elementary Chinese 2. Learn about Open & Free OLI courses by visiting the “Open & Free features” tab below.
Elementary Chinese 1 — Open & Free
- Description
- What students will learn
- Learning objectives by module
- Course assessments, activities, and outline
- Other course details
- System requirements
Description
Elementary Chinese 1 is the first half of a two-semester Mandarin Chinese course that aims to help beginners develop communicative competence in the basic four skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing) and culture of Chinese. The course curriculum is organized around the 5 Cs principles of the National Standards for Foreign Language Education for the 21st Century – Communication, Cultures, Comparisons, Connections and Communities. Elementary Chinese 1 covers 8 units. We recommend that students go through the units in order to take advantage of the systematic scope and sequence of the learning materials. However, the curriculum is also flexible for individuals and institutions to adopt and modify to meet their different needs, schedule and emphasis. The current course is available for low-cost use by instructor-led classes of enrolled students.
Note: the Open & Free Chinese 1 course includes just one sample lesson, Unit 2: Greetings.
Topics Covered:
- Foundation: pinyin and basic expressions
- Greetings
- Names
- Nationalities and languages
- Talking about studies
- Talking about yourself and your family
- Making phone calls
- Daily schedules
Course structure
Elementary Chinese 1 is part of a two-part sequence. The units in both courses have a consistent structure, containing the following main content and activities:
Main Content
- Objective
- Main video (+questions)
- Video preview exercises
- Text of the video
- Text translation and pinyin with slower audio (students are strongly encouraged to listen and repeat after the sound files)
- Text notes
- Vocabulary tables
- Video comprehension exercises
II. Listening
- Pinyin recognition exercise
- True and false exercise
- Translation exercise
- Question answering exercise
III. Grammar
- Grammar notes
- Sentence jumble exercise
- Dialogue jumble exercise
IV. Reading Exercises
- Reading comprehension
V. Consolidation Exercises
- Picture description exercise
VI. Culture Link
- Culture notes
- Culture info
VII Characters
- Characters in the character book (both traditional and simplified versions)
